[gentoo-user] new machine : (1) which CPU ?

[gentoo-user] new machine : (1) which CPU ?

[Philip Webb]

I plan to build a new machine in the next few months:
it wb for regular desktop use, but performance is as important as price.

A quick look at what was available in April suggested
an Intel Ivy Bridge i7 ( 22 nm ) ; Phoronix said it works with Kernel 3.2
+ an Intel Z77 mobo (I usually buy ASUS) & that power/watt was excellent.

However, I'm quite willing to look at AMD or consider waiting a bit
till something newer from Intel reaches the regular market.
My current box dates from 2007 & my stand-by from 2002 :
the former has an Intel Core2 Duo, the latter an AMD Athlon XP 2500+ .

I don't want to pay a premium price for a bleeding-edge device
which wb available at a more normal price a few months later.
I wb buying it from the local store (Canada Computers), not on-line.

Does anyone have thoughts or advice ?

-- 
========================,,============================================
SUPPORT     ___________//___,   Philip Webb
ELECTRIC   /] [] [] [] [] []|   Cities Centre, University of Toronto
TRANSIT    `-O----------O---'   purslowatchassdotutorontodotca

Re: [gentoo-user] new machine : (1) which CPU ?

[v_2e]

  Hello!

On Fri, 20 Jul 2012 03:24:42 -0400
Philip Webb <purslow@ca.inter.net> wrote:

> I plan to build a new machine in the next few months:
> it wb for regular desktop use, but performance is as important as
> price.
> 
> A quick look at what was available in April suggested
> an Intel Ivy Bridge i7 ( 22 nm ) ; Phoronix said it works with Kernel
> 3.2
> + an Intel Z77 mobo (I usually buy ASUS) & that power/watt was
> excellent.
> 
  If you are considering to buy an Intel CPU, I'd recommend you to pay
some attention to such Intel' technologies as this one:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sandy_Bridge#Intel_Insider_and_remote-control
because it doesn't looks like an advantage to the end user, but rather
as a security (or privacy) hole in one's system.


> However, I'm quite willing to look at AMD or consider waiting a bit
> till something newer from Intel reaches the regular market.
  Speaking of AMD processors, I remember one of my friends told that
their A10-series a good. I didn't study any details of it, but if you
are interested, you can check them out as well.

> My current box dates from 2007 & my stand-by from 2002 :
> the former has an Intel Core2 Duo, the latter an AMD Athlon XP 2500+ .
> 
> I don't want to pay a premium price for a bleeding-edge device
> which wb available at a more normal price a few months later.
> I wb buying it from the local store (Canada Computers), not on-line.
> 
> Does anyone have thoughts or advice ?
> 

  Regards,
    Vladimir

----- 
 <v_2e@ukr.net>

Re: [gentoo-user] new machine : (1) which CPU ?

[Dale]

v_2e@ukr.net wrote:
>   Hello!
>
> On Fri, 20 Jul 2012 03:24:42 -0400
> Philip Webb <purslow@ca.inter.net> wrote:
>
>
>> However, I'm quite willing to look at AMD or consider waiting a bit
>> till something newer from Intel reaches the regular market.
>   Speaking of AMD processors, I remember one of my friends told that
> their A10-series a good. I didn't study any details of it, but if you
> are interested, you can check them out as well.
>
> Regards, Vladimir ----- <v_2e@ukr.net> 

I built my rig with a AMD CPU and I like it.  I prefer AMD since it has
a lot of bang for less bucks.  Mine is this one:

AMD Phenom(tm) II X4 955 Processor

I went from 12 to 14 hours building LOo on my older AMD 2500+ single
core to about a hour or so on my new rig. 

One thing I have learned over the years when money is tight.  Always buy
parts that are about 2 to 3 notches below the latest release.  My
current CPU is 3.2Ghz which is about two notches below the fastest they
had at the time.  I think the fastest was 3.4Ghz or something.  I saved
a lot of money but most likely wouldn't be able to see the difference in
speed.  You can do the same for mobos and such too. 

