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About building a PC that fits the bill

Second Technician RimmerSecond Technician Rimmer Posts: 490
in Technical Help (nuts n bolts)

My current machine being of much outdated specs, I think, it seems to be time for me to replace its innards. Gaming is fine but I want this to run swiftly in DS and be able to render faster than I currently do.

I would really like some suggestions, as I have been a bit out of the game lately when it comes to high end hardware.

Current specs are:

CPU: i7 2600K

MOBO: Asus P8P67 PRO Rev 1.xx

RAM: 32GB

GPU: MSI (Nvidia) GTX970 

All of it running on a W10 64 pro.

Thanks in advance :)

Comments

  • ebergerlyebergerly Posts: 3,255
    Seems like a very nice machine to me. If your main purpose is Iray render speed, then add another GPU...as much as you can afford
  • Second Technician RimmerSecond Technician Rimmer Posts: 490

    So you think that adding anything else than a stronger GPU wouldn't change my output by much, then?

  • ebergerlyebergerly Posts: 3,255

    Yeah, CPU's are pretty much useless with most graphics software nowadays since most software is going towards the far faster and more efficient GPU's when they can. You have a ton of RAM, so that's good. If you can afford another 970 that would be good (if your motherboard and power supply can handle it), or even something bigger (1070ti or 1080ti).  

  • ebergerlyebergerly Posts: 3,255
    edited July 2018

    By the way, here's a list of render times of various GPU's on a benchmark scene. Your 970 would render it in 4.5 minutes, and two of them in about 2.5 minutes. And if you bought a 1080ti instead it would render in around 2 minutes. Give or take. So two 970's would be pretty sweet. 

    BenchmarkNew.jpg
    383 x 465 - 52K
    Post edited by ebergerly on
  • Angel_2232633Angel_2232633 Posts: 1,204
    edited July 2018

    I would get this puppy. https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B06Y11DFZ3/ref=oh_aui_detailpage_o03_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

    Honesly its the best buy I've made in years. Great card. Your other system specs are well beyond fitting the bill.

     

    Also, It's 13.5 inches. Make sure your case can hold it.

    Post edited by Angel_2232633 on
  • Second Technician RimmerSecond Technician Rimmer Posts: 490

    That board would be a wet dream, AW, except my wallet couldn't possibly take it :D It's a bit sad as my case would easily accomodate it.

    Ebergerly, about the use of two gtx'es, maybe you can clarify for me something I've been wondering about. In gaming, using two boards means using them in a bridged way (if Nvidia, through SLI). How does that really work in rendering? I was told quite a while ago that iRay doesn't work through SLI ?

    In the end I'll probably have to settle for something halfway through, would a board with 8GB still fit the bill? 

  • ebergerlyebergerly Posts: 3,255

      Yeah, I have a t080ti with a 1070 and no SLI bridge. Iray doesn't like SLI bridges. Disconnect them. 

    I've never tried it, but I'm told that Iray doesn't like them. 

    As far as GPU VRAM and how much is enough, there's no right answer. It depends on the kind of scenes you build. Big scenes need more VRAM. For me, with a 1080ti and 1070, it seems like scenes that fill up 30+ GB of system RAM can barely fit on my GPU's. Much more than that and it crashes to CPU. 

    But I can only make scenes that big by merging 3 existing scenes together. None of my original scenes get even close to that. But I'm more of a "less is more" kinda person. I generally like my scenes to focus on a clear subject of interest rather than having 328 characters in a scene, all in focus.  

  • KitsumoKitsumo Posts: 1,222

    In SLI gaming, only one card is rendering, but both cards are doing calculations, so the main card needs to get input from the other card. SLI=Good

    In Iray, neither card is really creating an image, they both are just doing calculations and sending them back to the CPU, so they don't need to talk to each other. In fact, talking to each other takes away cycles they could be using for rendering. SLI=Bad

    As far as your CPU, looking at Tom's Hierarchy, you are still in the 2nd fastest group. There isn't much point in upgrading unless you can move up 2 tiers or more. You can certainly do it, and you'll see a performance increase, but it won't be worth the money you spent. If money's burning a hole in your pockets, get a 1070 or better, or wait and see what Nvidia releases in a few months. Replacing your entire PC with something better in all categories could easily cost $2000 or more.

