Please suggest PC config for virtualization and casual gaming

[jainmj]

Feedback req - PC for virtualization and casual gaming

1. What is the purpose of the computer? What all applications and games are you going to run?
Ans: Mainly, Virtualization. This is gonna be a lab for multiple server OSes, softwares etc inside VMs. I will be dual booting with Windows for occasional gaming, movies and photo editing. I didn't have a PC in the last 4 years. So, haven't played any game recently. But I should be able to play the current and near future NFS games in full detail. Saw battlefield videos recently and liked it. Might play that also. Planning to get the basic Lab system right now and upgrade later for games, movies and windows.

2. What is your overall budget? If you can extend a bit for a more balanced configuration, then mention this too.
Ans: 50k for the urgent build. Not a tight limit.

3. Planning to overclock?
Ans: No

4. Which Operating System are you planning to use?
Ans: Win 7, Linux

5. How much hard drive space is needed?
Ans: 500GB for Lab (Future: Optional ~1TB for data, Optional SSD for Windows and softwares)

6. Do you want to buy a monitor? If yes, please mention which screen size and resolution do you want. If you already have a monitor and want to reuse it, again mention the size and resolution of monitor you have.
Ans: My roommate has an LG 19" 720p TV. Will use it for now. (Future: 1080p IPS panel ~24" matte finish)

7. Which components you DON'T want to buy or which components you already have and plan on reusing?
Ans: I already have a MS ergonomic keyboard bought long time back for office use.

8. When are you planning to buy the system?
Ans: In a month

9. Have you ever built a desktop before or will this be done by an assembler?
Ans: Havent done before. But gonna build this myself.

10. Where do you live? Are you buying locally? Are you open to buying stuff from online shops if you don't get locally?
Ans: Bangalore. Will be buying online whatever possible.

11. Anything else which you would like to say?
Ans:
These are the options I currently have in mind and I need feedback for:
Cabinet: I like to have a small case. CM Elite 361 is good. But no front usb3.0 . Read about Elite 120 recently and it looks interesting. CM says it will be launched in sept. And I will have to go for a mini-ITX for that case. Dont want to spend more than 2.5K on cabinet.
CPU: i5-3450/3550 or i7-2600 or FX-8120/8150 - Looks like AMD is more VFM but Intel will run much cooler. <14k. Is it worth to spend 20k for i7 3770?
Mobo: Asus P8H77-M or any AMD mobo with similar features (USB 3.0 is a must. RAID is good to have.). Prefers a mATX since Elite 361 is small <10k
HDD: WD caviar blue 500GB for now. ~4k
RAM: 8 GB for now. G.Skill Sniper/RipjawsX DDR3-1600 2x4GB or 1x8GB ~3.7k
Optical Drive: Any DVD writer ~1.1K
Mouse: Any basic, comfortable, full size mouse. ~300-400rs
PSU: Seasonic S12II 520w ~4.2k
UPS: APC BR1000G-IN (A bit costly. But I liked it and I need long backup. Not sure how much I can monitor it with apcupsd) ~7.6k
Total ~43-45k

Future upgrade:
Speakers: Creative Inspire T3130 or any good 2.1 ~2.4k
Monitor: AOC I2251FW is a cheap IPS panel. Is it good? Or should I be going for Dell U2312HM? How good are these IPS panels for gaming. I read mixed reviews. 8.5k/17k
Graphics: HD 7750/7770 7k/8k
RAM: +8GB - G.Skill/Corsair DDR3-1600 2x4GB or 1x8GB ~3.7k
HDD: WD caviar 1TB ~5.2k
SSD: Corsair Force 3 60/120GB ~5k/7k

Did I miss anything? Will I need more cabinet fans?

I am looking for a small, efficient, cool and silent system as this is gonna be running almost always(at least during daytime). For the same reason, I prefer the intel IB CPUs. Like to have an i7 but not sure if the added HT is gonna give that much performance difference compared to i5.

Sorry for the long post. Earlier, I was even confused whether to go for a laptop or desktop. The specs of samsung series 5 is awesome. i7 IB,8GB,1TB,GT650M,blue-ray for ~60k
Samsung Series 5 NP550P5C-S02IN 3rd Gen Ci7/8GB/1TB/2GB Graphics/Win 7 HP: Flipkart.com: Compare, Review Samsung Notebook

 

[NoasArcAngel]

@jainmj dont compare a laptop to a desktop, even though they may have the same gpu. The desktop version = 5x powerful

 

[jainmj]

@jainmj dont compare a laptop to a desktop, even though they may have the same gpu. The desktop version = 5x powerful

I have decided to go with a desktop because I dont need the portability and I guess the maintenance/upgrades will be cheaper in the future.

