[tech] Purchase of 2 New Machines

Tue Mar 8 20:32:30 AWST 2016

Hi Mitch,

That looks like a pretty solid build, but I think there's a couple of ways 
we can trim it without compromising on computing power or reliability. 
This is particularly relevant given that the clubs income is about to 
halve.

For starters, I suggest we ditch the DVD drives; they barely get used on 
the machines that do have them, and we bought an external DVD drive for 
this exact reason (it lives in the tool cupboard). Time for that to pay 
for itself: $40 saved across two machines.

When you say "Pinball" I assume you mean "Porcupine" - after all, 
Porcupine is a C2D while Pinball is an i5 with decent specs. Porcupine 
happens to have a decent case and PSU already, as we were careful in the 
past to try and get generic cases that would last across a couple of 
generations and were compatible with our security requirements. If I 
recall correctly it's a CoolerMaster Centurion 5 case (mk 1 or 2, not 
sure) and there's nothing wrong with it. We have spare blanking plates and 
internal parts for it in the machine room. Its power supply is also fine: 
$120 saved on that combo. Cockgrunters case is not compatible with our 
security as far as I know, and needs replacing. Might I suggest a 
CoolerMaster Centurion?

A 750W power supply is pretty overkill in this case. The PSU recommended 
on the geforce.com website for an i7 3.2 GHz with a GTX 960 is 400W. Given 
that the trend is towards cooler and lower-wattage electronics, I don't 
think 750W is necessary even for future proofing. If you don't get a PSU 
with the case, something like the $93 550W coolermaster GM RS550-AMAAB1 
from msy might be the go. NB: many of the clubroom machines have 
coolermaster silent pro PSU's in them and they've stood the test of time.

As someone who helps maintain the clubroom machines, I'm pretty keen on an 
SSD for the system disk. If nothing else, it makes maintenance more 
bearable when things install quickly. Can we swap one of the 2TB disks for 
a 240GB/250GB ssd in each machine? I have had good results with Kingston 
V300 at work, but I would understand if people want to go with Samsung 
instead.

The GTX960 is only 6% more powerful than the GTX950 based on a range of 
benchmarks I looked at. It's around 30% more expensive, and I would 
challenge anyone to be able to tell the difference, given the games we 
usually run and the resolutions of our screens. Given the number of 
graphics cards failures we have, I think the money would be better spent 
on a card with more reliable fans and slightly less power. By more 
reliable fans I mean ball bearing fans. "Maglev" and sleeve bearings are 
shit. Gigabyte GPU fans are shit and we have proven they don't survive in 
UCC. EVGA seem to be the only company doing ball bearing fans on the GTX 
950.

So based on your specs and the above suggestions, I took the liberty of 
doing a more exact costing:

2 of https://www.ple.com.au/Products/620472/Intel-Core-i5-6400-Skylake-27GHz-6MB-Retail-Box
2 of http://www.msy.com.au/pc-components/16372-gigabyte-b150m-d3h-intel-b150-s1151-4xddr4-2xpciex16-hdmi-dvi-d-sub-usb30-microatx-mb.html
4 of https://www.ple.com.au/Products/620893/Kingston-8GB-Single-DDR4-Value-Series-C15-2133MHz
2 of http://www.msy.com.au/pc-components/5282-kingston-kinsv300s37a-240g-240g-ssdnow-v300-sata3-25-ssd-hdd.html
2 of http://www.msy.com.au/waonline/pc-components/5103-seagate-35-barracuda-2tb-st2000dm001-sata3-7200rpm-64mb-cache-hard-disk.html
2 of https://www.pccasegear.com/products/33067/evga-geforce-gtx-950-superclocked-acx-2-0-2gb
1 of https://www.ple.com.au/Products/611809/Cooler-Master-Centurion-6-Black-Mid-Tower-Case---500W-PSU

Total cost without shipping: $2171

Andrew Adamson
bob at ucc.asn.au

|"If you can't beat them, join them, and then beat them."                |
| ---Peter's Laws                                                        |

On Mon, 7 Mar 2016, Mitchell Pomery wrote:

> Hey All,
> 
> As per meeting minutes, we are looking at purchasing two new machines. 
> Specs for both are as follows:
> 
> Mid Sized ATX Case
> 750 Watt Modular Power Supply
> Gigabyte GA-B150M-D3H Motherboard
> Intel Core i5 6400
> 16GB RAM (in 2x8GB Sticks)
> 2x 2TB Hard Drives (One for operating system, one for files/games)
> DVD Drive
> GeForce GTX 960 2GB
> 
> Cost is just around $1100 per machine.
> 
> One machine will also need a Windows license (Roughly $200), with the 
> preference being to get a Windows 7 License if possible, otherwise going 
> with a Windows 10 one.
> 
> Total cost: Around $2500, depending on who we get it from.
> 
> Aim is to build two machines that could operate as either Windows or Linux 
> machines, with one of these taking the place of Cockgrunter, the other 
> taking the place of Pinball. The parts salvaged from these two machines 
> will be put into other machines where suitable, or be disposed of/put into 
> the parts bin where not.
> 
> Regards,
> Mitchell Pomery
> 
> 2015 President
> University Computer Club
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