PC Build - Video Editing/Gaming/Possible 3d

pandaboy

Hey, so I was looking through some of the threads here and I've found some great information but I'd like to see if I can get some more. I found this build on one of the threads and I'm hoping someone could possibly help me customise the list to my own preferred build taking the applications that I plan to use into account.

I've been working from an iMac for the last five years and I'd prefer to move onto something that I can upgrade and offers more software wise. I'm looking to work with Adobe Premiere Pro CS5, Full Cs5 Design Suite including After Effects, Blender and possibly Cinema 4D.
I will also look to play games with this system so I'll be looking for something that will be cool and gives out little noise. I understand that the machine should be adequate for gaming if equipped for editing.

With regards to the motherboard. Does anyone know of an 8-core option? Is there a motherboard where I could place 2 i5/i7 processors onto it?

Does the below motherboard offer support for 2 graphics cards?

deconduo wrote: »

Cheaper and better build:

Item|Price
Total build cost: €1,173.20 + €30 shipping
Intel Core i5-2500K Box, LGA1155|€187.76
Thermalright HR-02 Macho|€33.70
ASRock Z68 Extreme3 Gen3, Sockel 1155, ATX|€112.71
XFX BLACK EDITION RADEON 7950 900M 3GB D5 2x mDP HDMI DVI|€401.65
8GB-Kit G.Skill PC3-10667U CL9|€32.63
Crucial M4 128GB SSD 6,4cm (2,5")|€146.99
Samsung SpinPoint F3 500GB, SATA II (HD502HJ)|€71.00
Corsair Carbide Series 500R schwarz, ATX, ohne Netzteil|€100.87
Super-Flower Amazon 80Plus 650W|€69.94
Samsung SH-222AB bare schwarz SATA|€15.95

pandaboy

Forgot to add this.


1. What is your budget? Don't know as of yet. Just stuck on square one for the time being.

2. What will be the main purpose of the computer? Gaming/Video editing/3D Modelling/Internet

3. Do you need a copy of Windows? Probably yes.

4. Can you use any parts from an old computer? No.

5. Do you need a monitor? Yes

5a. If yes, what size do you need. 22"

6. Do you need any of these peripherals? Keyboard/Mouse/Wireless Card

7. Are you willing to try overclocking? Not too sure about this.

8. How can you pay? Credit Card

9. When are you purchasing? Unknown

10. If you need help building it, where are you based? Cork

Serephucus

In answer to your first post, yeah, that board will support Crossfire/SLI.

You can get dual socket boards, but they are by no means cheap. Sandy Bridge was never designed to support more than one CPU, so you're looking at a socket 2011 server board, meaning probably about €1,500 for CPUs and board alone. Complete overkill unless you're doing some extremely high-end modelling.

If you're looking for more power, you could bump the CPU up to a 2600K. This would give you Hyperthreading, and access to a total of eight virtual cores. I'd also seriously consider overclocking this build, as it's criminally easy, and takes all of an hour or so to find a fully stable overclock, giving you up to a 40% performance boost.


Better off coming back when you get definite ideas of pricing, and time-frame, though.

pandaboy

Serephucus wrote: »

In answer to your first post, yeah, that board will support Crossfire/SLI.

You can get dual socket boards, but they are by no means cheap. Sandy Bridge was never designed to support more than one CPU, so you're looking at a socket 2011 server board, meaning probably about €1,500 for CPUs and board alone. Complete overkill unless you're doing some extremely high-end modelling.

If you're looking for more power, you could bump the CPU up to a 2600K. This would give you Hyperthreading, and access to a total of eight virtual cores. I'd also seriously consider overclocking this build, as it's criminally easy, and takes all of an hour or so to find a fully stable overclock, giving you up to a 40% performance boost.


Better off coming back when you get definite ideas of pricing, and time-frame, though.

Thanks for your post Serephucus I've read your responses in other threads and I truly appreciate your help. The dual processor idea was more of a query, I had a feeling that it would be expensive and given the work I'll be doing I could see it as a redundancy. Having looked at other threads I'm stuck between the i7 and i5 processors. I have looked at overclocking and hyperthreading and I'm pretty sure I could be capable of carrying this out. Firewire connectivity is also a big thing I'm looking for. I've found some motherboards supporting this.

