New "What machine should I buy" site

[COLNAGOBOY]

Thanks Dimitris for your insight,

I know there are no affordable 16GB DDR3 modules available today, but this was also the case for affordable 8GB DDR3 modules last year, so I believe affordable 16GB DDR3 modules will be out soon in the market. (ASUS board I mentioned has 16 slots while MSI board has 8 slots) I know PC tech. ages / depreciates so quickly, but I'm planning on spending up to $10k for the best system possible for rendering in VRay / Max. (no IRay nor VRay RT capabilities needed, therefore no expensive Cuda GPU is necessary) I'm running on a system with 32GB DDR3 with Sandy Bridge Core i7 2600k now, but I still experience shortage of memory sometimes while rendering, so I guess I am wondering how 128GB or 256GB will enhance the performance & stability for rendering, provided that I also need to refine my workflow to minimize taxing on the resources.

[Tommy L]

Thanks Dimitris for your insight,

I know there are no affordable 16GB DDR3 modules available today, but this was also the case for affordable 8GB DDR3 modules last year, so I believe affordable 16GB DDR3 modules will be out soon in the market. (ASUS board I mentioned has 16 slots while MSI board has 8 slots) I know PC tech. ages / depreciates so quickly, but I'm planning on spending up to $10k for the best system possible for rendering in VRay / Max. (no IRay nor VRay RT capabilities needed, therefore no expensive Cuda GPU is necessary) I'm running on a system with 32GB DDR3 with Sandy Bridge Core i7 2600k now, but I still experience shortage of memory sometimes while rendering, so I guess I am wondering how 128GB or 256GB will enhance the performance & stability for rendering, provided that I also need to refine my workflow to minimize taxing on the resources.

 

O M G... what a giant waste of money. Your current system is fine as a workstation. You're going to drop 10k on a new one. Just take the money and buy ~7 nodes. Get the rendering tasks off your workstation. Use the change to go on vacation for a week.

If 32Gig of RAM isnt enough for you then youre doing something wrong.

[COLNAGOBOY]

Thanks Tom for your comment,

What are 7 nodes? Are they some kind of render slaves?

People spend 30k on their car, but spending 10k on a tool that they use everyday is a waste of money, huh I guess.

It's subjective as I believe it's still better way of spending 10k than buying a high-end Mac Pro, while some people disagree with that.

[Dimitris Tolios]

Do you run out of memory because of VRay Frame buffer (VFB) perhaps?

An easy fix is to switch to VRay Raw image (VRI) and set VFB to "preview".

A 3930K would give you a comfortable 50% speed adv. while rendering, with the same single thread performance while modeling, and up to 64GB of RAM. There will also be compatibility with the IB-E series that will launch Q3 2013, but rumor has it that we won't see 8C i7s and IB-E will still be limited to hex-cores...I hope that's proven wrong (tho I won't mind replacing my 3820 to any 6C - SB-E or IB-E )

 

If you really need more than 64GB of Ram for your workstation, then a Xeon system is the only way to go, but even with CPUs @ the upper end of the spectrum, there will be a penalty in single thread performance due to lower clocks. In single processor systems (1P), there is virtually no real advantage in rendering times either, as the conservatively clocked 8C/16T Xeons are almost matched by faster 6C/12T (or surpassed if you O/C the i7). You need a 2P system and mid-to-high end 6C or 8C Xeons to really pull ahead of a 3930K/3960X.

 

-So, as far as single thread goes, you are almost at the top...there is nothing that really worths your money to upgrade to.

-If you want as much horsepower as possible @ in a single tower without breaking the bank, and you can work with 64GB of RAM, then X79 platform will cut it.

-If you have to have more RAM in your workstation, then Xeon...

-If you need as much rendering power as possible, then a render farm is much more cost effective and faster than a single machine, as you can buy multiple 4C i5/i7 CPUs for the cost of a single high-end 2P or even 1P Xeon workstation. A 2P 16C/32T Xeon tower might set you back $4-5000, while for the same money you can get 7-8 i7 nodes with 32GB ram each, for a total 56-64T.

When performance per thread/core is virtually identical (actually faster with the faster clocked i7), you can actually visualize the difference easily.

[Tommy L]

Thanks Tom for your comment,

What are 7 nodes? Are they some kind of render slaves?

People spend 30k on their car, but spending 10k on a tool that they use everyday is a waste of money, huh I guess.

It's subjective as I believe it's still better way of spending 10k than buying a high-end Mac Pro, while some people disagree with that.

 

Yes, a node is a render slave. Comparing a car to a computer is a bit ridiculous. Other than the the fact you have to buy them both, they dont have much in common. $10k is silly money to spend on a PC. I consider myself absolutely well equipped with 2 x i7 workstations, 7 x i7 nodes, a laptop, 4 screens and a hat full of gadgets. The whole lot probably came in at around $12k combined. Computers are disposable, buy them cheap.