Also, with Linux, older hardware has more stable drivers than newer
stuff.  If you buy a brand new mobo with all new chipsets, you can run
into stability issues until the drivers get sorted out.  If you buy one
that has been out a year or so, you have a MUCH better chance of getting
good stable drivers. 

As always, your mileage may vary. 

Dale

:-)  :-) 

-- 
I am only responsible for what I said ... Not for what you understood or how you interpreted my words!

Re: [gentoo-user] new machine : (1) which CPU ?

[Florian Philipp]

[-- Attachment #1: Type: text/plain, Size: 1958 bytes --]

Am 20.07.2012 14:06, schrieb Dale:
> 
> v_2e@ukr.net wrote:
>>   Hello!
>>
>> On Fri, 20 Jul 2012 03:24:42 -0400
>> Philip Webb <purslow@ca.inter.net> wrote:
>>
>>
>>> However, I'm quite willing to look at AMD or consider waiting a bit
>>> till something newer from Intel reaches the regular market.
>>   Speaking of AMD processors, I remember one of my friends told that
>> their A10-series a good. I didn't study any details of it, but if you
>> are interested, you can check them out as well.
>>
>> Regards, Vladimir ----- <v_2e@ukr.net> 
> 
> I built my rig with a AMD CPU and I like it.  I prefer AMD since it has
> a lot of bang for less bucks.  Mine is this one:
> 
> AMD Phenom(tm) II X4 955 Processor
> 
> I went from 12 to 14 hours building LOo on my older AMD 2500+ single
> core to about a hour or so on my new rig. 
> 
> One thing I have learned over the years when money is tight.  Always buy
> parts that are about 2 to 3 notches below the latest release.  My
> current CPU is 3.2Ghz which is about two notches below the fastest they
> had at the time.  I think the fastest was 3.4Ghz or something.  I saved
> a lot of money but most likely wouldn't be able to see the difference in
> speed.  You can do the same for mobos and such too. 
> 
> Also, with Linux, older hardware has more stable drivers than newer
> stuff.  If you buy a brand new mobo with all new chipsets, you can run
> into stability issues until the drivers get sorted out.  If you buy one
> that has been out a year or so, you have a MUCH better chance of getting
> good stable drivers. 
> 
> As always, your mileage may vary. 
> 
> Dale
> 
> :-)  :-) 
> 

+1 for AMD, especially if you consider integrated GPUs. If you want to
be sure you get a good deal, look for FLOPS per Dollar charts or similar
benchmarks. For example this [1].

[1] http://www.cpubenchmark.net/cpu_value_available.html

Regards,
Florian Philipp


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Re: [gentoo-user] new machine : (1) which CPU ?

[Dale]

OP,

If you need help with this, i'd be glad to help you pick parts for your
build.  The biggest thing is to make sure things work together.  If the
mobo only has SATA drive connectors, a IDE hard drive will not work. 
You have to make sure the memory will work with the mobo you have picked
too. Mobo, CPU and memory certainly are critical to work together. 

If you want help, let me know.  I'm sure others will chime in too. 

Dale

:-)  :-) 

-- 
I am only responsible for what I said ... Not for what you understood or how you interpreted my words!

Re: [gentoo-user] new machine : (1) which CPU ?

[Philip Webb]

120720 Dale wrote to me as OP:
> If you need help with this, i'd be glad to help you pick parts
> for your build.  The biggest thing is to make sure things work together.

Thanks for the offer & the other advice from everyone so far.
I built machines successfully in 2000 2003 2007
& am still using the last  2 , tho' the 2007 mobo failed (ASUS)
& its replacement is showing minor bugs (glad I got in-store warranty).
Therefore, I'm not looking for basic advice how to put a box together.

I'm also willing to pay for a fast upto-date CPU,
but not of course whatever came out just last week,
which will soon drop in price & will still need some bugs sorting out.
I don't have to choose between a good CPU & a good SSD
& expect to get a competitive price from Canada Computers, as before.

