Home Workstation PC for Motion Graphics

[PeopleCanFly]

(This entire post has been re-written)

1. This PC will be used only for video editing (Adobe After Effects CS3, Premiere CS5, and Photoshop CS3 Extended).
2. $800-900 budget.
3. I live in the USA (East Coast).
4. AMD is prefered/An Nvidia GPU is needed.
5. I only need the computer and operating system. I have a monitor, speakers, etc.
6. I will not be overclocking anything.
7. I would like to build this computer in the next month or so.
8. My monitor's native resolution is 2048x1152.

After reading a rather interesting article on how to take advantage of the GPU acceleration in Adobe Premiere and switching over to an AMD based build, I've put together a basic parts list for what I want. I'm looking for a decent system that I can use mainly for video editing and compositing. I will not be using this for games. To sum up that article in a nutshell, all you need to be able to "hack" your gpu to work with Premiere CS5 is at least 896MB of GDDR5 ram.

I've decided on an AMD build based around the 1055T since it is much cheaper compared to an i7 system (Which I really don't need since I don't do this proffesionaly). Paired with 8 GB of ram I don't know how to complain about it for the price, however, I'd like some ideas on how I could improve on this in any way.

I'm also not sure what to do for a case (And this is my biggest area of concern). I'd like a small, portable case since I'm moving my computer between houses every week. Even a microATX Mid Tower is a little bulky for me...I've toyed with the idea of using a MicroATX slim case, such as this one since they're so small. I even found a low profile GTS 450 on Newegg that should fit. I'll probably need a slightly heftier/better quality power supply, though.

Heres basically what I'm looking at right now:

Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit (OEM)
ASUS M4A88TD-M
Phenom II x6 1055T
Mushkin 8GB (2 x 4GB) DDR3 1333
GeForce GTS 450 1GB

[PeopleCanFly]

I've edited the OP with my new thoughts on going with an AMD system. Sorry for the bump.

[ilya]

With that budget I would just forget about CUDA for now. I would rather go with 4 cores/8 threads from Intel and onboard graphics like the i7 2600. (or K series, but you're not overclocking so that extra $20 is a bit of a toss up) Plus it'll be easier to cool in a SFF case. (video editing can heat up your system more than you might think) When you have the money later on, I'd rather buy a workstation video card, or at least a more powerful Geforce card with more shaders/memory bandwidth. Spend the rest of your current budget on multiple high performance/capacity storage drives.

But if you're really set on doing this as a hobby, I would suggest a full sized 450 with proper cooling and a better warranty. Palit has a 1 year warranty for a reason. A matx case with handles might work for you. (NZXT Vulcan, Thermaltake Lanbox, Apevia Qpack, Silverstone Sugo4, etc.)

The lack of extra drives and dedicated sound card don't exactly help either. See if you can squeeze some into your budget.

This is an expensive hobby, be prepared to deal with the occasional choppy video and mismatched audio if you're putting your budget that low.

[proxy]

I know a guy that has both an i7 and a Thuban setup. He does 3D modelling for a living. His take on them was the i7 is overall superior for all his regular tasks, and for heavy video encoding. The Thuban really comes into its own on his heavy 3D modelling, and he uses it almost exclusively for his 3D rendering. Also he has to use nVidia for CUDA and PhysX.

He suggests that someone working mainly on video editing/encoding (and not that much actual heavy 3D modelling) go Intel i7.

Not sure if that helps but there it is.