Building a poker computer - Page 2

wacki · #11 11-02-2005, 12:00 AM

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See it this way: If you are running ONE program and it is not threaded it will not be faster on either HT or Dual core cpus. If you run TWO programs that might both need alot of cputime, then both will benefit, threaded or not. So if you run PT, datamine and do all sort of things that are cpu intence, dual core will benefit you.

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I know all about the theory. I have programed multithreaded aps in Java, C++, scheme, perl.....

Theory does not always translate into real world performance. For instance, Intels hyperthreading feature will often slow programs down. The same goes with dual cpu mobo's. I understand the theory better than the vast majority of the people on this board do. I was simply wondering if anyone had any real world experience. I explained this in the post you replied to. Often the common user has more to share in that department than a full time computer scientist that has only read the label on the box.

Also, I disagree with your low content intel post.

ThePinkBunny · #12 11-02-2005, 02:40 AM

I have that exact motherboard and ram. Get a couple of hard drives and set up either a raid 0+1 or a raid 5... or just a raid 0, if you regularly back stuff up another way.

I have the 4600, and I can tell a big difference between it and my old 3.2 GHz pentium computer I had. With my old computer I felt some lag running Pokertracker, gametime, poker, depending on which sites I was running.

kyleb · #13 11-02-2005, 04:13 AM

I have a dual Xeon 2.8ghz machine utilizing RDRAM still, and I can personally say that multi-processor machines have significantly decreased lag time and allowed for very smooth operations of PartyMine, PokerTracker, and multiple other server applications that run full time. I highly recommend a SATA-150 hard drive and a dual processor setup.

Good luck!

wacki · #14 11-02-2005, 09:02 AM

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I'm running same mobo, 3200+ and a gig of ram and I don't have a noticable speed problem with PokerTracker until I start to switch between screens.

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What kind of a hard drive setup do you have?

wacki · #15 11-02-2005, 09:04 AM

kyleb, how much ram and what hard drives do you have?

astroglide · #16 11-02-2005, 01:20 PM

raid 0 isn't going to improve service time, it's just going to increase your sustained transfer rates. this is useful for large sequential loads (e.g. copying a 2GB file back and forth) but for random access it's not going to do anything for you.

if you hit ctrl-shift-esc you can look at your peak commit charge to see what the most amount of ram that you've simultaneously used is since your last reboot. odds are it's not anywhere close to 2GB.

kyleb · #17 11-02-2005, 09:26 PM

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kyleb, how much ram and what hard drives do you have?

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2 GB of RDRAM with a pair of SATA-100 Western Digital HDs, 200 GBs each. I will be upgrading to a pair of SATA-150s eventually. No RAID set-up, even though my board supports it (giant waste, as you no doubt know).

astroglide · #18 11-02-2005, 09:39 PM

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a pair of SATA-100 Western Digital HDs, 200 GBs each. I will be upgrading to a pair of SATA-150s eventually.

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a faster drive interface doesn't innately mean a faster drive. i don't know if this is what you actually believe, but it's one of the most common myths in storage performance.

kyleb · #19 11-03-2005, 03:35 AM

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a pair of SATA-100 Western Digital HDs, 200 GBs each. I will be upgrading to a pair of SATA-150s eventually.

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a faster drive interface doesn't innately mean a faster drive. i don't know if this is what you actually believe, but it's one of the most common myths in storage performance.

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No, I know.

wacki · #20 11-03-2005, 04:43 AM

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raid 0 isn't going to improve service time, it's just going to increase your sustained transfer rates. this is useful for large sequential loads (e.g. copying a 2GB file back and forth) but for random access it's not going to do anything for you.

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I've never considered raid 0. Right now I've been thinking about getting a reasonably priced 160 GB Seagate barracuda 7200.9 which has a read/write time of 13.7 and 14.9 via IPEAK SPT. The raptor's times are about half of that according to storage review. Right now I'm just wondering if the raptor is worth it as I still not sure how that will effect real world PT performance. I have no special urge to buy one but I've seen so many people go nuts over it.

All I know is I never look at my stats because it takes several minutes to switch between windows. PT always goes into "not responding" mode via the task manager when the computer is plugging away. When accessing my stats CPU is only around 8% usage so I'm guessing the raptor is probably the way to go.

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if you hit ctrl-shift-esc you can look at your peak commit charge to see what the most amount of ram that you've simultaneously used is since your last reboot. odds are it's not anywhere close to 2GB.

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I have and it's 1.05 GB. Considering the cost of value ram I figured going for 2 GB is a no brainer. I guess I could get a 1 gig and a 512 but I've found good package deals on 2x1 GB's.

Thanks for the advice astro.