With regards to budge I have nothing set in stone but I would like to keep it to the 800-1000 euro mark. Looking at what I what I think this is a low budget so it will probably need to be increased.
Tmeframe I'll be thinking of May/June. I hear some new processors are on the horizon.

Serephucus

Given the fact that you need all the peripherals, €800 would be tight for what you want, but €1,000 should be alright. Your best bet is to come back when you're around a week from ordering, then we can give you the most up-to-date help. You're fairly close on your own though - that build above would work fine for what you want, it's more down to pricing, etc. at the time, and what tech is out.

pandaboy

Thanks Serephucus, I had an idea that it would be close to the €1100 mark. It'll take a bit of time but I'll get there. It feels like a boy's "go-cart" project because I'll probably pick up the parts bit by bit.

At the moment though I was looking for help with research. I like to have my plans made a few months in advance so I know what to keep an eye out for when new products are released.

I was thinking of getting 16GB of RAM but I don't know if any applications use all of this RAM? I know Adobe CS5 has a limit of 8GB RAM (afaik). WOuld the extra 8GB be redundant or would another app use the spare RAM? I haven't been looking at computer builds since before the move to 64-bit so I'm quite useless at gauging this.

pandaboy

I was browsing around and I checked this out. I've excluded a graphics card because I'm still researching those but I think that this could be a good ground to start from.

Is it excessive at any parts?

pandaboy

OK, instead of starting a new thread I said I'd come back here. Tbh, a lot has changed since the above build spec. I haven't been taking too much notice of new releases since the 6 series release from nVidia. So I've got a few questions if someone could help me out. I've been fawning over the new build for quite a few months so I really can't wait to get this started

OK, I was going to move to the i7 2700k but now I see there's a new release, the 3770k. Is there much of a difference? I notice the graphics have improved and there's basically thinner threading. But should I notice much of a difference between this and the previous gen? I will be doing a lot of transcoding, encoding, compression, rendering with After Effects, Premiere Pro & some Blender. From what I can see, I shouldn't see too much of a difference and I'll save about €60 which could go into an extra HDD or RAM.

I'm also considering a drop to a 64GB SSD. I'll only keep the OS and apps on the SSD. I should hopefully be working with a 3-4 HDD system so I'm not considering SSD space outside of booting the system and apps.

Graphics wise, I will be using nVidia. I can see an advantage from the CUDA cores with Adobe so this is a given. I'm considering the 6series but if I could get a GTX580 cheaper than a GTX660 then I'll be happy.

That's pretty much it. The PSU and other parts I can discuss once I decide the above. Cheers

Procrastastudy

Ivy bridge (iX-3XXX) runs faster per clock, has PCI-e 3.0 and better iGPU whether that will help with video editing I have no idea.

Sandy bridge (iX-2XXX) Runs cooler and overclocks better.

Ivy v Sandy - difficult to call as PCI-e 3.0 is useless in all but the most ridiculous multi-GPU set ups. What Ivy has in the speed advantage is negated by Sandy's higher overclocks. If you're not over clocking go for Ivy imho.

If you're waiting around a bit why not wait for the nVidia 660ti and check that out.

ScumLord

pandaboy wrote: »

I was thinking of getting 16GB of RAM but I don't know if any applications use all of this RAM? I know Adobe CS5 has a limit of 8GB RAM (afaik). WOuld the extra 8GB be redundant or would another app use the spare RAM? I haven't been looking at computer builds since before the move to 64-bit so I'm quite useless at gauging this.

I'm using the Adobe production suite and have 16gb of ram, there doesn't seem to be a limit to how much of that ram Adobe products will eat through I've nearly used up the 16gb. So get as much ram as you can afford.

I've had after effects and photoshop and premiere open without problem. I have the i7 2500k. I keep meaning to overclock it seeing as it's just a setting in the bios but so far there's really been no need so far it sails through any task put in front of it.

pandaboy

ScumLord wrote: »

I'm using the Adobe production suite and have 16gb of ram, there doesn't seem to be a limit to how much of that ram Adobe products will eat through I've nearly used up the 16gb. So get as much ram as you can afford.