 

[NoasArcAngel]

Intel 3 GHz LGA 1155 Core i5-2320 Processor @ 11.2k
ASUS P8H77-MLE Motherboard @ 7.8k
G.Skill RipjawsX DDR3 8 GB (1 x 8 GB) PC RAM (F3-10666CL9S-8GBXL) @ 3.6k
Seagate Barracuda 500 GB HDD Internal Hard Drive (ST500DM002) @ 3.8k
Sapphire AMD/ATI HD 7850 HDMI OC Edition 2 GB GDDR5 Graphics Card @ 18.5k
Corsair 300R @ 4.3k
Corsair CMPSU-500CXV2UK 500 Watts PSU @ 4k

Total : 53.7 k . In the local markets you should be able to manage around 50~ k mark

Well if you are planning to buy / upgrade your desktop in peices i would advice you to edit your post and limit your budget to whatever you are going to spend now. If you want to upgrade later. invest in a good processor . avg motherboard and atleast 8gb ram. Also a 6gbps hdd (phyiscal hdd prices will go down so if you can manage with a okay one stick with that ) and a medium SDD will be a good touch. Additionally you might want to wait for a few months and then maybe get a good gpu.

 

[jainmj]

^^^
Please read my answer to Qn.11. I have already a config in mind and I need feedback and suggestions on alternatives. Please let me know why you dont recommend what I have already opted to buy. I will edit the topic to "feedback" instead of "suggest".

 

[acewin]

Thanks for the suggestions about PSU+Cabinet+Cooler. I liked them all. Specially the cabinet, which I feel, is awsome.


If you see my original requirements at the start of thread, you can notice that I had SSD in my mind. But, because of targetted budget, I decided that SSD can wait. Didn't want to compromise with the basic configuration for it.

With that, I believe my rig is almost finalized (99%) as below:

Component	Brand/Model	Shop	Price
CPU	intel core i5 3570k	SP Road Bangalore	14000
Motherboard	ASUS P8Z77-m Pro	Flipkart	12720
RAM	G.Skill RipjawsX 8 GB DDR3-1600/PC3-12800 1 x 8 GB	Flipkart	3774
HDD	WD Caviar Blue 500 GB 6.0 Gbps	Flipkart	3902
Monitor	Dell 23" LED ST2320L	Flipkart	10864
Cabinet	Corsair 300R	Flipkart	4340
PSU	Corsair CMPSU-430CXV2UK 430 Watts	Flipkart	2867
CPU Cooler	Cooler Master Hyper TX3 EVO Cooler	Flipkart	1456
Case Fans x 2	Cooler Master BC 120 mm White LED Fan Cooler	Flipkart	1000
Keyboard + Mouse	Microsoft Wireless Desktop 2000 Wireless	Flipkart	1475
Optical Drive	Asus DRW-24B5ST Internal Optical Drive	Flipkart	1148
Total	57546

I'll wait for couple of more days for any last minute suggestions and better deals available. And will post more if I purchase or seek further changes in rig.

All the experts and seniors (and commoners too ), please suggest if I may improve the config for my requirements without effecting the budget too much.

dsdsdsd

 

[Myth]

^^ Posted in wrong thread ?

 

[acewin]

above is the post config taken by a different thread, this was suggested for heavy java programming
you want good cooling and you are considering a HTPC cabby which will not provide you enuf cooling option, you like it that is quiet understandable.
You do not want to sepnd more than 2.5K, -- do you want to limit yourself here or keep rig running for longer hours.
If I say you will be running for very very long hours, it will not be wrong, so I suggest spend decently on cooling and cabinet.
Also, you do not need OCing, hence will not suggest K series proccy.

About APC UPS, I hope you have checked this one as well APC BR1100CI-IN UPS - BR1100CI-IN by: APC - TechShop.in - Buy Tech

core i7 would be good thinking, but better get 2nd generation config , in little better and decent price margin.

 

[jainmj]

above is the post config taken by a different thread, this was suggested for heavy java programming
you want good cooling and you are considering a HTPC cabby which will not provide you enuf cooling option, you like it that is quiet understandable.
You do not want to sepnd more than 2.5K, -- do you want to limit yourself here or keep rig running for longer hours.
If I say you will be running for very very long hours, it will not be wrong, so I suggest spend decently on cooling and cabinet.

My requirements are different from Java requirements. AFAIK, Java just need a lot of memory and good enough CPU. For me, more CPU, the better. Because, they are going to be divided among the VMs. CM 361 has a lot of options for additional fans. 3rd party CPU coolers may not fit. I havent checked the sizes of such coolers. And I dont think I will need them. Please stop me if I am wrong.

