Buildapc

5040 readers

1 users here now

founded 2 years ago

MODERATORS

Lemmenmo@lemmy.world

Are traditional builds obsolete? (lemmy.world)

submitted 5 days ago by Blue_Morpho@lemmy.world to c/buildapc@lemmy.world

13 comments fedilink hide all child comments

I've been pricing out components for my first new build in 20 years. (I've bought many ebay servers and a few mini PCs in between).

The parts are around $2k. But then I look at the amd ai max+ 395 PCs that are out or coming out shortly and I think I might be buying an already obsolete platform. For the same price I'd get 16 cores and over 2x the memory bandwidth.

you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments

[–] brickfrog@lemmy.dbzer0.com 7 points 5 days ago* (last edited 5 days ago) (1 children)

Depends on what you're building. If you're looking for an overpowered SFF type of platform then yeah those AI Max+ builds may be what you want. Just keep in mind a lot of those are integrated motherboards (non-upgradable parts) and usually have minimal storage options and slots for add-in cards.

The other reason those AI Max+ PCs get a lot of press is that there's still not a whole ton of CPUs with capable NPU built-in aka Windows Copilot+ compatible. AI Max+ happens to be one of those. (whether NPU is actually useful right now beyond Copilot+ is a whole other discussion)

So if you actually want a more extensible build out and don't care about this Copilot+ stuff then traditional builds / non SFF builds are probably still more in line with what you want.

[–] Blue_Morpho@lemmy.world 3 points 5 days ago

Just keep in mind a lot of those are integrated motherboards (non-upgradable parts)

Yeah that's what bothers me. But a 256GB upgrade on AM5 is $800 and extremely slow compared to the 128GB non upgradeable on Max+. So really it comes down to 1pcie slot vs 3 or 4. If there's a usb4 to PCIe adapter, even that's not a limitation.

I think the NPU is generally worthless but the 128GB of fast ram makes local LLM like deep seek feasible. ( I watch a lot of level1techs on YouTube. )

The concerns you brought up are the same I have!