Will SFF Compete with this??

C

csidd

n00b
Joined
Jan 6, 2004
Messages
23
I have a few questions for the veteran SFF users here. I am considering a SFF to replace my mamoth tower. I'd like to know if it can compete with my current tower setup. I curruntly have

Lian Li PC70
H20 cooled
Asus P4C800 ED
P4 3G
2GB Corsair
ATI 8500XT
Antec 550 true power ps

If I replace that with something along the lines of a
Shuttle SN25P
AMD 64 3000
will I have any problems wih heat? I'm assuming I will gain a little performance over the P4.
It's time to get rid of this small house under my desk but I would like to gain performance not lose performance. I mainly a lot of photo editing, gaming and video editing. Thanks for the feedback.
 
If you do any amount of editing, more than gaming, P4 is the way to go. Get ready for the AMD fanclub to enter the room, though. If you game for even 2 hours a day, but edit videos,etc for more than 4 hours a day, an AMD is useless, especially a 3000+. With Homesite, Photoshop CS, and IE open, my 3000+ would slow down. With my new P4 600 setup it flies through everything, and yes, it plays games fine. Its not like a P4 CANT play games, it plays games just fine!

I would recommend:

SB81P
P4 600 Series CPU

2GB of ure ram
your VC, etc...
 
You do know all you would have to do is get a new heatsink a motherboard. All your existing stuff would fit into a SFF (not a shuttle. Thinking Fragbox or Monarch Hornet Pro)
 
Dillusion said:
"If you do any amount of editing, more than gaming, P4 is the way to go. Get ready for the AMD fanclub to enter the room, though."
Click to expand...
Um, what do you expect when you interject your opinion in such a manner? He's asking about heat and you go on a tangent about how Intel is better than AMD for editing? As it stands, Intel's CPU's tend to consume more power hence dissipate more heat and would be bad for SFF's. Like the generalized statement?

/Rant

csidd, heat is always an issue with SFF boxes. While the ICE heatpipe setup is nice, you will probably need to do a bit more with regards to creating positive airlfow in the case. Many folks add an 80mm intake fan to the side of the case, or, tend to replace the case panel with mesh sides. Check out the SFFTECH forums for some of the mod's people do to keep their boxes running cool, including both Intel and AMD's latest offerings. With the setup you describe you should be fine.

-E
 
You could always get something like an Aquagate Mini closed circuit watercooling kit for around $100 if you have a 120mm fan.
 
i have that exact setup as my seoncdary mini, csidd....
cooling is not a problem at all with that mini... there have been roumors about ram overheating... but i call BS on that, or they are putting too much Volts to the ram, cuz mine runs smooth and stalbe....

however... i would take Dillusion's advice if you are into editing.... because A64's and P4's both run games great... and you will not be held back by eather of them.... but when it comes to productivity... once cpu is gona leave you sitting and twittleing your thumbs longer than the other... and you know what they say... time = money... ;-)

and shadowbreaker513 is also right... you can buy a Monarch Hornet Pro barebone and stick your current compnents in there... its about 50% bigger than the smallest shuttles, but worth the extra space for their upgradability (since they use normal computer parts) and lack of propriatary parts means if something breaks or acts up... its a lot easyer to troubleshoot/replace...
 
Intel beats AMD in video editing by a few seconds, a minute at most, AMD beats Intel in gaming buy a lot more FPS, they are cheaper, and dissipate less heat

Intel<AMD
 
Hate_Bot said:
Intel beats AMD in video editing by a few seconds, a minute at most, AMD beats Intel in gaming buy a lot more FPS, they are cheaper, and dissipate less heat

Intel<AMD
Click to expand...

FPS that you cant see is my point....
they are both blazing fast, and play all the current games flawlessly.... and your "A LOT" is gona be arround 10FPS @ most @ res's & details that it actually matters to compare them at...

i have a P4 2.8 socket478 mini and a A64 SN25P 3000+ mini and i "see" absolutly no gaming differance between the 2 machines... (and they are both running 6600GT's)
 
The intel counterpart is going to consume a lot more power and run hotter - the minor performance differences aren't a major issue in this case.
 
Hate_Bot said:
Intel beats AMD in video editing by a few seconds, a minute at most, AMD beats Intel in gaming buy a lot more FPS, they are cheaper, and dissipate less heat

Intel<AMD
Click to expand...

Yes.

You are correct.

AMD beats Intel by 40 bajillion FPS in EVERY game known to man kind.

But WHAT THE HELL IS THE POINT if BOTH CPU's already render at >70 FPS?

70 FPS is the LIMIT to what the human eye can differentiate at... If hes using it for editing then the P4 for would better suit him, otherwise he'd be much wiser saving the cash for the A64.

Christ, can people not be IMPARTIAL observers instead of fan boys?

Second post of this type...
 
Amazes me how a simple "will this be okay for SFF heat wise" ends up into yet another; AMD vs INTEL war... I guess it never does get old though..... AMD all the way!
 
