Upgrades to my new PC?

[P1]

So the new Western Digital 2TB hard drive works great as my main drive, but it's very noisy when it's working. I put it inside a small form factor Dell I had lying around, and it was quiet. Why would it be loud in my new Dell but quiet in my old one???

[P1]

The old PC is SATA II. The new one SATA III. Could it be because of that?

[Banana Hammock]

Originally Posted by P1et

Treated myself to a new PC after having had my trust Dell OptiPlex for close to a decade. Thing was solid; ran 24/7 for ten year and never skipped a beat, apart from having to replace the power supply once.

Fast forward to last week, when I took delivery of a new XPS 8900. Dell had a good deal on it, and it came with most of the stuff I was after, including the new i7-6700 processor. It also came with 8GB of memory, and the GeForce GT 730. Few questions:

1) Would it make sense to bump up the memory to 16GB, or even 32GB? I don't play any games, or at least not much. It's more for my SightHound software, along with photo and video editing software.

2) If I don't play games, is putting in an SSD drive worth it?

3) How about bumping up the video card to a GT 960? I think I can run it without upgrading my power supply. Ultimately, I'd like to use an HDMI out to replicate my security cameras on all TVs in my house, using an HDMI extended over Cat 6e.

Thanks!

1) Having more RAM is never a bad idea but sometimes a manufacturer will charge you an arm and a leg for RAM upgrades. 16GB should be more than enough unless you're doing some serious multi-tasking. Photo and video editing software are usually CPU intensive so the i7-6700 will be great for your use case. IIRC, the new Adobe CC recently added some hardware acceleration done by the graphics card but I've read that it's not so great.

2) Absolutely. An SSD is the best bang for the buck upgrade you can do for a PC. I would suggest a good size SSD (about 250gb - 500gb) for applications and a large HDD for your files (photos, videos, and RAW files).

3) Wattage wise, your PSU should be enough since a 450Watt should be enough to power an i7 with a GTX970. The only obstacle you'll run into is whether or not the PSU will have the necessary 6 or 8 pin PCI-E power cables that the card will require. If needed, you could buy a 4-pin molex to 6 or 8 pin adapter to make the card work.

Originally Posted by P1et

So the new Western Digital 2TB hard drive works great as my main drive, but it's very noisy when it's working. I put it inside a small form factor Dell I had lying around, and it was quiet. Why would it be loud in my new Dell but quiet in my old one???

SATA III is backwards compatible with SATA II so it shouldn't cause any issues. What kind of noise is it making? Hard Disk Drives do make a bit of noise, especially when they're spinning up to perform a read or write operation. Lack of sound or vibration dampening in the computer case can make this noise more audible. If it's a clicking noise, that's bad news as it's a sign that the drive is starting to die.

[P1]

Originally Posted by duck fat

1) Having more RAM is never a bad idea but sometimes a manufacturer will charge you an arm and a leg for RAM upgrades. 16GB should be more than enough unless you're doing some serious multi-tasking. Photo and video editing software are usually CPU intensive so the i7-6700 will be great for your use case. IIRC, the new Adobe CC recently added some hardware acceleration done by the graphics card but I've read that it's not so great.

2) Absolutely. An SSD is the best bang for the buck upgrade you can do for a PC. I would suggest a good size SSD (about 250gb - 500gb) for applications and a large HDD for your files (photos, videos, and RAW files).

3) Wattage wise, your PSU should be enough since a 450Watt should be enough to power an i7 with a GTX970. The only obstacle you'll run into is whether or not the PSU will have the necessary 6 or 8 pin PCI-E power cables that the card will require. If needed, you could buy a 4-pin molex to 6 or 8 pin adapter to make the card work.



SATA III is backwards compatible with SATA II so it shouldn't cause any issues. What kind of noise is it making? Hard Disk Drives do make a bit of noise, especially when they're spinning up to perform a read or write operation. Lack of sound or vibration dampening in the computer case can make this noise more audible. If it's a clicking noise, that's bad news as it's a sign that the drive is starting to die.

Thanks for the response. Yes, I've been quite impressed with the XPS 8900 so far. Certainly a big upgrade from my last PC. I did some research, and turns out the Western Digital Blacks are just a bit noisier than the other hard drives out there. But they're reliable and perform well, so I suppose that is the trade off.

I'm contemplating SSD, but I run my NVR software on the same machine and am afraid that it would prematurely wear out the SSD. Problem is that the NVR writes all the TMP files to the drive where the application is running off first, before storing all the video files on a separate hard drive. Something to think about for now, until the software has the ability to move the TMP folder onto another drive.

As far as the video card is concerned, I might stick with a GTX 960. I don't even play games, so I should probably suffice.

[theriz]

Originally Posted by P1et

Treated myself to a new PC after having had my trust Dell OptiPlex for close to a decade. Thing was solid; ran 24/7 for ten year and never skipped a beat, apart from having to replace the power supply once.

