2011 or 1155 build for cs6

[dpm87]

I am looking to purchase the parts in the next couple days for my build. I am building this computer for these reasons:

CS6 PS: 50%
CS6 PR & AE: 20%
Games: 20%
Internet: 10%

Here are the two builds I was looking at, what one do you THINK is a better option for the price/performance. I have 6tb currently with a i7-920, frio, 460gtx, 900w psu, 16gb 1300mhz ram. I will transfer the drives over to the new build.

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2011 Build with 6 core = $1,900

Antec DF-85 Black Steel / Plastic ATX Full Tower Computer Case
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811129087
$120 AMIR

EVGA 02G-P4-2670-KR GeForce GTX 670 2GB
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814130782
$400

Antec High Current Gamer Series HCG-900 900W ATX12V
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817371050
$130

G.SKILL Ripjaws Z Series 32GB (4 x 8GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1600
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820231507
$210

GIGABYTE GA-X79-UD3 LGA 2011 Intel X79 SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.0 ATX Intel
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813128532
$240

Intel Core i7-3930K Sandy Bridge-E 3.2GHz (3.8GHz Turbo) LGA 2011 130W Six-Core Desktop
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819116492
$570

CORSAIR H100 (CWCH100) Extreme Performance Liquid CPU Cooler
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835181017
$110

Mushkin Enhanced Chronos MKNSSDCR120GB 2.5" 120GB SATA III MLC Internal Solid State Drive (SSD)
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820226236
$94

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1155 Build with 4 core = $1710

Antec DF-85 Black Steel / Plastic ATX Full Tower Computer Case
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811129087
$120 AMIR

EVGA 02G-P4-2670-KR GeForce GTX 670 2GB
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814130782
$400

Antec High Current Gamer Series HCG-900 900W ATX12V
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817371050
$130

G.SKILL Ripjaws X Series 32GB (4 x 8GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1600 (PC3 12800)
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820231569
$250

ASUS SABERTOOTH Z77 LGA 1155 Intel Z77 HDMI SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.0 ATX Intel Motherboard
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813131821
$230

Intel Core i7-3770K Ivy Bridge 3.5GHz (3.9GHz Turbo) LGA 1155 77W Quad-Core Desktop Processor Intel HD Graphics 4000
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819116501
$350

CORSAIR H100 (CWCH100) Extreme Performance Liquid CPU Cooler
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835181017
$110

Mushkin Enhanced Chronos MKNSSDCR120GB 2.5" 120GB SATA III MLC Internal Solid State Drive (SSD)
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820226236
$94

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I know I could adjust to save some money on the 1155 or the 2011 but that is what I am looking at right now. Any ideas? I know Ivy is faster but they dont have a 6 core yet and I want to build something now.

Thanks!

 

[blazorthon]

You might want to consider an AMD Radeon 7950 or 7970 graphics card if you do anything in CS6 that supports OpenCL acceleration because they are far faster in compute performance than all of Nvidia's consumer video cards and with the very new Catalyst 12.7, on-par with or beating their Nvidia competitors in gaming performance. Otherwise, I think that the LGA 2011 build would be the better idea, assuming that you can take advantage of all six cores. You also might want to consider a non-SandForce SSD such as the Vertex 4 or the Samsung 830.

 

[dpm87]

Thanks, I dont know jack about AMD so I will have to look into it. I can just swap the 670 for a 7950?

 

[blazorthon]

Thanks, I dont know jack about AMD so I will have to look into it. I can just swap the 670 for a 7950?

Yes. The 7950 is far faster in OpenCL compute performance and CS6 supports OpenCL (and is getting more and more support for it with every release), so it makes sense to use the faster compute card for it. With gaming, you're not losing anything except a little power efficiency (which, as much as I like to argue about, is less important in this situation IMO) so long as you use the latest driver. Just don't use an AMD CPU for this build. Unlike their graphics cards, AMD's CPUs aren't top-notch right now and although they are great for lower end machines, your purposes seem to be too much for any of them to handle in most situations.

 

[dpm87]

So I was looking at replacing the card for the 2011 build for this card:

ASUS HD7950-DC2-3GD5 Radeon HD 7950 3GB 384-bit GDDR5 PCI Express 3.0 x16 HDCP
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814121490
$410

What do you think? Thanks for the help.

 

[blazorthon]

I was thinking this one:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814125414

Better cooling while being quieter, hopefully higher overclocking capability, and cheaper. Supposedly, there was a recall on those Asus cards a while back, so I'm a little weary of them.

 

[paradoxeternal]

i would say the LGA 2011 build because a lot of those programs seem like they would be very multi-threaded stuff. I imagine you are overclocking the 3930K? if so they are easier to overclock than the LGA 1155 Ivy Bridge since the IB get very hot easily.

More threads with the CPU plus having more RAM (something i'm guessing those programs need, from what i understand Adobe programs are extremely resource hungry) completely makes the case for LGA 2011. I would definitely go with that.

The 7950 is a good card and i know nothing about how the programs support OpenCL so i couldn't say anything there but gaming wise it's good too, considering that you won't be doing much gaming it's fine but if you were i would reommend the GTX 670 or 680, the 670 edges out a 7970 and definitely beats a 7950 in terms of FPS, but then again i don't think you would care about losing 5-15 FPS in a game. This sounds like an extremely powerful rig no matter what.

 

[blazorthon]

i would say the LGA 2011 build because a lot of those programs seem like they would be very multi-threaded stuff. I imagine you are overclocking the 3930K? if so they are easier to overclock than the LGA 1155 Ivy Bridge since the IB get very hot easily.

