Powerful gaming and video editing machine (build)

[bladexngt]

Hello!

I am looking to build a powerful pc for gaming and video editing. I have home videos in 1080p that needs editing. I have spec'ed out the following, what do you think? I would like to get the price lower, so if there is anything I can substitute please let me know.

Intel i7 3770K
ASUS P8Z77-V DELUXE [like SSD implementation]
Kingston HyperX 8GB (2 x 4GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1600 (PC3 12800) [Maybe 16gb?]
Geforce GTX680

Thank you.

 

[dmoney1980]

In order for us to provide you with the best options, please answer the following questions:

1. What YOUR PC will be used for. That means what types of tasks you'll be performing.

2. What YOUR budget is. A price range is acceptable as long as it's not more than a 20% spread

3. What country YOU will be buying YOUR parts from.

4. IF YOU have a brand preference. That means, are you an Intel-Fanboy, AMD-Fanboy, ATI-Fanboy, nVidia-Fanboy, Seagate-Fanboy, WD-Fanboy, etc.

5. If YOU intend on using any of YOUR current parts, and if so, what those parts are.

*

7. IF YOU plan on overclocking or run the system at default speeds.

8. What resolution will you be using?

9. WHEN do you plan to build it?
Note that it is usually not cost or time effective to choose your build more than a month before you actually plan to be using it.

*

X. Do you need to purchase any software to go with the system, such as Windows or Blu Ray playback

 

[bladexngt]

1. What YOUR PC will be used for. That means what types of tasks you'll be performing.
-PC will be used for gaming and video/photo editing. The most demanding bit I can see is the 1080p video editing. I also do a lot of recordings of my DJ sets.

2. What YOUR budget is. A price range is acceptable as long as it's not more than a 20% spread
-$1000-1200

3. What country YOU will be buying YOUR parts from.
-USA

4. IF YOU have a brand preference. That means, are you an Intel-Fanboy, AMD-Fanboy, ATI-Fanboy, nVidia-Fanboy, Seagate-Fanboy, WD-Fanboy, etc.
-Intel and Asus

5. If YOU intend on using any of YOUR current parts, and if so, what those parts are.
-Monitor, Keyboard, Mouse

7. IF YOU plan on overclocking or run the system at default speeds.
-Thinking stock speeds only, but it seems like lot of the new parts (that I looked at at least) are geared towards overclocking.

8. What resolution will you be using?
-1920

9. WHEN do you plan to build it?
Note that it is usually not cost or time effective to choose your build more than a month before you actually plan to be using it.
-Within the next 2 months.

I do not need to purchase any software as part of this estimate.

Thank you.

 

[MichaelD]

That's a nice system you spec'd out, but you left out a power supply. The PS is the heart of the system. Don't cheap out on it. I'd go for 650W or higher.

What NLE program will you be using? For HD video editing you should try to go for 16GB of RAM. RAM's cheap these days and NLE timelines eat up RAM quickly. Additionally, for optimum performance you should have two separate HDs for your video; a source and a destination drive. Keep the video off your System drive and your encoding will go much faster and the system will be much more responsive as well.

The idea is: System reads video off this drive -------> Crunches the data, processes it through the system drive --------->writes data to this drive. Hope that makes sense.

 

[bladexngt]

That's a nice system you spec'd out, but you left out a power supply. The PS is the heart of the system. Don't cheap out on it. I'd go for 650W or higher.

What NLE program will you be using? For HD video editing you should try to go for 16GB of RAM. RAM's cheap these days and NLE timelines eat up RAM quickly. Additionally, for optimum performance you should have two separate HDs for your video; a source and a destination drive. Keep the video off your System drive and your encoding will go much faster and the system will be much more responsive as well.

The idea is: System reads video off this drive -------> Crunches the data, processes it through the system drive --------->writes data to this drive. Hope that makes sense.

I had looked into the following, but briefly.
OCZ ModXStream Pro 700W Modular High Performance Power Supply

I was looking at an adobe solution, premier, encore... since I am somewhat familiar with them.

Looking into one SSD and one 7200rpm drive. SSD for all the OS and programs.
I dont need huge disks since I have a NAS for storage and back-up.

 

[MichaelD]

That's a decent PS. I'm partial to Corsair/Seasonic/Antec myself. Being that you're building from scratch, what's one more HD? Your NLE and system in general will really benefit from having the video separate from the system drive and having separate source/destination drives for the video.

 

[bladexngt]

That's a decent PS. I'm partial to Corsair/Seasonic/Antec myself. Being that you're building from scratch, what's one more HD? Your NLE and system in general will really benefit from having the video separate from the system drive and having separate source/destination drives for the video.

Gotcha. So you are recommending 3 drives in total.
SSD - OS/applications
HD - Source
HD - Destination

I had not thought of that, thank you for the suggestion.

 

[MichaelD]

Gotcha. So you are recommending 3 drives in total.
SSD - OS/applications
HD - Source
HD - Destination

I had not thought of that, thank you for the suggestion.

Exactly and you're welcome. You can also use one of the "video hard drives" for storage of your music/backups/whatever. I keep nothing on the system drive except the OS/Apps. My Documents/music/email/files are on a separate HD that I backup to my NAS.

 

[Cerb]

What cards and peripherals will you need? That mobo is expensive. I can't see it being worth it unless you need to use multiple PCIe 16x cards, or unless will use several USB 3.0 ports.

 

[riversend]

Have you looked at this guide?

