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Showing posts with label Hardware. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Hardware. Show all posts
Comparing CPU Speed and Performance from Benchmarks Reports
2 years ago I moved my website from WebhostingBuzz to a dedicated server in SoftLayer and has been using it until today. The server was considered quite powerful then and luckily it has been able to support this blog and forum without giving any major downtime. There are still times when this website gets a surge of visitors and caused the server to crash. Here are my current dedicated hardware specification. Single processor quad core Intel Xeon X3220, 8GB DDR2 RAM, 100Mbps uplink, 2 x 73GB SA-SCSI 15K RPM hard drives WITHOUT RAID and I am paying a whopping $349 every month for the past 2 years.
Recently I found out that the monthly price for X3220 and X3230 is the same except there is an additional one time $49 setup fee. I figured that the X3230 should be faster than the X3220, so I went ahead and ordered the upgrade which was performed last weekend. I didn’t really know what are the differences because I never really performed any benchmark.
Sometimes I do felt like I am paying too much for the server rental in SoftLayer so I searched around and I finally found a datacenter that was offering a much better price with a more powerful server compared to SoftLayer.
My current SoftLayer dedicated server specification:
CPU: Intel Xeon 3230 4×2.66GHzMy upcoming new NetDepot dedicated server specification:
Memory: 8GB DDR2 RAM
Hard Drive: 2 x 73GB SA-SCSI 15K RPM without RAID
Bandwidth: 2000GB (100Mbps uplink)
Annual Price: $4212
CPU: Dual Intel Xeon E5520 Nehalem 8×2.26GHzAs you can see I am getting a way more powerful processor with an increased of memory and also RAID 1 for hard drive mirroring. The best part is the price that I get from NetDepot is much cheaper than SoftLayer. The first year price is a bit higher compared to the second year onwards because of the “buydown” option where I pay for the upgrades once and never had to pay for it again. The server migration will be done somewhere end of this month to early of March and the whole process should be transparent.
Memory: 12GB DDR3 RAM
Hard Drive: 2 x 146GB SA-SCSI 15K RPM with RAID 1
Bandwidth: 3000GB (100Mbps uplink)
First year Annual Price: $3590.2
Second Year Onwards: $1771.2
Anyway, I wanted to share on how to compare CPU speeds and performance based on benchmark reports. Like I said earlier, I didn’t know what are the difference between a X3220 and X3230 or X3230 vs E5520 in numbers so these reports would really help.
1. PassMark CPU Benchmark Charts
PassMark Software has delved into the thousands of benchmark results that PerformanceTest users have posted to its web site and produced five Intel vs AMD CPU charts to help compare the relative speeds of the different processors. Included in this list are CPUs designed for servers and workstations (Intel Xeon and AMD Opteron processors), desktop CPUs (Intel Core2 Quad, Intel Core i7, Intel Core2 Extreme and AMD Phenom II processors), in addition to mobile CPUs.
2. frybench
Frybench is an open public benchmark based on RandomControl’s flagship product, fryrender, to which anyone could submit performance measurements. Fryrender’s core doesn’t let a single CPU cycle be wasted. Its routines have been written to be cache efficient, and to take the maximum advantage possible of the new multi-threading capabilities present in modern CPU architectures.
3. Futuremark Benchmark Results
Futuremark has public benchmark results but the search form makes it hard to find for the CPU score that you’re looking for. You can search for what kind of processor such as Intel Core 2 Quad but can’t search for the exact processor number such as Q6600, Q6700 or E5520. So far I could only find this 3 sites that are offering up to date CPU benchmark reports. If you know any, do let me know so I can add it to the list.
VirusTotal Uploader 2.0 Supports Uploading up to Five 20MB Files
VirusTotal is one of the best online service that is provided for free to everyone. It is an online file scanner that allows you to upload any suspicious file to have it scanned using 41 different antivirus software with the latest virus definitions. If you find that uploading file to VirusTotal is a hassle, you can always use their uploader program that works on Windows. Simply right click on the file, go to Send To and finally select VirusTotal from the list. The uploader program will automatically send the file to VirusTotal without you opening your web browser, typing virustotal.com in the URL bar and wait for the website to load.
The VirusTotal Uploader has been recently updated to version 2.0 and it has a couple of major improvements to make it even faster and better.
case of multiple-file malware queries. Additionally, the file limit has been increased to 20 MB (previously 10MB) per file.
Secondly, VirusTotal Uploader version 1.0 only allows you to send the file to VirusTotal using right click context-menu but now it has an independent standalone program! In this mode, you can upload files to VirusTotal in a few ways:
1. Select an executable process that is active in Windows
2. Drag and drop up to 5 files to the program
3. Manually browse for the file in your computer
4. Enter an URL address with a suspicious file that will automatically “Get and upload”.
Another improvement to the latest VirusTotal Uploader 2.0 is a pre-upload check if the file is already present in the VirusTotal database. In this version, the Uploader calculates a hash of the file before uploading it, and checks if it appears in the database. If so, the file doesn’t get uploaded, saving both time and transfer. Of course, you are still able to force the uploading of the file for reanalysis.
