New Rig: Need Advice On Specific Component Decisions Please

c0y0te

I'm looking to get a local crew to build me a rig - so that at least I have some comeback if anything goes wrong - rather then just buying the components from komplett/overclockers etc. and doing it myself. They have sent me a suggested list of components and configs and it has prompted some questions on my part.

Typical usage of the new rig will be a mix of gaming and homeoffice type stuff. The key questions I have are as follows:-

1) RAID 0 or not?
My current PC has a raid 0 config and it's pretty damn fast, but getting old at this point. Newer HDDs seem to be seriously fast and cheap these days. Is there still any merit in going with a Raid 0 stripe these days? Or just easier to dump in 2 disks and split the partitions across 'em naturally?

2) Backup options
I installed Ghost last time around and used it for a while, but then got bored switching DVD drives

This time around I'm thinking of just getting an external HDD and using that as my backup. Are there any better ways or options I should consider? I don't just want to copy the data, I want to be able to restore a system image and reboot if the **** hits the fan.

3) Mobo
The mobo that the local crew are suggesting to me is an ASUS P5B - but research on the net suggests that this is not capable of doing SATA II Raid successfully. Given that I will be going with a core 2 duo 6600 config - what mobo do you all recommend?

4) PSU
I've been told the best PSUs (and quietest) are the seasonic variety. I'm currently looking at using a Seasonic 600W S12-600HT; any opinions or alternative suggestions?

5) GFX
For eye candy I was going to go with a club 3d ATI Radeon x1950XT card; I'm not an nvidia fan and was wondering if anyone has opinions on this card, or better recommendations?

Basically what I hope to end up with at the end of the day is a rig with the following spec:-
- Intel Core 2 Duo 6600
- 2GB Ram
- 512MB PCI-E Graphics Card
- PCI-E SATA II Mobo
- Quiet/Fast 600+ PSU
- Fast HDDs
- Decent Backup Solution

I'm hearing the intel chip prices are dropping on April 22nd so I was hoping to do the research over the coming weeks, then wait for the drop and order the kit thereafter. The new rig should leave me options to upgrade later if required (e.g. the main reason I'm doing this is because I was dumb enough to buy a dell XPS GEN 3 back in 2004/2005 which has zero upgrade potential because of all the proprietary boards/PSUs/Case etc.)

Thanks in advance for any help or advice.

DirkVoodoo

Yeah, a raid 0 with some decent hard drives (samsung, WDs, etc.) is better than a raptor. Two 500 GB drives can be had for 250 euro.

If you are running a single graphics card, then you can go with a DS3 over a more expensive Sli option.

Don't really buy that whole "ATI vs NVIDIA" thing, if one card performs better than another for similar money, get it. For a bit more than a 1950 tho, you cud get an 8800 GTS.

Problem with external drives is the 3.5" jobbies need there own power supply. This means more cables hanging around and another socket needed. If you don;t need portability, buy more HDDs as backup solutions or backup your important stuff to some DVD RWs.

8T8

1) I too would go for a RAID 0 setup as the primary location for the OS and use standalone HD's as a means of personal storage/backup.

You can also go RAID 0+1 which combines RAID 0 for performance and RAID 1 for mirroring so you get a good mix of performance and some safety net you'll need 4 hard drives to make it work.

2) RAID 0+1 would take care of backups to some degree though of course the "RAID is not a backup" mantra still holds true so an external HD large enough to accommodate all your data along with Ghost making the image should do.

3) MSI P965 Platinum is what I'd go with reliable board. Supports all types of Core 2's and Quad variants.

4) Seasonic is good for 600-700W is recommended.

5) Image quality on GeForce 7 was inferior to ATI series but GeForce 8 series IQ is actually better than ATI. However if you are pleased with ATI the X2k series is only around the corner so I would not buy a high end GPu at this time given it is only 1 month more till the R600 (X2900XT) shows up ATI's Direct-X 10 GPU.

If you cannot wait till then I would recommend going with an 8800GTX to 8800GTS over the X1950XT.

c0y0te

Thanks for the advice folks... I'll check out that mobo and the GFX alternatives.

One way or another I won't order the rig up until probably early May so I've got some time to consider the options.

joshcork

I have recently got a Zalman 600-hp which sounds like it isn't there, had a small problem with my own stupidity installing the ATX power but otherwise it seems like a solid PSU with a nice semi-modular design.
I have the 8800GTX, 4 HD's, AMD64X2 5600+, SB Fatality, CD drive, a few fans, LED's and all the rest and she seems to be holding up just fine.

