HELP! Building a new Workstation with a Pre-Build Company

[j.ssuarez]

I am a Digital Designer, and I've been working with a Apple computers for more than 5 years now. It's time to invest in a new more powerful computer, and I don't live in the US, so I've been researching computer building companies like Xidax, Origin PC, etc.

Xidax seems to offer the best deal, specially because of the Lifetime Parts Warranty and their customer service has been great so far. They've helped me with my build and answered all my questions.

I wanted to ask around if anyone has any reviews or experience with this company, specially because I am ordering from another country I want to make sure I make a good investment.

NOTE: This is intended as a workstation build, NOT a gaming rig. I use the Adobe Suite and mostly work creating motion graphics, video editing and 3D (I use C4D+Octane Render but still have to use C4D's render from time to time). Also, I am NOT considering building the rig myself for a main reason, and that is that I live in Venezuela, and having parts (or anything for that matter) shipped here is already very expensive, a huge hassle (shipping and mail don't work here anywhere near as good as they do in the US). So ordering all the parts, have em shipped all the way here and then having a part not working correctly or something go wrong, I can't just return the part because that would mean more money spent in International Shipping, plus more time to wait, and more hassle, so I decided to go with a company that can build the computer for me, test it and guarantee that it will work as soon as I plug it in.

Here's the build that I am planning to buy:

MSI Z179 Krait ATX

Intel Quad Core™ i7-6700 Processor - Liquid Cooled

32 GB DDR4 RAM

Corsair 750W PSU

24x Asus DVD-RW combo

PCI-Express Wireless-N Adapter

NVIDIA GeForce GTX 980ti 6GB - Overclocked

240Gb SSD + 1TB HDD (x2 in Raid 1)

Windows 10 Home Premium 64 bit

FREE Rise of Tomb Raider Game

FREE Lifetime Support

_______________________________________

$2,634 Total 

 

Keep in mind that a build made at Origin PC with 16Gb of ram and a GTX 970 came to about $2,800 so this is still a better machine and at a better price. I was suggested to make a Xeon based system in another forum, but to my understanding those are WAY more expensive and apparently Xidax doesn't offer Xeon based systems, OriginPC does, but they start at more than $2,500 and my budget (including shipping) is $3,000.

Of course I want this system to be future proof, as I would like to be able to upgrade this to better CPU's/GPU's/RAM as time goes by and technologies advance, but I am talking in a few years.

Here's the link to the configuration I have going at Xidax > https://www.xidax.com/desktops/x-6/?saveconfig=86160, feel free to edit anything, and to save the configuration just hit the button at the top, enter your email and then copy that link from your email and paste it here.

I really appreciate any help from anyone on this!

Thanks!

[Heesleemer]

x99 may have more longevity due to programs leaning towards more cores. You should be able to get Haswell E and then Broadwell E later on as an upgrade path. 

[lolJon]

You state in your first line that you're looking to get a workstation but your build has a lot of gaming hardware. Xidax seems like they're specifically centered around custom gaming computers. Origin PC on the other hand has an entire section for "Professional" hardware.

I do 3D modeling and work with AE/Premiere Pro at work (usually 4k or spherical content). It was a main requirement for my work PC that it has at least a Quadro card, a Xeon and ECC memory. Those features are usually what set apart a Workstation.

If this is going to be purchased by you as an independent then I'd definitely recommend looking at workstation specific hardware (and also checking the requirements on your modeling software) I know Solidworks requires you to have a workstation GPU and in some cases a Solidworks specific driver version.

I'll probably get reamed for this, but if you work for a larger company and they would be purchasing for you, its not necessarily a bad idea to go with HP or Dell for their workstation specific hardware lines. If your company can afford it, the corporate customer support can be insanely good (talking they will same day ship parts or new systems in emergencies)

Let me know what modeling applications you'd be using and I might be able to recommend workstation hardware that would be best suited for it.

[j.ssuarez]

8 hours ago, lolJon said:

You state in your first line that you're looking to get a workstation but your build has a lot of gaming hardware. Xidax seems like they're specifically centered around custom gaming computers. Origin PC on the other hand has an entire section for "Professional" hardware.

I do 3D modeling and work with AE/Premiere Pro at work (usually 4k or spherical content). It was a main requirement for my work PC that it has at least a Quadro card, a Xeon and ECC memory. Those features are usually what set apart a Workstation.

If this is going to be purchased by you as an independent then I'd definitely recommend looking at workstation specific hardware (and also checking the requirements on your modeling software) I know Solidworks requires you to have a workstation GPU and in some cases a Solidworks specific driver version.

I'll probably get reamed for this, but if you work for a larger company and they would be purchasing for you, its not necessarily a bad idea to go with HP or Dell for their workstation specific hardware lines. If your company can afford it, the corporate customer support can be insanely good (talking they will same day ship parts or new systems in emergencies)

Let me know what modeling applications you'd be using and I might be able to recommend workstation hardware that would be best suited for it.

Thanks for the reply!

Yes, I've been getting a lot of the same comments that Xidax is aimed for gaming. OriginPC does offer workstation solutions, as well as Xidax, but those start at $2,500 and my budget including international shipping is $3,000. Even tho there's a lot of gaming oriented parts, this should still be a good work machine right? Let me know what you think of it, given that I need a pre-built and tested system with a warranty and my budget of course.

I use After Effects, Premiere and Cinema 4D + Octane Render(GPU based render engine in case you don't know what it is) most of the time and of course Photoshop, Illustrator and InDesign.

I am a freelancer, so no, the company is not paying for this system, this is coming out of my own pocket AND I live in a place where shipping is not possible as fast and as good as in the US. Long story short I can't buy all the parts and have them shipped here for me to build the system, because if something goes wrong in the shipping process or theres a defective part, its just too complicated and expensive for me to send it back and get a new one.

I appreciate the help!

Thanks!

 

[lolJon]

Nomad,

Looking at the requirements for all of those programs you use it seems I may have been leading you astray! The Quadro cards nor the ECC RAM would give you any true measurable increase in performance.

However as the first post put, you may be better off going with an X99 board. This would allow you to use more powerful processors, as well as run your RAM in quad channel (as opposed to dual channel on Z170 boards) I know you're currently looking for a turn-key solution and shipping directly from a builder, but if you ever decided to upgrade, X99 would allow you to get a Xeon processor.

I do a decent amount of international shipping for my company so I TOTALLY understand the issue. I shipped a couple things to Thailand early last month that aren't going to arrive until this week, and that was with "priority" status...