Advices on a PC build

[Nicola_Destefanis]

Hello everyone,

I’m in the need to upgrade my machine and I feel ready to switch back to PC after a long time, I’m a 3D motion designer and the main reason I’m doing that also to start working with last generation CPU and GPU render engines.
I’m freelancer and usually I work in studios, so this will be my home machine for personal projects and studying/learning new software.

I’ not really an expert about PC build but I tried to read online articles.
I don’t need an huge beast right now, but I want to keep the chances open to upgrade, my initial idea was to get 2 graphic cards (2x 1080Ti) but I think I can start with 1 and maybe upgrade in 1 year time adding a second one.
So is really important for me to understand what I need in terms of motherboard or CPU or whatever I’m not aware of in order to to that in a good way.
Same for the RAM, guess starting with 32 is alright but wish to upgrade to 64 without replacing, just adding.

Can you please have a look at this setup and tell ma what you think:

Motherboards: ASUS PRIME Z390-A - supports x2 GPUs
Intel CPUs and Overclocking: lintel Core i9 9900K, Coffee Lake, 8-Core with Hyperthreading, 3.6GHz, 5.0GHz Turbo
CPU Cooler: be quiet! Dark Rock 4
Memory: 32GB (2x16GB) Corsair DDR4 Vengeance LPX, 2666MHz, CAS 16-18-18-35
Graphics Card: 11GB EVGA GeForce GTX 1080 Ti FTW3, 3584 Cores, 11000MHz GDDR5X
Power Supply: 850W Corsair RMx, Mudular, Silent, 80PLUS Gold - Dual GPU
Storage - Solid State Drives - PCIe (NAND): 250GB Samsung 970 EVO, 3400MB/s Read, 1500MB/s Write
Storage - Solid State Drives - SATA: 500GB Samsung 860 EVO, Read 550MB/s, Write 520MB/s, 98K IOPS

[Ma_Ya]

Well , As you posting in Arnold forums and it's only CPU based , first advice will be more cores

I'm not going to advertise AMD vs Intel battle , you can see yourself how they do in terms of price/perf

If.. as you said it's a motion design (not requires huge datasets and tons of textures) then you don't need 11 GB VRAM , I'm working with 8 gigs now and can easily turn whole massive of buildings

keep in mind that you only need VRAM for viewport shading and mesh amount performance , it not going to give you a boost in CPU renderer during render, but if arnold will become GPU soon (that I will doubt) at least not soon , then you need as much VRAM as you can.

in other words for now , more cores = more power , I would invest in more cores rather than more VRAM

My advice would be to wait for a little bit to have more clear picture what is going on .

Arnold GPU will have RTX boost that is not supported with 1080 family cards (supported only after turing generation e.g 20xx Cards)

So I will try in 2 words again ...

1) I would go with not expensive 8gb Video Card for now (1070 for example) , For CPU buy as more core CPU as you can afford

2) for RAM 32 is very good start , 64 is pro graded amount for heavy 3d (u can always add after)

3) Don't forget about space - I would go | 1x m.2 nvme 256 and 6TB Seagate or WD (you need to see their HDD differences by color afaik black is for performance ) or if you can afford 512 m.2 it will be even better

system goes to m.2 (current work in progress also on m.2 , and when done with project you're moving project to HDD)