More threads with the CPU plus having more RAM (something i'm guessing those programs need, from what i understand Adobe programs are extremely resource hungry) completely makes the case for LGA 2011. I would definitely go with that.

The 7950 is a good card and i know nothing about how the programs support OpenCL so i couldn't say anything there but gaming wise it's good too, considering that you won't be doing much gaming it's fine but if you were i would reommend the GTX 670 or 680, the 670 edges out a 7970 and definitely beats a 7950 in terms of FPS, but then again i don't think you would care about losing 5-15 FPS in a game. This sounds like an extremely powerful rig no matter what.

New driver, Catalyst 12.7, gives AMD a pretty large performance boost (apparently larger than Nvidia's new driver boosted Nvidia's performance).

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/radeon-hd-7970-ghz-edition-review-benchmark,3232.html

With how the 7950 can overclock as well as the 7970 can (if you don't mind equalizing the voltage, which should be perfectly safe), it can do quite a lot more than previously which was already pretty high.

 

[dpm87]

i would say the LGA 2011 build because a lot of those programs seem like they would be very multi-threaded stuff. I imagine you are overclocking the 3930K? if so they are easier to overclock than the LGA 1155 Ivy Bridge since the IB get very hot easily.

More threads with the CPU plus having more RAM (something i'm guessing those programs need, from what i understand Adobe programs are extremely resource hungry) completely makes the case for LGA 2011. I would definitely go with that.

The 7950 is a good card and i know nothing about how the programs support OpenCL so i couldn't say anything there but gaming wise it's good too, considering that you won't be doing much gaming it's fine but if you were i would reommend the GTX 670 or 680, the 670 edges out a 7970 and definitely beats a 7950 in terms of FPS, but then again i don't think you would care about losing 5-15 FPS in a game. This sounds like an extremely powerful rig no matter what.

Yes I was looking to overclock the CPU +0.5 - 1.0 GHz.

I am in a toss up with what GPU to go with. I dont know much about the Radeon cards.

I think my PSU might be way to large with this GPU though.

 

[blazorthon]

Yes I was looking to overclock the CPU +0.5 - 1.0 GHz.

I am in a toss up with what GPU to go with. I dont know much about the Radeon cards.

I think my PSU might be way to large with this GPU though.

At stock, the 7950 and 670 use similar amounts of power. Overclocking, well, they both suck more. What's to know about the Radeon cards? Like Nvidia, just pop it in your computer, boot it up, install the drivers, and you're good to go. You should install the Catalyst 12.7 driver for optimal performance if you choose AMD. Keep in mind the huge performance advantage that AMD has in OpenCL acceleration, a large and growing part of CS. For SP math, AMD has a roughly 50% advantage and for DP math, an ~450% advantage. No, that's not a typo.

 

[paradoxeternal]

Yes I was looking to overclock the CPU +0.5 - 1.0 GHz.

I am in a toss up with what GPU to go with. I dont know much about the Radeon cards.

I think my PSU might be way to large with this GPU though.

Honestly, I've had horrible experience with AMD drivers. Several games i owned didn't play correctly or had major bugs with new and old drivers, so I don't really trust AMD's software team. This is nice, but it's not like NVIDIA's drivers will never improve performance in the future.

If i were the OP it wouldn't really matter. Gaming is not your #1 priority and the 7950 can play all the latest games at High specs if not Ultra specs, just like any other high-end card. I was merely pointing out that until today apparently, the 670 was the second best single GPU on the market. It will eventually probably retake that position, as NVIDIA's drivers are famed for stability and significant performance boosts, if not at bit by bit instead of in single leaps and bounds. I would honestly take whatever you can find cheaper.

 

[dpm87]

Thanks again, I just am not as well educated on the brand, that is all. I guess I should back down the PSU to 700-800 watts to meet that the power usage.

Guessing a 400-500watt draw at max load and that is 70% of a 700watt PSU. Any thoughts on that. Thanks again!

 

[blazorthon]

Honestly, I've had horrible experience with AMD drivers. Several games i owned didn't play correctly or had major bugs with new and old drivers, so I don't really trust AMD's software team. This is nice, but it's not like NVIDIA's drivers will never improve performance in the future.

If i were the OP it wouldn't really matter. Gaming is not your #1 priority and the 7950 can play all the latest games at High specs if not Ultra specs, just like any other high-end card. I was merely pointing out that until today apparently, the 670 was the second best single GPU on the market. It will eventually probably retake that position, as NVIDIA's drivers are famed for stability and significant performance boosts, if not at bit by bit instead of in single leaps and bounds. I would honestly take whatever you can find cheaper.

Catalyst 12.6 and 12.7 are two of the most stable drivers that AMD has ever made, if not the most stable. 12.7 is much faster than 12.6. AMD has changed their driver strategy to be more like Nvidia's in their releases, so the bit-by-bit has been giving way to much larger changes per driver release. Also, I can find jsut as many driver problems that Nvidia has had over the years (and several recent examples) as AMD. That famed superiority is a myth. You could look up the recent stuttering issues and throttling issues for proof if you like. Nvidia seems to b=have solved them in their latest driver release, but they happened.

 

[blazorthon]

Thanks again, I just am not as well educated on the brand, that is all. I guess I should back down the PSU to 700-800 watts to meet that the power usage.

Guessing a 400-500watt draw at max load and that is 70% of a 700watt PSU. Any thoughts on that. Thanks again!

You could back down. A Corsair 750w PSU would probably do very well for you without being way too much. It's good to over-provision significantly, especially with overclocking, just not too much like an 800w or more would be.