Architectural Rendering/Gaming Build Help

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Approximate Purchase Date: The sooner the better. Before the end of the year would be great, but if there are deals to be had around Xmas time then I'm willing to wait.

Budget Range: $1500-1700

System Usage from Most to Least Important: Architectural renderings (3DS Max, Vray, Photoshop), Gaming (BF3, SWTOR) and listening to music (I want to be able to plug into my Yamaha receiver for sound)

Parts Not Required: Keyboard, mouse, monitor and speakers

Preferred Website(s) for Parts: Newegg.com

Country: United States

Parts Preferences: I'm open to anything.

Overclocking: Yes (would need to learn how, but like the option)

SLI or Crossfire: Yes (for the future)

Monitor Resolution: 1920x1080

Additional Comments: After talking with one of my professors at school he recommended a dual CPU build as renderings are CPU intensive. I'm not sure if this is the way to go if I'm looking for performance in both gaming and rendering, but I am open to anything.

With that said, I want a computer I can use for high performance gaming but also be able to use for school projects (renderings and CAD drawings). I would also like to be able to upgrade this in the future, so spending extra money for parts that will be good for years to come is fine with me.

 

[rvilkman]

Well obviously dual CPU would help, but generally it comes down to price. Dual CPU you'll be spending more on the motherboard to allow you to have 2 CPU's and then you have to buy the 2 CPU's as well.

You would probably be best served with a i7 2600k based setup using a Z68 Motherboard with Gen3 support ( Asus P8Z68-V Gen3 series and MSI Z68A-GD65 for example )
If it can be squeezed into the budget a I7 3930K and suitable mobo might also be fine but it's in the neighbourhood of $900 for the MB+CPU while the i7 2600k + mobo = $500. Then add a nice aftermarket air cooler like Cooler Master 212 EVO for any overclocking needs.

Memory, for rendering get a 4x4GB kit of 1.5V CAS9 1600Mhz memory

Then based on how much juice you want for graphics, starting from GTX560TI and Radeon 6950 for good settings at 1920x1080.

PSU for the above cards a solid unit from seasonic, corsair, antec or XFX in the 750W range will let you SLI/Crossfire in the future, up to 1000W depending on which graphics card you do get.

Case, something with good airflow $100-150 is a good range that provides a myriad of choices. Since it's looks this is very much up for your personal preference

DVD burner is handy to have unless you need a bluray drive, add one to your liking

Storage: SSD for OS & Apps, depending on how much yours take space 120GB-256GB OCZ vertex 3, Crucial M4, Samsung 830 for example do well
HDD: expensive at the moment but Samsung Spinpoint 1TB still a good way to go at $150.

 

[kajabla]

^I support just about all of this.
The 3930K'll barely be better than the 2600K anyway.
You can find Hitachi 1tb drives for $130, or 750gb ones for $100.
128gb Crucial M4 or the cheapest around.
Almost any case above $60 or so will work fine. Choose by stylistic preference and then check with us.
You can easily fit in a $500 580 on this budget. 850W will do for SLI, though 900W might last longer.

 

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Thanks for the replies, this information is greatly appreciated and really helpful!

After looking at the CPU benchmarks for those processors it seems that the 3930k is far ahead of the 2600k, but if it's not something I'll notice greatly then I'd rather save the money. The only other question I have is if I go with the 3930k will buying a LGA 2011 board be better for upgrading, to say the Ivy Bridge, down the road? If so would I be better off to just bite the bullet now and invest in one of those motherboards?

After looking for cases I've become interested in the Corsair Graphite Series 600T. Is this a good case for the price?

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811139007

 

[kajabla]

It's certainly not twice as good as an $80 case, so no, it's not. Get it if you like the style, though.
I think the 2600K'll be the best choice, and 2011's probably worth it. The cheap ones aren't that much money.

 

[rvilkman]

For your use cases with the rendering, the extra 2 cores and extra 2 HT threads will help, so it probably is a good amount ahead of the i7 2600k.
But it's not really ahead by the amount of extra money it costs. The other thing to note with the LGA2011 platform which may be of help to you is that in many cases there are 8 memory slots on the motherboards. So you can get 32GB memory using 4GB modules instead of going for the expensive 8GB modules.

