Total newbie needs help on first rig

abaddon7 · Dec 27, 2013

Hi , im totally confused and paranoid when it comes to even starting to look for a rig to buy and build. The more i read all these guides the more i get confused. Im ashamed to ask and have been delaying this from a very long time. Here is what i have in mind which is just a mere

general idea of what i want:

budget: no issue, flexible
Processor: Intel i7
Graphics: An Nvidia with more than 2GB RAM
RAM: 8 or 16GB
Motherboard: no idea
Other aspects dont matter for now

Why i need a High end rig:
To play the latest games in high settings, will be doing animation (high poly modeling and rendering with 3d softwares like maya, max, zbrush) will be editing videos (after effects) and pictures (digital painting), will be designing game levels (unity3d, unreal editor)

The problem / buying phobia

I guess motherboard should be the first on the list to research but the problem is that there are so many brands and variations out there that its like finding a needle in a haystack! Same goes for the graphics cards and Processor versions!
Please help me get started. I know this is a silly lot to ask but if only i could get a clear idea to even get started on my research! How do i narrow down to the right things? Please guide me...

razor 10 · Dec 27, 2013

Ok friend. I'm here to help. Since you are demanding an i7, 2GB Nvidia. Here some brief. Now the latest i7 processor is 4th gen in which the motherboard will run on socket LGA 1150. So if you want this generation of processor. Find the motherboard with socket LGA1150. Same goes to 3rd generation which is socket 1155. But since you are building new system better to get 4th generation. For motherboard reference http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductList.aspx?N=100007627%20600438202&IsNodeId=1&Submit=ENE.

Next is Graphics Card. Since you are expecting high specs. Nowdays lots of Graphics Card id 2gb but remember choose the powerfull one because the low end graphics card also 2gb itself. Here is some list of ass kicking cards for your desired budget. http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/gaming-graphics-card-review,3107.html

Next is ram. Its good to have 8gb but better to have 16gb since your system will be more stable. If you are done finding in your motherboard and processor then ram shouldnt be a problem for you. This is the explanation tht i can provide. If any doubt just ask me

. Happy researching and shopping.

animal · Dec 27, 2013

will you need mouse/keyboard, speakers, OS, etc? Or just the components that will go in the case?

Krishna Moorthy · Dec 27, 2013

If you want an i7 and money isn't a issue i would go for a 4770k this is the latest brand of intel processors the specs can be found here http://cpuboss.com/cpu/Intel-Core-i7-4770K. This processor comes in the 1150 socket so you need to look for that in your motherboard. Brands of motherboard that are good include Gigabyte, Asus, and MSI. For your Graphics card (if money inst an issue you could always get a GTX Titan but those things are like a $1000) The graphics card you would be looking for would be anywhere from the GTX 760 and above (770, 780/780ti) http://gpuboss.com/graphics-card/GeForce-GTX-760. Graphics cards come with third party factory overclocks and maybe some mods to the board/ cooling these are quite good and i run one myself. Reputable companies who do this are Gigabyte, Sapphire, Powercolour, EVGA, MSI, Asus and Galaxy. Hope this helped

Jessepog · Dec 27, 2013

If you want to be doing alot of rendering like me and your not worried about budget you might want to build a workstation rig i would recommend this build which is the same as mine and is a beast...
mobo -asus rampage 4 extreme
cpu -i7 ivy e 4930 k
ram -i use 32 gb kingston xmp beast 2400 ram (going to want lots of ram for rendering) at least have 16 gb
gpu -i would get at lest one 780 or better 780ti but im using 144hz monitor so i have 2x 780 for awesome frames in bf4(thats if you prefer nvidia like me but if your amd fan go for 290x just remember the 290x haz a pretty shit cooler)
hdd ssd - at least one 240 gig ssd for operating system and games coupled with as many hdd as yo need for storage. (i use 2x 240 gig corsair force 3 ssd in raid 0 for more performance with 2x 4 terabyte western digital SE HDD for storage)
Cooler -I use an all in one liquid cooler becouse the perform good and are easy to install. I use the best performing one you can get its a swiftec h320 it fits six fans in push pull if you want witch is how i use it.
I suppose the tower and the rest will be as preference but i recommend the corsair 900d in my opinion the best case ever built.
Oh and i also use a 1250 wat xfx pro psu your gonna need alot of power to feed this rig especially if your overclocking everything.
Hope this helps sum this build will be more than enough for wat you need....

abaddon7 · Dec 28, 2013

Thankyou all for the quick response! You have helped me get started on the processor. Jessepog, that is a sweet monster! Definitively gonna take it as reference!
Ive done some research and thankyou guys: razor 10 and Krishna Moorthy,
The socket type really helped me understand it

Im going to stick with i7 Haswell 4770k. However some little doubts regrading this:

List_of_Intel_Core_i7_microprocessors

These are just some doubts, but im gulping them and stickin with i7. I mean latest is greatest right?

animal :

Actually, im gonna build from scratch, so its gonna be everything. But for simplicity sake in forum, im starting with important components first.

