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Computer recommendations?

crifmer_a3ace2ba16crifmer_a3ace2ba16 Posts: 37
edited December 1969 in New Users

Forgive me if this is posted elsewhere... I tried a couple cursory searches, but didn't find much.

I'd like to purchase a PC to use as a dedicated rendering machine. Right now I'm doing everything on my laptop, and while I don't mind letting it render overnight, I kinda need it during the day/evening, so there's only so much time I can afford my renders. If I had even one PC for rendering, this wouldn't be an issue.

I'd like something inexpensive with a 64-bit operating system. Otherwise I'm open to suggestion. My laptop is an Intel Core i7 2.30GHZ with 8GB of ram and standard Intel HD 4000 graphics. It does the job, but renders take 8-16 hours, sometimes MUCH longer. I'm okay with this if all the machine is doing is rendering. I'd like faster renders, but I don't really have a deadline so I'm okay with waiting.

My question is what would be a good tradeoff of power vs economy? Obviously the above specs work for me, but maybe I can get something a bit more powerful. I bought the laptop about 5 years ago.

Any suggestions for specs or where to buy? I don't even know where to look for the good deals these days. I'm looking around on Tiger Direct and Overstock, but I don't even know what's good. Let's call the budget $300-600. Could maybe be a little more, but I'm looking for inexpensive just to have something rendering constantly in the background. Oh, and I plan on sticking with 3Delight for the foreseeable future, if that helps. I'm waiting until iRay is out of beta.

Thanks.

Comments

  • Richard HaseltineRichard Haseltine Posts: 102,770
    edited December 1969

    Rendering in DAZ Studio? If so, have you looked at the new beta with iray (or at least some of the show your Iray render threads) to get an idea of whether you want to use that or to stick with 3Delight (or use LuxRender via the reality plugin for Poser or DS, or via Luxus)? Do you want an alternative laptop, or would you be willing to look at a desktop (which might give you more power for less money)? Do you have a budget?

  • crifmer_a3ace2ba16crifmer_a3ace2ba16 Posts: 37
    edited December 1969

    I mentioned above I'm looking in the $300-600 range. I should have clarified that I don't need another laptop. A desktop is just fine since it'll just be sitting in my studio rendering its processor off.

    I'm perfectly okay with 3Delight (in Daz Studio). I'm doing a fantasy webcomic and don't need realism. I like the nice but video-gamey style I'm getting out of it. Hopefully soon I'll be able to post a few renders from that - I need to re-render everything with gamma correction (I just learned about gamma correction). To be honest, I"d rather stick with what I know than go through the hassle of relearning stuff to use iray. I'd like to not say the phrase "why isn't this working?" again anytime soon.

    I'm just looking for something affordable to get a render farm started. Like a decent economy car, I just need something to get me where I'm going. Hopefully down the line I'll have the money for more powerful stuff to give me faster renders. Right now I"m just doing this for a fun hobby, so I don't need much.

  • mjc1016mjc1016 Posts: 15,001
    edited April 2015

    crifmer said:
    I mentioned above I'm looking in the $300-600 range. I should have clarified that I don't need another laptop. A desktop is just fine since it'll just be sitting in my studio rendering its processor off.

    I'm perfectly okay with 3Delight (in Daz Studio). I'm doing a fantasy webcomic and don't need realism. I like the nice but video-gamey style I'm getting out of it. Hopefully soon I'll be able to post a few renders from that - I need to re-render everything with gamma correction (I just learned about gamma correction). To be honest, I"d rather stick with what I know than go through the hassle of relearning stuff to use iray. I'd like to not say the phrase "why isn't this working?" again anytime soon.

    I'm just looking for something affordable to get a render farm started. Like a decent economy car, I just need something to get me where I'm going. Hopefully down the line I'll have the money for more powerful stuff to give me faster renders. Right now I"m just doing this for a fun hobby, so I don't need much.

    In that case just about any modern CPU (quad core or better, preferred) and as much memory as can possibly fit on the motherboard.

    This is an off-lease machine, but I would probably buy it for that kind of use...

    http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=9552652&CatId=2627

    I'd also ditch two of the included 2 GB sticks of RAM and drop in a pair of 4 GB sticks to up it to 12 GB. And probably drop in a low to mid ($100 range) Nvidia video card. Both of those would still be under the $600 mark. 8 GB of RAM should be around $100 for that machine.

    Or something like this...

    http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=4959030&CatId=114

    I'd probably pull the CPU and go with this one instead...

    http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=4904562&CatId=11857

    Of course, if you can bump the budget up a little you can get something like this...

    http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=9179708&CatId=114

    With an extra 8 GB of RAM.

    Post edited by mjc1016 on
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