I'm no expert - hopefully they will be along shortly - but I think all the next gen stuff from AMD is just around the corner, so may make sense to wait a couple months.

For CPU the sweet spot seems to be the 9900K .. half the price.

https://cpu.userbenchmark.com/Compare/Intel-Core-i9-9900X-vs-Intel-Core-i9-9900K/m639130vs4028

@Kinvermark - Good point! But there’s always a new corner to turn. As to waiting, no real rush. I’ve just talk with the PC builders and they are aware of the AMD coming.

Thanks K

For memory go for 3200mhz. 2666 is dog slow these days and avoid the Corsair Vengeance. I've got it and it often cant hit it's rated speed, let alone be overclocked.

Gskill is a good bet.

For processor you want higher Ghz over cores. Many here with 32core threadrippers and lower performance than those on a 4-8 core.

@mintyslippers - I just asked the Builder your points and I was told that it’s a stock thang!

@xberk - Woah, I also communicated the X and K difference to the Builder, who’s just emailed me the revised quote. 🤗

OK, here’s another quote. Waddyah think guys?

Just seen the omission of the DVD. Gonna change that!

Actually, I would think that with your "stated goal of 4K and 8K", you should stay with the original thinking of the i9-9900X on the X299 platform. Same if you wanted to go the AMD route. Reason: PCI-e bandwidth. May be nice to have the "Super-fast" now, but down the road, your eventual 4K/8K will need some "breathing room". Nothing wrong with the Z390 or X470 boards, just the lacking of bandwidth. And, if you are planning to keep this "rig" in use for quite some time, you are going to need that "throughput" for files, whether Native Source, Intermediates, or possibly higher bandwidth Proxies (in the future?).

Video card: currently, I feel it is a "toss-up" between the two (nVidia and AMD) camps. Got a Radeon VII in my ThreadRipper build, an RTX 2070 (Founder's Edition) in my recently "re-furbished" X99 build (i7-6800K).

What I will say with that X99 build, and the processor "only" having 28 PCI-e lanes, couldn't figure out for over a day why my GPU (2070) was only showing as running at "PCI-e 3.0 x 8" speed. Well, besides the Intel 660p 1TB NVME drive on the board's M.2 slot, I also put an Intel 660p 2 TB drive on an adapter card. Guess what? It was the "Lack of Lanes" from the processor, so the original PCI-e slot I had installed the adapter card in, "triggered" the board to adjust the lanes accordingly for the processor! Just had to move the adapter card up to another slot, and everything fine now. You won't find that particular issue on ThreadRipper, and some possible "down-scaling" on the X299 platform.

But, like noted in the Post as well, COMPUTEX is at the end of the Month, so who knows what "Uber Product" Intel, AMD, nVidia and others will show us!

p.s. Thanks for adding in the DVD drive! Tired of hearing all those Wonder Techs keep telling us we don't need them in our systems. Let's see, a DVD/Blu-Ray writer that allows me to create family memories, or a more expensive case with RGB that won't get anything done for me?...

What are you paying for that build?

I really would insist on better memory. That stuff really is super slow by today's standards and why an RX 580? I would go Vega 56 or above if your looking at amd.

I went for an AMD Ryzen over the same i7 you've been quoted as it was cheaper and offered better performance in the reviews and benchmarks I found. For 4k I would listen to the i9 advice.

My build handles everything I've thrown at it just fine so far with around 60fps rendering for 1080p with heavy FX. Very happy for the price point. Just the ram isnt the most flexible.

+1. I think having the future headroom to add "accelerators" in whatever form that comes in is a good idea for video editors especially. I haven't changed my PC motherboard in 8 years, but almost everything else has been upgraded at least once, and that allows it to keep working OK. Probably time soon though... :)

@Chief24 and @mintyslippers your advise will go into the mix. And I shall communicate this to the Builders come tomorrow.

As to price, it’s well inside my budget and yes, I will spend-up if needed. What you’ve done guys is to focus on the essential Memory issues.