Any further thoughts re Intel vs AMD wb very welcome.

-- 
========================,,============================================
SUPPORT     ___________//___,   Philip Webb
ELECTRIC   /] [] [] [] [] []|   Cities Centre, University of Toronto
TRANSIT    `-O----------O---'   purslowatchassdotutorontodotca

Re: [gentoo-user] new machine : (1) which CPU ?

[Alecks Gates]

On Fri, Jul 20, 2012 at 8:27 PM, Philip Webb <purslow@ca.inter.net> wrote:
> 120720 Dale wrote to me as OP:
>> If you need help with this, i'd be glad to help you pick parts
>> for your build.  The biggest thing is to make sure things work together.
>
> Thanks for the offer & the other advice from everyone so far.
> I built machines successfully in 2000 2003 2007
> & am still using the last  2 , tho' the 2007 mobo failed (ASUS)
> & its replacement is showing minor bugs (glad I got in-store warranty).
> Therefore, I'm not looking for basic advice how to put a box together.
>
> I'm also willing to pay for a fast upto-date CPU,
> but not of course whatever came out just last week,
> which will soon drop in price & will still need some bugs sorting out.
> I don't have to choose between a good CPU & a good SSD
> & expect to get a competitive price from Canada Computers, as before.
>
> Any further thoughts re Intel vs AMD wb very welcome.
>
> --
> ========================,,============================================
> SUPPORT     ___________//___,   Philip Webb
> ELECTRIC   /] [] [] [] [] []|   Cities Centre, University of Toronto
> TRANSIT    `-O----------O---'   purslowatchassdotutorontodotca
>
>

You'd definitely get more bang for your buck out of AMD, especially
with Gentoo.  It might even be worth waiting for AMD's piledriver-core
CPUs depending on how much of an improvement they actually give,
though I'm not sure when those are supposed to be out.  And paying for
a top-of-the-line AMD CPU is still much cheaper than Intel.

This is a very broad generalization of course, but a lot of it comes
down to multi-threaded (lean towards AMD) vs single-threaded (lean
towards Intel).  Honestly I don't think you'd notice the difference
anyway on a general desktop.  I'd pick AMD, and very likely one of
their APUs if you don't need intense graphics, as they seem to be able
to handle most things well and even some light gaming.

Re: [gentoo-user] new machine : (1) which CPU ?

[Dale]

Alecks Gates wrote:
> On Fri, Jul 20, 2012 at 8:27 PM, Philip Webb <purslow@ca.inter.net> wrote:
>> 120720 Dale wrote to me as OP:
>>> If you need help with this, i'd be glad to help you pick parts
>>> for your build.  The biggest thing is to make sure things work together.
>> Thanks for the offer & the other advice from everyone so far.
>> I built machines successfully in 2000 2003 2007
>> & am still using the last  2 , tho' the 2007 mobo failed (ASUS)
>> & its replacement is showing minor bugs (glad I got in-store warranty).
>> Therefore, I'm not looking for basic advice how to put a box together.
>>
>> I'm also willing to pay for a fast upto-date CPU,
>> but not of course whatever came out just last week,
>> which will soon drop in price & will still need some bugs sorting out.
>> I don't have to choose between a good CPU & a good SSD
>> & expect to get a competitive price from Canada Computers, as before.
>>
>> Any further thoughts re Intel vs AMD wb very welcome.
>>
>> --
>> ========================,,============================================
>> SUPPORT     ___________//___,   Philip Webb
>> ELECTRIC   /] [] [] [] [] []|   Cities Centre, University of Toronto
>> TRANSIT    `-O----------O---'   purslowatchassdotutorontodotca
>>
>>
> You'd definitely get more bang for your buck out of AMD, especially
> with Gentoo.  It might even be worth waiting for AMD's piledriver-core
> CPUs depending on how much of an improvement they actually give,
> though I'm not sure when those are supposed to be out.  And paying for
> a top-of-the-line AMD CPU is still much cheaper than Intel.
>
> This is a very broad generalization of course, but a lot of it comes
> down to multi-threaded (lean towards AMD) vs single-threaded (lean
> towards Intel).  Honestly I don't think you'd notice the difference
> anyway on a general desktop.  I'd pick AMD, and very likely one of
> their APUs if you don't need intense graphics, as they seem to be able
> to handle most things well and even some light gaming.
>
>

