Help with new build - Hyper-V

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16 Nov 2014
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4
Hello,
I wanted to get some advice please.
I am looking for a workstation to do my MCSE on, it would use hyper-v running about 5 instances of windows server 2012.

My logic is thinking a i7 is needed for the hyper-threading (is i7 better than i5 for hyper-v significantly?), with 32GB ram, though I might be able to squeeze the VMs onto 16GB.

I like the look of the x99 systems but they still seem a little pricey for me. I don't know if the older type of i7 would be better than the newer x99 i7 - as the X99 seems to run 4 DIMMs meaning that I cannot buy 16GB now and 16GB extra if I need it.

I just need motherboard, CPU + RAM as I have the rest salvaged from my old core2Duo system. I am not sure about the difference in motherboards, as most expensive does not always mean the best value.

My budget is as low as possible, please can someone spec me up one, at the moment I am looking at the steamroller bundle but I think it could be done better.
 
You could go for an AMD 8-core system. It'd be significantly cheaper and probably not slower than the quad core i7s, especially given that VMs are usually RAM limited more than anything.
 
I'd suggest 1600MHz, above that you won't really see much of a performance benefit. In fact 1333 would be fine if it happens to save you enough money.

I'd also suggest including an SSD for the server OS to run on.
 
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