Jessepog · Dec 28, 2013

abaddon7 :

The hazwell 4770k is well worth its money in my opinion its a solid cpu defiantly beats going for an i5 your only other option is getting an ivy bridge which will over clock better than the hazwell and doesn't have integrated graphics. But i think you will be more than happy with the 4770k especially if you get a water cooling solution and over clock a little because this chip does get a lil hotter than it's predecessors

abaddon7 · Dec 29, 2013

Yes cooling is going to be a very important thing next, as the place i live in, temperature goes up to 40 degree in summer! But im not willing to go for liquid cooling. Will have to look into other ways.

My research status till now:

■ Socket: LGA 1150
■ Max ram support: 32 or 64
■ RAM slots: 4
■ form: ATX standard size
■ SSD support
■ 2 PCIe x16 (or go for PCIe 3.0?) slot for graphics cards (SLI in future = optional)
■ (in future) Sound card slot
■ storage connectors...?
■ should have USB 3.0 ports
■ chipset...?
■ Ethernet support

animal · Dec 29, 2013

comments on your bullet points:

1) Socket 1150 is a good choice, but if you haven't already, you may want to look into socket 2011 abilities. It is a more expensive route but for your non-gaming needs it might be worth considering.

2) Most newer ATX motherboards will support a minimum of 32 GB RAM and have 4 slots. I believe the socket 2011 allows up to 8 RAM slots.

3) SSD support will be accomplished using the SATA ports, so you will want a combination of SATA2 and SATA3 which again, is fairly standard on ATX motherboards, although the amounts of each will vary from board to board.

4) Regarding PCIe slots, most newer Intel motherboards have at least one PCIe 3.0 slot, many have more. For future-proofing, I would go for a board that has the best PCIe 3.0 SLI'ing capability that supports your other needs.

5) Many newer motherboards have quality onboard sound, so a sound card may or may not be necessary. This is up to you. However, make sure the motherboard you select will have the number of expansion slots you need and remember that many high-end GPUs cover two or three slot spaces. Just make sure that the slot you want to install a sound card (or anything else for that matter) won't be buried by a GPU.

6) SATA ports will most likely to be used for connecting the storage devices. Plan ahead to make sure the motherboard has the amount of SATA ports you think you will need.

7) Newer motherboards will have a combination of USB 2.0 and USB 3.0 ports at the rear of the motherboard, along with many having additional onboard headers for adding additional ports to your set-up.

8) For SLI capability, you will want Z87 chipset, as other 4th gen series chipsets do not allow for SLI.

9) Almost all motherboards come with onboard Ethernet circuitry, some even come with a wireless kit.

abaddon7 · Dec 29, 2013

Thankyou for going over the points.

■ Looking at the socket 2011, the first things that catch the eyes are the more Ghz and TDP(W) than the 1150. List_of_Intel_Core_i7_microprocessors
For the TDP i believe, Intel says that, it has optimized this in the haswell, reducing power consumption and all. Plus im trying to aim for future proof stuff as much as possible, so 1150 is the latest right? But please give your advice on this, if im going the wrong way, if im being overzealous.

■ Regarding the PCIe 3.0, like you said, newer motherboards will have it, i want to know that, if i want it to be utilized, will i have to look strictly for "PCIe3.0 only supported" graphics cards and other expansions? Or does it support PCIe x16 and older too? Does it have backward compatibility?

Sam66er · Dec 29, 2013

which one important to you , game or 3d rendering ??? i7 4770k for OC non K for plp who do not run OC at all is good for gaming faster then extreme processor 4960X becos game never run on multi threads technology + 16x 16x pcie really 16x 8x pcie only different by a few FPS. but come to 3D and multi media or photo editing or zipping super large file or calculate complex formula......... 4770k 1150 got to ready for overtake by extreme 2011.

Rendering - you need really a good processor. lot of memory capacity and professional graphic card not GTX or ATI HD series. maya, 3d studio, z brush recommend multi core or multi processor to run very complex animation rendering like Transformer

animal · Dec 29, 2013

Not sure how much longer socket 1150 will be here, 4th gen Intel CPUs may be the last to use it . But then again, not sure how long socket 2011 will be here for either. Maybe someone with more insight into Intel's future plans could answer that.

As far as the PCIe 3.0 slots, yes, they are backwards compatible.

edit: Intel's upcoming 5th gen processors (Broadwell) will be socket 1150 from what I have been hearing/reading.

abaddon7 · Dec 29, 2013

Sam66er :

I thought getting a gaming rig is equal to getting a rig for animation? :??:

However i will be doing both gaming and rendering but mainly rendering as animation in general is my career.

