New User - Planning System

[BFisher]

Great advice Proto. In fact, this morning I had the same thought as you... "maybe Quad core makes more sense" and sure enough, it wasn't that much more money!

I like the recommended Mobo, but it doesn't have a graphics driver. I guess I could add a cheap card (it won't be connected to a TV, but I need something to configure and manage the system). If I go with Quad-Core, I'll need a different Mobo anyways so I'll look around some more.

I need to look into RAID more. I didn't think I'd need it, but I've seen quite a few people here using it... so maybe I need to. What level of RAID recommended? Or something else I'm missing?

thanks for your help!

[Protoman]

Actually, I wasn't recommending a different Mobo, I literally had the one you picked out in my Wish List, for a few weeks. Loved the onboard graphics and the array of PCIx1 and PCI slots, but it lacked Dual Gigabit Network (it is for later on when I get a gigabit switch and do Link Aggregation). So if that does not bother you stay with the Intel BOXDG965WHMKR LGA 775!

I had Raid 0 (for over a year now), it worked. I decided after reading the Sage forums, that Raid is nice, but I would rather have the flexibility to dictate which tuner records to which HDD. Especially since I will be tripling the amount of internal tuners I have in the near term by adding two HVR-1800s to my existing PVR-500, will stow away my Hauppauge PVR-USB2 unless needed later on.

This will give me 4 Analog tuners and two HD tuners. Being able to tell the software that ALL Analog tuners record to HDDs 1 & 2, HD Tuner #1 record to HDD 3, and HD Tuner #2 record to HDD 4.

I also like that adding HDD is easier without RAID, granted you get another drive letter (unless you are using Windows Home Server *another topic*), but it sure beats trying to add that drive to the RAID and hope you don't lose shows.

This concept of essentially 1 HDD per tuner, could give a greater amount of bandwidth while recording to hard drives that RAID or single drives lack. Please correct me if I am wrong though.

Now if we are talking about critical data, like photos or important documents, then RAID (1, 5, 6, or 10 ideally) would be something to look into AND even a backup solution. For me at this time I have a single HDD NAS that I copy this information to, so I have two locations for that data. I will be eventually trying to do an offsite backup solution, whether it is a NAS in my detached garage or asking a relative or friend to house a small NAS for me and reciprocate that for them as well. Nothing wrong with using off-hours bandwidth and rsync...


Thanks,
Protoman

[BFisher]

Thanks - your RAID assessment matches my original thoughts - I thought it sounded like less work and more flexiblity to not use RAID.

Great information - thanks

[ybrew]

I've got the Intel board - BOXDG965WHMKR
Love it.

I'm using it as a sage server running xp and using the onboard sound and video.
The 3 PCI slots are being used by 3 hauppauge 500s. I wish it had more firewire ports built-in as I could use them to control my external cable boxes (probably just to control channel changes - although the usb-uirt is working well with 2 cable boxes now)

I didn't realize this board supported quad-core processors. Eventually I'll probably replace my e6600 with a q6600, but the dual core is running perfectly fine now with hd transcoding and comskip.

[ybrew]

one thing with that board...

Use ONLY SATA drives. I had reboots almost daily when I put my new sage server in production. Knock on wood, it's been fine since saturday morning when I replaced the boot disk with a SATA drive (that was my plan all along, but didn't have the sata disk when I started.

I can't say for certain having the mixed IDE & Sata drives cause the problem, but normally i'd have expected it to have rebooted by now, and so far, so good.

(What led me to think IDE right away was the fact that after a server crash, the system was at a "insert system disk" prompt with the IDE drive not detected. It was resolved by powercycling the box, but it was a pain to do so every 24-36 hours.)

[BFisher]

Originally Posted by ybrew

I didn't realize this board supported quad-core processors. Eventually I'll probably replace my e6600 with a q6600, but the dual core is running perfectly fine now with hd transcoding and comskip.

I don't think it does support quad processors... My original plan was to use dual-core, and then checked quad on "a whim" and it wasn't much more. As noted though, I need to spec another Mobo to use with it.

I'm not sure I need the extra power... but based on one of my design goals (build it with enough horsepower that I don't need to upgrade for 5-7 years), I'll probably spend the extra little bit of money. My wife has already given me the go-ahead on the extra

[ybrew]

My bad. I double-checked and I was wrong. oh well, I'm 'stuck' with an e6600.

This is enough to support HD, so I'm set for several years at least.

[Protoman]

I went back and looked for the information I got about that board. It does support Quad Core* (<-- notice the BIG asterisk), BUT it is a certain revision number of that board.

Here is the link:
http://support.intel.com/support/mot...8.htm#revision

Not sure if I would trust that I would be receiving that revision number. I did however find a comparable board after doing a quick search.

