Gaming / Video, 2D & 3D Design Build

SirBaz

SirBaz

SirBaz

Associate
Joined
9 May 2022
Posts
2
Location
United Kingdom
Hi Folks

It's been a while since I've upgraded or built a PC. My current build is showing its age a little bit, and I'd like to get with the times.

I'm looking to upgrade from the following spec which has been upgraded a few times with various components:

Windows 10 Pro
Intel Core i5 2500K
Asus P8Z68-V-GEN3 motherboard
16GB DDR3
GeForce GTX 1060 6GB
Crucial MX500 500GB SSD
Corsair RM850x 80 Plus Gold PSU

I'm looking for my new build to be future-proof for a few years, and for it to be able to handle some gaming, Adobe apps (Photoshop, Premiere etc for work), as well as some 3D modelling and use of Unreal Engine 5 comfortably.

My budget is around £1500, and I'm happy to reuse the Corsair PSU to save a bit of cash as it's quite a recent purchase.

Thanks for any help from the OCUK hive mind!
 
What resolution are you going for?

For CPU, I'd suggest a 12700 or 5900X.

For productivity stuff, you're usually better off with an nvidia card, but that will be decided by the resolution (and budget, of course).

You could keep the MX500 as a boot drive, if you're happy with that.
 
Tetras said:
What resolution are you going for?

For CPU, I'd suggest a 12700 or 5900X.

For productivity stuff, you're usually better off with an nvidia card, but that will be decided by the resolution (and budget, of course).

You could keep the MX500 as a boot drive, if you're happy with that.
Click to expand...
I've got two 4k LG monitors in dual screen which I'm quite happy with, but I'm not looking to game at 4k 60fps or anything (Not looking to break the bank).
 
12700/12700k/5900x and 3070ti or 3080 depending how flexible your budget, 32gb ddr4 3600mhz. Ddr5 is availible on intel but is much more expensive . Unfortunately Overclockers don't stock the 12700 so can't spec you on that

I would do some reserch to see if amd or intel is better for your work use,.
 
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mickyflinn said:
12700/12700k/5900x and 3070ti or 3080 depending how flexible your budget, 32gb ddr4 3600mhz. Ddr5 is availible on intel but is much more expensive . Unfortunately Overclockers don't stock the 12700 so can't spec you on that

I would do some reserch to see if amd or intel is better for your work use,.
Click to expand...
Looking at Google, seems like UE5 is very single threaded so an Intel 12700 would be ideal.

Op, Definitely get 32gigs of RAM and an Nvidia RTX GPU for RT and all the extra things supported by UE5.

Could be nice playing around with RT.

Not sure your budget quite covers a 3080 so maybe look at a 3070 or 3060 ti.
 
if using UE5, from what I've seen on UE5 website/content creation yt etc, you'll want 64gb ram min

I'm not a creator but was curious and read a few websites etc a little while ago, so take what I say with a grain of salt but, p*********s do high end builds for creators in the states...not linking as might break forum rules as they sell systems, so will paraphrase..more for showing diff aspects..ie, if doing shader work in UE5, best is threadripper as cpu intensive, as much ram as poss(128GB or 256GB) and gpu is rtx 3080(cpu more important than gpu)...if doing rendering then gpu more important so rtx 3090 with 5950X and 64gb ram. AS you put 3d modelling, then falls in latter category so GPU takes lead over cpu, so a 3080 would be a 15% uplift compared to a 3070ti(plus you get 2GB extra vram...uplift was based on article relating to UE4 overall performance so assuming scales similarly)
DDR5 can give a 7% boost in some instances, but downside is cost, esp if going 64GB ram. other issue is running 4 sticks ddr5 causes a fair amount of instability on Z690 boards, so if going that route get 2 sticks max, otherwise you'll prob have to lower the frequencies to make it stable. as budget £1500, I'd stick to DDR4

