Motherboard Specs for PC based-Statistics Processing

[Stingose]

Can anyone offer me some advice on what motherboard specs I should be looking for today that will enable my SPSS Stats program to run like lightning or at least faster then the snails pace it does now please? I run an old motherboard (AGP PCI IMB USB etc) but it has 512RAM, 2Ghz Clock and Intel Pentium 4 and Radeon 8500LE Graphics card. If cost was not much object what would I be good to get, and what of say a average budget? The key points or should I say parts? Thanks to all who reply.

Stingose with Axe Oil.
Try it.

[caperjack]

looks like you old beast should run it just fine ,so to me that means just about any new core 2 duo cpu tower will run it like a bullet train . check requirements on site .
http://www.spss.com/statistics/

[Stingose]

G'day Caperjack. Thanks for your thoughts. I reckon it might be my average 512Ram mem slowing the proc down right now, I can read a book between pages it processes on SPSS. I wonder if a math co-processor would help it out? Where are the cool stats processing dudes when you need one? Ha ha :(

[caperjack]

i suspect other things .is this computer hooked to the internet? ,do you use it for other normal computer use ?if yes is you answer i suggest 2 programs .
first a temp file /registry clean up program .
www.ccleaner.com.
2nd. a malware/trojan cleanup program .
Download Malwarebytes' Anti-Malware (http://www.majorgeeks.com/Malwarebytes_Anti-Malware_d5756.html) to your desktop.

* Double-click mbam-setup.exe and follow the prompts to install the program.
* At the end, be sure to checkmark the Update Malwarebytes' Anti-Malware and Launch Malwarebytes' Anti-Malware, then click Finish.
* If an update is found, it will download and install the latest version.
* Once the program has loaded, select Perform full scan, then click Scan.
* When the scan is complete, click OK, then Show Results to view the results.
* Be sure that everything is checked, and click Remove Selected.
* When completed, a log will open in Notepad.

you could post the log back here

[Stingose]

Caperjack, thank you very much for this advice.

This morning I visited my local pc hardware shop. I have now installed the hottest cpu I can get, a Pentium 4, 3.2Ghz cpu and discovered that I was in fact running only a 512 RAm so upgraded this to 1.512GB RAM (will make it 2GB later when shop has the stock recall my old mother board is a relic so must get stock for it).

The new cpu really helps things and the extra RAM helps with page turning and transfer between a number of programs. It's like a turbo and hot exhaust system for my car, cool!

I wanted to let everyone know if they suffer the same fate and need to upgrade. This experience may be useful for them. Start with your hardware and max out on that first. The shop owner mentioned the new dual and quad core cpu's, saying they are commonly 1.8GHz only so actually remain slower than this 3.2Ghz model. I have recently seen a lot of people recommending dual core and so forth, but for me there is no substitute for raw speed. It works and my stats processing in SPSS is significantly faster (p>.0001). ;) Fyi, total cost for this was a paltry $175AUD.

Thanks again for taking an interest in my issues, Caperjack,

Sincerely,
Stingose
And goes and just keeps on goin'...

[caperjack]

Caperjack, thank you very much for this advice.

your welcome

The shop owner mentioned the new dual and quad core cpu's, saying they are commonly 1.8GHz only so actually remain slower than this 3.2Ghz model. I have recently seen a lot of people recommending dual core and so forth, but for me there is no substitute for raw speed. ..

Intel will disagree with the shop owner and you on this one ,saying the new core 2 duo cpu works different and is therefor faster than the P4 ,just from what i read ,not what i know !

[Stingose]

Can anyone offer me some advice on what motherboard specs I should be looking for today that will enable my SPSS Stats program to run like lightning or at least faster then the snails pace it does now please? I run an old motherboard (AGP PCI IMB USB etc) but it has 512RAM, 2Ghz Clock and Intel Pentium 4 and Radeon 8500LE Graphics card. If cost was not much object what would I be good to get, and what of say a average budget? The key points or should I say parts? Thanks to all who reply.

Stingose with Axe Oil.
Try it.

