System Requirements for Running NewViews

The Workstation Computer

NewViews requires a contemporary computer system to provide satisfactory performance. Computers can be ordered with processors that have different speeds. A typical NewViews computer should run at least at 3.2 GHz. Many expensive server computers only run at 2 GHz, these are not suitable. NewViews does not perform better on high multi-core processors, a high speed CPU or processor is required. Below are some recommended Intel processors from the past 5 years.

Year Generation Intel CPU GHz
2024 14th i5-14600 → i7-14700 3.9 → 5.2
2023 13th i5-13600 → i7-13700 3.9 → 5.1
2022 12th i5-12600 → i7-12700 4.8 → 5.0
2021 11th i5-11500 → i7-11700 4.5 → 4.9
2020 10th i5-10500 → i7-10700 4.5 → 5.1
Sample Hardware Configurations for a NewViews Workstation
LOW END MID TIER Data in cloud HIGH END
CPU Intel i5-10500 (≥ Comet) Intel i7-14700 (≥ Raptor Lake)
Memory 16 GB 32 GB 64 GB
Hard Disk 500 GB SSD 2TB SSD or 1TB (10,000 rpm)
Video Card On board – Intel CPU graphics
Networking On board – Gigabit
Operating System Windows 11
Internet Connection < 15ms latency, 10 MBs upload < 10ms latency, 20 MBs upload

The Server Computer

We strongly recommend that NewViews be run on its own server.

However, we do not recommend that the Server computer run a Microsoft Server Operating System. We prefer the simplicity of Windows 10 Pro for this purpose. The NewViews Server does not rely on any services provided by a Microsoft Server OS and is not restricted by the 10 connection limit of a Microsoft desktop OS. Any computer can act as a NV2 Server, even a powerful laptop.

Sample Hardware Configurations for a NewViews Server
2 – 5 USER SERVER 5+ USER SERVER
CPU Intel i5-10500 (≥ Kaby Lake) Intel i7-14700 (≥ Coffee Lake)
Memory 16 GB 32 GB
Hard Disk 512 GB SSD or RAID 1 – 2 x 500 GB HD 1 TB SSD or RAID 10 – 4 x 1 TB HD
Video Card On board – Intel CPU graphics
Networking On board – 1 or 10 Gigabit
Operating System Windows 11

Components

Windows 11

NewViews operates on any Windows 11 computer or laptop with 2048 MB of RAM.

There are several versions of Windows:

  • Windows 7 – Starter, Home Basic, Home Premium, Professional, Enterprise & Ultimate
  • Windows 8 – RT, Basic, Professional & Enterprise
  • Windows 8.1 – RT, Basic, Professional & Enterprise
  • Windows 10 – Home, Professional & Enterprise
  • Windows 11 – Home, Professional & Enterprise

NV2 runs on all of the above versions, both 32 and 64 bit. We strongly recommend the “Pro” versions (Professional and Enterprise) which are targeted at the business market.

Suggested Storage

Financial data is critical, therefore we recommend RAID 1 configured computers.

During the last decade, computer components prices have dropped sharply. Now component quality and mean time between failures is also dropping. The hard drive is a mechanical device. It has an electric motor and high speed magnetic actuator arm. The hard drive is not a solid state device. The hard drive is where all your data is stored.

Recently we have noticed an increase in the number of hard disk failures. By adding two (2) hard drives to a computer and mirroring the data, the exposure of losing data due to hard drive failure is greatly reduced. This can easily be achieved with a RAID 1 or RAID 10 system.

Consider ordering new computers for the accounting department with RAID 1.

Many computers can now be ordered with an Intel P35 ICH9R or P965 ICH8R chipset. These computers provide onboard Intel RAID 1, 0 or 10 support. RAID = Redundant Arrays of Inexpensive Disks.

The cost difference between a computer with a single drive and one configured with two drives in SATA RAID 1 can be as low as $125.

Sample Inexpensive SATA RAID Configurations
TYPE DESCRIPTION # OF DRIVES CAPACITY MAIN ADVANTAGE RECOMMENDATION
RAID 0 striped set without parity 2 x 500 GB 1000 GB high performance
(not recommended)		 NO – if one drive fails all data is lost
RAID 1 mirrored set without parity 2 x 500 GB 500 GB redundancy YES – if one drive fails data is safe
RAID 10 nested mirrored sets in a striped set 4 x 500 GB 1000 GB highest performance possible with redundancy YES – if a drive fails data is safe
RAID 5 striped set with distributed parity 4 x 500 GB 1500 GB highest redundancy NO – if a drive fails data is safe but suffers from low write performance
Recommended Hard Drives
MANUFACTURER MODEL # TYPE SIZE DESCRIPTION /
MAIN ADVANTAGE
Western Digital WD60000HLHX SATA 10,000 RPM 600 GB currently the fastest SATA drive with highest performance on database i/o
Western Digital WD1001FALS SATA 7,200 RPM 1 TB high performance on database i/o
Western Digital WD7500AYYS SATA 7,200 RPM 750 GB large capacity and high performance on database i/o
Seagate ST3750330AS SATA 7,200 RPM 750 GB large capacity and high performance on database i/o
Seagate ST3500320AS SATA 7.200 RPM 500 GB high performance on database i/o

Performance

Benchmarks

Below are some timing tests performed in February 2013. The application database was 175 MB and all tests were performed using version NV 2.25.3.

SYSTEM READ / WRITE TESTS NVREORG OBJECTS NVREORG INDEXES ACCOUNT HISTORY
(lower is better) m:ss h:mm:ss mm:ss
1 Xeon 2.13 GHz SSD (VM) 5:32 1:42:29 30:06
2 i3 3.0 GHz 7,200 rpm hard drive 5:11 1:15:00 19:49
3A i7 4.2 GHz 10,000 rpm hard drive 2:34 38:38 10:53
3B i7 4.2 GHz Intel SSD 2:27 38:58 8:01
  • system 1   – Xeon E5606 @ 2.13GHz 8GB ram SSD 240Gb (OCZ RevoDrive), Virtual Machine
  • system 2   – i3   540   @ 3.0GHz 4GB ram HD 500Gb WD, 7,200rpm
  • system 3a – i7 3770K @ 4.2GHz 4GB ram HD 1 Tb WD VelociRaptor, 10,000rpm (no RAID)
  • system 3b – i7 3770K @ 4.2GHz 4GB ram SSD 240 Gb (Intel 520)

Virtual machines do not perform well, even when using very high end hardware.
SSDs only have a slight advantage over Raptor 10,000rpm hard drives.
For real performance, there must be a fast CPU and a fast drive subsystem.