March 2012 update with 3 recommended builds! You can mix & match components between the two DIY9 P9X79 builds (Hot Rod vs Videoguys' Choice). For those on a tight budget our DIY8 Sandy Bridge system based on the P8Z68 and i7 2600K processor is a fine choice. For our Videoguys' Choice DIY9 system we tried to get as close to $2K as possible for our system, but we went over.

- We are going with the Asus P9X79 Pro motherboard after getting some valuable feedback from one of our DIY followers. We'll pay $50 more, but the added stability will be worth it. We may still need FireWire for capturing our older legacy DV & HDV footage, so we may end up adding a cheap FireWire card later.
- We're going to go with an SSD boot drive even though it adds almost $200 to the cost of the build.
- I'm still thinking we may go for the full 32GB of RAM. I think we may be a penny wise and pound foolish going with just 16GB.
- We're also going with a GTX570 to save costs, although for Avid you really want to go with a Quadro2000 or 4000.

Unfortunately we still have not had the chance to build our DIY9 machine. Some internal IT issues have taken the bulk of our tech teams time over the past few weeks. We are also finding the i7 3930K processor in very tight supply.

Click here for the full DIY9 article Videoguys Blog - Videoguys' DIY9 Sneak Peek: It's Time for Sandy Bridge-E (http://www.videoguys.com/Guide/E/Videoguys+DIY9+Sneak+Peek+Its+Time+for+Sandy+Bridge+E/0xe9b142f408a2b03ab88144a434e88de7.aspx)

Gary

If you're wanting to build a real NLE 'Hot-Rod', VideoGuys is the place to go. July of '2011, I built the DIY 8 'Hot-Rod', I just increased the RAM from 12GB to 24GB of matched memory. VideoGuys is "the" resource.

I would recommend getting a nVidia Quadro 2000 or the 4000 also.

Treat yourself well,

J.

I used their DIY research when building my computer and was glad to find out "the easy way" re not going for Sandy Bridge motherboards etc. Stuck with an X58 setup and am very happy.

Andrew

That was true when the Sandy Bridge chipsets weren't mature enough. The early P67 chipset suffered from the SATA II degradation issues.

But now, the X58 recommendation is no longer valid since the entire LGA 1366 platform is now obsolesced and effectively EOL with the introduction of the LGA 2011 / X79 platform. As such, the DIY9 build now has three builds - the lowest of which uses the LGA 1155 Sandy Bridge CPU and Z68 platform while the other two use the new LGA 2011 and X79 platform with hexa-core Sandy Bridge E CPUs.

True, true. It was simply the case for when I jumped in about 4-5 months ago.

Tip of the hat to Gary, BTW.

Andrew