Last year I built my own desktop for my BIM-based engineering thesis and for my personal exploration of generative design.

I have been building my own desktops since I was 7, and I highly recommend it to almost anyone in the market for a workhorse. It gives you the opportunity to optimize components that are critical to your work. I don't know about you, but having a $200 sound card isn't that important to me for architectural work- why pay for it?

The system I built cost me approximately $1,300 (not including monitor or other peripherals)- at the time, a similarly geared box would have cost in excess of $3,500 to buy from a name-brand manufacturer.

I have only been to Fry's a few times when I lived in Houston, and it was pretty expensive. I can't comment on how Fry's is now, but it was one of the last places that I would have shopped for parts along with Best Buy/ Circuit City. My personal favorite is MicroCenter (a national chain) because it is dirt cheap and if I need help, they typically have brilliant people working there. If I don't need help, newegg.com is another place that I check out- prices can vary there though.

I'd be happy to point you in the right direction with what components you should be looking at, but I really need to know more about what you are intending to use it for and how long you want it to last. Fire me an email: cjw5027@psu.edu

better to purchase parts online where you can get better deals than some chain stores like frys. just be cautious that the hardward you get, supports the programs you’ll be running. There’s a few video cards that gets finicky with certain softwares.

After progressively burning out a laptop through a bunch of intensive hours-long processing (I assume - maybe I just didn't clean it out often enough, or used it to prop up the table one too many times), I can't recommend the desktop solution enough. More flexibility, more reliability if you keep the temps down, and it's also easier to multimonitor (I use three). Plus, it's way cheaper if you're using higher-end components.

+1 on not going to Fry's. Newegg is probably the most consistently inexpensive site for components (although I think there was another site that aggregated prices from several sites - pricewatch.com maybe?). Google around for guides on building systems - IIRC, the main differences between systems at the moment are AMD/Intel (with Intel's i-series using either LGA1066 or LGA1366 chipsets) - the processor, RAM, and motherboard should be compatible, to start.

Checking around tech forums is also helpful (especially if you want to overclock to up your framerates in video games or whatever - seemingly the primary concern of the tech forum people sometimes, so YMMV!) Anandtech, HardOCP, Tom's Hardware, and several other sites run forums; poking around there is helpful when attempting to get a 'lay of the land' for hardware enthusiasts, so to speak.

check this site out.

http://www.3datstech.com/2010/12/december-2010-workstations.html

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i also don't buy new laptops anymore. i am typing this on a 3 1/2 year old hp from their refurbished business computers site

for both the machine i built and a refurbished laptop (that showed up looking new) the cost was perhaps just a hair under $2000 and I have a power workstation and something for on the go

plus, if you plan the workstation well (platform you choose, will it support next generation processor, ram), you can upgrade it incrementally to some extent so you can spread a $800-$1500 cost over a few years

Building your own is totally worth it and actually pretty easy. I sourced all my bits off newegg and the customer reviews along with newegg's product suggestions were extremely helpful in determining what goes with what. Prices can vary wildly on that site, but it also carries some of the best deals.

The trick is getting everything to work together. I built my computer around the software I wanted to run so I looked into what the software companies recommended and went with that.

Once you determine software, determine core hardware. The i7 is a great processor to build a rig around and far cheaper than the equivalent xeon. Your CPU choice will determine what MOBO and RAM you need. Video cards are always issuesome for architects, but realize renderings go through your processor, not your GPU, so unless you're going with heavy BIM stuff that needs the raw graphics oomph so your digital models load quick and run smooth you can probably get away with a mid-level gaming card. Hard Drives are pretty straight forward usually, just scour the customer reviews and go with a model with a low failure rate. Realize though that faster drives are usually smaller ones (+/-250gb) and slow drives are bigger ones (+/- 1tb). Larger caches and higher RPM speeds mean your stuff will load faster off the drive. DVD/BD/CD drives are usually pretty straight forward as are sound cards. Internet/ethernet is usually off the MOBO these days but dedicated cards are still available. My sound and ethernet cards are right off the MOBO and work great.

Once you've got all that, the next thing to spec is your power supply. Now this is very important, because underwatting your system can actually lead to data loss and corrupt files so buy more capacity than you calculate you'll need. With power supplies, you really can never have too much so save some money in your budget for a good one.

The case you stuff all this in is important, because some cases don't support some MOBOs. A mini-ATX case can only support a mini-ATX MOBO and cooling these systems is a factor. The more space between components, the cooler everything will be, so if you buy a bunch of high-end hardware that will produce alot of heat be sure to buy a big enough case with enough fans to keep the whole mess cool. I have three fans in mine, two intakes at the front for the HDD(s) and one at the back for exhaust. Big fans typically move more air and make less noise than small ones.

Happy building!

Oh! If you're rendering, get at least an i7-9xx series (920 or 930 seems to be the sweet spot), using an LGA 1366 chipset. You get proper memory handling, and your four-core processor can split into eight logical cores, which is great for rendering (or any other task involving parallel processing or multitasking). I'm not sure if the non-1366 i7s do this or don't do this; perhaps someone with an 8xx-series knows better. For the 1366 chipset, memory apparently works better in threes as opposed to twos (so 6GB comprised of three 2GB sticks, as opposed to 4GB comprised of two 2GB sticks) - most others work best in multiples of two.

