First Build any tips appreciated

jiw123

jiw123

jiw123

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19 Dec 2013
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I've decided to make the leap and build myself a pc my budget is roughly £1000, less would be nice though. I need it mostly to run CAD and CAE software (3D design rendering and engineering strength test etc). I'd also like it to be good for photo editing and some gaming...mostly for the CAD and CAE though.

  • monitor -dell 23" -owned
  • hdd-750gb western digital black 2.5" hdd-owned
  • processor-AMD Piledriver FX-8 Eight Core 8350 Black-£149.99
  • mb-Asus Sabertooth 990FX R2.0 AMD 990FX (Socket AM3+)- £139.99
  • memory- Corsair Vengeance Blue 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-15000C9 1866MHz Dual Channel Kit £89.99
  • graphics Gigabyte Radeon R9 280X Rev2.0 WindForce 3X OC 3072MB GDDR5 £269.99
  • psu Corsair CS750M 750W Semi-Modular 80+ GOLD Certified Power Supply-£95.99
  • case NZXT Phantom Enthusiast USB3.0 Full Tower Case - Orange/Black £104.99
  • ssd Corsair Force LS Series 120GB 2.5" SATA 6Gb/s Solid State Hard Drive £79.99
  • thermal compound Arctic Silver 5 Thermal Compound (3.5g) £8.99 (Do I need this if I'm using the stock cooler?)
  • keyboard/mouse Logitech Wireless Combo MK520 £35.00
  • Microsoft office £8.95
  • os windows 8.1 pro £49.99
  • bluray r/w LG BH16NS40 16x SATA Internal BDRW £73.99
Total cost £1,107.85

I'm getting the software through work which is why it's cheap but everything else is priced of the website. Is there anything I've missed for my build? any components that don't work together or I should swap for something else? I've gone amd as it seems cheaper for same if not better spec but if I'm making an error there let me know I don't have a problem with Intel/ nvidia at all. Thanks :)
 
Welcome,

It looks a pretty good start though i have some advice..

First off, get the 8320, the 8350 ISN'T worth the extra money over the 8320. They perform equally and can be overclocked to be exactly the same (performance wise) with no effort.

Get an aftermarket cooler, those chips run hot under high loading (which you may achieve) and the stock cooler will drive you crazy (the noise).

Really for CAD work, you'd want 16GB of RAM and a Nvidia gPU of CUDA rendering.

This is the main PC parts you'll need:

YOUR BASKET
1 x MSI Geforce GTX 770 Gaming Edition 2048MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card £269.99
1 x TeamGroup Vulcan RED 16GB (2x8GB) DDR3 PC3-17100C11 2133MHz Dual Channel Kit (TLD316G2133HC11ADC01) £129.95
1 x AMD Piledriver FX-8 Eight Core 8320 Black Edition 3.50GHz (Socket AM3+) Processor - Retail £119.99
1 x Gigabyte 990FXA-UD3 AMD 990FX (Socket AM3+) DDR3 Motherboard £99.95
1 x Corsair Carbide 300R Mid Tower Windowed Case - Black (CC-9011017-WW) £78.95
1 x Samsung 120GB SSD 840 EVO SATA 6Gb/s Basic - (MZ-7TE120BW) £74.99
1 x SuperFlower Golden Green HX 550W "80 Plus Gold" Power Supply - Black £59.99
1 x Prolimatech Black Megahalems CPU Cooler £49.98
1 x Corsair SP120 Performance Series High Pressure - Dual Pack (CO-9050008-WW) £23.99
Total : £922.76 (includes shipping : £12.50).



Red colour scheme too. :)

EDIT: this is an interesting read: http://www.behardware.com/art/imprimer/880/
 
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Hi, just take your time and anything your not sure of there's plenty of info on the net. Make note's if need be and build in stage's and them double check it.

Keep the mobo manual handy to make sure you put the ram in the right slots and cable's in the right connectors on the mobo.

Before you power up, take a little break them just a quick check to see if everything is ok, power up.

Best of luck,
Oldphart.:)

PS - Don't use cheap screw drivers and use the right size so it does not slip and damage the screw head.
 
Doomedspeed said:
Really for CAD work, you'd want 16GB of RAM and a Nvidia gPU of CUDA rendering.
Click to expand...

Is this true OP? Consumer AMD GPUs are far stronger in compute performance than Nvidia (other than the Titan). What support for GPUs does your software have? It may only support workstation hardware for example (with eye-watering prices).
 
As Joe (three time) said, it depends entirely on the program whether its CUDA or compute..

