Advice on a new computer rig

aajohnny

Hey,
I am not very good at all at putting computers together, I am totally new to custom rigs, so I plan on getting a new rig by the summer, and I do not make a lot of money so I am aiming for building a rig for around $500-800 (hopefully thats possible)

Here is what I would use this rig for:

- Modeling
- Sculpting
- UDK
- Probably play some games once in a while.

I want to be able to have 3ds max, zbrush and udk up at the same time so I can go back and forth. With this laptop im using now I just can't even get close of doing that.

Any advice on custom computers? I know I will get parts from newegg.com I just have no idea about whats the best brand of whatever part and I am unsure of the specs for the parts too. What do typical 3d artists or game developers have as computer specs?

Thanks,
John

mdeforge

I'd be looking at the core i3, 4gb of ram minimum and a decent graphics card. I wouldn't spend more money on a graphics card than on your processor if I had that budget. More RAM is never a bad thing, especially with zBrush. If you can get 6GB, do it.

Tomshardware.com and Anandtech's builds are a great place to do some research/see what they're doing with that budget.

I don't really see the need for UDK to be up at the same time as Max and Zbrush. Even then, I don't see the need for having any of those open with the other. Do your work in one, switch over, complete work there, switch back, export, import into UDK. You'll need your RAM free'd up for what you're working on.

aajohnny

Well I want it to be able to at least do that , is it possible to get a very good rig for like $500-600?

Artifice

aajohnny wrote: »

is it possible to get a very good rig for like $500-600?

Yes, as long as you're willing to accept that it won't be the best machine in the world with the newest parts. I've been builing my own set ups for years and I've never once spent over $700, and they tend to last at least 2-3 years minimum.

Two quick bits of advice. First, look at what you can reuse. Builds typically get expensive when you want to replace everything. If you've got a decent case, a serviceable PSU, a working DVD-R, a monitor, etc, and you're just going to replace the guts, you're going to come off a lot cheaper. It's easy to spend just as much on all that peripheral stuff as it is the core of your system.

Second, use the Newegg reviews to your advantage. Go for well reviewed parts with a lot of feedback on them. It's a pretty easy way to get a feel for what problems you might encounter with a piece of hardware in daily use. After that, it's just a matter of sussing out what you can afford.

Oh, and as it's been mentioned in another thread, more RAM and an SSD are the cheapest ways to get more performance out of a machine. I'd look at those before spending way too much on a CPU or GPU.

aajohnny

Oh okay, yeah I don't need a monster to be honest, I just wanna be able to model without it overheating like my current laptop, and something that will last me years and years. I never replaced anything so idk how to choose parts wisely.