Also, you do not need OCing, hence will not suggest K series proccy.

Yes. K series is not required.

About APC UPS, I hope you have checked this one as well APC BR1100CI-IN UPS - BR1100CI-IN by: APC - TechShop.in - Buy Tech

The "CI" series dont have software support, which I think is a cool feature to have.

core i7 would be good thinking, but better get 2nd generation config , in little better and decent price margin.

Yes. i7-2600 is an option. Will I get USB 3.0 with 2nd Gen processors?

 

[Minion]

Get AMD FX 8120/8150 visualization will utilize more no. of cores and amd processors now runs more cooler than intels.
I have a amd phenom x4 945 even with 5GB ram I can run 4 VMs at a time and smoothly so i assure you all your VMs will run smoothly with FX 8120/8150

 

[acewin]

incase 2nd gen core i config check this
Intel 3.4 GHz LGA 1155 Core i7-2600 Processor | Processor | Flipkart.com -- 17.6K(there is some 1K instant cash back there)
Z Series chipset board Z68 or Z77 both are fine Intel DZ68DB Motherboard vs ASUS P8Z77-M PRO Motherboard vs Gigabyte GA-Z77M-D3H Motherboard: Compare Motherboards: Flipkart.com
Asus mobo I have suggested in case you are fine spending 12K, otherwise Z68 chipset board will be quiet good as well.
Also this in 10K range ASUS P8Z77-M Motherboard | Motherboard | Flipkart.com
RAM buying single chip of 8 GB is fine but will suggest get a pair of 8GB chips, you will find

yep you will get USB 3.0 check the boards I have suggested

wrong, virtualization needs more memory than Java programming. I have whole day round 1 linux VM running on windows with dedicated 4GB.
Mem utilization gets shown as 6-7 GB at that time out of my 16GB on my elitebook.
Java programming does not require that much ram, it is the IDE which requires the RAM. and that too not much dedicatedly

 

[jainmj]

Get AMD FX 8120/8150 visualization will utilize more no. of cores and amd processors now runs more cooler than intels.
I have a amd phenom x4 945 even with 5GB ram I can run 4 VMs at a time and smoothly so i assure you all your VMs will run smoothly with FX 8120/8150

TDP of FX is 125w. Intel IB is 77w. Is that not a big difference? That is the only thing stopping me.
Also, please suggest me a good mobo for FX. I need usb 3.0, on-board graphics and RAID. Only the 9 series chipsets support DDR3-1600 and more. And they are costly. How do you compare DDR3-1333 and DDR3-1600? Not much difference?

Thanks.

Please give feedback on this:

AMD Build:

Cabinet	CM Elite 361	2.2k	Flipkart
Processor	AMD FX-8150	12.3k	Flipkart
Motherboard	ASUS M5A88-M	5.6k	Flipkart
RAM	G.Skill NT DDR3-1333 2x4GB	2.5k	Flipkart
PSU	Seasonic S12II 520w	4.2k	Flipkart
HDD	WD Caviar Blue 500GB	3.9k	Flipkart
DVD Writer	Any	1.1k	Flipkart
Mouse	Logitech M100	0.4k	Flipkart
UPS	APC BR1000G-IN	7.6k	agsystemsindia.com
Total		40k

Intel Build Diff:

Processor	Intel Core i5 3550	13.5k	Flipkart
Motherboard	ASUS P8H77-M	8.7k	Flipkart
RAM	G.Skill Sniper DDR3-1600 2x4GB	3.7k	Flipkart
Total Diff		+5.5k

Please let me know if there are better places to buy these from.

Will I need extra fans? Not sure if the motherboards can support extra fans.

I can save 2.5k more if I opt for FX-8120. The max frequencies are 4.0 and 4.2GHz respectively. Will there be much difference in max performance?

Is it better to buy AMD 970/990FX based motherboards for FX-8120/8150? They are going to be costlier and without on-board graphics. I will have to purchase the graphics card right away.

 

[vkl]

@ jainmj

As you are going to run multiple server OSes and softwares inside the VM it is better to get the fx8150.

