New Hardware advice...again

[pvr599]

I have to rebuild very soon since my cable company is going digital in June. I've been reading and reading for days in hopes to come up with a stable build for HD recording from 2 Colossus cards and an HDHR. I have a HD100 and HD200 for now. I do plan on using comskipping.

Could the experts here take a look at the hardware I picked to see if there are any adjustments that should be made?
Thanks a TON
Dana

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16813128444

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16819103921

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16820145279

[panteragstk]

Looks good to me. Depending on how many comskip instances you run this might be worth the extra $70. That and transcoding HD will be very fast with the extra cores (if you transcode that is).

[rrhorer]

You might consider the 890 instead:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16813128435
While its user rating is not as high, it has more PCIe x1 slots and, apparently, less trouble with them. It also has better video (HD 4290 graphics with 128MB DDR3 Sideport Memory vs. HD 4250) if you will be using it as a client also.

[panteragstk]

Originally Posted by rrhorer

You might consider the 890 instead:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16813128435
While its user rating is not as high, it has more PCIe x1 slots and, apparently, less trouble with them. It also has better video (HD 4290 graphics with 128MB DDR3 Sideport Memory vs. HD 4250) if you will be using it as a client also.

More pcie 1x is never a bad thing.

[jnmfox]

Originally Posted by pvr599

I have to rebuild very soon since my cable company is going digital in June. I've been reading and reading for days in hopes to come up with a stable build for HD recording from 2 Colossus cards and an HDHR. I have a HD100 and HD200 for now. I do plan on using comskipping.

Could the experts here take a look at the hardware I picked to see if there are any adjustments that should be made?
Thanks a TON
Dana

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16813128444

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16819103921

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16820145279

Why not go with a new Intel Sandy Bridge set-up

Any of these MB

CPU- http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16819115076

RAM- http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16820231253

Not sure if you needed 8 GB for a specific reason, typically 4 GB is more than enough and you can always add more down the road.
Total it would be about $15-20 more but IMO would be well worth it for a faster and more efficient CPU.

[panteragstk]

Originally Posted by jnmfox

Why not go with a new Intel Sandy Bridge set-up

Any of these MB

CPU- http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16819115076

RAM- http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16820231253

Not sure if you needed 8 GB for a specific reason, typically 4 GB is more than enough and you can always add more down the road.
Total it would be about $15-20 more but IMO would be well worth it for a faster and more efficient CPU.

I was going to suggest this, but since OP asked for amd I hesitated. Sandy bridge will be more efficient on power while being much more powerful processing wise.

[jnmfox]

Originally Posted by panteragstk

I was going to suggest this, but since OP asked for amd I hesitated. Sandy bridge will be more efficient on power while being much more powerful processing wise.

I have a Phenom X4 and have enjoyed it but it is an old architecture, if you are building new Sandy Bridge is the only way to go. You could wait for AMD's new stuff (Llano & Bulldozer) but who knows when they will actually be released and their relative performance compared to SB.

[pvr599]

Thanks you guys so much for the replies.

I normally prefer AMD but I'm not committed to it by any means.

JNMFOX - I was checking out your MB options and when I was looking at AMD boards, I was looking for full ATX with as many PCIe slots I could get and onboard video just to not have to add a video card. If I could use a PCI video card, that would be fine too probably. I use the server headless for the most part, but there are times I need to have it connected to see what's going on beyond remote desktop.

Looking through the choices you suggested, I don't see any that match anything near what I thought I needed. Are these really my only best options? I'm sure you chose them for a reason.

[pvr599]

Ok I may be really dumb here, but how does a MB have no onboard video chipset, but has an HDMI and DVI port?

I haven't built a system for a couple of years. I'm doing some catching up for sure.

[pvr599]

Ok, I looked again at going the Sandy Bridge way. I would love this thing to last at least as long as my current setup has.

What do you think now?
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16813128475

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16819115076

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16820231253

I was asking in the last post about onboard video. I think I can assume that I will be able to connect to a monitor or my TV with the HDMI or Display port and actually get a picture? I know, I feel dumb about asking.

Once I get this part nailed down it'll be onto the storage and finally the Sage install which from what I remember was a nightmare back 5 years ago. I'm sure it's gotten simpler since then. Just gotta do it!!

[jnmfox]

Originally Posted by pvr599

Ok, I looked again at going the Sandy Bridge way. I would love this thing to last at least as long as my current setup has.

What do you think now?
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16813128475

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16819115076

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16820231253

I was asking in the last post about onboard video. I think I can assume that I will be able to connect to a monitor or my TV with the HDMI or Display port and actually get a picture? I know, I feel dumb about asking.

Once I get this part nailed down it'll be onto the storage and finally the Sage install which from what I remember was a nightmare back 5 years ago. I'm sure it's gotten simpler since then. Just gotta do it!!

Looks good, nice MB. The new Sandy Bridge CPUs have a CPU build on-die so there is no need for a separate video card (on the MB or discrete) everything you need is on the CPU. This is partly why the SB chips are so efficient.

About storage, not sure of your budget but if you have the spare cash I would also recommend a SSD for the main OS drive and then a large storage drive.