[AlboRegency]

I just saw the new benchmarks for the 3970X. It seems to me that the i7 3930K is the best value for performance for a workstation at this time. I wonder how fast it is when overclocked. http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/core-i7-3970x-sandy-bridge-e-benchmark,3348-6.html

 

Anyways, I plan on getting a new computer next year. Mine is a few years old now...I kinda want to wait for Haswell Cpus. What do you guys think about that? The GT3 model will have an impressive iGPU. I wonder if I can add a future GPU for combined power in regards to GPU rendering. I want a strong CPU as well cause I don't like upgrading that often. Hard to decide, so many new developments.

 

Also ultrabooks should be getting Haswell Cpus as well. That should make for quite a powerful laptop and portable workstation.

[COLNAGOBOY]

Thanks Dimitris for your deep suggestions,

I need to reconsider the system configurations.

[COLNAGOBOY]

Thanks Tom,

What are the power requirements for your 7 nodes?

Do they come in a rack like servers?

I wonder what kind of boards are used and how to cool the nodes.

Would you be able to give me a bit of hints!? I'd greatly appreciate them.

[Devin Johnston]

Andrew do you have any recommendations for 1 or 2U rack render nodes?

[Tommy L]

Hi, just saw this. I dont know the power consumption of the nodes. They are just plugged into the wall and electricity is so cheap in the US I dont ever reallly think about it. They are regular tower PC's, not rack-mount. Built as ceahp as I can just to use the CPU. They have no extra cooling, just the stock fans. They are not overclocked. I'd rather just buy an extra node than jeopardize the reliability for an extra 10% out of the processor, so they dont need extra cooling.

Thanks Tom,

What are the power requirements for your 7 nodes?

Do they come in a rack like servers?

I wonder what kind of boards are used and how to cool the nodes.

Would you be able to give me a bit of hints!? I'd greatly appreciate them.

[Dimitris Tolios]

I can vote that it is a great configuration - as I have 90% of it identical in the rig I am writing this post from.

I have the same 690 II (692 adv) case, same series PSU, mobo and CPU.

 

Mobo is great - perhaps the best you can get as a balance of features / BIOS settings / Overclocability / Build Quality - for the price. It lags behind the considerably more expensive Asrock Extreme 11 and Rampage IV / WS Asus boards, but that's understandable.

 

CPU: well...tbh the 3820 is not the best CPU for the job, as a 3770K is faster and the CPU+MoBo combo is cheaper. 3820 = a stepstone for something better than a quad, or the basic i7 that can do more than 32GB of RAM. I got it as it was on offer more than $100 cheaper than the 3770K at the time, and got the motherboard with $50 total discount ontop for buying them both the same day (MicroCenter in-store offer, summer 2012). Too many coincidences, that led it being within $20-25 of a 3770K + Asus P8Z77 Pro.

 

The positives are that this board is still compatible with both the 3930K SB-E processors, and the upcoming IB-E processors (Q3 2013) that will fit in s2011, so I hope I will snatch an upgrade cheaper than the current price of the 3930K sometime in a year or so from now (with my PC pushing 1.5-2years). The 3770K is faster than the 3820, but it is the end of the line for the 1155 socket, which will be abandoned with the upcoming Haswell architecture this summer.

 

If you think you can use the 3930K as you do render A LOT, i.e. you are going for animations or large renderings often, it is not a bad buy, but its speed advantage will be only when rendering. For single threaded stuff, i.e. almost all modelling, particle effects calcs etc, the 3770K will be the fastest of the bunch.

[Charley89]

Thanks for the long and useful reply!

So, if I buy a 3770K, it's a bit faster, but no longer upgradeable.

If I buy the LGA2011 system, I can upgrade it with an upcoming CPU a 1-1,5 year later.

 

And what do you think about the RAM ?

[stormchaser]

Thanks for the long and useful reply!

So, if I buy a 3770K, it's a bit faster, but no longer upgradeable.

If I buy the LGA2011 system, I can upgrade it with an upcoming CPU a 1-1,5 year later.

 

And what do you think about the RAM ?

 

You should most definitely go with 3930k, no point in choosing an x79 mobo and not choosing 3930k. a secondhand 3930k goes for abt 425-440$. I dont know how much it goes for in Hungary, I would also check out seasonic powersupplies. and for HDD make sure the caviar blue is single platter otherwise go with caviar black.

Regards

Sajid

[Dimitris Tolios]

Thanks for the long and useful reply!

So, if I buy a 3770K, it's a bit faster, but no longer upgradeable.

If I buy the LGA2011 system, I can upgrade it with an upcoming CPU a 1-1,5 year later.

 

And what do you think about the RAM ?

