AMD 1950X Threadripper | Windows 10 64-bit | 16-Core 3.40 GHz | 272 FPS

[Esben Oxholm]

AMD Ryzen Threadripper 1950X 16-Core/32-Thread Processor 3.40 GHz

270-275 FPS

See exact build here: https://pcpartpicker.com/list/mdHr4C and read thoughts and suggestions prior buying and building the pc.

____________________________________________

Hi all.

My current system is starting to become a bottleneck for my production and I'm looking to build something somewhat powerful to help cut down on rendering time.

The workstation will mainly be used for KeyShot, Photoshop, After Effects and MODO.

So far I've put this together: https://pcpartpicker.com/list/2dmfQV
The cost is approximately what I have budgettet for.

Any thoughts on the setup? It's almost 15 years since I built my first computer, so I'm a bit rusty with all this technical stuff
Anything that you would have picked differently?
Do you have experience with something similar?

Thanks for the help!
Best,

[mattjgerard]

I was int he same boat 1 year ago when I left my job and went freelance. I walked into the local computer part place and gave them my budget of $2500 and told them to build something around the GTX1080 which just came out. I was going to be doing a lot of GPU rendering at the time. The nerds came crawling up and over the shelves and from underneath the displays to watch someone build a system with the budget that large, the guy said normally people start to complain about spending more the $600 on a PC build!

But, like you I knew next to nothing. It appears that nowadays, compared to 10 years ago, its pretty much all plug n play. Especially with sites like PC Parts picker that check for card clearances, compatibility, PSU requirements, etc. No guessing, just pick your specs and go with it. Being a mac guy for the past 15 years, I had never built a windows PC, i had repaired and beefed up countless Macs though. My 13 year old son and I built the PC and got windows up and running within 2 hours. It was crazy, like a big boy lego kit. Every thing just fit together. Was really fun. The process of loading drivers and other software took another couple hours, but I really didn't have any problems.

I would say, I would do different is build as much of the mother board (CPU, cooler, ram, etc) outside the case. I mounted my board first then proceeded to have to remove it twice because of routing cables, and whoops forgot to put the thermal paste on the CPU. Lesson learned.

I don't know much about the particular parts you picked, but I would really take a minute to research the warranties of the major parts. I had my motherboard die about 1 month ago, and it had a good warranty, Gigabyte repaired it and I had it back within 2 weeks. But, I was close to just buying another one since I had work waiting.

The other thing is that with those CPU's, I think you might have 4 channels of RAM slots available, and you would want to populate those 4 channels with one stick each, so you might be better off getting 4 sticks of 16 GB rather than the 2 of 32. I could be wrong on that , but from what I read that's the preferred way of doing it. I have 4 sticks of 8GB and works pretty well. I don't overclock or anything either, so I have air coolers as well.

have fun and keep us posted!

[Robb63]

Would the "AMD RYZEN Threadripper 1950X 16-Core /32" be a better/faster choice?

VS shows it being ahead of the Xeon...  https://versus.com/en/amd-ryzen-threadripper-1950x-vs-intel-xeon-e5-2660-v4

Not sure if you are wanting to stay all Intel or are OK with AMD?
The Threadripper is about $400 less per CPU, you could almost go to three CPU's at that price if they would fit in the case.

I'm no expert, but have been building a budget gaming rig for my son on PCpartspicker (not that I can afford the Threadripper), it's just how I became aware of it.

[Esben Oxholm]

Thanks for the insight and history, Matt!
I'll keep your assembly tips in mind and have an extra look on warranties and that RAM thing. Wether it is better to go with 4x16 instead of 2x32. Thanks for the heads-up. PC Part Picker is indeed super handy.

Thanks, Robb!
I've been looking a lot on the Threadripper 1950x. Not tied into any brand here.
The thing is that I want (and think I have budget) for something faster than what one Threadripper 1950x can give me. From what I've understand (and what pcpartpicker allows me to do) it is not possible to have two Threadrippers running in one setup. Can someone confirm or bust this?
Having two Threadripper 1950x's would be optimal I think.

[Speedster]

Hi Esben;
Why not talk to the folks at BOXX Technologies?  As you know, I have a 32 core BOXX, about five years old.  It came in at about double your budget, but that was then.  The main thing is that they spec against the latest and greatest technology, and build to your exact needs, rather than generic.  They're great to work with, and their build spec sheet would certainly help on your decisions. Also, it's fully warranted, a big deal with a big investment. Also, look into their RenderPro solutions.
Bill G

[Esben Oxholm]

Hi Esben;
Why not talk to the folks at BOXX Technologies?  As you know, I have a 32 core BOXX, about five years old.  It came in at about double your budget, but that was then.  The main thing is that they spec against the latest and greatest technology, and build to your exact needs, rather than generic.  They're great to work with, and their build spec sheet would certainly help on your decisions. Also, it's fully warranted, a big deal with a big investment. Also, look into their RenderPro solutions.
Bill G

Thanks for the suggestion, Bill.
I had a look at their system a while ago, but got the impression that they only shipped to US and Canada. Might have changed since.
From what I've seen so far I can get an significant amount of extra power by building it myself, which is why I haven't looked into it any further. The warranty is a big advantage, though. Will have a look again, thanks!

