KVR Audio

josevin2000 · Post by **josevin2000** » Sat Jul 08, 2006 5:46 am

Am building a PC for a musician friend who uses Cubase with loads of VST's as his tool... Budget is unlimited...

After lot of research here's what i've narrowed it down to

AMD opteron 275 processor
Tyan 2895 mobo
ECC registered RAM 1GB * 2
NVideo XFX DDR 6600 video card
Samsung 17" LCD
Antec Titan 500 Case

Since he will run WIN XP i am not goin for more than 2 GB Ram... Also after speaking to lots of computer experts what i learnt is that the 32 bit WIN XP OS is capable of only a limited processing power. Thats why i've only gone in for a single opteron 275, although my mobo has support for 2 CPU's

So given a similar scenario, for musician running cubase with loads of VST's, and budget being unlimted, is there a better PC that can be built out of components currently available in the market, which will ghive better performance running WIN XP 32 bit.....

RTaylor · Post by **RTaylor** » Sat Jul 08, 2006 5:53 am

http://forum.nuendo.com/phpbb2/viewtopic.php?t=7386

english · Post by **english** » Sat Jul 08, 2006 6:15 am

Well your 'computer experts' are full of shit. WinXP (32bit) will happily use 2 dualcore proccies and see all 4 cpus. I have been using a similar system myself for over a year now with 2x dualcore Opterons in winxp32. They work amazingly well with the audio soft I use (Nuendo/CubaseSX3.) I deffo recommend getting 2 dualcore procs (if your audio soft supports it) as it makes the whole world of difference.....as you would expect

eng

RTaylor · Post by **RTaylor** » Sat Jul 08, 2006 6:25 am

I'm not quite sure what you're talking about. One of the systems they have listed uses 2 dual core processors. At any rate, they're not exactly "mine"... tho' that would be the first place I'd check before I built a high end Steinberg based system {Tho' I'd definitely go with a Tyan board regardless. {Intel if they ran Opterons and I was setting up an Opteron based system.}}. I am reasonably sure they know what they're talking about.

english · Post by **english** » Sat Jul 08, 2006 6:35 am

I was replying to Jose original post... he mentioned speaking to "computer experts." I know all to well about the Nuendo post you mention, I helped contribute to it. Not sure what your bleeting about Intel?!?! I use a Supermicro H8DCE board myself ( I owned the Tyan 2895 before it) and it has a nicer spec. Dont get me wrong, both boards are more than capable of holding a system like this, and they both run equally well in a dual dual-core setup.

eng

RTaylor · Post by **RTaylor** » Sat Jul 08, 2006 6:43 am

Looks like we're in agreement then. Tho' you'll probably have to admit that there really aren't a lot of operating systems out there that aren't "capable of only a limited processing power".

I like both Supermicro and Tyan. I like Intel boards as well. {:) They don't actually work well with Opterons though.}

josevin2000 · Post by **josevin2000** » Sat Jul 08, 2006 8:47 am

Hi English. What i am saying is that 2 opteron 275's give processing power far greater than what win xp is designed and capable of handling. In fact some ppl told me that even the processing power of one opteron 275 will not be fully utilized in the current 32 bit win xp platform.. and its only in the later 64 bit os versions that the processing power of 2 opteron 275's will be fully utilized...

have any of u guys actually tested 2 systems, one with a single dual core opteron and one with two dual core opterons and noticed considerable performance diferrences? performance difference in terms of VSTi handling capacity... Coz thats what the pc will be used for...

jupiter8 · Post by **jupiter8** » Sat Jul 08, 2006 8:57 am

josevin2000 wrote:Hi English. What i am saying is that 2 opteron 275's give processing power far greater than what win xp is designed and capable of handling. In fact some ppl told me that even the processing power of one opteron 275 will not be fully utilized in the current 32 bit win xp platform.. and its only in the later 64 bit os versions that the processing power of 2 opteron 275's will be fully utilized...

have any of u guys actually tested 2 systems, one with a single dual core opteron and one with two dual core opterons and noticed considerable performance diferrences? performance difference in terms of VSTi handling capacity... Coz thats what the pc will be used for...

Well my friend.The ppl wou've been talking to are complete morons.Actually i'm quite baffeled that you've actually managed to find several people who makes such ridicoulus claims.It is pure bs.Next time they open their mouths,tell 'em to shut it.

http://www.adkproaudio.com/benchmarks.cfm
Just show them this page and tell them to go play on the highway.

english · Post by **english** » Sat Jul 08, 2006 9:15 am

Indeed, I dont know who you have been speaking to but mention to them that they are complete retards the next time you do. What your saying is a single 275 is more powerful than winxp needs? Well thats pretty obvious as the minimum spec for winxp is like a p3 with 256 ram or something lame IIRC ? If your saying a single 275 is more powerful than winxp can actually use, then thats just horse shit. It will use whatever proc you throw at it, its the software programs you actually run that make the difference. Of course, newer OSs may take more advantedge of certain features the opteron has, as you mention 64bit OSs will make more use of it as it is also a 64bit chip, but to say its to powerful for an OS is complete anal fumes and I suggest you dont listen to these 'computer experts' any longer.

