3d apps (3dmax, zbrush) build - what to look for?

Hi everyone.
Theres an expression in italian that says "like a fish out of water", no idea if there an equal in english, but thats exactly how i feel now that i have to build my next PC system. Im a student of game design and spend a lot of time in front of my pc for work and for pleasure.

Been working a lot with 3d applications like 3dstudio max, maya, zbrush, mudbox, all of them having huge problems with my actual pc when handling scenes of 50k polys. (except mudbox, where i can work up to 4mio polys). my aim would be working with 1gb big files and around20 mio polys per scene.

the problem is, thinking "ill get a good grafic card and all will be fine" sounds a bit minimalistic, so im here to ask you guys (and i hope you know better than me) which components are essential for working fluently with 3d applications. On the other side, i also play on that pc. Im not the kind of guy who has 20 last.gen games installed at a time, so for instance a good velociraptor300gb will do on that field..

my budget is around 1600-1800euros, 1400-1500gbp... (screen included, 22-26inch)
if any of you has good builds to point out on that matter, or a guide for that specific matter, or knows about people working in that scene being very happy with a product, please let me know..

waiting for your answers!
regards, raffael

That's a nice build and good choices.

Ideally you would work and play on different machines, because you would get better work performance from a workstation GPU such as:
http://www.dabs.com/products/pny-q [...] s=50740000

I understand there are ways to get good 3D modeling performance out of a standard GTX card though... you might want to look around for that info.

3d applications make use of CUDA which helps a lot in rendering ati hasn really got anything that can match it

This is an interesting review of Nvidia Quadro FX vs ATI FirePro, read it before buying a new Graphics card.(remember new ati series is coming out soon)
http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/v [...] repro.html

You need a Blue-Ray player (or writer), Sony, Samsung, Pioneer and LG are good makes).

I would go for 8 [2x4] giga byte of memory and another Hard drive for backups. (you could setup up a raid).

As for the OS Windows 7 64Bit

That depends on if OP has the plug ins for it. There are no NATIVE CUDA support with 3DS and most other programs.

so thats the result of a small council i had with a friend of mine keeping in mind the suggestions done here an the high-profile approval it got.. (btw im getting 2 of them grafic cards)

what exactly are you talking about the 19? unknown matter to me.. ¨cheers

Not 19 but i9... The next gen LGA 1366 CPU. By going with the X58 board now you should be able to upgrade to a 6-core CPU down the road.

With that kind of budget, OP could probably get good performance from SSD, might be worthwhile to have an OS/Programs/Working Directory drive, and then have a RAID 1 backup.

when is the new ati serie coming out approximately? and the i9? i guess i could postpone a bit even thou it is kind of a vicious circle..

It's not about waiting, but about an upgrade path. Using the X58 board with the i7 920 will allow you to upgrade to 6 cores next year.

Using the P55 board with the i7 860 will cost less now, but future upgrades will be limited to 4 cores.

The 5xxx cards should be on Newegg etc, soon.

@ proximon

You Write: "It's not about waiting, but about an upgrade path. Using the X58 board with the i7 920 will allow you to upgrade to 6 cores next year.

Using the P55 board with the i7 860 will cost less now, but future upgrades will be limited to 4 cores."





I've read this same thought from many people, and I always find it missing in its logic. The upgrade path is not limited to anything specific, unless you clarify what upgrade means to you. Lets say a person chooses 1156 socket now, perhaps due to performance today and saves $100 over buying 1136. (just a for-instance).

Then lets say in two years (not immediate upgrade, but once the technology settles, that person chooses to upgrade to the i9.


They do have a path! They buy a new mobo, processor/hsf. Who knows what that will cost, but to decide if that process is desireable, you would have to reduce that cost to npv which would be the cost of the mobo + processor/(1+i)^2, and you'd have the ability to calculate a figure of merit for the decision to buy 1156 now as: $100- present value of the cost of the future mobo/processor. (i represents the interest rate)


You then have to compare that result to the other scenerio, which is 0 savings now, and the cost of the processor (only) in, say, 2 years. Which is 0 - processor costs/(1+i)^2


How can you say which way is better without knowing the future cost of the mobo and processor, the likely interest rate, and without knowing if something else about mobos for i9 will be different in 2 years to render it undesireable to continue to employ the "old" x58 mobo?

Best,
Bob

Proximon, your reply helps fill in your assumptions: that is the "upgraders" will normally seek a sub-optimal upgrade in exchange for reducing the upgrade time to that of replacing a processor/hsf.

I suggest "sub-optimal", because I value the fresh os install that always accompanies my upgrades. I can't remember an upgrade in which I didn't redo the mobo as part of the build. And the technology is always changing, whether as part of an improved bios, or i/o or power or sata or something....

Agreed that cpus come down in price, but mobos, and ram do too. That's why I think the op could be making a good choice to avoid the high cost of the 1136 mobo today, even if he may wish one for a future upgrade.

At least we owe the op the awareness that there could be a potential benefit to planning his i9 build to simply be a different build rather than an extension of this one.

I've rebuilt, btw, (normally a new mobo/processor/ram...sometimes video) nearly a dozen times with OEM Windows and never faced a hassle, so I'm not sure what you are referring to. All you have to do is inform MS of the upgrade.

Best,
Bob

ahhh, thanks for that, I didn't know as I'm only now about to go from xp to 7. I skipped vista. I wonder what the "rigamarole" will be when upgrading with the intent to use the same license of 7 in a new machine.

I would go with one of the new ATI cards, the ATI HD5850 is about the same price as the GTX275/GTX280, and performs better than them, so you might want to look into that, or if you have a little budget room, the ATI HD5870 is the fastest card out there right now.