My statement was barely an opinion, who cares about heat, who gives a shit if the intel reaches 70C under load, and the AMD only reaches 50c. As long as its stable. Point being, is that the P4 will excel in what he wants it to do, and it will also chug along AT FPS LESS THAN AMD, BUT ALSO MORE THAN ENOUGH THAT CAN BE SEEN BY THE HUMAN EYE.
 
Dillusion said:
My statement was barely an opinion, who cares about heat, who gives a shit if the intel reaches 70C under load, and the AMD only reaches 50c. As long as its stable. Point being, is that the P4 will excel in what he wants it to do, and it will also chug along AT FPS LESS THAN AMD, BUT ALSO MORE THAN ENOUGH THAT CAN BE SEEN BY THE HUMAN EYE.
Click to expand...

Heat affects more than just your processor. The hotter P4 will raise the case temperature, which will increase the video card temperature, RAM temp, HDD temp, chipset temp etc.. All giving a higher possibility of failure and/or instability. Also, the hotter the CPU runs, the harder your computer has to work to keep it cool. And the harder your computer is working to keep it cool = more noise, especially in an SFF. Considering this guy is coming from a WCed computer I think he is someone who values both a cool and quiet processor.

And to you Intel fanb0ys, dont patronize people with your "AMD's advantage in such and such is so small as to not matter". Intels advantage in video editing is around 5-15% in most cases, with it generally hovering somewhere around 10. This means that unless you are using your computer as part of a render farm, the advantage of the Intel is pretty much just as meaningless as the advantage AMD has in gaming....i mean seiously what were you gonna do with those extra ten seconds of your life anyways?
 
Ok! So since the advantage of both companies is so small, lets ditch them alltogether! What this man needs is a dual VIA C3 System, complete with 1 DIMM slot and a PCI Slot, And who cares about heat when all your processors need is a GF2MX HSF!

Im not an intel f4nboi, my spare rig is a sempron, and my last months rig was an A64 S939 setup, so dont bitch at me. And guess what? Ill probably move to M2 when it comes out, so dont speculate what you dont know.

FYI- The heat arguement is pointless, because the shuttle ICE or the new P chassis BTX style cooling system is more than enough to handle any high end P4 or AMD Processor and keep it at more than acceptible temperatures. So with your heat arguement gone, whats left, power consumption? Each PSU is again more than enough to handle all his needs. So with that said, you have youre 'marginal performance' arguement, which is solved by the fact that he does allot of video editing, and this 'marginal performance gain for intel' will 'marginally' help him. God forbid he gets only 80 FPS in HL2 as opposed to 87 FPS with an AMD processor, oh sheeettt.

The point is still, that the marginal performance he needs, is the marginal performance in editing apps, not gaming.
 
Dillusion said:
The heat arguement is pointless, because the shuttle ICE or the new P chassis BTX style cooling system is more than enough to handle any high end P4 or AMD Processor and keep it at more than acceptible temperatures. So with your heat arguement gone, whats left, power consumption? Each PSU is again more than enough to handle all his needs. So with that said, you have youre 'marginal performance' arguement, which is solved by the fact that he does allot of video editing, and this 'marginal performance gain for intel' will 'marginally' help him. God forbid he gets only 80 FPS in HL2 as opposed to 87 FPS with an AMD processor, oh sheeettt.
Click to expand...

heh, i was going to point out the new P series by shuttle eliminates cooling the cpu heating up the rest of the case as it goes in one side and right out the other bypassing the rest of the case, but looks like you alrady covered that...
 
Some of you guys need to chill, and just give some advice on if what the man wants to build bill be powerful enough to do what he needs to do. Having said that here comes my 2 cents: Price is always something that I look at when I'm contemplating a purchase. From what I found on www.pricewatch.com the AMD64 3000+ 939 was about 30 bucks cheaper than the P4 3G. This is a fact, and saving money on a deal is my advice and my opinion so having said that I'm going to run before some fan boy threatens to castrate me for having said what I have said.
 
Dillusion said:
Ok! So since the advantage of both companies is so small, lets ditch them alltogether! What this man needs is a dual VIA C3 System, complete with 1 DIMM slot and a PCI Slot, And who cares about heat when all your processors need is a GF2MX HSF!

Im not an intel f4nboi, my spare rig is a sempron, and my last months rig was an A64 S939 setup, so dont bitch at me. And guess what? Ill probably move to M2 when it comes out, so dont speculate what you dont know.

FYI- The heat arguement is pointless, because the shuttle ICE or the new P chassis BTX style cooling system is more than enough to handle any high end P4 or AMD Processor and keep it at more than acceptible temperatures. So with your heat arguement gone, whats left, power consumption? Each PSU is again more than enough to handle all his needs. So with that said, you have youre 'marginal performance' arguement, which is solved by the fact that he does allot of video editing, and this 'marginal performance gain for intel' will 'marginally' help him. God forbid he gets only 80 FPS in HL2 as opposed to 87 FPS with an AMD processor, oh sheeettt.

The point is still, that the marginal performance he needs, is the marginal performance in editing apps, not gaming.
Click to expand...


