Proposed new build
Posted: Sat Nov 10, 2012 9:22 pm
I don't have any vendors for the parts yet because I'm waiting for prices to go down, and also for some new options to come to light.
I'm looking at a Xeon build, which will be used with both Pro Tools 10, Adobe Premiere Pro, and maybe some light Photoshop/Lightroom usage. Photoshop/Lightroom are only a maybe because I tend to do most of that work on my laptop with an external drive, rather than my desktop. I'm a TV/Digital Media major, with a concentration in Production, so I do a lot of HD Video editing (720p and 1080p), and with Pro Tools I do demo recording for bands, as well as having this system to match a Pro Tools system that I will be working with on campus, so I can transfer sessions back and forth, which is why I need something a bit more demanding.
http://ark.intel.com/products/65726/Int ... e-3_50-GHz
http://www.gigabyte.com/products/produc ... id=4281#sp
Those are the two important parts of the build, 77W CPU and a motherboard with dual Thunderbolt ports. I'm looking to condense all of my current external drives (7 total) down to 3. One just for scratch disk use, another only for personal data storage, and a third specifically for use with my laptop. I already have Thunderbolt on my 2011 MacBook Pro, which I use with a Blackmagic Intensity Extreme and Premiere Pro. I use a FW800 bus powered external drive for scratch data currently.
Because it's mATX, I have a lot of flexibility, but I plan to use:
Silverstone PS07B
Scythe Ninja 3 (If I can find one)
Antec HCG-400W
8GB DDR3 Samsung 30nm Low Profile (may end up buying 16gb if it's cheaper, but I don't run into problems with 8gb right now)
Western Digital 300GB Velociraptor
I have a Western Digital 640GB drive with my music, and other various backups that I access often that will also be put in.
For fans, I'm looking at Scythe Slip Streams, or Noctua fans, with ULNA adapters.
As far as a GPU, I currently have a pair of ATI 4850's I could use, but I will likely transfer my nVidia GTX260 if I need any more than the integrated GPU. I have a pair of Acer S211HL-BD monitors that I absolutely love. My audio interface is an M-Audio ProFire 2626, my video capture device is the Blackmagic Intensity Extreme, as mentioned before. I will end up getting a PCI-E x1 FW card for the 2626 and external drives.
Because Pro Tools includes a driver for read/write support to HFS+ drives, I don't need to worry about the formatting, I have never had a problem with it before. My MacBook Pro's external 500gb drive is formatted HFS+ because I had nothing but problems when I tried using it with NTFS formatted drives. I did enable NTFS support, but some updates likely started the problems with that.
Finally, I will say that if I'm able to go for an ITX build I probably will, as well as look into an external Thunderbolt connected GPU, so I can have it enabled/in use only when I need it. Overall I'm looking to have a lot of power on tap to keep the bigger projects under control. My current setup does take a long time to load Pro Tools 10, and most importantly, lacks thunderbolt and USB3.0. While USB3.0 is the easy fix, Thunderbolt is not something I can just add easily, and most of my devices will be taking that turn rather quickly, as it's easier for me to work on much faster transfer protocols.
I'm not interested in going SSD just yet, I know they're getting much better than they used to be, and I have an SSD in two laptops right now, but they're both cloud based, so they have next to no internal storage being used, aside from the OS.
If anyone has any comments or knows of better motherboards or options to go for, by all means, I'm not looking to actually buy the system for another couple months probably. Ideally, I'd like a physically smaller computer, which is why ITX is what I'd like, but mATX would be fine if that's all I can find. First and foremost, I need power, but the power is not to come at a cost of high power draw. Even at medium to high usage, I'd like to keep the power usage and heat down, which is why I opted for the 77W CPU.
I already purchased Windows 8 Pro, and will be holding off installing it until I get a new machine.
Thanks in advanced!
I'm looking at a Xeon build, which will be used with both Pro Tools 10, Adobe Premiere Pro, and maybe some light Photoshop/Lightroom usage. Photoshop/Lightroom are only a maybe because I tend to do most of that work on my laptop with an external drive, rather than my desktop. I'm a TV/Digital Media major, with a concentration in Production, so I do a lot of HD Video editing (720p and 1080p), and with Pro Tools I do demo recording for bands, as well as having this system to match a Pro Tools system that I will be working with on campus, so I can transfer sessions back and forth, which is why I need something a bit more demanding.
http://ark.intel.com/products/65726/Int ... e-3_50-GHz
http://www.gigabyte.com/products/produc ... id=4281#sp
Those are the two important parts of the build, 77W CPU and a motherboard with dual Thunderbolt ports. I'm looking to condense all of my current external drives (7 total) down to 3. One just for scratch disk use, another only for personal data storage, and a third specifically for use with my laptop. I already have Thunderbolt on my 2011 MacBook Pro, which I use with a Blackmagic Intensity Extreme and Premiere Pro. I use a FW800 bus powered external drive for scratch data currently.
Because it's mATX, I have a lot of flexibility, but I plan to use:
Silverstone PS07B
Scythe Ninja 3 (If I can find one)
Antec HCG-400W
8GB DDR3 Samsung 30nm Low Profile (may end up buying 16gb if it's cheaper, but I don't run into problems with 8gb right now)
Western Digital 300GB Velociraptor
I have a Western Digital 640GB drive with my music, and other various backups that I access often that will also be put in.
For fans, I'm looking at Scythe Slip Streams, or Noctua fans, with ULNA adapters.
As far as a GPU, I currently have a pair of ATI 4850's I could use, but I will likely transfer my nVidia GTX260 if I need any more than the integrated GPU. I have a pair of Acer S211HL-BD monitors that I absolutely love. My audio interface is an M-Audio ProFire 2626, my video capture device is the Blackmagic Intensity Extreme, as mentioned before. I will end up getting a PCI-E x1 FW card for the 2626 and external drives.
Because Pro Tools includes a driver for read/write support to HFS+ drives, I don't need to worry about the formatting, I have never had a problem with it before. My MacBook Pro's external 500gb drive is formatted HFS+ because I had nothing but problems when I tried using it with NTFS formatted drives. I did enable NTFS support, but some updates likely started the problems with that.
Finally, I will say that if I'm able to go for an ITX build I probably will, as well as look into an external Thunderbolt connected GPU, so I can have it enabled/in use only when I need it. Overall I'm looking to have a lot of power on tap to keep the bigger projects under control. My current setup does take a long time to load Pro Tools 10, and most importantly, lacks thunderbolt and USB3.0. While USB3.0 is the easy fix, Thunderbolt is not something I can just add easily, and most of my devices will be taking that turn rather quickly, as it's easier for me to work on much faster transfer protocols.
I'm not interested in going SSD just yet, I know they're getting much better than they used to be, and I have an SSD in two laptops right now, but they're both cloud based, so they have next to no internal storage being used, aside from the OS.
If anyone has any comments or knows of better motherboards or options to go for, by all means, I'm not looking to actually buy the system for another couple months probably. Ideally, I'd like a physically smaller computer, which is why ITX is what I'd like, but mATX would be fine if that's all I can find. First and foremost, I need power, but the power is not to come at a cost of high power draw. Even at medium to high usage, I'd like to keep the power usage and heat down, which is why I opted for the 77W CPU.
I already purchased Windows 8 Pro, and will be holding off installing it until I get a new machine.
Thanks in advanced!