I've had after effects and photoshop and premiere open without problem. I have the i7 2500k. I keep meaning to overclock it seeing as it's just a setting in the bios but so far there's really been no need so far it sails through any task put in front of it.

Nice one. Yeah since then I've considered moving up to 32GB of RAM. Merely to future proof myself and it would probably make a better resale bundle if I considered moving to 64GB at some stage.

Which GFX card are you using?

Skylinehead

pandaboy wrote: »

Nice one. Yeah since then I've considered moving up to 32GB of RAM. Merely to future proof myself and it would probably make a better resale bundle if I considered moving to 64GB at some stage.

Which GFX card are you using?

Bear in mind that Ivy Bridge motherboards don't support any more than 32GB RAM, if you want 64 you'll need to go Sandy Bridge-E or Ivy Bridge-E (Socket 2011).

pandaboy

32GB it is so. Didn't bear that in mind. Thanks for that Skylinehead.

ScumLord

pandaboy wrote: »

Nice one. Yeah since then I've considered moving up to 32GB of RAM. Merely to future proof myself and it would probably make a better resale bundle if I considered moving to 64GB at some stage.

MOr RAMS!! I never intended on getting 16gb I bought 12gb and discovered I needed to fill the other slot or I'd have to make do with 8gb. Just make sure you get the right combination of sticks.

Which GFX card are you using?

A Nvidia geforce gtx460. I only went with Nvidia because of the cuda support in premiere, it renders out effects on the fly using the card.

Nvidia have experience with commercial grade cards for use in CAD design and some of those features are in their consumer cards too.

pandaboy

GCDLawstudent wrote: »

Ivy bridge (iX-3XXX) runs faster per clock, has PCI-e 3.0 and better iGPU whether that will help with video editing I have no idea.

Sandy bridge (iX-2XXX) Runs cooler and overclocks better.

Ivy v Sandy - difficult to call as PCI-e 3.0 is useless in all but the most ridiculous multi-GPU set ups. What Ivy has in the speed advantage is negated by Sandy's higher overclocks. If you're not over clocking go for Ivy imho.

If you're waiting around a bit why not wait for the nVidia 660ti and check that out.

Thanks mate. From what I can see though with the 600 series is that they're PCiE 3.0 so I will probably have to go with Ivybridge.

pandaboy

ScumLord wrote: »

MOr RAMS!! I never intended on getting 16gb I bought 12gb and discovered I needed to fill the other slot or I'd have to make do with 8gb. Just make sure you get the right combination of sticks.

A Nvidia geforce gtx460. I only went with Nvidia because of the cuda support in premiere, it renders out effects on the fly using the card.

Nvidia have experience with commercial grade cards for use in CAD design and some of those features are in their consumer cards too.

And do you game with the 460? I've been thinking of getting a short term graphics solution and the 460 sli might be a good solution. Single card for editing and sli for gaming. Or would I be wrong?

Procrastastudy

pandaboy wrote: »

Thanks mate. From what I can see though with the 600 series is that they're PCiE 3.0 so I will probably have to go with Ivybridge.

So single card set up needs PCI-e 3.0 the cards are backwards compatible with PCI-e 2.x.

People, mainly me, make the argument that PCI-e is worth it because an 8 lane PCI-e 3.0 slot is the same bandwidth as a PCI-e 2.x 16 lane slot. That said if you are looking for performance ant any cost then you'd go for a 40 lane socket2011 platform.

ScumLord

pandaboy wrote: »

And do you game with the 460? I've been thinking of getting a short term graphics solution and the 460 sli might be a good solution. Single card for editing and sli for gaming. Or would I be wrong?

Yeah, I game with that. I haven't ran into any problems. It plays batman arkam city at full whack and of course that game gets extra visuals using a Nvidia card. I can Max out Max Payne 3. The only problem from my point of view is that I use 3 screens and the card only supports two. It's a minor annoyance the 3rd screen is a projector and isn't on all the time anyway.

The other problem I've had is also with the projector it's a 3d one and I could never really get the 3D working to it's full potential Nvidia don't seem to have a universal 3d solution.