If you are the adventures type that likes download a lot of dangerous programs such as keygen, cracks, patches, trojans, crypter, binder and etc, then you should definitely use VirusTotal Uploader. This program does not take up any system resource at all when it is not running. Another advantage in using a desktop uploading tool is the transfer rate speed is definitely faster than uploading from web browser.
[ Download VirusTotal Uploader 2.0 ]
12 RAM Disk Software Benchmarked for Fastest Read and Write Speed
RAM Disk is a technology where you use your computer’s memory (or some people call it RAM) and make it into a virtual hard disk drive. People do that because the speed of RAM is so much faster for most kinds of storage and files on a RAM disk can be accessed much more quickly. Another factor is RAM are pretty affordable nowadays and most modern computers have at least 2 to 4GB of memory which we’ll never fully utilize. Ever get annoyed on how long it takes to run Adobe Photoshop? Even after using Firefox for a long time, you’ll notice that the best browser starts to crawl. Well if you install and load it in RAM Disk, I strongly believe that the time that takes to startup will definitely cut down by a lot. All you need to do is to install the software on the drive that is created with RAMDisk or if it is a database, set the program to load the database from the RAMDisk.
I have found 12 RAM Disk software with most of them are shareware and only a few that is free. After a little research and testing on the RAM Disk software, I noticed that some performs faster by giving a faster read and write speed even when working on the same memory. I believe how the RAMdisk driver is being coded and optimized makes a difference on the performance of the software.
I will be using CrystalDiskMark, a very popular disk benchmark software to do the test on a clean Windows XP computer with service pack 3 and all latest hotfixes. I have 1GB DDR2 (333MHz) x 3 installed on my desktop computer. As a standard, I will create 500MB on every RAMDisk software if it allows me to. Then I will use the default CrystalDiskMark benchmark settings to test on the RAMdisk space. I’ve tried running the test a few times and the result I get is always different but they are very close. The number that matters the most is the 4K test which is at the third row of the screenshots. Higher is better.
7200RPM hard drive without using RAM Disk.
1. Qsoft RAMDrive Enterprise 5.3.1.11 (Shareware $10 USD)
2. Virtual Hard Drive 2 Pro (Shareware $29.99 USD)
3. Gilisoft RAMDisk 3.2 (Shareware $19.96 USD)
4. VSuite Ramdisk Standard Edition 4.3.4127.1603 (Direct IO) (Shareware $29.95 USD)
5. SuperSpeed RamDisk 10.0.1 (Shareware $39.95 USD)
6. Dataram RAMDisk 3.5.130 (Freeware)
7. VSuite Ramdisk Free Edition 1.16.2127.1603 (SCSI) (Freeware)
8. ImDisk 1.1.6 built 7 (Freeware)
9. Gavotte RRamdisk (Freeware)
10. SoftPerfect RAM Disk 1.0.1 (Free Beta)
11. Power RAMDisk 2.80 (Shareware $9.95 USD)
Note: Can only create FAT and FAT32 drive (NTFS not possible). Blue screen of death crash occur when try to test read and write speed with CrystalDiskMark.
The last two is a failed RAM Disk product and they’re charging money for it! If you want to use RAMDisk software for free, go for Dataram RAMDisk. If you’re willing to buy it, then choose either one from the top 3 because they all have similar results.
Keyboard LED as Indicator for Windows Incoming and Outgoing Network Packets
I like the network connection icon for XP that is in your notification area compared to Vista or 7 because it’s very clear and visible whenever you have network activity. The connection icon for Vista and 7 has improved with nicer and smoother looks but I personally felt that the “blink” is not bright/visible enough to know if there are incoming/outgoing traffic.
All keyboards has LED so you can easily tell you if you have Numlock, Capslock and ScrollLock enabled/disabled. I found a small tool called Network Lights which really doesn’t do much except giving you a nice little indication on your network traffic by blinking your keyboard LEDs whenever you have outgoing or incoming packets on network interface.
This utility is a standalone executable. Run the program, you’ll see a new system tray icon. Now you can monitor your network traffic using the ScrollLock and NumLock LEDs on your keyboard. You can use the system tray icon (click the mouse) to customize program settings. If you have an older motherboard and your keyboard LED doesn’t blink when there are network traffic, try going to Settings and enable “Force Keyboard Capture” option.
Network Lights is only 96KB in size and takes only 1MB of memory when it is running. Lasted updated on June 2006 but I’ve tested it on Windows XP and Windows 7, both seems to work without problems. I am not sure which network connection it will indicate if you have more than 1 network connection. I bet this program will make your keyboard looks cool especially at night when all lights are turned off.
[ Download Network Lights ]
Search a Particular Word in Multiple Editable Text Files
I have my own private RapidLeech server which is hosted in Malaysia and it’s very useful whenever I am downloading a file at a very slow speed. I can make use of the server that has a very fast connection to download the file for me and save it to the server and then I will download it from the server. Since the server is located in the same country as I currently am, I am able to achieve maximum download speed. The only thing I have to worry is I have to make sure that my hosting does not run out of the given bandwidth which is 200GB. Once I exceed the bandwidth limit, all websites will be suspended until it reset in the new month.
