Computer Oppos?

"Slant6" (slant-6) 04/30/2014 at 20:25 • Filed to: None

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Im starting to do more things with 3d studio max and my Lenovo ultrabook isn't cutting it. Can anyone recommend a high performance laptop or tower that's just around $600? I'm not opposed to building a tower but I need to have windows and the license ive found makes most ones I build online cost prohibitive.

I need around 8 gigs of ram and the capability of a SSD. i5 or i7.

Devilishprune > Slant6 04/30/2014 at 20:29

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I don't really have much to add here other than if you're attending a university, you should check with your school's IT department to see if they provide licenses of windows to students. I found out about this when I built my computer last year and it saved me 100 bucks, which is always nice.

AthomSfere > Slant6 04/30/2014 at 20:30

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Do you have monitors, are you comfortable building?

jkm7680 > Slant6 04/30/2014 at 20:31

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My Not-Recommendation is Windows 8 with a Toshiba. Never again will I do that.

http://www.amazon.com/Samsung-NP470R…

!!! UNKNOWN CONTENT TYPE !!!

Take a look at this one! Getting real close to budget though.

Slant6 > AthomSfere 04/30/2014 at 20:35

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I have two set up with my Mac Mini (used exclusively as a photo server). I was thinking I could do a HDMI or DVI switch. I can build. I helped a friend before and I also spent my youth taking apart old beige towers.

AthomSfere > jkm7680 04/30/2014 at 20:36

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IN all honesty, a horrible machine for 3d work. Slow hard drive, and the video card will choke on 3d bad.

Slant6 > Devilishprune 04/30/2014 at 20:37

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Junior in high school. Maybe I should wait until college so I'm not obsolete before I actually have intense assignments to do.

jkm7680 > AthomSfere 04/30/2014 at 20:38

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I do hobby 3d modelling, I use Sketchup and am trying out Blender.

My Toshitba can't handle much.

tromoly > Slant6 04/30/2014 at 20:41

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Look for i5, 8GB ram, SSD isn't really important, atleast nVidia 600-level or higher, and motherboard to keep it together.

Sincerely, Engineering student who runs lots of CAD and CFD.

PS9 > Slant6 04/30/2014 at 20:43

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$600 is just barely enough, and leaves no room for an nVidia GPU, which you are going to want. Even a lower level GPU is 3-4x faster than the fastest CPU you can get at rendering, nevermind all the time you'll save tweaking your renders in a ultrafast WYSIWYG environment. There's just no reason to leave that out.

Also, I say 'nVidia GPU' because the fact of the matter is, CUDA development is lightyears ahead of OpenCL when it comes to hardware rendering, and that leaves AMD out of the loop. This is coming from an (up until recently) lifelong AMD guy.

AthomSfere > Slant6 04/30/2014 at 20:45

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I would strongly encourage a build then, and not because "building is always better" or anything, but because what is going to make the biggest differences to you aren't going to be in a budget Dell (Or most over the counter big box) systems.

The three points of importance that it appears post over looked:

You need a 3D graphics card, not a gaming card or an integrated card. ATI and NVidia both make professional cards (some about the price as your average gaming card) but the special drivers makes them out perform a gaming card with identical specs by an order or two of magnitude in 3D packages like 3D Studio, Maya etc.

You want a true quad core or better CPU, if the difference between an i7 or and AMD is whether or not you take a better GPU, then get the AMD. 3D is generally very multithread aware, this is important to get the fastest and most cores you can for rendering.

Hard Drive: You need to write to hard drive as seldom as possible, so if it comes to getting a bigger drive or more RAM, get more RAM. In fact, with a tight budget I would get a Seagate Hybrid drive, it will get you a large drive with good burst times but not force you to lose capacity, couple this with 16GB RAM and you should come out all around over all ahead. You wish, I would be happy to spec a machine out (IT professional here, this is easy and a fun break from corporate monotony)

AthomSfere > jkm7680 04/30/2014 at 20:47

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http://oppositelock.jalopnik.com/i-would-strong…

I am offering my professional advice there if you want to follow it. Might even do a good wishlist build if OP wants.

jkm7680 > AthomSfere 04/30/2014 at 20:54

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I respect your advice! I'm not an extreme 3d modeler either.

Slant6 > AthomSfere 04/30/2014 at 21:02

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That sounds great. If you could spec it that'd be great too because whenever I try to I end up way over budget. I could go over, I just need the best machine for the money that could also get me through college.

XJDano > Slant6 04/30/2014 at 21:15

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I don't computer.

AthomSfere > Slant6 04/30/2014 at 22:32

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Do you have a firm max budget then?

