building new rig

Sage

Yup another one of those threads.

It's been awhile since I played with PC hardware and there are like a million options...

My budget is around 1000 to 1500. The more I can save the better though. My computer will be used to model in 3ds max, texture, and sculpt in zbrush. I also will work with level editors like unreal ed. I would also like to be able to play some games.

I read through a bunch of threads here on what hardware to get since I was trying to avoid making one myself.

Here are the questions I have at the moment.

Is it worth getting a 2 gig graphics card over a one gig one. Currently, I like the nvidia 560 or the ati 5960. I did some searching on google but I'm wondering if there are better options. I need the graphics to power two 22 in lcd monitors.

For the cpu I'm currently sold on an intel i5 with the sandy bridge... I'm wondering what the AMD equivalent is. Since modeling and texturing is my main goal with this rig. While offline rendering is nice I don't think I need an i7 cpu.

Is getting a solid state hard drive worth it??? I was going to get a terabyte hard drive and call it a day. My concern with the SDD and having the OS there is that windows 7 like to put files all over the place, like when you install Max, basically a bunch of files end up in the c drive. If the c drive is only 126 gigs I might end up with storage space problems. If I get the SDD drive I'll be getting a 1T hard drive for data and applications.

For Ram I'm going with 16 gigs. Is it worth getting DDR3-1600MHz over DDR3-1333MHz? Is it worth the money?

Let me know what you think. Thanks.

Minos

Im on the same boat. After a lot of research I have finally decided what I'm getting and I believe this is gonna be a kickass PC for such a small budget (1000 - 1200). Some of the main parts:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814130623
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822148681
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817139011
2x http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820233144
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819115070
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813128502
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835186134

hope that helps

EmAr

I'm looking for a new system too. Intel(CPU)-AMD(GPU) combo is the best option these days as nVidia is not as great as they used to be. Both hardware and customer relations wise. There's a thread about performance issues in Maya.

For the ram, game benchmarks show little effect caused by ram frequency. I don't know if this is true for boot time etc. though.

I'm planning to buy something like this BTW:

i7 2600, AMD 6950, 8 gb ram.

Bart

Need to change my 6 years old PC also. Was looking at the same stuff that Minos posted. Tho I don't think you'll need that huge 850 power suply. 650 will be enough

Tom Pritchard

I just got myself pretty much what you're thinking of and it is a beast. I have:

• Intel Core i5 2500k @3.3Ghz
• AMD HD 6950 2GB
• 16GB 1600Mhz DDR3 RAM

I would recommend it.

Joshua Stubbles

At home I've got:
i5 2400k OC@3.6ghz
8GB Corsair Dominator DDR3
ASUS P8P67Pro mobo (no longer made)
GeForce GTX560

I can run any game, includng BFIII @ High settings. I've had SLI in the past. If you can get cheap cards, I suppose it's worth it. It can cause instability with some titles, but you can always disable a card for that game in the profiler. Also, it's not a HUGE perf boost, just so you know. SLI is really handy for SLI AA. One card does all of the antialiasing, so you get much higher image quality.

EmAr

Forgot to add this: I had a graphics card and a mobo by GIGABYTE that had this slashed "Pb" logo which means lead-free solder was used on them. Both boards were useless after 3 years due to solder failure. I don't know if they are still using the same type of lead-free solder but the logo is there so I'd look into that.

greevar

EmAr wrote: »

Forgot to add this: I had a graphics card and a mobo by GIGABYTE that had this slashed "Pb" logo which means lead-free solder was used on them. Both boards were useless after 3 years due to solder failure. I don't know if they are still using the same type of lead-free solder but the logo is there so I'd look into that.

The problem with lead free solder is that stresses will cause the tin in the solder to break apart and must have another metal to prevent the "tin wiskers". Lead was implemented for this, but was banned in some countries in 2006.

R3D

going to point again to

http://www.tinyurl.com/falconguide

EmAr

greevar wrote: »

The problem with lead free solder is that stresses will cause the tin in the solder to break apart and must have another metal to prevent the "tin wiskers". Lead was implemented for this, but was banned in some countries in 2006.

Yeah, I wish lead wasn't this harmful for the environment or we could recycle it effectively.

greevar

EmAr wrote: »

Yeah, I wish lead wasn't this harmful for the environment or we could recycle it effectively.

I wish they could find a metal that serves the same purpose that isn't toxic.

Sage

Thanks for the great info.