Other than price my biggest worry is the maturity of the X79 / LGA2011 platform, seems to be issues with just about all the boards available.

I think you will be happy going either way, but going for the 2600k you will have a more mature platform and more money to spend on everything else. Like a larger SSD or faster graphics card.

 

[Why_Me]

With the programs you plan on using I would look at an Nvidia card. This one down down below is factory over clocked and runs on par with a gtx 570. That case down below has front USB 3.0 ports, multiple fan controller, 200mm side fan, etc... the psu is modular, and 16GB of RAM should suffice nicely.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/ComboDealDetails.aspx?ItemList=Combo.776231 $429.98 - $15.00 Mail In Rebates FREE SHIPPING
Corsair Carbide Series 500R Black Steel structure with molded ABS plastic accent pieces ATX Mid Tower Computer Case
Intel Core i7-2600K Sandy Bridge 3.4GHz (3.8GHz Turbo Boost) LGA 1155 95W Quad-Core Desktop Processor Intel HD Graphics 3000 BX80623I72600K

http://www.amazon.com/Corsair-Enthusiast-Certified-Performance-CP-9020003-NA/dp/B005E98FVS/ref=sr_1_10?s=pc&ie=UTF8&qid=1323434862&sr=1-10 $114.49 & this item ships for FREE with Super Saver Shipping
Corsair Enthusiast TX V2 Series 750-Watt 80 Plus Bronze Certified High Performance Modular Power Supply CP-9020003-NA

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835103099 $33.99 FREE SHIPPING
COOLER MASTER Hyper 212 EVO RR-212E-20PK-R1 Continuous Direct Contact 120mm Sleeve CPU Cooler Compatible with latest Intel 1366/1155 and AMD FM1/AM3+

http://www.amazon.com/ASRock-MB-Z68X4G3-Intel-Z68-Motherboard/dp/B005FE52X6/ref=sr_1_7?m=ATVPDKIKX0DER&s=pc&ie=UTF8&qid=1323434739&sr=1-7 $184.99 & this item ships for FREE with Super Saver Shipping
ASRock Z68 EXTREME4 GEN3 LGA 1155 Intel Z68 HDMI SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.0 ATX Intel Motherboard

http://www.amazon.com/Liteon-iHAS324-DVD-RW-Optical-Drive/dp/B002QGDWLK/ref=pd_cp_e_1 $19.89 & eligible for FREE Super Saver Shipping on orders over $25
Liteon iHAS324 24X DVD-RW SATA Optical Disk Drive

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814130738 $289.99 FREE SHIPPING
EVGA 012-P3-2066-KR GeForce GTX 560 Ti (Fermi) 448 Cores FTW 1280MB 320-bit GDDR5 PCI Express 2.0 x16 HDCP Ready SLI Support Video Card

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820233197 $84.99 FREE SHIPPING
CORSAIR Vengeance 16GB (4 x 4GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1600 (PC3 12800) Desktop Memory Model CML16GX3M4A1600C9

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820249015 $324.99 FREE SHIPPING
Plextor PX-M3S Series PX-256M3 2.5" 256GB SATA III Internal Solid State Drive (SSD)

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822148697 $134.99 FREE SHIPPING
Seagate Barracuda ST31000524AS 1TB 7200 RPM 32MB Cache SATA 6.0Gb/s 3.5" Internal Hard Drive -Bare Drive

Total: $1,483.31

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813157264 <---- another look at that board on newegg

 

[rvilkman]

^ other than possibly going with an Asus or MSI Z68 Gen3 motherboard, looks pretty good.

 

[Why_Me]

^ other than possibly going with an Asus or MSI Z68 Gen3 motherboard, looks pretty good.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813131792 <---- this Asus gen3 board is a decent one,..not so sure about the MSI boards. Something with that Asus board booting up slowly though. It seems like half these Z68 boards have a bug/issue with them. New bios update seems to fix most of them.

 

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You all have been extremely helpful! After I finish my finals today I will take a closer look at everything. Thanks again!

