Need Advice on PC Rig

Kewop Decam

I'm trying to build a new PC mostly for 3D modeling which means I'll be using a lot of 3DSMAX, Zbrush, ect. Zbrush and Max require a lot of processing power for high-res meshes. Right now, my rig is pretty good, but I need something even better for when I'm baking normal maps and ect.

I'd also like to play games too so yea. here' what I have listed out on newegg right now. Nothing in this list is final and I haven't build a rig in like 3 years and haven't been keeping up with what's the hottest new stuff. So any help you can give will be great. Here's what I listed out so far.

Intel Core i7 920 - $290
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819115202

ASUS P6T Deluxe X58 ATX Intel Motherboard - $330
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813131351

CORSAIR DOMINATOR 6GB (3 x 2GB) DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1600 - $166
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820145224

GeForce GTX 260 896MB - $210
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814130433

CORSAIR PSU 750w - $120
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817139006

WD 1TB HD 7200 - $110
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822136284

LIAN LI Case - $100 (kindda a lot for case right?)
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811112040

LG DVD drive -$25
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16827136153

Total being $1351

b0bd0d

what are you doing for cooling? you gonna overclock? looks pretty easy to bump to at least 3 ghz with a decent cooler. but fuck, looks like it's gonna be a beast.

Shawnasee

Why go with the 260? Budget constraints? If you need a lot of juice, go with the ATI 4870x2 or the 280.

PotatoNinja

The technology subforum in G&T can probably give you excellent advice. I notice you're spending quite a bit on your mobo and cpu relative to your gpu, might be something to consider.

vonPoonBurGer

What PotatoNinja said. Why do you need the Deluxe version of the P6T? The base version of the P6T is pretty feature-rich on its own, make sure you actually need something the Deluxe offers before you spend the extra scratch.

If you can get a regular P6T instead, you should definitely consider putting the extra money freed up towards a better video card. A Radeon 4850 X2 would be the next best step up from a GTX260 for that amount of money, or at least that's Tom's Hardware's recommendation for April for cards ~$250.

Edit: Or you might to move up to RAID. Is the 3D modeling stuff pretty disk intensive? I have almost exactly the same guts (core i7 920, Asus P6T vanilla, 3x2GB Corsair DDR2), running a RAID-1 mirror on 2x 500GB HDs. I get nearly double read performance over using a single disk, since the RAID controller has two separate physical spindles that it can read from at the same time. This is great when switching level/zone in games, since textures for the new area will be read nearly twice as fast. Writes are pretty much the same performance as a single disk though, and obviously you need to spend twice as much on drives vs. going with a single disk. The redundancy is nice though, a single hard drive crash shouldn't wipe out your work. I've been using the Intel integrated RAID controllers since the ICH5R, and they are really, really solid.

If your 3D modeling apps use a scratch file, you need write performance, not just read performance. In that case, you could buy 2x 80GB 7200RPM SATA drives for a mere $70 ($35 x2) and create a 160GB RAID-0 scratch space with that. You probably wouldn't want to run RAID-0 on your main partition though, unless you're Ok with the thought of doubling your chances for a drive failure, and a single drive failure in a RAID-0 array trashes the entire volume.

Oh, and don't forget you'll need a 64-bit copy of Windows in order to use more than half of that RAM. Check application compatibility with 64-bit OSes. Trust me. Support for Windows XP Pro 64-bit in particular can be somewhat spotty, but 64-bit Vista seems to have more robust support out there. 64-bit XP was kind of an afterthought, and it's actually more like Windows Server 2003 64-bit reskinned to be XP, whereas Vista was more designed with 64-bit at least somewhat in mind.

Kewop Decam wrote:

LIAN LI Case - $100 (kindda a lot for case right?)

No way dude. Worth every freakin' penny. I've had a Lian-Li PC-60 for several years, and I love it. It's a tool-free case, all thumbscrews, so it's easy to get it open and get parts in and out. The build quality is fantastic, and the extra features like a removable mobo tray make building a PC much easier. I'm working inside my PC on at least a yearly basis, and the amount of time the removable mobo tray alone has saved me made it well worth it. So spend the money on a decent case, you'll thank yourself every time you have to crack it open.

Kewop Decam

I picked the 260 and the mobo cause someone recommended it, but if there is something stronger and more pimp, please let me know cause the budget matters in that I don't want to spend a lot of money and not get value out if that makes any sense.


For cooling, I have an antec freeze fan in my old PC that I'll take out. I forgot what it's called, but I think it's like arctic freeze or something like that.


Anything else you guys recommend?

Thanks for the help!

JohnnyCache

I'm +1ing GPU is a little anemic for the rest of it

Case seems a little mediocre/generic for the money but I too like a simple black case so I can't fault it per se

vonPoonBurGer

Kewop Decam wrote: »

For cooling, I have an antec freeze fan in my old PC that I'll take out. I forgot what it's called, but I think it's like arctic freeze or something like that.

Is that a CPU cooler? If so, it almost certainly will not fit the new mounting used on the core i7 socket. I wouldn't worry about it though, Intel has finally exorcised the suck from their stock coolers. I'm running stock cooling on my 920 and it is both quiet and effective. Unless you're planning on overclocking, you can just use the stock cooler for zero extra monies.

If it's some kind of slot cooler or something, you can probably use it, but you also likely won't need to. That case has two intake fans and two exhaust fans, on top of the PSU's exhaust fan. Should be plenty of airflow. My old PC-60 doesn't have a top fan, just the two front and one rear (plus whatever's in the PSU) and heat hasn't been an issue for me.

Kewop Decam

JohnnyCache wrote: »

I'm +1ing GPU is a little anemic for the rest of it

Case seems a little mediocre/generic for the money but I too like a simple black case so I can't fault it per se

which card do you suggest for this build?

JohnnyCache

probably the 280

I happen to run geophysical modeling stuff that really likes nvidia, though

The Radeon 4850x2 someone mentioned is a really good card for the money - I don't know that it would even cost you much extra.

Shawnasee

I would definitely research the programs you are intending on using and see which vid card plays nicer with them.

I bought a monster rig to play City of Heroes maxed out only to find out after the fact that ATI doesn't play nicely with that game.

Maybe check out the forums of those programs and see what components and setups work well generally.

Kewop Decam

Shawnasee wrote: »

I would definitely research the programs you are intending on using and see which vid card plays nicer with them.

I bought a monster rig to play City of Heroes maxed out only to find out after the fact that ATI doesn't play nicely with that game.

Maybe check out the forums of those programs and see what components and setups work well generally.

there are no real vid cards that play "nicest" with Zbrush/max/Maya/XSI/ect really. You just need pretty much raw power (more processing/ram then vid card). The vid card is just for overall gaming, but it still does factor in those two programs, but no where as much as a game pushes a vid card. Think about it, on screen I might have only one model (maybe one 2K, 4K texture). Now, if I'm Zbrush sculpting that one model can literally be 30+ million polys. Now, it is IMPOSSIBLE to drag 30 million polys into Max without a crash, but you do it in pieces. Right now, my Max can probably handle like 1.5-3 million, but once I try an ambient occlusion bake... out of ram, crash, explode... anger. Also bring that 1.5-3 brings it to like 5 frames a second... really annoying.

So really, it's straight up processing and ram power for those programs, awesome vid card for overall gaming.