Official Building/Upgrading thread

[SkinnyPupp]

Just a reminder when looking at those benchmarks, the 4KB files are the most important results, especially the low queue/low thread ones. This is what replicates loading many small files, like loading games, etc.

These drives are insane at sequential transfer, but that is a rare job. Moving large files from one drive to another is the main case for that (but that will only be as fast as the slower drive)

Still a nice upgrade! just not as insane as the huge numbers can suggest

[Hondaracer]

Is there an easy way to isolate a ram issue?

I hadn’t started my computer in a few weeks and now I’m getting a ram issue (red light on in the case no boot screen) I’m thinking one of the sticks is bad as I’ve had this issue intermittently before, however I have a large noctua heatsink covering the ram that I’ll have to remove

Is there a better way than pulling one stick at a time and seeing if it boots?

[Razor Ramon HG]

memtest86

You'll still need to run it eventually on individual sticks so..

[AzNightmare]

My current PC has been acting up and I've already reinstalled a fresh copy of win10 and it's still acting up. I'm pretty certain it's a hardware issue.

I moved the SSD with my OS in it to another PC.

I've read that you generally shouldn't do this and that you should reinstall windows again, but is there really any downside to doing this?

The second PC seems to boot up fine and work right now..

[CRS]

Originally Posted by AzNightmare

My current PC has been acting up and I've already reinstalled a fresh copy of win10 and it's still acting up. I'm pretty certain it's a hardware issue.

I moved the SSD with my OS in it to another PC.

I've read that you generally shouldn't do this and that you should reinstall windows again, but is there really any downside to doing this?

The second PC seems to boot up fine and work right now..

Usually driver issues and incompatibilities.

But if it's working....

[Traum]

I'm surprised the OS didn't bxtch about the CPU ID and stuff being different.

[SkinnyPupp]

If going from Intel to AMD or vice versa, it can cause problems. Upgrading to a different chipset from the same brand usually works OK though. Windows might eventually give a license failure, in which case you'll have to call to renew the license.

[AzNightmare]

Originally Posted by CRS

Usually driver issues and incompatibilities.

But if it's working....

Yeah... weird.
I did some research and all sources pretty much said the same thing.

So far, the only thing I've noticed was that I had to update my video card drivers so my monitor would display the correct resolution. All my apps and stuff still work fine.

Originally Posted by SkinnyPupp

If going from Intel to AMD or vice versa, it can cause problems. Upgrading to a different chipset from the same brand usually works OK though. Windows might eventually give a license failure, in which case you'll have to call to renew the license.

I just noticed an "Activate Windows... Go to Settings to activate Windows" watermark on the bottom right of my screen now.

[ime2006]

Building up a 4K Media Server.

If 5 rooms streaming 4K Remux at the same time from this server, Will Cat5e be sufficient on bandwidth ?

[Hondaracer]

Originally Posted by ime2006

Building up a 4K Media Server.

If 5 rooms streaming 4K Remux at the same time from this server, Will Cat5e be sufficient on bandwidth ?

Should be. Cat5e capable of around gigabit speeds. Pulling 4k video streams typically uses 30mb/max

[ime2006]

Originally Posted by Hondaracer

Should be. Cat5e capable of around gigabit speeds. Pulling 4k video streams typically uses 30mb/max

30MB - You meant Megabyte ?

I was doing some calculation.
Gigabit is capable of doing 125 MB.

So, which means it can stream up to 125/30 = 4.16 Devices in 4K
Safe to say it will stream 4 devices without hitting bottleneck.

[!LittleDragon]

The biggest 4k file I have is about 60GB for a 2 hour movie. About 8MB/s... your network should be okay. Disk on the other hand might be a problem depending on your setup. They're pretty big files, likely fragmented all over the place. If you have 5 users requesting reads, it may not be able to keep up.

I did a test with a brand new machine at work with a 5400rpm drive and a jellyfish file. The hardware played the file just fine but the drive couldn't supply the data fast enough and there was a lot of stutter.

[ime2006]

Originally Posted by !LittleDragon

The biggest 4k file I have is about 60GB for a 2 hour movie. About 8MB/s... your network should be okay. Disk on the other hand might be a problem depending on your setup. They're pretty big files, likely fragmented all over the place. If you have 5 users requesting reads, it may not be able to keep up.

I did a test with a brand new machine at work with a 5400rpm drive and a jellyfish file. The hardware played the file just fine but the drive couldn't supply the data fast enough and there was a lot of stutter.

I was also thinking that mechanic hard drive might not be able to keep up if 3-4 systems streaming at the same time.

Unless, i use SSD or raid setup......thats gonna be really expensive.

[!LittleDragon]

Don't go SSD for now, they're still too expensive for the sizes you need. RAID is your best bet. I'm lucky in my line of work, I have access to old server hardware. I'm running a Dell R510 12 bay server for my storage and all I need to buy was the drives and a HBA. I'm doing 3 RAID5 arrays with 4 drives each. Started off with 1 array and kept adding a set of drives when I ran out of space.

Right now, all my slots are full. If I run out of space, I'll upgrade my biggest array 1 drive at a time and expand it. Use the drives I just took out to expand my other arrays, etc until I've removed my smallest drives. It should be a while before I need to do that, my current capacity is about 400TB.

