EEVblog #1026 - Mystery Dumpster Diving PC

[EEVblog]

What's inside this mystery dumpster dive PC?
Will it work?

[innkeeper]

the i7 920's (2.66 ghz) were famous for being overclocked to 4ghz+ reliably, i've been running 3 of them at 3.8ghz 24/7 since 2008... and with that kinda overclocking, its taken a long time for it to be worthwhile considering upgrading.

so id say you can get a lot more out of that processor with some conservative (for that series processor) overclocking... give it a try.

[blueskull]

That machine can score $350 easily on eBay, or $400+ if you are patient and are willing to sell it as parts, piece by piece. Whoever threw it may either be stupid, or had a fight with his family and his family threw it out (quite common in China, daddy throws kid's computer out, usually smashed, or sells it for cheap).

That being said, if you want to OC it to 4.0GHz, get a better PSU and a better cooler. Personally I would sell it rather than keep it since it's way too power hungry. The latest Intel 8700K CPU can turbo boost to 4.3GHz for all 6 cores, and to 4.7GHz for single core, while still fitting in a 95W power envelope. It's said that its multicore performance is better than R7 1800X from leaked tests.

[EEVblog]

The latest Intel 8700K CPU can turbo boost to 4.3GHz for all 6 cores, and to 4.7GHz for single core, while still fitting in a 95W power envelope. It's said that its multicore performance is better than R7 1800X from leaked tests.

Yeah, but it's not like I can just drop in the new processor, right?

[EEVblog]

the i7 920's (2.66 ghz) were famous for being overclocked to 4ghz+ reliably, i've been running 3 of them at 3.8ghz 24/7 since 2008... and with that kinda overclocking, its taken a long time for it to be worthwhile considering upgrading.
so id say you can get a lot more out of that processor with some conservative (for that series processor) overclocking... give it a try.

Don't really need to do that, as I have two other machines more powerful (mine and David2's editing PC's).
Not sure what I'll do with this one.

[blueskull]

The latest Intel 8700K CPU can turbo boost to 4.3GHz for all 6 cores, and to 4.7GHz for single core, while still fitting in a 95W power envelope. It's said that its multicore performance is better than R7 1800X from leaked tests.

Yeah, but it's not like I can just drop in the new processor, right?

You need DDR4 with Z370 mobo, and at this moment, DDR4 is expensive like f*. It's basically 3x the price per GB it used to be 1.5 years ago.

[technix]

I wonder if Sagen have his PC already. If not, I think now he get one.

This machine can still compete with modern mid range machines now, if given a small upgrade of an SSD. Wipe the drive and reinstall the operating system on this thing (as the current setup is likely infested with some Chinese PUPs and that may be why the machine is thrown out.) and you get a perfectly working mid range PC.

As mentioned above the i7-950 are good overclockers, and the Fractal case here allows you to mount an all-in-one liquid cooler on the top, giving you a lot more overclocking headroom on the processor than the Intel stock cooler allows. Another slightly expensive upgrade it can use is a GeForce GTX 1060 graphics card, especially when modern game titles or 4K video is involved.

[station240]

Don't really need to do that, as I have two other machines more powerful (mine and David2's editing PC's).
Not sure what I'll do with this one.

Giveaway for the Australians ?
This is way better than the PC I have now

[IanMacdonald]

Just be aware that something worth a fair bit which has been inexplicably dumped, may be stolen goods. Not necessarily because some people have more money than they know what to do with. However, just be aware that you could have your collar felt if you put it up for sale and it's spotted.

Might be worth checking if there are stolen property lists in your area.

[blueskull]

Just be aware that something worth a fair bit which has been inexplicably dumped, may be stolen goods. Not necessarily because some people have more money than they know what to do with. However, just be aware that you could have your collar felt if you put it up for sale and it's spotted.

Might be worth checking if there are stolen property lists in your area.

Don't know laws in Australia, but Chinese laws say unintentionally selling/buying dirty goods isn't illegal, but the seller is obligated to provide info of the buyer, and return money to buyer. The buyer, if being contacted, is obligated to return the dirty goods, even without a refund (if seller is the con).

[Muttley Snickers]

Giveaway for the Australians ?
This is way better than the PC I have now

Yeah, I would certainly buy a ticket for that lottery and happily pay the shipping costs as well, it runs rings around the old rusty things I have here, most of which have either passed their self destruct date or are on the blink anyway.   

Sent from my TV, It's a bit much for the PC to cope with.

[Brumby]

I'd be in that.  I don't even have USB3 on this thing.

Shipping cost is a little drive - if Dave would be OK with a pickup.