I did some checking when I built my rig.  If I recall correctly, just a
comparable Intel CPU would have cost as much as my AMD CPU *and* the
mobo.  After you put down some bucks for the CPU, you still have to buy
a mobo which seem pricey to me as well.  Between those two parts, you
can spend a lot of money for Intel based stuff. 

Seriously, for desktop use and budget, go with AMD.  Spend the money you
save on your SSD or a really nice video card.  After all, the video card
is what you really see anyway. 

I'm not saying Intel is bad but AMD is a great CPU and much cheaper. 

Dale

:-)  :-) 

-- 
I am only responsible for what I said ... Not for what you understood or how you interpreted my words!

Re: [gentoo-user] new machine : (1) which CPU ?

[Michael Mol]

On Fri, Jul 20, 2012 at 9:49 PM, Alecks Gates <alecks.g@gmail.com> wrote:
> On Fri, Jul 20, 2012 at 8:27 PM, Philip Webb <purslow@ca.inter.net> wrote:
>> 120720 Dale wrote to me as OP:
>>> If you need help with this, i'd be glad to help you pick parts
>>> for your build.  The biggest thing is to make sure things work together.
>>
>> Thanks for the offer & the other advice from everyone so far.
>> I built machines successfully in 2000 2003 2007
>> & am still using the last  2 , tho' the 2007 mobo failed (ASUS)
>> & its replacement is showing minor bugs (glad I got in-store warranty).
>> Therefore, I'm not looking for basic advice how to put a box together.
>>
>> I'm also willing to pay for a fast upto-date CPU,
>> but not of course whatever came out just last week,
>> which will soon drop in price & will still need some bugs sorting out.
>> I don't have to choose between a good CPU & a good SSD
>> & expect to get a competitive price from Canada Computers, as before.
>>
>> Any further thoughts re Intel vs AMD wb very welcome.
>>
>> --
>> ========================,,============================================
>> SUPPORT     ___________//___,   Philip Webb
>> ELECTRIC   /] [] [] [] [] []|   Cities Centre, University of Toronto
>> TRANSIT    `-O----------O---'   purslowatchassdotutorontodotca
>>
>>
>
> You'd definitely get more bang for your buck out of AMD, especially
> with Gentoo.  It might even be worth waiting for AMD's piledriver-core
> CPUs depending on how much of an improvement they actually give,
> though I'm not sure when those are supposed to be out.  And paying for
> a top-of-the-line AMD CPU is still much cheaper than Intel.
>
> This is a very broad generalization of course, but a lot of it comes
> down to multi-threaded (lean towards AMD) vs single-threaded (lean
> towards Intel).  Honestly I don't think you'd notice the difference
> anyway on a general desktop.  I'd pick AMD, and very likely one of
> their APUs if you don't need intense graphics, as they seem to be able
> to handle most things well and even some light gaming.

I love AMD for the historical ladder upgrades; all of my AMD systems
are comprised of components (RAM, CPU, and other pieces) which mostly
came from previous systems or newer systems' replaced components.

That's nice, and wonderfully cheap.

That said, right now Intel gives the best performance per watt...and
perhaps the best performance per dollar. I'm a few months out of date
on my research, though.

Wander around on cpubenchmark.net (Thanks, Florian, I'd lost my
bookmark to that site) and find the processor that fits your price and
performance level. Both Intel and AMD make excellent processors, so
you'll have to do your own research for a good decision.


-- 
:wq

Re: [gentoo-user] new machine : (1) which CPU ?

