My Build!

[Stailey]

I'm new to the forum here...

My dad and I just finished this build a week and a half ago together. I fronted the money, he fronted the expertise and I was able to learn a lot about putting a system together. I am proud of it... so this is my moment to brag about it.

 

Specs:

 

Motherboard: ASUS Z8PE-D12 (Server motherboard to hold two processors)

Processor: (2) Intel Xeon E5520 - 2.26GHz

RAM: 12 GB (6x2GB) - Will be 24GB by mid Jan

HDD: (3) Western Digital Caviar Black 750GB in Raid5 Config

Video: EVGA GeForce GTX 285 2GB 512-bit

ODD: Blue-Ray Player and DVD Writer

Sound: ASUS Xonar DX 7.1

Fan: (2) Zalmann CNPS9900 on top of processors

PSU: Corsair HX1000W (Modular)

Case: CoolMaster 932 HAF

Monitor: (2) Hanns-G 28" HDMI

 

 

However, I really would like some feedback on what I could add to improve my system to render better. As I read over this forum I am finding that my idea of adding another video card is unnecessary (tell me if I am wrong). I will be adding more RAM. I have 3 more PCI-Express slots available and I definitely want to fill up the rest.

 

Thanks for letting me take my moment to brag...

[Archiform 3D]

Hi Chris,

 

Render speed comes down to CPU grunt and then the RAM only becomes an issue if you run out. You may find that increasing to 24 GB will do nothing but slow down your boot times.

 

I am on a Mac, but I am sure you can get a similar utility for Windows. It's called "iStat Menus" and it keeps a monitor on RAM usage, disks, etc. This way I can tell if I am coming close to using up my 16 GB or RAM, which very rarely happens. I suggest you try something similar and see how yours runs - if you dont come near using up your RAM then dont bother upgrading.

 

So the only real option for you is just faster CPUs. I dont think there are any PCI options you can get to speed things up.

 

Steve

[BOXXLABS]

That looks pretty good.

I concur with Steve's statement. More RAM won't do anything to speed up your computer unless it's already running out of memory - which I'll bet it's not.

 

Also, I don't see a hardware RAID controller card listed.

 

Are you using the "software RAID5" capabilities built into the mainboard's drive controller?

 

If this is the case, you are surely getting very poor disc write performance which is definitely slowing down your productivity everytime your computer goes to save (or save changes to) large files such as project/scene files or large image files.

 

To verify this, run a disc benchmark - you're probably getting about 180MB/s or so in sequential READS but only maybe 40MB or 50MB/s in sequential WRITES. Probably slow than this for random WRITES.