The i7-4960x extreme edition??

[expeacer]

I am in the process of building a high-end workstation-class rig with an operating budget of around $5000, and am wondering whether the i7-4960x would cut it. Bear in mind that i would be using the build for heavy video editing, coloring, compositing and some gaming (not important but now that gaming is possible, maybe I will give it a go). The other option is getting dual Xeons, but Xeons cant be overclocked, which would men I would be stuck with stock speeds. Anyone could clarify this for me?

 

[TehNinjaCat]

I am in the process of building a high-end workstation-class rig with an operating budget of around $5000, and am wondering whether the i7-4960x would cut it. Bear in mind that i would be using the build for heavy video editing, coloring, compositing and some gaming (not important but now that gaming is possible, maybe I will give it a go). The other option is getting dual Xeons, but Xeons cant be overclocked, which would men I would be stuck with stock speeds. Anyone could clarify this for me?

I Think That The i7-4960x would be superb at what you are wanting to use it for, as i dont think Xeons would be as good, (only really seen them in servers, not actual rigs) so yeah, go for it 😀

 

[Paul Tomato]

Consider spending some time researching what others who are doing what you are doing are using. From what little I've read real-time video editing is VERY resource demanding - needing 4 (or maybe more) SSD's in a RAID 0 configuration just for the minimum bandwidth. What's your highest editing resolution (now AND future use), and what machines are others who are editing at the same resolution - it would kind of bite if you built your machine and found that you just don't have enough processing power or RAM - as most/all single processor i7 boards are limited to 32 Gb you may even need more than that!

Maybe not - I don't know, but you certainly need to know things like this!

Good Luck!

 

[Supahos]

You can use 64 gb on a board for that processor but I'm pretty sure if I were legitametly building what you say you are I would run dual Xeons, and if you think the software will utilize it try for 128gb of ram. As said before check with others running the same program see what their needs are. Don't think a xeon can't keep up just b/c of its clockspeed if the app is very threaded http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819116931 will tear apart the 4960 by itself, put two of them in it and watch your data melt... granted that may be a bit over your budget by the time you add storage/ram.

 

[expeacer]

Consider spending some time researching what others who are doing what you are doing are using. From what little I've read real-time video editing is VERY resource demanding - needing 4 (or maybe more) SSD's in a RAID 0 configuration just for the minimum bandwidth. What's your highest editing resolution (now AND future use), and what machines are others who are editing at the same resolution - it would kind of bite if you built your machine and found that you just don't have enough processing power or RAM - as most/all single processor i7 boards are limited to 32 Gb you may even need more than that!

Maybe not - I don't know, but you certainly need to know things like this!

Good Luck!

Precisely what I have done. I have done some research around my office but the results seem to vary. For example, a co-worker of mine working on a compositing project uses a build with dual 4960x's along with a custom watercooling loop, but his budget was about 2 grand more than mine. Another co-worker uses a pair of E5-2620's as part of his setup, which may offer me more bang for my buck. My highest editing resolution so far would be 4k, at 3840x2160, but with the push toward 8k Ultra HD starting to heat up, I may have to move up to 7680x4320 in the near future.

 

[expeacer]

You can use 64 gb on a board for that processor but I'm pretty sure if I were legitametly building what you say you are I would run dual Xeons, and if you think the software will utilize it try for 128gb of ram. As said before check with others running the same program see what their needs are. Don't think a xeon can't keep up just b/c of its clockspeed if the app is very threaded http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819116931 will tear apart the 4960 by itself, put two of them in it and watch your data melt... granted that may be a bit over your budget by the time you add storage/ram.

What about dual 4960x's? I'm a little reluctant to get Xeons due to the fact that it cant be OC'ed.

 

[Supahos]

I still think you're better off getting dual http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819116932 if whatever you use is threaded enough, 32 threads running full out will make up the difference. The fact its only 95w won't hurt anything for the longevity of the system either. You can do it either way it won't much matter but you can Is your guy with the 4960xs faster than the Xeon box?

 

[expeacer]

I still think you're better off getting dual http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819116932 if whatever you use is threaded enough, 32 threads running full out will make up the difference. The fact its only 95w won't hurt anything for the longevity of the system either. You can do it either way it won't much matter but you can Is your guy with the 4960xs faster than the Xeon box?

It perfoms roughly equally, but the guy with the 4960x's has the ability to squeeze even more juice out of his processor as he has considerably OC'ed it, and with the excellent watercooling, the temps are always kept low. Now, if I were to do that, I'm guessing I would considerably go over my budget. However, the Xeons seem to be able to handle highly-threaded applications better than the 4960x's. Still divided along these lines.

 

[Taboshkas]

Here is what i did. I used 2 intel i7 4960x processors (overclocked to 4.2ghz with 4.7 turbo) with 128 gb of ram oc to 3133MHz. Then for storage i used 6 samsung 850 pro series ssds (all 1tb each) in raid 0. Then for backup and for extra storage i used 12 tb of wesrn digital black series hard drives. For graphics i used dual 780ti graphics cards. If you have a huge budget i would definatly recommend this rig. Windows 8.1 boots in less than a second! The spinny circle does not even have time to come up