I wouldn't go for anything less than a quadcore...
Q6600 or a Phenom II 940 perhaps
Starting to look at replacing my oldest cruncher and just wanted to get some feedback from those who have good (read: fast ), cheap crunchers...
Current cruncher is:
AMD Athlon(tm) 64 Processor 3400+ with 1GB RAM
Looking for something with a bit more bit - dual core (or more), 2GB (got a few DDR2 sticks lying around)...not wanting to spend more than £250-300 on it.
Already have case, PSU, hard disks - so just be new motherboard, processor and a cheapy gfx card.
Doing a quick look around and I can get:
Intel Core 2 Duo, E7400 @ £103
Asus P5KPL SE @ £50
and a cheap gfx card for £10
Worth getting a(nother) Q6600 for £150...
Hmm - damn, shouldn't have started looking
I wouldn't go for anything less than a quadcore...
Q6600 or a Phenom II 940 perhaps
I've got a great Phenom rig, IMHO
I was surprised after all the bashing they got re benchmarks how good they are in reality.
If you go for a phenom you have to get the black editions as they are unlocked (I think)
Run SoB great very favourably vs the Core2Quad
Also some boards come with GFX onboard, although I'd go for a 9800 of some description for some serious CUDA power, then you get 2 crunchers for the desk space of 1.
Decided in the end to replace my main PC with a shiny Core i7 (plus 12GB, SSD and some other bits and pieces )...just finishing building it
Should be fast enough for me - esp once I o/c it when it's settled in
Chip was OEM so no crappy retail heatsink; using an AKASA AK-967 NERO on it
Do you run 8 BOINC tasks on your i7? I find if I do, streaming video gets stuttery but it's only that, everything else is fine - running 6 atm so just have to see.
Temp wise - sitting around 46c on the CPU with 6 tasks running (cores are reporting ~40C)
Running at 3.2GHz now (20 x 160) - temps gone up 1-2c so prob push a bit more and try for 3.4 (on air, seems to be the best without changing voltages).
Using a ATi 4850x2 - only streaming video is stuttery so I'll have to do some testing to see why...
Getting :
vie Everest - HD don't show on the trialCode:Temperatures Motherboard 39 °C (102 °F) CPU 55 °C (131 °F) CPU #1 / Core #1 63 °C (145 °F) CPU #1 / Core #2 63 °C (145 °F) CPU #1 / Core #3 62 °C (144 °F) CPU #1 / Core #4 62 °C (144 °F) GPU1: GPU Diode (DispIO) 48 °C (118 °F) GPU1: GPU Diode (MemIO) 52 °C (126 °F) GPU1: GPU Diode (Shader) 50 °C (122 °F) GPU2: GPU Diode (DispIO) 44 °C (111 °F) GPU2: GPU Diode (MemIO) 49 °C (120 °F) GPU2: GPU Diode (Shader) 44 °C (111 °F)
Stuttering sorted (kinda - only stutters on second monitor so not a big issue )
I'll prob give it a few days to settle down then push towards what you have...160 is very stable so far so should be ok to go higher...
Running Windows from a SSD is great - takes about 20 secs from boot and as soon as the desktop appears it's usable even if it's loading things...
BOINCView is showing the new PC as producing 211 points/hour; the next nearest is a slightly o/c Q6600 at 90 points/hour...hmm; need more cash to replace on my boxes with Core i7s
I'll be saving up for a possible birthday present to myself this year I think.
Wow, I wish I had the funds for one too.