New PC Build....Questions...

jeffreaux2 · March 25, 2009

I am trying to sort out components for a new pc. A few questions...

1- I am planning on a 10k rpm C/ drive for OS and programs and a 7.5k (1TB) drive for storage for starters. How benificial would it be to have a third drive to use as a scratch disk. I know this is important for video editing...and audio mixing, but will I see an improvement with photoshop if I spend money on that third drive? I may go with a SSD main drive if the prices continue to far....time will tell.

2-I need to choose a power supply. Is single rail better than multiple rails?

kini62 · March 25, 2009

I'll only comment on the 10K RPM drive. IMO they are a waste of money. You won't be able to notice any real world difference between that and a good 7.2K RPM drive. Why pay double or triple oer GB for no noticeable gains?

SSD drives have their own issues.

Gene

Pupator · March 25, 2009

Single rail is better.

Here's a great one:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817139005

dogwood · March 26, 2009

jeffreaux2 wrote:

I am trying to sort out components for a new pc. A few questions...

1- I am planning on a 10k rpm C/ drive for OS and programs and a 7.5k (1TB) drive for storage for starters. How benificial would it be to have a third drive to use as a scratch disk. I know this is important for video editing...and audio mixing, but will I see an improvement with photoshop if I spend money on that third drive? I may go with a SSD main drive if the prices continue to far....time will tell.

2-I need to choose a power supply. Is single rail better than multiple rails?

I use Acronis DiskDirector to partition a section of HD for a scratch disk. It's simple and has been worth the initial price of the software (least for me). That way you can have your c: drive plus a scratch disk on the same drive. Acronis also has some great disk cloning software that works AWESOME when you're ready to "retire" a HD after a couple of years. You can easily copy your entire OS to a new drive with no issues at all.

Newegg is a fabulous source of reviews for components. There's enough input there that you can pretty quickly figure out what is good and what may be dicey.

One issue with Newegg though, is if you get a bad component. Their RMA policy is excellent, but waiting a week and half to get a replacement component can be a bit tiring. And it's not always Neweggs fault-- UPS doesn't always handle everything with kid gloves.

Also, be aware HD's don't seem to include cables these days, and the most recent ASUS MB's I've seen contain one or two cables

. Cables are cheap, but again, it can be a drag to get your components home only to realize you still need cables.

Art Scott · March 26, 2009

yeah.....I just got a XFX mobo and it had 1 sata cable but has 6 headers.....so I got more at OUTLET PC.....price range is $1.98-3.98.....I also traded my flat IDE cable for a round one just to help with air flow.

I still use TIGER DIRECT for most other componets as they seem to have a little better prices than New Egg........and equally as good customer service.

jeffreaux2 · March 26, 2009

kini62 wrote:

I'll only comment on the 10K RPM drive. IMO they are a waste of money. You won't be able to notice any real world difference between that and a good 7.2K RPM drive. Why pay double or triple oer GB for no noticeable gains?

SSD drives have their own issues.

Gene

There is a tangible difference in performance.

The 10k drive I am purchasing is capable of 1348 I/O operations per second vs 850 or so for the 7.2k drive.

I would have to configure a RAID 0 array with the 7200rpm drives to even approach this performance. My primary drive on my last build was a RAID 0 array, and while it is buttery fast, I would rather a singular drive serve this purpose.

That same benchmark operation for an SSD is in the neighborhood of 5k I/O operations per second, but the cost here is still prohibitive.

jeffreaux2 · March 26, 2009

Pupator wrote:

Single rail is better.

Here's a great one:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817139005

Why is single rail better?

I am going to be in the 850-1000 watt range Im afraid.....at least according to the calculators I used.

jeffreaux2 · March 26, 2009

dogwood wrote:

I use Acronis DiskDirector to partition a section of HD for a scratch disk. It's simple and has been worth the initial price of the software (least for me). That way you can have your c: drive plus a scratch disk on the same drive. Acronis also has some great disk cloning software that works AWESOME when you're ready to "retire" a HD after a couple of years. You can easily copy your entire OS to a new drive with no issues at all.

Newegg is a fabulous source of reviews for components. There's enough input there that you can pretty quickly figure out what is good and what may be dicey.

One issue with Newegg though, is if you get a bad component. Their RMA policy is excellent, but waiting a week and half to get a replacement component can be a bit tiring. And it's not always Neweggs fault-- UPS doesn't always handle everything with kid gloves.

