Computer Specs

[Ti Moute]

Hello all,

 

Been a while since I have posted (went back to college).

Now that I am almost finished and I was Spammed to upgrade to V13 (and I will),

My old computer crashed about a week or so ago (crappy performance since I bought it 2 years ago) so I have one to just get by for college work (word processing, etc).

When I order a new computer, what specs are best for AM now.

I would prefer to either get a Mac that will boot also to windows but I don't know if I want to spend that much money. Feel free to change my mind because I would like to Final Cut Studio. (now you know why I am hesitant to get a mac...i already have the adobe products)

OK, so providing you with that info,

give me some of the best hardware to use with the current AM (amt of RAM, video card, and any conflicting hardware/software)

 

Thanks in advance.

 

Ti

[John Bigboote]

As much RAM as possible...

A:M works well with most any video card that has a lot of ram and a fast processor or two behind it.

 

If you are leary of an 'intel-mac', I can attest that A:M runs swift, smooth, and steady on the pc platform. Buy a name brand...Sony, Boxx, HP etc

[ddustin]

I can't comment about mac.

 

PC:

We use AMD primarily which render faster than Pentiums.

 

PCIexpress video card with 256Mb of memory.

2 Gb of RAM is an OK starting point, 4Gb would be a good target to shoot for.

 

Dual Hard drives 250 Gb each

 

Dual Monitors 17" minimum with 19's being an excellent choice.

 

No experience with Dual Core processors.

 

David

[Fuchur]

I can't comment about mac.

 

PC:

We use AMD primarily which render faster than Pentiums.

 

PCIexpress video card with 256Mb of memory.

2 Gb of RAM is an OK starting point, 4Gb would be a good target to shoot for.

 

Dual Hard drives 250 Gb each

 

Dual Monitors 17" minimum with 19's being an excellent choice.

 

No experience with Dual Core processors.

 

David

 

So, lets talk about the real question here:

Dont invest too much in the videocard (a mid-range is enough, for me my nvidia cards worked great, but there are some people which had problems with them) and try to get min 1 GB better 2 GB RAM and a fast AMD-processor...

 

Oh... and a big screen or even better two screens...

 

*Fuchur*

[Ti Moute]

As I mentioned before, I am looking for computer specs to enhance AM.

 

Some added information about the computers I currently own.

 

1-Systemax AMD Athlon 650 (with coprocessor not on the mother board) w/ 512 Ram and Oxygen vx32 video card and Win98

2-Everex Explora GS28 with AMD Sempron 2800 w/256 ram and built in video (work computer) and WinXPhome

3-Sony VAIO RZ45G P4-3.2G with hyperthreading w/1.5G ram and nVidia 5200 (never has worked correctly and crashed to the point of me wanting to take it hunting with me...I hate that computer) and WinMCE2003

4-HP Pavilion a1267c AMD 64 3800 w/1G ram and integrated ATI Radeon xpress 200 and WinMCE2005 (Ok but slow video) but it does have a slot for a video card

[MMZ_TimeLord]

Render Times in A:M are only PART of the performance issue with PCs. The other part is real time display of the models in shaded and wireframe modes.

 

Render Times for AMD Processors have been found to be shorter.

 

As to real time display... any fairly modern card that has good OpenGL drivers will work. The faster and more memory you have on the video card, the more complex of a scene you will be able to display at a good frame rate in real time in shaded mode with textures.

 

Main memory (RAM) will allow A:M to run without having to swap out to the hard drive and drag your system to a crawl. It will also allow you to have other applications open (Adobe Premier, Photoshop, etc.) at the same time without having to swap to the hard drive too.

 

My recommendations...

 

P4 at 3.0Ghz+ or an AMD Athlon64 at 2.0Ghz+

Minimum 1 GB of RAM (Preferrably DDR2)

GeForce FX 6000+ with 256 MB of RAM or ATI Radeon X550+ with 256 MB of RAM

Minimum of 80 GB hard drive (to store all those finished animation frames in TGA form)

 

Hope that helps... Cheers!

[SirSpectre]

My personal recomendation is

 

Asus A8N-SLI Premium Motherboard

AMD FX-57 or AMD64 4800+ Dual core (FX-60 if you really want a Ultra amazing computer and if you can afford it)

Nvidia 7800 PCIe (two of them in SLI if you can afford it)

2 GB of Corsair Low latency RAM (2-3-3-6 Timings) [Motherboard can Support 4 GB]

2x 250 GB SATA2 HDDs (RAID if you want but, meh)

Windows 64 bit edition <--I just upgraded to that, and with out changing any hardware, I gained significant performance on renders.

 

On the AMD CPUs, always remember to overclock them up a 100 Megahertz, they love it.

 

Now this setup is pretty pricy (prices based of Newegg.com)

Motherboard $210

FX-60 $850

Video card(s) $290 each

RAM $200

HDDs $80 each

 

Not including fans, case, Power supply (at least 550w) CD-drives, Monitors, other bling...

 

But I Guarantee that this sucker will crank out render times lightning quick.

 

Rob~

[Zaryin]

This is an interesting thread. These types of threads come up alot, but disappear quickly. I wish someone would pin this one so the info will stay and can be added to.

[SirSpectre]

Hello SirSpectre,

 

Have you spoken to an old senile man, who told you that he had an 8-bit, 4 mHz computer and upgraded to a 16-bit, 4 mHz and all of his 8-bit programs went faster?

 

On the other hand, if A:M uses CPUID and then changes asm-routines, I am more than happy to know about it.

 

 

Niels.

 

 

ps.

They do have a +5000

 

 

[EDIT] WINVERSION, would be easier, if it matters anyway, I do not claim to be a windows-programmer.

 

Running 32-bit applications in a 64-bit environment is a tricky thing. Windows developers created a built in Emulator, which turns out is accually more efficient that normal windows because it is 64 bit. Because of this, 32-bit apps are being crunched as 64-bit apps but are being displayed at 32-bit. I wont say that performance increases are with all applications, but it has been my experiance that many programs have the tendancy to run much faster. I have been doing benchmarking of some of my programs over the past few weeks and 32-bit applications in a 64 bit environment have seen anywhere from a 3%- 15% increase in performance.