PC Build Proposal/New PC user

[GammaRay]

Hi,

Editor transitioning over to 3D Animation and am making that my focus for the long term. Been using Apple for all previous work (editing, animation, color grading, design, etc.) I have started with Blender and will probably be using it for a while. I'm definitely a PC noob, but have learned quite a bit over the past few weeks. Budget is around $2500cdn, so looking to get a pretty powerful machine that can last me a good while. I have created a build using your builder, but have made a few modifications. Let me know what you think.

Potential Build

CPU - AMD Ryzen 9 3900x 3.8ghz 12-Core processor ($619, Newegg or amazon)
CPU Cooler - be quiet! Dark Rock Pro 4 ($117, Newegg)
Motherboard - Asus ROG Strix B550-F Gaming ($280, CC)
GPU - MSI GeForce RTX 2070 SUPER DirectX 12 RTX 2070 Super GAMING X 8GB 256-Bit GDDR6 PCI Express 3.0 x16 HDCP Ready SLI Support Video Card ($750, anywhere)
RAM - G.SKILL Ripjaws V Series 32GB (2x16gb) DDR4 SDRAM ($160, Newegg or CC)
Pcle-SSD - Sabrent Rocket 1TB NVMe Gen4 M.2 Solid State Drive ($280, amazon)
Power Supply - EVGA 650 B5, 80 Plus Bronze 650W Power Supply ($177, amazon)
Case - Fractal Design Define R5 Black ATX Mid Tower Case ($170, CC)
Total Cost: $2553-2600

I'm most worried about compatibility with the motherboard and everything fitting in the case because this will be my first PC build. Is there anywhere I could possibly save money? Does the number of RAM sticks make a difference? I have also read that it would be to my benefit to have an SSD and HDD to help compartmentalize storage...is there validity to that? Any advice helps! Thank you

 

[Alex Glawion]

The build is fully compatible and will perform nicely in your 3d workloads and other content creation workloads. The b550 Motherboard too is compatible with all current gen (and most likely upcoming gen) Ryzen AM4 CPUs, so no worries there!

With two RAM modules you can run those in dual channel mode, theoretically doubling your memory bandwidth, so I'd recommend keeping the two modules. On HEDT systems, with 4 modules you can even have them run in quad channel mode. This is not possible on mainstream systems though (like b550).

Concerning the Storage, personally I just find it nice to have multiple drives to easily separate my projects from my OS&Apps. Another benefit is that if the OS (windows) screws up your boot drive (which it sometimes does...) you risk also losing all of your project files when you have to reformat. Having your work-files (your money-stuff) on a separate drive just makes a lot of sense.

In addition, of course, if this is how you make a living, you should absolutely get an HDD for backing up / archiving your projects regularly.

The build looks great though! go for it

 

[GammaRay]

Thanks for confirming everything. And I will probably then get an HDD.

One last question, how powerful is this build as it is right now? For example if my animations started to get more complex, or I transition from blender to Maya or other more professional softwares. Just wanna get an idea of how much I'm going to be getting out of this build.

Thanks for all your help

 

[Alex Glawion]

It's very powerful. I wouldn't be recommending anything else for maya or c4d or 3dsmax. They all kind of work the same, and Blender needs just as much performance as other 3D Apps.