Also, be aware HD's don't seem to include cables these days, and the most recent ASUS MB's I've seen contain one or two cables . Cables are cheap, but again, it can be a drag to get your components home only to realize you still need cables.

Its easy enough to partition a new drive during its initial formatting without any special software. My question was aimed more at would there be a noticable performance gain by using a dedicated drive for scratch disk rather than a partition on a drive that is also being used by applications or data storage?

I have never made a purchase through Newegg or Zipzoomfly that didnt go smoothly.

jeffreaux2 · March 26, 2009

Art Scott wrote:

yeah.....I just got a XFX mobo and it had 1 sata cable but has 6 headers.....so I got more at OUTLET PC.....price range is $1.98-3.98.....I also traded my flat IDE cable for a round one just to help with air flow.

I still use TIGER DIRECT for most other componets as they seem to have a little better prices than New Egg........and equally as good customer service.

The new board I have chosen is Asus. Ill have to check to see how many cables ship with it....and the case. The case I am looking at ships with a bundle of cabling as well. We have a mom n pop computer store about 3 minutes away for small inexpensive items like this if all else fails.

I am still probably several months away from purchasing these components, but its good to be prepared/ aware of what to expect.

Thanks.

dogwood · March 26, 2009

jeffreaux2 wrote:

My question was aimed more at would there be a noticable performance gain by using a dedicated drive for scratch disk rather than a partition on a drive that is also being used by applications or data storage?

I would say no but actually I don't know.

The Acronis software assigns a new drive letter and all that-- so as far as the OS is concerned, it looks like another drive. But all disk partitioning may be like that. It would seem like going for as much RAM as possible would make a scratch disk a little less important.

And on newegg, again, sometimes it's not their fault. I just received a MB that appeared damaged in shipping and was DOA. :cry

Ric Grupe · March 26, 2009

Check this out.

Even if you don't buy from them, it's a nice resource for comparing hardware configurations.

jeffreaux2 · March 26, 2009

dogwood wrote:

I would say no but actually I don't know. The Acronis software assigns a new drive letter and all that-- so as far as the OS is concerned, it looks like another drive. But all disk partitioning may be like that. It would seem like going for as much RAM as possible would make a scratch disk a little less important.

And on newegg, again, sometimes it's not their fault. I just received a MB that appeared damaged in shipping and was DOA. :cry

FWIW....all partitioning behaves that way!

I may spring for the third drive anyway, I am not sure about a performance gain with photoshop...but....am positive it will be a plus for audio or video editing chores. I agree that RAM is an important factor. I intend to go with 12 gigs of DDR3 for a couple reasons. The most obvious one is that the MB manufacturer suggests/reccomends leaving the slot closest to the CPU cooler open with a configuration that only uses 3 sticks of RAM in 3 slots. Once the CPU heatsink and fan are installed it might be tricky to physically get in there to snap a stick of RAM in that open slot. I can avoid that later if I just fill up the slots to begin with. An additional 6G of RAM wont cost much in the big scheme of things. I see no GOOD reason NOT to fill the machine with RAM as long as the operating system can make use of it.

jeffreaux2 · March 26, 2009

Ric Grupe wrote:

Check this out.

Even if you don't buy from them, it's a nice resource for comparing hardware configurations.

Yikes....their pricing is a bit high! I plugged in my hardware configuration and the price rose above $3k pretty quick. I am trying to stay in the $2500 ballpark for the box.

I bought my last pc from ABS and highly recommend their systems....if you have deep pockets.

I am surprised that ABS isnt putting a core i7 machine together just yet.
www.abs.com

Richard · March 26, 2009

Hey Jeff,

Don't be a wimp...Dell has announced the Precision T7500, which can take up to 192 GB of RAM. $50K and it's yours. Lenovo and Cisco are also offering hyper machines. Read about it here.

Kidding, of course.

jeffreaux2 · March 26, 2009

Richard wrote:

Hey Jeff,

Don't be a wimp...Dell has announced the Precision T7500, which can take up to 192 GB of RAM. $50K and it's yours. Lenovo and Cisco are also offering hyper machines. Read about it here.

Kidding, of course.

Im all in....lets go in halves and we can have joint custody.

Richard · March 27, 2009

jeffreaux2 wrote:

Im all in....lets go in halves and we can have joint custody.