Intel BOXDG33FBC LGA 775 Intel G33 ATX Intel Motherboard

The only downfall to it that I noticed right away was the 4 SATA connections (as opposed to 6 SATA on the other board). This can be made up by adding a RAID card into the PCI-e x16 slot.

I have my parts on order and hopefully they will be here before the weekend hits. And hopefully, a BIG hopefully that that HVR-1600 and HVR-1800 have QAM support the week following, and are not out of stock!

Thanks,
Protoman

P.S. I did not order The Intel Quad Core from Newegg, as they said they were "out of stock" and it was listed for $299. I bought it from Mwave.com for $275. I checked 2 hours later and Newegg was selling it for $320, and they are now selling for $375 from Newegg! Mwave.com is now selling them at $279. Just FYI.

[BFisher]

good find - but they are now out of stock too. Oh well... maybe next week

[ybrew]

Originally Posted by Protoman

I went back and looked for the information I got about that board. It does support Quad Core* (<-- notice the BIG asterisk), BUT it is a certain revision number of that board.

Here is the link:
http://support.intel.com/support/mot...8.htm#revision

Not sure if I would trust that I would be receiving that revision number. I did however find a comparable board after doing a quick search.

Intel BOXDG33FBC LGA 775 Intel G33 ATX Intel Motherboard

The only downfall to it that I noticed right away was the 4 SATA connections (as opposed to 6 SATA on the other board). This can be made up by adding a RAID card into the PCI-e x16 slot.

I have my parts on order and hopefully they will be here before the weekend hits. And hopefully, a BIG hopefully that that HVR-1600 and HVR-1800 have QAM support the week following, and are not out of stock!

Thanks,
Protoman

P.S. I did not order The Intel Quad Core from Newegg, as they said they were "out of stock" and it was listed for $299. I bought it from Mwave.com for $275. I checked 2 hours later and Newegg was selling it for $320, and they are now selling for $375 from Newegg! Mwave.com is now selling them at $279. Just FYI.

I've got a replacement hard drive on order. when I swap the bad drive out, i'll look for my revision number.
It'll probably be a week or so before I have a chance to do this though.

[davephan]

Is the Q6600 quad-core 2.4 GHz CPU fast enough to playback compressed HD?

I haven't upgraded from standard definition to HD yet, but I might upgrade to HD in the next year or two.

The Q6600 is 2.4 GHz and costs $315, the Q6700 is 2.66 GHz, costs $579. Both Q-series cannot be overclocked. The QX6700 is 2.66 GHz, costs $975, and can be overclocked. I have heard of the QX6700 being overclocked to 3.66 GHz with water cooling.

I would prefer to buy a 2.4 GHz quad-core if it is fast enough to playback compressed HD. An alternative would a overclockable dual-core that is cheaper than the QX6700 be a better choice to playback compressed HD.


Dave

[bialio]

There seems to be ample evidence on the web that the Q6600 can be overclocked......

There is a 3.0 GHz C2D that is a little less than $300 now - I don't know how it stacks up to the Quad core at 2.4 (that's a review I'd like to see!) but if you are looking for pure speed without overclocking that might be your ticket.....


btl.

[Shield]

Originally Posted by davephan

Is the Q6600 quad-core 2.4 GHz CPU fast enough to playback compressed HD?

I haven't upgraded from standard definition to HD yet, but I might upgrade to HD in the next year or two.

The Q6600 is 2.4 GHz and costs $315, the Q6700 is 2.66 GHz, costs $579. Both Q-series cannot be overclocked. The QX6700 is 2.66 GHz, costs $975, and can be overclocked. I have heard of the QX6700 being overclocked to 3.66 GHz with water cooling.

I would prefer to buy a 2.4 GHz quad-core if it is fast enough to playback compressed HD. An alternative would a overclockable dual-core that is cheaper than the QX6700 be a better choice to playback compressed HD.


Dave

Well I'll let you know soon enough...finally bought a Q6600; it's on its way. I have 3 main boxes; a win2k3 server (not sage, but file/print/AD/ICS/DHCP/Term serv), a main workstation (all u320 scsi with a 2.93 EE Core 2 Duo) and now my Sage box will have 6 drives, a PC Power & Cooling 610, 8600GT, 2 gb 1066 OCZ, Asus p5k, 8308ELP LsiLogic SAS/Sata controller.
This box will feed 3 HD Tv's simultaneously (with a component switch) and 3 RF remotes in various parts of the house.

Here at my household we're serious about TV!

If I get ANY stuttering on HD 1080p, I will swap the q6600 with the x6800EE.

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