Looking for statistics & gaming build

[chewger]

Approximate Purchase Date: in the next 3 months or less

Budget Range: $1500 or less, but flexible for good value

System Usage from Most to Least Important: Heavy statistics package and data processing, and gaming of course

Are you buying a monitor: No

Do you need to buy OS: Yes, will use Win8 student discount

Preferred Website(s) for Parts: Newegg, but amenable to anything

Location: Michigan, US

Parts Preferences: Intel CPU that’s as future-proof as possible

Overclocking: always willing to do “easy” overclocks

SLI or Crossfire: Not necessary

Your Monitor Resolution: 1920x1080

Additional Comments:

-I already have a HD7870 that I will use, so no need to spend on a vid card.

-I would ideally like 64GB of RAM (the ability to go to even higher in the future would be nice, but I don’t know if this exists in non-server motherboards)

-I probably will want to run a ~250GB SSD primary, and then have 2-4TB of extra storage.

-The computer will have heavy around the clock use (always on, running data stuff all day/overnight, only interrupted by intense gaming)

-Reliability is very important – data loss really sucks. I’d take suggestions for a good UPS.

And Most Importantly, Why Are You Upgrading: Mostly because I want to go 64-bit and my current motherboard only supports 8GB of RAM, but it’s time for new hardware anyway. My work computer is faster for stats packages, and that’s just unacceptable!

Thanks for your input!

 

[g-unit1111]

-I would ideally like 64GB of RAM (the ability to go to even higher in the future would be nice, but I don’t know if this exists in non-server motherboards)

You will never ever need 64GB of RAM. Even 32GB of RAM is overkill for most uses. What kind of programs are you going to be running?

Here is what I would suggest:

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant / Benchmarks

CPU: Intel Core i7-3930K 3.2GHz 6-Core Processor ($569.99 @ Newegg)
Motherboard: ASRock X79 Extreme6 ATX LGA2011 Motherboard ($227.49 @ Newegg)
Memory: G.Skill Ares Series 32GB (4 x 8GB) DDR3-1600 Memory ($189.99 @ Newegg)
Storage: A-Data XPG SX900 256GB 2.5" Solid State Disk ($199.99 @ Newegg)
Storage: Western Digital Caviar Blue 1TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive ($79.99 @ Newegg)
Case: NZXT Phantom 410 (White) ATX Mid Tower Case ($109.98 @ Newegg)
Power Supply: PC Power & Cooling Silencer Mk III 750W 80 PLUS Gold Certified ATX12V Power Supply ($145.98 @ Newegg)
Total: $1523.41
(Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available.)
(Generated by PCPartPicker 2013-03-01 16:32 EST-0500)

 

[chewger]

-I would ideally like 64GB of RAM (the ability to go to even higher in the future would be nice, but I don’t know if this exists in non-server motherboards)

You will never ever need 64GB of RAM. Even 32GB of RAM is overkill for most uses. What kind of programs are you going to be running?

Hey, thanks for the build suggestion.

I have a sense of what my memory requirements can be based on the size of the datasets I have to manipulate. I often have to break sets into hundreds of pieces so that my stats software, Stata, can use it. So even though most individual applications would never total to 64GB, I have essentially unlimited memory requirements because I can always load my data in bigger. Plus I would like to multitask with data loaded

How would you rate the contribution of 6 cores? I'm suspecting that the performance of the i7-3930k is not worth the higher price over the i7-3770k..

 

[burritobob]

CPU: Intel Xeon E3-1275 V2 3.5GHz Quad-Core Processor ($354.99 @ Newegg)
Motherboard: ASRock Z77 Extreme6 ATX LGA1155 Motherboard ($159.98 @ Outlet PC)
Memory: Corsair Vengeance Performance 32GB (4 x 8GB) DDR3-1866 Memory ($191.99 @ Amazon)
Storage: Seagate Barracuda 1TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive ($74.95 @ Amazon)
Storage: Seagate Barracuda 1TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive ($74.95 @ Amazon)
Storage: Seagate Barracuda 1TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive ($74.95 @ Amazon)
Storage: Seagate Barracuda 1TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive ($74.95 @ Amazon)
Storage: OCZ Vertex 4 256GB 2.5" Solid State Disk ($239.99 @ Microcenter)
Case: Cooler Master HAF 912 ATX Mid Tower Case ($59.99 @ Amazon)
Power Supply: Corsair Gaming 700W 80 PLUS Certified ATX12V Power Supply ($77.34 @ TigerDirect)
Optical Drive: Asus DRW-24B3ST/BLK/G/AS DVD/CD Writer ($25.98 @ Outlet PC)
Total: $1410.06
(Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available.)

