Hi all, I need your opinion!

I have got an 8 years old HPZ840 with the following specs:

Intel Xeon E5-2640v3 2.6 1866 8C 1stCPU
Intel Xeon E5-2640v3 2.6 1866 8C 2ndCPU
32GB DDR4-2133 (8x4GB) 2CPU Registered RAM
NVIDIA Quadro M4000 8GB 4xDP 1st
512GB SATA 1st Solid State Drive

At the moment I am still on WIN10. I never had issues with the system and it still works fine for most of my work.

Would an upgrade to a new workstation (budget around 5K) be a game changer in performance?

The only thing I really miss is a bigger Monitor with WUHD-5K2K resolution. Unfortualtely the Quadro M4000 does not support above 4k. Would it make sense to just swap the graphics card to a newer one wich supports 5k? Is there a cheap one that works fine with Avid/Premiere?

Thanks,
Michael

I think you could easily get more value out of that machine by simply upping the RAM to 128GB or so and swapping out the GFX card for something newer.

Try and get a PCI SSD instead of a SATA one and that should also give you a nice speed boost. In times like these, wring every penny out of your current kit. Those machines were always solid performers. 

Andi

z840 can take nVME in stead of HDD or SSD -- and NVME makes a difference. And yes, you'd be better off with more RAM on that machine.

Thanks, that sounds good and would spare me a lot of money...

 

Could you recommend a graphics card that does the job while supporting higher resolutions than the quadro m4000?

 

Michael 

The GFX card would not be the first thing on my list to replace. That m4000 can drive 4 4K monitors at 60Hz. So I reckon it can drive more than just one 5K monitors (although they may require a dual-displayport connection).

 The GFX card would not be the first thing on my list to replace. That m4000 can drive 4 4K monitors at 60Hz. So I reckon it can drive more than just one 5K monitors (although they may require a dual-displayport connection).

That might be convoluted, though -- replying to myself here.

Avid also specify a p4000 which does run 4x 5k monitors.

https://resources.avid.com/supportfiles/config_guides/AVID%20HP%20Z840%20Config%20Guide%20-%20Rev%20E.pdf

...dont expect a real speed boost going to NVME over your solid state SATA as your WIN drive.....yes, its faster but not enough to make a real world difference that is noticeable to the end user....great as can be for storage for media you want to edit with...blazing for that....

....RAM for sure....interesting that is all it really takes to be up to date ...just RAM....and inexpensive NVME storage....

Hello!

Michael from cologne:

Would an upgrade to a new workstation (budget around 5K) be a game changer in performance?

It's virtually impossible to answer this question without a better understanding of which type of material you edit. Do you use GPU-intensive tasks like PhraseFind indexing? Do you do online editing or just offline (proxy) editing?

If you're looking to improve PhraseFind indexing performance, upgrading your GPU would make sense. If you're working with big sequences and find yourself running low on RAM, I would upgrade that. If you'd like faster render/transcode times, get a new system with a better, more up-to-date CPU. 

There is a certain level of overhead managing two CPUs rather than one. And as long as you have over six cores, core speed is what really becomes important. 

Another consideration is power draw... Quite sure a Z840 is powerhungry and loud

.....when i finally get that cushy university job teaching editing......

....on day one we will teach the proxy workflow.....

....or even to high school kids on a two day course....

...it needs to be that basic.....

(and just about anything can handle it these days....)

Hi all!

Thanks for your opinions, fortunately theres nobody really encouraging me to buy a new system :-).

- So I'l upgrade RAM to 128GB
- Get an 2TB NVMe drive (I need more space anyway)
- Look for a reasonable but good value graphics card


regarding NVMe:
Is the process of a clean system intall on an NVMe the same as on a SATA?

regarding graphics:
Basically I'am mostly editing in FHD with Avid or Premiere, little effects, sometimes I use After Effects but for "easy stuff".

Would a nvidia T1000 do the job? Other recommandations? I would love to stay under 500€/$ for the GPU, max. 1000€/$ but only if it really needs to...

Thanks,
Michael

NVME and SATA the same install.....are you sure your PC will support an NVME Boot drive?  Does the board have a NVME slot or are you using an add in card?

That’s an excellent question -- yes the nvme drive requires a pci slot in the z840. It will gladly boot from it but I can't remember if it requires a change in the boot order in the bios. HP offered the Turbo Z drive option, which was a pcie card with twin nvme's. That's what mine came with. Currently rocking a 2TB nvme.

 

There's a thread on the HP Community site which goes into NVME drives on the 840

see here...

https://h30434.www3.hp.com/t5/Business-PCs-Workstations-and-Point-of-Sale-Systems/Z840-PCiE-Bifurcation-for-M-2-NVMe/td-p/8717269

A quick google will turn up plenty of Youtube videos on how to install an nvme drive as boot on an z840. 

Andi

...maybe just get a bigger solid state SATA drive for the WIN boot and be done with it?  It won't make any real difference...

....formatting and reinstalling a fresh WIN would be just as effective as any NVME swap....and then, you don't spend any money on your boot drive but could spend it on screaming fast NVME storage for media....