New Computer from Dell

[Demodave]

At work, we are now being asked to buy all new computers from Dell. Good stuff generally. I am ready for a new system for Saw Studio Lite and would love your opinions:


SYSTEM COMPONENTS
Dell Precision T3400 525w Qty 1
Intel™ Core®2 Duo E8500 (3.16GHz/1333MHz/6MB L2) 525W, Genuine Windows® XP Professional, SP2 with Media Unit Price $1,885.00
Save $170 on select Dell Precision T3400 through Dell Small Business.
Special offer
- $170.00


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Catalog Number: 4 BWCW7ZZ
Module Description Show Details
PWS T3400 525W (32bit) Intel™ Core®2 Duo E8500 (3.16GHz/1333MHz/6MB L2) 525W
Operating System Genuine Windows® XP Professional, SP2 with Media
Chassis Configuration and 1394 Mini-Tower Chassis Configuration
Memory 4GB, 800MHz, DDR2 SDRAM Memory, ECC (4 DIMMS)
Keyboard USB Entry Quietkey, No Hot Keys
Monitor No Monitor
Graphic Cards 256MB PCIe x16 nVidia NVS 290, Dual Monitor DVI Capable
Boot Hard Drive 250GB SATA 3.0Gb/s with NCQ and 8MB DataBurst Cache™
Hard Drive Configuration C8, ALL SATA, RAID 1 for 4 Hard Drives
Floppy Drive and Media Card Reader Options No Floppy Drive
Mouse Dell USB 2-Button Mechanical Mouse with Scroll
CD-ROM, DVD, and Read-Write Devices 48X CD-ROM
Speakers No Speaker option
Resource CD Resource CD-contains Diagnostics/Drivers-Genuine Window® XP Pro SP2
2nd Hard Drive 250GB SATA 3.0Gb/s with NCQ and 8MB DataBurst Cache™
File System NTFS File System
Hardware Support Services 3 Year Basic Limited Warranty and 3 Year NBD On-Site Service
Installation Services No Onsite System Setup
3rd Hard Drive 250GB SATA 3.0Gb/s with NCQ and 8MB DataBurst Cache™
4th Hard Drive 250GB SATA 3.0Gb/s with NCQ and 8MB DataBurst Cache™
Purchase Intent Purchase is not intended for resale.
Labels Genuine Windows® XP Sticker

[Naturally Digital]

At work, we are now being asked to buy all new computers from Dell. Good stuff generally. I am ready for a new system for Saw Studio Lite and would love your opinions:Dave, before purchasing the machine, please check the number of expansion slots and the chipset. If you can't find this info then ask the manufacturer... That's what they're there for.

Precision is certainly a good series to buy from Dell but be sure of what you're getting and don't worry about saving $170 by buying it through work. You could easily save much more than that by having a proven DAW configuration built for you.

Once we know the chipset, it will be easier to give some feedback on the model.

BTW: Does it have Firewire onboard?

Which soundcard/interface do you plan to run on the machine?

[Ian Alexander]

I've had good luck with Dell Precision Workstations. Glad to see that you understand these are NOT the consumer Dimension boxes. I have since discovered that speccing a machine through a local box builder yields similar components for a lot less money. If work requires Dell, though, that's not an option.

A few thoughts:

I have read here and elsewhere that RAID may increase reliability, but may negatively affect read/write speeds. If track counts are fairly low, that may not be an issue for you.

I would consider a DVD writer. Makes it much easier to archive larger projects or several days of work.

BTW, I was able to connect the onboard sound to a pair of computer speakers for the Windows noises and usually ran SS through the Lynx card. I sometimes checked mixes through the crummy audio and small speakers. I rarely hear anything through the comp speakers from the audio computer because I rarely do any of the things Windows has sounds for. It is nice to hear when a batch of mp3 files is finished, etc.

[Demodave]

The computer is not for me personally, but for my production studio for doing radio stuff. That is why I am sticking with the Dell. The chipset is Intel X38 Express. I'll transfer my soundcard from the old machine, which is a RME Hammerfall plugged in to a Panasonic DA7 via ADAT optical cables. I'll also transfer the Sony and Pioneer DVD-R writers to the new machine. As for the Windows sounds, I turn those completely off. Although, checking the mix thru some crappy computer speakers hooked up to the on-board sound isn't a bad idea. I am definitely interested in the read/write capabilities of a Raid-1 setup. If it will adversely affect SAW, then I will opt for a standard setup.

Here is the tech page for the Dell machine: Link (http://www.dell.com/content/products/productdetails.aspx/precn_t3400?c=us&cs=04&l=en&s=bsd)

[Ian Alexander]

http://www.sawstudiouser.com/forums/showthread.php?t=5347

http://www.sawstudiouser.com/forums/showthread.php?t=6238

Googling "raid read write speeds" yields some potentially useful info, too.

http://www.z-a-recovery.com/art-raid.htm

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RAID

It appears that RAID 0 improves performance but not reliability and has a 50 percent capacity hit. RAID 1 uses two disks, has a 50 percent capacity hit, improves reliability somewhat, may improve read speed, but will likely slow write speed. RAID 5 is similar to RAID 1, but uses more than two disks and has a capacity hit of one drive.

An interesting note is that RAID is not a good substitute for regular backups. RAID systems are still subject to file corruption, user error, fire, theft, etc.

If you have to back up anyway, why not use all the space on those drives and forgo RAID?

HTH

[AudioAstronomer]

At work, we are now being asked to buy all new computers from Dell. Good stuff generally. I am ready for a new system for Saw Studio Lite and would love your opinions:


Also, please check prices.

Both my mother and cousin have EPP programs with dell, and it's a total scam.

They advertise %20 off, %15 off, -$100 etc.. but what really happens is they take off the discounts you would get if you just went to dell.com and then apply the discounts you see.

I've seen a number of times where the price direct from dell.com, rather than going through an EPP or similar is actually cheaper.

Be careful, and make sure to price match regardless of what you get.


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If you're not using an epp or similar, then make sure you scour the web. There's lots of offers out there that can save you money

[Demodave]

Here is why I wanted to use RAID-1:

I always have lots of small projects going...many that I don't need to back up to CD or DVD for the long term. I always back up my important stuff. I just figured that if my audio drive fails, I can always change to the other drive and immediately be up and running again. So my reason for the RAID is redundancy, not extra speed. Although, I have read reports that if a drive starts to get corrupted, there is a good chance that the mirrored drive will become corrupt too.

So many questions...:confused:

[DominicPerry]

That is the risk, that you don't back up because you think that RAID will protect your data 100%. It won't. As you say, drive corruption is common, usually brought down by the OS but also by the RAID controller. Fiddling around with RAID drives is, in my opinion, enjoying technology, not deploying it to your advantage. I wouldn't bother with it unless you are rendering video projects, in which case it needs to be set up for speed and no resilience and you need more than a couple of drives.

Dominic