What is better? Old I7 950, or the 8350 piledriver?

[Havensdad]

O.K.,

I am building a computer PRIMARILY for video rendering. The rendering I do takes my old I5 460 and its 6GB of ram, about 30 or so hours to complete (I use Adobe CS6 suite, fyi).

I am trying to cut that down, so I am building a rendering machine on a very tight budget. I WAS going with an AMD 8350 8 core system, because #1 It is Cheap, and #2 Adobe software is able to utilize the eight cores in a way that, say, games could not.

However, a friend of mine just offered me a I7 950 for free. I like free! However, I am not sure that it will meet my needs. I was planning on going with a full 32 gb of ram...something which is not possible with the I7; max is 24, @1066 (3x8 or 4x6 which is SUPER expensive...more expensive than the 32gb!!) .

What should I do? Is the difference in the two CPU's going to be so noticeable, or is the performance going to be more GPU based, than Ram/Cpu?

 

[Havensdad]

GPU acceleration is more important than CPU and definitely more important than RAM.

"More important"? No, they are both important. A computer with a top of the line GPU, and 8 GB of Ram, is still going to be agonizingly slow on high end effect renders. Some functions in after effects are not even affected by the GPU. On the other hand, EVERY function of After Effects require rather large chunks of Ram....

 

[twelve25]

Then get what you really want instead of asking for advice! If you already know the answer, why ask the question?

 

[Havensdad]

Then get what you really want instead of asking for advice! If you already know the answer, why ask the question?

I wanted advice. But advice based on reality. I am just repeating what the actual software information says.

 

[ebalong]

"More important"? No, they are both important. A computer with a top of the line GPU, and 8 GB of Ram, is still going to be agonizingly slow on high end effect renders. Some functions in after effects are not even affected by the GPU. On the other hand, EVERY function of After Effects require rather large chunks of Ram....

Can't you harness CUDA cores for those high end affect renders?

A 560Ti has 384 CUDA cores and runs $200-$250; a 570 has 480 cores and runs ~$300. I don't know if Kepler 6xx cards are quite there with respect to GPU-assisted computing. Check some benchmarks that have GPGPU computing vs. 8+ core CPU power for the rendering on CS6 before you turn down free hardware that is still quite viable.

 

[twelve25]

I wanted advice. But advice based on reality. I am just repeating what the actual software information says.

Actual software says 8GB for After effects or UP TO 4GB per core for best performance. So that's max of 16GB for the i7, which 12GB isn't that far off and 24GB far exceeds. The other parts of Premiere CS6 are fine with 8GB of RAM.

CUDA acceleration (with the right GPU) far outperforms even the fastest CPUs. Look at the benchmarks.

I'm just trying to tell you that your free solution should work good. If you want to buy something, buy a card for CUDA acceleration and max the MB out at 24GB.


Also keep in mind going over 16GB of RAM needs Windows 7 x64 Professional (or above) or any version of Windows 8. W7 Home premium only allows 16.

 

[Havensdad]

Can't you harness CUDA cores for those high end affect renders?

A 560Ti has 384 CUDA cores and runs $200-$250; a 570 has 480 cores and runs ~$300. I don't know if Kepler 6xx cards are quite there with respect to GPU-assisted computing. Check some benchmarks that have GPGPU computing vs. 8+ core CPU power for the rendering on CS6 before you turn down free hardware that is still quite viable.

That is basically exactly what I am planning. I have decided to go with the I7, and put part of the money saved to a better, card: I am going with a 570 (not Ti), that not only has CUDA, but also supports adobe premiere's Mercury Playback engine.

Any suggestion on the brand of GPU (MSI, EVGA, ZOTAC, etc.)? I have been out of the gaming scene for awhile, and I know nothing about high end video cards...

 

[Havensdad]

Actual software says 8GB for After effects or UP TO 4GB per core for best performance. So that's max of 16GB for the i7, which 12GB isn't that far off and 24GB far exceeds. The other parts of Premiere CS6 are fine with 8GB of RAM.

CUDA acceleration (with the right GPU) far outperforms even the fastest CPUs. Look at the benchmarks.

I'm just trying to tell you that your free solution should work good. If you want to buy something, buy a card for CUDA acceleration and max the MB out at 24GB.


Also keep in mind going over 16GB of RAM needs Windows 7 x64 Professional (or above) or any version of Windows 8. W7 Home premium only allows 16.

If you look at the system requirements, you will notice that the 4gb per core for rendering, is in addition to the 4-8 gb requirement for the foreground copy of After Effects. From the SR:

"in addition to RAM reserved for the normal foreground copy of After Effects..."

I was planing on going with Windows 8 pro. The student edition is amazingly cheap; since I am a student, might as well take advantage. I have heard that Windows 8 tends to perform better than 7, though I have no idea if that is true.

 

[ebalong]

EVGA 570 is a solid choice, it seems to garner some of the better reviews. I don't know what is going on with the Kepler cards, on paper they have significantly more cores than Fermi, but I think that the support is not there for GPU acceleration, and I haven't read anything that indicates when it will be.

Does SLI'ing work for GPGPU acceleration? That is, if you throw 2 GTX-570's in your rig, will the double amount of cores render ~twice as fast, or doesn't it work like that?

 

[Havensdad]

Not sure what brand of card to get. I was looking at this one: http://www.amazon.com/MSI-N570GTX-TWIN-FROZR-PCI-Express/dp/B008809SUM/ref=wl_it_dp_o_pC_nS_nC?ie=UTF8&colid=3HMJPG4HIA960&coliid=I27W8DGF060O8X

Or should I go with a factory overclock model? Like this:

http://www.amazon.com/EVGA-Superclocked-Mini-HDMI-Lifetime-012-P3-1572-AR/dp/B004EYSMGW/ref=sr_1_2?s=electronics&ie=UTF8&qid=1353821053&sr=1-2&keywords=570+GTX

I really need to stay under 300 dollars, or the whole "save money" thing is out the window!!

 

[Havensdad]

EVGA 570 is a solid choice, it seems to garner some of the better reviews. I don't know what is going on with the Kepler cards, on paper they have significantly more cores than Fermi, but I think that the support is not there for GPU acceleration, and I haven't read anything that indicates when it will be.

Does SLI'ing work for GPGPU acceleration? That is, if you throw 2 GTX-570's in your rig, will the double amount of cores render ~twice as fast, or doesn't it work like that?

I have not found this information in their specs....but I would like to know! I cannot afford a second video card now, but if I could in the future...

 

[Havensdad]

Nevermind: I found it. Only the "Maximus" setup works for multiple video cards. Adobe does not support SLI 🙁.

 

[ebalong]

Well hey, all you need is about $3,000 for a Quadro 4000 and a Tesla C2075

 

[Havensdad]

Best answer selected by Havensdad.