Plan to build yet another dually with MSI K7D-Master

[dante]

Hello

Today my MSI K7D-Master-L arrived in the mail. This is to be the first part of my new great dualie system. As I'm new to this dualie scene I have some questions I'd like have cleared up before buying the other parts. I have read the stickies and the other noob threads, but there are questions nevertheless... Thanks for bearing with me!

First off: cmcquistion recommends to take off the fan of the northbridge on the motherboard. There appears to be a heatsink below the fan. I understand that I don't have to touch the heatsink itself, or will I have to change it for something more potent?

I'm planning on buying two Athlon XP 2500+ (Barton core). But I'm 'hedging' on more price drops, so I can/will wait a bit (until about end of October). At the moment I can get them at 127 francs each (tray) or at 145 francs (boxed) (about $ 100 / 110 respectively). Would you wait as well for the rumoured price drops or is waiting nonsensical?

Then as for RAM sticks: In the sticky cmcquistion recommends buying Samsung PC2700 registered for overclockability and upgradeability. But I can't seem to get these locally, I'd have to buy in 'foreign parts' (and part with a tidy sum of custom duties). Locally I can seem to get Crucial PC2700 ECC Reg or Kingston ValueRam PC2700 ECC Reg. Which would you recommend? Or would you go with 1GB unregistered instead, as this is about the same price as 512MB registered. This way I still could have up to 2GB later, using the two slots for unregistered RAM.

For the power supply there apparently aren't many options locally respective to the recommendations I found on this board. The possibilities in the 450Watts+ department are:

ANTEC TruePower 480, 480 Watts Fr. 174.70 ($133 equivalent)
ANTEC TruePower 550, 550 Watts Fr. 214.70 ($165 eq.)
ENERMAX EG465AX-VE(G)(W) FM, 460Watts Fr. 133.00 ($100 eq.)
Various (NoName) 550 Watts, ATX Fr. 85.00 ($65 eq.)

Should I still go with the Antec 480W or is the Enermax 460W enough? What about the NoName's?

For coolers I'm thinking Thermalright SK7 with those nifty 75mm fans from YS-Tech with the motors around the fans (smaller dead zone in the center). This is the most bang for the buck cooling solution I think.

The other parts will be leftovers from old computers for the time being. I'm planning to upgrade, obviously, but the system will work fine with old CD-drives, Riva-TNT video cards etc, more so because I'm not planning to game on this system (I've got the other one for this )

 

[Deathknight]

Your cooling sounds nice On the power supply I would definatly recommend Antec True power over enermax. You are probably better off with the 550 true power to be safe but maybe some people here have managed with a 480?

As for the memory I would probably go registered if you are starting fresh, but if you don't think you will ever need more than the first 2 dimm slots than by all means go with unregistered. I would imagine either of the 2 registered rams that you listed there would perform fine, even with tight timings. After all you will only be able to run 150fsb through them at the very most.

I do have one question though... how can you just let that motherboard sit there?!? That would TORTURE ME!

You are a stronger man than I am, this much is for certain

 

[chipvideo]

Deathnite, I agree with you on the torture of leaving the motherboard sitting there. Last week when my parts arrived I had all the boxes open within 5 minutes. Took me 4 hours to put the entire computer together. Not bad considering it was my first ever build.

 

[Xaotic]

It's worse when the company that you got your heatsinks from doesn't ship the retainers. Then, 3 days on the phone to get them to even acknowledge that the retainers are supposed to be with the heatsinks. Further complicated by them only sending 1 set of retainers for 2 heatsinks. All of the parts sat there for over 2 weeks due to their lack of knowledge and customer service.

The YS Tech fans are nice, not as shrill as a lot of 70mm fans and it does seem to help a bit on the temps. I was looking for the 70-80mm fan adapters, but no one seemed to have any.

 

[OSUmaxx]

On the power supply I would definatly recommend Antec True power over enermax. You are probably better off with the 550 true power to be safe but maybe some people here have managed with a 480?

I'd say people have done more than just managed with the 480. Myself and many others use this PSU (or even a weaker one) on our AMD duallies with no problems at all. I'm 100% stable 24/7 with it. If he can afford the 550, its a nice PSU, but I don't think its necessary unless you are running LARGE drive arrays, etc.

 

[cmcquistion]

Yes, you just need to take off the fan. It is held to the heatsink with four screws. You can leave the heatsink, alone. It doesn't need to be replaced.