As far as i know most rendering programs prefer CUDA and most Stress benifit from compute. Though Nvidia does also compute (not as well as AMD though), where as AMD doesn't do CUDA.. Thats why i went Green. :)
 
Thanks for all the help guys I'll do some reading on the new parts you mentioned but does look a better compromise than my first attempt :) I take it you agree it's not worth going the intel route?

Shipping isn't a problem I live 20mins from the OC shop so I'm happy to pick stuff up.

joeyjojo said:
Is this true OP? Consumer AMD GPUs are far stronger in compute performance than Nvidia (other than the Titan). What support for GPUs does your software have? It may only support workstation hardware for example (with eye-watering prices).
Click to expand...

I don't think it will require workstation hardware (I'd never heard of it before though so I will check). I've been running it on my ancient laptop. Intel core duo T4300 2.1Ghz, 4gb ram, ati radeon hd4570, the 750 wd black hdd mentioned above, and it does run, just, however it requires leaving to make a cup of tea whilst it does any form of load analysis or if it's anything really substantial leaving over night. I'm running AutoCad2013/ Inventor2013, UGS NX 7.5 and potentially in the near future ProE if that helps any but the specs on there website are fairly low which isn't entirely helpful.

PS good tip about the screwdrivers, I know the cost of cheap tools as you might of guessed I'm an engineer by trade but started as a mechanic!
 
Haha np it does look a nice case especially the black/white version, guess it depends how many pennies I manage to scrape together between now a purchase day for things like that!

Don't think I've ever done so much research for anything outside of work and university in my life.
 
jiw123 said:
I'm running AutoCad2013/ Inventor2013, UGS NX 7.5 and potentially in the near future ProE if that helps any but the specs on there website are fairly low which isn't entirely helpful.
Click to expand...

AutoCAD 13 seems to favour Nvidia (see here and here).
Inventor surprisingly is the opposite, AMD win.
Pro/E seems to like AMD, but data are scant.

I'd go for a GTX 780 or R9 290X (the former is better in AutoCAD, the latter in Inventor), but anything you get will be a gigantic improvement over that laptop!
 
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Thanks that's really interesting, I'd never of guessed from the specs alone that Nvidia would have such a performance gain. I don't understand why ProE would be different from Autodesk, likewise with Inventor. From the bench marking either will clearly do what I need but as they're the same cost near enough Nvidia does seem the way to go.

I'm surprised by how much difference there is in cost between workstation and gaming cards, I don't really get why there's much difference between the cards, suppose if your designing for appearance the accuracy of the graphics card is very important. I work with engines so aesthetics doesn't really come into it. I mostly use CAD/CAE for component strength testing etc before prototype. Correct me if I'm wrong but I'd of thought the CPU did all the stress/deflection/buckling type calculations so the precision would come from that not the GPU?

Ps I know the laptop is a shocker...insert usual student type excuses here
 
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jiw123 said:
I'm surprised by how much difference there is in cost between workstation and gaming cards, I don't really get why there's much difference between the cards
Click to expand...

The newer article on one of the above links says it all:

However, using a card that is not certified is often not an option for professional users. If you need reliability or the additional features found in workstation cards or their drivers - such as double precision computing or ECC video memory - there really is no substitute for a high quality workstation card.
Click to expand...
http://www.pugetsystems.com/labs/articles/AutoDesk-AutoCAD-2014-Professional-GPU-Acceleration-504/

On top of the above I imagine the certification gives you a bit of cover in case things go wrong. Imagine what would happen if a firm used a gaming GPU to design a bridge that collapsed, and were found to have bought gaming GPUs over workstation ones to cut corners...
 
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I don't know for a fact but I'd be astonished if the GPU did any of the actual stress calculations I suspect that is all done by the CPU. I think the improved precision is more from an aesthetics point of view, that is to say the 3D imagery looks much closer to the real thing. For that I can imagine the extra precision being really useful especially on large highly detailed drawings.

Any reputable engineering firm will preform a sanity check on the calculations to check they seem reasonable no one blindly trusts what the computer chucks out (I hope, it'd certainly get me fired!). The level of precision they are talk about would get lost in the tolerances of most calculations for strength etc outside of extreme engineering like F1 cars at anyrate (and I suspect even then) anyway. I think the increased cost is probably the relatively low volume of sales and the fact most business won't really notice a couple of hundred quid.
 
I think you're probably right. Maybe save some monies and go for a 760 or 270X? If their gaming performance is good enough for you. Other than that Doomedspeed's build looks good.
 
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