 

32GB DDR3-1600 should be fine. You could get 1866, but it won't be really faster - nothing you can really notice in real life that is. I have my Ram O/Ced to 2333, and did some tries with lower speeds, and I did not see noticeable losses. I keep it @ 2333, "just because".

 

The s2011 offers future upgrades - at least according to intel's press releases thus far.

We have very little information on what the IB-E i7s will have to offer.

IB-E Xeons are anounced for up to 15 cores / 30 threads (woot), but are expected to hit much lower core speeds than current 4-6 cores SB-Es.

 

For IB-E i7s there are a lot of rumors but nothing is verified - some are saying that the low-end 3820 replacement will be a quad with around 10% increase in real life speed (clock per clock), which was what we saw with the 2700K vs. 3770K and the equivalent i5s that switched from SB to IB.

 

Others say that the IB-E basic model will be a hex core, with the afformentioned 10% speed increase (clock per clock, it might end up being faster in clocks altogether), and a pricetag somewhere in-between the 3820 and the 3930K, while the 3930~3980K replacements might be 8-core/16 thread chips, against the original rumors that had the i7 IB-E remaining 6 cores at best...

 

So best case scenario will be getting something with 8 cores and 10% better clock per clock speed in similar price with the current 3930K (even if it is for the same price as the 3960K is actually huge), or you will be getting a 6-core chip faster than the current 3930K that will be priced a bit more than 3820.

 

Worst case scenario, the IB-E will drive prices down for the SB-E, and you will be able to get a clearance deal or a used 3930K for a much better price than current retail

[Charley89]

OK, thanks!

And the CPU water cooler is good, or should I buy an air cooler?

[stormchaser]

OK, thanks!

And the CPU water cooler is good, or should I buy an air cooler?

it depends on how far you want to take your cpu. do you plan to squeeze every last mhz out of it or just normal without much tinkering oc? if youre not pushing the limits then i suggest go with the aircooling. thermalright silver arrow series used to be good value for money 6 months ago, i dont know if things have changed now.

[Dimitris Tolios]

If you don't plan on that kind of O/cing, then a Coolermaster 212 is a good bet to keep your CPU happy and cool at stock clocks. You don't need the W/C, closed or open, unless you just want to play with something fancier. But large air coolers are also very potent and usually much more silent than closed loops like the 120mm H80/80i or the CLW0215 which not really better than the SB-E or ND-D14, but still a safe choice.

 

I have been pushing my i7-3820 to 4.5-4.65 under my Thermalright Silver Arrow (SA) SB-E since the 1st week I bought it late July.

It won't go much higher than 68-70oC (winter) and or 73oC max (summer) and the current voltage under load, and trust me, I have been pushing it to the limits of what is considered safe voltage for SB-E under air.

 

 

To do really better than the SA SB-E or other top air coolers, you need to go open loop (custom) watercooling, and then - if you are lucky with your cpu - you might be pushing closer to 5 or more GHz, with a tad more voltage, but much better temps. At this speeds, SB-E chips will be putting out tremendous heat - the 3930K is measured to be above the 250W range under full load @ 5GHz, so even fractions of a Volt gained out of a better CPU or higher quality mosfets powering it, do work wonders. Thus usually extreme o/cers go for the Rampage IV or equivalent boards - P9X79 Pro or Sabertooth X79s do it to, but seen less often in relevant forums doing so.

 

With open loop WC, the rule of thumb with CPUs is a 120/140mm radiator segment per 100-120W you want to dissipate @ around 10-15oC above ambient, so usually you get 240mm rads doing the work. If you are more "relaxed" with temps, you can use single 120mm rads to cool down much hotter chips - "the mod" is a well known application of closed loop 120mm WC to cool down 170-200+W GPUs in the 4xx/5xx/6xx nvidia GTX line, and equivalent Radeons, and those do a pretty good job at keeping those darn hot cards around 60-70oC. That is huge difference over the much louder stock air-coolers that can be reaching 90+oC or more under full loads.

[Charley89]

I made some changes after your comments (and my budget.)

This came out:

ASUS P9X79 PRO

INTEL Core i7-3930K 3.20GHz

KINGSTON 16834MB HyperX DDR3 1600MHz CL10 KIT

WD Caviar Black 1000Gb 7200rpm 64Mb SATA3

COOLERMASTER Silent Pro M2 620W ----------> Is this good enough?

COOLERMASTER RC-692-KWN2 CM 690 II Advanced

COOLERMASTER RR-H412-16PK Hyper 412 Slim

COOLERMASTER R4-BCBR-12FB-R1 extra cooler

[Dimitris Tolios]

Yes, the 620W PSU is enough for the 3930K + a beefy GPU if you don't plan on overclocking both heavily.

