Need help to build Motion Graphics workstation

generally, id get 2 of the cheaper 8 core xeons and run them on the asus board you got there.

-for the ram, find the cheapest 4x8gb 1600mhz kit you can find and get 2 of those
-generally speaking, a gtx 770 is more than enough for premiere and aftereffects. upgrading wont do a whole lot unless you are doing 3d double percision compute work
-whoever recommends 14 SSDs is a total joke. raid 0 has literally no effect on general performance and you are way better off just getting a single good 256gb mainstream SSD

given how close the CPUs are with each other, you probably want to buy a custom liquid cooling kit such as the ones provided by raystorm. a 360mm rad will be enough to cool the 2 CPUs

funrap,

Here is an idea for your system >

BambiBoom CalcuCannon Videosimurendanimatica Supermodeler Turbotic 911 ©!!®™?™©$_ REV 10.7.13

1. CPU > (2) Intel Xeon E5-2687W Sandy Bridge-EP 3.1GHz (3.8GHz Turbo Boost) 20MB L3 Cache LGA 2011 150W 8-Core Server Processor On the Passmark CPU benchmark chart, this processor is the No.2 rated, score = 21491. In the top 100 systems on Passmark Performance test, this CPU is used in the 6th highest performing system. > $3,868. ($1,934 each)

2. CPU Cooling > (2) Thermaltake Water 3.0 Extreme (CLW0224) Water Cooler CPU Cooler > $220 ($110 each) ( Intel specifies liquid cooling for the Xeon E5-2687W, but a large, elaborate cooling system is not necessary. The case configuration, noise levels, and custom options will present refinement)

3. MOTHERBOARD > ASUS Z9PE-D16 SSI EEB C602 Server Motherboard Dual LGA 2011 DDR3 1600 > $480 ( In place of the D8, the D16 provides 16RAM slots up to 512GB.)

4. RAM> 128GB (8 X 16GB) SAMSUNG M393B2G70BH0-CK0 1X 16GB for ASUS Z9PE-D16 > 128GB= $1,160 ($145 each, Server Direct) (Keep in mind that the RAM is divided symmetrically between the two CPU's, so 32GB is the equivalent of only 16GB in a single CPU system. You could begin with 64GB, but I'd suggest buying module sizes to accommodate an eventual total of 128GB

5. GPU > NVIDIA Quadro 6000 by PNY 6GB GDDR5 PCI Express Gen 2 x16 DVI-I DL Dual DisplayPort and Stereo OpenGL, DirectX, CUDA, and OpenCL Professional Graphics Board, VCQ6000-PB > $2,300. (This card was designed as a video editing card. May be used in SLI for 12GB RAM. An older design but fantastic performance and prices have dropped recently in anticipation of the K6000)

____5A. GPU OPT'L > NVIDIA Quadro K6000 VCQK6000-PB Workstation Video Card 12GB> > $5,000 (This is considered in effect, the workstation equivalent of the TItan, but with twice the memory. As the system is based on error-correcting RAM, it makes sense to use a graphics card having it as well. The usefulness of the K6000 will depend on the complexity and file size of 3D models, processing and animations)

6. OS / APPLICATIONS DRIVE > SAMSUNG 840 Pro Series MZ-7PD512BW 2.5" 512GB SATA III MLC Internal Solid State Drive (SSD) > $520

7. WORKING FILES DRIVE > SAMSUNG 840 Pro Series MZ-7PD512BW 2.5" 512GB SATA III MLC Internal Solid State Drive (SSD) > $520 (Instead of RAID 0 fro the OS and applications, which does not significantly improve performance with SSD's, load the active project to this drive and create RAM disk while working, then save to the mechanical drives.)

