Prescott PSUs?

Is it OK To use the new Prescott PSUs which have 1mb cache to build Geovision systems?

The new Prescott's generate a lot of heat compared to their counterparts the Northwood chips and on overall benchmarks, you need to be running higher than 3.6GHz before they are faster than Northwood processors.

We will continue using Northwoods as long as we can. The socket 775's Prescott's are a newer stepping than the socket 478 Prescott's and run a bit cooler, but still hotter than the Northwood chips.

Hope that helps,

Mamajama

I agree with that... the prescott is not worth the extra bucks and when benchmarked the performance gained compared to the generated heat is really not worth it

Just testing the edit function

I would probley upgrade the heat sink. You going to get more heat with that CPU but you can do somethings to ease that. They make fans that are mounted in a CD-rom bay, they will help with air flow. (These are great for when someone insists that the thing go in a closet.) Then chose your cabling carefully. Wire it with an eye toward airflow. And if you're still truely worried, they make PCI slot fans and you can mount it next to the card.

Cheers for the feedback Guys,

Thomas im beginning to appreciate the idea of using High quality computer components. My Geo systems are gonna cost prob $100 more, but even i've started to note the difference in performance.

As for the prescott CPUs, i think you're right in saying upgrading the Heat Sink compound, but even without the upgrade, the prescott shouldn't give any major problems, if anything i thought they would outperform the northwood ones. I've only ordered 5, gonna test them out and ill try provide some feedback or any problems i have.

The performance is nice, but the bonus is in the reduced calls on site. I see it here alot. The installers who do good work, thier clients don't call us often. And I don't mean the little "how does X work calls" but the evil hour long calls.

Tom is spot on, it is not really about performance, more about reliability, simple software can be explained fast especially when you make cheat sheets etc, but going inside a machine to test something, well that just takes an age!

the extra heat from Prescott's are only partially from the processor. Most Socket 478 motherboards were not initially designed for Prescott processors. The onboard power inverters which convert the 5V rail to the 1.XX voltage needed by the various Prescott porcessors are often a bigger issue. They were not designed to handle the wattage at the lower voltage that the Prescott's run at. We have some $200 boards that will literally burn black marks into the boxes on the bench when running Prescott CPUs. No type of heatsink can remedy this. There is an "Intel" requirement that cases for Prescott's have a side port hole to ensure a fresh flow of cool air.

In other words, the case needs 80mm+ case fans mounted preferable in the back and side blowing fresh air "IN" the case near the heatsink to help cool the board and processor.

Also, PCI fans and 5 1/4 bay fans are mostly crap and will likely go bad early and cause noise problems which will just irritate your customer and require your attention.

I am relatively new to the CCTV field, but my company has been into high end hardware for nine years. I will greatly give any advice needed as I will likely need a lot for CCTV:)

Mamajama

dont hit me hard, but this should be in the computer/networking forum? Where's the mod Seriously, havent heard from larry in a long long time.

The drive bay fans are iffy (depending on who makes them), where they help is drawing air in to get better airflow. They are pretty loud, but I'm noticing that people want these machines tucked away in little nooks. They don't get the server room treatment alas, so the sound doesn't matter as much, but maxizing airflow does matter.

as always I agree with Tom, we replace the HDD bay fans with ones purchased seperately, all the ones I used at home have now had to be replaced.

The PCI slot fans have the same problem, my recommendations is to use a good case with good ventilation, like the Antecs, try to use Sata if you can because cables can block airflow, replace the heatsink witha better one and a more robust fan, Zalman does pretty good ones.

We do not use Prescotts because of the heat generated, and if you are concerned about noise, get fan controller's or buya $2.50 resistor to reduce the spin and the noise. That way if they put it in a cupboard you can leave it noisy, but if in a nice aircon office you can afford to reduce the spin a little and therefore the noise.

If you chosoe wiseley you can get fan controllers with temp guages in them, so you can monitor the temps, but these are not 100% accurate, however they do givea firly good indication.

The trick to telling which mobos will get along with the prescott is looking for it's FMB spec. You need something supporting 1.5 or 2.0.

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