Hi friends,

As suggested, I'm looking at spec'ing out a new PC build. This will solely function as a dedicated audio workstation (no gaming etc).

I am an Ableton 11 user (Win11) and my workflow is largely reliant on VSTs. I have 32GB of RAM & an NVIDIA 1650 GPU I am repurposing for this build, along with Gen 4.0 and 3.0 M2 drives for storage.

I am stuck between the I7-12700 and Ryzen 9 5900X. Any guidance would be appreciated?

Also, motherboard recommendations are welcome, my primary focus is favorable VRM ratings. Thunderbolt connectivity is not a priority.

Thanks in advance. Always appreciate the input!

 

Im very happy with my i7-12700k CPU/Asus z690 MB.. and im using Win10 (Win11 is supposedly even better performance, but one of my interfaces hasn't been updated for it yet - all 3 are USB) with one stick of 16GB DDR5 (I planned to add a second but no need for now), a couple of M.2 SSD's. I've yet to hit a wall with any amount of VST's, although I am not really trying to do that so im sure there is a point where Ableton will choke. For reference, I would say an average project has anywhere from 30-60 tracks with gobs of plugins everywhere.

Oh and im using the CPU onboard graphics UHD 770 along with 32" LG GN650 monitor (2560 x 1440p) which works great. I even do some mild gaming on the Win11 internet partition and it all works perfectly. I guess if you wanted to, if you arent really using it, you could sell that graphics card to offset some of the cost.

 

Last edited by a moderator: Sep 21, 2022

Thanks for the input @terrific!

In your opinion, is it worth selecting the K variant of the CPU (rather than the straight 12700)?

My current RAM config is 32GB (2x16GB) DDR4. I hadn't considered jumping to DDR5 just yet.

 

Yes. The K version, even without overclocking or doing anything fancy, has slightly better performance. Here's a decent review, although I would disregard the bit about graphics because as I wrote I am using 1440p 165hz via Displayport with the stock graphics and it works great (gaming, videos and so on).

I'd go with the DDR4 you already have and see how it goes... with the z690 it leaves room for upgrades down the road should you want/need to (DDR5, Pcie 5.0 etc.), and of course price drops, which is what I was planning when I bought this base setup - I was worried it might not be up to the task (with stacking lots and lots of the latest CPU hungry plugins), but honestly, after months of daily use, I don't need to upgrade anything on this rig as it does everything I need it to without any struggles whatsoever.

 

Last edited by a moderator: Sep 21, 2022

Intel would be the save bet....

Also i highly suggest that you look for a mainboard that has some oldschool USB 2.0 ports for your interface to rule out possible problems from the start

Dual channel DDR4 is for sure faster than one stick of DDR5, i don't know the DDR5 pricing atm but last time i checked it was rediculously high, i would not pay more than let's say 25% premium for that and even then just to be future proof, performance gains are neglegible atm...

The K is about 10% faster out of the box. Plus you get all the options. I never got a non K CPU, is the difference in price that much?
https://www.cpubenchmark.net/compare/Intel-i7-12700-vs-Intel-i7-12700K/4669vs4609

 

Last edited: Sep 21, 2022

This is great - it sounds like some valuable info. I often find it difficult to understand benchmarks, particularly since this build's use will be audio only.

That is a very valid point about maintaining some USB 2.0 connectivity

 

Hello @BuckyBucky, here is my tip:

Gigabyte X570 Aorus Xtreme

AMD Socket AM4, support for : Supports AMD Ryzen™ 5000 Series/ Ryzen™ 5000 G-Series
The X570 Aorus Xtreme is also the king of VRM thermal performance.
www.gigabyte.com/us/Motherboard/X570-AORUS-XTREME-rev-10#kf

Whether your old RAM is supported can be found here:
Ryzen 9 5900X = Former Codename "Vermeer"
www.gigabyte.com/us/Motherboard/X570-AORUS-XTREME-rev-10/support#support-doc

 

Last edited: Sep 21, 2022

I'm thinking about upgrading my i7-5820K rig so I'm in similar situation as you,

here's what I learned so far:
Intel 12th gen is a beast, easily outperforming Apple Silicon in single core performance;
mix of Performance and Efficiency cores yields inconsistent performance in apps not optimized for it, Windows 10 can't handle them properly, MacOS (hackintosh) can't handle them properly;
DDR5 is very clunky, you won't see a build with 128GB DDR5 working properly;
NVME slots layout is: top slot is 4 PCIe lanes from cpu, other slots are from chipset, some NVME slots receive 4 lanes, some only 2 lanes (so worst case scenario you put NVME PCIe 3 SSD into NVME 4 2-lane slot and get half speed of PCIe 3.0 which is terrible performance and waste of money;
not all motherboards provide enough power delivery to cpu, especially with higher-end Intel models this becomes a real problem, even without overclocking;
not many cpu coolers offer LGA1700 support yet;
not many air coolers can comfortably handle those power-hungry high-end Intel chips (cpu power draw easily over 240W) and you don't want a water cooling with noisy pump;

that said, there are basically 2 options worth buying in my opinion:
1) i5-12600 + ASUS ROG STRIX B660-A GAMING WIFI D4
2) i7-12700K + ASUS ROG STRIX Z690-A GAMING WIFI D4

first option gives you "best" cpu without E-cores, it provides solid 40-50% boost over my 5820K which also has 6 cores (12 threads),
second option gives you cpu with 8 P-cores (16 threads), you can overclock or underclock it to get consistent performance across all 8 P-cores and eventually disable E-cores completely, it provides additional 2 P-cores over my current 6-core 5820K so it should remain relevant longer,

both builds have DDR4 motherboards, which are much cheaper and without any big performance loss for audio work,
I'd definitely consider 64GB ram kit (2x32GB), most likely Kingston Fury Beast Black 3200MHz as it's quite cheap despite being solid 64GB,
for primary "all-round" NVME SSD, as of today I'd pick 2TB Kingston KC3000 NVME 4.0 SSD, as it offers 1600TBW lifespan which is significantly more than 2TB Samsung 980 PRO with only 1200TBW

with all that said, I'm not at all buying anything right now because there's new Intel 13th gen and new AMD cpus just around the corner, also new nVidia and AMD graphics cards releasing soon which shall make me decide on what power supply I'd need for the build (750-850W most likely)

