Advice needed - 1st custom built PC for Maya and After Effects

[frogfucious]

I've been reading the forums and noticed how many knowledgable people here are nice enough to offer their advice on helping build custom PCs. I have never built one before but I would like to because my budget is limited and I am confident that with some direction, I can do it.

The purposes of this build would be primarily for 3D/ motion graphics work. Heavy Maya rendering, and using the bifrost plugin, heavy After Effects rendering using the Element 3D plugin, Zbrush 64bit, Realflow. I would like to be able to work in After Effects as smooth and fast as possible, and also be able to chew up 3D renders. I don't mind if I can't play games maxed out - this is for work.

My budget is around $2,500 - $3,000 give or take.

Certain components I would like are the following:

-A 256GB SSD for my software
-A 3TB HD for my data (or more?)
-At least an i7 quad core 4ghz (Or should I go 6 core? Are more cores more important or higher ghz?)
-A good video card to handle the work I listed above(GTX 980?)
-64GB RAM (or is 32 enough?)
-A new monitor (2560x1440 would be nice, dual monitors would be great)
-A DVD drive/burner
-USB3 ports
-Speakers (don't care what kind)
-Keyboard (don't care what kind)
-Mouse (3 button for maya)
-Case (something relatively quiet)
-Some kind of liquid cooling (needed?)
-Windows (I was hoping to create this once windows 10 is released so I have time.)
-motherboard - no idea
-power supply - no idea

My problem is I am not sure if the components I listed will play nice together, or if I even chose ones that match my needs? You will also not offend me if you say something I listed makes absolutely no sense or if my budget is way off. Please feel free to be as honest as you like. I really appreciate anyone taking the time to make any suggestions. Thanks in advance!

 

[Chris_Cruise]

I have these EXACT same questions. I was at a store here in Toronto yesterday and spoke with a sales guy at length about the same components you listed. The price in CAN was in that 3k-3.5k range you also mentioned. He was confident that 32gb of ram would enough, and 32gb of DDR4 was going to be $650 -$700 range

The biggest price difference was between the 8 core and 6 core CPU's. We're talking either $700 or $1320!! That's a significant price difference and I too am wondering if its worth it to splurge on the extra cores or not.

Seems like you have listed a very good build and I'm probably going to go to the store and pick up this exact system this weekend.

 

[Steve Bloomfield]

I'm no expert, but I too am just about to venture into my first build in the next coming months. From what i've read, more cores and ram are needed for graphics, I've decided on a spec computer that is similar to your budget. You can check it out here... http://uk.pcpartpicker.com/p/7dFQxr although im from UK but you can change so its in $ im also working on my storage options

 

[Steve Bloomfield]

This build also leaves plenty of room for upgrades, where as a 4 core i7 would not, onlly faster ram and another GPU

 

[frogfucious]

I have these EXACT same questions. I was at a store here in Toronto yesterday and spoke with a sales guy at length about the same components you listed. The price in CAN was in that 3k-3.5k range you also mentioned. He was confident that 32gb of ram would enough, and 32gb of DDR4 was going to be $650 -$700 range

The biggest price difference was between the 8 core and 6 core CPU's. We're talking either $700 or $1320!! That's a significant price difference and I too am wondering if its worth it to splurge on the extra cores or not.

Seems like you have listed a very good build and I'm probably going to go to the store and pick up this exact system this weekend.

I was curious if you ended up picking up this system over the weekend. I also recently heard that 32 of DDR4 would be sufficient. On another forum I was recommended to get the AMD FirePro W7100 8GB Video Card instead of the GTX 980 for my specific needs, not sure why. Did you go with 4 core or 6 core? What type of power supply and motherboard did they recommend?
Thanks

 

[frogfucious]

I'm no expert, but I too am just about to venture into my first build in the next coming months. From what i've read, more cores and ram are needed for graphics, I've decided on a spec computer that is similar to your budget. You can check it out here... http://uk.pcpartpicker.com/p/7dFQxr although im from UK but you can change so its in $ im also working on my storage options

I was curious the reasoning for so many fans. I am not familiar with building pc's so I wonder if I should consider many fans as well? I thought all you need is one good one. Also how did you decide on your motherbpard? I am not sure what to look for when it comes to that.

 

[Steve Bloomfield]

I am not a pc expert & this will be my first build. As for fans, the only reason i have this many is i plan to overclock at some point, plus add more RAM and another 980, so i need to keep it cool. With regards to the motherboard, it kinda follows on from what i said above, firstly, it matches my chipset & socket for the CPU (very important) but it also allows plenty of room for upgrades, like 64GB RAM & up to 4 GPU's should i wish. So the reasoning behind all of it was i didnt just want a PC that was only going to last 2yrs before having to change it all. I can now keep it & upgrade it as and when I want or need

Hope that helps

 

[frogfucious]

I am not a pc expert & this will be my first build. As for fans, the only reason i have this many is i plan to overclock at some point, plus add more RAM and another 980, so i need to keep it cool. With regards to the motherboard, it kinda follows on from what i said above, firstly, it matches my chipset & socket for the CPU (very important) but it also allows plenty of room for upgrades, like 64GB RAM & up to 4 GPU's should i wish. So the reasoning behind all of it was i didnt just want a PC that was only going to last 2yrs before having to change it all. I can now keep it & upgrade it as and when I want or need

Hope that helps

Oh that makes sense, thanks for the info! Good luck with the build.

 

[Steve Bloomfield]

No worries Watch as many videos & read as much stuff as you can before making/deciding to build. I've done about 2 months of research, and im still worrying about doing my first build

Good luck with whatever you decide