Hi guys,

I don't have any techie friends I can ask IRL about this stuff. I've done some research and I'm trying to build a new PC for audio and light video production. If there are any guys with experience building a PC, I'd like to hear your opinions.

I put together this parts list but I'm nut sure if I'm: A) missing something important, or B) picked something bad for what I need. I'm trying to stay under $1,000 USD.

https://pcpartpicker.com/list/NNv4cq

Like do I need one of those fancy video gamer graphics cards for cobbling together music videos in VSDC and/or Filmora? I don't play video games. I've read articles saying an integrated GPU will not cut it for video rendering.

I'm currently running Cakewalk, but I'm thinking of switching to FL Studio. My current PC is 10 years old and can't keep up with my workflow in any DAW or video software.

 

I built a i5 8400 16 gig ddr4 ram for 300 bucks and I can run massive plugins and still be under 50% of cpu. I can even run ik tapes Matt orangeaorange inmin amdtand redared in high mode amdIand nebula with norno problems. I'm running plugins I never could before and don't even look at cpu anymore. I just load and it's still good. The i5 8400 will beat a i7 7700 just so u know. If your on a budget and want most bang for your buck I recommend.

 

If it were me, for music production PC, I'd ditch the WIN 10 Home and download WIN 10 PRO/Enterprise/Enterprise LTSC from {gen2}, and save a hundred bucks. You're gonna want a second SSD or HDD.

 

- Cooler Master Hyper 212 Black Edition 42 CFM CPU Cooler

Does your CPU come with a cooler & is it satisfactory? If it does, you don't need to buy extra cooler. I'll leave this for others to discuss.

- Western Digital Blue 500 GB M.2-2280 Solid State Drive

You'll run out of space very quickly. Get at least 1.8TB HD.

>I've read articles saying an integrated GPU will not cut it for video rendering.

- XFX Radeon RX 570 4 GB RS XXX Video Card

For offline video editing, the job is also CPU-heavy. So you want a good CPU 1st. The only time when you NEED a dedicated GPU for video encoding is when you care more about speed than quality, e.g, need lag-free 1080p broadcasting for twitch/YT while gaming so you can offload the job to a compatible GPU.


- Corsair CXM 650 W 80+ Bronze Certified Semi-modular ATX Power Supply

I would suggest a semi-modular at 80+ gold TX https://www.corsair.com/ww/en/Categ...-Units/txm-series-2017-config/p/CP-9020131-KR . Save power.

 

NVidia cards are popular in video production because of their intergration into adobe premiere's mercury engine, which utilises the nvidia's cuda cores to accelerate rendering performance. Regrettably AMD radeon cards aren't natively supported in premiere, however i just came across this video on youtube that seems to have found a fix for it, whereby you simply modify one system registry entry to enable premiere to fully utilise the radeon GPU... going by the many comments underneath it very much looks like it works too, so you're in luck there.

The stripped-down Win 10 pro's etc will definitely serve you better for serious production than the bloatware win 10 home edition. Use the cash saved there to purchase more storage because, as @bluerover correctly notes, you definitely will want/need a second SSD or NVME for project data/favourite libs and maybe another high-capacity HDD - especially if you plan to do much video work and/or you one day lose it on a frenzied kontakt lib safari...

 

Last edited: Jul 29, 2020

I'm in this same boat, but I'd like to spend $2,000~ and also would like to do some gaming on it. Is there a good resource for researching all of this stuff? I haven't built a PC in over 10 years, I'm switching back over from Apple.

 

This my current PC...jus bought it in May...

https://pcpartpicker.com/user/PhenomDaDON/saved/#view=QJQzf7

Graphics Card is https://www.newegg.com/asus-geforce-gtx-1660-super-dual-gtx1660s-o6g-evo/p/N82E16814126352

so around 1600 in total.

I make Beats in FL Studio...got hella VSTs (prolly too many)

I record in Pro Tools...got hella Plugins (prolly too many)

and Play games and I'm about to start streaming when I get a second monitor.

 

Dope, I'm having a look. This is quite insightful, thank you!

