I5 Ivy Bridge & 64-bit OS

[bobby2478]

I'm looking at building a HTPC and am going with either an i5 3450 or an i5 3570K Ivy Bridge processor. Do I want to get 64-bit OS to run with these processors? I thought they handle 64-bit but wanted to confirm for sure.

Is there anything else hardware wise that needs to specifically support 64-bit OS other then the CPU? I'll also be going with a Z77 motherboard.

Thanks!

 

[nikorr]

U can have your desktop connected and view whatever u see on the screen.

Its cool to have. I like that idea of no wires, we have 2 cats : )

 

[bobby2478]

Funny, my cat loves chewing on wires! He's better now that he's not a kitten anymore, but he was really bad. Anything with a wire, he'd chew through it.

 

[nikorr]

Tell me about that, when we got cat twins, they have a fetish about anything stringy.

One day I teased them with dental floss and when I ditched it, she went in the trash bin ate 10 feet of it, got sick and vet. doc bill was $3000 for the operation.

So now whenever u have anything like that, its open game for the cats.

I fell to sleep with iPod and suddenly I could hear only in 1 ear. U can guess.

BTW, she is OK after her ordeal and didn't changed a bit. Still goes after it.

 

[Blandge]

I won't be doing much gaming or video rendering or encoding. It will basically be my PC for regular home use, as well as my media player for all my movies. I want support for SD, HD as well as 3D, and from what I've read, both the i3 and i5 will handle that.

A Sandy Bridge Pentium ($60-$80) can easily do all of this in a very small form factor. Don't be fooled into thinking you need a ATX mid size tower with an i5 k edition to run Windows and watch movies.

Obviously if you want the extra power there's nothing I can do to stop you, but you're wasting money if you only reason to by an i5 is to have the latest and greatest and because you "like the fact it is a true 4-core processor." Four cores doesn't mean anything if you aren't doing anything that requires more than 2.

Think about it in terms of convenience. A mini-ITX with a lightweight processor means a tiny computer, little to no noise, no annoying case fans/lights less space used, more mobile, etc.

 

[bobby2478]

That sucks, glad everything turned out OK though. Mine has chewed through my speaker wires for my PC, so I had to jerry rig those back together. Luckily, he's mostly outgrown this now though.

He does have an odd oral fettish with plastic bags, he LOVES to lick and chew on plastic baggies (like zip lock bags). Something about the cool plastic on his gums that he likes. He was a shelter kitten that was only 8 weeks old max when I got him, probably taken from his mom too soon, hence his weird oral fettish with plastic bags and licking fingers lol.

 

[nikorr]

Mine too, but only her brother has it.

He goes great lengths to get some dose of plastic.

He likes also the rapper from case of water bottles.

That is harder than wal-mart bag : )

They are shelter kittens too. Our older cat (17yo) died of kidney failure

and when we wanted another cat, somebody just dropped a box on the front

door of the vet hospital with 2 kittens and we got them.

Now he picked up another thing, . He licks off fuss off of the carpet and anything u can tell.

God knows what is he doing that for : )

8 weeks is about what we got. Good age.

 

[bobby2478]

A Sandy Bridge Pentium ($60-$80) can easily do all of this in a very small form factor. Don't be fooled into thinking you need a ATX mid size tower with an i5 k edition to run Windows and watch movies.

Obviously if you want the extra power there's nothing I can do to stop you, but you're wasting money if you only reason to by an i5 is to have the latest and greatest and because you "like the fact it is a true 4-core processor." Four cores doesn't mean anything if you aren't doing anything that requires more than 2.

Think about it in terms of convenience. A mini-ITX with a lightweight processor means a tiny computer, little to no noise, no annoying case fans/lights less space used, more mobile, etc.

Thanks for the input. In my case a Mid ATX tower will actually work best and allow for more future expandability. My HTPC is located in my office, which is physically separate from my Living Room where I'll be watching movies. In fact all my components are in my office, and only my TV is in my Living Room. I plan on building a rather large library with multiple drives, so a larger case allows for expandability.

So I don't need to worry about getting a mini ATX form factor that looks like a conventional component, don't need to worry about getting the quietest fan possible, and don't need tons of fancy case lights, as it will simply be in a separate room.

The Sandy Bridge 2100 I was looking at only ends up being $20 less then an i5 anyway with the MC bundle discount.

 

[bobby2478]

Yeah 8 weeks is a good age, he just ended up not being weened from his mom properly, which is why he licks and suckles fingers as he thinks he's nursing still. He thinks I'm his mom, it's pretty funny lol.

The big deal that he loves to steal is twistie ties, he has a 6th sense for whenever there is one up on a counter someplace and within minutes he'll have stolen it and is dragging it around the house. He's an orange tabby, and I've heard they tend to have unique personalities, so far it's held true to form.

I also have a female cat who is about 6 months older then he is, and she's a thief too. She doesn't chew and doesn't have the weird oral compulsive behavior her brother has with hard plastic, but she does like to seek out and steal anything small that I happen to leave out on the counter or table.