[waltdnes]

On Fri, Jul 20, 2012 at 08:49:32PM -0500, Alecks Gates wrote

> I'd pick AMD, and very likely one of their APUs if you don't need
> intense graphics, as they seem to be able to handle most things well
> and even some light gaming.

  How do AMD's and Intel's open source video drivers compare?

-- 
Walter Dnes <waltdnes@waltdnes.org>

Re: [gentoo-user] new machine : (1) which CPU ?

[Florian Philipp]

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Am 21.07.2012 07:55, schrieb waltdnes@waltdnes.org:
> On Fri, Jul 20, 2012 at 08:49:32PM -0500, Alecks Gates wrote
> 
>> I'd pick AMD, and very likely one of their APUs if you don't need
>> intense graphics, as they seem to be able to handle most things well
>> and even some light gaming.
> 
>   How do AMD's and Intel's open source video drivers compare?
> 

Last time I tried to use AMD's open source driver, it worked well for
office applications and minor OpenGL (glxgears, desktop effects, etc.)
but it couldn't play a DVD on full screen (1920 * x) without frame
drops. (Yes, I tried tuning parameters with mplayer2).

Intel's driver works well enough for this but it doesn't have much head
room, either.

ATI's closed source driver works pretty well, too, nowadays. I had
trouble with xorg-server-1.12 but haven't investigated it, yet.

Regards,
Florian Philipp


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Re: [gentoo-user] new machine : (1) which CPU ?

[v_2e]

  Hello!

On Sat, 21 Jul 2012 10:44:11 +0200
Florian Philipp <lists@binarywings.net> wrote:

> Am 21.07.2012 07:55, schrieb waltdnes@waltdnes.org:
> > On Fri, Jul 20, 2012 at 08:49:32PM -0500, Alecks Gates wrote
> > 
> >> I'd pick AMD, and very likely one of their APUs if you don't need
> >> intense graphics, as they seem to be able to handle most things
> >> well and even some light gaming.
> > 
> >   How do AMD's and Intel's open source video drivers compare?
> > 
> 
> Last time I tried to use AMD's open source driver, it worked well for
> office applications and minor OpenGL (glxgears, desktop effects, etc.)
> but it couldn't play a DVD on full screen (1920 * x) without frame
> drops. (Yes, I tried tuning parameters with mplayer2).
> 
> Intel's driver works well enough for this but it doesn't have much
> head room, either.
> 
> ATI's closed source driver works pretty well, too, nowadays. I had
> trouble with xorg-server-1.12 but haven't investigated it, yet.
> 
> Regards,
> Florian Philipp
> 
  One of my friends uses ATI video card both on desktop and laptop
machines and he told me recently that the free driver for ATI video
chips ( http://xorg.freedesktop.org/wiki/ati )  is very good nowadays
and is being actively developed.
  He also said that the performance of his video card with open-source
driver in different modes is almost the same as with the proprietary
driver. I just don't remember the exact video card model, unfortunately.

  And according to this article:
http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=news_item&px=MTA3NDE
AMD releases the code for some newer chips as well. Which gives more
chance for the new hardware to work good with GNU/Linux.

   Regards,
      Vladimir

----- 
 <v_2e@ukr.net>

Re: [gentoo-user] new machine : (1) which CPU ?

[Alecks Gates]

On Sat, Jul 21, 2012 at 12:55 AM,  <waltdnes@waltdnes.org> wrote:
> On Fri, Jul 20, 2012 at 08:49:32PM -0500, Alecks Gates wrote
>
>> I'd pick AMD, and very likely one of their APUs if you don't need
>> intense graphics, as they seem to be able to handle most things well
>> and even some light gaming.
>
>   How do AMD's and Intel's open source video drivers compare?
>
> --
> Walter Dnes <waltdnes@waltdnes.org>
>

I've never used an Intel chip actually (well not in ages, and not on
Linux), but they tend to have the best open source drivers.  Their
graphics chips aren't nearly as good, though.

AMD radeon open source drivers are getting better with every kernel.
Apparently there was a huge performance increase with 3.5 alone.  They
are catching up and as long as you don't have something brand new the
support is pretty good (and apparently even this is getting better,
too).