Right. I could keep my entire photo archive in RAM with loads of room to spare. The really weird thing is that in another few years, huge memories like that will be normal. Of course, since pics will be 1 GB each (to allow for dynamic focusing and composition), we'll still be bitching about not having enough RAM.

kini62 · March 31, 2009

jeffreaux2 wrote:

There is a tangible difference in performance.

The 10k drive I am purchasing is capable of 1348 I/O operations per second vs 850 or so for the 7.2k drive.

I would have to configure a RAID 0 array with the 7200rpm drives to even approach this performance. My primary drive on my last build was a RAID 0 array, and while it is buttery fast, I would rather a singular drive serve this purpose.

That same benchmark operation for an SSD is in the neighborhood of 5k I/O operations per second, but the cost here is still prohibitive.

Are you running that many I/O operations, ALL the time, for any significant amount of time. Would you really notice any REAL world difference. I highly doubt it. Maybe if you ran disk intensive operations for hours at a time you might save a few minutes here and there. Plus you could run 2 7.2K drives is raid and it would still cost less per GB than the 10k drive and be quieter.

I still think 10k drives are a waste of money for anything other than large scale database servers or non stop 24/7 disk intensive usage.

Gene

sConcept · March 31, 2009

GPU Acceleration

jeffreaux2 wrote:

FWIW....all partitioning behaves that way!

I may spring for the third drive anyway, I am not sure about a performance gain with photoshop...but....am positive it will be a plus for audio or video editing chores. I agree that RAM is an important factor. I intend to go with 12 gigs of DDR3 for a couple reasons. The most obvious one is that the MB manufacturer suggests/reccomends leaving the slot closest to the CPU cooler open with a configuration that only uses 3 sticks of RAM in 3 slots. Once the CPU heatsink and fan are installed it might be tricky to physically get in there to snap a stick of RAM in that open slot. I can avoid that later if I just fill up the slots to begin with. An additional 6G of RAM wont cost much in the big scheme of things. I see no GOOD reason NOT to fill the machine with RAM as long as the operating system can make use of it.

Hey Jeff, your thread reminded me of this recent article I read...
http://www.earthboundlight.com/phototips/cs4-gpu-acceleration.html

You haven't mentioned anything about your video card (and forgive me if the specs for the video card mentioned in the article is standard on most cards these days, haven't been in the market lately), but including this in your system might be on your path to photoshop performance nirvana.

It'd be great to hear how your new system turns out...keep us informed!

dogwood · March 31, 2009

sConcept wrote:

Hey Jeff, your thread reminded me of this recent article I read...
http://www.earthboundlight.com/phototips/cs4-gpu-acceleration.html

You haven't mentioned anything about your video card (and forgive me if the specs for the video card mentioned in the article is standard on most cards these days, haven't been in the market lately), but including this in your system might be on your path to photoshop performance nirvana.

It'd be great to hear how your new system turns out...keep us informed!

Nice article. What I've noticed is that even with the fancy pants OpenGL enabled, I don't get jaggies at 33 or 66 percent views, but the brush tools and scrolling around the photo don't work quite as smoothly as they do at the regular 25, 50, 100 percent views.

I am about to upgrade my graphics card so we'll see if that makes a difference. It's amazing what is available for around $90US these days!

HeroOfCanton · March 31, 2009

jeffreaux2 wrote:

I am trying to sort out components for a new pc. A few questions...

1- I am planning on a 10k rpm C/ drive for OS and programs and a 7.5k (1TB) drive for storage for starters. How benificial would it be to have a third drive to use as a scratch disk. I know this is important for video editing...and audio mixing, but will I see an improvement with photoshop if I spend money on that third drive? I may go with a SSD main drive if the prices continue to far....time will tell.

2-I need to choose a power supply. Is single rail better than multiple rails?

I know I'm relatively new here but, I have a few thoughts for you to take or toss as you will

.

1 - A higher RPM HDD like a raptor will net you more improvement in large file seek and access time when you are doing a lot of it in large amounts like video editing and such. It's not that important, IMO, when you have a RAID 0 or even better, RAID 5 setup. Save yourself the $ on raptor's and get some decent 7200RPM drives with 32MB of cache and set them up in a RAID 5. You shouldn't be doing work on your main drive anyway, windows likes to eat itself far too often to trust your main drive (even a partitioned one) to your data. Use a smaller drive as your main one and then all your other data manipulation on the physically seperate drives.

