What Render Machine Could I Spec Better Than This for Under 3K

[Robb63]

I'm looking at building a stand alone render machine for several users to send Keyshot files to strictly for rendering. I've built this config on pcpartpicker.com, and would appreciate some feedback on perhaps a better way to go.

My requirements are...
1. I need to keep this build under 3K
2. It will need to be on our network
3. We will be using it for renderings mostly, but will also be sending it some product animations[/li][/list]


Here'sthe proposed build... http://pcpartpicker.com/user/Robb63/saved/f2qtt6

Thanks for any help!

[TpwUK]

Hi Rob, I would be tempted to swap a couple of parts and drop one too. The part I would drop is the NIC, your motherboard choice has two already built on. I would consider the i7-5820K on an Asus x99-A. That chip and motherboard combination is very easy to over-clock with liquid cooling a fellow KS user recently upgraded to that combination and gets over 140fps with his CPU OC'd to 4.7Ghz redering at 58c with the camera benchmark. With the money saved, you could add an M2 SSD on the Asus motherboard for either super fast launch times or have it as a network drive for extremely quick data load times .

[Robb63]

Hi TpwUK,
Thanks for responding. Sorry for not replying sooner! I've made some adjustments based on your recommendations (hopefully I made the right choices?). My build is now down to $1800, so I've got about $1200 more to play with.

Currently, If I read things right I've got 12 cores for Keyshot to render with. If i want to upgrade that to 24 cores is it as simple as adding another motherboard and CPU into the tower? Are additional components needed?

[Chad Holton]

Must be nice to have $1200k left to spend! 

If it were me, I would jump to the i7 8 core processor (16 threads) and over-clock.

When you start talking dual cpu motherboards, the prices go way up and may be out of reach. You pay extra for the Xeon processors since they're server class. I heard you can add dual i7's to these boards if the sockets match (to save money) but not sure that HT would be possible which would make the upgrade to a dual CPU MB pointless. 

[Robb63]

Thanks for the input Chad.
If I switch to the "Intel Core i7-5960X 3.0GHz 8-Core Processor", I'm at $2,285 Which will be much easier to get final approval on than if I crank it all the way up to $3K
I just want to be sure we are gong to see much better render speeds than we are currently getting with our Dell M6800 laptops (i7-4710mq 2.5Ghz)

Config Below
http://pcpartpicker.com/user/Robb63/saved/#view=tP2XsY

[Chad Holton]

I did a quick scan over your build and noticed you have an air cpu cooler. If you're planning on overlocking,  I would highly recommend using a water cooling system like the CORSAIR Hydro Series H105 or equivalent. Just be sure you are able to mount it to your case.  I had used air on a previous build and couldn't overclock it much at all. On my last build, I went with water cooling and like it so much more.

Your current setup doesn't look bad at all but think you could almost have double the speed out of the box (before overclocking).

[Robb63]

Thanks Chad, I switched the config to a water cooler. I have liquid cooling in my personal BOXX computer and it's been running perfectly for four years now.
Are you saying that you think this config will give us about double the speed of our Dell's?
Anything you'd do differently with the same budget?

http://pcpartpicker.com/user/Robb63/saved/#view=mDb7YJ

[Chad Holton]

No prob, Rob! The HD seems a bit small but assume you're using a file server for storage?

What KS benchmark FPS are you seeing now on the Dells?

[Robb63]

Yep, this would strictly be a render machine, all files would be on our server.

Currently our Dell's are maxing out at 58.1 FPS on the benchmark camera scene

[Chad Holton]

That's not bad for a 2 year old (?) laptop. Check this out, if you haven't already: https://www.keyshot.com/forum/index.php?topic=9023.0

That benchmark was using v5 and v6 is faster. I'm guessing if you OC to 4.4 GHz, you would see around 150+ FPS and be doing circles around the old laptop.

[Robb63]

Would a used server (or two) be a better way to go? Something like one of these units...

http://www.ebay.com/itm/HP-DL580-G7-4x-2-26GHz-X7560-32-Cores-32GB-RAM-4x-146GB-2-5-HD-512MB-FBWC-/182046807562?hash=item2a62d5d60a:g:1NoAAOSwDuJWu1St

If this makes more sense than a Desktop PC, can the Network Render add-on run on Linux, or do we need to buy/run Windows Server?

[Robb63]

Well, we dived in yesterday and bought four of these systems....

http://www.ebay.com/itm/HP-DL380-G6-2x-Xeon-X5670-2-93GHz-Hex-Core-72gb-8x-146gb-2x-750w-/371650039560?

We will have 48 physical Xeon cores for about $1500. I talked to the guy who sells these, and he builds and test them all before sending them out. I actually bought the fourth machine as a backup/parts machine, but if all four units work on arrival I'd like to get them all rendering for us.

If these allow hyperthreading (and I think they do), I'd like to do that. To do this, I would need to upgrade from 32 Network Render cores to 96. Does hyperthreading actually double the speed, or is it 150% faster, etc..?
Knowing the increase would certainly let me justify the ROI of upgrading.

I'll keep the thread posted on how these older servers work out.

[Will Gibbons]

Well, we dived in yesterday and bought four of these systems....

http://www.ebay.com/itm/HP-DL380-G6-2x-Xeon-X5670-2-93GHz-Hex-Core-72gb-8x-146gb-2x-750w-/371650039560?

We will have 48 physical Xeon cores for about $1500. I talked to the guy who sells these, and he builds and test them all before sending them out. I actually bought the fourth machine as a backup/parts machine, but if all four units work on arrival I'd like to get them all rendering for us.

If these allow hyperthreading (and I think they do), I'd like to do that. To do this, I would need to upgrade from 32 Network Render cores to 96. Does hyperthreading actually double the speed, or is it 150% faster, etc..?
Knowing the increase would certainly let me justify the ROI of upgrading.

I'll keep the thread posted on how these older servers work out.

Hey Rob! This seems like an insane deal. I can't wait to hear how this ends up working. Yes, as far as I know, hyperthreading will double your cores and there's a linear relationship between core count and render speed. I'm interested in learning about what else is required (either in elbow grease or money) to get this system up and running. I'd be interested in that... at $15.62 per core (0.o)

[Robb63]

Hey Will, The systems will arrive Monday. It will take IT a couple of days to get it set up (that will drive me crazy).
In addition to the systems, we did have to buy 4 windows licenses (4 x $65), and we had bought a 32 core Network render license recently, but will probably be upgrading that to a 96 core license to support the 48 cores with hyperthreading (96 cores). We already have the server racks in IT so they will just slot in the cool room they have there.

The Xeon chips are a few generations old (Which is why we can afford to buy them like this), but we are currently rendering on our Dell M6800 laptops with i7 chips, and 8 cores so I'm pretty sure we are looking at a major render boost!! 

I'll keep the thread updated as we play with this setup.

[guest84672]

Keep in mind that a virtual core adds about 30% in performance gain. KeyShot is utilizing this gain at 100%, so you get the full 30% performance improvement. Hope this makes sense.