Workstation specs purely for 3ds Max rendering

[gareth evans]

I am trying to put a workstation spec together purely for 3DS Max rendering but am worried I might be overspending on some items?
Any advice on the following spec would be appreciated as I am not too clued-up on the component side of things other than what I've read on this site...

i7 Extreme 965 3.2GHz
1TB (SATA2) HDD 32MB Cache @ 7200RPM
4 x 2GB DDR3-1333 RAM
X58 Chipset LGA 1366
850W power supply
Nvidia Quadro FX1800 graphics card
OS - Windows Vista ultimate (upgrade to Windows 7 when available)

 

[obsidian86]

you would get better responses here http://www.tomshardware.co.uk/forum/forum-13.html

 

[enayet_redeemer]

I am trying to put a workstation spec together purely for 3DS Max rendering but am worried I might be overspending on some items?
Any advice on the following spec would be appreciated as I am not too clued-up on the component side of things other than what I've read on this site...

i7 Extreme 965 3.2GHz
1TB (SATA2) HDD 32MB Cache @ 7200RPM
4 x 2GB DDR3-1333 RAM
X58 Chipset LGA 1366
850W power supply
Nvidia Quadro FX1800 graphics card
OS - Windows Vista ultimate (upgrade to Windows 7 when available)

To my point of veiw, for processor you can go for Dual Xeon 5520 (Quad core, Nehalm architecture) with 5520 compatible chipset. Two Quad cores would be sufficient to met your requirement. To know about Intel Nehalm based processors: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intel_Nehalem_(microarchitecture)

Even a single Xeon 5520 (its a Quad core Nehalm, man) would be enough to serve your requirement. You can save money and invest on nVIDIA Quadro FX4600 as it is more expensive compared to Quadro FX1800 but will give far better performance.

To know more about Qaudro cards you can go to the link: http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/quadro-fx-4800,2258.html . Mainstream equivalent of Quadro 4600 is Geforce 8800 and Quadro 1800 is Geforce 8600. There will be significant performance difference between these two cards. FX3800 or 3700 will also do good job. http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/video/display/quadrofx-firepro_17.html#sect0

Lets take a look also to the link: http://www.nvidia.com/page/quadrofx_family.html

FX1800 is a mid-range product and FX4600 is an ultra high end product. My opinion is if you are buying a high-end system then why would you buy a mid-range card?

From the spec it looks like you want to use 4x2GB RAM. Why not go for triple channel? It will give you best performance. For Xeon, ECC RAM is required.

 

[Guest]

If it is going to be just a "render" machine using Backburner, does it need a graphics card at all. We put together a $1400 rack-mounted server and it just uses the onborad video card. It renders just fine and we didn't need to spend the money on a video card.

Richard