2 - I am assuming you are talking about the 12V+ line and as such, single rails are better than multiple rails but finding a single rail PSU when you need 1KW is going to prove limiting. You can find them but you are going to pay out the nose in comparison to multiple rails. You can see a list of the ones on newegg with 900W-1000W and single rail here or 1000W+ here

Only buy from newegg is my advice, I have tried zipzoomfly, tigerdirect etc. and the prices are rarely lower and the customer service and shipping are A LOT worse than the 'egg which isn't hard, I would kill baby seals for the 'egg, that's how much I love using them. Once you know, you newegg!

jeffreaux2 · April 1, 2009

sConcept wrote:

Hey Jeff, your thread reminded me of this recent article I read...
http://www.earthboundlight.com/phototips/cs4-gpu-acceleration.html

You haven't mentioned anything about your video card (and forgive me if the specs for the video card mentioned in the article is standard on most cards these days, haven't been in the market lately), but including this in your system might be on your path to photoshop performance nirvana.

It'd be great to hear how your new system turns out...keep us informed!

I am currently planning to use an ATi/Radeon brand video card with dual processors on board. The motherboard I intend to use can accept up to 3 video cards running together in the crossfire or SLi mode, but I think Id prefer the simplicity of a single card....and have less headache in pwering and cooling the devices.

http://www.newegg.com:80/Product/Product.aspx?item=N82E16814150349

jeffreaux2 · April 1, 2009

HeroOfCanton wrote:

I know I'm relatively new here but, I have a few thoughts for you to take or toss as you will .

1 - A higher RPM HDD like a raptor will net you more improvement in large file seek and access time when you are doing a lot of it in large amounts like video editing and such. It's not that important, IMO, when you have a RAID 0 or even better, RAID 5 setup. Save yourself the $ on raptor's and get some decent 7200RPM drives with 32MB of cache and set them up in a RAID 5. You shouldn't be doing work on your main drive anyway, windows likes to eat itself far too often to trust your main drive (even a partitioned one) to your data. Use a smaller drive as your main one and then all your other data manipulation on the physically seperate drives.

2 - I am assuming you are talking about the 12V+ line and as such, single rails are better than multiple rails but finding a single rail PSU when you need 1KW is going to prove limiting. You can find them but you are going to pay out the nose in comparison to multiple rails. You can see a list of the ones on newegg with 900W-1000W and single rail here or 1000W+ here

Only buy from newegg is my advice, I have tried zipzoomfly, tigerdirect etc. and the prices are rarely lower and the customer service and shipping are A LOT worse than the 'egg which isn't hard, I would kill baby seals for the 'egg, that's how much I love using them. Once you know, you newegg!

Thanks for your input. I am currently running a RAID 0 array for applications with another single internal HD and a couple externals for storage and data.

After thinking it over, I am pretty sure I will build the new system with a pair of 7200rpm hard drives in RAID 0 for the OS and applications. I will get a 1TB drive for storage/data. I will add a third drive.....not sure what size, but under 100gigs would be fine, as a scratch disk. This third drive will be a solid state drive.

I have located everything except the case I want at newegg. Its a newer coolermaster. All aluminum with a slide out motherboard tray, very nice. Maybe they will start stocking it soon so I can get it all in one stop.

Aside from photo editing, I do a fair amount of video editing. The manual for premier suggests using a seperate drive as a scratch disk, so Ill go that route.

moe · April 6, 2009

I have to disagree on the performance assessment of the Velociraptor. I've got two of these drives in a RAID0 stripe and this combination significantly beat anything else I've tried. These are screaming fast drives that approach the performance of Enterprise Class SAS drives. The Velociraptor is a seriously high performing hard drive for $230. The performance vs the Western Digital Black (for example) is quite noticable.

Benchmarks are great but nothing speaks more than real world performance with the actual applications you use. I've noticed a significant speed boost during disk operations with Lightroom & CS4. The Velociraptor positively rocks for the types of IO we see during post processing. I highly encourage you to give them a try.

If you have the cash though, the Intel X25 in a single drive config smokes everything else out there. But it's also $400 for an 80GB drive. These drives will be very exciting once capacities increase and costs come down.

New PC Build....Questions...

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