Rig recommendations? for rendering

[alfromcal]

Can anyone recommend me a rendering rig under $1400 budget? I am looking to use this for rendering purpose - thus, more threads/core? A friend recommended dual Xeon, but due to the budget, I dont think I can afford it.

- i7? 12 GB memory? Bigger HD? Mobo?


Thanks!
Al

[RickyTick]

Dual Xeon's will take up half your budget, and Gulftowns are even more.

Would you be interested in the AMD 6 core processors? They recently reduced some of their prices.

Have a look at this.


Case (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811119194) COOLER MASTER Storm Sniper Mid Tower Computer Case

Power Supply (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817139005) CORSAIR CMPSU-650TX 650W

Motherboard (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813131631) ASUS M4A89GTD PRO/USB3 AM3 AMD 890GX HDMI SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.0 ATX AMD Motherboard

CPU (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819103849) AMD Phenom II X6 1090T Black Edition Thuban 3.2GHz

Ram (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820231312) G.SKILL Ripjaws Series 16GB (4 x 4GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1333

Video Card (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814125341) GIGABYTE GV-N450OC-1GI GeForce GTS 450

Hard Drive (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822136533) Western Digital Caviar Black WD1002FAEX 1TB

Optical Drive (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16827151188) SAMSUNG Black SATA DVD Burner w/LightScribe Support

Operating System (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16832116754) Microsoft Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit 1-Pack for System Builders

This runs $1376. This just gives you a guide to go by. You can find cheaper cases, and maybe you can use 8gb of ram instead of 16.

[alfromcal]

Thanks for suggesting a rig, Rick! :D

Regarding AMD's cheaper price for performance, I'm still wondering if hyperthreading a i7 -> 8 cores might be faster than a AMD hex just 6 cores. I dont quite understand the benchmark graph some websites have.

By the way, is there a site that tells us what future processors are going to be released soon in the future? Or what companies are working on right now?

[RickyTick]

Thanks for suggesting a rig, Rick! :D

By the way, is there a site that tells us what future processors are going to be released soon in the future? Or what companies are working on right now?

You may have to just google it. I know Sandy Bridge is the next big thing from Intel, and Bulldozer is coming soon from AMD. I don't a lot of details.