Building Ivy Bridge edit/color grading system - looking for some advice

[5thwall]

(Success!) Building Ivy Bridge edit/color grading system

I finally got all the additional parts and everything is now working super smooth. Running 10.8.1 and no problems, so far.


[EDIT] Here are all the parts I purchased:

Intel Core i7-3770K Quad-Core Processor 3.5 GHz 6 MB Cache LGA 1155 - BX80637I73770K
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B007SZ0EOW/ref=ox_sc_act_title_7?ie=UTF8&smid=ATVPDKIKX0DER

Gigabyte Intel Z77 Dual Thunderbolt ATX Motherboard with BT4.0/Wi-Fi (GA-Z77X-UP5-TH)
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B008LTB3QW/ref=ox_sc_act_title_8?ie=UTF8&smid=A1TSN35NIS24VZ

Cooler Master Hyper 212 Plus CPU Cooler with Four Direct Contact Heat Pipes (RR-B10-212P-G1)
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B002G1YPH0/ref=oh_details_o04_s00_i01

Corsair Professional Series 650-Watt 80 Plus Certified Power Supply compatible with Intel and AMD Platforms - CMPSU-650HX
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B002LVUPZQ/ref=ox_sc_act_title_1?ie=UTF8&smid=A2YLYLTN75J8LR

SanDisk Extreme SSD 480 GB SATA 6.0 Gb-s 2.5-Inch Solid State Drive SDSSDX-480G-G25
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B006EKIQYM/ref=ox_sc_act_title_6?ie=UTF8&smid=ATVPDKIKX0DER

EVGA GeForce GTX680 SuperClocked 2048MB GDDR5, DVI, DVI-D, HDMI, DisplayPort, 4-way SLI Ready Graphics Card Graphics Cards 02G-P4-2682-KR
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B007KC1R9E/ref=ox_sc_act_title_3?ie=UTF8&smid=ATVPDKIKX0DER

2x Corsair Vengeance 16 GB (2x8GB) DDR3 1600MHz PC3 240 Pin DIMM Memory CMZ16GX3M2A1600C10 for total of 32GB
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B006EWUO22/ref=ox_sc_act_title_4?ie=UTF8&smid=ATVPDKIKX0DER

Corsair Carbide Series 500R Mid Tower Gaming Case CC-9011012-WW
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B005E983JW/ref=ox_sc_act_title_5?ie=UTF8&smid=ATVPDKIKX0DER

Syba SATA III 6Gbps PCI-e Card, Switch from SATA to eSATA Ports SD-PEX40049
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B006SF68OS/ref=oh_details_o00_s00_i00

LG Electronics LightScribe 10x SATA Blu-ray Combo Internal Drive UH10LS20
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0037FUW9E/ref=oh_details_o01_s00_i00

StarTech.com 3 Port 2b 1a 1394 PCI Express FireWire Card Adapter PEX1394B3
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B000WCT5HK/ref=oh_details_o02_s00_i00

Targus USB Bluetooth® Adapter - Class 2 ACB10US
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0002K6RK0/ref=oh_details_o03_s00_i00

Moved over from an old system:

AJA Kona 3

2 Apple Cinema Displays (last gen gray bezel)

Apple Magic Trackpad

Wacom Intuos 3 Tablet

[EDIT] System is up and running. Got a Geekbench score of just over 14,000. It's working great. I have received the eSATA card, Firewire card, Bluetooth dongle, and BD-R drive. They are all working!!!

I used Alfa's guide when setting up the system:
http://www.tonymacx86.com/mountain-...cess-gigabyte-ga-z77x-up5-th-thunderbolt.html

Lessons learned:

This takes TIME. ONLY GO WITH RECOMMENDED PARTS unless you want to spend your days troubleshooting why something isn't working.

Sometimes, however, it's good to experiment. In my case the Kona 3 card was a huge experiment and the entire build depended on it working (which it is, for now). So that was huge for me.

Put the system in a room where you have plenty of space. You will more than likely need to disassemble something at some point.

Definitely get a more powerful CPU cooler. Do not waste your time on the stock Intel cooler. I did and it was just wasted time.

Davinci Resolve 9 beta *sees* the 680 card, which is great!

All other pieces of edit software are working at top performance (FCP 7, FCPX, Avid Symphony 6, Premiere CS6, Resolve, and Smoke 2013 Beta).

There are not a lot of video pros on this site. We are a finicky bunch, in that our systems and their performance are extremely important. If you are building this system for work with clients, I highly recommend doing your research and spending lots of time testing the system.

To be honest, I still have more testing to do. I won't be using this system on a mission critical job for a little while longer. Mainly doing low-pay offline edits where I've backed up the media on other drives so I can quickly pull them up on another system.

You will not always get answers to questions when things go wrong. This is the risk you are taking in building the system. If it works, then it's a big payoff. High risk, high reward in my opinion.

DO NOT USE THE ROCKETRAID 2322 CARD!!!! I cannot emphasize this enough. This card, for whatever reason ERASED MY MEDIA DRIVE!!!! This was a ghastly, horrible, purely evil event. I have since purchased a 2-port Syba card and, even though it gets low reviews on Amazon, it is working very well. I'm getting 250mb/s.

I have not been able to test any Thunderbolt products, yet. From what I've heard, the drives and AJA IO devices should all work well.

Ethernet on this motherboard is about 20% slower than on my Mac Pro towers. Alfa thought that there might be a firmware update in the near future that would increase the speed. Here's hoping because I don't wish to spend any more money.

In the end, the price to performance ratio is REALLY GOOD. Know that you are potentially sacrificing future support for OS updates, IO cards, hard drives, etc... So, build something that you think will last.

You will not get a good resale price on your system, like a Mac will. You will probably be best served by harvesting components and upgrading them over time. In the end, whatever you build will make an awesome Windows box.

 

[Mate94]

Good build. You have done a good research.<br>The dual monitors will be fine, don't worry.<br><br>And I'm not able to answer your other questions because I don't know the answers. You should able to ad an other card(a supported one) but that Resolve thing is unknown to me.

 

[5thwall]

Thanks, Mate94.

If anybody knows about the power supply, that would be greatly appreciated.

 

[jester969]

The PSU is fine.

 

[5thwall]

Thanks all for the responses. Just put the order in today. Only thing I left out was the wifi card as I have ethernet in the office.

Hope I'll get it all up and running by the weekend. Very excited and can't wait to get it working. Was slogging my way through FCPX today and it was killing me on an older system. Hoping this new box does the trick.

 

[5thwall]

What would be a recommended CPU cooler for the case and CPU I listed above?

If I start out with the stock cooler, and I decide I want to replace it, is it necessary to remove all the thermal paste in order to put another one on? And if so, is that difficult or something that just comes off with some rubbing alcohol?

thanks.