New desktop computer....any advice?

[GraphicDisorder]

The proble, here is many compare these think stations to either shitty manufacture computers or DUI computers with budget parts. 

I am not saying a think station is a shitty computer, but I'd jump off a cliff if I had to use one daily compared to several of our rigs. 

[mk162]

And that is the problem, Thinkstations are built with better parts, pure and simple.  If I built a new system with the same exact parts, I could expect to spend a couple grand.  Heck, my thinkstation has an $800 graphics card.

[GraphicDisorder]

In what 2010?  Lol sorry had to. 

[mk162]

There is clearly no sense in trying.  All I am saying is an $800 system can't compete with a used $4-5,000 system.  This is the reason Macs are generally better than PC's, they are built from better components.

But hey, I am sure that the company that worked on the special effects for Transformers 3 called you to use your system, oh wait, nevermind, I think they used Thinkstations.

[GraphicDisorder]

There is clearly no sense in trying.  All I am saying is an $800 system can't compete with a used $4-5,000 system.  This is the reason Macs are generally better than PC's, they are built from better components.

This was true many years ago.  Today Macs use Intels, and graphics from companies that build the same style PC components.  No offense at all, but your opinoin on that is somewhat dated.  But yes if you go out and buy a 4-5k built PC by Dell or HP, and you go out and buy a Mac of the same value, I would take the Mac.  That's not the PC's fault though, thats the builder.  Dell/HP/etc all take short cuts IMO, I know this because I have had a few really high end ones in my day.  Go build one yourself with parts you know are great, it will be as or more stable than a Mac.  How do I know?  I have a 27 inch iMac and a MacBook Pro, 2 iPhones, and 2 iPads.  I wouldn't use any of them to do my work, they are NOT powerful enough.  Period.  Don't pretend otherwise.  Will they do the work, sure, if you like to work slower.

But hey, I am sure that the company that worked on the special effects for Transformers 3 called you to use your system, oh wait, nevermind, I think they used Thinkstations.

LOL.  Special Effects on movies is done on server farms, rendering terabytes of data to built those types of films.  They are not using the think station that people are suggesting people should buy for $300 bucks LOL.  That's like saying they use Chevy's to pull trailers and buying a Colorado to pull 20,000lbs.  LOL.  Dude, wow. 

BTW here is some info about the rendering farms that did Transformers 2....   The render farm is much larger now though, doubling capacity each year roughly in size due to higher demand for detail/render time.

During the height of production, ILM dedicated 80 percent of its total rendering capacity to Transformers 2, one time even hitting 83 percent. “We broke all the ILM records,” Smith says. “Everyone else squeezed into 17 percent.” How much is that? ILM’s render farm has 5700 core processors, the newest of which are dual processor and quad cores (eight cores per blade), with up to 32 GB of memory per blade. In addition, the render farm can access the 2000 core processors in the artists’ workstations, which ups the total core processors to 7700. As for data storage, the studio’s data center currently has 500 TB online. Transformers 2 sucked up 154 TB, more than seven times the 20 TB needed for 2007′s Transformers.

http://www.studiodaily.com/2009/06/ilm-builds-the-bots-for-imax-shots-in-transformers-sequel/

[blue moon]

Pierre has made me a believer in Thinkstations.  I will never buy a different system unless I need a cheap compy for shipping or something like that.  For any place else in the shop, you cannot beat a Thinkstation...period.  I built my computers for years, and I can tell you that the Thinkstation I bought for $600 is better than my $1500 custom build...by a lot.

Obviously as a PC repair/builder/consultant I'm gonna need some convincing of this.

Can you explain how that is?  I've built many of machines and RARELY have any issues... on the other hand not many brand name systems that I haven't seen issues with.  Be it cheap ram or just plain odd hardware configurations that mean you can't drop in a standard replacement PSU (which is an issue of itself that I need to replace so many PSU's like that).

I'm not closed to changing my mind, I just can't see how it beats a well planned out "DIY" PC with good quality hardware.