8. STORAGE DRIVES > (2) Western Digital WD SE WD4000F9YZ 4TB 7200 RPM 64MB Cache SATA 6.0Gb/s 3.5" Internal Hard Drive $480 ($280 each) (RAID 1) (Storage, backup, system image)(This capacity can of course be added to)

9. SOUND CARD > Lynx AES16e-SRC > $800 (The soundcard will need to be chosen according to your applications, inputs, whether you need MIDI, use priorities, and etc. Both Lynx and RME have ranges with considerable capabilities./

10. MONITORING > Monitoring systems will vary too according to multiple factors such as applications, inputs, mixers, surround sound.)

11. PSU> SeaSonic X-1250 1250W ATX12V / EPS12V SLI Ready 80 PLUS GOLD Certified Full Modular Active PFC Power Supply > $254.99

12. CASE> Case Labs Mercury S5 Case Aluminum ATX Full Tower Computer Case about $500 (these are modular and price varies according to options)

___12A. CASE OPT'L > LIAN LI PC-A79B Silver Aluminum ATX Full Tower Computer Case > $370 (This is a very good design with 11 expansion bays and good airflow. It is also more plug and play than the Case Labs, which require careful ordering and configuration.)

13. OPTICAL DRIVES > (2) ASUS Black 16X BD-R 2X BD-RE 16X DVD+R 5X DVD-RAM 12X BD-ROM SATA Blu-ray Burner BW-16D1HT > $220.

14. FAN CONTROL> NZXT Sentry-2 5.25" Touch Screen Fan Controller > $28.

15. OS > Microsoft Windows 7 Professional 64-bit (Full Version) - OEM $140

Future >

1. More RAM!

2. As storage needs, and performance requirements increase, consider adding an LSI or similar SAS/SATA RAID controller.


_______________________________

TOTAL = $11,000 to $15,000 depending on options


Cheers,

BambiBoom


Systems > Architecture, industrial design, graphic design, rendering, animation, writing >

1. Dell Precision T5400 (2009)> 2X Xeon X5460 quad core @3.16GHz > 16 GB ECC 667> Quadro FX 4800 (1.5GB) > M-Audop 2496 sound card> > Logitech z-2300 > WD RE4 / Segt Brcda 500GB > Windows 7 Ultimate 64-bit > HP 2711x 27" 1920 x 1080 > AutoCad, Revit, Solidworks, Sketchup Pro, Corel Technical Designer, Adobe CS MC, WordP Office, MS Office >

2. HP z420 (2013)> Xeon E5-1620 quad core @ 3.6 / 3.8GHz > 24GB ECC RAM 1600> Firepro V4900 > Samsung 840 SSD 250GB / M-Audio 32 /192 "Audiophile" > Logitech z-2300 > Seagate Barracuda 500GB > Windows 7 Professional 64 > AutoCad, Revit, Inventor, Maya (2011), Solidworks 2010, Adobe CS4, Corel Technical Design X-5, Sketchup Pro, WordP Office X-5, MS Office 2007

I don't know enough about what funrap wants to do with his machine, but generally:

All components work together and depend on each other. Therefore balancing the components is very important.

If a GTX770 is enough or not or even overzised depends on the rest of the system. For a 6-core CPU with at least 32GB RAM that is either overclocked or has a harddrive-systems that is able to realize more than 800 MB/s it woulf fit perfectly.

But here we have lot more CPU-power. This would only make sense when the GPU ist strong enough to cooperate with this horsepower. Also and especially the hard-drive-system has to be adequate. In this case that has to be at least 800 MB/s, but you would benefit a lot even from much higher data-rates. Even 3000 MB/s helps a lot and would bring the CPU-power to shine, if RAM and grafics are adequate. But more than 64 GB of RAM would not help very much as far as I know.

Spending between 30% and 50% on the disc-system ist balanced. Two RAID5-arrays in a RAID0-array gives nice and stable power. Maybe better Two RAID6 in RAID0 and/or HotSpares. If you do not add an adequate disc-system, datas will not be fast enough to serve CPU and GPU. A single SSD would not fit - it would be a massive waste of money with Premiere running on this two Xeons. An i5 would be adequate.

