OK I shaved an e6600 crunching rig down to $765 (shipping included) (Prices from TigerDirect.com)! I dropped Windows XP (for Linux). I changed the motherboard to MSI's P965 Neo-F (which does 1066 FSB and 800 MHz RAM and has integrated video). CD-ROM will be added to install the OS and then it will be removed. If I buy this I will either make a rack for it to rest on or I will buy a case locally.

NOTICE: the Power Supply is 180-Watts. This is all that is needed unless you overclock.

If I were to guess, this would get around 1500 credits per day?


CP1-DUO-E6600 :: Intel Core 2 Duo E6600 2.40GHz / 4MB Cache / 1066MHz FSB / Dual-Core / Socket 775 / Processor with Fan (0.1 lbs) $399.99

TSD-80H3 :: Hitachi / 80GB / 7200 / 8MB / SATA-300 / OEM / SATA-II Hard Drive (1 lbs) $49.99

A250-1088 :: AOC / Shark SFX-L / 180-Watt / MATX / 80mm Fan / SATA-Ready / Power Supply (2 lbs) $24.99

M452-2648 :: MSI P965 Neo-F Intel Socket 775 ATX Motherboard / Audio / PCI Express / Gigabit LAN / USB 2.0 / Serial ATA (3 lbs) $109.99

C13-2032 :: Corsair Dual Channel TWINX 1024MB PC6400 DDR2 800MHz EPP Memory (2 x 512MB) (0.5 lbs) $152.99

-Bradford

I would seriously rethink your PSU choice. A 180w no-name PSU could possibly be useful on a P2 cruncher, but that's about it. I'd suggest at least a 400w from Forton or Antec.

And if you aren't going to be overclocking, why get the DDR2-800? Just get some cheap DDR2-533 if you're running stock. http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16820231041 <----This would probably work out fine for you, and costs $81.99 +shipping after a $10 MIR.

Actually, you could probably ditch TigerDirect and buy from Newegg.com. They have the E6600 for $369.99 http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16819115003

The Hitachi HDD for $42.99 http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16822145082

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I bought the same HD at Newegg for less last week, and I'd not try to save money on the power supply. You may decide to put it in a case and need more power later. I recommend over 400 watts.

You are brave to post your specs, because everyone has an opinion... :-D

Edit: You beat me to the post, XS_The_Machine. Nice that we agree on the power supply.

Thanks for the input!

Check out this link for computing power supply needs:

http://www.extreme.outervision.com/psucalculator.jsp

The spec'd computer came out to less than 150 Watts. Maybe I will go with a 200-230 Watt power supply (just in case these no-namers are not 80% efficient). I just don't want to waste power throughout the year (which would increase the cost). Not that I'm particularly strapped for cash, just want something efficient that I can build a couple before the quad-core chips become available and cheap.

Thanks for the info on the RAM. I'm totally new to overclocking so I haven't thought about that aspect. It's good to know that the higher bandwidth is most useful for overclocking!

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I'm not terribly certain that I would trust those online Power calculators. And if you get a PSU that has more power than you need, you probably would be drawing less power from the wall, because a smaller PSU would have to work much harder to produce power if it's working at it's peak rating. A larger PSU isn't necessarily going to draw more power from the wall just because it's capable of more power. It will only draw as much as it needs.

And those no-namers would probably last about 2-3 months powering that computer, if in fact it was able to. And when it did die, there's a chance it take something with it.

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A higher rated PSU doesn't actually use more power. . It only consumes as much power as your hardware needs. The rating is a "Maximum" rating. Getting one of the nicer PSU's would probably save electricity since the electronics wouldn't be operating near their max ratings.

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Paydirt, I've gone ahead and made a list for a cruncher at Newegg for running a stock computer. It came out to $683.33 shipped.


Newegg.com - Computers, Computer Parts and Electronics



1 Gigabyte GA-945GM-S2 Socket T (LGA 775) Intel 945G Micro ATX Intel Motherboard - Retail
Model #: GA-945GM-S2

$95.99


1 HITACHI Deskstar 7K80 HDS728080PLA380 (0A30356) 80GB 7200 RPM SATA 3.0Gb/s Hard Drive - OEM
Model #: HDS728080PLA380

$42.99


1 G.SKILL Extreme 1GB (2 x 512MB) 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 533 (PC2 4200) Dual Channel Kit System Memory Model F2-4200PHU2-1GBNT - Retail
Model #: F2-4200PHU2-1GBNT

$91.99 -$10.00 Instant $81.99


1 ENERMAX Noisetaker II EG425P-VE SFMA 2.2 ATX12V 420W Power Supply - Retail
Model #: EG425P-VE SFMA 2.2

$79.99


1 Intel Core 2 Duo E6600 Conroe 1066MHz FSB LGA 775 Processor Model BX80557E6600 - Retail
Model #: BX80557E6600

$369.99

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Well, 400W is overkill, and power supplies are usually less efficient when lightly loaded. But hard drives take a lot more power when starting up, and there's no telling how much power a no-name supply can actually produce.

I would look at something like a SeaSonic S12-330. It is a high efficiency quality supply, and 330W is plenty.

A diskless test cruncher (AM2 + sempron) that I set up using an older version of this power supply drew 58W from the wall while running SuperPi. :)

I would look at something like a SeaSonic S12-330. It is a high efficiency quality supply, and 330W is plenty.

That PSU is highly recommended here: http://www.silentpcreview.com/article28-page1.html

I'm ordering the 430W version tonight as my supplier doesn't stock the 330W (or I'd get that!). Unless you're running a high end GPU I'd be very suprised if you ever need more power than that. I'd definitely say don't scrimp on a cheap PSU though - it's a false economy.