’ve updated to the latest Rapidleech v42 pr-t2 because the v41 wasn’t working very well. After the upgrade, I am seeing an error message at the footer of the rapidleech page which says “getCpuUsage(): couldn’t access STAT path or STAT file invalid“. I have tried installing RapidLeech on another server and there’s no such error message. It is supposed to display a nice information on server space and CPU load.
That error is not a big deal but I don’t want that error message to show. There are 447 files in RapidLeech archive and I am certainly not going to edit one by one with notepad and search for the getCpuUsage keyword. So I use TextCrawler to automatically help me find a keyword across multiple files
and folders.
TextCrawler is a free tool for searching and replacing over multiple plain text files. It can search for straight text and supports advanced search/replace via regular expressions.
TextCrawler Features:
Find and Replace across files Fast searching, even on large files Simple to use interface Flexible search parameters Text Extractor – rip text into a new file Search and replace using Regular Expressions. Create sophisticated searches Regular Expression test tool Regular Expression library – Save your searches Create backup files Highlighted search results Export Results Batch find and replace operations
To use TextCrawler search for a word, I first select the folder (Start Location) that I want to search in. Then set the Filename/Filter as *.* so it will try to search all files in that selected folder. At Find, I entered the word getCpuUsage and then clicked the Find button. In less than 3 seconds, TextCrawler is able to let me know which text files contains the word “getCpuUsage” and at which line.
In another scenario, during software giveaways, there are more than 1000 entries and copying every single email address to a text file to randomly select a winner is tough. So I hacked the Wordpress core file to set it to display 300 comments for an article. Then I saved all the contents to a text file, and use TextCrawler’s Regular Expressions to easily extract all the email addresses.
Enable Disabled Buttons in Windows with Enabler
There are times when Windows or a software doesn’t allow us to click a button. It could be a shareware that only after registering the button would be enabled or a feature that doesn’t make any sense if it was enabled. For example, if you run Windows Task Manager, go to the Users tab and click on the user that you are currently logged on as, the Send Message button is disabled. This sending message feature is useful if there are a few users logged on and you can send a message to another user but there is no logic in sending the message to yourself. That explains why the Send Message is disabled for currently logged on user.
Jack ONeill, the owner of EvilFingers has created a simple free tool called Enabler that can enable any disabled or grayed out buttons in Windows. There is no requirement or need for privilege escalation because this will enable any button on the user’s windows and there is no requirement to be a root or super user for enabling the buttons.
Here is a simple proof of concept on how Enabler works. Right click on Windows Taskbar and select Task Manager. Click on the Users tab and then select the current logged on user. The disconnect and Logoff button is enabled but the Send Message button is not accessible. Keep Windows Task Manager open and do not close it.
Now run Enabler and click the Enable button.
Click OK when you get a confirmation window saying that it’s Done.
Go to the Windows Task Manager again and you should see that the Send Message button can be used. Try clicking the Send Message button, type any message and click OK. A new message window should appear with the message that you’ve written.
It is important to make sure that the user is in focus/selected after enabling the button. Once you click on other areas and then you go back to the user again, the button will be disabled and you have to use Enabler to bring it back. If Enabler doesn’t work for you, then perhaps you can try DM2 or TurnItOn.
[ Download Enabler ]
Athlon II Or Phenom II: Does Your CPU Need L3 Cache?
It makes sense to equip multi-core processors with a dedicated memory utilized jointly by all available cores. In this role, fast third-level cache (L3) can accelerate access to frequently needed data. Cores should not revert to accessing the slower main memory (RAM) whenever possible.
That’s the theory, at least. AMD’s recent launch of the Athlon II X4, which is fundamentally a Phenom II X4 without the L3, implies that the tertiary cache may not always be necessary. We decided to do an apples to apples comparison using both options and find out.
How Cache Works
Before diving deeper into our tests, it’s important to understand some basics. The principle of caches is rather simple. They buffer data as close as possible to the processing core(s) in order to avoid the CPU having to access the data from more distant, slower memory sources. Today’s desktop platform cache hierarchies consist of three cache levels before reaching system memory access. The second and especially the third levels aren’t just for data buffering. Their purpose is also to prevent choking the CPU bus with unnecessary data exchange traffic between cores.
Cache Hit/Miss
The effectiveness of a cache architecture is measured by its hit rate. Data requests that can be answered within a given cache are referred to as hits. If that cache doesn’t contain the sought data and must pass the request on to subsequent memory structures, this is a miss. Obviously, misses are slow. They lead to stalls in the execution pipeline and introduce wait periods. Hits, on the other hand, help sustain maximum performance.
Cache Writes, Exclusivity, Coherency
Replacement policies dictate how room is created in a full cache for new cache entries. Since data written into a cache eventually has to be available in the main memory, systems can either do this at the same time (write-through) or mark overwritten locations as “dirty” (write-back) and execute the write once the data is wiped out of the cache.
Data on several levels of cache can be stored exclusively, meaning that no redundancy exists. You won’t find the same piece of data in two different cache structures. Alternatively, caches can operate in an inclusive manner, with lower levels guaranteed to hold the data found in higher-levels (closer to the processor) of cache. AMD’s Phenom works with an exclusive L3 cache, while Intel follows the inclusive cache strategy. Coherency protocols take care of maintaining data across multiple levels, cores, and even processors.