The 412 Slim seems to be a nice cooler: push-pull, with low noise fans - should be a step up from the 212, just like CM is marketing it, and logically will cope with the 3930K just fine at stock speeds or mild O/Cs.

[shahabnick]

I use 3dsmax and Vray and im going to buy a new pc

please help me what's the best choice for these pieces in 2 prices 1000$ and 1500$?

1-CPU ?

2-VGA ?

3-Mainboard ?

4-RAM ?

5-SSD -HDD?

6-Power supply ?

[ChrisLSimpson]

I noticed the lists at the start of this thread, but also that they were from last year. Is there a more up to date list somewhere? I will be getting a new computer in a few months and having a up to date list would be nice.

[danb4026]

I want to upgrade my cpu on my computer from a i7 2600k to something faster/better. What are your recommendations for an MSI P67-GD66 1155 MB?

 

Current config is: 64bit, 32gb ram, and GeForce GTX 580

[Dimitris Tolios]

I want to upgrade my cpu on my computer from a i7 2600k to something faster/better. What are your recommendations for an MSI P67-GD66 1155 MB?

 

Current config is: 64bit, 32gb ram, and GeForce GTX 580

 

Unfortunately you won't find many options...

The 3770K, the current 3rd gen top i7 for LGA 1155 is the fastest CPU that should probably work with your P67 mobo should you upgrade to the latest BIOS...BUT...you won't see more than 5-10% speed increases over your 2600K.

In most cases the difference won't even be noticeable.

 

There are a few "suggestions" for your problem:

• Just stick with the 2600K, happy that your investment holds its value still
  
• The above + overclock your 2600K...you can do anywhere from 4.5-4.8GHz effortlessly with these chips - probably the easiest and most foolproof recent generation of CPUs to O/C. Good chips with good cooling can do 5GHz or more. Even @ 4.5GHz which is conservative, you will see much better performance than a stock 3770K, and a cheap cooler master 212 evo can get you there (or 4.8) without issues. The 3rd gen of i7s are a tad trickier to O/C past 4.5-4.6. It is actually easier to go much higher than that with the 2600K/2700K, and should you reach a 200MHz clock advantage with a 2600K over a 3rd gen CPU like the 3770K, this 5-10% speed benefits the latter has is vanished.
  
• Wait for the new LGA 1150 platform and the Haswell based i7s. About 6 months or so. We don't exactly know what to expect, other than much faster integrated graphics and probably the same "10%" clock-to-clock speed increase. Rumor has it it will o/c like a beast, but this might be wishful thinking. Prices will ofc be salty for the 1st few months.
  
• Upgrade to a LGA 2011 / X79 platform with the 39xx series 6 core / 12 thread processors. This is technically 1.5x a 2600K. Single threaded performance is identical, but you get a 50% increase in speed when rendering or doing other heavily threaded stuff. By far the most expensive option, but...
  

Edited March 29, 2013 by dtolios

[danb4026]

[*]Upgrade to a LGA 2011 / X79 platform with the 39xx series 6 core / 12 thread processors. This is technically 1.5x a 2600K. Single threaded performance is identical, but you get a 50% increase in speed when rendering or doing other heavily threaded stuff. By far the most expensive option, but...

 

Thanks Dimitris.....If I were to go with the 2011/x79, would I have to change out my ram, video card etc?

[Dimitris Tolios]

No. All current system platforms from intel and AMD are using DDR3 Ram and PCIe graphics, and probably DDR3 will be with us for a couple more generations - hardly the bottleneck in today's systems. DDR4 is not "there" yet. If we see some platforms switch in 2014/2015 will be more likely cause DDR3's supply has saturated the market and it is too cheap now, so foundries will want to make more money. /end of rant

 

You probably have 4x8GB sticks, and those should work just fine with a X79 mobo in "Quad Channel" mode. Gimmick, doesn't give RL performance gains (in my system it doesn't) - just saying.

 

The GTX 580 is as good as GeForces go for viewport acceleration...before a GTX Titan perhaps, so don't sweat it: unless you would be willing to get a half-decent ($450-800) Quadro, just stick with your fermi space heater.

 

Again, the 3930K is in the "ballpark" 6x dual threaded CPU modules of the same architecture the 2600K has 4 off.

Depending on where your CPU struggles, you might not see ANY improvement, as many operations are still single threaded - say cloth modifiers, physic simulations etc in 3DS.

 

Renderers are the only CGI task where hex-core CPUs will shine, but the benefit might be noticeable only on large renders: if what you often do (stills or animation) renders for hours, the 50% speed increase will be noticeable. If what you do renders in few minutes time - i.e. it is much more modelling and PP in your workflow than actual rendering - or you do large renders very very rarely, a 3930K will be more of a psychological aid than a real time-saver. Think of it as buying a ZR1 Corvette over your "vanilla" to commute in downtown NY...lack of HP would be hardly your issue