SCOPE PCI Motherboard/CPU Recommendations

[djmooncat]

Hi Everyone, GaryB,

I've recenlty made a gaff in buying a new system which doesn't work well with my Scope PCI & Pulsar 2 cards (Intel 1155 motherboard/CPU). I'm thinking about either trying to recitify the problem or putting together another system which I can use specifically for my music stuff.

Could anyone recommend a good motherboard and Processor which are still available ideally with 3 PCI slots ( I also have an old Pulsar 1 I could drop in there is I can get a motherboard with enough slots). Any recommendations would be greatly fully recieved although personal experience would be preffered of them working well could be great.

Having thought about it and read the recommendations about BIOS settings am I right in thinking that there's no point going for an i7 processor as the main difference between i7 and i5 processors is that the i7's have hyperthreading, which isn't wanted on when using a computer for music stuff?

Many Thanks,

Mark

[djmooncat]

Having had a look around I've seen these for a reasonable price:

Intel i5 760 2.8GHz Socket 1156 8MB L3 Cache Retail Boxed Processor
ASUS P7P55 LX, LGA 1156

Do all the 1156 chipsets have native PCI support or is this something which is specific to the actual motherboard design?

Regards,

Mark

[jhulk]

depends on what os your using 32bit 64bit

if using a 32bit machine max ram 4gb

then there are a few very good systems that work and you can get a machine for £60-100

the Hewlett Packard server machines are great and there a a number that work well

i just upgraded to a dual zeon xw6000 2 x 3.4 ghz processors and 4gb and a 40gb hard drive with xp professional 32bit installed

its a fast machine has 4 pci slots and 1 pcie i payed £69.99+ postage

the xw4600/4800 also are good these use the core duo processors and quad these have 3 pci slots

these have been used by other members and was recommended by garyb remember to turn off ht support on both systems

the server systems seem to have better lagacy pci support

the xw4600/4800 they sell between £80-110 depending on configuration the quads are dearest

[garyb]

yes, hp business machines fromthat series are a great bargain.

1156 motherboards are fine.

[djmooncat]

Thanks for taking the time to reply. Ive had a look at the HP machines and they are very similar to what I have at the moment, although mine is 5 years old. I was wanting to get the most put of my cards by getting a new machine that would last until I can afford to by an xcite. it sounds like at some point native pci motherboards aren't going to be available so if I go with a new system it should mean I can get spares if it breaks for a bit longer.

Will have a think, but many thanks for the help.

Cheers,

Mark

[garyb]

sure. is there something your current system can't handle?

there are always server boards. companies like supermicro will have very high quality boards for quite some time. you can even still buy new motherboards with isa slots this is a quick google search:
http://www.nixsys.com/products/accessor ... oards.html
http://www.justservers.com/isa_motherboards.php

it's only the consumer market that is shut out.

here's a board that i used for a customer's build. please tell me how this won't do enough work with dual 1366 XEONs. it's still sold.
http://www.supermicro.com/products/moth ... /X8DAi.cfm
Intel® Xeon® processor 5600/5500 series, with QPI up to 6.4 GT/s
Intel® 5520 (Tylersburg) Chipset
Up to 192GB DDR3 1333/ 1066/ 800MHz ECC Registered DIMM / 48GB Unbuffered DIMM
XITE ready and still has THREE usable PCI slots-2 (x16) PCI-E 2.0, 1 (x4) PCI-E (in x 8 slot), 3x PCI 33MHz slots

i'm just saying there are other possibilities out there. a 5 year old computer is pretty good these days. the benchmarks have improved faster than the actual real world performance, although the newest machines are plenty sweet.

[ehasting]

I bought new mother board april this year and bought following:

ASUS F1A55-V, Socket-FM1
ATX, A55, DDR3, 2xPCIe(2.0)x16,CFX,SATA 6Gb/s, USB

AMD A-Series A6-3500
Socket- FM1, Triple Core, 2.1Ghz, 65W, 3MB, Radeon


It has build in GPU, which means i don't have to generate additional heat from an external graphic card. And it has 3 PCI slots which perform max with Scope. (12 masterVerb). I had some problem in the start.. but it turned out to be loose/dirty STDM cables between the cards. Running 2x Pulsar 2 and 1x Scope card.

Intel or AMD is more or less "same shit" for me, i bought it due to the fact it had build in gpu and 3x pci slots. I am more then happy with the build though. But i use the machine strictly for music with Windows 7 and Reaper. And it gives me 2.6ms latency in 48khz without any problem. Running 24 ASIO channels from Reaper right into Scope.

[djmooncat]

Hey,

With respect to my old machine its been used a lot. My main concern that its going to die at some point soon and I don't want that to happen with my SCOPE cards in it. So I'm looking to proactively replace it before that happens and get something that will give me another five or more years, so that I don't have the pressure to get an Xcite setup. I just don't have the money spare to do that at the moment.