I'm not sure whether waiting on the CPU's will be worth it, or not. I suspect that we won't see any big price drops on Bartons for quite a while. I may be wrong, though.

For RAM, I have always had fantastic experience with Crucial and only mediocre experience with Kingston. If I had to choose between the two, I would pick Crucial. That said, however, you may want to save some money and just get unbuffered. It it completely up to you. Weigh you options; cost or upgrade potential. Either choice is good, just make sure you go with PC2700 and you should have good overclocking headroom.

On the PSU, I would stay away from the Enermax. I think the Antec True 480 would be great. If you have to skimp on costs, I would recommend generic 550 watt units over the Enermax. Enermax PSU's simply cost too much and deliver too little. Their power output is equal only to generic PSU's, yet they cost a lot and are louder than most quality PSU's.

 

[OSUmaxx]

I'm not sure whether waiting on the CPU's will be worth it, or not. I suspect that we won't see any big price drops on Bartons for quite a while. I may be wrong, though.

I just read a post in the folding forum that claims AMD will be dropping price on the Bartons at the end of October/early Nov. Can't verify it, but its something to think about.

 

[Arkaine23]

My 431w enermax puts out 5.11v to the 5v line (bios shows 4.98v). Of course it was like $80 and its only a 431w unit, but it works great...

 

[cmcquistion]

I've been really impressed with Fortron's PSU's. They are cheap and really deliver a lot for their low price.

 

[Arkaine23]

Yeah, I always hear good things about those too. Where did you find those power magic units, Chris?

 

[cmcquistion]

Yeah, I always hear good things about those too. Where did you find those power magic units, Chris?

I got them from www.amamax.com

In hindsight, however, I'm starting to think that a Fortron FSP-350 would be a better recommendation.

I'm doing some bench testing, right now, on my main rig, to see how many watts it uses and what PSU's are working.

The answer is extremely surprising.

My rig is a dual Barton XP2500 system overclocked to 2250 MHz @ 1.725 Vcore. I have two hard drives, two optical drives, a GF4 Ti4600, and misc goodies. My usual PSU is a Vantec Stealth 520. (This PSU is not stealthy. In fact, it is the loudest PSU I have ever owned.)

I have tested three good quality 300-350 watt PSU's on it and all three have passed.

The models tested:

Fortron FSP300-60PN
Heroichi HEC-300AR-T
Antec SL350

I tested a fourth PSU, too. It is a generic (ProSource) 520 watt PSU. It failed my tests because it has problems cold-booting the system. If I shut down normally, the system won't start back up, unless the PSU is turned off, then back on. Reboots work though.

My tests are not particular thorough, just quick. I hook up the system, and boot up at my overclocked speed. I run two instances of Prime95. I also run Passmark's BurnInTest (this program stresses CPU, memory, both hard drives, both optical drives, and does some video stress testing. While Prime95 and BurnInTest are running, I also run a round of 3DMark2003. I let 3DMark2003 finish and BurnInTest finish (the evaluation version runs for 15 minutes.) If those two can pass, then the PSU passes. Prime95 sometimes fails. I'm not sure if this is because I am overclocking too high, without enough Vcore, or if it is just these low wattage PSU's fault. I will retest with my usual Vantec 520 and see if Prime95 fails, during this regiment, too. *EDIT* I tested with my Vantec 520 and it failed, too. I think I just need more Vcore, so ignore the fact that those other PSU's failed one of the instances of Prime95. It was not a PSU issue, but a Vcore issue. At 1.75 Vcore, Prime95 has not yet failed.



These results really amaze me. I have read post after post after post of people having problems with AMD duallies, when using low wattage PSU's. I have always suggested that they just replace the PSU with a more powerful model, because in the past, I have tried lower wattage PSU's and had problems with them. Now, I think I'm beginning to realize that some lower wattage PSU's can actually cut it, although I am convinced that most cannot.

Goes to show, I guess, that quality is more important than published wattage. Larva, our forum's foremost authority on PSU's (as far as I know), insists that you can't trust the numbers that manufacturers publish about their PSU's. He says there is too much inconsistency and many can't provide the power they boast, while others (like Fortron) provide FAR more power than what is listed on their casing.

 

[dante]

Thank you for your replies!

Believe me, it's not easy to stay put and wait for dropping prices. When ordering the motherboard I speculated on price drops (was around the time the new 64bitters came out), so I thought that I was going to get the bartons any time now. Not much happened pricewise. Anyways, I still can get the cpu's whenever I want...