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More info than you ever cared to know about PSU's:
http://www.dansdata.com/psus.htm

And a quote from that article on ratings:

In the real world, very high PSU ratings are seldom important. If you're not running giant drive arrays, big Peltier cooling rigs and/or an amazingly overclocked CPU, a quality 350W PSU should be more than enough for any system. Extra capacity doesn't hurt, though; a computer that only needs a 300W PSU won't draw any more power if you give it a 600W one.

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Thanks. I feel a little leery of G-SKILL memory, have you used this much in your awesome farm? I would also need to get a CPU w/fan - I think?

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G.Skill makes some awesome memory. I haven't had that particular set, but I've had two other sets, and they've been champs.

The Retail C2D comes with a HSF, which should be fine for running stock. I've heard that the fan on it is a little loud though.

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What's the difference from having (1) 512 MB memory card, or having (2) 256 MB memory cards?

Yeah, I've got to agree, G.Skill rocks.

I'm not certain, but I think that you can put a quieter fan in for the stock one.

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What's the difference from having (1) 512 MB memory card, or having (2) 256 MB memory cards?

The 2x256 will operate in dual channel. That's the only difference besides the fact the 1 512 stick will be easier to upgrade, especially if you only have 2 ram slots.

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You'll want atleast 512 per core for any boinc project. Needs vary, but your max gain is felt by going up to 512, then the gain for any more than that slips quickly.

What's the difference from having (1) 512 MB memory card, or having (2) 256 MB memory cards?

It will take someone better than me to explain that in layman's terms. Here is an excellent article at ARS Technica. RAM Guide: Part I
DRAM and SRAM Basics http://arstechnica.com/paedia/r/ram_guide/ram_guide.part1-2.html

On this page in Part III with important statement in bold by me, http://arstechnica.com/paedia/r/ram_guide/ram_guide.part3-1.html

RAM Banks and performance
The advantage to having multiple banks on one DIMM is that each bank can have a row (or "page") active and waiting to spit out data. You'll remember from the previous edition that only one row at a time in an individual bank can be active, and that whenever you need data from a row other than the active one, 1) you've got to precharge the new row, 2) close out the active row, and then 3) open the new row for reading. All of this stuff that's involved in switching rows eats up valuable time, so it's best to keep a particular row active as long as possible. Plus, when a row is active, you can strobe column addresses to it without having to repeat the row address, which allows you to burst data from those columns onto the bus, one column after another. So the more rows of memory that a system can have open at once, the quicker the memory can get data to the CPU whenever it asks for it. And since only one row per bank can be active at a time, having more open rows means having more banks.

Another way to think about the need for multiple banks is to think of it all in terms of keeping the data bus full. If a 64-bit wide data bus is being run at 100MHz, then it has a lot of clock pulses flying by on it every second. Since two words of data can ride on a single clock pulse (one word on the rising edge and one word on the falling edge), the bus has a lot of potential clock pulses open every second that are available to carry pairs of 64-bit data chunks. So think of each clock pulse as having two empty slots that need to be filled, and think of the 100MHz bus as a conveyor that carries those pairs of slots by at a good clip. Now, if there were only one bank of memory, then there could be only one row open on each DIMM. If you had a system with only 1 DIMM then that one row would have to put out enough data every second to fill up all of those slots. Since memory accesses often move around from row to row, that's not likely to happen. That one bank would have to keep switching rows, and since switching rows takes time, a lot of those clock pulses would have to fly by empty-handed while the bank is doing its switching.

More banks gives you more rows open, so that each of those rows can do its part to fill up those clock pulses as they fly by. And if one bank needs to switch rows, another bank can (hopefully) pitch in with some data from its own active row and fill up those clock pulses itself so that none of the pulses get wasted while that other bank is taking care of its business. So you can see that having the ability to keep multiple banks, and thus multiple rows, open is essential to keeping a high-bandwidth data bus full. Note that regular PC133 SDRAM sports multiple banks per chip, but the higher bandwidth and double data rate of DDR DRAM makes the need for multiple banks even more critical.

On an added note, this discussion illustrates why two, 512MB DIMMs of SDRAM will outperform a single, 1GB DIMM. Since each DIMM can have up to four banks, regardless of its size, spreading your memory out among multiple DIMMs offers better performance because of the increased number of banks.

On the same page in Part III, http://arstechnica.com/paedia/r/ram_guide/ram_guide.part3-1.html there is a diagram and it is stated:

Since DDR DRAM is an evolution of SDRAM, its overall approach to providing memory bandwidth is pretty much the same, aside from the fact that it transfers two words of data per clock. To recap the last edition a bit, remember that SDRAM (and now DDR) provides a wide, 64-bit data path from each DIMM, and has multiple banks of memory on each DIMM that can feed into that data path. Check out the following conceptual diagram, which shows a memory subsystem with 3 DIMMs, each of which contains four banks of memory.

This means that two 512s will provide more bandwidth than one 1024 or two 256s are better than one 512. <I've got to fill some of my blank slots...>

If you wait some months you can use the new PS3 Playstation as a crunching box. look here what I have seen today :-)

I think that might only pertain to F@H, though.

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If that's true for F@H and PS3, I guess I will have to hold off on purchasing a crunching machine and wait for the PS3 to come out! *Checks calendar* That just boggles my mind that a PS3 could do 100 gigaflops where a Core 2 Duo does 3.2 gigaflops...

That would be huge! If Rosetta@Home could utilize that, it would only take 1500 PS3's to meet their goal of 150 teraflops!

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