Need help choosing hardware for folding/personal use

Im looking to upgrade my system with a new mobo, cpu, hard drives and ram. I would like the hardware to be the tried and true sort for overclocking and folding. I want to put a couple cheap and reasonably fast hard drives together in a raid configuration (raid 5 would be the best I guess). I need it to be cheap but I dont want any junk. So in that case you could say that Im looking for something in the mid-low end of the hardware spectrum.

thank you in advance for your input
andy

should have looked at all the posts fisrt ... here is my response in your first thread :

http://www.ocforums.com/showpost.php?p=4116722&postcount=11

one word...... INTEL!!!

posted again to the other thread ... duh http://www.ocforums.com/showpost.php?p=4116922&postcount=13

Also, if you are going to use the p4 for other stuff while it is folding QMD's you should get more than 512mb or the system will be somewhat sluggish ... qmd's use upto 300MB. so a good config is 2x512MB (or more) to get dual channel mem on an 800 fsb cpu.

I would steer clear of the 533 FSB cpus unless you are on a tight budget.

hey guys, so I guess by your comments that Intel gets the best results in folding. Is this true when the computer is used for folding and entertainment (movie, downloading, music, ect ect...) at the same time? I don't want to rack up my power bill too much so I wanted to fold while I do other stuff mostly. Is there a type of processor that would be especially good for that?
thanks
andy

nth697 said:

hey guys, so I guess by your comments that Intel gets the best results in folding. Is this true when the computer is used for folding and entertainment (movie, downloading, music, ect ect...) at the same time? I don't want to rack up my power bill too much so I wanted to fold while I do other stuff mostly. Is there a type of processor that would be especially good for that?
thanks
andy

Click to expand...

yes, Intel is the favorite type of CPU in folding at the moment.

as for which type, well, first of all, if just playing music/movie/download doesn't tax any of nowaday's cpu much (unless you are upconverting a video files or watch HD contents). so, if just for playback, it really doesn't matter much IMHO.

but if you do work on lots of other more CPU intense stuffs (encoding video, etc.) at the same time, then yes, dual core CPU would be better choice.

but DO pay attention on the amount of memory you have in the system tho (more important than cpu type IMHO). since you plan on Intel, means you will going fold QMDs for the best ppd, than you want at least 1GB of memory/physical cpu core IF you still want your machine runs smoothly. yes, folding will step back on processing power when other stuffs need to use the power; however, it will not release the amount of memory that it had taken and a QMD unit could take up to 300MB of memory alone!!

Dual core intel's are awesome point producers - i have an 830 which is a bit of a power hog and heat producer. The 820 might be a better choice but not sure if this hold as true at overclock.

I have an 830 at 3.830 ghz producing about 800 ppd, a 551 at 4.25ghx producing about 710 ppd on the asus p5wd2 boards. Haven't measured electric consumption on either of them yet, but for overclock you need a decent HSF ... stock intel hsf won't get you much if any past stck speed.

I have several 531's getting 550-570 ppd (around 250 fsb) running abit as8/asus p5p800.

On the non dual cores i run 1 QMD instance including my sig rig (which also gets around 550 ppd depending on how much other heavy activity i do on it) ... i can also rip/encode and do email/office stiuff on at the same time. Although video encoding and QMD folding simultaneously make it a bit sluggish for some office work but i don't encode that often.

I have a 520 that is overclocked lower than a 530 yet produces the same ppd ... it has some oxz EB memory in it.

the highest northwood p4 producers i have are around 475 ppd ... but unless you are shopping used u won't find many of them around ... and they seem to be going for premium prices on ebay these days.

Except for my 1 of my northwoods, all the machines have fast memory ddr433 or higher.

Some of my latest folding only rigs are 2x256MB mem, but most are 1GB.

If you want to go dual core Intel, I strongly suggest waiting a month and getting a Presler. Less heat output, less energy usage and a higher overclock.

Who said:

If you want to go dual core Intel, I strongly suggest waiting a month and getting a Presler. Less heat output, less energy usage and a higher overclock.

Click to expand...

yup!! and you will have a very good chances to clock them over 4ghz easily too!! (this coming 2 months will be the hardest time for me.... soooo itchy to upgrade my northwood farm, yet something a lots better is just around the corner....)

ummm.... are thoes the ones that cost $900?

hey guys, I think that Im barking up the wrong tree with this pentium d talk. They look like they cost too much ($250?). That would be about what I would pay for a mobo and chip combo I think. Found this page http://www.memoryexpousa.com/mbcope432ghz.html
or should I be looking for individual parts?

I would not get any combos on that page.
Do you have a budget? It'll make it easier to choose hardware if you give us some sort of budget.
Do you want/need the hardware now? Some sweet new things are coming out in a little over a month that will definately be worth waiting for.