On the subject of PSU's: I found two old ones, one 300W, one 275W. I could try these or what do you think?

Seriously, I think I'll go with the Antec, because I want to get my first dualie right - the (relative) assurance of brand names helps. Fortron does not seem to sell here in Switzerland, or I would buy one of these.

Also, I guess that unregistered RAM should be sufficient. If later registered is needed, I still can use the unregistered ones in another of my systems or sell them. Is the motherboard dual channel memory enabled or is it a waste of time to have paired sticks?

Well, I still am waiting a bit on the price side... have as well too much other going on atm, renovating my home (great fun as well). But I'll check back here to tell how it goes - and shoot some more questions, if need be

Thanks again, folks!

 

[cmcquistion]

The motherboard price, you can pretty much guarantee, won't go down. It hasn't gone down in two years.

I don't think you should even bother with the 275. I wouldn't recommend using the 300 watt unit, unless it is a very high quality unit. My Fortron 300 and Heroichi 300 both supply 242 watts on the 3.3V and 5V lines, combined. The Antec 350 supplies 267 watts on its 3.3V and 5V lines, combined. If you PSU doesn't offer at least 200 watts on the 3.3V and 5V lines, combined, then I wouldn't use it.

Keep in mind that my figures above are going completely by the published numbers on these PSU's. These published numbers may or may not be accurate and every company probably measures differently. The 5V line is the most important aspect, for an AMD dually. All of my PSU's that passed supply at least 30A on the 5V rail. The generic 520 watt unit that failed, however, boasted 40A on this rail, yet still didn't work right. It had a weak 3.3V rail, though. It only claimed 15A on the 3.3V rail, while all of the other PSU's tested claimed at least 26A. It's combined wattage of it's 3.3V and 5V rail was claimed to be 249.5 watts. This is an example of a badly designed/rated PSU and a good reason not to trust generics.

 

[Penguin4x4]

yup I'd defintely go for the Antec TruePower550, though the Fortron 550's do have a bit beefier +5V line (AMD's hammer the +5V line, BTW). I only wish I could have the cash for that nice of a rig....

 

[cmcquistion]

I've heard of people running their dually on an Antec True430 or True480. In light of that, and considering that he is trying to keep costs down, I think the 480 is just fine.

*EDIT* By the way, if you are interested in a Fortron, they are also marketed under the brand name "Sparkle", so you may want to give that a shot. Fortron/Sparkle are just as good as any brand and they are generally cheaper.

 

[Koranuso]

chipvideo

you dont knwo pain until youve put the entire comp together and then realise that you forgot to order a heatsink and fan for your processor since it didnt come retail.

then having to wait a whole week for it to arrive with a very ncie comp just sitting there and sitting there

AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

btu ive recovered......

 

[Deathknight]

chipvideo

you dont knwo pain until youve put the entire comp together and then realise that you forgot to order a heatsink and fan for your processor since it didnt come retail.

then having to wait a whole week for it to arrive with a very ncie comp just sitting there and sitting there

AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

btu ive recovered......

As for price drops well I am not banking on big drops for bartons any time soon. There has been some speculation that the tbreds will be discontinued and the bartons will take their role of the lower end, non-budget chips. Possibly once that happens the prices would drop, but I think the A64 would need to be out there in substantial quantities for it to make sense to drop prices to any significant degree.

 

[trimai]

I think a good brand name P/S above 400W should be sufficient for a dual AMD set up. My system used a 420W Channel Well and I do not have any problem whatsoever. It currently runs two XP 1800s (modified to MP) at 2266 Mhz and has passed two instances of Prime95 for more than 20 hours. I have stoped it to try 2346 Mhz presently.

 

[dagamore]

keep n mind enermax under rates there PSU, and i have had my 431watter at 485 watts (dummy load test) for over 3 hours before it shut down because of a thermal issue, but after an hour for it to cool (and me to get a burger) it powered right back up all of the lines were right at 2% of what they were before the monster load, and worked for another 2 hours at 485 watts, befor i shut it down as a good PSU i miss the tools we had at college for testing electronics .

but i have not had any problem with my Antec TruePower550 that i have running 2 of my duals (other duals have enermax psu) so either one would be a good one, but if you have money to burn get a PCP&C psu, they rock and are the best on the market.