Cache Capacity
Larger caches can buffer more data, but they also tend to introduce higher latency. Since cache also consumes large amounts of a processor’s transistors, it is important to find a viable balance between transistor cost and die size, power consumption, and performance/latency issues.
Associativity
RAM entries can either be direct-mapped, meaning that there can only be one position in a cache for copies of main memory, or they may be n-way associative, which stands for n possible positions in the cache to store data. Higher associativity (up to fully associative caches) provide the best caching flexibility because existing cache data doesn’t have to be overwritten. In other words, high n-way associativity guarantees higher hit rates, but it introduces more latency, since it takes more time to compare all of those associations for hits. Ultimately, it makes sense to implement many-way associativity for the last cache level because there’s the most capacity available, and searching beyond that would send the processor out to slower system memory.
Here are some examples: The Core i5 and i7 work with 32KB of 8-way associative L1 data cache and 32KB of 4-way associative L1 instruction cache. Clearly, Intel wants instructions to be available quicker while also maximizing hits on the L1 data cache. Its L2 cache is also 8-way set-associative, while Intel’s L3 cache is even smarter, implementing 16-way associativity to maximize cache hits.
However, AMD follows another strategy on the Phenom II X4 with a 2-way set-associative L1 cache, which offers lower latencies. To compensate for possible misses, it features twice the memory capacity: 64KB data and 64KB instruction cache. The L2 cache is 8-way set-associative, like Intel's design, but AMD’s L3 cache works at 48-way set associativity. None of this can be judged without looking at the entire CPU architecture. Naturally, only the benchmarks results really count, but the whole purpose of this technical excursion is to provide a look into the complexity behind multi-level caching.
by : Patrick Schmid and Achim Roos
One Last Look: ASRock And MSI Preview P55 Motherboards
Meet MSI's P55-GD80, the company's highest-end P55-based offering, expected to run right around $200. As with many past MSI platforms, this one sports tasteful aesthetic touches, like black and dark blue components, classy, unobstructed cooling on the voltage regulation circuitry, and an oversized anodized-looking heatpipe.
In this preview, we'll explore MSI's flagship in greater depth and then introduce ASRock's upcoming top-end model as well. Representatives from ASRock recently spent the afternoon in our Bakersfield, California lab to talk about P55 plans, pricing, power, and future technologies--I'll give you more detail as we skirt around the company's P55 Deluxe.
But first, let's dive into the P55-GD80, a board we're expecting to be a hit with the overclocking community and will evaluate in greater depth once Intel's upcoming platform officially debuts...
You'll find no surprises here: two legacy PS/2 ports, coaxial/optical digital audio outputs, FireWire 400, plenty of USB 2.0, eSATA (with a powered USB port), dual Gigabit Ethernet jacks, and analog audio connectivity constitute the board's basic back-panel I/O.
MSI's V-Check Points facilitate easy readings if you have a multimeter and want to take your own voltage measurements. To the left of that block, you'll find a bank of DIP switches used to unlock more aggressive voltage options in the board's BIOS.
As with most other P55 boards, the P55-GD80 proffers four DDR3 memory slots supporting dual-channel configurations running at speeds as high as 1,333 MT/s. The slots themselves are color-coded to ensure you install modules correctly.
We've actually spent some quality time with MSI's OC Dial feature, which worked well on the company's 790FX-GD70. OC Genie actually handles the overclocking process automatically by altering Bclk settings in the BIOS through a hardware-based IC. More than likely, this is something mainstream folks might be tempted to play with, but we're pretty confident that power users will choose to set their own parameters. Fortunately, two on-board Direct OC buttons facilitate 1 MHz Bclk adjustments in either direction.
Underneath the Direct OC and OC Genie buttons, you'll find Green Power, reset, and power icons silk screened onto the PCB. Those are actually touch-sensitive buttons that light up when activated, similar to the power button on a PS3. MSI calls the feature Easy Button 2, and we dig it.
With support for CrossFire and SLI, the first two PCI Express x16 slots on MSI's P55-GD80 are tied to the LGA 1156 interface. With one graphics card installed, the top slot gets all 16 of the CPU's available lanes. With two installed, the slots automatically revert to x8/x8. The third x16 slot runs to the P55 PCH and is wired to operate at x4 signaling rates. Bear in mind that if you populate the third slot, neither of the x1 slots will be usable. Why not? Doesn't P55 include eight lanes of PCI Express 2.0? Yes, it does. But MSI's integrated extras (networking/storage) utilize what's left. So, just keep the slot limitations in mind as you plan your upgrade path.
Two standard PCI slots round out expansion on the P55-GD80.
Several vendors claim to optimize intricate power circuits, switching phases on and off as needed. MSI's implementation (which centers on a relatively-conservative eight phase hardware design) is complemented by an LCD readout indicating exactly how many power phases are being used at any given time.