As mentioned before, the MAIN difference is going to be in the amount of time spent insuring the compatibility. You can go and buy top of the line parts and put them together, but some of the drivers or possibly even hardware interrupts might be incompatible. Even worse, they might have sections of code that are incompatible and only throw an en error once a month. In workstations everything is analyzed and compatibility is guarantied to the highest extent possible. One of the reasons Macs are more stable than the PC's (other than the better operating system) is the fact that everything is running on their platform and has been thoroughly tested for compatibility.
Additionally, all the workstations are running ECC memory which stands for Error Correction & Checking. RAM contains two additional bits of information (in each byte) and unlike parity memory used on some systems, ECC will actually correct any false readings rather than serving you the incorrect value and notifying you that something is wrong. This in itself is worth the upgrade to workstation chipset.

Additionally, workstation chipsets are designed for higher data throughput rates than regular desktops and support processors with higher amounts of L2 and L3 cache. Same CPUs  (like Intel Xeon) can run larger internal registers and have faster data transfer rates between the core and the cache. Workstation Chipsets also tend to have better communication with the video cards.

All of this translates into faster speed and more reliability. Obviously, as Brandt pointed out, dated technology get overpassed by our regular desktop stuff after some amount of time, but it does take few years and the reliability is still higher on the workstation than the DIY or or even name brand desktop PC.

The reason Thinkstations are the way to go is the fact that they depreciate fast and for very little money you can get something that just two years ago cost 10-20 times as much. Stuff returned off lease and going to ITXchange is coming from big companies in clean air conditioned environment with IT staff to support it and take care of it. These are systems that have been taken care of (companies spending $4k on the systems are usually doing high end work and ppl using them are getting paid a little more than minimum wage.) Almost all fo the workstations and servers purchased from ITX looked brand new on only occasionally had a scuff mark here and there. The insides were always dust free and in perfect condition.

So in the end, yes, my $2k video card is now selling for $250 or so. But I paid $570 for the system about two years back that has been working flawlessly and spent a fraction of what it would cost to build it now, let alone then. I have no less than 10 windows open at any time and very often 30-40. GB sized files in Photoshop zoom in smoothly, I can rotate the whole canvas, have a pixel grid when working on details all without any hiccups. All this for a fraction of what it would cost to build a similar new system with better reliability.

Convinced yet?

pierre
 

[Zelko-4-EVA]

There is clearly no sense in trying.  All I am saying is an $800 system can't compete with a used $4-5,000 system.  This is the reason Macs are generally better than PC's, they are built from better components.

But hey, I am sure that the company that worked on the special effects for Transformers 3 called you to use your system, oh wait, nevermind, I think they used Thinkstations.

Im sure i could dig out the Amiga 1000 that my dad paid $4,500 for back in the mid 80s
I will sell you the entire system plus a copy of Deluxe Paint for $800



Joking aside - I could build a computer with workstation components that would equal the performance of a high end Mac.  They essentially would have the same parts.  The difference would be the price and the operating system.

[blue moon]

There is clearly no sense in trying.  All I am saying is an $800 system can't compete with a used $4-5,000 system.  This is the reason Macs are generally better than PC's, they are built from better components.

This was true many years ago.  Today Macs use Intels, and graphics from companies that build the same style PC components.  No offense at all, but your opinoin on that is somewhat dated.  But yes if you go out and buy a 4-5k built PC by Dell or HP, and you go out and buy a Mac of the same value, I would take the Mac.  That's not the PC's fault though, thats the builder.  Dell/HP/etc all take short cuts IMO, I know this because I have had a few really high end ones in my day.  Go build one yourself with parts you know are great, it will be as or more stable than a Mac.  How do I know?  I have a 27 inch iMac and a MacBook Pro, 2 iPhones, and 2 iPads.  I wouldn't use any of them to do my work, they are NOT powerful enough.  Period.  Don't pretend otherwise.  Will they do the work, sure, if you like to work slower.

But hey, I am sure that the company that worked on the special effects for Transformers 3 called you to use your system, oh wait, nevermind, I think they used Thinkstations.

LOL.  Special Effects on movies is done on server farms, rendering terabytes of data to built those types of films.  They are not using the think station that people are suggesting people should buy for $300 bucks LOL.  That's like saying they use Chevy's to pull trailers and buying a Colorado to pull 20,000lbs.  LOL.  Dude, wow. 

