[Digikam-users] Advices for a new cpu + mobo + ram - probably Off Topic

[Benjamin Girault]

Hi,

I recently build a new computer from scratch (Intel Core I7, Haswell
generation, Asus mother board with Z87 chipset), so here are a few
tips from that experience.

2013/8/11 ultimateclem <ultimateclem at gmail.com>:
> I decided to keep hard drives (internal sata, external usb2 and usb3) and
> video card (MSI GT630 with 4Gb ram) from my old computer and to change the
> box + power, mobo + cpu + ram. I already bought a 480W power supply, and a
> ATX box with extra fans.
>
> System : kubuntu last version, digikam last version, rawtherapee last
> version, gimp 2.8. No 3D, no game, only web and music playing but that does
> not count. About 250€/300$ the kit...

If you go for Intel, and buy a processor from the latest generation
(i.e. Haswell), be careful with the power supply. The Haswell
generation introduced a new low power state with a power consumption
that is so low that the power supply may shut down if not compatible.

> What brand of mobo ? Which cpu ? I thought amd FX 8-cores was a good
> compromise, but i'm not sure. What is the difference between 970, 990X and
> 990FX chipsets ?

With Intel CPUs, no need for a graphic card, there is a GPU integrated
with the CPU (although not very powerful, but you ruled out 3D). A
nvidia card like yours has CUDA cores, so there may be some softwares
that can leverage this power (hugin does as far as I can remember, but
I'm not sure about digiKam). A comparison chart is available on
wikipedia for Intel processors:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haswell_%28microarchitecture%29. The
mother board socket is LGA1150 for Haswell, LGA1155 for Ivy Bridge
(keep that in mind for the mother board choice). You can plug a SATAII
in a SATAIII slot, so a mother board with SATA III is better for
future HDD upgrades (same with USB2 / USB3). I have no idea about AMD
processors, and I think that they have less power than the Intel ones.
Look for tests on the Internet, I'm sure you will find good
comparisons between CPUs of the two brand.

Mother boards will all have the same set of basic features (provided
by the intel chipset). Differences may appear on the number of SATA
ports, USB2/3 ports, PCIe slots, or whether there are PCI slots or
not. Difference may appear also on the quality of the components
(especially the capacitors), but this is something hard to evaluate
from the description of the mother board, except for the price... I
have the feeling that the brand of the mother board is not very
important.

A nice addition is a SDD. Those are cheaper now. However, it's not for
data, but for the system partition to get the system more reactive
(system and software loading time reduced, GUI reactivity increased,
etc...)

-- 
Benjamin.