Here are some power supply calculator links:

http://extreme.outervision.com/psucalculatorlite.jsp
http://educations.newegg.com/tool/psucalc/index.html

Also, noise! Larger fans with slower speeds will make your computer quieter, and if you can find a good quality power supply (there's a spec with '85' in the number, which relates to the efficiency of the PSU), they are likely to be quieter also because they produce less heat.

Make sure you have good airflow through the computer, too...cable management, properly arranging the fans, and keeping the thing clean will help keep temps down and prolong the life of your computer.

I bought my components from www.mwave.com and for $80 they assembled it, making sure all the components where compatible and even installed the operating system. 4 years later still runs great.

the i7-8xx series also have four physical cores that run as 8 logical cores with hyperthreading and they have power boost so if you are only running 1 core during modeling, the speed of that core will go up to between 3.2 and 3.4 ghz

the i7-8xx performs very well

but the new sandy bridge chips have the i7-8xx and i7-9xx beat or matched with respect to performance (except for the i7-980 extreme)

if you can hold out a little while longer, then a sandy bridge chip is the way to go (from reviews and forums I've read)

also, do your homework and read reviews on toms hardware, anandtech, xbitlabs, etc.....you will almost always find a $200-$350 CPU that gives you 80%-90% of the performance of the $1000 chip. likewise, there is usually an Nvidia graphics card in the $200-$300 range that will give you 80%-90% of the performance of a $400-$800 GPU

This is because sometimes the difference is only in the instruction set or what features are turned on or off but underneath it is the same chip/set of chips---- for instance, if you look back to recent history, The Q6600 quad core chip gave you almost all of the performance of the QX6850 for just 25%-40% of the cost (don't remember exactly off the top of my head). Similarly, the Nvidia GTX275 GPU gave almost all of the performance of the GTX285 for about 60% of the cost ---- in summary, if you do your homework, you may discover that you can build a system for <=$1500 that gives you almost all of the performance of a $3500_$5000 system ---- the great thing then is that in two years, the $3500 system is already becoming a relic and you could build a completely new <=$1500 system that will blow it away and over the two year span, you will have still spent less than the $3500 system

why is this? well it could be that the physical architecture is near identical. it could be that the limitations have to do with the drivers and so if the two components have the same or similar drivers, performance ends up almost the same. it could be because the rest of the computer's hw or sw does not fully take advantage of the extra capacity or revised instruction set of the component. it could be that there is a bottle neck somewhere else in the system that makes the extra capacity irrelevant. so it cannot be stressed enough, do your homework! so you don't waste money --- because you won't necessarily get more performance from just sticking more expensive components in the box

Just finished building two desktop PCs. Probably spent around 400 per unit to build w/ Windows 7 professional. They have all the power , bells and whistles I need. Can't imagine why anyone would need to spend 1000 or 2000 for a homebuilt. After spending alittle time researching what I needed to run my software apps Now my desktop is 4 time more powerful than the unit it replaced. Boots up in mere seconds. Saves files and shuts down in a blink of the eye.
Plus, a factory prebuilt comes with a ton of trash loaded that I would never use that gobbled up resources. And would have cost twice as much. It helps to be a hands on type person with some techincal savy. But, truely anyone could build a respectable rig. Youtube is a good source for DIYers

@studio43

what are the system specs?

what sw do you run?

Wow, thanks for all the great comments. I'm looking forward to building my first computer soon. I went to MicroCenter this afternoon and here is what they suggest. I told them my desire to get a computer that can render V-ray and be used for Revit and all the Adobe software. I still need to do some more research on these components to make sure the Micro Center employee was leaning me towards the type of computer I want to build and not what he has on the stores shelves. Plan on going to autodesk website and really see what the requirements are for the software to work well with the harddrive. So any input again will be greatly appreciated!

1.cpu: Intel i7-950-$199.99
2.motherboard: Asus Sabertooth x58 1366 ATX - $199.99
3.video card: PNY GTX570 1280MP PCIe DDH - $349.99
4.memory: Corsair 12GB 3x4 D3 - $169.99
5.power supply: Corsair HX 750W ATX 12V MOD PSU - $159.99
6.harddrive: Hitachsto 1TB 3.5 SATA 7200RPM DKSR - $59.99
7.optical drive: LG 22x DVD Burner SATA - $17.99
total - $1158
Only other components I need is a case and Window 7 OS

looks like a very nice system for a great price

only thought is to double check if the PSU is big enough... there are PSU calculators online that can help...

have built one machine--found out after many frustrating days/weeks that my memory was an oddball w/ my mobo (didn't have to scrap them, but still a pain to reconfigure---and wasted a bunch of my time) So, like others say, double and triple check that your components will all work together smoothly out of the box before you order anything.

arri, that looks like a pretty good set of components, as well as a decent price. Windows 7 has been out for a while now, but make sure the components have drivers available for 7.

i encountered a similar situation as greyvsgray. a lot of these components may not be easy to return once you open them, so make sure they are all compatible and designed to work together.

Microcenter does it again, they're by far the best retail store for personal computer builds! 750w PSU is plenty even if you upgrade after this. With that setup your recommended would probably be around 500-550w. The only reason you'd need a larger one would be if you get into over-clocking or choose to take advantage of your board's SLI capabilities (which would add another $350 to your overall cost if you match cards). I run 1050w only because I need it, otherwise you're just wasting your money.