I have tested with a single dualcore cpu installed, not for what you are suggesting but for another reason. Either way with the 2nd dualcore cpu installed and running (cubase sx3) it took off about another 25-30% on the cpu meter for my largest vsti laden projects. So yes, 4 cpus does make a considerable difference more than 2 (if the software supports it) and not just in the cpu meter. General responsiveness and use of programs (not just audio progs) are greatly improved.

eng

whyterabbyt · Post by **whyterabbyt** » Sat Jul 08, 2006 9:41 am

josevin2000 wrote: In fact some ppl told me that even the processing power of one opteron 275 will not be fully utilized in the current 32 bit win xp platform.. and its only in the later 64 bit os versions that the processing power of 2 opteron 275's will be fully utilized...

There are two main factors here : If you're running a 32-bit version of Windows, the applications being used will not be able to take full advantage of the faster 64-bit instructions available to a 64-bit processor. In fact, both the application and the operating system would need to be 64-bit versions to get the best possible speed from a 64-bit processor. However, that is the only potential limiting factor on processor 'effectiveness', and its completely moot if there's no 64-bit version of the application. I dont believe Cubase has a 64-bit version on release yet, for example

From tests done by Cakewalk, for example, a 64-bit compiled version of Sonar will typically run about 20-30% faster under XP64, than the 32-bit version runs on the same processor on XP. However thats not the processor or XP being 'limited', thats the application not taking full advantage of possible code optimisations. You could probably say that any application which hasnt been hand-coded in assembly language by a genius has the same 'limits'.

The second factor is multi-processor support in the application; if the application cant support multiple processors, then it doesnt matter whether its a single-processor-single-core system, or a 4-core-dual-processor system, only one processor would be available to the application for audio processing. That, as far as Im aware, is not a problem for current versions of Cubase, and definitely isnt for Sonar, although it is for some audio applications.

If you are running XP Pro, you can potentially use all 4 cores of a dual dual-core-processor system. Windows XP has no 'limit' on the CPU power it can use; that is complete and utter bullshit; it has a limit on how many cores it can potentially use, but thats not the same as 'CPU power', and it cant allow the use of 64-bit instructions, but thats not 'CPU Power' either.

I suspect your 'experts' are the types who half-understand what they're talking about, but not enough to differentiate between several unrelated factors, so they wind up conflating them into nonsense.

DevonB · Post by **DevonB** » Sat Jul 08, 2006 10:00 am

whyterabbyt wrote:support in the application; if the application cant support multiple processors, then it doesnt matter whether its a single-processor-single-core system, or a 4-core-dual-processor system, only one processor would be available to the application for audio processing. That, as far as Im aware, is not a problem for current versions of Cubase, and definitely isnt for Sonar, although it is for some audio applications.

No problems for Cubase SX whatsoever. In fact, I even noticed a nice bump in performance on the dual core going from SX 2 to SX 3 of about 5%-10% better performance on the same project. I've also had a Opteron 275 dual dual core system in my hands briefly. I assure you, XP Pro runs plenty fine with it.

Devon

RTaylor · Post by **RTaylor** » Sat Jul 08, 2006 11:08 am

whyterabbyt wrote:The second factor is multi-processor support in the application; if the application cant support multiple processors, then it doesnt matter whether its a single-processor-single-core system, or a 4-core-dual-processor system, only one processor would be available to the application for audio processing. That, as far as Im aware, is not a problem for current versions of Cubase, and definitely isnt for Sonar, although it is for some audio applications.

Regardless of whether or not your application can use the additional processer, the os can. This means it can shunt system stuff {additional stand alone stuff and maybe plugins as well.} off to one processor while leaving one wide open for the application.

whyterabbyt · Post by **whyterabbyt** » Sat Jul 08, 2006 11:41 am

RTaylor wrote: Regardless of whether or not your application can use the additional processer, the os can.

Im aware of that. However it wasnt relevant to what I was saying regarding applications without multi-processor support.

This means it can shunt system stuff {additional stand alone stuff and maybe plugins as well.} off to one processor while leaving one wide open for the application.

Not quite; plugins run in-process, I believe. If a host application isnt capable of running on multiple processors, then plugins hosted in that application wont run across multiple processors. Try it.

josevin2000 · Post by **josevin2000** » Sat Jul 08, 2006 12:32 pm

Gee thanks guys... that clears the air... So i will go in for 2 opteron 275's... and of course once the world moves to 64 bit, in terms of stable drivers, applications etc making the shift for me hopefully should be relatively smooth...

so only thing added to my config will be another opteron 275....

Thanks again all ya guys !!!!!

i hope my understanding on max RAM XP supports is not skewed.. I bileive XP 32 bit only supports upto 2GB.. so dont wanna stack the mobo with more unless fully utilized...

english · Post by **english** » Sat Jul 08, 2006 12:46 pm

The ram thing isnt quite correct, but to save you more headache (and me more typing) go with 2GB. You wont need more until Vista when there should also be a nice 64bit version of your seq that will use the extra mem also. Get two 1GB sticks for now so you can get another 2 down the line for 4GB.

eng

Mother of all PC's !!!