i5 VS i7 Processor For New BI Build?

[molimelight]

I've seen some talk on here regarding the i7 as the way to go for BI. My old Asus board and AMD processor just can't handle BI when I start adding 3MP cameras. I'm pricing a new system build. Asus again. I can't say enough good about those boards. I have three of them running of varying ages and never a hiccup! The BI board is the oldest and the slowest. Anyway, the i7 is going for about $120.00 more than the i5. With only about 4 cameras at 3MP is it worth it to spend the extra bucks for a system that will only be utilized for BI and some file backup? Any advice is appreciated.

 

[fenderman]

I've seen some talk on here regarding the i7 as the way to go for BI. My old Asus board and AMD processor just can't handle BI when I start adding 3MP cameras. I'm pricing a new system build. Asus again. I can't say enough good about those boards. I have three of them running of varying ages and never a hiccup! The BI board is the oldest and the slowest. Anyway, the i7 is going for about $120.00 more than the i5. With only about 4 cameras at 3MP is it worth it to spend the extra bucks for a system that will only be utilized for BI and some file backup? Any advice is appreciated.

The i5 will be more than sufficient for 4x3mp cameras..before building keep in mind that you can by business class i5 haswell machines for 300 and i7 haswells for about 430 when dell has an outlet sale (about monthly)...comes with a three year next business day warranty. You cannot build it for less.

 

[molimelight]

Thanks fenderman! I appreciate the input. I never seem to be able to get in on those sales, there or at New Egg. Whenever I pull it up they are sold out but have another one they want to sell me for the same price that is half the machine. Not to impugn Dell or Newegg, but I think there's a certain amount of bait and switch that goes on with those great deals. On the other hand maybe I'm just bitter that I didn't get in on one! :laugh: Ha! If I can get one built for around $700 I'll be OK with that. I'll be upgrading some things. The power supply is a good one and the case is good. So are the hard drives, but I'll be going to SSD for the OS and I'll be getting 16 megs of ram. That, the Asus board and a new copy of OEM Win (Not sure if I'll go with 10 or stick with 7) 64 bit, and it should be pretty much bullet proof. I'll probably go to BI4 while I'm at it. Thanks again for the input.

 

[bp2008]

I can confirm those deals do exist, you just have to check for deals daily and when there are good coupons up, check the stock throughout the day as it changes a lot.

If you are dead set on building new, at least wait until the Skylake CPUs are readily available. i5-6600k or i7-6700k. Don't pay a price gouger extra to get it a few weeks early either.

 

[fenderman]

Thanks fenderman! I appreciate the input. I never seem to be able to get in on those sales, there or at New Egg. Whenever I pull it up they are sold out but have another one they want to sell me for the same price that is half the machine. Not to impugn Dell or Newegg, but I think there's a certain amount of bait and switch that goes on with those great deals. On the other hand maybe I'm just bitter that I didn't get in on one! :laugh: Ha! If I can get one built for around $700 I'll be OK with that. I'll be upgrading some things. The power supply is a good one and the case is good. So are the hard drives, but I'll be going to SSD for the OS and I'll be getting 16 megs of ram. That, the Asus board and a new copy of OEM Win (Not sure if I'll go with 10 or stick with 7) 64 bit, and it should be pretty much bullet proof. I'll probably go to BI4 while I'm at it. Thanks again for the input.

Follow the dell twitter account and check ebay. I buy these all the time...there is no bait and switch. You can take the extra money and spend it on cams.

 

[blake]

Dont forget the reliable HP Elitedesk 800 G1.

 

[molimelight]

Re: i5 VS i7 Processor For New BI Build Update

Thought I'd update the direction I went in setting up my BI machine. Previously it was running on an AMD Athlon 64 x2 Dual Core 4600+ processor. It was my old office machine and it could run BI but when I started adding 3MP cameras it pegged the CPU pretty quickly. After looking around I thought I'd try running it on my current office machine which had an updated Asus Board and a faster processor. It did better but was still in the 50% CPU neighborhood so I thought I'd take a chance and upgrade the processor to an AMD FX-8350 Eight-Core Processor. (It was $169.00 at the time through NewEgg and I just happened to have a $169.00 gift card!) What a difference that made! I'm currently running x3 3MP cameras, one 1MP Wireless Foscam (in the shop that's about 150 feet away), and a 720P webcam being fed a stream from YawCam (just for fun) and it's sitting at 7%. I tried recording all of them at the same time (not even direct to disk) and, according to the Windows System monitor that I had running, it never got higher than 13.28 and averaged 7.10. So, now my plan is to move my office system out to the garage where I had the old system and I'm building a new office system. I don't think I'll need to expand much from what I have now. I'll probably replace the Foscam with a wired 3MP one when I run network wiring to the shop but that will about do it as far as cameras go.

Here's what BI is running on now:

Asus M5A97 LE R2.0 Motherboard
AMD FX(tm)-8350 Eight-Core Processor
16GB A-Data Technology DDR3 PC3-10700 Memory
2 x SanDisk SSD PLUS SDSSDA-120G-G25 2.5" 120GB SATA Revision 3.0 (6 Gbit/s) Internal Solid State Drive (SSD) For OS & Mirror
HighPoint RocketRAID 2300 PCI Express SATA II (3.0Gb/s) Controller Card
4 x Hitachi GST Deskstar 500GB 7200 RPM 16MB Cache SATA 3.0Gb/s 3.5" Internal Hard Drive Bare Drive in RAID 5 for 1.5TB Storage
ASUS GeForce GT 610 GT610-2GD3-CSM 2GB 64-Bit DDR3 PCI Express 2.0 x16 HDCP Ready Video Card

Just for geek fun, here's what I'm building for the office:

ASUS Z97-E/USB3.1 LGA 1150 Intel Z97 HDMI SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.1 USB 3.0 ATX Intel Motherboard
Intel Core i5-4460 Haswell Quad-Core 3.2GHz LGA 1150 BX80646I54460 Desktop Processor Intel HD Graphics 4600
ZALMAN CNPS9500A-LED 92mm 2 Ball CPU Cooler
G.SKILL Ripjaws X Series 32GB (4 x 8GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1600 (PC3 12800) Desktop Memory Model F3-1600C9Q-32GXM
2 x SanDisk SSD PLUS SDSSDA-240G-G25 2.5" 240GB SATA Revision 3.0 (6 Gbit/s) Internal Solid State Drive (SSD) For OS & Mirror
HighPoint 600 Lite Series Rocket 640L PCI-Express 2.0 x4 Low Profile SATA III (6.0Gb/s) RAID Controller Card
4 x TOSHIBA PH3300U-1I72 3TB 7200 RPM 64MB Cache SATA 6.0Gb/s 3.5" Internal Hard Drive To run in RAID 10 for 6TB Storage

So, the whole purpose of this update is to let people know, if you have a Socket AM3+ board, it seems as though this AMD processor will handle a moderate BI installation just fine. The only caveat is that it's a 125w processor so it get's pretty warm, so I'll be upgrading the cooler.