More cores or faster speed or huge RAM?

[DArnaez]

Hi guys! I have a consultation. I'm planning to renew my old computer. I use 3DS Max 2017 with Vray 4.06. My current system is a humble (old)
- DELL Desktop Computer Precision T3500 Intel Core i7 1st Gen 950 (3.06 GHz) 12 GB 500 GB HDD Windows 10 Pro 64-Bit

And I tempted to buy a Newegg :
- Dell Precision T7910 Workstation, 2x Xeon E5-2620 v3 2.4GHz Six Core Processors, 128GB DDR4 Memory, 256GB SSD, NVIDIA Quadro K600, Windows 10 Professional 64-bit Installed

So from a Quad core 3.06 to more cores(I see another with 12 cores) but slower 2.4Ghz. I know that for rendering the ideal system is with a big RAM... but are more cores really important? ANy suggestions??

Another that I founded is a 2x Xeon E5-2643 v3 3.4GHz Six Core Processors, 128GB DDR4 Memory... How much energy consume 2 Xeon microprocessors 3.4Ghz? Any idea? Is it worth? or just a single mic with 6 cores and 128 Gb RAM is ok?

Thanks!!!

[cmjohncheng]

hi, u can check this 2 link
i7 950
https://benchmark.chaosgroup.com/nex...40+3.40GHz+x24

xeon E5 2643 v3
https://benchmark.chaosgroup.com/nex...%40+3.07GHz+x8

around 3000 vs 13000

2643 v3 much faster than ur original processor.

TDP 130W vs 135W x2(processor only)

[Muhammed_Hamed]

These older Xeons are terrible for single-threaded tasks, They were made back in 2013 ,what we have now in 2020 is much better tech in all respects
I would recommend looking at the new Ryzen CPUs ,you don't need to get a threadripper.. something like 3900X for example is pretty good!
Could equip it with 128 GB of RAM if your scenes are massive, and it offers cool features like 10G lanes, NVMe support and PCIe Gen 4

[Muhammed_Hamed]

I know that for rendering the ideal system is with a big RAM

Not really, as long as you don't run out of memory you are fine.. don't go for 128 GB unless your scenes require that
More RAM will not speed up your rendering

but are more cores really important? ANy suggestions??

It is more complicated than what you think
2x Xeon E5-2643 are 12-cores ,if you compare to a 3900X which is 12 cores as well
The 3900X is 35% faster in rendering and 90% faster in single threaded tasks
This is because the Ryzen CPU is clocked much higher, and it uses a better architecture
Even if you clock it down to 3 GHz, it is gonna be much faster than the Xeons.. because of the architecture advantage

So don't buy old hardware, it is not worth really. The Quadro you mentioned doesn't support newer drivers and will cause issues in most apps

[FritzBaass]

Like Muhammed said, I'd strongly recommend a newer architecture. The ryzen 3900x(t) is propably the sweat spot at the lower range budget builds. A huge improvement to your current system though. These old Xeon's are sort of okay to use as render nodes. But on a workstation it would occupy a lot of your time starring at the monitor waiting for the system to get ready for the next input.

If you don't know by now you're gonna use gpu rendering, you probably won't. For gpu rendering you have to change your way to set up scenes quite a bit. Think of it as a completely seperate renderer, though there is some compatibility between gpu and cpu rendering. But translating a scene from one to another isn't such an easy process. You could get a nvidia graphics card with 6 gb ram like a gtx 1660 and you're probably fine. Even a gtx 1650 could be an option if the budget is running short. Quadro's don't get you any advantage in 3ds max or vray at all.

More ram doesn't generally make your system faster. Only if your scenes are too big to fit into your ram it will impact your rendering speed dramatically. If you are using 12 gb ram at the moment getting 32 gb could be enough and 64 gb will be plenty in most common situations. Just make sure using the dual channel mode by sticking in at least two identical ram sticks. If there is more budget you could spent, always go for mor cpu cores. For example a ryzen 3950x is roughly 25% faster in rendering compared to a ryzen 3900x given that it comes with 25% more cores.

Since the b550 chipset is now available this could a good option for the mainboard.

[DArnaez]

Wow! Thank you so much for your advice! I think that I'm stuck on the time. LOL. Do you guys any recommendations for any offer or deal any place? I'm client of Newegg but if you suggest any specific system.. I'm open. ANother question that I have now that you propose to move to AMD instead of Intel. Year ago I read that a final render is not the same for a Intel and a AMD computer based chip. Is this true now? I mean will I have the same result render my old scenes in a AMD workstation? Thanks!! I will start my research about a Ryzen 3950x and see if I found a decent 64 Mb RAM for less $2000.

[Micha]

I would recommend looking at the new Ryzen CPUs ,you don't need to get a threadripper.. something like 3900X for example is pretty good!

Is the 3900X also good for multi GPU setups? I remember me that in the past Ryzen was not recommended. Is the experience now that the Ryzen works quite well too?

[Muhammed_Hamed]

Is the 3900X also good for multi GPU setups? I remember me that in the past Ryzen was not recommended. Is the experience now that the Ryzen works quite well too?

Hi Micha,
For more than 2 GPUs you will be running at x4 .. which is not enough for NVlink
If you don't care about NVlink, it is a descent option honestly .. few people are running 4 GPUs on the high end X570 boards

But I recommend Threadripper for 4 GPUs, specially if you will have NVlink.. you will be running at x8 or x16

[Muhammed_Hamed]

Year ago I read that a final render is not the same for a Intel and a AMD computer based chip. Is this true now?

You shouldn't worry about that, at my former employer we had mix of Intel and AMD render nodes, they worked just fine.
I think only once I have seen someone report a difference here on forum and he uploaded the scene to support(as this is not expected to happen)
For 2000 Euros, you could build a very cool machine

Here is a nice list of parts I usually use for my builds,

Aorus X570 master >> 350 Euros
Ryzen 9 3950X >> 700 Euros
Gskill TridentZ Neo 3600 CL16 4x16 >> 350 Euros
NZXT H710 >> 150 Euros
NZXT kraken X72 >> 150 Euros
Samsung 970 Evo 1TB >> 150 Euros
Seagate Barracuda 4 TB 7200 RPM >> 120 Euros
MSI RTX 2060 Super >> 400 Euros
Corsair 750 Watts 80+ Gold >> 120 Euros

This is about 2500 Euros, and it uses the 16-core Ryzen 9 (more than twice as fast as those Xeons you had above)
You can downgrade to the 12-core 3900X if you wanna stick to 2000 Euros

If you don't plan on building the system on your own, check out Maingear. They are quite good in my experience. Could give them a call, asking about the same specs

And if you have questions about the build, let me know.