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 Tor Neilands posted on Wednesday, December 10, 2014 - 11:17 am
I will soon be in the market for a new computer. Our university has a contract with Dell, so I would be limited to Deel hardware. I am trying to decide between a multicore laptop and a multicore desktop. I'd be curious to learn what Muthen & Muthen as well as Mplus Users have found to be the most important computer hardware considerations in maximizing the performance of Mplus under the Windows 7 operating system? Obviously, one would want to obtain as much RAM as possible, use 64-bit architecture, and have multiple hardware cores. Any thoughts you have on whether a "loaded" laptop has a chance of being as good a performer as a desktop for doing computationally-intensive Mplus runs would be appreciated, as well as hearing what seems to make a difference or not make much difference in Mplus performance under Windows would be appreciated. Thanks!
 Bengt O. Muthen posted on Wednesday, December 10, 2014 - 5:39 pm
We don't endorse any particular setup, but we did mention what we used in the Part 1 handout for V7 in Utrecht 2012; see slides 14-20.

The most powerful laptop still can’t quite compete with the most powerful desktop. RAM and CPU speed/cores make the most difference in performance.

CPU is the most important – one could argue in favor of the fastest i7 Quad core. 16 GB memory is fine.

Dell put out some 6-core PCs – but not yet on the office computers – shortly we should have it on office machines. The new processor is called i7 5930K.
 Tor Neilands posted on Sunday, December 14, 2014 - 10:15 am
Thank you, Bengt! Very much appreciated,

Tor
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