Below I was trying to prioritise GPU over cpu for UE5 modelling etc so put 64gb ram in, a 3080 and 12600K(cheaper than a 12700 and about 3% diff between them, and 12600k comparable to a 5900X for productivity, and cheaper than that too). The asus mobo one of the cheapest I could find that had a thunderbolt header on it for future expandability if you needed that. you can get creator boards with the thunderbolt ports on the back if you want but more expensive(though seeing as add on cards are expensive, if you need thunderbolt may be way to go). this board doesn't have wifi also..if you need it does come with it but up at £220, in which case prob go with different board, esp if you don't need thunderbolt
the zotac 3080 wasn't the cheapest, though fairly close, but came with a 5yrs warranty as opposed to 2yrs

Still need storage though. I'd suggest something like a firecuda 520 gen 4 drive for doing your project work on, which has good durability which I've seen range from £210 to £245 area. Would mean keeping your MX500 as your boot drive, and also keeping case and PSU.
Don't know how big your projects are etc, so could drop to a 1tb drive(gen 4 around £110 for decent one so saving £100)



Savings to be had to include ssd

dropping to a 3070ti saves £160 (zotac equiv with 5yrs warrant)
UE5 can run on lower ram amounts so could drop to 32gb, so saving £100 there..



My basket at OcUK:

Total: £1,517.06 (includes delivery: £11.10)​

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Guy below does builds/tests etc but more for creators...may ve worth a browse thru his vids​
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Craig_d1 said:
if using UE5, from what I've seen on UE5 website/content creation yt etc, you'll want 64gb ram min

I'm not a creator but was curious and read a few websites etc a little while ago, so take what I say with a grain of salt but, p*********s do high end builds for creators in the states...not linking as might break forum rules as they sell systems, so will paraphrase..more for showing diff aspects..ie, if doing shader work in UE5, best is threadripper as cpu intensive, as much ram as poss(128GB or 256GB) and gpu is rtx 3080(cpu more important than gpu)...if doing rendering then gpu more important so rtx 3090 with 5950X and 64gb ram. AS you put 3d modelling, then falls in latter category so GPU takes lead over cpu, so a 3080 would be a 15% uplift compared to a 3070ti(plus you get 2GB extra vram...uplift was based on article relating to UE4 overall performance so assuming scales similarly)
DDR5 can give a 7% boost in some instances, but downside is cost, esp if going 64GB ram. other issue is running 4 sticks ddr5 causes a fair amount of instability on Z690 boards, so if going that route get 2 sticks max, otherwise you'll prob have to lower the frequencies to make it stable. as budget £1500, I'd stick to DDR4

Below I was trying to prioritise GPU over cpu for UE5 modelling etc so put 64gb ram in, a 3080 and 12600K(cheaper than a 12700 and about 3% diff between them, and 12600k comparable to a 5900X for productivity, and cheaper than that too). The asus mobo one of the cheapest I could find that had a thunderbolt header on it for future expandability if you needed that. you can get creator boards with the thunderbolt ports on the back if you want but more expensive(though seeing as add on cards are expensive, if you need thunderbolt may be way to go). this board doesn't have wifi also..if you need it does come with it but up at £220, in which case prob go with different board, esp if you don't need thunderbolt
the zotac 3080 wasn't the cheapest, though fairly close, but came with a 5yrs warranty as opposed to 2yr
Click to expand...

I've dabbled with UE4, UE5 and creator software and my impression is that what you need is very much dependent on the kind of projects you make and once you hit those ceilings you'll know it, because it'll crash, or slow to a crawl, to the point you want to throw your computer out of the window. But, if you build a workstation PC now, with the intention of coping with every eventuality and production workloads for the next 5 - 10 years, it will get extremely expensive, very fast.

My thoughts are to just go with a regular desktop system that makes the best of what is available right now and if the OP gets very serious and starts doing professional level work, they'll be able to make the cost/benefit analysis from a completely different perspective. Unlike UE4, UE5 is fairly recent and it will be intended to last quite awhile, so to really max out UE5 development that's quite hard to do with current consumer hardware, without spending a fortune, so I'd go down the modest hardware route and step up, if and when necessary. Something like a 12700 or 5900X will be a massive upgrade to what the OP is using (or the step down for 64GB like you suggest), so I'd hope it'll be alright for the time being.
 
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