Given that the Core i5 and Core i7 processors launching next month are 95W parts, we suspect that MSI's decision to go eight-phase, even when competing vendors are deploying as many as 24, is probably a safe bet. We've already taken a pre-production i5 up past 4.1 GHz on this board without any sort of issue. And we know from discussions with Intel that lower phase counts, designed properly, can be just as effective as more complex solutions.
MSI covers its MOSFETs with beefy heatsinks and a substantial heatpipe. This cooling circuit, dubbed SuperPipe, is designed to draw heat away from on-
board components and move it to less-sensitive areas of the motherboard. The heatsink on the left in the above picture doesn't actually rest on vital core logic. Rather, it's in place to help keep power circuitry cooler. We've seen similar designs from other vendors and questioned the necessity of extra cooling on a cost-conscious d
esign. However, at a sub-$200 price, we're willing to test the effectiveness of SuperPipe when it comes time to round up the higher-end P55 platforms.
Most of the features highlighted on MSI's P55-GD80 center on drawing in the enthusiast crowd. However, "True Blu-ray Audio" silk-screened onto the PCB caught our attention, too. So, what does that mean, exactly?
As far as we're able to tell, it's a reference to the integrated Realtek ALC889 audio codec. CyberLink's PowerDVD 9 playback app supports the ALC889 (among four other HD Audio codecs) and offers up to 96 kHz / 24-bit audio playback through eight analog channels. It won't do lossless pass-through, like Asus' Xonar HDAV 1.3 , but there is truth to MSI's claim for high-def support if you're using the right playback application and speaker configuration.
AMD Athlon II X4 620: Quad Core For The Masses At $100
With the recent introduction of Intel’s new LGA 1156-based Core i5 and Core i7 processors, AMD faces even more pressure in the competitive upper-mainstream and high-end market segments. Phenom II is a great processor design, but it can only beat Intel’s growing Nehalem family on price.
However, it was only a matter of time until the firm introduced triple- and quad-core processors that don't include any L3 cache—a perfect opportunity for a comeback of the Athlon brand. Welcome the Athlon II X4, follow-up to the Athlon II X2 launched back in June.
What It Has
The new Athlon really isn’t new, although AMD introduces two fresh core names for it: Propus (for the quad-core family) and Rana (for the triple-core).
The first sample we received is a 2.6 GHz Propus blessed with all the features of the Phenom II, including its 45 nm SOI manufacturing process and four cores with 512KB L2 cache each. The chip also sports all of the extensions you’d want today: MMX, SSE, SSE2, SSE3, SSE4a, Enhanced 3DNow!, the NX bit feature (or execute disable, on Intel CPUs), 64-bit support, AMD-V virtualization support, and Cool’n’Quiet to lower clock speeds and voltages during idle periods.
Since Propus is based on the Deneb design, all new Athlon II X3 and X4 processors can operate either on Socket AM2+ platforms with DDR2 memory or on Socket AM3 with DDR3. Clearly, the new processors represent an excellent upgrade option for older AM2 systems, especially if you consider the attractive $100 price point.
What It Doesn’t Have
No one should be surprised that $100 won’t buy you a top-of-the-line product, so we have to wonder about the chip’s limitations. The most obvious step down is the cache architecture. All Athlon II processors, including the already-introduced Athlon II X2 chips, lack any L3 cache memory.
Given this, the Athlon II X4 breaks with AMD’s tradition of implementing shared cache memory in unified multi-core processor designs. The L3 omission is the main differentiator between the Phenom II and the Athlon II families, although there are obviously also clock speed differences (lower on the Athlon II side).
However, the stripped L3 cache may introduce an advantage of one sort, as the transistors necessary to realize the Phenom II’s 6 MB L3 cache require power. It follows that the Athlon II X4 shouldn’t perform anywhere near the Phenom II X4’s level, but it could end up being more efficient.
How To Install Windows 7 Faster Using USB Flash Drive
I’ve tried researching on how to install Windows XP from a USB flash drive before and when I finally managed to do it, the whole process is so unbearably slow that I thought I would NEVER install it from a USB flash drive. Recently there has been many articles about installing Windows 7 from USB flash drive and I’ve decided to give it another try and see if there is any improvement on the speed. Installing Windows from USB has its advantage which is you don’t need to worry if the DVD drive cannot read the disc or if there is any scratches on the Windows installation DVD, and it is more convenient to carry around your USB flash drive rather than a DVD disc. Moreover, a lot of new compact small laptops or desktops doesn’t even have a CD/DVD drive. Other than that, you can even save useful software setups such as Firefox, Windows Live Messenger, 7-Zip, Orbit Downloader and etc into the USB drive so you can install them once Windows installation has been completed.
I will show you two ways (manual and automatic) on how to install Windows 7 using your USB drive.
Before we start, make sure you have at least a 4GB USB flash drive. Windows 7 installation files takes up around 3GB of space. The manual way
1. Insert your USB flash drive.
2. Hit WIN+R, type cmd and click OK.
3. Type diskpart and hit ENTER
4. Type list disk, hit ENTER and identify the disk number for your USB flash drive. You MUST be very sure of this or else you’ll be formatting the wrong drive later on. If you have only one hard drive, then normally your USB flash drive will be disk 1.