 

Here's the part list of a pc I am going to build, just for audio and light gaming.(Amd gpu's aren't suited to video processing)
https://pcpartpicker.com/list/3cgjrV

 

I always recommend not to store anything in this pc and use it almost like temporary working storage, and move all the stuff to a NAS.

 

I don't necessarily agree to that. I mean a NAS is nice, but you really need to have a fast network, which does not come cheap if you don't happen to already have it, and if you are on a budget building or buying a NAS in addition to the actual PC is not a cost effective option in my opinion

 

This is a lot closer to what I was thinking, but I'll probably downgrade slightly in the CPU and video card departments, for my personal needs. Thanks for sharing!

 

Also, I live near a Micro Center... Anyone recommend going through them vs just ordering everything online? I've never done that. Should I just go there to buy a CPU? Seems like their CPU's are always priced cheaper.

 

Nothing that's meant to serve professional needs today is "cost effective".

 

Yes, because tech support and part servicing will be easy if you buy from them.

 

What I would change:
memory to the F4-3200C15D-16GTZSK Trident Z DDR4-3200MHz CL15-15-15-35 1.35V 16GB (2x8GB) $89.99
M.2 NVMe to Team Group MP34 $66.98
video card to XFX Radeon RX 580 8 GB GTS XXX ED $169.99
Power Supply to Cooler Master MWE Gold 650W fully modular $99.99
If upgrading is planned, change the memory to DDR4-3600.

Upgrading not an issue, just performance:
For half the price you could of course go with a refurbished with warranty, Lenovo P500. Should last you another 5 years if taken care of. These are workstations built for production work (video, CAD,plotting,etc...). It replaced the Lenovo S30 which is an Avid Pro tools approved & qualified system.

These usually come with a minimum of 16gb - 32gb of DDR4 ECC (quad channel config), SSD, HD & Optical,
Quadro graphics (2gb - 4gb). CPU will be some variant of the Xeon E5 V3 or Xeon E5 V4 (E5-1650 or E5-2643 for 6 core).

 

Get an nvme m.2 instead of an sata m.2 ssd. It's about 4 times faster.
Pick the Define R5 with sound dampening material. It helps a lot in reducing computer noise

 

Wow guys, thank you for all the responses! I've started making edits to my parts list based on the suggestions.

I picked the Cooler Master add-on because someone elsewhere said it would be an improvement over the AMD CPU's stock cooler.

Also several of you guys mentioned needing more space. Like an idiot I forgot to mention I will be moving the 2 HDDs I already have into this build as secondary drives (1TB and 2TB respectively). I also have 2 Dell Monitors (21.5" each) that I got for free from work.

The big reason I don't want to get a pre-built PC is because I'll need to crack it open to add my HDDs and I wouldn't want to void the warranty only to find out later that something was messed up with the system.

Is there a music production reason why an Intel i5 may be preferable over the AMD Ryzen 5 3600?

 

Although the Intel i5-10600K is a good CPU it is on a dead end path. The Ryzen 3600 is a better choice for production based work & is PCIe 4.0 ready giving an easy update/upgrade path.

If you are not in a hurry, wait for Zen 3 (4000 series desktop) later this year. You should have a better price for Zen 2 & the option of Zen 3 for newer tech & future upgrade options.

 

Err sorry but it won't, they are about the same with the 7700, and the 7700K is just faster despite being 4 cores and the 8400 is 6. Here:
https://cpu.userbenchmark.com/Compare/Intel-Core-i7-7700-vs-Intel-Core-i5-8400/3887vs3939
With that said the 8400 is an ok budget cpu, but just ok and only for Intel fans. It can't compete with AMD's similarly priced Ryzen 5 3600, since its base clock is 2.8 ghz and just turbos to 4ghz, whereas the 3600 is 3.6ghz (and turbos to 4.2). Taking into consideration that the 3600 supports pci-e gen.4 and can also be upgraded up to a 16 core beast, it just represents a much better overall value.
Something for everyone who doesn't already know, turbo boost -on both Intel and AMD cpus- isn't permanent. It's activated when apps demand more cycle power from the cpu and may last anything from a fraction of a second to a few minutes continuously until the cpu reaches its safety thermal limit where then the cpu backs the clock down again to compensate and cool down.
Cheers