Suppose you want to run many VMs at a time say 7 VMs at a time.
In case of fx8150 you can assign each VM one core and the remaining core is for OS(host).
But in case of i5 2400 as the number of cores(4) is lesser than number of VMs running at that time,the VMs have to share CPU cores which is done by CPU time slicing.
So even though i5 2400 is significantly faster per clock say about 40%,the speed of execution would be less as each VM gets effectively lesser speed(each VM gets less than half of this speed) due to CPU time slicing resulting in VMs running slower.
Also time is lost due to context switching as processor has to save each VM's state and registers before switching to another VM.
Even if you run 3-4 VMs and want to assign 2 cores to say 2 of them,in the case of i5 2400 it would be achieved by CPU time slicing but in the case of fx8150 there would be no need of CPU time slicing.In this case also the fx would br handy as the per core performance of the i5 would be more than neutralized.
With Fx there is more flexibility for core assignments to VMs if one is running more VMs or wants to assign more cores to VMs.



Fx8150/8120 runs cooler than their ivy bridge counter parts.
Unless you are into overclocking you won't gain from the amd 970/990X based motherboards.
970/990x mobos generally have crossfire as well as sli support and have internal header for usb 3.0.
If you are going for an FX config then opt for 1600MHz RAM like G skill ripjaws(1600MHz).
Go for the fx8150 if possible as the max turbo frequency of fx8120 which you are talking of is with 4cores.
Max turbo frequency with 4cores for fx8150=4.2GHz Max turbo frequency with 4cores for fx8120=4GHz
Max turbo frequency with 8cores for fx8150=3.9GHz Max turbo frequency with 8cores for fx8120=3.4GHz

For cabinet cm361 is a compact one but nzxt source 210 elite would be better if you take airflow into account.

 

[jainmj]

Re: Feedback req - PC for virtualization and casual gaming

So even though i5 2400 is significantly faster per clock say about 40%,the speed of execution would be less as each VM gets effectively lesser speed(each VM gets less than half of this speed) due to CPU time slicing resulting in VMs running slower.
Also time is lost due to context switching as processor has to save each VM's state and registers before switching to another VM.
Even if you run 3-4 VMs and want to assign 2 cores to say 2 of them,in the case of i5 2400 it would be achieved by CPU time slicing but in the case of fx8150 there would be no need of CPU time slicing.In this case also the fx would br handy as the per core performance of the i5 would be more than neutralized.

Valid point. Thank you.

Fx8150/8120 runs cooler than their ivy bridge counter parts.

Yes. Was reading some more benchmarks yesterday and realized that non-K Ivy Bridge is not that efficient.
Power Consumption And Max. Temperature : Core i5-3570K, -3550, -3550S, And -3570T: Ivy Bridge Efficiency

Unless you are into overclocking you won't gain from the amd 970/990X based motherboards.
970/990x mobos generally have crossfire as well as sli support and have internal header for usb 3.0.
If you are going for an FX config then opt for 1600MHz RAM like G skill ripjaws(1600MHz).

The motherboard ASUS M5A88-M dont support 1600 normally. It says 1600(OC) is supported. What does that mean? Can I use 1600MHz ram safely?

Go for the fx8150 if possible as the max turbo frequency of fx8120 which you are talking of is with 4cores.

Didn't know that. 8150 it is then.

For cabinet cm361 is a compact one but nzxt source 210 elite would be better if you take airflow into account.

ok. How much does nzxt cost?

 

[vkl]

^^Nzxt source 210 costs around 2.6k.It has a front usb3.0 slot.

ASUS M5A88-M can be overlclocked to run the memory at 1600MHz.If one doesn't overclock it will run at 1333MHz.

Alternatively you can opt for Gigabyte GA-970A-UD3 which natively supports memory frequency upto 1866MHz and also has an internal header for usb3.0.
Though for that you have to buy a graphic card as it doesn't have on board graphics.

 

[jainmj]

^^Nzxt source 210 costs around 2.6k.It has a front usb3.0 slot.

Good one. Let me know if it is better to relax the budget for a cool and quiet run for many years (in case there are better cabinets).

I am confused about the motherboard now. Lemme think.

 

[vkl]

At around 2.5-3k range nzxt source 210 is a good option.It is enough for your purpose

If you really want a good all round cabinet which can last you many years then corsair carbide 400r is the one to go for.
Good airflow,good cable management,good fans,2 front usb3.0 port slots,huge rear end space.Costs around 5k

 

[jainmj]

I think I can buy the items in future upgrade now itself and go for flipkart's 3 months EMI. That way, I can take opt for 970 chipset based motherboard.

So I need suggestions on these:
Speakers: Creative Inspire T3130 or any good 2.1 ~2.4k
Monitor: AOC I2251FW is a cheap IPS panel. Is it good? Or should I be going for Dell U2312HM? How good are these IPS panels for gaming. I read mixed reviews. 8.5k/17k
Graphics: HD 7750/7770 7k/8k

 

[acewin]

with my biased opinion I would say Dell and it is 15K not 17.
HD7750 or HD7770 are good, more like which is inside budget.