BTW here is some info about the rendering farms that did Transformers 2....   The render farm is much larger now though, doubling capacity each year roughly in size due to higher demand for detail/render time.

During the height of production, ILM dedicated 80 percent of its total rendering capacity to Transformers 2, one time even hitting 83 percent. “We broke all the ILM records,” Smith says. “Everyone else squeezed into 17 percent.” How much is that? ILM’s render farm has 5700 core processors, the newest of which are dual processor and quad cores (eight cores per blade), with up to 32 GB of memory per blade. In addition, the render farm can access the 2000 core processors in the artists’ workstations, which ups the total core processors to 7700. As for data storage, the studio’s data center currently has 500 TB online. Transformers 2 sucked up 154 TB, more than seven times the 20 TB needed for 2007′s Transformers.

http://www.studiodaily.com/2009/06/ilm-builds-the-bots-for-imax-shots-in-transformers-sequel/

your iMac is a desktop. It makes sense you would use something faster to do the work. I've had HP, Dell and IBM workstations and will take IBM over the others. I do think the Thinkstation reliability is on par with Mac if not better. Obviously, loading crap on it can make all that go away.

I see where you are coming from, and agree, you can get a lot of bang for the buck by building yourself. I used to design them, build them and support them for many years. In the end though, for 50% of what you spent on your system (or even less), I can get 90% of the performance and 120% of the reliability.

That is what makes them such a good deal!

pierre

[blue moon]

There is clearly no sense in trying.  All I am saying is an $800 system can't compete with a used $4-5,000 system.  This is the reason Macs are generally better than PC's, they are built from better components.

But hey, I am sure that the company that worked on the special effects for Transformers 3 called you to use your system, oh wait, nevermind, I think they used Thinkstations.

Im sure i could dig out the Amiga 1000 that my dad paid $4,500 for back in the mid 80s
I will sell you the entire system plus a copy of Deluxe Paint for $800



Joking aside - I could build a computer with workstation components that would equal the performance of a high end Mac.  They essentially would have the same parts.  The difference would be the price and the operating system.

absolutely agreed, if you are going to build a system for work, use the workstation boards.

[GraphicDisorder]

There is clearly no sense in trying.  All I am saying is an $800 system can't compete with a used $4-5,000 system.  This is the reason Macs are generally better than PC's, they are built from better components.

This was true many years ago.  Today Macs use Intels, and graphics from companies that build the same style PC components.  No offense at all, but your opinoin on that is somewhat dated.  But yes if you go out and buy a 4-5k built PC by Dell or HP, and you go out and buy a Mac of the same value, I would take the Mac.  That's not the PC's fault though, thats the builder.  Dell/HP/etc all take short cuts IMO, I know this because I have had a few really high end ones in my day.  Go build one yourself with parts you know are great, it will be as or more stable than a Mac.  How do I know?  I have a 27 inch iMac and a MacBook Pro, 2 iPhones, and 2 iPads.  I wouldn't use any of them to do my work, they are NOT powerful enough.  Period.  Don't pretend otherwise.  Will they do the work, sure, if you like to work slower.

But hey, I am sure that the company that worked on the special effects for Transformers 3 called you to use your system, oh wait, nevermind, I think they used Thinkstations.

LOL.  Special Effects on movies is done on server farms, rendering terabytes of data to built those types of films.  They are not using the think station that people are suggesting people should buy for $300 bucks LOL.  That's like saying they use Chevy's to pull trailers and buying a Colorado to pull 20,000lbs.  LOL.  Dude, wow. 

BTW here is some info about the rendering farms that did Transformers 2....   The render farm is much larger now though, doubling capacity each year roughly in size due to higher demand for detail/render time.