Fast forward to last week, when I took delivery of a new XPS 8900. Dell had a good deal on it, and it came with most of the stuff I was after, including the new i7-6700 processor. It also came with 8GB of memory, and the GeForce GT 730. Few questions:


1) Would it make sense to bump up the memory to 16GB, or even 32GB? I don't play any games, or at least not much. It's more for my SightHound software, along with photo and video editing software.

I would be bumping the memory up to 16 even if you don't play games.

2) If I don't play games, is putting in an SSD drive worth it?

SSD is always worth, depending on your motherboard get the samsung 850 pro or the M.2 950 pro if you're a big spender I have both, the 850 for booting up and storing small things and the M.2 for games. Honestly M.2 is over kill...

3) How about bumping up the video card to a GT 960? I think I can run it without upgrading my power supply. Ultimately, I'd like to use an HDMI out to replicate my security cameras on all TVs in my house, using an HDMI extended over Cat 6e.

If you don't play video games I wouldn't bother upgrading this...

Thanks!

You really have to look at what your needs are and spend money accordingly.

I should upload some pics of my two PC's...

[Banana Hammock]

Ahh okay. That's good news. Glad to hear that you're happy with the new machine.

Would it be possible install the operating system and your video and photo software on SSD but install the NVR software on a different drive or does the software require that you install it on the same drive as the operating system?

Absolutely, the 960 is plenty even for gaming.

[P1]

I'm at a loss here. Added a second hard drive to my PC today. It used to be in my old PC, and it's a Western Digital Black 1TB drive. This thing was always quiet as a mouse. Now that it's in my new PC, it's suddenly LOUD. Just like the 2TB Western Digital Black drive I have in there. In another older PC, nice and quiet. In my new PC, quite loud.

I don't get it. Are we 100% sure it doesn't have anything to do with SATA II vs. SATA III?

[Banana Hammock]

Positive.

The reasons I can think of off the top of my head to explain the sudden increase in noise is that the vibrations from the hard drive is causing the entire case to resonate and amplify the noise or the new case is much thinner than the old case so it doesn't do as good of a job to dampen the noise.

How is the drive installed in the case? Is it screwed directly to metal? Are there any any physical differences in construction between the new and old case? Does the new one feel thinner than the old?

[P1]

Originally Posted by duck fat

Positive.

The reasons I can think of off the top of my head to explain the sudden increase in noise is that the vibrations from the hard drive is causing the entire case to resonate and amplify the noise or the new case is much thinner than the old case so it doesn't do as good of a job to dampen the noise.

How is the drive installed in the case? Is it screwed directly to metal? Are there any any physical differences in construction between the new and old case? Does the new one feel thinner than the old?

Yes, the drives are screwed directly into the metal. And the new case definitely feels thinner (it's MUCH lighter) than the old case. The old PC has these handy brackets around the drives so you could swap them quickly:



Damn it. That riles me. You'd think newer = better.

[Banana Hammock]

Yeah, newer cases, especially the ones you get from companies like Dell are made with thinner gauge sheets of aluminum and it's really a case (no pun intended) of "they don't make them like they used to".

If you look on the inside of the old hard drive caddies, there should be some rubber grommets where the drives are held in by. You can try to replicate that in the new case with some rubber washers to see if that helps. The goal is to put something (preferably rubber) between the hard drive and the case to dampen the vibrations. If that's not possible and the noise is really bothering you, there are dampening mounts you can buy that lets you install the hard drive into a 5.25" drive bays.

Something like this http://www.performance-pcs.com/mitro...dampeners.html

[P1]

Originally Posted by duck fat

Yeah, newer cases, especially the ones you get from companies like Dell are made with thinner gauge sheets of aluminum and it's really a case (no pun intended) of "they don't make them like they used to".

If you look on the inside of the old hard drive caddies, there should be some rubber grommets where the drives are held in by. You can try to replicate that in the new case with some rubber washers to see if that helps. The goal is to put something (preferably rubber) between the hard drive and the case to dampen the vibrations. If that's not possible and the noise is really bothering you, there are dampening mounts you can buy that lets you install the hard drive into a 5.25" drive bays.

Something like this http://www.performance-pcs.com/mitro...dampeners.html

Thanks for the help! I'll see if I can find some of those rubber washers. I'll report back!

[P1]

Ordered another 16GB of memory since it was for sale on Newegg. I'll have a total of 32GB now...

[P1]

Questions in regards to SSD. I currently have a 2TB WD Black boot drive, and another secondary 1TB WD Black boot drive.

My case three 3.5" bays, plus a slot for an M.2 drive.

1) Does it make more sense to use a Corsair 2.5" to 3.5" adapter that fits two 2.5" SSD drives? Or use the M.2 slot?



2) Is M.2 faster/slower/equal compared to a regular SATA III slot?

3) If SATA III tops out at 600MB/s, what is the point of buying anything better than the 850 EVO drives? I see that the 960 Pro and Evo are much faster, but how can SATA III take advantage of that?

[zx10guy]

Originally Posted by P1et

Questions in regards to SSD. I currently have a 2TB WD Black boot drive, and another secondary 1TB WD Black boot drive.

My case three 3.5" bays, plus a slot for an M.2 drive.

