Help with PC build, details inside (i dunno anymore!)

S

Sillicur

New member
So a friend of mine wants to build up a good PC, best he can get for about 12-15k max...

Thing is, this wont be for gaming. Yeh, he wants to game as well, but he is an architecture student and needs to run CAD/sketchup/revit/3dMAX at a decent speed as well.

So any of you guys have some ideas, do not want an SSD but anything else is goggo ! Would love to see some pc builds. Seeing as he wants to game as well, he wont be getting quadro/firepro cards.

Plz help guys, looking for some awesome advice :)

What i was thinking:

i7 2600
16gb 1600 ram
WDblack hdd 1tb
580 3gb edition

Need it to render / work well in CAD/sketchup/revit/3dMAX while still being able to play games on a budget of 12-15k.

Thanks guize :)
 
You can get a pretty beast machine with 10-12k but if its mainly for cad, the above specs will handle more than fine.
 
One option to maybe think of is getting 2 of the same HDD, then putting them in RAID striped. This will give a nice performance boost without having to get SSHDD.

And I reckon RAM would play the biggest part here, for rendering and jumping between graphics software, the more RAM the less swapping.....

Just my 2c :)
 
Definitely cant skimp on the RAM. It has the biggest effect on the process.
 
You will also benefit more from a graphics card with a higher amount of RAM than a faster one with less RAM. Especially when doing CAD.
 
Buy a ram and a ewe, stick them in the pc's and they can make more rams. The more rams the better :)

Try go for the unlocked i7 such as the 2600k or 2700k rather. I am sure those extra ghz will come in very useful.
 
Thanks for all the helkp so far guys !

He is looking into a sandy bridge extreme chip, the 3930 as well.

U guys think he should up the ram to 24-32gig? Seems to be almost a concensus oO :)
 
Sillicur said:
Thanks for all the helkp so far guys !

He is looking into a sandy bridge extreme chip, the 3930 as well.

U guys think he should up the ram to 24-32gig? Seems to be almost a concensus oO :)
Click to expand...

Whats the size of the models he makes? How is the usage now? Lets not go crazy. :p

Do the newer cad versions use all four cores now, btw?
 
Sup :)

Ok 1st things 1st.
If his budget is 12k a Sandy E system is out of the question, even at 15k its gonna be a hard build to pull off
Rendering is all about CPU power, so I would advise to grab a i7 2600K or look at the Sandy Extreme series, a overclock will def improve performance so he would also need to look at a decent cooler( Something along the lines of a Corsair H100)
Ram wise 16GB minimum decent spec ram (Patriot G2, Patriot vipers, G.Skill snipers)
Machines that render also need good airflow so a decent chassis is also needed.

I would recommend:

Core i7 2600K OC'd 4.5Ghz
Corsair H100
Gigabyte/Asus Z77 board.
Patriot G2 4x4GB DDRIII 1600
AMD 7970 3GB 384bit, destroys any Nvidia card for raw computing power which is what you need.
Seagate 3TB 7200 Sata 6G HDD
XFX Core Edition 850w PSU
Corsair 500R Carbide Series
Asus 24x DVD writer

That'll set you back around R15 000 - R16 000
 
CZC, no clue but i think they have good multicore support.
Well some of the models are huge, needa do a movie thing in 3dmax at the end of the year as well. Btech architecture.

The joker, thx for the build / input!

2 things we were afraid of was overclocking (cause cad/max already pushes the hardware very hard) and ATI cards, not the cards, i personally love them, but their driver support in CAD/MAX. Wonder if they will be supported as well an Nvidia etc. 680's cudas are also suppressed so didnt go there :(

Anyone got experience with ATI cards and those type of programs? If they run well, they would be best bet! TY :)
 
Thanks a lot for the help man ! Will definately let him know and see what he decides :) We got some decisions to make hehe!!!
 
The Joker said:
Sup :)
I would recommend:

Core i7 2600K OC'd 4.5Ghz
Corsair H100
Gigabyte/Asus Z77 board.
Patriot G2 4x4GB DDRIII 1600
AMD 7970 3GB 384bit, destroys any Nvidia card for raw computing power which is what you need.
Seagate 3TB 7200 Sata 6G HDD
XFX Core Edition 850w PSU
Corsair 500R Carbide Series
Asus 24x DVD writer

That'll set you back around R15 000 - R16 000
Click to expand...

Nice build BUT, I'd drop :

RAM for Corsair Dominators
HDD for a Transcend 120gb SSD and a 1TB Seagate 7200rpm.
PSU for Huntkey X7 900w
 
Why the 2600K when ivy bridge is almost here?? Also, you have the Z77 board which runs hand in hand with that. 7970 destroys a gtx 680? Thats insane dude. The 680 has Cuda Core. Perfect for CAD. Plus you can pick up an MSi for under 6K. Cheaper than the 7970.
 
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Sounds like you're well on your way with the awesome advice above. :)

Just be sure to check the GPU's drivers with the software. My system is also built for rendering, so a friend lent me his Radeon GPU for a weekend. It performed amazingly in games, but Blender 3D freaked out. The 3D interface made all these weird glitches that made modeling impossible in both Linux and Windows. (I didn't test the other 3D apps)

So, get the PC first, pop in a friend's GPU, try it out and if it works 100% with the Radeon, then go buy one.

Oh, and I can't stress it enough.... COOLING!
The CPU renders at full power for hours, even in my Lanboy case it gets quite hot.
 
Inn3rs3lf said:
Why the 2600K when ivy bridge is almost here?? Also, you have the Z77 board which runs hand in hand with that. 7970 destroys a gtx 680? Thats insane dude. The 680 has Cuda Core. Perfect for CAD. Plus you can pick up an MSi for under 6K. Cheaper than the 7970.
Click to expand...

IF you actually bother reading any of the links posted you'll see how the 7970 pawns the 680 at CAD, Whoopy Nvidia has cudacores, the 7970 had 20x the computing power of it. The 680 is a magnificent gaming card but that's it. Where as the 7970 offers you both excellent gaming and computing power. Also the 7970 just got a nice price cut, so it is now much cheaper than the GTX680. Ivy Bridge will only be avialable in SA in a couple of weeks and having used one already I can tell you the performance increase isn't great for normal users. Use it don't use it, I do this for a living :)
 
Well thx for all the help guys, he decided on what is gonna get

i7 sandy bridge extreme + 580, 16gb ram etc

Gonna get it locally in PE, thx again for all the tips etc :)
 
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