joyceanblue said:
not true, "It's not the size of the dog in the fight, it's the size of the fight in the dog."
Sounds great but the dog known as i7 does have greater fight in it, especially for a professional.
Also note that i said a professional.
Please do not forget that not all overclock or unlock(nowadays) their chips.
Stability and reliability is of utmost importance to a professional.
Also if a professional in the true sense of the word, that is making decent enough money from their profession, they will seek the best platform available cause every amount of signififant enough improvement translates into more earnings.
Else the word professional be dropped imho and let's make just another rig for 50K that has to do whatever the OP mentioned and for the least bucks possible.
Rockfella-
professional level 3D, pro sound- that's asking for too much in 50K imho- honestly.
Also the need for professional audio recording etc etc can be done on older platforms too- more dependent on the audio hardware.
But if someone is a 3D "professional", anything that is not a quad core is big compromise.
I have been lucky enough to know some talented and successful and decently well-off professionals in the 3D business but also value-concious at the same time without being cheapskates- rare quality imho.
They wouldn't have gone for a few i7 rigs in their studios/offices (partial upgrade as per available finances) if it wasn't giving enough improvement.
I did assemble a lot of Q6600+Gigabyte G31 rigs for use at stock speeds, all work ok.
But the end-users are professionals who are employed at 3D firms who needed a cheap yet decent enough home rig for experimenting/learning/personal assignments and to carry backlog home if need be.
But that was till early this year.
That should sum up the 2 extremes of professional 3D rigs.
Hope i sound a little more clearer than before.
But having said that, it's obvious that one has to stay within one's budget.
Just that investing in socket 775, especially with high DDR2 prices, doesn't sound very prudent, especially for a professional.
For me, even a Q6600 is an overkill.