5. Type select disk 1 and hit ENTER
6. Type clean and hit ENTER
7. Type create partition primary and hit ENTER
8. Type select partition 1 and hit ENTER
9. Type active and hit ENTER
10. Type format fs=fat32 and hit ENTER
11. Type assign and hit ENTER
12. Type exit and hit ENTER
13. Insert the Windows 7 installation DVD disc and copy everything from the DVD to your USB flash drive.
14. Boot up your computer with USB flash drive. You will need to go into your BIOS and make sure it is set to boot from flash devices. If you got it right, the Windows 7 installation should load from your USB flash drive.
The automatic way
There is a software called WinToFlash that does everything above automatically. All you need to do is run the program, set the location of the Windows 7 installation disc and the destination of your USB flash drive.
1. Download the latest version of WinToFlash
2. Extract and run WinToFlash.exe
3. Click the big check button to start Windows setup transfer wizard.
4. Click Next
5. Specify the locations of Windows files and USB drive then click Next. The Windows files path if the drive letter of your DVD drive and the USB drive is the drive letter of your USB flash drive.
6. Select “I Accepted the terms of the license agreement” and click Continue.
7. Click OK to start formatting your USB flash drive and the files will be automatically transferred from your Windows 7 install disc to your USB flash drive.
8. Click Next when finished copying and boot up the computer with USB flash drive. You will need to go into your BIOS and make sure it is set to boot from flash devices. If you got it right, the Windows 7 installation should load from your USB flash drive. Your computer hardware specification plays a part on the time taken to install Windows. I managed to complete installing Windows 7 from USB flash drive with only 17 minutes and my desktop’s specification is Intel Pentium D 2.8GHz, 2GB ram, 7200RPM 160GB SATA hard drive and MSI 945P Platinum mainboard. When I time installing Windows 7 using DVD, it took 22 minutes. So on my desktop computer, it is 22% faster installing Windows using USB flash drive compared to DVD.
Should You Be Looking For A Hard Drive Upgrade?
Most desktop PCs bought or built in the past five years are probably using hard drives in the capacity range of 80 GB to 250 GB. Recent price drops in the hard drive market mean that most current drive generation is more attractive than ever before. You can get 1 TB hard drives for less than $100 now.
Knowing that capacity may not be the only impetus for upgrading your hard drive, we "recreated" a three-year old system with a 200 GB hard drive and looked at what would happen if we replaced the drive with a modern terabyte model.
Capacity Quadrupled, Performance Doubled
It is safe to say that each and every hard drive selling today is far superior to older-generation drives, as improving recording technologies keep pushing forward capacities and performance. Other modifications, such as the interface transition from parallel ATA to Serial ATA 150 (and then 300 MB/s), also make a difference. But no individual feature—even Native Command Queuing or a larger cache—can make as much of a difference as simply stepping up from one drive generation to the next. In fact, the only reason why new hard drives aren’t getting faster to an even greater degree is an increased emphasis on power consumption and drive efficiency.
The bottom line is a simple recommendation that is almost always valid: when it comes time to buy a new hard drive, make sure the one you pick is a latest-generation model.
Capacity Upgrade: Check
The number one reason to purchase a new hard drive for an existing system, undoubtedly, is capacity, since a three-year old 200 GB hard drive fills up fast. In a year, most people typically add at least a few gigabytes of digital pictures, or even more data if video is stored on the drive. Add to that music, new applications, and so on. Unless you don’t touch digital media at all, you might need an additional 50-100 GB capacity per year, and enthusiasts and professionals may easily require far more. Hence, a hard drive replacement or upgrade every few years is absolutely warranted.
Performance Upgrade: Sure?
The next reason for replacing a hard drive would be performance. To illustrate this, we recreated a typical PC system using a Pentium 4 660 processor and a 915G-based motherboard from Asus with 1 GB of RAM; this represents an upper-mainstream system from the 2005-era. We selected a 200 GB Samsung Spinpoint P120 series SATA hard drive and ran several performance and power consumption benchmarks. Then we replayed the benchmark suite using a brand new 1 TB Samsung Spinpoint F2 EcoGreen to measure the difference.
Southbridge Battle: 780a, ICH10 and SB750, Compared
All chipsets today offer integrated Serial ATA (SATA) support, since all mainstream hard drives now utilize the fast serial interface. Even entry-level chipsets tend to support the creation of striped sets (RAID 0) or mirrors (RAID 1) to accelerate storage performance or improve data protection.
Upper-mainstream and high-end products not only offer more SATA ports but also added software-based functionality, such as RAID 5. Although few users actually use RAID 5 on desktop PCs (given a three-drive minimum), this mode requires processing horsepower to calculate parity, which is required to rebuild stored data should one hard drive break. The CPU supplies the horsepower, but the southbridge acts as the controller for the RAID operations, and we found significant differences between RAID 5-enabled desktop chipsets for these tasks.
Under Core i7's Hood: Comparing The C0 And D0 Steppings
Whether you're looking at the IT hardware business or automobile industry, products often receive bug fixes, improvements, or upgrades during their active life cycle. Cars get face-lifted once they’ve been on the market for a while, usually at that halfway point between launch and the introduction of a successor.
