What would be the most energy efficient way to build one for 500$?

id love to fold, but id also like it if i can keep my electricity bill down. i dont want to waste electricity.

How about the Xeon E3-1220L. 2.2GZ @ 20 watts seems like a good balance for maximum power savings while still delivering realistic performance.

For desktop processors, the Core i5-2390T 2.5ghz @ 35 watts looks to have the best power to watt ratio.

At 57% of the power for a ~17% performance decrease, the Xenon beats it hands down.

If by efficient you mean the most points per KWh, the 2600K is still the $500 champion, though you may have a little trouble keeping it under $500 with retail parts. THe cpu's Hafa points out are more energy efficient than a 2600K, but that efficiency is overcome by Quick Return Bonus (halve the time per frame and get 2.828 times the ppd). The classified should have some good 2600Ks as the folding farmers sell them off to build server class machines that are the real champs at points/KWh.

ChasR said:

If by efficient you mean the most points per KWh, the 2600K is still the $500 champion, though you may have a little trouble keeping it under $500 with retail parts. THe cpu's Hafa points out are more energy efficient than a 2600K, but that efficiency is overcome by Quick Return Bonus (halve the time per frame and get 2,828 times the ppd). The classified should have some good 2600Ks as the folding farmers sell them off to build server class machines that are the real champs at points/KWh.

Click to expand...

its not about points, its about efficiency for the calculations.

THe points measure the value of the science performed. I don't know how else you're going to measure efficiency. If the dual core Xeon uses 100 Watts and makes 5000 ppd, is it more efficient than a 2600K using 250W but making 35,000 ppd? I'd say not, but you might see it differently.

Well I built a Shuttle XPC I5 2405S folding rig, and Another Shuttle XPC I5 2320 Rig.
I pay my own electric bills and 35W at full load on the i5 2405s is amazing. The i52320 gets about 48W at full load. My Electric bill saw a increase this month of about 45 bucks. I should have gotten 2 2405s. I see value in long term quiet and cooling folding rigs. And I have little space. So for me these are the best options. I don't want to worry about cooling issues or mother boards or power supplies failing due to 24/7 folding. I tried folding earlier this year on some other systems and the boards and power supplies started to fail. One was AMD X2 and the other was CD2. I should note that We use both of the computers I built daily as main PCs too.

Miltz, how many points are your said i5 making individually and what name do you fold them under?

ChasR said:

THe points measure the value of the science performed. I don't know how else you're going to measure efficiency. If the dual core Xeon uses 100 Watts and makes 5000 ppd, is it more efficient than a 2600K using 250W but making 35,000 ppd? I'd say not, but you might see it differently.

Click to expand...

oh i am sorry i was on sleepaid when i wrote that.

I'm using The Windows 7 and FAH Version 7 Client beta so my results aren't the highest possible. I'm getting about 25,000 PPD from both systems combined at stock with no tweaks.