Which motherboard/processor for pci cards?

[docric]

Originally Posted by RyanC

I just did the the gigabyte p55 ud3l like inteldoc. . 875k 8GB running great with PTHD4.

You do have to dremel the heatsink on the southbridge but it's pretty easy. Very happy with this machine, super stable and fast.

Doing same here (w/870), will post when up & running...

[application4]

So, I've done my custom PC build, and with some fiddling (mostly manually loading the DSP drivers in PT 8.1cs1) it's all running smoothly.
Not done any extensive testing yet, or installed third party plugins apart from Play (EWQLSO) 64 bit.

Here's what I'm running:
Windows 7 64bit Ultimate
PT HD 8.1 cs1
HD Accell 2 PCI

Hardware:
ASUS P7P55D LE
Intel i7 870 2.93 GHz
8 GB 1333 Kingston RAM (4x2gb)
Bunch of SATA2 drives including SSD system drive
XFX HD ATI 5570 1GB PCIe graphics
Antec P183 Case (see below*)
Antec CP-850 power supply
Firewire PCI 1394a/b card (Texas Instruments controller)
Viewsonic 22" LED screen

*This case wasn't the right choice - although it's really very quiet and well made it's just a little bit small for full-length PCI cards. To get them to fit I had to remove one of the drive mounting bays. Not terrible as there are loads of places you can put drives, but still a bit of an oversight on my part!

Oh, and Ableton Live 8.1.5 runs really well too. Although that would probably load and run on my microwave oven.

[docric]

OK, first full day with the new system (see Sig.), and things are going well... other than a minor Command 8 glitch... fixed now.

First off, THANK YOU to all the folks that, knowingly or unknowingly, helped me do this. I haven't built a PC since the 80's (XT & a PCjr !),
and have been living in "mac-world" for the last 15 years... folks on this board have been great.

Learning points:
1) I'll be able to do an HD4 eventually, but it's HD3 for now.
2) Anyone building out this board to an HD4 will need to get a SLIM vid card (most will cover the first PCI slot).
XFX was the only Radeon/ATI card builder I could find with 2 DVIs AND a narrow profile.
3) card order needs to be (from cpu) Core-accel-accel-accel ... as long as the core is CLOSEST to the cpu (on THIS board), it'll work.
4) flex cables go from port A on the ACCEL card to port B on the CORE (which seems VERY bass-ackward to me...),
otherwise it's click/tick/pop heaven. (then all the rest of the accel to accel flex cables will follow in the only order they can).


The machine's MUCH quieter than my old G5, and I haven't put in the silent cooler (Noctua NH-U9B) yet OR the quieter psu (PC P&C silencer mk2).
Graphics are great! Never thought I'd like a PC over a mac for graphics!

Anyhoo... still in the "trial" stage... I'll post back in 2 weeks with an update re:stability...

[Raoul23]

I to am after putting a pc together for pci cards could someone give me a ruff idea how much one of these would cost to put together I'm not to hot on pc parts so a friends gonna put it together for me just wanna no roughly how much it will set me back

Thanks

[docric]

Big Range depends on what ya want...
Older tech/on the cheap... $600
Newfangled/quiet/all the gizmos... $1200

very rough estimate.... HTH

[Raoul23]

Originally Posted by docric

Big Range depends on what ya want...
Older tech/on the cheap... $600
Newfangled/quiet/all the gizmos... $1200

very rough estimate.... HTH

That's brillient thanks docric

[RyanC]

Originally Posted by docric

3) card order needs to be (from cpu) Core-accel-accel-accel ... as long as the core is CLOSEST to the cpu (on THIS board), it'll work.
4) flex cables go from port A on the ACCEL card to port B on the CORE (which seems VERY bass-ackward to me...),
otherwise it's click/tick/pop heaven. (then all the rest of the accel to accel flex cables will follow in the only order they can).

Interesting, my cards are in the normal way (eg core card farthest away from CPU) and flex cables go core A to accel B, etc. Did you try that way first?

I haven't had any issues with clicks and pops other then with huge sessions with tons of Rtas running at 128k buffer.

It still seems to me like CPU utilization isn't as good as it should be, eg, task manager still has CPU overhead when PT rtas starts crapping out, that seems to be more of a v8 issue in general though. I wonder if if I should try reversing my cards? Did you start off with the core furthest away and flex going a to b?

thanks

[docric]

Originally Posted by RyanC

Interesting, my cards are in the normal way (eg core card farthest away from CPU) and flex cables go core A to accel B, etc. Did you try that way first?...I wonder if if I should try reversing my cards? Did you start off with the core furthest away and flex going a to b?

Hey Ryan,
Yeah, I started out this way. Just about all the threads I'd read seemed to suggest this, but when I did it, it'd only work with the core card alone. As soon as I added an accel card, I couldn't get PT to start up at all.

The flex cables were another issue entirely. Going core Port A to accel B, I got nothing but Rice Krispies... I actually ordered a back up flex to troubleshoot (thought maybe I had a bad one), and the included directions also have the port B of the core card connecting to the port A of the accel card, FWIW...

It still seems to me like CPU utilization isn't as good as it should be, eg, task manager still has CPU overhead when PT rtas starts crapping out, that seems to be more of a v8 issue in general though.

I haven't been working on any big mixes/rtas sessions this week, so don't really have anything to add here. Tracking all week on 20-40 audio track/ 2-3 RTAS VI's/minimal plug sessions... it's been solid, much faster than the PPC... it's nice to finally have a dependable system again.

Hey, just curious, what video card did you end up using?

[Raoul23]

Trying to find a mother board for pci cards to run pro tools hd3 on xp any recommendations some of the ones ive searched for dont seem to be availabe anymore eg GA-H55-USB3. i live in the uk if someone could help that would be great

P.S. i dont wanna have to do any drimmeling to the heat sync

[lifer]

http://www.scan.co.uk/Products/MSI-P...roductFeatures

http://www.dabs.com/products/intel-h...sata-6KJT.html

I'd go for the MSI myself..has usb3 etc