Workstation Potential

Hi,

my first post here just want to say another hello to you all.

I am currently in the process of speccing a new workstation, my previous workstation, p4 3.2, 4gb ram, ati fire gl x2 256t is over 3 yrs old and i have been given a budget (£8,000) to spec a new one. I will be building the system myself.
I am primarily involved with 3D, using max and hopefully utilising the new Unreal 2007 engine. I was thinking of a system something like this -


2 x Intel xeon 5160 3.0ghz (woodcrest) cpu's
Supermicro X6DAE-G2 motherboard, (anyone reccomend aleternative? are tyan's better?)
8gb ram (any reccomendations?)
250gb hard drive, raptor 10,000 rpm, (as i will be rendering out RPF's (rich pixel format) i was planning to do this on external hd's as i already have several terrabyte's of lacie external)

ATI fire gl 7350 1gb pcie 16 gfx card. I am in a quandry as to which gfx card to get, the ATI card is about £1200, wheras the nvidia equivilent, Quadro fx 5500 is about £3800, but you can buy one in the U.S for $2500. (£1400) I would be better off going to New York, staying with friends for a week, buying the card (or even 2 cards if i could configure a sli system that supports 2 xeons) and then pay the tax upon returning to the country, still saving a rake of £££'s what u reckon?

still undecided as to what case but the thermaltake cases are looking pretty appealing, the periphiral modules, such as dvd writers and cd rom's are neither here nor there for the moment.

I am planning on getting the dell 3007 wfp 30'' monitor.

should I go with Xeon? i will be doing lots of processor intensive modelling and rendering, the core 2 duo's look appealing but are they tried and tested for doing high end 3d? more importantly can u build multi processor duo core 2 systems? can't seem to find a mb that suports 2 of them. I am pretty sure I don't want AMD. I have spent allot of time looking on this site, it's reviews, and in the forums, and the net as a whole, you guys here seem to know ur stuff.

any advice or opinions are appreciated.

AJ

Well, it seems some of the info included above is inaccurate, the Quadro fx5500 is available on the scan website for £2200, a substantial price drop form the £3800 i have seen on other sites, still there is a substantial difference between the Quadro fx 5500 and the ATI FireGl 7350 of £1000. why is this when the cards are comparible performance wise?

AJ

I'm not sure this forum would be the right place to ask about the gfx, I don't think many people here have experience with high end 3d cards as far as i'm aware. Generally people have gaming cards. Maybe ask on the discreet site or cgsociety forums?

On a side note, are you a games designer then?

hi,

i use game engine technology for educational purposes and art projects, but they are constructed following the same production pipeline as any mainstream comp game.