[NANDBlog]

These old 1366 platforms can be upgraded for cents now, to get a very decent PC.
Xeon X5690 100 USD, 6x3.5GHz
24 GB DDR3 RAM for some 60 USD
Video card of your liking. I'm not sure I would keep the
SSD.
For a total of some 250 USD, you get a PC which is plenty for today's tasks. I'mactually considering to get a second hand LGA2011v3 workstation. For 400 USD, there are 8 core 32 GB ram beasts. Used hardware is very very cheap.

[EEVblog]

These old 1366 platforms can be upgraded for cents now, to get a very decent PC.

Not quite cents.
Seems I can use any one of these processors:
https://www.cpubenchmark.net/socketType.html#id4

X5650's are $35 on ebay delivered and would be a reasonable upgrade.
Just realised my lab PC is the same i7-950, so I could upgrade both machines.
X5660's about 10 bucks more.
X5690's are about $160
I have much better video cards and RAM, and a spare SSD

[ChrisLX200]

All sorts of uses e.g., convert it into a NAS fileserver/backup store. You don't need to run the power-hungry GFX card in that role.

[NANDBlog]

You should check Aliexpress for prices. I think there are some chinese computer refurbishing firms, using that, and not ebay. In any case, they sell x5690 below 100 USD, and X5660 for 30.

[EEVblog]

If I turned it into a FreeNAS RAID server then I'm guessing that my primary requirement would be the least power consumption?
i.e ditch the graphics card and switch to as low power a processor as I can get?

[ChrisLX200]

If I turned it into a FreeNAS RAID server then I'm guessing that my primary requirement would be the least power consumption?
i.e ditch the graphics card and switch to as low power a processor as I can get?

Yep, don't need a monitor powered up most of the time either - and it can be stored someplace out of the way when running. I think that processer will scale power usage down when it's idling, and if you want RAID then a decent discrete controller card that includes RAID5 or 10 would be a good addition. For security I would not open any ports to the internet - but you may need to if you want to access it from a remote site (you have two offices?) so careful security-concious configuration will be required.

ChrisH

[EEVblog]

Yep, don't need a monitor powered up most of the time either - and it can be stored someplace out of the way when running. I think that processer will scale power usage down when it's idling, and if you want RAID then a decent discrete controller card that includes RAID5 or 10 would be a good addition.

FreeNAS does not recommend hardware RAID.

[genBTC]

I can recommend the Xeon X5675 32nm 6 core, 12 thread for the X58 board. I picked up one for $43. And it OC's past 4Ghz stable. I was running my i7 950 at 3.8ghz previously and that was only 4 cores, this Xeon really kicks arse. It even has AES-NI which I didnt have before. I just picked the X5675 as the sweet spot of price, between the lineup of X5650-X5690. (Note - dont overclock on the stock fan )

With the 6 cores @ 4.1ghz it gets 919 cinebench multicore, and 119 single core.
Where a modern 7700k would get like 190 single core. (only downside of the CPU being so old).
(the old i7-950 @ 3.8ghz scored 571 cinebench multicore and 102 single core.)

[hans]

Hardware RAID has died years ago.
You really don't want to use that with spinning rust containing 2+ TB's per disk.
If you aim on running FreeNAS and want to use something modern like ZFS, they also recommended ECC memory by the way. Oh, and loads of RAM.

The i7 machine is pretty decent but it's a power hungry beast. I wouldn't use it as a server personally, unless you pay like 'zero' for electricity or need some extra room heating. On the other hand, you could build a pretty wicked NAS box , including compression and deduplication probably.

The case looks a bit beaten up, but nevertheless that's just cosmetic. I paid over 100 euro's for my R4 model, Fractal Design are really nice clean looking cases. Especially with the harddrive bay slots and the amount of sound isolation material.

[IanMacdonald]

Hardware RAID has died years ago.

Nope, still widely used. Though, the tendency these days is to use RAID1 (Simple mirroring) or RAID10 (Mirror+stripe)

RAID5 has largely bit the dust because it was found to be less of a data protection than was thought. Plus, failure of the RAID controller itself leaves you with a perfectly intact but mysterious collection 1's and 0's that no other computer can make sense of   

[cdev]

Dave,

Would any of the software you use to do the tasks you do support and be helped by splitting up those tasks i.e. network rendering, or similar - divide and conquer?

[Monkeh]

RAID5 has largely bit the dust because it was found to be less of a data protection than was thought. Plus, failure of the RAID controller itself leaves you with a perfectly intact but mysterious collection 1's and 0's that no other computer can make sense of   

That's why hardware RAID is problematic. Thankfully, we have alternatives.

[PA0PBZ]

My home PC is an I7 950 with 6GB, still not found a reason to replace it. Well, it has an SSD of course, best upgrade you can do if you didn't already.
I think it's like 7 years old but it still doesn't feel slow or anything so I guess I'll be using it a bit longer.