 

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After looking over some of your suggestions I've come up with a short list and a couple questions. I'll start with the parts.

CPU: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819115070
Intel Core i7-2600K Sandy Bridge 3.4GHz (3.8GHz Turbo Boost) LGA 1155 95W Quad-Core Desktop Processor Intel HD Graphics 3000 BX80623I72600K

Motherboard: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813157264
ASRock Z68 EXTREME4 GEN3 LGA 1155 Intel Z68 HDMI SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.0 ATX Intel Motherboard

Power Supply: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817139029
CORSAIR Enthusiast Series TX850M 850W ATX12V v2.31 / EPS12V v2.92 80 PLUS BRONZE Certified Modular High Performance Power Supply

Graphics Card(s): http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814130738
EVGA 012-P3-2066-KR GeForce GTX 560 Ti (Fermi) 448 Cores FTW 1280MB 320-bit GDDR5 PCI Express 2.0 x16 HDCP Ready SLI Support Video Card

Memory: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820233197
CORSAIR Vengeance 16GB (4 x 4GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1600 (PC3 12800) Desktop Memory Model CML16GX3M4A1600C9

Optical Drive: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16827106346
LITE-ON Black 12X BD-R 2X BD-RE 16X DVD+R 12X DVD-RAM 8X BD-ROM 8MB Cache SATA 12X Blu-ray Burner with Blu-ray 3D feature IHBS112-29 - OEM

Case: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811139007
Corsair Graphite Series 600T CC600TM Mid-Tower Gaming Case

Total: $1394.93(Before a hard drive, SSD and cooling)

Questions:
I don't need THAT much storage on my hard drive. I'm currently using a 320GB hard drive and have only used about 71GB of space because I save all of my music and movies to an external hard drive. With that said, would I be better off going with a hard drive that's less expensive such as this one:

http://www.amazon.com/Western-Digital-Caviar-Cache-Desktop/dp/B00461G3MS/ref=sr_1_4?s=electronics&ie=UTF8&qid=1323715491&sr=1-4
Western Digital Caviar Blue 500 GB SATA III 7200 RPM 16 MB Cache Bulk/OEM Desktop Hard Drive - WD5000AAKX

My next question has to do with the SSD. From what I've read, the advantage of these drives is their ability to read/write data quicker. So, for me, the benefit would be quicker loading times when loading games and the software I use for renderings? If so, since I'm only using about 71GB of space with all the programs I need, including games I like to play, would it be better for me to go with a cheaper, smaller SSD such as this one:

http://www.amazon.com/Intel-SATA-2-5-Inch-Solid-State-Drive/dp/B004U8ZHY2/ref=sr_1_1?s=electronics&ie=UTF8&qid=1323715811&sr=1-1
Intel 320 Series 120 GB SATA 3.0 Gb-s 2.5-Inch Solid-State Drive

Finally, my last question is about cooling. I remember reading that overclocking isn't the greatest thing to do for computers used for renderings because it affects the stability of the CPU. If I'm not going to be overclocking, the cooler that Why_me recommended should be fine, but if I do plan on overclocking should I look into liquid cooling? Thanks again

 

[rvilkman]

The Intel 320 is a solid choice for reliability point of view, coming with a 5 year warranty and all.
However it is considerably slower than the Sandforce based SataIII drives. While still a lot faster than HDD's.

But sizewise you are right, you can manage easily with the 120GB.
So I would recommend:
Crucial M4 128GB - Sata III and very fast
Intel 510 120GB - Sata III close to the same speed as the M4

The intel is a bit on the expensive side, but the Crucial M4 is in the $200 range and quite fast.

Other possibilities Sandforce based ones such as OCZ vertex 3 120GB ~$160-170 after rebates.

 

[kajabla]

I don't think you'll see much subjective difference between SSDs. They're so much faster than HDDs that it's just worth saving the money for a couple of extra mb/s.

 

[rvilkman]

There is actually a pretty sizeable difference between intel 320 and the sandforce based drives, one that you also notice in regular use when writing is involved.
However since it is mostly reading it's not a major issue. And to my knowledge the pricing is even about the same on the drives.

 

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