In terms of silicon devices, we’re talking about steppings, which often incorporate a number of different improvements. When Intel introduced its Core i7-975 Extreme, it started to replace the 965 Extreme's C0 stepping with the more advanced D0 silicon. We found some significant differences between the two.
New Steppings Don’t Mean More Performance
First of all, we’d like to make clear that modified processor steppings eliminate known bugs, while also improving the production process. Typically, this includes optimization on a transistor level, which may result in extended clock speed margins, lower voltage requirements for standard operation, or even the addition of features.
As a result, the latest processors normally show better energy efficiency, as they may require slightly less power than previous steppings to deliver the same performance results. However, stepping updates usually do not introduce any performance increase, as the processor vendor would rather have you pay for that.
New Stepping Mean More Possibilities
Other publications, such as AnandTech (Core i7-920 D0 Preview) and X-bit labs (D0 Processor Stepping in Action), already reported impressive results with D0 parts over the previous, first-generation Core i7 C0 stepping. Anand looked at a model 920 while X-bit labs tested a 965-Extreme.
We decided to do an apples-to-apples comparison with both Core i7 Extreme editions: the 3.2 GHz 965 and the 3.33 GHz 975. We set both to run at 3.33 GHz in order to compare performance and, surprisingly, we did find differences. Then we tried to overclock as far as possible on air cooling using a Zalman CPNS 10X cooler. Finally, we performed power comparison measurements at the highest clock speed, which both the C0-based 965 and the D0-based 975 processor would support reliably.
DDR3 On A Budget: Six 6 GB Memory Kits
Have DDR3 prices finally hit rock bottom? DDR3-1600 reached $30 per 2 GB module several weeks ago, making it completely competitive in price-per-performance with DDR2. Available in both dual-channel and triple-channel kits for $60 and $90, these aren't last year’s high-voltage parts, but instead completely modern 1.50-1.65 V modules, fully compatible with Core i7, Phenom II socket AM3, and future Core i5 platforms.
But those were June's prices, and several of the modules that qualified for our “sub-$100 triple-channel roundup” have since gone up to as much as $130. Meanwhile, prices for the DDR2 that still competes for attention in AM2+ and LGA 775 platforms have remained relatively flat. A few of today’s contenders haven’t yet been hit by the higher cost bug, but we see it as only a matter of time before the cheapest models get more expensive or the more expensive models get cheaper. Either move will result in all six sets once again settling into the same price class.
Today’s comparison is about value, so the products lagging behind the upward pricing trend have a distinct advantage no matter how long it lasts. With daily updates logistically difficult, tomorrow’s readers should instead find our test data far more useful than any value conclusions when using future prices.
Value for us is defined by how much performance we can extract from a part, rather than how much it’s specified to provide. Overclocking and under-latency test results are thus more significant to us than rated settings, yet some people refuse to overclock by a greater amount than specified by the module manufacturer. Here’s a short list of how today’s samples are marketed.
The only company to rate its part at standard voltage, Crucial’s higher-latency DDR3 can be viewed as the only parts in today’s lineup that don’t require overclocking techniques to reach rated speed and timings. Our overclocking tests will be the equalizer, since we apply the same voltage limit to every set.
Before we move on to overclock testing and value assessment, let’s take a closer look at each product in today’s comparison.
Asus P7P55 WS Supercomputer P55 Motherboard Preview
Meet Asus' P7P55 WS Supercomputer, little brother to the P6T7 WS Supercomputer based on Intel's X58 chipset. Of course, the P7P55 WS centers on P55, Intel's upcoming platform controller hub, complementing LGA 1156 Core i5 and Core i7 processors.
From over top, everything about the P7P55 WS looks fairly standard, but there's actually quite a bit going on with this platform when you zoom in and start flying by its various onboard components. For instance, notice the five PCI Express x16 slots. So what, right? The P6T6 WS Revolution sports six PCI Express x16 slots, after all.
Ah, but the rabbit hole goes deeper. Remember, there's a world of difference between the X58 and P55 chipsets...
In case you've missed any of our other P55 motherboard previews, we covered Gigabyte's microATX P55M-UD4 and Asus' P7P55D Deluxe in the same picture story. We introduced Gigabyte's P55-UD4P and P55-UD6 in another piece. Before that, Asus' P7P55D Evo stood on its own. Don't worry, we're looking to share the love. Solutions from MSI and ASRock are up on the block next.
AMD Phenom II X4 965 Black Edition Review
There is nothing wrong with an incremental update—especially an update that adds performance without affecting pricing. Such is the case with AMD’s new Phenom II X4 965 Black Edition, which arrived at our performance lab running at 3.4 GHz—200 MHz faster than its predecessor, the Phenom II X4 955 BE. Everything else is exactly the same as the Phenom II X4 955, reviewed back in April 2009.
So, if the latest Phenom II is predictably faster than AMD’s former flagship, why is today’s launch so significant? In short, it comes just a few weeks ahead of Intel’s upcoming LGA 1156-based P55 platform debut—an event that’ll almost certainly play a bigger role in the adoption of Nehalem-based machines than either the LGA 1366 Core i7 or Xeon 5500-series CPUs have thus far. After all, LGA 1156 is going to be the interface that purportedly makes Intel’s latest architecture accessible to the mainstream, supplanting the Core 2 family at a number of affordable price points.