Even a six-core benefits suprisingly much from data-rates above 800 MB/s, you can see that even a six-core benefits lot from data-rates of 2000 MB/s and more.

Adobe does normally not benefit from Quadros. You can go with the corresponding consumer-card and you'll have the same performance for much less money.

you arent using the GPU for gaming here. i can slap a quadro 200 which has 96 cuda cores onto something like a 4 socket board and nothing about the GPU will bottleneck the CPU. the GPUs run completely independently and have zero effect on a CPU

if you want 3000 mbps, get a ramdisk, not SSDs. a single SSD will be more than fast enough to load up your software and work as a scratch disk. suggesting such high rates for these tasks is plain stupidity as raid 0 does nothing to improve loading times.

do not get raid 1.its not safe enough to be called safe. if a error is to be produced on one hard drive, the same error will be mirroed onto the other drive (in otherwords you still lose your data)

slsPCs,

1. The applications used by funrap include rendering, frame processing, which are entirely CPU dependent. Those applications- and including operations in Premiere (beginning with CS5.5) can use all available cores, so the dual, eight-core Xeons significantly reduce processing frame rendering times. Dual CPU's also provide more PCIe lanes. Video editing station can have multiple sound cards, RAID controllers, and AVID /Protools plug ins.

2. An i5 is useless on such a system as they are not hyperthreading. A quad core i5 has four cores and four threads, whereas a four core i7 or Xeon E5 has 8 threads, each of which can run a rendering thread. Therefore, the dual 8-core system has 32 threads or 8X that of an i5. The memory bandwidth is also one half that of an i7 or Xeon E5 and an i5 supports a maximum of 32GB RAM. The Xeon 2687W supports 256GB each. Also, an i5-4670K has 6MB cache whereas the E5-2687W has 20MB and that cache makes a lot difference. Each E5 supports 40 PCIe lanes, the i5 supports 16 lanes.

http://ark.intel.com/products/75048/

http://ark.intel.com/products/64582/Intel-Xeon-Processor-E5-2687W-20M-Cache-3_10-GHz-8_00-GTs-Intel-QPI

3. Have you ever used Adobe professional products? There is a long symbiosis between Adobe and Quadro- among the closest bwtween any hardware and software companies I know. Adobe produces "Partnered" drivers for Quadros. There was a Quadro (based on the FX 4800) called the "CX" specifically optimized to run CS4.Adobe imaging products are CUDA accelerated and are benefited by Quadros because the Quadro's have error -correction and the drivers are image quality rather than image speed (frame rate) oriented. There is enhanced anti-aliasing, special viewport capabilities, 10 bit color and because of the error correction, no artifacts, and correct shadows, reflections, particles, and multiple lighting sources in rendering.

4. The disk system is important, but once the file is loaded into RAM, as, disk speed is not as important as reliability over long periods. The use of SSD's in this kind of system is due to the file size in loading and saving. TheBigTroll has useful comments on this.

5. The amount of RAM is important as dual CPU systems divide the RAM between the two processors. Sixty-four GB's is 32 per CPU and is minimal because of the immense file sizes and the number of simultaneous applications. There is a reason the motherboard supports 512GB of RAM and there are eight-CPU boards for the Xeon E7 (10 core) that support 4,096GB of RAM- there are applications that can use it. Haven't you ever needed to make a complete dynamic model of the Earth's atmosphere for a school project?

Content creations systems are quite different from content consumption systems.

Cheers,

BambiBoom

you arent going to use the 10 bit colour function unless you get a 10 bit colour panel (which the OP should invest some cash there). as for the artifacts, i can tell you that there isnt a huge issue as i do some school projects with 3d effects off of my 670, but then again some people have the money for a quadro card.

the firepro cards are also great

TheBigTroll,

Yes, I would think the OP would have at least one very jazzy monitor- 3840 x 2160, 10-bit. I'm still saving up for 2560 X 1440.

