New Computer..Advice needed

[werticus]

I don't understand why you'd buy a mac pro... in Australia those things cost 2x what such hardware should cost... especially if your just going to boot camp it there is zero point to getting a mac.

[horoXhoro]

I have all of the above mentioned running on win7 without any problem. If anything win 7 is a much more compatible vista so to speak. I did not experience issues of any kind when it came to installing software. Actually pretty happy with it and planning to make a full move to it shortly.

YEAa..Im using Windows 7 RC x64 is awesome. Definately better than Vistax64. so far so good crash free

[GLASS-CANVAS]

etown: just put windows7-x64 on it, works like a dream. all the windows 64-bit hardware drivers are available on the new snow leopard disk

to the OP: whatever you get, just go for as many processor cores as you can afford. for VRay 8x2.2GHz cores is vastly superior to 4x3GHz cores. And lots of RAM (which is cheap anyway)

[mdi]

yeah...dont buy a mac - there nice an all, but x2 the cost.

[muzzy]

is there any render benchmark comparision between Q6600 vs i920.

Is it worth the upgrade ?

[Mikokariadis]

For me it was worth it, I still have the "old" q6600 around and the i7 920 is almost twice the speed while rendering, plus it is the path to the i9 so you will be able to milk the platform a little further.

Though at this point I would be looking at those dual hexacores from amd had I not went with the i7. Unfortunatly the prospect for a motherboard that supports those and has more then one pcie (think future support for opencl) is not good at the moment.

[PDI]

I7 920

I upgraded from Quad Core to an I7, and the difference is huge.
Never used a Xeon so can't comment.

For price vs preformance, I would recommend the following.

MB: Aus P6t Delux
CPU: I7 920
MEM: 12 Gb Ram
GPU: Nvidia QuadroFX 580 <-- Allows for independent screen calibration
Case: Antec
PSU: Antec
Monitor: 2x 23" of your choice <--- Recommend Samsung P2370
OS: Any windows x64 operating system

I currently use this system. It enables me to render and still carry on modelling another scene with comfort.

Hope this helps.

[werticus]

i7-920 vs q6600, I have two machines of each and the i7's are consistently more than twice as fast... at a MINIMUM they are twice as fast and often more than twice as fast, sometimes significantly more (depending on the scene and ram use because I have 12gb in the i7 and only 8gb in the q6600)

Currently rendering an animation the q6600's are getting 17.5mins a frame the i7's are 8.5mins a frame. Neither is running out of ram.

Had another animation where the ram ran out during part of the animation the i7's were 5mins a frame vs 5 hrs :P But running out of ram will do that to you!

[peterguthrie]

I have a macpro octo machine (1st gen i think with ddr2 ram) and my i7 920 sometimes out-renders it. Its overclocked to 3.4ghz but the times when it does better than the mac pro are in RAM heavy scenes due to the speedy ddr3 ram.