Funny enough, there are some things I've actually had run faster using
radeon than fglrx, mostly with wine games.  But the radeon driver
still does not have full support and even some things will simply not
work with them.

Re: [gentoo-user] new machine : (1) which CPU ?

[Michael Mol]

On Fri, Jul 20, 2012 at 7:40 AM,  <v_2e@ukr.net> wrote:
>   Hello!
>
> On Fri, 20 Jul 2012 03:24:42 -0400
> Philip Webb <purslow@ca.inter.net> wrote:
>
>> I plan to build a new machine in the next few months:
>> it wb for regular desktop use, but performance is as important as
>> price.
>>
>> A quick look at what was available in April suggested
>> an Intel Ivy Bridge i7 ( 22 nm ) ; Phoronix said it works with Kernel
>> 3.2
>> + an Intel Z77 mobo (I usually buy ASUS) & that power/watt was
>> excellent.
>>
>   If you are considering to buy an Intel CPU, I'd recommend you to pay
> some attention to such Intel' technologies as this one:
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sandy_Bridge#Intel_Insider_and_remote-control
> because it doesn't looks like an advantage to the end user, but rather
> as a security (or privacy) hole in one's system.

We went through this on this list a couple months ago.

That tech has been part of business-grade laptops and workstations for
a while. It's intended as a tool for a corporate IT department, not
the direct user of the machine.

I'm not saying it's something I'd necessarily like to have on my
personal devices, just that it's not exactly new.
-- 
:wq

Re: [gentoo-user] new machine : (1) which CPU ?

[Mick]

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On Friday 20 Jul 2012 13:13:41 Michael Mol wrote:
> On Fri, Jul 20, 2012 at 7:40 AM,  <v_2e@ukr.net> wrote:
> >   Hello!
> > 
> > On Fri, 20 Jul 2012 03:24:42 -0400
> > 
> > Philip Webb <purslow@ca.inter.net> wrote:
> >> I plan to build a new machine in the next few months:
> >> it wb for regular desktop use, but performance is as important as
> >> price.
> >> 
> >> A quick look at what was available in April suggested
> >> an Intel Ivy Bridge i7 ( 22 nm ) ; Phoronix said it works with Kernel
> >> 3.2
> >> + an Intel Z77 mobo (I usually buy ASUS) & that power/watt was
> >> excellent.
> >> 
> >   If you are considering to buy an Intel CPU, I'd recommend you to pay
> > 
> > some attention to such Intel' technologies as this one:
> > https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sandy_Bridge#Intel_Insider_and_remote-contr
> > ol because it doesn't looks like an advantage to the end user, but rather
> > as a security (or privacy) hole in one's system.
> 
> We went through this on this list a couple months ago.
> 
> That tech has been part of business-grade laptops and workstations for
> a while. It's intended as a tool for a corporate IT department, not
> the direct user of the machine.
> 
> I'm not saying it's something I'd necessarily like to have on my
> personal devices, just that it's not exactly new.

I didn't know my laptop came with this <aheam> 'Intel rootkit' feature until I 
posted here a few weeks ago.  I haven't done any research on this, but found 
these spooky pages:

http://communities.intel.com/community/vproexpert/blog/2012/01/19/configuring-
intel-vpro-with-linux-in-user-control-mode

http://software.intel.com/en-us/articles/download-the-latest-intel-amt-open-
source-drivers/

I'm not sure how vulnerable my machine may be as supplied by Dell - I assume 
that unless the system is enabled first no out-of-band attempts will work.
-- 
Regards,
Mick

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[gentoo-user] Re: new machine : (1) which CPU ?

[Nikos Chantziaras]

On 20/07/12 10:24, Philip Webb wrote:
> I plan to build a new machine in the next few months:
> it wb for regular desktop use, but performance is as important as price.
>
> A quick look at what was available in April suggested
> an Intel Ivy Bridge i7 ( 22 nm ) ; Phoronix said it works with Kernel 3.2
> + an Intel Z77 mobo (I usually buy ASUS) & that power/watt was excellent.