You forget the whole point that more heat more noise, and no matter how good the cooling system is, it doesn't completely isolate the heat from the CPU. A hotter CPU still heats up the ambient case temp and therefore all other components in the case...

Also, I doubt he NEEDS that extra 10 seconds he has to wait for his AMD cpu to render the same video that it would take the Intel to render. The point I am making that both processors will be more than adequate for his needs. Also, I never said that an SFF would not be able to handle the heat from a Pentium CPU, but the fact remains that Athlons run significantly cooler than P4s, and therefore you could get a much quieter system from an Athlon than a P4, and since the guy is coming from a watercooled system, I am sure he is someone who values peace and quiet.
 
Im not sure if you do allot of 2d/editing work, but you really do need that extra 10 percent. When i had my 3000+, it would struggle to even save .html files in homesite in time before i alt+f4'd the program. it took at least 2 seconds to close the document, and save it, causing the 'do you want to save' message to pop up, after pressing ctrl+s and alt+f4 directly after it. Now the reason this was so annoying, is that i had 2,000 html pages to edit, and i was copying, pasting, saving, and closing, all within seconds. To me, saving the pages the instant i pressed ctrl+s was imperative, and the A64 couldnt handle that. This P4 can, and that 'minimal increase' i get, is just what i need to do all those pages in a timely manner, and not have to answer to the error message, wasting time.

Thats a personal experience with the 3000+, and my upgrade to a 630.
 
as far as heat and noise goes, while the SN25P with a 3000+ does not get much over 60*C in a room with a reasonable temperatue, it does make quite a bit of wracket when under any kind of load... i would only assume that the same is to be expected of the P4's P Chasis...
but even being "LOUD" i would not consider the P Chasis's fan noise annoying, its actually quite easy to tune out..
 
Vapor1000 said:
as far as heat and noise goes, while the SN25P with a 3000+ does not get much over 60*C in a room with a reasonable temperatue, it does make quite a bit of wracket when under any kind of load... i would only assume that the same is to be expected of the P4's P Chasis...
but even being "LOUD" i would not consider the P Chasis's fan noise annoying, its actually quite easy to tune out..
Click to expand...


To put in my $0.02 , most computer fan noise is easy to tune out, however, you dont truly realise how annoying it can be until you work with a truly silent (or at least much more silent) computer. When I turn off the fans on my laptop, its like...amazing. I mean the fan usually sits at low and is pretty easy to tune out as you said, but when turning off the fans and the room falls completely silent, its amazing, thats why I never underestimate the value of a truly silent pc.
 
Erasmus354 said:
To put in my $0.02 , most computer fan noise is easy to tune out, however, you dont truly realise how annoying it can be until you work with a truly silent (or at least much more silent) computer. When I turn off the fans on my laptop, its like...amazing. I mean the fan usually sits at low and is pretty easy to tune out as you said, but when turning off the fans and the room falls completely silent, its amazing, thats why I never underestimate the value of a truly silent pc.
Click to expand...

oh i know... back about a year and a half ago when i was lax on having "Performance PCs" i had a P4 2.4 system that i had fan bussed way down (just under 5v) and granted my pc ran about 136*F idle (it was in a cabanate with the door off back then), but it ran completely silent... and by silent... i mean you couldent hear the hard drive, and you couldent hear the fan noise even if your ear was 2 incehs away from the fan itself..
as ive become more of an enthusiest again, ive had to learn to deal with a little bit of fan noise.. but Vantec Tornado's i will never learn to tolorate...
 
Dillusion said:
Im not sure if you do allot of 2d/editing work, but you really do need that extra 10 percent. When i had my 3000+, it would struggle to even save .html files in homesite in time before i alt+f4'd the program. it took at least 2 seconds to close the document, and save it, causing the 'do you want to save' message to pop up, after pressing ctrl+s and alt+f4 directly after it. Now the reason this was so annoying, is that i had 2,000 html pages to edit, and i was copying, pasting, saving, and closing, all within seconds. To me, saving the pages the instant i pressed ctrl+s was imperative, and the A64 couldnt handle that. This P4 can, and that 'minimal increase' i get, is just what i need to do all those pages in a timely manner, and not have to answer to the error message, wasting time.

Thats a personal experience with the 3000+, and my upgrade to a 630.
Click to expand...

Sounds like something was wrong with your OS, software or just lack of ram. I have a A64 3000 and it does not lag at all. Even an old Athlon 700 should save files in Homesite pretty quick.

As far as video editing, Intel is the way to go. If you do video editing on any professional level, you need something that has been proven to be stable and quick. Seems like video editing software vendors write their tools for the Intel processor. This is just pure speculation on my part. Read any benchmark out there and you'll see that intel has an advantage in this area.

Gaming wise, AMD is the way to go. Bang for the buck, AMD.

Heat is not an issue with SFF's, or at least with shuttle SFF systems. I would think that these systems have proven themselves in terms of stability. Why does anybody still bring this up. You can have a small, fast, and quiet system that will not crash on you.
 
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