New Computer for Blender

[thisguy]

Need some advice. I saw in a thread awhile back someone talked about Blender. I downloaded it for my 10yo and he's doing really well with it so I want to get him his own computer. The wife and I have been using Macbooks for over a decade but I'll probably get him a PC which I feel a little lost with now.

Here is a link to the program requirements and a refurbished computer. Any thoughts or a better suggestion for a computer? We were trying to get one for about $500 or so but this seems pretty good for the price.

Thanks in advance!

https://www.blender.org/download/requirements/

https://www.newegg.com/lenovo-thinkcent ... 6883994527

[Zozobra]

I'll open with saying I don't know a great deal about blender, other than it's a 3D rendering package so I guess a good GPU is going to be important for this. An integrated GPU is going to be limiting I suspect.
Unless someone here chimes in I'd recommend asking here: https://www.reddit.com/r/blender/
and here (if you don't mind building a pc anyway): https://www.reddit.com/r/buildapc/

[nightflameauto]

My last two blender machines were specced out with decent mid-range processors that could support a good GPU (check the Blender site for their recommendations when you're ready to build or buy a machine), as much memory as I could afford to stuff in the thing, and a heavy duty power supply to keep the GPU happy.

Oh, and don't forget lots of hard drive space for all the movies you won't finish if you're anything like me.

[atrox]

I'm not a Blender user, but I do 3D production for a living.

Get an i7 or better. Thread Ripper if you can. 16 GB RAM at the very least. Also, I know Blender has an Octane Render plug-in available and it's a game-changer for LookDev to see what you're working on in real-time. You'll want a decent Nvidia GPU. I'm not sure, but I believe RedShift also has a plug-in for Blender. Arnold... also not sure, but I don't think so... which is a shame because Arnold is easily the best renderer out there,

Your best bet without researching the hell out of it getting something custom made is to get a computer made for gaming. You're guaranteed a somewhat decent CPU and a somewhat decent GPU then,