The best performance for money is the i5 2550K CPU.  If you want the 
integrated graphics because you don't have an actual graphics card, you 
can go for the 2500K.

This is a Sandy Bridge CPU.  I normally don't recommend the Ivy Bridge 
ones because they run hotter, so changing the clock multipliers isn't as 
fun as with Sandy Bridge.

Re: [gentoo-user] Re: new machine : (1) which CPU ?

[microcai]

2012/7/21 Nikos Chantziaras <realnc@gmail.com>:
> On 20/07/12 10:24, Philip Webb wrote:
>>
>> I plan to build a new machine in the next few months:
>> it wb for regular desktop use, but performance is as important as price.
>>
>> A quick look at what was available in April suggested
>> an Intel Ivy Bridge i7 ( 22 nm ) ; Phoronix said it works with Kernel 3.2
>> + an Intel Z77 mobo (I usually buy ASUS) & that power/watt was excellent.
>
>
> The best performance for money is the i5 2550K CPU.  If you want the
> integrated graphics because you don't have an actual graphics card, you can
> go for the 2500K.

For those don't want an integrated graphics, buy Xeon E3-123? serise
CPU. the same price as i5 2500K , but you got 8 thread :)

>
> This is a Sandy Bridge CPU.  I normally don't recommend the Ivy Bridge ones
> because they run hotter, so changing the clock multipliers isn't as fun as
> with Sandy Bridge.
>
>

Re: [gentoo-user] Re: new machine : (1) which CPU ?

[Frank Steinmetzger]

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Am Samstag, 21. Juli 2012, 15:33:05 schrieb Nikos Chantziaras:
> On 20/07/12 10:24, Philip Webb wrote:
> > I plan to build a new machine in the next few months:
> > it wb for regular desktop use, but performance is as important as price.
> 
> > A quick look at what was available in April suggested
> > an Intel Ivy Bridge i7 ( 22 nm ) ; Phoronix said it works with Kernel 3.2
> > + an Intel Z77 mobo (I usually buy ASUS) & that power/watt was excellent.
> > […]
> > I don't want to pay a premium price for a bleeding-edge device
> > which wb available at a more normal price a few months later.

Those two statements are a bit contradicting.
Generally, I wouldn’t buy an i7. First, those high-end components tend to be 
comparatively more expensive than their smaller siblings (regarding bang for 
the buck). Okay, it’s a quad with HT instead of “just a quad” (oh my, the 
times we live in), but secondly, if it’s *mostly* a desktop and occasionally 
performance-critical, I think it is also a waste of power. More power means 
more heat means more fan noise.

> > I wb buying it from the local store (Canada Computers), not on-line.
> 
> > Does anyone have thoughts or advice ?

A friend of mine built a new machine recently. I too am planning on doing this 
once I got the bucks (hopefully) in a few months. So we picked components 
together, based on recommendations of an “efficient home-brew PC” article in 
computer magazine c’t.
We know that Intel is more expensive, but also less power-hungry and known to 
work excellent both with Linux and with other components. And my friend 
believes that the Intel graphics drivers are still superior from a FOSS 
standpoint (he had an ATI in his old system).

Using the comprehensive Wikipedia articles on Ivy Bridge¹ and LGA1155², we 
decided for the biggest i5 (3570K, ~220€), as it has the bigger of the two HD 
Graphics chips (external Graphics were not on the shoping list). This new baby 
built GCC in 12 minutes and a bit. First he wanted an Intel board, but because 
those don’t have VGA anymore, he went for Gigagybe. He was building a big 
tower ATX system, and so chose the Z77 (around 100€).

I, however, am planning for something more modest, a cute mATX system with 
medium power. Right now I’m planning on a B75 board. It has all *I* need and 
is considerably cheaper (70€). I think I may also take the smaller i5 that 
comes with HD4000, the 3475S, which is around 25€ cheaper. But even then, it 
is still a beast when compared to my Core 2 Duo laptop which has to run 
permanently throttled due to its ageing heat spreader.

