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View Full Version : Advice on upgrading my pc for 3d work please

Infinitum1
09-26-2008, 04:57 PM
I'm an animation student and i'm looking to upgrade my pc for my final year. I need to be able to run maya. It currently runs maya but is very unstable when doing so. It also has always been very unreliable at running games and I have always thought that some of the components conflict in some way.

This is the Current Spec of my pc:-

AMD Athlon 64 x2 Dual Core Processor 3800+
2GB Ram
ATI Radeon x700 series Graphics Card
Asus A8N-SLI Motherboard
Maxtor 6L200M0 200GB Hard Drive
230w psu
NEC DVD RW ND-3540A

I am looking to upgrade the Graphics card to support maya. I am thinking of changing to nvidia because I think the ATI card has caused alot of my problems.

I'm also thinking of increasing the ram.

I know that I will need to also upgrade the PSU. Also within the last few days my pc has started making a strange grinding noise. I think it is either the psu or the cooling fan.
Does anyone know what it might be?

I have a spare 500w psu but it doesn't have a brand name of any kind. It only cost 15 pounds. I feel it probably would not be good to use.

So I would apprieciate any advice on these upgrades and the most effective way of achieving a reliable, safe system for running maya.

Also, on a side note, I am thinking of storing my work on a maxtor one touch 4 500gb external hard drive that I have. Does anyone know about the reliability of these?

Any advice would be greatly appreciated, thank you.
Vashner
09-26-2008, 08:24 PM
Aye upgrade the power supply to at least 500. Get something with SLI certificiation is a good way to get one that will last a long time. I use Antec but many other brands are good.


As far as the video card. ATI makes some good cards but I do like Nvidia myself. Get the best you can afford. X700 just had a weak support of shader 2.0. The brand new ATI and Nvidia have Shader 4.0 and all the shaders supported.
bdk9246
09-27-2008, 03:01 PM
switching to nVidia will probably help a little with maya.
But if your having stability issues, you would probably get more benefit from re-installing windows from scratch (especially if its XP and you have been running it for years)
Infinitum1
10-02-2008, 11:19 AM
Thanks for the replies both of you.

Vashner - That explains the thing with the graphics problems, thanks. I'm thinking 500w too. I didn't know about the sli certification. That will help find a good one. I'm strugling to find any Antec ones.

bdk9246 - Yeah a reinstall might be a good idea, clar things out for the new year. Thanks.

hanks again both of you for your advice.

If anyone else has any advice on this then it would be apprieciated thanks.
olson
10-03-2008, 12:35 AM
Maxtor drives are rubbish, that's why they have a one year warranty. Put in the few extra bucks and get a Seagate with a five year warranty. Don't get a generic power supply as they are also rubbish, look for something with large single 12V rails and good warranty. I recommend PC Power & Cooling (400-600 watt is about right). The graphics card makes little difference if you're not using hardware rendering. Any ATI gaming card will do just fine, I've used X700 Pro, X1900 XTX and X3870 with zero problems (aside from hardware rendering limitation). More memory and a better CPU will do more good than anything else on your list. Cheers!
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