  • ebergerlyebergerly Posts: 3,255
    Kitsumo said:

    As far as your CPU, looking at Tom's Hierarchy, you are still in the 2nd fastest group. There isn't much point in upgrading unless you can move up 2 tiers or more. You can certainly do it, and you'll see a performance increase, but it won't be worth the money you spent.

    Of course, whether your particular software actually NEEDS a faster/more cores CPU should be a consideration too, don't you think? 2 tiers, 3 tiers, doesn't really matter if your software doesn't use all that CPU power. I have an 8 core/16 thread Ryzen that sits there doing nothing most of the time. 

     

  • RARA Posts: 78

    Last year, I build a render machine with an AMD Ryzen 7 and a single GTX 1080.  No complaints.

  • KitsumoKitsumo Posts: 1,222
    ebergerly said:
    Kitsumo said:

    As far as your CPU, looking at Tom's Hierarchy, you are still in the 2nd fastest group. There isn't much point in upgrading unless you can move up 2 tiers or more. You can certainly do it, and you'll see a performance increase, but it won't be worth the money you spent.

    Of course, whether your particular software actually NEEDS a faster/more cores CPU should be a consideration too, don't you think? 2 tiers, 3 tiers, doesn't really matter if your software doesn't use all that CPU power. I have an 8 core/16 thread Ryzen that sits there doing nothing most of the time. 

     

    I agree. That's why I said the best bang for the buck would be a new GPU, 8Gb or better. CPU speed has sort of topped out over the last decade or so.

  • Second Technician RimmerSecond Technician Rimmer Posts: 490

    Oh, a 1080ti would be so sexy... science says though that I can't afford it :D I guess I'll have to stick to a 8gb card, like a 1070ti for example. If, much later, I change my pc's mobo, maybe adding a second one will be a good option, that'll make it a 16gb worth of vram and by then, the prices will have dropped.

     

  • Dim ReaperDim Reaper Posts: 687
    second.technician.rimmer_9571136c47 said:

    Oh, a 1080ti would be so sexy... science says though that I can't afford it :D I guess I'll have to stick to a 8gb card, like a 1070ti for example. If, much later, I change my pc's mobo, maybe adding a second one will be a good option, that'll make it a 16gb worth of vram and by then, the prices will have dropped.

     

     

    Two 1070ti cards later will render faster than a single 1080ti because it will give you more cuda cores.  But, the vram does not stack - each card needs to load the same information, so two 8GB cards will give you 8GB of vram.  If you were to keep your existing card, you could use the cuda cores on that in addition to the 1070ti, but that card would be dropped by iray if you went over 4GB and it would render with just the 1070ti.

    All that said, get the 1070ti - you will notice a big difference in your iray render times and the size of scene that you can render.

  • KitsumoKitsumo Posts: 1,222
    Dim Reaper said:
    second.technician.rimmer_9571136c47 said:

    Oh, a 1080ti would be so sexy... science says though that I can't afford it :D I guess I'll have to stick to a 8gb card, like a 1070ti for example. If, much later, I change my pc's mobo, maybe adding a second one will be a good option, that'll make it a 16gb worth of vram and by then, the prices will have dropped.

     

     

    Two 1070ti cards later will render faster than a single 1080ti because it will give you more cuda cores.  But, the vram does not stack - each card needs to load the same information, so two 8GB cards will give you 8GB of vram.  If you were to keep your existing card, you could use the cuda cores on that in addition to the 1070ti, but that card would be dropped by iray if you went over 4GB and it would render with just the 1070ti.

    All that said, get the 1070ti - you will notice a big difference in your iray render times and the size of scene that you can render.

    Yeah, definitely keep the old card in addition to the new. My 4gb 770 still contributes to most of my renders. Every little bit helps.

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