During the height of production, ILM dedicated 80 percent of its total rendering capacity to Transformers 2, one time even hitting 83 percent. “We broke all the ILM records,” Smith says. “Everyone else squeezed into 17 percent.” How much is that? ILM’s render farm has 5700 core processors, the newest of which are dual processor and quad cores (eight cores per blade), with up to 32 GB of memory per blade. In addition, the render farm can access the 2000 core processors in the artists’ workstations, which ups the total core processors to 7700. As for data storage, the studio’s data center currently has 500 TB online. Transformers 2 sucked up 154 TB, more than seven times the 20 TB needed for 2007′s Transformers.

http://www.studiodaily.com/2009/06/ilm-builds-the-bots-for-imax-shots-in-transformers-sequel/

your iMac is a desktop. It makes sense you would use something faster to do the work. I've had HP, Dell and IBM workstations and will take IBM over the others. I do think the Thinkstation reliability is on par with Mac if not better. Obviously, loading crap on it can make all that go away.

I see where you are coming from, and agree, you can get a lot of bang for the buck by building yourself. I used to design them, build them and support them for many years. In the end though, for 50% of what you spent on your system (or even less), I can get 90% of the performance and 120% of the reliability.

That is what makes them such a good deal!

pierre

That is interesting claim.  I have no stability issues.  Computer is on 24/7/365.  How much more reliable can you get, just curious.  The last time I shut this computer down was to clean the fans off.  I don't have any hanging apps, no crashing, haven't seen a blue screen in probably 10 years.  Sorry but that's a fairly wild claim that you would presume to know what sort of stability I am having.  This computer is only powered off for cleaning now and then and for power outages only if the UPS shuts it down.  It is only restarted for forced updates for windows or anti virus.  I guess if there is something more reliable than that I should rush out and get it.  BTW I have 3 fully built computers here that run just like that every single day.  I have built 100's of computers over my years, people often tell me they are the most stable machines they have ever had.  Of course I force them to use quality parts....unlike mass manufactured crap that many manufactures stuff in their sub 1k machines.

I reviewed the specs of them, I didn't feel like they were a good deal for a designer at all......  They would have a place, but a powerhouse computer for a designer is certainly in no way on the horizon for those things..... 

[blue moon]

That is interesting claim.  I have no stability issues.  Computer is on 24/7/365.  How much more reliable can you get, just curious.  The last time I shut this computer down was to clean the fans off.  I don't have any hanging apps, no crashing, haven't seen a blue screen in probably 10 years.  Sorry but that's a fairly wild claim that you would presume to know what sort of stability I am having.  This computer is only powered off for cleaning now and then and for power outages only if the UPS shuts it down.  It is only restarted for forced updates for windows or anti virus.  I guess if there is something more reliable than that I should rush out and get it.  BTW I have 3 fully built computers here that run just like that every single day.  I have built 100's of computers over my years, people often tell me they are the most stable machines they have ever had.  Of course I force them to use quality parts....unlike mass manufactured crap that many manufactures stuff in their sub 1k machines.

I reviewed the specs of them, I didn't feel like they were a good deal for a designer at all......  They would have a place, but a powerhouse computer for a designer is certainly in no way on the horizon for those things.....

as somebody who has built hundreds of computers you have the experience of which parts work well with others and will create least problems. Most ppl have built few and don't have the knowledge you have. They will not be able to pick as well or fine tune as you can.

and also agree, that they are not the powerhouses you can buy or build today. But they will run in stride everything you can throw at them in a screenprinting shop. Even if the hardware seems a little dated, remember, they are optimized for the type of work we need them for and the drivers are written specifically to improve the video performance and reliability.

In the end, as we agreed to disagree before, I like the Thinkstations, you prefer custom built. Both will do just fine. . .

pierre

[Mr Tees!!]

...love the debate and all, but can anyone help me out with maybe a place to order from, a definitive parts list, stuff like that? Many of you have said buy quality parts, but the problem is that I have NO idea what is and isnt. My background is press and screens, all the comps I have used up to this point have been off-the-shelf from big-box stores.

...to give you an idea, this is what I have been using for the last two years:

http://www.amazon.com/HP-Pavilion-DM3-1130US-13-3-Inch-Laptop/dp/B00318CG8C

...now, what I am looking for is something that will just...well, WORK FASTER. Illy and PS open painfully slow, even Corel gets hung up each move if there is a complicated contour, or if I import an Illy file that has high-node elements. You know what I mean? I guess $500-1k would be fine, and a TRUSTED refurb like Pierre mentioned would be okay too.

