Professional X99 build

[casualconnect]

Just about to pull the trigger on this one.
It's a X99 based Xeon ECC RAM build for professional software development (+ gaming in Windows, hence the graphics card).

Should there be anything to be concerned about (apart from the obvious, back-up plan is using Linux)

Thanks in advance!

Processor: Intel Xeon E5-1650 v3
Motherboard: ASRock X99 Extreme6/ac
Graphics: Asus STRIX-GTX980-DC2OC-4GD5
Case: Fractal Design Define R5 Zwart
CPU Fan: Scythe Mugen 4 PCGH Edition
Memory: Crucial CT4K8G4RFS4213 (DDR4, Registered, ECC)
Optical Drive: LG BH16NS40 (Blue Ray burner for data)
PSU: Corsair RM550
SSD: Samsung 850 EVO 500GB x2

 

[riverini]

What programs do you plan working with?

 

[casualconnect]

Mostly software development in Clojure, Java, R and Python.
But some of it is pretty CPU&Memory intensive (data mining, machine learning).
Also, if I get OS X to run I'll be doing some graphics design with Photoshop/Lightroom/Illustrator.
And then there's the occasional Virtual Machine and Vue for one of my hobbies.

 

[Silizium]

And then there's the occasional Virtual Machine and Vue for one of my hobbies.

Vue is also one of my hobbies. But finding information about preferred hardware is a pain. Not even on the Vue page are some clear informations. Some say the drivers of Nivida cards are not able to unleash theres power on OSX, others say AMD would be the best, Its very confusing. I know only, Vue uses OpenGL. I don't know about Cuda and other Threats on the Card. Maybe someone can put some light on this case?

PS: I contacted the Vue Support and got this email back, can someone translate it to terms of what GPU etc?

It is difficult to answer such a request, obviously the render times will depend a lot on how complex your scene is. Even the hardware requirements can vary wildly depending on how your scene is built and/or rendered. For example, if you want to do rendering with the (GPU-accelerated) path tracer instead of the regular (mostly CPU-bound) ray tracer, the GFX capability is the most important aspect of the configuration you will want to invest money into. On the other hand, using the CPU ray tracer will yield render times roughly proportional to the number of CPU cores of your configuration, so that depends only on your budget or patience.

In any case, a lot of memory is always useful, and it's not the most expensive part of the computer.

As you seem to be using a Mac, a MacPro with 4 or 6 cores and 32GB of memory will certainly do the job handsomely (consider a dual GFX setup for the path tracer, but be aware of the current limitations of this feature!), but I have no idea whether this fits your budget!