Have a look and it will give you a good baseline for $1000. Do you do a lot of video editing, or is this just something you would like to get done with your home videos? That could certainly influence where you go with respect to your final config. If editing work is a primary use or time sump, then I would go with mfenn's midrange build, swap out for the 3770k and an additional hard disk as suggested earlier. That should keep you in the upper range of your build.

 

[bladexngt]

I will not be doing a lot of editing, but I do have a lot that I need to catch up on. Its a hobby.

I chose that Mobo because of:
ASUS SSD Caching

I was originally looking at the non delux version.

 

[bladexngt]

Have you looked at this guide?

Have a look and it will give you a good baseline for $1000. Do you do a lot of video editing, or is this just something you would like to get done with your home videos? That could certainly influence where you go with respect to your final config. If editing work is a primary use or time sump, then I would go with mfenn's midrange build, swap out for the 3770k and an additional hard disk as suggested earlier. That should keep you in the upper range of your build.

Thanks but I am unable open the link. --nevermind got it working. Thanks.

 

[Insert_Nickname]

That's a nice system you spec'd out, but you left out a power supply. The PS is the heart of the system. Don't cheap out on it. I'd go for 650W or higher.

The Corsair Professional Series AX650 is a very nice power supply, but its expensive...:sneaky:

I use my primary system for pretty much the same as the OP, so here is my current config...

CPU: Intel Core i7 3770non-K @ 4,3GHz
Mainboard: ASUS P8Z77-V Deluxe
RAM: 8GB DDR3-1600
GFX: AMD Radeon HD7870 connected to 1440p display
Disks: 1x Samsung SSD-830 128GB system drive, 2x WD RE4 1TB in RAID1 + 1x 2TB Seagate Barracuda Green "scratch pad" drive
PSU: Corsair AX650

This system handles anything I have thrown at it without breaking a sweat. I hope it helps your decision...

 

[bladexngt]

The Corsair Professional Series AX650 is a very nice power supply, but its expensive...:sneaky:

I use my primary system for pretty much the same as the OP, so here is my current config...

CPU: Intel Core i7 3770non-K @ 4,3GHz
Mainboard: ASUS P8Z77-V Deluxe
RAM: 8GB DDR3-1600
GFX: AMD Radeon HD7870 connected to 1440p display
Disks: 1x Samsung SSD-830 128GB system drive, 2x WD RE4 1TB in RAID1 + 1x 2TB Seagate Barracuda Green "scratch pad" drive
PSU: Corsair AX650

This system handles anything I have thrown at it without breaking a sweat. I hope it helps your decision...

Thank you, it does indeed help.

 

[T_Yamamoto]

I will not be doing a lot of editing, but I do have a lot that I need to catch up on. Its a hobby.

I chose that Mobo because of:
ASUS SSD Caching

I was originally looking at the non delux version.

Any z77 mobo has ssd caching

 

[BTRY B 529th FA BN]

wonder if a 6 core + ht will yield better results. have you checked?

 

[bladexngt]

Any z77 mobo has ssd caching

Hmm I didnt come across that when going through mobo reviews. Ill take another look. I have no problem going with a lower model of this Asus mobo.

 

[mfenn]

First, I think you need to adjust your expectations when it comes to what you can get on a $1000-1200 budget. The parts you've picked out thus far come to $1,129 and are nowhere near a fully functioning computer.

Check out this thread for a good $1000 starting point. If you want to take that PC to $1200 and beef up the editing prowess, double up on the 1TB HDDs and swap the CPU to an i7 3770K.

 

[bladexngt]

I realize that the price of the items that I looked at will constitute for a higher than budget price. I was looking for guidance from all of you in terms of how I can lower the overall price.
Thanks

 

[Insert_Nickname]

Check out this thread for a good $1000 starting point. If you want to take that PC to $1200 and beef up the editing prowess, double up on the 1TB HDDs and swap the CPU to an i7 3770K.

Personally I use the 3770non-K @ 4,3GHz. I don't think the extra cost is justified for the K version (unless you can get a good deal on it...). 4,3/4GHz seems to be the limit for ivy at stock voltage anyway. And you will properly have to factor in the cost of an after market cooler if you want to go higher...:hmm:

 

[lehtv]

Can you share the math for 4.3GHz on a 3770? Assuming that is for a single core and 4.0 for all four

3770K costs just 6.5% ($330 vs $310) more on newegg. I think it's a negligible difference and worth paying if you're overclocking as you avoid messing with BCLK and get the 4.3 OC for all four cores and more OC potential beyond that

 

[bladexngt]

So only do 3770K if I am interested in overclocking? Will I not see much gains from more cache and hyper threading?

 

[bladexngt]

So only do 3770K if I am interested in overclocking? Will I not see much gains from more cache and hyper threading?

Not sure what I was reading before, but it seems like all i7 3770 CPUs support both. In that case, is Overclocking the determinant factor?

 

[lehtv]

The fully unlocked clock multiplier is the only difference between 3770 and 3770K

 

[Insert_Nickname]

Can you share the math for 4.3GHz on a 3770? Assuming that is for a single core and 4.0 for all four

3770K costs just 6.5% ($330 vs $310) more on newegg. I think it's a negligible difference and worth paying if you're overclocking as you avoid messing with BCLK and get the 4.3 OC for all four cores and more OC potential beyond that

Ah, pics or it didn't happen...

I can tell you that here in Denmark the i7 3770K costs 35US$ more then the standard 3770...