For anyone who is reading this and wishes to upgrade - let me tell you what I did...I replaced trhe 2GHz Pentium 4 with a 3.2GHz P4 chip and upped the Ram to 2GB. This has significantly improved the speed in handling statistics processing.

Stingose
Do you know what Axe Oil is? It's not oil from or for Axes by the way...;)

[Suspishio]

I'm pleased that your SPSS now runs faster than before. In fact it had to if you notched up th GHz and RAM.

But your PC supplier is wrong about Pentium 4 vs Intel Core2 Duo. Look at this comparison and you'll see what I mean.
http://www.cpubenchmark.net/common_cpus.html

If your new CPU is a Pentium D, then you're up there with the 32 bit Core Duos. There are many factors at work here including the size of L1 and L2 cache and the speed of the Front Side Bus, which is greater on the Core 2 Duos and, of course, the Quad processors (I use one of these for Monte Carlo simulations).

I'm no longer familiar with the skinny on SPSS and the extent to which it supports multi-core CPUs. I've seen on their web-site that SPSS does support multi-core CPUS (maybe even your version). I would also imagine that if SPSS is labouring through pages of data to arrive at means, variances and so on, that it do this in two or four CPUs and halve the time over and above the extra handling speed of more mdern PCs than your Pentium 3.2GHz.

Frankly, I don't think your PC Store did you any long lasting favour unless the new PC was offered at a no brainer price; but from what you say, he turned you off the dual CPU PCs and, like caperjack, I think he was plain wrong for whatever reason (I can think of at least one).

[Stingose]

I'm pleased that your SPSS now runs faster than before. In fact it had to if you notched up th GHz and RAM.

But your PC supplier is wrong about Pentium 4 vs Intel Core2 Duo. Look at this comparison and you'll see what I mean.
http://www.cpubenchmark.net/common_cpus.html

If your new CPU is a Pentium D, then you're up there with the 32 bit Core Duos. There are many factors at work here including the size of L1 and L2 cache and the speed of the Front Side Bus, which is greater on the Core 2 Duos and, of course, the Quad processors (I use one of these for Monte Carlo simulations).

I'm no longer familiar with the skinny on SPSS and the extent to which it supports multi-core CPUs. I've seen on their web-site that SPSS does support multi-core CPUS (maybe even your version). I would also imagine that if SPSS is labouring through pages of data to arrive at means, variances and so on, that it do this in two or four CPUs and halve the time over and above the extra handling speed of more mdern PCs than your Pentium 3.2GHz.

Frankly, I don't think your PC Store did you any long lasting favour unless the new PC was offered at a no brainer price; but from what you say, he turned you off the dual CPU PCs and, like caperjack, I think he was plain wrong for whatever reason (I can think of at least one).

G'day Suspishio.
Yes and no..but mostly thanks for your reply!
I was taking the overall cheaper route i.e. not to buy a new motherboard. As a lowly paid scholarship postgrad on a miserly fortnightly salary that wouldn't feed a family of mice, I was stuck with a severe budget limit. I always remain open to new learning, and appreciate your notes about the differences in core processing speeds esp the cpu benchmark reference. Only the other day I was procrastinating my way through the latest intel v. amd debate and performance specs. I found this article quite useful: http://www.extremetech.com/article2/0,2845,2334518,00.asp .
Turning to stats processing, you mention you are doing Monte carlo sims, can I ask you what you are using your stats for? Work, study/research or personal use? It has been a slow process to connect with stats contacts...so always nice to meet one. Finally, I can't wait to recommence earning, so I can upgrade my pc; may come soon as I contemplate a move back to Singapore...regards.

[Suspishio]

Possibly the Gods here might frown on inter-personal chit chat rather than problem solving. Suffice it to say I do the simulations for business and if I say what, then others might be able to identify me as it's quite specialized.

Anyway, I think you can mark this thread as Solved because you are where you are and getting benefit from your purchase.

Best of luck.

[Stingose]

Strangely my screen shows this thread marked as solved. I don't know why it remains open?

It says above this quick thread screen:
This thread has been marked solved.
Perhaps start a new thread instead?

We are done, and thanks again.
Stingose Off.