Gary,

I totally agree that the systems you've listed on there have some serious punch in terms of performance and they would provide way more than I will ever need for doing audio stuff. I hadn't considered looking at the server type hardware for building my system not sure quite why that hadn't crossed my mind and that's a great avenue should I need it, the only down side with Xeon stuff is its so much more expensive.

I think I'm going to go with the AMD CPU/ASUS motherboard suggested, that would be perfect for me and its a great price to boot and it sounds like the performance is spot on too. This will allow me to build up a great replacement system for a very good price.


Ehasting,

One question I have about the spec's of the motherboard you listed I could only find an ASUS version with the A55 chipset which supported 3Gb/s SATA ports.

http://www.asus.com/Motherboards/AMD_So ... ifications

Regards,

Mark

[garyb]

AMD solutions seem to be working very well, judging from the user reports.

[ehasting]

.: F1A55-V

http://www.komplett.no/k/ki.aspx?sku=648065
Sorry But the Page is in Norwegian


But it Seems like You Need to go for the a75 version.
Don't know if it works as good as the one I have, but I think that is the biggest different between the chipset, perhaps some memory speed aswell!

[braincell]

I got the MSI Z77A-G43 LGA 1155 Intel Z77 HDMI SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.0 ATX Intel Motherboard with UEFI BIOS.


What I like is I am reading 250 megabytes per second on my Kingston SSD drives using the built in SATA. It has 3 PCI slots and I am using all 3.

The price is $109 at Newegg.

What I do not like is the first one I had to return because it was DOA. I noticed too many people also had this problem. Newegg did give me my money back within a week of receiving it. Postage both ways was free. You have to drop it off at an authorized UPS pickup location. Save all the packaging for a month.

[Polarity]

Please can you keep us informed about how this mobo is behaving with your Pulsar/Scope cards?

So, if it gives the problems with PCI bus or other that users has complained with 1155 socket mainboards?
With 3 PCI slots, SATA3 ports and PCI-Express 3 it's really interesting for me.

what CPU did you put on it?
which DAW do you use for music?

Thanks in advance.
Andrea

[braincell]

I use the i7. I just built this computer. I'm waiting for Cubase 7 to arrive before I install Cubase. Trying to do a clean install of everything. It should arrive by the end of next week. Sweetwater didn't get any in yet. I will load up Scope for you and post here in a week or two. It's 9 DSP chips on two cards. Probably would be more stable with just one card but I am hoping everything will be fine. Scope installed and seems fairly snappy starting but I haven't tested it yet other than to see if I get any audio out of it.

[Polarity]

Ok, thanks.
Awaiting your news/updates then.

so you didn't do the Masterverb test yet?

[braincell]

I tested with one instance of it with no problem. I will max it out later, keep adding reverbs until it crashes and post to this link and send you a private message when I do.

[Polarity]

Thanks.
maybe you can follow and publish the results in the Masterverb Thread,
http://forums.planetz.com/viewtopic.php?f=19&t=17078
so it will be available with all the others.

[braincell]

Alright. I will run the test without Cubase and post there today.

[Polarity]

@Braincell: any news about your new MSI motherboard and Scope-Cubase behaving?

[braincell]

Based on past experience with Scope and the feeling I have about my new computer, if Scope loads with no error message, it will be fine unless I reach maximum DSP load.

[micmars]

i would just like to sy hello to everyone in the planetZ community. i would like to bring to attention that creamware cards run awesome on tyan motherboards .mine is a dual mp 2800 processors 2 gigs of registered ram with a adaptec sata pci controler card with my operating system on it . stable stable stable no problems what so ever.yes i know its old technology but it is very powerfull see as thow creamware does all its own processing .if you can git youre hand on all the componets you would have a kick a.. system trust me .my motherboard is the tyan tiger mpx 2466-n .this is the same board as the tyan thunder .minus i dont remember. these boards are server boards and handle audio amazing . the board hac the amd chip set with a raid controler but i dont do raid and know nothing about raid. here is my setup nuendo 3.0 .pulsar2 zlink.waves diamond plugin set.and a whole lot of other vst and directx plugins.anyone who knows waves plugins knows they can eatup some cpu processing power with my setup i can run anywere from 20 to 50 plugins in a project without crashing stable stable stable. i record instruments no synts for me just good old rock and roll yes some of my client need to use midi so i do use som synths its been a few years since ive been recording and iam dusting of my computer and my daughter and i are going to make magic together shes 12 years old and a very talented child .she plays piano bass celio and violin .music class for celio self taught on the rest oh yeh i forgot guitar . ther is only one problem i have forgoten how to setup a 16 channel asio zlink project in scope fusion plateform does anyone have a asio 32bit project setup to help me git started iam older and my memory is not what it used to be. lol lol lol