New PC Build Opinions Needed!

[evanmoore]

Hi,

 

I'm looking to build a PC used for applications such Adobe Premier Pro and After Effects, Autodesk Autocad, Maya and Showcase. I'm not a professional but do video editing, animation and 3D design mostly as a hobby at the moment but am looking to study 3D design at university next year so will need a good computer to cope with the stresses of the various CAD software. I also edit videos as a hobby and may use those skill at university next year. So I need a computer which wont let me down in these areas of work. This is the components i am thinking of puting into my PC and i was wondering if you could give me your opinion or any suggestions/advice on the build as a whole for the applications i am going to be using.

 

CPU- intel i7 4770K

CPU cooler- Noctua NH-D14

Motherboard- ASUS Z87 pro ATX

Memory- Patriot Viper 3 16GB DDR3-1866

Storage- Kinston hyperX 3K 240 GB SSD and 1TB Western Digital Caviar Black 7200rpm

Power supply- Corsair 550W ATX12v

Case- NZXT Phantom

 

You'll notice that I have left out the GPU that because this is were Im still unsure, I'v been looking at the Nvidia quadro K4000 or the AMD Firepro W7000 or maybe a SLI GTX 680 or the GTX 780 but i would much appreciate an opinion on any of the cards or even a alternative which I haven't listed and whether the cards are overkill for what I looking to do and I don't need to spend so much money!

I am planning on overclocking my system to about 4.5 GHz using ASUS 4-way optimization process.

The last thing I was wondering was how well a top spec Imac would deal with the applications I want to use?

 

Many thanks

[AJLynn]

A few comments:

 

Haswell chips don't overclock as well as the previous generation. I've seen it said that some fairly high percentage of 4770K chips won't go above 4.2 without losing stability, and to get that high you need a lot of cooling.

 

I wouldn't necessarily spend that much on video cards. SLI is good for games but gives almost no advantage in 3D authoring apps (and multiple GTX cards would also require a larger power supply than you listed). Honestly, in the current market, unless I were gung ho about GPU rendering and needed a multi-GPU rig for it, I would not spend more than about $300 on a GPU for a workstation, and a majority of 3D authoring users would be happy with hardware costing half that. High power Geforce or Radeon rigs are for gamers and high power Quadro and FirePro rigs are for nVidia and AMD to make money.

[Dimitris Tolios]

A top spec iMac will do ok, given it has "integrated-graphics" or laptop grade graphic options and low voltage CPU versions.

It will be probably slower than a $1000-1200 range, 4770K equipted desktop before overclocking, and quite a bit slower than an overclocked PC or hackintosh.

 

The K4000 is overkill or will go un-noticed by almost all applications you've mentioning other than Maya. Even for Maya, would take a VERY advanced modeler and a pretty complicated model to actually throw his arms up trying to optimize his workflow and cry "I need a better card" than those Andrew mentions (i.e. $100-150 range "gaming" cards).

You see, optimizing your workflow within the hardware limitations is the biggest part of the battle. If you cannot do it properly, you will bring any short of machine to its knees sooner or later. Throwing money at it instead of fighting it in a smarter way, postpones the inevitable.

 

For professional grade OpenGL performance, and if a $100-150 Radeon won't do the trick (Radeons are traditionally a tad better in OpenGL than GTXs), a K2000 or W5000 would probably do the trick better than any gaming card (even Titan, easily) in OpenGL. You don't have to have K4000 or W7000.

 

Video editors and ACAD don't really care about Quadros - with some exceptions.

Certain Premiere and AE features are GPU accelerated, but that' calls for raw power that is available in cards like the K5000, or fast GTX gaming cards, and lately expanding compatibility to fast Radeons/Firepros.

 

SLI cannot be utilized outside gaming yet. 2x 680/770s are faster than a 780, but...only in games and GPU accelerated tasks other than viewports.

[RyderSK]

I think Maya is way more ambiguous in terms of Quadro/GTX fight compared to 3dsMax as newly rewritten qt Maya (2013+ ?) has both option for traditional openGL viewport (would benefit greatly from Quadro) or Viewport 2.0/DX11 under conditions you have 2013/2014 Maya installed under Windows7/8 64bit and have DX11 supporting graphic card. In that case, GTX seems to be more favourable choice.

 

My partner Veronika uses retina MacbookPro with GTX650m and it's not exactly a "fighter" in viewport, definitely worse than my 765m in MSI gaming laptop. It's usable but we have it for vanity reasons, would never advice anyone to get is as actual work machine for 3D. It also gets so funky loud :- )