What I’ve realised is that my eight year old rig cost more than the quotes for a rig which is probably 6 to 8 times faster!

That power supply is also WAY WAY WAY over powered. 650 is what you need. 750 if you want some future head room but 1k. Your just burning money on the PSU and they are most efficient when working near capacity so burning money when it's turned on.

My rig in my profile is more power hungry than your proposed spec and running at absolute max for stress testing I don't go over 500w.

@mintyslippers - Ah, now PSUs, I’ve had experience of an underpowered one. I’m a serial expander and got 2x replacements PSUs. So this 1000watt is what I want.

I would go with a threadripper CPU.. cheaper, keeps up with the intel chips at most tasks, and offers more PCI-E lanes, so you can put more things like M.2 hard drives or additional GPUs in your system later if you choose and have plenty of lanes left to accommodate it all. It's a win/win/win, and your wallet will thank you. Get a nice liquid cooling system to go with it. It's worth noting the current fastest render speed record holder for Vegas Pro around here uses a threadripper system.

I'm loving the performance advantages my Radeon 7 is giving me, it really does scream in Vegas, but the drivers could be better. Every time I turn on my secondary monitor, I have to go back into display settings and make a change to it (changing resolution, turning wide color mode off, etc., anything that makes the GPU reset the signal it is sending to the secondary monitor) and that brings my monitor back. That could very well be resolved in the next driver update, so I'd keep this card on your radar. 3840 GPU compute cores and 16GB of 4096bit RAM is definitely going to give you some serious advantages with media production. It's worth noting, the RTX stuff in the Nvidia cards only applies to gaming, it enables real time ray tracing of video game graphics, making reflections, ambient light reflections, and shadows rendered in the games far more realistic. It has no use whatsoever in Vegas Pro.

System drive: I've been using a Evo Pro 960 m.2 512gb system drive... over 3gbps read speed, just shy of 2gbps write. This drive screams, and I highly recommend getting one of the more recent models for your main system drive.

RAM, 64GB at lesat, DDR4 3000mhz at least (they have faster now, that is what I put in my system last year).

Of course, make sure you are using windows 10.

PSU: I just bought a 1000watt EVGA PSU from best buy for $120. It has all the bells and whistles, and is modular, so I only have to plug in the cables that I am using, rather than having a massive loom of wires coming out of the PSU, half of which I will never use. Works wonders with keeping the case clutter free.

I remember you saying building PCs wasn't something you did, but I would highly recommend checking out some youtube tutorials on it. It seems intimidating, but it's actually quite easy once you dig into it, and it will save you a ton of money. I and I'm sure plenty of other folks around here can also lend a hand if you get stuck.

Who's your builder?

My thoughts (disclaimer: I use my home PC only for hobby or entertainments, not as working PC):

- PSU is way too overpowered. Modern stuff usually does not require as much power as 10 years old gear so the PSU will not work in the most efficient mode. I'd choose 750 max. It might be another choice if more than one GPU is installed in the system (one for video and one for computation, for example).

- Memory timings are not really important as the difference in real applications is tiny and the days when I overclocked my PC are gone. Now I prefer stability over a little bit of extra speed and would like to be sure that when (yes, 'when', not 'if') some program crashed this does not related to OC. Memory should work on timings of the system and for future they might be a bit faster. For example, if system is designed to work on 2400 it does not make sense for me to buy 3200+. For now it would be 3000 min. 32 GB (64 is overkill). Any known brands are fine, and I also prefer G'Skill over Corsair.

- I'd "downscale" SSD M2 to 250 (Samsung 970 Evo+ or WD Black) and replace one HDD with 1/2TB SSD (not M2). If more space required I'd replace another HDD with the bigger one. So I'd choose 250GB SSD M2 for OS, 1TB SSD for projects, 4/6TB HDD for storage. It might be slightly different story if (for some reason) you want to setup RAID from HDDs. I do not need such RAID in PC. I do have RAID in NAS and also have backups in place (not on NAS! on separate off-line HDDs!)

