CNC Computer

I hope I can get some help here even though I am not a gamer. The last game I tried to play was Myst on a 286 computer. It crashed most of the time. I do CNC designing and rendering of jewelry. My ASUS G1S just burned up and I need a replacement. Looking for a desktop this time.  My program, Rhino-Matrix needs Nvidia. Will not work with ATI.  My questions: Should I get HAF 932 or 922 (or something else).  Is the factory cooling enough for what I am building. Should I have this overclocked. I am worrying about stability with my programs. I need a lot of USB ports because several of my programs require me to have dongles hanging on my computer. I think I saw somewhere that there is a plate that attaches to the back of this board to connect more ports. This is what I have arrived at so far after reading a lot of your posts on this forum.


Specifications: 
Chassis Model: Special Deal Hot Seller - Cooler Master HAF 932 
processor: Intel Core i7 930 2.8GHz (Quad Core)
Motherboard: EVGA X58 LE Edition SLI (Intel X58 Chipset) (Supports SLI or CrossFire)
System Memory: 6GB DDR3 1600MHz Digital Storm Certified Performance Series  (Highly Recommended) (Hand Tested)
Power Supply: 750W Corsair TX (Dual SLI Compatible)
Hard Drive Set 1: Operating System: 1x (2TB Seagate/Hitachi/Western Digital (7200 RPM) (32MB Cache) (SATA) (Extreme Speed)
Optical Drive 1: DVD�R/RW/CD-R/RW (DVD Writer 24x / CD-Writer 48x)
Internet Access: High Speed Network Port (Supports High-Speed Cable / DSL / Network Connections)
Video Card: 1x NVIDIA GeForce GTX 470 1.2GB (Includes PhysX Technology)
Sound Card: Integrated Motherboard Audio
Extreme Cooling: Standard Factory Heat-sink and Fan
Chassis Airflow: Standard Factory Chassis Fans
Boost Processor: FREE: Stage 1: Overclock the processor between 3.3GHz to 3.9GHz (Cooling Upgrade Recommended)
Windows OS: Microsoft Windows 7 Professional (64-Bit Edition)
Restore Kit: Digital Storm Specialized Recovery System (DVD Image Based)

Doing CNC/AutoCAD? A workstation PC might fare better, since I'm guessing that it'll be your main business for the PC. If not, well, GTX 4 series cards made by nVidia have a ridiculous power usage rating, just to take into consideration. ATI's 58 series (5850, 5870) have equal performance, but not as much power usage.

My personal choice for hard drives is to have one, small, fast drive for the operating system, and having a couple of large drives for everything else. Just so that nothing related to data can drag down your OS.

Moving on to overclocking. Stock cooling and overclocking work, but they don't work that well, I know from experience. Upgrade to a better cooling option, and nab the free overclocking, just so you can get the settings. To fully optimize this, this one of the times where I might possibly suggest an ASUS board, since pretty much all of them come with softclocking software installed. Either that, or find an EVGA board that specifically supports their overclocking software, E-L33T. Softclocking is when you modify the processor's voltage, etc., and essentially do overclocking in Windows itself, while the machine is still running. The reason why I recommend this is so you will have the ability to apply the overclocking settings you received whenever you want, more speed with the potential for less stability, or complete stability while doing a very very critical task. DS's overclock is very stable, but I don't take chances.

For USB Ports, yes, most motherboards usually come with a small bracket that you can attach to the headers on the motherboard. One header = 2 USB ports. Usually though, there are some PCI chips that can just turn a PCI slot into around 5 ports. Or, like Cretae suggested, you can get a USB hub. USB Hub's I never understood though, USB 2.0 has a limited data transfer bandwidth, technically, if you had enough data going through it, the bandwidth can be maxed out.




Edited by ablahblah - 17 Jun 2010 at 10:21am

This system will smoke what you're used to. Truly, you'll be surprised. Especially with the OC. DS pushed mine past 2 chip upgrades and it's solid as a rock at 3.81gHz. That's not really "pushing" this chip BTW, they'll do 4.5. The i7 900's are phenomenal. Good luck!!