As to the GPU very hard to keep up with it all these days, we all know who's best at the moment but no-one knows how long ATI will be releasing their r600 which will undoubtedly be better than Nvidia for a time DirkVoodoo says it well.
I just got bored of waiting for ATI and horsed on a head with a 8800GTX worked great so far although I haven't had a chance to fully test it to the max yet.

I was thinking of putting a few HD's in to RAID 5 just for the craic you get the speed and reliability of Raid 1+0 but with less minimum drives required (that number being 3). But I'm told it takes up more CPU time in the writing of data since the parity writing takes more effort. I'm not entirely sold about the performance benefits these days considering how well HD's are made, whats an extra couple of seconds here and there loading a media file. And I've not ever encountered a busted HD, touch wood. I just wanna do it cus I can

I agree with the RaptorX loudness thing its a tad annoying but its cool to see the spindle moving under a cool blue neon light :cool:

mewso

I'm not sure about the benefits of Raid 0 anymore. I would google some articles on how much of a performance boost it really does give compared to say just having 2 seperate drives because with 2 seperate drives (non-raid) if something goes wrong you don't lose the stuff on the other drive.

I have the Club 3D x900xt and it's a good card for the price. noisy when you play games but quiet otherwise. If you can get it cheap and it's a good jump over what you had before I think it's a good stopgap for the time being because even though new cards are coming out soon I still think most folks should wait until the dust settles to find the good buys on DX10 cards.

SwampThing

joshcork wrote:

I was thinking of putting a few HD's in to RAID 5 just for the craic you get the speed and reliability of Raid 1+0 but with less minimum drives required (that number being 3).

I'm afraid this isn't the case josh - RAID 5 is nowhere near RAID 0+1 performance wise.

But you have started me thinking - I was a Raptor fanboy and was thinking of oputting two in a RAID 1 setup in my new build. But maybe 4 x 320GB 16MB drives in RAID 1+0 might be a better option. Still get the performance, reliablilty, added capacity and no noise. This needs a little more investigation, but could be an option.

OP - bear in mind that CPU prices are set to fall by about 40% at the end of this month, so make sure your 'builders' don't rip you off.

8T8

Yup RAID 5 is dog slow especially on the built in RAID controllers on motherboards, in order to get a bit better performance from it you'd have to pick up some dedicated controllers would would cost a lot of money.

RAID 0+1 is supported by the inbuilt controllers on motherboards and is your best avenue I think.

joshcork

Cool I stand corrected, but I must get my pc working before I can start bragging about RAID this and that for me.
Slowly making progress on that front but man is it frustrating when you have software issues that is.

c0y0te

I've been told that a standard onboard raid 1 implementation (mirroring) will use a round robin reading method, which should yield the raid 0 performance but will also give some backup protection via the mirroring.

Anyone care to comment? Is this true?

If it is - I might just slap in 2 x 320gb drives in a raid 1 setup and go with that.

awhir

you can do that but its called raid0+1 i think or sumthing like that.

Khannie

SwampThing wrote:

But maybe 4 x 320GB 16MB drives in RAID 1+0 might be a better option. Still get the performance, reliablilty, added capacity and no noise. This needs a little more investigation, but could be an option.

Please report back on your investigation.

I have a raptor, 2 x 200G samsungs and a 320G seagate (last three as an LVM partition). I'm concerned that one of the drives will go tits up at some point soon, so raid 0 + 1 would be a nice option.

In a 4 drive setup, I presume it would be mental /not/ to use 0+1?

SwampThing

I feel like a guinea pig in a transparent pressure cooker!

If I'm telling my Grandma how to suck eggs Khannie, my apologies - but you can't setup RAID on that gaggle of drives you have. You could RAID 1 or RAID 0 the two samsungs, but you really need all the drives to the same size in a raidset and even more ideally, the same make, model and firmware revision.

I've expanded my probable raidset to be 6 x 320GB drives - that'll leave me with about 900GB of usable space.
With the potential to stay up and running with three drive failures, I'll take a chance and sell my AIT tape drive!

joshcork

Yes from what little I seem to know about the subject if yuo make a RAID array from say a 320GB and 250GB thew RAID will only see it as 2 250GB drives so you loose a load of memory in the setup. It would still work as far as I know but not half as good as having a set of the same type of drives. I've got 3 Seagate 250GB 7200.10's and might get one more for the RAID 1+0 thing, you need at least 4 for that one right? which would give me fast safe 500GB Memory.

SwampThing

Exactly josh.

Check the spec's on your mobo raid - just make sure it can support the type of raid you want to setup.

joshcork

It'll take it alright but I need sort out my RAM first then think about fixing my data.