Building a Video Editing PC (or Hackintosh)

The_Illuminator

Hi all,

Just looking for some advice/recommendations for building a PC that I'll be using for video editing, motion graphics, photo editing and possibly some 3D rendering. I know all of this is very intensive, and I've assigned myself a budget of €1,200 - €1,350. Main things I'm wondering about are;

• Where is the best place to buy?
• Which specs should I be prioritising?
• Would you recommend assembling the machine myself? (I have little experience in this)

I've also looked into building a Hackintosh, but I'm now leaning away from that option due to the hassle that it can cause (based on my research, at least.) However, I'm still open to persuasion on this.

Any advice is very much appreciated.

The_Illuminator

1. What is your budget?

€1,200 - €1,350.

2. What will be the main purpose of the computer?

Video editing, motion graphics, photo editing and possibly some 3D rendering

3. Do you need a copy of Windows?

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.

20"-24".

5b. If no, what resolution is your current monitor and do you plan to upgrade in the near future?

6. Do you need any of these peripherals?

Keyboard and Mouse. Nothing too fancy.

7. Are you willing to try overclocking?

Not initially, at least.

8. How can you pay?

Debit Card/Bank Transfer

9. When are you purchasing?

All at once, within the next week or so.

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

Dublin based, but confident enough that I'll be able to handle a build.

BloodBath

Hardwareversand is the site most of us use here for ordering parts. It offers the best prices and cheap delivery. Priority specs for your requirements are the processor, ram size more so than speed and hard drive speed and space. I would say build it yourself as the experience is invaluable if you need to to troubleshoot any issues and since you work with computers all the time there is no harm having this knowledge. There are lots of guides on youtube and you can ask for help here if there are any problems. HWVS offer a build service for €20 if you don't want to do this though.

Here's a build I threw up for someone else that would suit you as well. The xeon is basically the same as an i7 3770 without the igp and running 100mhz lower + it can't be overclocked. It has really good performance for the price though.

You can upgrade to the 24" inch version of the same monitor for €30 more here. You could get a 27" 1440p monitor from korea fairly cheaply. It's handy if you need the screen space and/or if you are working on high res photos or video.

Something like this. You could use 2 monitors either, 2 x 1080p or a single 1440p with a 1080p if you need the screen space.

If you are going to set up a raid for the hard drives upgrade the mainboard to this. If you need more speed and storage than the 2 x 1tb drives below I'd advise getting 4 of them and setting up 2 raids with them. This will give you faster read/write speeds and more storage.

If you are going to go with 4 drives then upgrade the case to this and grab extra sata cables. The board comes with 2.

Grab a keyboard on Amazon as the German layout is different. You could grab the same monitor on amazon for around the same price as well. It will come with a 3 pin plug instead of the 2 pin German plug if you order it from HWVS.


Item|Price
Intel Xeon E3-1230v2, boxed, LGA1155|€202.63
Alpenföhn Sella - 92mm, AMD/Intel|€17.85
ASRock B75 Pro3, Sockel 1155, ATX|€65.09
16GB-Kit G.Skill PC3-10667U CL9-9-9-24|€108.94
Samsung SSD 840 120GB SATA 6Gb/s|€85.04
2 x WD Caviar Blue 1TB 6Gb's|€112.24
Gigabyte GeForce GTX 660 OC Windforce 2X, 2GB GDDR5, 2x DVI, HDMI, DisplayPort|€171.33
Cooltek Antiphon Black, ohne Netzteil|€60.73
be quiet! SYSTEM POWER 7 500W|€53.75
Samsung SH-118AB schwarz|€12.45
LG 22EA53VQ-P|€125.83
2 x LogiLink SATA Anschlusskabel mit Sicherungslasche, 0.5m|€2.78
Sharkoon Squad Laser Mouse|€10.97
Shipping|€18.99
Total|€1048.62

Windows 7 OEM €29

beno619

If you do go the Hackintosh route make sure you go with a Gigabyte mobo into the build Blood suggested .

There's a wealth of info here.

You can always partition your drives and dual boot or buy a separate one when your ready to play around.

The_Illuminator

Thanks for the advice, lads. A friend tells me that the Hackintosh process can be more hassle than it's worth, and that upgrading the OS is tricky. Think I'll just go down the PC route.