Re artifacts > I had a terrible time when I was first running renderings. It may have been partly a function of the size of my Sketchup model- 90MB is actually considered very large, and it had millions of polygons- but the GTX 285 was producing a "rain" of vertical lines, shadows were at bizarre angles, textures dropped out, navigation was snail-like and so on. No viewports in Solidworks either I thought these apsects were the CPU's duty, but all was solved with a Quadro FX 4800. The GTX 285 was based on the FX 5800 GPU, had the same number of CUDA cores bad worked perfectly for everything except the workstation applications I used 20 hours per day! It's the drivers.

As you mention Firepros, by coincidence, I've just begun using my first Firepro, a V4900. When I bought the HP z420, I chose the V4900 as it was inexpensive and I'd decided that I would have a Quadro K4000, but only after the prices dropped a bit- or consider a used one.

The thing is, the Firepro V4900 tests as well as a Quadro 2000 at twice the cost- the 3D Passmark score (for what it 's worth) is 1402 where the Quadro FX 4800 in the Precision T5400 makes 1097 and the GTX 285 was 1312. Yes- surprisingly good and only $175. It's much faster in a big Sketchup model than either the 4800 or 285. Of course, the z420 has a higher clock speed- 3.8 on the first two cores, and the RAM is 1600 instead of 667. I'll see after more experience, but I may end up using the Firepro longer than I thought- and by that time instead I'll look for a used Quadro K5000- I think that's the card to have for my uses.

Cheers,

BambiBoom

well, since the 285 was released, GPUs and drivers have gotten much better. the kelper cards if you are talking about render speeds, the geforce side is more often than not faster by a substantial amount. then again if you need the 10 bit colour and absolute perfection with your millions of polygons, you should probably look at the k4000 or k5000

from my friend, apparantly, OpenCL and GL doesnt play well with so features in after effects.

yeah. id probably suggest you go with a quadro k5000. a tesla card does nothing for you as they are meant for things like weather simulations or modeling seismic activity. quadsros on the other hand are built for 3d work such as car design and all that stuff

get a 10 bit monitor as well

http://www.studio1productions.com/Articles/PremiereCS5.htm
http://ppbm7.com/index.php/tweakers-page
especially
http://ppbm7.com/index.php/tweakers-page/83-balanced-systems

http://ppbm7.com/index.php/results/top-25-performers (the difference to the fastest system in this benchmark is ..... not CPU, not Quadro, not RAM ..... but disc-system)
http://ppbm7.com/index.php/news/planning

EDIT:

@ funrap

There are several points to think abot.

In general my system would give you what you want.

But what would also be important to know ist how much space you need on hard-drive. Than we can optimize and save money. Either by going with hard-drives if you need a lot of space, or with less SSDs, if you do not need much.

Another point would be:

If you would not need 10bit-colours, a GTX-card is the better choice, in this case a Titan. More about that later. If you need 10-bit, an adequate Quadro to do he rendering is really very expensive. But if you would only need 10-bit colour for colorwork on pictures, you could go with a Titan and a smaller Quadro, e.g. the 4000.

Another point ist that it might be that you want to work with special plug-ins that maybe need a Quadro, I don't know. Or maybe you also need other software that needs a Quadro. I Don't know this. Normally most programms, even the very hard ones in film-studios like daVinci work with GTX, a Titan would be fine here as well. Normally a Quadro would not be neccessary - and if once it would, you could add a cheaper one to your system and use it for the special purposes it's needed for.

But with given informations I cannot tell you if a system like that we are discussion here is overpowered in general or not. It might be that you would be saatisfied with a much smaller system as well or with something that you find described in my contribution at the bottom of the following linked thread. This would be a system that is made with two PCs or more.

http://www.tomshardware.co.uk/forum/id-1757456/bestconfigs-high-end-workstation.html

Can you list all software that you are already using or might expect to use?

EDIT:
Can you maybe also name the codecs you are using or want to use?
And what sources are you using? What kind of files?