thinking what to do with i7 cpu.....

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Sardine

Sardine

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the HP Microserver I have running nntp client and xbmc with around 6tb hdd in it + ati 6450 vga.

runs great serving files to other devices and as an XMBC for my main TV.

now, its a tad slow (AMD Turion II 1.5 Ghz).

Running Hyperspin front end for mame etc its just too slow maxing cpu on both cores to 100% easily.

so im thinking I have :-
i7 2600k 3.4 TDP 95w and retail small Fan.
16gb DDR3 (4*4gb)
128gb SSD

should I buy
Very Slim Mini ATX case 300-350w psu , use the built in on cpu HD3000 with the i7 and 8gb (2*4gb) with 128gb SSD

this should be more than powerful enough to run hyperspin and or some smaller games.

or would the HD3000 suck the big one and I should go for Micro ATX and a dedicated GPU(my ati 6450 from the microserver?).

I would much rather go for smaller and quieter as this would replace the spot under my Livingroom TV from my HP Microserver. (which would just serve as a NAS)

thanks for any suggestions.

the cheaper the better, I don't need wifi but I do need quiet :)
 
Simple, wait untill Ivy Bridge E, new Haswell processors that will come in September are much better when it comes to power usage and TDP, so much less heat.
Combine it with a good mATX board with everything onboard and mSSD, and your set.
 
A good idea but im trying to use what I have to save cash.

with what I have ideally all I hopefully would need is a Mini ATX motherboard and a Slimline Mini ATX Case
 
Then I would suggest the GIGABYTE GA-H61M-S1 (rev. 2.1) and Lian Li PC-Q07B these two would set me back about 80 euro, so I guess around 65 pounds, that is the cheapest I see here.

The onboard Intel GMA graphics should be fast enough, if not you can Always add a PCI-e card later.
 
[Leftfield]
How about a Q6600 Quad-core on a DDR-3 motherboard? Intels run quiet on the stock fan and even though it's a generation or two older, with quad cores it should cope with games, even with a passively-cooled graphics card. They can be had cheaply too these days. Just thinking out loud.
[/Leftfield]
 
The Q6600 was a great processor. I ran one as my main system for a long time overclocked to 3GHz, and it ran really cool. However in tests even an i3 540 beat it in most instances, and it proved a bottleneck for a 6950, which was when I upgraded to an i7.

I would personally use an i3.

Sent from my Nexus 7 using Tapatalk HD
 
Buzzfuzz said:
Simple, wait untill Ivy Bridge E, new Haswell processors that will come in September are much better when it comes to power usage and TDP, so much less heat.
Combine it with a good mATX board with everything onboard and mSSD, and your set.
Click to expand...

Ivy Bridge-E for a file server/HTPC? I personally think that's a little overkill (imo of course :))... Also, Ivy Bridge-E is rumored to have a TDP of 130W which is obviously higher than the i7 2600K (95W) Sardine was going to use.

Haswell at the moment runs hotter than both Sandy & Ivy Bridge and still consumes slightly more power than Ivy Bridge (not by much though). I'm personally skipping Haswell and will hang on to my Ivy setup until AMD or Intel release something worth upgrading to ;).


Merlin said:
[Leftfield]
How about a Q6600 Quad-core on a DDR-3 motherboard? Intels run quiet on the stock fan and even though it's a generation or two older, with quad cores it should cope with games, even with a passively-cooled graphics card. They can be had cheaply too these days. Just thinking out loud.
[/Leftfield]
Click to expand...

The Core 2 Quad Q6600 is a legendary CPU... The Q9550 (95W) and the Q9550S (65W) were pretty decent too :). These old beasts would make a cheap and capable file server/HTPC and can still handle a bit of gaming too :thumbsup:.


EDIT: It seems the Core 2 Quad Q9550 & Q9550S are still a bit overpriced on the other bay (Q6600 prices seem ok though).
 
The Ivybridge i3 however should be extremely power efficient in comparison to anything else.
 
AmiNeo said:
The Ivybridge i3 however should be extremely power efficient in comparison to anything else.
Click to expand...

Definitely!... The i3 3220 is 55W and still outperforms most, if not all Core 2 Quad processors ;). I think even the 65W quad core AMD APUs (socket FM2) might be a good option too seeing as the IGP is quite capable on most of them (especially the new Richland based APU).
 
Buzzfuzz said:
Then I would suggest the GIGABYTE GA-H61M-S1 (rev. 2.1) and Lian Li PC-Q07B these two would set me back about 80 euro, so I guess around 65 pounds, that is the cheapest I see here.

The onboard Intel GMA graphics should be fast enough, if not you can Always add a PCI-e card later.
Click to expand...

that's too big.

im looking for something the size of a sky box.

like this. comes with 350w Flex PSU.

469177-501615-800.jpg
 
Something I pondered when I got my HP microserver but never got round to checking - is the mainboard in it a standard mini-irx size - if so why not just put a new itx board in its place ?

Has anyone checked this yet....

:coffee:
 
from memory I don't think the cpu would fit, the drive bays are too low and I don't want to take that apart when I can buy a mini atx case for £30.
 
Was just a thought.

You can get a quiet low profile cooler thats just 28mm tall for an intel cpu, thats very low profile.

I've not looked at mine closely enough yet to see what its all about inside.

I got my £100 cheque yesterday; might use it for a cheap ssd or some ecc ram for it.

:)
 
Fitzsteve got some extra ram but was incompatible with what he had installed even though it looks the same / spec.
 
Well I had a snoop on the HP web site for the part number for the ecc 1333 ram for it, theres plenty on eBay, although you can use standard non-ecc ram too.
 
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