> This is a Sandy Bridge CPU.  I normally don't recommend the Ivy Bridge
> ones because they run hotter, so changing the clock multipliers isn't as
> fun as with Sandy Bridge.

Yeah, according to the aforementioned Wikipedia article¹, they changed the 
heat spreader material inside. However, the 2550K you recommended has a TDP of 
almost 100W, whereas Ivy Bridge maxes at 77W. How much those figues are to be 
taken as real-world values is of course something else.

A nice improvement of Ivy Bridge in my view is its integrated USB3 controller, 
which, according to some tests, is considerably better than the patched-on 
solutions of Sandy Bridge boards. And if you don’t want a dedicated graphics 
card but still want some GPU power, that’s of course another plus for Ivy.

Hm... perhaps one can use the best of both worlds and use a Sandy CPU ond an 
Ivy board? The other way around would work with a BIOS upgrade.



Footnoty stuff
¹ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ivy_Bridge_(microarchitecture)
¹ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LGA_1155

-- 
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“Microsoft isn't evil, they just make really crappy operating systems.”
  – Linus Torvalds

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Re: [gentoo-user] Re: new machine : (1) which CPU ?

[Alecks Gates]

On Sat, Jul 21, 2012 at 7:33 AM, Nikos Chantziaras <realnc@gmail.com> wrote:
> On 20/07/12 10:24, Philip Webb wrote:
>>
>> I plan to build a new machine in the next few months:
>> it wb for regular desktop use, but performance is as important as price.
>>
>> A quick look at what was available in April suggested
>> an Intel Ivy Bridge i7 ( 22 nm ) ; Phoronix said it works with Kernel 3.2
>> + an Intel Z77 mobo (I usually buy ASUS) & that power/watt was excellent.
>
>
> The best performance for money is the i5 2550K CPU.  If you want the
> integrated graphics because you don't have an actual graphics card, you can
> go for the 2500K.
>
> This is a Sandy Bridge CPU.  I normally don't recommend the Ivy Bridge ones
> because they run hotter, so changing the clock multipliers isn't as fun as
> with Sandy Bridge.
>
>

Actually according to the link Florian linked here[1], AMD is doing
extremely well regarding price/performance.  Unless you want a Celeron
or a Pentium.  i5s do rate up there, though... these tests are also
from Windows.

[1] http://www.cpubenchmark.net/cpu_value_available.html

[gentoo-user] Re: new machine : (1) which CPU ?

[Nikos Chantziaras]

On 22/07/12 06:18, Alecks Gates wrote:
> On Sat, Jul 21, 2012 at 7:33 AM, Nikos Chantziaras <realnc@gmail.com> wrote:
>> On 20/07/12 10:24, Philip Webb wrote:
>>>
>>> I plan to build a new machine in the next few months:
>>> it wb for regular desktop use, but performance is as important as price.
>>>
>>> A quick look at what was available in April suggested
>>> an Intel Ivy Bridge i7 ( 22 nm ) ; Phoronix said it works with Kernel 3.2
>>> + an Intel Z77 mobo (I usually buy ASUS) & that power/watt was excellent.
>>
>>
>> The best performance for money is the i5 2550K CPU.  If you want the
>> integrated graphics because you don't have an actual graphics card, you can
>> go for the 2500K.
>>
>> This is a Sandy Bridge CPU.  I normally don't recommend the Ivy Bridge ones
>> because they run hotter, so changing the clock multipliers isn't as fun as
>> with Sandy Bridge.
>>
>>
>
> Actually according to the link Florian linked here[1], AMD is doing
> extremely well regarding price/performance.  Unless you want a Celeron
> or a Pentium.  i5s do rate up there, though... these tests are also
> from Windows.
>
> [1] http://www.cpubenchmark.net/cpu_value_available.html

I mean performance that doesn't suck :-P