(04-07-2010, 08:15 AM)ilovejedd Wrote: [ -> ] (04-07-2010, 08:02 AM)Bositman Wrote: [ -> ]Second option 
It's 3 cores working at 2,1 Ghz each, that does not count as 3x2,1.
Theoretically, if you've got an app that scales really well with multiple cores and doesn't suffer any penalty from threading, you could get work done thrice as fast as a single 2.1GHz core. Effectively, that makes it as fast as a single 6.3GHz CPU.
Alas, that's all theoretical. Sadly, reality is far from that.
Well, i'm studying that kind of thing. The codes that allow us to take advantage of multiple cores (more than 2 cores) and then combine them. Let's say virtual clock speed CPU. Say that a CPU has 4 cores. In this case, maybe in the future we can take advantage of those cores and divide them into 2 virtual cores (each virtual core consists of 2 cores). Well i said maybe and that doesn't mean it should or will happen at times like this.
Building a new Mini-PC. What do you guys think of the following?
SILVERSTONE Sugo SG05-B w/300W SFX PSU
DFI LANParty MI P55-T36 LGA-1156 P55 Mini-ITX or GIGABYTE GA-H55N-USB3
Intel Core i7-860 2.80GHz (originally planned on i5-750 but this was only $200 at MicroCenter)
COOLER MASTER Geminii S
XFX GT240XYHFC GeForce GT 240 512MB GDDR5 (wanted the HD5670 but I need CUDA)
Kingston ValueRAM 4GB (2x2GB) DDR3 CL9 1.5V KVR1333D3N9K2/4G
Kingston SSDNow V 40GB x2 RAID-0 (on-hand)
Would the GT 240 be a severe bottleneck for PCSX2? With the power supply, I'm afraid to go any higher and the unusual form factor means it can't be easily replaced.
(04-09-2010, 05:38 AM)ilovejedd Wrote: [ -> ]Building a new Mini-PC. What do you guys think of the following?
SILVERSTONE Sugo SG05-B w/300W SFX PSU
DFI LANParty MI P55-T36 LGA-1156 P55 Mini-ITX or GIGABYTE GA-H55N-USB3
Intel Core i7-860 2.80GHz (originally planned on i5-750 but this was only $200 at MicroCenter)
COOLER MASTER Geminii S
XFX GT240XYHFC GeForce GT 240 512MB GDDR5 (wanted the HD5670 but I need CUDA)
Kingston ValueRAM 4GB (2x2GB) DDR3 CL9 1.5V KVR1333D3N9K2/4G
Kingston SSDNow V 40GB x2 RAID-0 (on-hand)
Would the GT 240 be a severe bottleneck for PCSX2? With the power supply, I'm afraid to go any higher and the unusual form factor means it can't be easily replaced.
It looks good, the GT 240 shouldn't be a problem for most games at low resolutions. I somehow doubt all this can work with a 300W PSU though..
Excuse me for asking, but why are you building a mini-PC and not standard ATX O_O?
Build looks good for PCSX2 though. Might want to add an aftermarket CPU cooler to overclock the CPU though.
COOLER MASTER Geminii S is an aftermarket CPU cooler.
(04-09-2010, 08:09 AM)Bositman Wrote: [ -> ]It looks good, the GT 240 shouldn't be a problem for most games at low resolutions. I somehow doubt all this can work with a 300W PSU though..
It should work fine. Silverstone specifications say the power supply can output 300W continuous at 50C. The specifications actually mention up to a GTS250 being supported. However, I'm uncomfortable running it too close to its limits. Realistically, I'm probably looking at less than 150W load.
On Anandtech's review, a system with a Core i7 920 oc'ed to 3.33GHz with GT240 GDDR5 consumes 121W idle and 171W load. A Lynnfield running at stock or mild oc should consume much less.
(04-09-2010, 08:29 AM)sakraycore Wrote: [ -> ]Excuse me for asking, but why are you building a mini-PC and not standard ATX O_O?
Build looks good for PCSX2 though. Might want to add an aftermarket CPU cooler to overclock the CPU though.
Space constraints. This will be sitting on top of my current file server. Kinda hard to do that with a tower. There's an aftermarket CPU cooler (GeminII S) but I don't think I'll be doing any massive overclocks owing to the 300W power supply and excessive heat. Besides, building a low- to mid-level gaming machine in such tight confines would be a nice project.
(04-08-2010, 11:33 AM)ikazu Wrote: [ -> ]maybe in the future we can take advantage of those cores and divide them into 2 virtual cores (each virtual core consists of 2 cores). Well i said maybe and that doesn't mean it should or will happen at times like this.
Parallelism is something I'm very interested in as well. I have been a programmer for many years and have a limited amount of experience emulating hardware in software. Here is my 2 cents:
A lot of time during the execution of a program, you can't do more work until the current task is done, because the next task is entirely dependent on the results of the current task. For such tasks, be it virtual or non-virtual cores, hardware or software threads, it makes little difference what resources are available if the main thread is waiting in a loop for something to happen or complete. Usually a program that requires constant user input is going to not scale up very well with more threads.
An admittedly flawed car analogy that may illustrate this better.
If i gave you a car and a list of carefully arranged instructions that detail the absolute fastest way to get somewhere, I couldn't get you there any faster by giving you more cars. I'd have to give you a faster car to get you there sooner.
In a different scenario, If I have a list of places all around the city that I would like to have photos of, I could benefit from splitting the instructions up and handing out assignments to multiple drivers/cars, because it doesn't matter which order the pictures are taken, and it would be a lot faster than having one car travel the entire city.
(04-06-2010, 06:49 PM)Mello Wrote: [ -> ]intel pentium E5400 2.7 GHz
GT 240
How well will it run playing games like Xenosaga, Kingdom Hearts, and GTA?
6GB DDR3 Ram
320GB HDD
If more specs are needed although I'm not sure how much that will help out.
(04-09-2010, 06:39 PM)Mello Wrote: [ -> ] (04-06-2010, 06:49 PM)Mello Wrote: [ -> ]intel pentium E5400 2.7 GHz
GT 240
How well will it run playing games like Xenosaga, Kingdom Hearts, and GTA?
6GB DDR3 Ram
320GB HDD
If more specs are needed although I'm not sure how much that will help out.
dunno about Xenosaga and GTA but kingdom hearts will definitly run full speed
as the old T5650(2ghz) of my previous laptop was enough to run it full speed
Heres my specs. I Bought a gateway desktop and upgraded the psu and gpu.
Here's the specs:
i3 @ 2.93 ghz
Coolmax 500w semi-modular psu
Visiontek HD Radeon 1 gb GDDR5 5770
6 gb DDR3 ram
Windows 7 Premium
What should I expect from most games?