I built what I would say is really the best bang for the buck system, but fairly over budget right now (~50%) but weening it down isn't an issue, just need to start making decisions.

Also, research suggests specifically for 3ds Max (new name for 3D studio Max as of 2012 I think) more cores == always better.

Best budget card for video appears to be the v4900 @ $150.

But preliminary spec: (All top brand, because I hate watching stuff go boom the day warranty runs out)

8 Core 4GHz AMD processor

8GB RAM

240GB SSD

AMD V4900 video card

Windows 8

~$910 (So way over)

Tell me what to trim as far as price and I will make changes and recommendations and repost.

AthomSfere > PS9 04/30/2014 at 22:44

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Workstation cards and software is an odd thing though. I went in thinking the same, but 3DS Max benchmarks at the budget level actually have the FirePro ahead of the Quadro.

mazdaspeed2 > Slant6 04/30/2014 at 22:49

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It will be tough to do on that budget, but I would recommend building for the same reasons other people have already said. If it is possible I HIGHLY recommend waiting until black friday on Newegg. I bought the parts for my computer around then over the course of a couple weeks and it was about $800.

Specs:

i5 3570k 3.4 GHz quad core

1TB HDD

128GB SSD

16BG RAM

GTX 650 (cheaped out a bit here but it has been able to handle diablo 3 on the highest settings easily, not sure how 3d stuff would go on it though)

I also spent wayyy too much on my case, but subscribe to newegg email deals and you can find some really really good deals sometimes.

PS9 > AthomSfere 05/01/2014 at 01:51

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Nevermind the pro cards (strange thing to say, but...) they're exclusively for viewport FPS. For everything outside of that, they are rubbish.

When it comes to final rendering, the lowest level Quadro is no better than a CPU, and a Q6000 ($1,500) is slower than a GTX from two generations ago. Even at the firepro level, AMD is still not a factor here because OpenCL still sucks compared to CUDA. Even if you already have a Quadro, it still makes sense to buy a GTX given the massive speed advantage you get when final rendering, which will also grant you the ability to tweak materials in render preview, and know with ~95% certainty what you will get before committing time and energy to the final render.

For my money, I wouldn't even bother with the Quadro cards given how much better the GTXs are at final rendering. The FPS advantage Quadros have compared to that can only be realized under extreme circumstances (Maybe 10-50M polys in viewport), and compared to what you lose, the deficit between a Quadro and a GTX in final render is not-at-all worth giving up, given the massive premium Quadro cards demand. I'm not saying these are bad cards - Quadro and Firepro are your only hope when it comes to something like Solidworks or PROEngineer - but as a hobbyist who can only live with one of these cards, there's no sense right now in paying the premium for a Quadro.

AthomSfere > PS9 05/01/2014 at 09:12

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What article are you pulling this from?

The Quadro 2000 is a ~$400 card, the titan (Best performer) is over 1000. And 3DS max does seem to have a FirePro bias.

PS9 > AthomSfere 05/01/2014 at 15:06

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The Firepro bias is for viewport rendering only. Meaning this:

When it comes to final rendering - meaning this:

The GTX - whichever flavor you want to pick - gets the job done faster than any other cards out there, including the Quadros. Pick whichever hardware rendering app you want; iRay, Blender Cycles, Octane Render, it doesn't matter. If it runs on CUDA, shader-unit-for-shader-unit it will run faster on a GTX than it will a Quadro. The Firepro - again, when it comes to final rendering - is not a factor, because OpenCL is lightyears behind CUDA at this point, and neither the Firepro nor the Quadro is a match for the GTX in final render. They just aren't. You don't have to take my word for it; check this review and see for yourself. The numbers do not lie.

I will state this again to clarify; The GTX is faster than the Quadro at final rendering (That is, hit F11 or whatever hotkey it is for 3D max and wait while the picture appears.) The Quadro is better for viewport rendering (editing the model in a real-time in a probably OpenGL based live-feedback style environment) and the only option for Solidworks, PROEngineer, and other non-final render 3D apps that require driver level optimization to work (the kind a gaming card like the GTX isn't going to have).

AthomSfere > PS9 05/01/2014 at 20:16

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Yes, the driver optimization is exactly what I am looking at. Also, most 3D programs are optimized for GL, not CL or DirectX where a traditional NVidia or ATI card is optimized for.

Also, your link is bad.

Also worth noting, all other things the same that i7 mentioned is a $330 CPU and it is massively over clocked. Splitting the cost over a decent 8 core and v4900 Firepro makes more sense all around, especially if you think about flexibility.