- As per CPU/GPU -- it is too religions topic to discuss :) I have Intel/AMD CPUs and AMD/NVIDIA GPUs in my home PCs. Buying what have better performance/dollar for myself and upgrading parts when required. From my experience it was easier to upgrade AMD as their sockets lived longer. It turned out that every time I replaces Intel CPU I did it with MB (so upgrade is more complicated).

- I would not buy DVD/BD. Do not even remember when I used it last time. Ah, remembered. I got photos of my son from school on DVD last year. Was extremely surprised by this as usually they are just sending link to image. And it is not reliable to store archives on DVD/BD

I'm with fifonik on this. Doesn't take much to get smooth 4K playback. How many one-hour renders do you currently do? For most users, good enough is good enough. Spend another one or two thousand, shave ten seconds off the one hour render time. Of course, it's only money, and who cares, if you've got a lot of it. Another benefit, you can spend time researching an playing with computers rather than making films. You can use an external BR/DVD drive for the rare occasions you'll need one.

Ah, now PSUs, I’ve had experience of an underpowered one. I’m a serial expander and got 2x replacements PSUs. So this 1000watt is what I want.

You should not have such issues if you chose good branded and properly certified (Bronse or better) PSU.

Modular PSU is complicated topic. They are much more comfortable to work with (especially if you upgrading parts) and it is very tidy inside PC case (so they are popular for modders). However, I experienced "bad connections" issues in this universe too many times. Not sure that I'd like to have such thing happen with PSU to MB or PSU to GPU connection at least once.

Guys! You’ve all provided so much valuable feedback that I’m going to take more time in responding. However, I’m rather interested in responding @Rainer

How many one-hour renders do you currently do? For most users, good enough is good enough. Spend another one or two thousand, shave ten seconds off the one hour render time.

It’s not the length, it’s the intermediary files that I need down, and down quickly so I don’t loose the ideas I come up with. Also, much of the software I use has been developed or is being developed beyond my seven year old PC.

Of course, it's only money, and who cares, if you've got a lot of it.

No, not at all. I care that you all care, and want the best for me. Yesterday I was arguing with my Cellphone Co. and got 30% discount plus a further 2gb of DATA. Being canny with money is a Craft with me. 😉

Another benefit, you can spend time researching an playing with computers rather than making films.

Over the last 20 years I’d hope I’ve done both.

You can use an external BR/DVD drive for the rare occasions you'll need one.

Yes, I thought this too.

I have 1 (one) external DVD (USB) drive on my shelf for that rare cases (was used only once yet). No internal DVD drives in all my home PCs these days.

I keep a blu-ray drive around, handy for data backup when it comes time to remove a project from the HDDs.

@Grazie The comment about money - sorry , I misquoted Trump. Meme for marketers. Another one: at the end of your life, how much would you pay for another ten seconds? Invest now. - Your revised build - basically OK, I'd opt for a quieter case, 750W seems to be the sweet spot for power supplies, and if you're not in a raging hurry wait for the new Ryzens.

The comment about money - sorry , I misquoted Trump.

@Rainer - No harm done 😉.

Another one: at the end of your life, how much would you pay for another ten seconds?

Sure. It’s all a question of balance, how much against effectiveness. Will my workflow be benefitted. As I get older I’m recognising I’ve got an “unusual” approach to narrative and I need flexibility in sketching and drafting my mad ideas.

Invest now. - Your revised build - basically OK, I'd opt for a quieter case,

Do you know that is noisy? I’ll carry your thoughts forward.

750W seems to be the sweet spot for power supplies, and if you're not in a raging hurry wait for the new Ryzens.

I've had issues with underpowered PSUs that they’d got hot and one got noisy and failed. So, again, a question of balance. I’ll review the price difference.

Do you know that is noisy? I’ll carry your thoughts forward.

Just know it doesn't have any acoustic padding. Some cases are sold as quiet (I'm happy with my Coolermaster Silencio).