1) Does it make more sense to use a Corsair 2.5" to 3.5" adapter that fits two 2.5" SSD drives? Or use the M.2 slot?



2) Is M.2 faster/slower/equal compared to a regular SATA III slot?

3) If SATA III tops out at 600MB/s, what is the point of buying anything better than the 850 EVO drives? I see that the 960 Pro and Evo are much faster, but how can SATA III take advantage of that?

The M.2 slot is hands down faster than SATA III. The M.2 interfaces the SSD directly to the PCIe bus. Plus with the M.2 which is for the latest NVMe drives, you're eliminating the performance hit of AHCI. I'll have to dig up a bench mark I did with a NVMe drive mounted to a PCIe card. It's eye opening. I'll post it up in a bit.

[zx10guy]

Here's the benchmark I did with I think an Intel P3608 NVMe PCIe SSD.

[P1]

Originally Posted by zx10guy

The M.2 slot is hands down faster than SATA III. The M.2 interfaces the SSD directly to the PCIe bus. Plus with the M.2 which is for the latest NVMe drives, you're eliminating the performance hit of AHCI. I'll have to dig up a bench mark I did with a NVMe drive mounted to a PCIe card. It's eye opening. I'll post it up in a bit.

Awesome, thanks! So stick with the M.2 slot and out regulat HDDs in the 3.5" bays? I have a 2.5" SSD lying around (256MB) that I'd like to use somewhere also...

[zx10guy]

Originally Posted by P1et

Awesome, thanks! So stick with the M.2 slot and out regulat HDDs in the 3.5" bays? I have a 2.5" SSD lying around (256MB) that I'd like to use somewhere also...

I don't know what other drives you have. I'm assuming the HDDs you're referencing are spinning disk high capacity drives. If so, yes, I would regulate them to 3.5" drive bays.

Not sure what your budget is for a possible M.2 drive which would dictate the capacity of it. I guess you could still use the 256MB SSD drive as additional storage. My ASUS motherboard allows me to use an SSD as a disk cache. But I don't see a need for it right now. I have a 512MB Samsung 840 EVO as the OS drive and the aforementioned Intel P3608 NVMe 1.6TB NVMe drive where I store all my gaming files on....or any application/data which I want better I/O performance. Adding the 256MB Samsung 840 EVO SSD I also have laying around as a disk cache probably won't help and I would venture actually hurt performance with the setup I have.

As I come into these high performance SSDs, I'm finding I have more and more slower SSDs that are just sitting around. I hate to get rid of them but I can't use them in any other systems I have as they're just too slow now.

I know tough problem to have....#firstworldproblems.

[P1]

Originally Posted by zx10guy

I don't know what other drives you have. I'm assuming the HDDs you're referencing are spinning disk high capacity drives. If so, yes, I would regulate them to 3.5" drive bays.

Not sure what your budget is for a possible M.2 drive which would dictate the capacity of it. I guess you could still use the 256MB SSD drive as additional storage. My ASUS motherboard allows me to use an SSD as a disk cache. But I don't see a need for it right now. I have a 512MB Samsung 840 EVO as the OS drive and the aforementioned Intel P3608 NVMe 1.6TB NVMe drive where I store all my gaming files on....or any application/data which I want better I/O performance. Adding the 256MB Samsung 840 EVO SSD I also have laying around as a disk cache probably won't help and I would venture actually hurt performance with the setup I have.

As I come into these high performance SSDs, I'm finding I have more and more slower SSDs that are just sitting around. I hate to get rid of them but I can't use them in any other systems I have as they're just too slow now.

I know tough problem to have....#firstworldproblems.

You could just sell them to me! Drives such as the 850 EVO are plenty for what I'm using the computer for.

[zx10guy]

Talk to me offline. I might be able to hook you up. You still have my email address, right?

[P1]

Originally Posted by zx10guy

Here's the benchmark I did with I think an Intel P3608 NVMe PCIe SSD.

I just looked up how much this costs, and promptly fell off my chair.

[theriz]

Originally Posted by P1et

I just looked up how much this costs, and promptly fell off my chair.

M.2 are definitely worth it every penny IMO. My boot up takes around 5-7 seconds. If you're coming from regular hard drives you'll probably fall out of your chair because of how much faster it is too.

[zx10guy]

Originally Posted by P1et

I just looked up how much this costs, and promptly fell off my chair.

Yeah, it's crazy how much these drives cost. Fortunately because of work, I have a relationship with Intel. So they gave me a couple of these drives to play with in my lab and to hand out to customers for testing.

They dropped me two of the 1.6TB P3608 drives and two of the 2TB P3700s.

Micron has been doing the same. They dropped me their 3.2TB 9100 series NVMe drives in both PCIe and 2.5" U.2 form factors.

If you haven't seen it yet, look for my thread about fun with SSDs in this subforum. I did a test with I think either 5 or 6 Micron DC630 1.92TB 12Gb SAS drives in a Windows Storage Spaces configuration. It's pretty sick.

ETA: Just thought of something I might try. Putting some of the NVMe SSDs I have on hand into a Storage Spaces setup to see how fast that configuration is.