There's no cheap way to do this. I'm hoping SSDs will come down in price enough for me to stuff a 24x2.5" bay server with 4TB SSDs... lol

[Presto]

I think it's about time to replace my Crossfire 7950 with a single GPU. I'd like to stick with AMD since I have Freesync-capable screens. I see that RX580 for ~$300 is already better than my old-ass Crossfire setup. Any recommendations for the best value under $500?

[underscore]

Originally Posted by !LittleDragon

I did a test with a brand new machine at work with a 5400rpm drive and a jellyfish file. The hardware played the file just fine but the drive couldn't supply the data fast enough and there was a lot of stutter.

People still buy 5400rpm drives? If you're going new I don't see a reason not to get 7200.

[roastpuff]

Originally Posted by Presto

I think it's about time to replace my Crossfire 7950 with a single GPU. I'd like to stick with AMD since I have Freesync-capable screens. I see that RX580 for ~$300 is already better than my old-ass Crossfire setup. Any recommendations for the best value under $500?

nVidia cards can work with Freesync screens now - there are lists out there as to screen compatibility, so I'd check your monitor against that list.

Best value for Team Red would be a Vega 56 for around $350-400 depending on sale. RX580s can be had for $250 or better. Keep checking on r/bapcsalescanada for the best deals.

[Traum]

Originally Posted by underscore

People still buy 5400rpm drives? If you're going new I don't see a reason not to get 7200.

I have a different take about this -- why even bother with 7200 rpm drives now? If you want speed, you go SSD. If it is just a storage drive, it doesn't matter whether it is 5400 or 7200 rpm.

[!LittleDragon]

Originally Posted by underscore

People still buy 5400rpm drives? If you're going new I don't see a reason not to get 7200.

I didn't spec these machines but they're the super small machines that use laptop components. They didn't go SSD because of cost and the alternative was 2.5" 5400rpm drives. For most users using Outlook/Word/Excel, it's sufficient.

[underscore]

Originally Posted by Traum

I have a different take about this -- why even bother with 7200 rpm drives now? If you want speed, you go SSD. If it is just a storage drive, it doesn't matter whether it is 5400 or 7200 rpm.

Depends on what you're storing, if you're only adding or reading a small file every so often it's not a big deal. But if you have a large storage drive that has a lot of data, when you want to move large portions of that data the increase in speed actually becomes a significant amount of time difference. Why would you not want the best mix of size and speed?

Prime example being high res video, as said above a 5400rpm drive couldn't keep up. I'm not going to keep the 4k77 version of Star Wars on an SSD, and when I want to grab a copy and watch it I want it to copy that massive file (I want to say it's 50GB?) as fast as possible.

On the topic of drives, why are external drives significantly cheaper than their internal counterparts? I assume the externals come with a 5400rpm drive in them, but this Seagate internal is $30 more than what appears to be the equivalent external drive?

Internal: https://www.amazon.ca/Seagate-Barrac...gateway&sr=8-1
External: https://www.amazon.ca/Seagate-Expans...gateway&sr=8-2

Is the extra cost just for the better warranty or am I missing something here?

[Traum]

Originally Posted by underscore

Depends on what you're storing, if you're only adding or reading a small file every so often it's not a big deal. But if you have a large storage drive that has a lot of data, when you want to move large portions of that data the increase in speed actually becomes a significant amount of time difference. Why would you not want the best mix of size and speed?

This is probably because I am a cheapa$$ -- aren't the 7200 rpm drives more expensive? For the same $$$, I can get a higher capacity drive, or for the same capacity, I can get a cheaper drive.

For moving large volumes of data, I usually just initiate the copying and go off to do something else.

[!LittleDragon]

I buy the cheapest drives... lol... I'm running parity on my arrays so the writes are god awful slow. It'll drop down to 20MB/s once it fills the cache. It's slower than the writes for a single 5400rpm drive so there's no point to go 7200rpm. Reads are not an issue.

[underscore]

I'm having a hard time comparing the price since most of the drives I just picked at random are 5400 for larger sizes and 7200 for smaller sizes. I found a WD Blue 1TB available as either and the 7200 is actually cheaper for whatever reason. I usually buy stuff during sales as well so hard to really compare pricing directly, I just know I can tell without checking the label which of the drives in my storage PC are which when I move files around.

[Jmac]

Originally Posted by underscore

I'm having a hard time comparing the price since most of the drives I just picked at random are 5400 for larger sizes and 7200 for smaller sizes. I found a WD Blue 1TB available as either and the 7200 is actually cheaper for whatever reason. I usually buy stuff during sales as well so hard to really compare pricing directly, I just know I can tell without checking the label which of the drives in my storage PC are which when I move files around.

The 7200 RPM unit is an older model that's being cleared out.

I ordered one to replace a failed Green 1 TB drive last month and Newegg ended up shipping me the lower RPM one. That's what they told me when I asked WTF?

[underscore]

If that's the case am I better off just buying an external drive and stripping it? I'd like to add a 6-8TB, I don't mind paying more money for better stuff but I'd prefer if it's actually better and not just marked up for no reason.