Linux workstation

[AoeAoe]

Hi,

I would like some advice on more budget oriented, Linux workstation that has some gaming potential (mostly play CS:GO) but has decent CPU for real work (programming, one or two VMs and heavily multithreaded workload - I'm on gentoo linux).
My budget is right around so 750$ (can stretch it further, but don't really want to) - I have harddrives (512GB SSD + 2TB HDD) and peripherals (gaming mouse, mechanical keyboard, monitor, etc).

My current plan is:
1. Decent CPU
2. OK graphics card (NVIDIA used to run best on Linux years ago, havent tried ATI/AMD since if anything has changed)
3. Cheap out on rest of the stuff (motherboard, case, rams, power supply).

My current plan is to get 6600K skylake i5, GTX 660, random motherboard with 2 memory sticks and 2x8GB DDR4 (even though I run several VMs, I rarely need even 8GB of memory presently).

Anyone got thoughts how could I improve that setup? Since I'm building on rather tight budget, I'm also considering haswell + ddr3 alternative. I rarely do upgrade my PC, but my core2quad machine is getting pretty slow lately

Anyways, thanks in advance for advice.

[Mr.Meerkat]

3. Cheap out on rest of the stuff (motherboard, case, rams, power supply).

PLEASE DON'T CHEAP OUT ON THE PSU!!!!

Feel free to "cheap out" on any seasonic/XFX power supplies but it's still best to go with something better

[IsaacDaGrazin]

PLEASE DON'T CHEAP OUT ON THE PSU!!!!

Feel free to "cheap out" on any seasonic/XFX power supplies but it's still best to go with something better

^

|

|

unless you want a nice and toasty computer!

[bking]

Hi,

I would like some advice on more budget oriented, Linux workstation that has some gaming potential (mostly play CS:GO) but has decent CPU for real work (programming, one or two VMs and heavily multithreaded workload - I'm on gentoo linux).

My budget is right around so 750$ (can stretch it further, but don't really want to) - I have harddrives (512GB SSD + 2TB HDD) and peripherals (gaming mouse, mechanical keyboard, monitor, etc).

My current plan is:

1. Decent CPU

2. OK graphics card (NVIDIA used to run best on Linux years ago, havent tried ATI/AMD since if anything has changed)

3. Cheap out on rest of the stuff (motherboard, case, rams, power supply).

My current plan is to get 6600K skylake i5, GTX 660, random motherboard with 2 memory sticks and 2x8GB DDR4 (even though I run several VMs, I rarely need even 8GB of memory presently).

Anyone got thoughts how could I improve that setup? Since I'm building on rather tight budget, I'm also considering haswell + ddr3 alternative. I rarely do upgrade my PC, but my core2quad machine is getting pretty slow lately

Anyways, thanks in advance for advice.

 

Looks pretty good, aside from the PSU comment above. As for GPU, I still trust Nvidia FAR more than ATI in Linux, although you need to be careful as Ubuntu (for example) now makes it hard to truly kill the OpenSource Nvidia driver which sucks so very, very hard.

[Redicat]

Huh so a Core 2 quad machine isnt that fast enough like... if you OC at all have you tried OC?

[AoeAoe]

Thanks for the input, will try not to cheap out on PSU (even tho I had luck doing it so far).

As for core2quad thing, I mean c'mon man, that 2007 CPU deserves to rest in peace at this point (I have troubles aircooling it under load in vanilla, no idea how would it go on OC).
Q6600 already has like 120W TDP or something and I might just retire my old fan with it (which is getting pretty noisy lately).

