buying better hardware question

[Uri Blass]

I think to buy a new hardware(I use only single core A3000 or PIV3.19 ghz) and I am interested to know what is the best hardware that I can get for different prices.

I plan to buy deep rybka3 so I would like to know the best performance that I can get for every hardware price from 200$ to 1000$

I am not going to build my computer so do not suggest me to do it for a smaller price.

Please include all the costs(including software that I probably need to run rybka 64 bits like 64 bit windows).

Uri

[AdminX]

Here in the United States, a HP Pavilion Elite m9340f - Core 2 Quad Q6700 2.66 GHz with 6GB ram and 750GB Harddrive can be bought for $929 USD not sure what deals are in your neck of the woods.

PS: It comes with Windows Vista 64-bit Home Premium. Oh and they sell it on Amazon.com, not sure what Amazon's price is ....

[Martin Thoresen]

I guess any computer with a Q6600 or Q6700 is a nice deal.

You don't really need 6GB RAM though, it would be sufficient with 2 (or 4 if you plan on running long games -> big hash).

[Marc Lacrosse]

Here in the United States, a HP Pavilion Elite m9340f - Core 2 Quad Q6700 2.66 GHz with 6GB ram and 750GB Harddrive can be bought for $929 USD not sure what deals are in your neck of the woods.

PS: It comes with Windows Vista 64-bit Home Premium. Oh and they sell it on Amazon.com, not sure what Amazon's price is ....

If you intend to overclock the unit do forget about HP : HP PCs and workstations come with a specific BIOS (and some specific chips on the MB) so that any overclocking attempt will fail. I had this painful experience with a coreduo HP unit two years ago and I was told in some fora that this was the case with all their models.

The best performance/cost you can get is by buying spare parts and building the PC yourself. At the moment best perf/cost ratio is either a Q6600 quad (you should build one for a little more than 1000 $ parts) and Majd Ansari just posted the specs for building an octal at less than 2000 $ on rybkachess.

Both Majd and Phil Harris regularly give extremely useful advices on performance chess PC building and overclocking in the rybkachess forum.

Marc

PS I easily built my own watercooled Q6600 for ~1500 dollars in november 2007 (I had no experience with this before). Since then it has run at 3.6Ghz 24/24 7/7 without any failure. I am sure that the same unit could be built for a lesser expense nowadays. I surely will build any new PC myself again in the future. Not only is this not as difficult as one could fear, but it was really an interesting experience for me!

[AdminX]

Here in the United States, a HP Pavilion Elite m9340f - Core 2 Quad Q6700 2.66 GHz with 6GB ram and 750GB Harddrive can be bought for $929 USD not sure what deals are in your neck of the woods.

PS: It comes with Windows Vista 64-bit Home Premium. Oh and they sell it on Amazon.com, not sure what Amazon's price is ....

The best performance/cost you can get is by buying spare parts and building the PC yourself. At the moment best perf/cost ratio is either a Q6600 quad (you should build one for a little more than 1000 $ parts) and Majd Ansari just posted the specs for building an octal at less than 2000 $ on rybkachess.

Both Majd and Phil Harris regularly give extremely useful advices on performance chess PC building and overclocking in the rybkachess forum.

Marc

I am not going to build my computer so do not suggest me to do it for a smaller price.

[Marc Lacrosse]

I am not going to build my computer so do not suggest me to do it for a smaller price.

Sorry, I missed it.

Maybe there are factory-built PCs with an overclockable Q6600 from another company?

As you can easily win close to 50% additional speed through OC with a Q6600/Q6700, it is a bit of a pity to buy one for chess without this feature ...

Marc

[AdminX]

I am not going to build my computer so do not suggest me to do it for a smaller price.

Sorry.

Maybe there are factory-built PCs with overclockable Q6600's from another company?

As you can easily win close to 50% additional speed through OC with a Q6600/Q6700, it is a bit of a pity to buy one for chess without this feature ...

Marc

I think there might be a few companies who build Over Clockable systems, most don't for Warranty reasons. They would loose money on CPU's/ Motherboards when they get that customer that goes overboard and fries their computer.

[Uri Blass]

Here in the United States, a HP Pavilion Elite m9340f - Core 2 Quad Q6700 2.66 GHz with 6GB ram and 750GB Harddrive can be bought for $929 USD not sure what deals are in your neck of the woods.

PS: It comes with Windows Vista 64-bit Home Premium. Oh and they sell it on Amazon.com, not sure what Amazon's price is ....

If you intend to overclock the unit do forget about HP : HP PCs and workstations come with a specific BIOS (and some specific chips on the MB) so that any overclocking attempt will fail. I had this painful experience with a coreduo HP unit two years ago and I was told in some fora that this was the case with all their models.

The best performance/cost you can get is by buying spare parts and building the PC yourself. At the moment best perf/cost ratio is either a Q6600 quad (you should build one for a little more than 1000 $ parts) and Majd Ansari just posted the specs for building an octal at less than 2000 $ on rybkachess.

Both Majd and Phil Harris regularly give extremely useful advices on performance chess PC building and overclocking in the rybkachess forum.

Marc

PS I easily built my own watercooled Q6600 for ~1500 dollars in november 2007 (I had no experience with this before). Since then it has run at 3.6Ghz 24/24 7/7 without any failure. I am sure that the same unit could be built for a lesser expense nowadays. I surely will build any new PC myself again in the future. Not only is this not as difficult as one could fear, but it was really an interesting experience for me!

This task is not for me.
I thought about doing it in 2004 because I read claims that it is simple but
people already convinced me in 2004 that I have no chance to do it
when they told me to try to build some old computer from it's parts and I failed.


They told me that the task of building newer stuff is harder(I do not know if this is harder to build new hardware than old hardware but it was clearly their opinion).

Note that they also have no experience in building computers and I did not talk with people who had commercial interest to sell me a new computer.

I am not good at technical stuff and with no enviroment that supports me I simply has no chance.

I can add that I do not intend to overclock the computer.
I want to finish with the computer after buying it.
I do not like to overclock when later it may crash or who know what.

I am happy with something that works for many days without problems
and I prefer to have something 20% slower and safe and not to have it run at maximal speed only to crash after some time.

I remember that the rebel team lost one game in the rebel challange because of hardware problems when the hardware was simply overclocked.

I plan to use the computer for correspondence analysis so I do not like to take risks.

Uri

[Marc Lacrosse]

OK Uri : if you feel so then HP is surely an interesting option.

Marc

PS : do not forget to get informations regarding proposed operating system and OS upgrade possibilities. A 64 bit OS is a plus for many engines as you know.
Switching my older not-overclockable HP core Duo from 32bits XP to 64 bits XP was a pain (I just did it a few weeks ago)...
... I would even say that this was more complicated than building my quad from scratch

[AdminX]

OK Uri : if you feel so then HP is surely an interesting option.

Marc

PS : do not forget to get informations regarding proposed operating system and OS upgrade possibilities. A 64 bit OS is a plus for many engines as you know.
Switching my older not-overclockable HP core Duo from 32bits XP to 64 bits XP was a pain (I just did it a few weeks ago)...
... I would even say that this was more complicated than building my quad from scratch

You might be able to beat this HP price if you go Dell, but if you do I would only deal with their Business Side and NOT their Consumer Side. I for one don't recommend Dell, but your luck may be better.

PS: Here is a link to current Coupon Codes.