Hardware recommendations

AkaBear

Thanks to all those that assisted.

Ended up settling on something roughly the same for home, but fractionally cheaper and less power but opted for a safe route to avoid conflict with existing software that is not likely to be upgraded anytime soon.

As for the work pc, well might go higher yet. Still working on that one.

Dell XPS 630
Intel Intel Core2 Quad 2.66GHz
4GB DDR2 667MHz RAM
500gb Harddisk 7200rpm
NVIDIA GeForce 8800 GTx 512MB (avoided the ati card just to be safe for now, the NVIDIA is a fair card for graphics but the home pc is also partly for funn too!)
20.5in monitor

Will try out Vista Ultimate 32bit (but sad to let go of XP pro) although may downgrade later if dissatisfied.

remus

Quite a tidy setup

quick piece of advice with regards to the operating system: i wouldnt bother with vista, if you stick with xp for the moment and then upgrade to windows 7 when it comes out. Its basically a much more polished version of vista and much nicer to use.

brodie

Looks like a good setup to me. I had the 8800 GT for awhile, I think you'll be very happy with it (and it plays quite nicely with SU). I'd probably ditto the advice on waiting for Windows 7. And if you anticipate wanting some more ram later of course it'd be a good idea to go w/ a 64 bit OS as 32 bit won't recognize any more than the 4GB you've got.

-Brodie

Wazzer

HI Guys

I am still trying to spec a new company laptop and was hoping you can give me some advice.

I would really like to have a Lenovo W700 notebook with the Nvidia Quadro FX3700 1GB with Intel x9100 CPU however it is very very expensive!!

I am looking at a DELL alternative with the following specs for about 25% less than the Lenovo
It has Intell T9800 Core 2 Duo CPU
Nvidia Quadro FX3700 1GB
4GB 1067MHz DDR3 RAM
200Gb 7200rpm SATA HD
17" WUXGA 1920x1200 LCD Panel
All running on XP pro SP3

Can you guys tell me if this would work well with SU

Alternitivley

Can anyone recommend and alternative NoteBook with similar specs that would be cheaper?

Thanks for the feedback

Ben

Wazzer

Would it be worth considering downgrading to the FX3700 512Mb card and upgrading the processor?
Which would have bigger impact on graphics performance where SU is concerned?

Many thanks

BEn

thomthom

SU is more CPU hungry than GPU hungry.

Wazzer

Interesting thanks you

So a better CPU would be preferable to a high spec Graphics card.

Cheers

Ben

brodie

Your specs look really good to me. In fact they're almost overkill for SU, which doesn't use hardware very well (eg, doesn't recognize dual processors).

To elaborate on Thomthom's point. SU uses the processor to show the geometry and GPU for textures and shadows. Textures and shadows can be turned off while you're modeling and orbiting but you can't turn off the geometry, so the CPU is typically the more important.

-Brodie

Anssi

Hi Wazzer,

IMO you could even go to the lower spec (Quadro FX 2500 512 Mb or what the number now was, I was looking at the specs a couple of days ago) card but consider a CPU with more than 3 GHZ clock speed.

Anssi

Wazzer

Thats interesting thanks

So i would get as good or better performance with an X9100 processor and a Quadro FX5700 512Mb
Combination plus 4GB system Ram?

I appreciate your help guys

Ben

Zilonx

Core i7 920 ou Q9650 ???? (Well, both without overclock). Does anyone have experiences, benchmarks, opinions?

remus

The i7 is the better choice for SU, as it has turbo boost and the ability to be overclocked lots, should the wish ever arise.

solo

I did a quick test using a recent very high poly model (which taxes my old dual core @ 3.20ghz)

Using an i7 940 (standard...not over clocked) with a geforce gtx280, 12GB Ram and Vista 64bit, I made a video of how it handles the model then I duplicated the model several times and you can see the poly's, edges, etc and also on the right is the CPU fluctuations as the load and work required to run smooth pushes the clock speed by means of the turbo function, you will also notice that when the load is low the clock speed drops way down to conserve energy.

[flash=900,406:2949y7ky]http://vimeo.com/moogaloop.swf?clip_id=4516551&server=vimeo.com&show_title=1&show_byline=1&show_portrait=0&color=&fullscreen=1[/flash:2949y7ky]

numerobis

Geforce or Quadro? Radeon or FirePro?

Hi,

i'm planning to buy a new card.
so the question is...

is skp faster on workstation cards? or is it better to buy one of the cheaper workstation cards (200-300€) or a bigger gaming card?
looking at the latest card series, which one works better with skp - ati or nvidia?

i consider to buy a Radeon HD 4890 and mayby turn it into a Fire Pro.
Or a GeForce GTX 285.

thomthom

Was that a total of 11 million faces?

solo

Thomthom, I believe that's 1.18 million faces.
As you can see the rig was still very smooth. I tried a model that absolutely crippled my high clock speed dual cores in the past I did not check the face count but the size was 156mb , and it opened fast and was very smooth, the only issue was bounding boxes when orbiting with shadows on, but OMG my other rigs struggle to even open it never mind navigate without shadows on.

So again I say the i7 IS the best solution for SU IMO, it handles more poly's and makes more things possible.

i7 940
Asus p6 deluxe
64 bit Vista Ultimate
12GB corsair dominator ram
geforce gtx 280
1TB HD

thomthom

@solo said:

I tried a model that absolutely crippled my high clock speed dual cores in the past I did not check the face count but the size was 156mb

Pure geometry? Or did that include textures?

Btw, that model you tried in that video, any chance I can test it out on my rig so I can see the difference between our rigs?

solo

All geometry (no textures) This is part of it that I posted a while back, the complete file has double the amount of buildings.

I will be accessing my server as soon as my weekly maintenace is done and send you the candle model.

solo

Numerobis,

I suggest the nvidia gtx 285, ATI still have stability issues with many 3D modeling apps.
I would not bother with a Quadro as it performance gain if any is not noticable for the difference in price and then it's also a very limited card and chocks with heavy video editing.

thomthom

Impressive model. Is that each brick modelled?
I'm very interested in what you did with the brick wall on the left side of the model, where the bricks are visible only in spots. (Has this model been talked about in another thread?)