[DriesV]

Hey Esben

With that budget, it might be worhtwile looking at AMD Epyc as well.
http://www.amd.com/en/products/epyc-7000-series-2-socket-models

These CPUs are not released yet (as far as I know), but should be available anytime soon.
These server/workstation CPUs have the same pedigree as Threadripper and should offer excellent performance with very competitive pricing.

Definitely worth checking out.

Dries

[DriesV]

Also, would definitely do watercooling, and pick a NVMe SSD (e.g. Samsung 960 PRO NVMe M.2).
And I would do a different memory configuration as well, like 4 x 16 GB.

Dries

[designgestalt]

hello Esben,
no matter what you decide on, my suggestion would be to go for a prefab machine with a decent warranty and insurance!
I run my office for roughly twenty years and have a few years more work experience on my shoulder and I can tell you that I worked through quite a few machines!
there is nothing worse than having trouble with the hardware when you are in the middle of a project and time is pressing!
I had that more than just a few times!
when I have trouble I call the hotline and I have a replacement within 24h max!
on the expensive machines I even have a same-day-insurance
and I can tell you, this saved my butt for more than once!
I am sure you can get the machines I have quite a bit cheaper, but I sure do not have the time to run a diagnosis on what part failed and how I can fix this!
it is a different thing, when you set up a machine for your own use and when you want to run a business with it in my eyes!
this would be my two cents!
cheers
designgestalt

[mattjgerard]

Wow, I was wondering when the Threadripper chips would be doubled up. Its very early, and it appears that supermicro is the only ones with a motherboard out there, the rest are slated for q4 which could be soon, or 2 months away. That would be a killer machine, but also, its all new tech. So, how long wil they last? are they durable? Xeons have proven themselves to be fairly bulletproof, so there is that to consider as well.

The worst part of building my own machine was trusting what the sensors were telling me. I rarely hear my fans spin up which means they either don't need to or they aren't being controlled correctly. But I have the temp monitor window open most of the time I'm doing hardcore stuff, and they all seem to stay in line. Gigabyte has some great utilities to control temps and issue alerts if they go beyond the set parameters. My case is huge, and has 3 fans in the case and one on the CPU cooler, so I think I'm good

[MrTomB]

if your thinking of possibly overclocking it then you really will need to water cool it. That's what we do with ours and it runs pretty silently and faultlessly after a few initial hiccups due to faulty CPUs replaced under warranty

[MrTomB]

also, just one SSD is not enough for a workstation that really will get worked on heavily IMHO. Seriously consider 2 SSDs in RAID 1.

[mattjgerard]

Myself, being a dual OS user, but long time Mac user, OC'ing scares the bejeezus out of me. Too many horror stories in the early days of cooking CPU's because of a bubble in the WC pipe somewhere, or bumping the voltage a bit too high. I know its probably gotten a lot better, and I know a lot of the CPUs have internal thermal throttling now to prevent that sort of runaway damage, but yeah, still makes my skin crawl. 

But now that I've seen the Epyc specs, seems pretty promising for a render node or a workstation. Here at work, we have one NR setup that is slower than our local workstations. Its nice to offload, but if we would get a dual CPU Epyc setup, man that would be fun. Would be very tempting to remote in and use it for setup work too. Just think how fast that would region render cloudy plastic LED's with area lights behind them? Makes me giddy

[menizzi]

Build your own and stay away from boxx they are WAY overpriced. Everything is just plug and play these days. You can build a PC in two hours and if you are retarded and can't push stuff into slots because thats all it is and plugging in some cables well you can youtube how to build a computer.

1. who cares about warranty? Most parts are 3 years or more.
2. Even if a part failed that was out of warranty the amount of money thats being saved by building it yourself would most likely offset the cost of just buying another part.
3. When is the last time ANYONE had to rma a cpu? Really

If anything is going to fail it is going to be memory or the motherboard. But newegg and amazon offer warranties outside of what the manufacture offer so you can always go stupid with it. Shit you can also save big by buying CPU that are pulled from servers on ebay


Just my 2 cents

[Esben Oxholm]

Thank you all for your 2 cents!

I've gained some really valuable insights and perspectives that helps me to take a more enlightened choice.

I definitely see the benefit of buying something prefab in the sense that it should be more reliable and if it stops working (within the period of warranty) I have someone else to take care of it.

On the other hand, by building one myself I can get quite some more power for the money vs. the risk of spending a lot of hours troubleshooting if it stops working.

I've decided to take the 'risk' of still building my own setup, but to go with Threadripper 1950x instead of the intel E5's due to the amount of power vs. price. I know it is not good if it breaks down in the middle of a tight deadline, but I dare to rely on the render farms out there to save me, should it happen. It will anyway take at least a day or two to get a prefab replaced and I would have to use a render farm (or someone else's workstation) anyways. Also, for the money I save (compared to the first setup), I plan to build another Threadripper system to work as additional render power (over network rendering) and as a backup workstation.

This is the setup I plan to build: https://pcpartpicker.com/list/pwP3LD

Again, thank you all for you inputs. Much appreciated!
I'll keep you updated on the build and post benchmark here. Hopefully in 2-3 weeks.

Best,