In my own mind I have a feeling the card is a bottle neck but gaming wise it's managed everything I've thrown at it. I always go in and put everything up to the max settings and haven't noticed any problems.

pandaboy

GCDLawstudent wrote: »

So single card set up needs PCI-e 3.0 the cards are backwards compatible with PCI-e 2.x.

People, mainly me, make the argument that PCI-e is worth it because an 8 lane PCI-e 3.0 slot is the same bandwidth as a PCI-e 2.x 16 lane slot. That said if you are looking for performance ant any cost then you'd go for a 40 lane socket2011 platform.

I would like to have something that is future proof and especially if I'm considering the 660ti when it's released. Though I think the 2011 series would set my budget back, processor wise anyway. Would you have an example of a good processor & mobo in the 2011 series? Personally, especially considering budget. I'm stuck between the i7 2700k or the i5 3570k. Both would adequately do the work for me I believe.

Mobo wise I was considering the Asus Z68 series. I'm looking for firewire and nice HD audio. Toslink would be perfect, as I will be looking to go through possibly a pre-amp and studio speakers.

ScumLord wrote: »

Yeah, I game with that. I haven't ran into any problems. It plays batman arkam city at full whack and of course that game gets extra visuals using a Nvidia card. I can Max out Max Payne 3. The only problem from my point of view is that I use 3 screens and the card only supports two. It's a minor annoyance the 3rd screen is a projector and isn't on all the time anyway.

The other problem I've had is also with the projector it's a 3d one and I could never really get the 3D working to it's full potential Nvidia don't seem to have a universal 3d solution.

In my own mind I have a feeling the card is a bottle neck but gaming wise it's managed everything I've thrown at it. I always go in and put everything up to the max settings and haven't noticed any problems.

Yeah, I'm thinking as a short term solution I would use these. The only thing though is would an SLI bottleneck? With the news of the 660ti coming out I think I could hang on, as a I probably won't have my machine before then.

Procrastastudy

Z68 chipset doesn't support PCI-e 3.0 (AFAIK). That said by the time single cards start pushing the bandwidth of PCI-e3.0 an i5 or i7 will be in the bin.

I do qualify my remarks by saying I went for PCI-e 3.0 support for future proofing because I may go down the SLI route in the future.

In all honesty right this minute, if I needed to by a cooler as well, and I knew I was going to be on a single card set up - I'd go 2500K tray for €182.

The 660ti even two of them wont push hit the bandwidith of 8 lane PCI-e 2.x. Two GTX690s might but you'd be on the socket 2011 platform if you can afford them. Don't go for socket 2011 btw I'm just giving an example.

pandaboy

GCDLawstudent wrote: »

Z68 chipset doesn't support PCI-e 3.0 (AFAIK). That said by the time single cards start pushing the bandwidth of PCI-e3.0 an i5 or i7 will be in the bin.

I do qualify my remarks by saying I went for PCI-e 3.0 support for future proofing because I may go down the SLI route in the future.

In all honesty right this minute, if I needed to by a cooler as well, and I knew I was going to be on a single card set up - I'd go 2500K tray for €182.

Hmmm, that's a shame. Though there are some nice Z77 boards which support 3.0. A lot of the cheaper ones have feck all slots though.

Eboggles

Actually, a few P67 and Z68 boards are PCIe 3.0, just look out for "Gen 3" in the title.

pandaboy

Nice one. So we're pretty much looking at mid August for the 660 release? I'm hoping to have myself sorted by around then.

Say if I was to have a budget of €1000 - €1200 with a new for 2 monitors. Which set up would anyone recommend? GFX wise I think I'll have to minus some cash from the above budget as my heart is set on a 660ti. So maybe minus €300-€400. And with regards to future proofing I will be most definitely considering PCiE 3.0.

Procrastastudy

I assume you'll game on just one monitor?

pandaboy

Yup, I'll prob purchase a proper gaming monitor in a few more months. Once I'm set up for editing I'll be happy enough. Gaming wise will prob be pro evo and MMOs for a short while and then onto the likes of Skyrim and BF3. I have to ease myself into the gaming side of the machine or else I'll find myself hooked up to it.

pandaboy

Any recommendations on this as a 120hz screen?

BenQ XL2420T