Oh Pierre, BTW, I did look on ebay, but there was still a lot of variation in price and specs. Again, I just dont know what exactly to look for, much less who to trust and how not to get ripped off

...sorry, I know im kind of asking you to give a man a fish instead of teaching a man to fish, but any help is GREATLY appreciated. I dont wanna hafta do this again for at least 3 years.

...Thanks again guys!!

[RICK STEFANICK]

we just bought one from best buy yesterday,my motherboard friday afternoon in the other. what a nightmare this has been.
dell inspiron with 8gb memory, 1 tb hardrive,wireless, intel core i3 processor. came with a 21.5" hd monitor..out the door after tax for 527.00.. fast enough for me and the kids get to eat this week..

[GraphicDisorder]

That is interesting claim.  I have no stability issues.  Computer is on 24/7/365.  How much more reliable can you get, just curious.  The last time I shut this computer down was to clean the fans off.  I don't have any hanging apps, no crashing, haven't seen a blue screen in probably 10 years.  Sorry but that's a fairly wild claim that you would presume to know what sort of stability I am having.  This computer is only powered off for cleaning now and then and for power outages only if the UPS shuts it down.  It is only restarted for forced updates for windows or anti virus.  I guess if there is something more reliable than that I should rush out and get it.  BTW I have 3 fully built computers here that run just like that every single day.  I have built 100's of computers over my years, people often tell me they are the most stable machines they have ever had.  Of course I force them to use quality parts....unlike mass manufactured crap that many manufactures stuff in their sub 1k machines.

I reviewed the specs of them, I didn't feel like they were a good deal for a designer at all......  They would have a place, but a powerhouse computer for a designer is certainly in no way on the horizon for those things.....

as somebody who has built hundreds of computers you have the experience of which parts work well with others and will create least problems. Most ppl have built few and don't have the knowledge you have. They will not be able to pick as well or fine tune as you can.

and also agree, that they are not the powerhouses you can buy or build today. But they will run in stride everything you can throw at them in a screenprinting shop. Even if the hardware seems a little dated, remember, they are optimized for the type of work we need them for and the drivers are written specifically to improve the video performance and reliability.

In the end, as we agreed to disagree before, I like the Thinkstations, you prefer custom built. Both will do just fine. . .

pierre

No doubt about it, and id help any single one of you that wanted to build a computer.  Hell for some of you id even put it together for you free just you cover shipping and all that and all parts.  Building computers has been a big part of my life for a long time. 

There is nothing wrong with the machine you are pushing (so hard), but I personally think its should be VERY clear to people that it is yes in fact very dated.  You mention bus speed (it runs the same bus as a i7 boards from even 4 years ago just to give you a idea (I assume you are using a xeon 5160 roughly).  The $2,000 video card you have in your machine is only around 200 bucks today.  The Processor is not even on the list of high end processors on CPU benchmark site and its a really long list so that says something, 4mb cache vs 8mb on my proc, dual core vs quad core, and so on.  The machine you talked about came with nearly no ram either.  You can optimize all you want drivers, if they are slow they are still slow.  I have no delay at all in video, no hang up in video, nothing.  I have no idea what you think I am using over here but my 4 year old PC is still a rocket by even today's standards and the one I just built my employee Erik, smokes this thing.  You are probably still using slow 3gbps 7,500rpm hard drives even in that machine.  Sorry many but nothing about that machine screams performance by todays standards.  You should now by now tech moves quick. 

All I am getting at, is that its a mild at best machine and it is NOT a powerful machine by today's standards. 

I think if you fix around on customer art then that machine would be great.  If you intend to work with the machine all of the time hours on end, built it big, let it last for years and years and still be powerful.  Look at what I did, I spent probably 1800 ball park 4 years ago and still today it's considered a high end machine.  Had I bought a machine like you are suggesting (which would be out dated before I even bought it), it would then be 4 more years outdated by now.  I mean by your same math you should be running on a precision oval or something.  It just doesn't add up to me.  Sorry.

We certainly disagree, the numbers dont lie.

[mk162]

actually, you got some good benchmark software, we can test them?  that would be fun.