Sam66er :

Please do suggest a graphic card series. Im definitely looking at nvidia, not anything else. But its got so many models and series! Which one should i go for? How do they categorize these series and all in the first place? GTX, GX, blah, blah, so confusing!

abaddon7 · Dec 29, 2013

animal :

Now that is some good news! Im finalizing 1150.

animal · Dec 30, 2013

no, gaming and rendering do not mean the same thing and intensive rendering requires a different GPU than gaming.........most current games are more mainstream GPU oriented (there are a few that are CPU intensive) while rendering is highly CPU intensive and needing an upper-end gaming GPU (nVIDIA Titan or GTX 780ti) but would probably be better accomplished by using either a card from the nVIDIA Quadro series or the AMD FirePro series. However, the Quadro and FirePro don't game as good as the mainstream cards and are CONSIDERABLY more expensive.

look at this chart to get an idea of gaming GPU performance, nVIDIA cards are in the left column and AMD is in the right column. Each tier runs horizontal so you can see how nVIDIA and AMD stack up against each other. The first card listed in a tier is considered to be the best from that manufacturer with the upper tier being the best gaming performance cards:

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/gaming-graphics-card-review,3107-7.html

abaddon7 · Dec 30, 2013

Quadro is a definite No. The titan and 780 ti are quite expensive! Looks like im gonna have to settle for less

But dont want to go lower than 2GB

Sam66er · Dec 30, 2013

All depend on how complex of animation you create - I myself run Maya 2014 by using HD 7870 CF with i7 4930k 32G 2133 OC to 4700 mhz. It just cant take too complex rendering like transformer speed. it will lag cos of my graphic card slow down everything. you need to have a professional graphic card above mention - I recommend AMD firepro not nvidia cos nvidia more on gaming and speed. It will cost you a bomb expensive but compare to your career, it worth invest on it.

Choose well, you cannot have both super gaming and professional 3D in one desktop unless you buy a mainframe computer or buy both graphic card, gaming time change to gaming card and professional time change to firepro.

abaddon7 · Dec 31, 2013

Sam66er :

Let me clear the "professional" part of the discussions everyone keep coming to here

Should have mentioned it before, my apologies!
My needs are such that, i want to complete a small final project and make a showreel in this last semester that will end in 6 months. Will be doing modeling and texturing as that is my field of interest. In no way am i talking about a professional studio computer for animation because, after my study ends i will be doing a job, so its a matter of what pc i will be having there. You wont believe that my institution still has core 2 duos for us! And since i love gaming ill be coming home after the job to do just that. Plus i dont want to trouble my dad with the money part, i'd better build a dream rig with my own $ in future.
As you can see, my needs are not so high. Im just an animation student and a gaming addict.
PS: Im in a pentium p4 pc and 128MB graphics and just cant wait to take revenge! :gun:

Krishna Moorthy · Dec 31, 2013

abaddon7 :

Sam66er :

Let me clear the "professional" part of the discussions everyone keep coming to here

Should have mentioned it before, my apologies!
My needs are such that, i want to complete a small final project and make a showreel in this last semester that will end in 6 months. Will be doing modeling and texturing as that is my field of interest. In no way am i talking about a professional studio computer for animation because, after my study ends i will be doing a job, so its a matter of what pc i will be having there. You wont believe that my institution still has core 2 duos for us! And since i love gaming ill be coming home after the job to do just that. Plus i dont want to trouble my dad with the money part, i'd better build a dream rig with my own $ in future.
As you can see, my needs are not so high. Im just an animation student and a gaming addict.
PS: Im in a pentium p4 pc and 128MB graphics and just cant wait to take revenge! :gun:

Woud a firepro be too expensive for you becasue it will do you wonders in the animation department and still kick your 128 mb gpu in performance for gaming.

Sam66er · Dec 31, 2013

Fire pro definitely too expensive for me who only do modelling no animation in Maya 2014. My system is flying when constructing polygon and sub divisions. My gpu also able to take all type of shaders and texture. But come to rendering full HD animation . It will slow down .
So recommend normal gpu. Will do the job plus ssd x 2 in raid 0 mode, you will really see the improvement in your eye .

Sam66er · Dec 31, 2013

Fire pro definitely too expensive for me who only do modelling no animation in Maya 2014. My system is flying when constructing polygon and sub divisions. My gpu also able to take all type of shaders and texture. But come to rendering full HD animation . It will slow down .
So recommend normal gpu. Will do the job plus ssd x 2 in raid 0 mode, you will really see the improvement in your eye .

abaddon7 · Jan 1, 2014

Sam66er :

Yes, i will be mainly rendering just images of my high poly models with textures and occasionally rendering an animated video scene, thats why im going for geforce.
As far as amd cpu is concerned, comparing reviews and benchmarks, intel stands out, so intel would be the right choice for me. Sorry, no offense to anyone...

abaddon7 · Jan 1, 2014

However, please answer this as soon as possible:
Im still not sure which graphics card i want to buy, but specs are like 2GB and DDR5. I dont want to waste time on gpu research right now because im in a bit of a hurry to get everything else first.

My big doubt is: Ive decided to go for a H87 chipset motherboard.

compatibility

Krishna Moorthy · Jan 1, 2014

abaddon7 :

All pcie is backwards compatible. Pcie 3.0 cards wont be bottlenecked by pcie 2.0. Only when you start going into sli you may find some bottlenecks. If you want to save some money you can use a pcie 2.0 mobo

Total newbie needs help on first rig

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