A couple basic SSDs I'd recommend:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16820167031 (Intel's Generation 2 SSD)
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16820167047 (Intel's Generation 2.5 SSD)
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16820233124 (Sandforce SSD)

I have the Intel 80GB G2 and the Corsair Force 60GB, both have worked great as boot and main application drives. There are higher performing SSDs but unless you have a specific need they are probably not worth the extra $.

I'm relatively new to Sage but I have loved it, great community support and I love all the plug-ins. I thought the installation process was painless but getting everything running just how I want has taken time here and there for the past few weeks.

[pvr599]

So you think it's good to go?

I haven't looked into the SSD's at all, but have been reading about them some. I think that's going to be way out of my budget now. I would love to get them and not worry about it later, but I just don't think I can.

I have a few 300GB SATA 3.0 drives, 1x 1TB SATA 3.0 drive and an 80GB SATA 3.0 I partitioned for c:\ for Windows and d:\ for Sage and other programs. I plan on going to Win7 64bit from WinXP If you have any suggestions on drive setup also, I'd LOVE to hear it. I just can't go with the SSD's now. Someday they will come down to a reasonable price....I hope :0)

EDIT: by the way, I know what you mean about SageTV and the support. There are a few other HTPC software companies out there and when I first looked into doing this, I chose Sage mainly for the support. I never knew how far it was going to come. It's the absolute best out there!!

[jnmfox]

Originally Posted by pvr599

So you think it's good to go?

I haven't looked into the SSD's at all, but have been reading about them some. I think that's going to be way out of my budget now. I would love to get them and not worry about it later, but I just don't think I can.

I have a few 300GB SATA 3.0 drives, 1x 1TB SATA 3.0 drive and an 80GB SATA 3.0 I partitioned for c:\ for Windows and d:\ for Sage and other programs. I plan on going to Win7 64bit from WinXP If you have any suggestions on drive setup also, I'd LOVE to hear it. I just can't go with the SSD's now. Someday they will come down to a reasonable price....I hope :0)

EDIT: by the way, I know what you mean about SageTV and the support. There are a few other HTPC software companies out there and when I first looked into doing this, I chose Sage mainly for the support. I never knew how far it was going to come. It's the absolute best out there!!

Looks good. It will be nice when SSDs are affordable. Win 7 is great. Drive setup I feel is a personal thing, whatever works best for you is the best way to go.

[pvr599]

Great!! Thanks soooo much for the help. I'll be off clicking that "place order" button soon I think.

[jnmfox]

Originally Posted by pvr599

Great!! Thanks soooo much for the help. I'll be off clicking that "place order" button soon I think.

Enjoy, will be a sweet set-up

[d2tw4all]

You won't regret going Sandy Bridge. There's a place in my heart for AMD, but ever since i7 I'm back to intel all the way. I just picked up an Asus G73SW-3DE gaming laptop with the quad core Sandy Bridge i7 and it's just a rocketship.

Tom

[pvr599]

Thanks for the backup!! My credit card and I thank you

You know, I haven't looked at HDD in a while. I CANNOT believe how cheap they are. Shows how long it's been.

Like I said earlier tho, I'll be back with TONS of questions once it all gets here and it's up and basically working.

[pvr599]

I do have a storage question tho.
In the "old" days you were better off getting a smaller capacity drive to hold the OS so it would run faster. (I'm sure you know what I'm talking about) Is that still the case or does it really matter anymore with the 6Gb/s drives?

[SWKerr]

If the primary purpose of this rig is just SageTV then a really fast OS drive is probably overkill. If you have a limited budget I would spend it on as many 2TB 3gbs drives as you can afford. You will want the extra space with the HD content file sizes. It runs out faster than you think. I would even go down a level on the cpu and memory if necessary to be able to afford more drives. I would also consider a RAID setup if possible.

A small SSD OS drive would be nice but not necessary.

[jnmfox]

Originally Posted by pvr599

I do have a storage question tho.
In the "old" days you were better off getting a smaller capacity drive to hold the OS so it would run faster. (I'm sure you know what I'm talking about) Is that still the case or does it really matter anymore with the 6Gb/s drives?

I would just put your OS and programs on one drive and have a separate large drive for storage. The size of the drive won't have any affect on the speed of the drive, maybe in benchmarks but in real world use there is no tangible difference. If you want a faster HD you basically need to get an SSD . The only HDs that actually benefit from the 6GB interface are SSD, mechanical drives can’t even saturate a 3GB connection.

Originally Posted by SWKerr

If the primary purpose of this rig is just SageTV then a really fast OS drive is probably overkill. If you have a limited budget I would spend it on as many 2TB 3gbs drives as you can afford. You will want the extra space with the HD content file sizes. It runs out faster than you think. I would even go down a level on the cpu and memory if necessary to be able to afford more drives. I would also consider a RAID setup if possible.

A small SSD OS drive would be nice but not necessary.

This, just get as large of a HD as you can afford. As you need more storage you can always add more drives. I recently went from a 1 TB storage drive to a 2 TB drive. Shutdown Sage, copy everything over making sure you have the same paths so Sage will recognize it, give it the old drive letter “i.e. G:/” and you are good to go.