[Streetguru]

Hi,

If VMs are your AIM, you might actually want an FX 8 core, virutal machines are one of the few advantages AMD has over intel in general , otherwise if you aren't focusing much on VMs, then an i5 4460 is probably the way to go

 

PCPartPicker part list: http://pcpartpicker.com/p/QKh2vK

Price breakdown by merchant: http://pcpartpicker.com/p/QKh2vK/by_merchant/

CPU: AMD FX-8320E 3.2GHz 8-Core Processor  ($126.99 @ SuperBiiz)

Motherboard: Asus M5A99X EVO R2.0 ATX AM3+ Motherboard  ($114.99 @ Amazon)

Memory: G.Skill Value Series 8GB (1 x 8GB) DDR3-1333 Memory  ($33.99 @ Newegg)

Storage: Western Digital Caviar Blue 1TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive  ($49.98 @ OutletPC)

Video Card: PowerColor Radeon R9 380 4GB PCS+ Video Card  ($211.99 @ SuperBiiz)

Case: Deepcool TESSERACT WH ATX Mid Tower Case  ($42.98 @ Newegg)

Power Supply: EVGA 500W 80+ Certified ATX Power Supply  ($38.49 @ SuperBiiz)

Total: $619.41

Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available

Generated by PCPartPicker 2016-01-20 20:44 EST-0500

 

Also Linux gaming in general still isn't there, for AMD I guess you'd want the open source drivers over the ones from AMD, and Nvidia the opposite, of course the problem with Nvidia and GNU/Linux is that Nvidia seems to hate freedom...so ya

 

you could also just do a KVM GPU passthrough and avoid all the issues with gaming on linux all together, should be doable on AM3+, With intel parts you'd have to really check your processor and what it supports.

This guy has a 7750 passthrough with an 8350, although ya now that I think about it you'd need a 2nd GPU for the passthrough on AMD

[AoeAoe]

VT-d PCIE passtrough via qemu+kvm was indeed on my mind, but I'm a "linux purist", e.g. I don't really wanna use Windows for "ideological reasons".
As for AMD CPU choice, I was kinda considering it (mostly due to heavily multithreaded workload that would indeed benefit 8 real cores), but the thing that puts me off mostly is that motherboards are slightly more expensive and I would probably have to invest into better PSU and cooling than what I get from skylake i5.
From what I've gathered is that 6600K option is slightly more expensive in grand scheme of things and yet much faster than AMD alternative (even in best case scenario for AMD, multithreaded workload).

[Streetguru]

VT-d PCIE passtrough via qemu+kvm was indeed on my mind, but I'm a "linux purist", e.g. I don't really wanna use Windows for "ideological reasons".

Well ya, that is AMD's issue, you have to buy a decent motherboard to even run the chips properly.

You'd probably be better off with the Xeon 1231v3, which gives you 4 cores+hyperthreading for the same price as the unlocked Haswell i5, just double check the instruction set and motherboard support for it, this Xeon has integrated graphics

Also you'd probably want an AMD GPU in any case as Nvidia tries to prevent people from virtualizing non quadro cards, there's a fix, but otherwise you get a Code 43 error trying to do a passthrough.

PCPartPicker part list: http://pcpartpicker.com/p/87qFQ7

Price breakdown by merchant: http://pcpartpicker.com/p/87qFQ7/by_merchant/

CPU: Intel Xeon E3-1246 V3 3.5GHz Quad-Core Processor  ($279.99 @ SuperBiiz)

Motherboard: ASRock H97M Anniversary Micro ATX LGA1150 Motherboard  ($67.89 @ OutletPC)

Memory: Crucial 8GB (1 x 8GB) DDR3-1600 Memory  ($32.99 @ Adorama)

Storage: Western Digital Caviar Blue 1TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive  ($48.99 @ NCIX US)

Video Card: Gigabyte Radeon R9 380 2GB Video Card  ($194.99 @ Amazon)

Case: Fractal Design Core 1000 USB 3.0 MicroATX Mid Tower Case  ($29.99 @ Newegg)

Power Supply: EVGA 500W 80+ Certified ATX Power Supply  ($38.49 @ SuperBiiz)

Total: $693.33

Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available

Generated by PCPartPicker 2016-01-21 06:23 EST-0500