 

what i heard about power delivery is quite the opposite, meaning that the z690 board all have overbuild power stages and i would see no reason to go for an top of the line board that has basically nothing going for it other than LED Bling and some more IO ports

i would in that case base my decision more on how the uefi handles etc.... for that personally i would rank asus/msi/asrock over gigabyte, imho the gigabyte uefi is trash and does not make sense at all

MSI pro z690 has 14 power phases

additionally about the ryzen cpu... the amd chip is 15% slower in single core performance, that means pretty much that it is 15% slower for your usecase

to learn more read this

https://help.ableton.com/hc/en-us/articles/209067649-Multi-core-CPU-handling

most important parts being

"How many cores and threads of a multi-core processor can be utilized at once?
Live supports up to 64 cores for audio processing on Mac and Windows. Likewise, Live supports up to 64 processing threads for audio calculation.

How many threads are used per Live track?
Live uses one thread to process a signal path. A signal path is a single chain of audio flow. In tracks where instrument or effect racks are used, with multiple chains in parallel, Live may use one thread per chain depending on how CPU-intensive each chain may be. If two tracks are "chained" by routing, for instance by a side-chain routing, they are considered dependent tracks and count as one signal path. Any dependent set of tracks will use one thread each."

 

Last edited: Sep 21, 2022

I had a i9 7940X / ASUS X299 Prime Deluxe / 64Go DDR4
I just upgraded to a i5 12600K / ASUS Prime Z690-P Wifi D4 / 32Go DDR4
And it's perfect! Be careful to have the most powerful "single core freq".

 

A couple of good points and a some added thoughts from my experience from actual usage of the kit we're talking about.

Definitely avoid any and all RGB lights for a workhorse DAW build.

Noted above "I was worried it wouldn't be up to the task" was mostly because I hadnt done a full new PC build in many years and literally everybody told me I MUST get 32GB DDR5 MINIMUM! or the earth would explode... which turns out to be total nonsense. The MB was another unfounded worry.. "dont buy the "P" model!" is what I read and people said.. again wrong. After speaking with people who build these rigs for a living and actually have the same setup I bought, after months of research and head scratching I decided screw it, give it a go. It is forward and backward compatible and works perfectly with the i7-12700k, with more connectivity than I need.

I bought the lowest priced 12th gen i7 "future proof" setup possible with the idea that if it couldn't handle the latest plugins and lots of them, I could then add the second stick of DDR5, another larger and faster SSD, a 3000' series graphics card etc........ I dont know what your budget is or what your projects look like, but if similar to mine, dont overthink hesitate or worry, just go for it.

Don't wait for the next best thing, there will always be a next best thing "right around the corner if you can wait a couple of months".. 12th gen CPUs were a major step up from past gens. They've been out for almost a year already, if you need a new PC now, don't hesitate to buy now.

Win 10 Pro and Win 11 Pro both work great with the 12th gen i7-12700k CPU, 3 different brand interfaces, 3 different pairs of speaker monitors, VST's, hardware synths and processing and Ableton setup.

Good luck!

 

Last edited by a moderator: Sep 21, 2022

Thanks for the input @BEAT16 . The VRM rating on that listed board is top tier.

I'll definitely be double checking the RAM spec - thanks for the link

 

Thank you for taking the time to post these details & insights. This is incredibly useful info (that even i can understand)

That is a very good point concerning AIO liquid cooler pump noise. My preference has always been air cooling for my audio workstation for this very reason.

 

I appreciate this knowledge @nctechno

 

My man! (used in a gender neutral fashion - I hope this doesn't impart any offence).

This is valuable information I'm soaking up. I'm grateful for the time you've taken to dumb things down for a simpleton such as me

 

ah just jumping haphazardly- as someone with a nvidia 1070 and ableton if I had to do it again I would go Intel - for music. that Nvidia driver is always at the top of latency, well under the directx driver but I have read and am suspicious that Ableton and Nvidia (or certainly some vsts) and my high refresh rate monitor don't play well together.

I mean besides the potential future where gpus are able to be utilized in music production better it's just not worth IMO- for a dedicated music machine. I'm broke, I will live with being able to make music and play games on the same rig for now, but someday maybe I can get a separate one.

I just ran 38 seconds each on Ableton and reaper (what I use now) with latency monitor and the Nvidia total execution in reaper was 79 Ms and Abletons was 174ms. and Abletons project was basically all frozen audio and the reaper one was basically maxed out on CPU load cause it was this beat I just posted.

 

i agree

i do not know about the ram requirements for recordings but for producing electronic music in the box i never had any issues with 16GB.

Also i would say that cpu's like the 12700k are crushing daw use even at 32 sample buffer size with no efforts at the most until you use some 128x oversampling plugins

 

I guess it depends a lot what virtual instruments producer uses, and how,
for ex. people are obsessed about tons of RAM for Kontakt, while in fact they can stream directly from SSD and use Batch Resave for almost instant loading speeds - yet they fail to understand and use those two basic concepts of hassle-free Kontakt workflow