No doubt, those new Core i5/i7 CPUs will be faster than the Core 2 Quads they replace, and at competitive prices. Just when AMD looked like it had achieved performance parity with the top end of Intel’s Core micro-architecture, LGA 1156-based platforms seem almost certain to set the bar higher.
Thus, today’s Phenom II X4 965 BE introduction is actually a fairly important one for AMD. On one hand, it could earn the company its mainstream performance crown—at least for a few weeks. On the other, it could be the last time Phenom II looks as competitive as it does now. Of course, that’s going to depend mightily on how the upcoming Intel chips perform.
Up Against Core i5
Of course, we’re not able to publish performance numbers with the pre-production Core i5 processors currently running in the lab, so it’s hard to officially quantify how Phenom II will size up. But we can make best guesses using today’s Core i7s as rough test subjects.
You’ll find all of our usual benchmarks on the pages that follow. First, however, we wanted to set up Phenom II X4 965 BE against a hypothetical Core i5-750—a processor expected to cost less than $200 when it launches. We simulated the 2.66 GHz offering with a Core i7-920, which runs at the same clock rate. Of course, we had to pull out a single channel of memory (yielding two channels of DDR3-1333) and disable Hyper-Threading, since Core i5 won’t have that feature. The one variable we couldn’t reproduce was Core i5’s enhanced Turbo Boost, which is expected to accelerate clocks to 3.2 GHz when a single core is active. Core i7-920 only benefits from a single bin of Turbo Boost, yielding 2.8 GHz instead.
The only other platform capability setting LGA 1156 apart from LGA 1366 is the use of on-die PCI Express 2.0, which we’ve tested extensively and can say that, in single-card configurations, has almost zero impact on performance versus the X58’s chipset-based connectivity.
Gigabyte's Radeon HD 4650: Are AGP Graphics Still Good Enough?
Ah, the Accelerated Graphics Port. I remember when AGP first arrived, touted as the PC gamer’s savior.
Prior to 1997, a PC’s graphics card was limited to a measly 133 MB/s of bandwidth. Then came the AGP slot with 266 MB/s, followed by AGP 2x with 533 MB/s, AGP 4x with 1,066 MB/s, and finally AGP 8x with 2,133 MB/s of potential bandwidth. That kind of throughput is respectable, even by today's standards.
Right out of the gate, a first-gen PCI Express (PCIe) x16 slot, with its 4,000 MB/s of bandwidth, didn’t show any appreciable gains over AGP 8x because even the fastest graphics cards didn't saturate the AGP bus. Regardless, AGP was inevitably dropped in favor of the more scalable point-to-point PCIe standard. PCIe not only offered increased throughput, but it also brought with it the ability to transfer more power to ever-hungrier graphics cards.
By PC technology standards, all of this is ancient history. So why bring it up? Ask Gigabyte, one of the few manufacturers that sought to grace the aging AGP bus with a modern graphics processor, designed to save nostalgic gamers from buying a new CPU, motherboard, and graphics subsystem in making the jump to PCIe-based platforms. Its technical designation is the Gigabyte GV-R465D2-1GI, but you’ll probably know it better by its street name, ATI's Radeon HD 4650.
This is an interesting move on Gigabyte's part, as the Radeon HD 4650 isn’t really any faster than the previous king-of-AGP, the Radeon HD 3850. In fact, the older Radeon HD 3850 is probably faster, since it sports a wide 256-bit memory bus (compared to the 4650’s 128-bit bus) and fast DDR3 memory (compared to the 4650’s DDR2 memory). Still, the Radeon HD 4650 does have a few things going for it compared to the Radeon HD 3850, such as more conservative power requirements and two times the texture units.
Who Buys This Stuff?
Sounds great, but who's interested in upgrading ancient tech? Well, 57% of the participants in Valve's Steam Hardware Survey game with dual-core CPUs, while 26% use single-core machines. The most common memory capacity is 2 GB, and the majority of users with processors from AMD game on machines that have clock speeds between 2 and 2.29 GHz. Now, we don't have any specific information about the CPU models folks use, but it's a safe bet that there are a lot of people out there running older rigs.
And who wouldn't want to get more longevity out of an old box? Whether it's your primary gaming machine or just an old PC you keep in the basement, it'd sure be nice to play the newest titles on aged equipment. In fact, I can personally vouch that it's useful to have a spare PC around so a visitor can join in a rousing game of Left 4 Dead. So let's find out if this new Gigabyte GV-R465D2-1GI can breathe some life into one of the great gaming CPUs of antiquity, the Athlon 64 X2 3800+.
Accessories & Hardware
The Targus Ultra Mini Retractable Optical Mouse (Silver and Black with red LED) is the perfect solution for the mobile warrior who needs to save space when using an external mouse. The "Screen Scroller Button" will allow you to scroll up or down, left or right. The mouse allows you to browse web sites and Windows easily. The Ultra Mini Retractable Optical Mouse comes standard with a USB connection (USB 1.1) that will allow true plug and play connection with the notebook USB port.
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