The Xeon comes with hyperthreading means there are really 8 cores running for workstation loads. It's a better option than the i7 because this was specifically built for workstation use as there is acceleration for the kind of programs you will be running.

There are 4 disks because you can set them up in RAID 10 and you will have probably the best performing 4TB drive you can get. Plus it's redundant which is fantastic.

 

[burritobob]

Hey, thanks for the build suggestion.

I have a sense of what my memory requirements can be based on the size of the datasets I have to manipulate. I often have to break sets into hundreds of pieces so that my stats software, Stata, can use it. So even though most individual applications would never total to 64GB, I have essentially unlimited memory requirements because I can always load my data in bigger. Plus I would like to multitask with data loaded

How would you rate the contribution of 6 cores? I'm suspecting that the performance of the i7-3930k is not worth the higher price over the i7-3770k..

Sadly if you want to go with my suggested Xeon or the i7, their chipset does not support more than 32gb of ram the only way would be to have an X79 chipset motherboard. But this should be a sufficient reason to get an i7 3930k as the xeon processor has software acceleration for just about every program. You really won't use more than 32gb even while multitasking as 32gb is WAY more than enough for most servers or anything of the sort.

 

[chewger]

Sadly if you want to go with my suggested Xeon or the i7, their chipset does not support more than 32gb of ram the only way would be to have an X79 chipset motherboard. But this should be a sufficient reason to get an i7 3930k as the xeon processor has software acceleration for just about every program. You really won't use more than 32gb even while multitasking as 32gb is WAY more than enough for most servers or anything of the sort.

Is there a big tradeoff of the Xeon vs i7 for gaming? I've read that the 3770K is more versatile, and I'm willing to accept slower stats processing at stock speed for overclockability and better gaming.

Also, what would you say is a high quality motherboard for the i7-3770K?

 

[FinneousPJ]

Here's a build for the cheaper i7 with 32 GB RAM, 4 TB storage and 256 GB SSD.

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant / Benchmarks

CPU: Intel Core i7-3770K 3.5GHz Quad-Core Processor ($229.99 @ Microcenter)
Motherboard: ASRock Z77 Pro3 ATX LGA1155 Motherboard ($89.99 @ Amazon)
Memory: Mushkin Blackline 32GB (4 x 8GB) DDR3-1600 Memory ($169.98 @ Outlet PC)
Storage: Crucial M4 256GB 2.5" Solid State Disk ($186.98 @ SuperBiiz)
Storage: Seagate Barracuda 2TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive ($89.98 @ Outlet PC)
Storage: Seagate Barracuda 2TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive ($89.98 @ Outlet PC)
Case: BitFenix Outlaw ATX Mid Tower Case ($69.98 @ Newegg)
Power Supply: XFX 550W 80 PLUS Bronze Certified ATX12V / EPS12V Power Supply ($69.98 @ Newegg)
Optical Drive: Samsung SH-224BB DVD/CD Writer ($16.98 @ Outlet PC)
Total: $1013.84
(Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available.)
(Generated by PCPartPicker 2013-03-02 04:15 EST-0500)

 

[burritobob]

Is there a big tradeoff of the Xeon vs i7 for gaming? I've read that the 3770K is more versatile, and I'm willing to accept slower stats processing at stock speed for overclockability and better gaming.

Also, what would you say is a high quality motherboard for the i7-3770K?

No tradeoff you really will see that much of a performance gap, only in workstation based programs will you see how far ahead the Xeon is. Overclocking is generally not recommended for productivity work such as this. Also you should prefer the 4 drives in a RAID 1+0 array you get speed and redundancy you really cannot achieve with that other build. Focused on ram and ram speed for this build really.