If you also want to do video editing (which the OP seems to be doing) a better CPU will also be beneficial. What I suggested was based on that. I would always recommend an i7 over an i5 especially as you will usually have several graphics-related programs open at the same time. 

There is no pixel shading setting in iClone 6, unless you run it under DX9.

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Multi-card setups do not benefit iClone.
Workstation cards do not benefit iClone.
Really powerful CPU's do not benefit iClone.
SSD's might help you load stuff faster, but will not really benefit iClone beyond that. They can be nice for faster disk though.

For a good iClone workstation, What you need is a decent CPU. That means an i5 or better. But you should choose a high end i7 if you can afford such.

For top performance, a really high-end Nvidia GTX gaming card. A 980 Ti or Titan X would be your best bet right now. Lots of VRAM is good.

Get as much system RAM as makes you comfortable. It's pretty cheap. ;)

iClone has a DirectX gaming engine, so double-precision workstation cards have no benefit. If your also doing CAD work, then consider it. 

You can export some parts of your iClone projects as FBX to use in external rendering engines, but you cannot export everything. Trees cannot be exported. Soft-cloth physics cannot be exported. And probably a few other things as well.

The lucky bastard with the 4 Titans in the second video!!!

I suddenly remembered a demonstration I saw at a trade show.  The company did ultra-realistic, extremely high-resolution renderings (mostly of car interiors) in real time.  You could zoom in and see the stitching and threads in the fabric, and the texture on the leather-wrapped gear shift.  They even had patented scanning technology that allowed them to scan anisotropic(?) material properties, like brushed metal where the light behaves differently depending on the orientation of the material.

I'm going to have to look them up again so I can give a link.  It was custom-built stuff, utilizing an array of high-end Nvidia cards, I'm pretty sure.

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iClone 7... Character Creator... Substance Designer/Painter... Blender... Audacity...
Desktop (homebuilt) - Windows 10, Ryzen 9 3900x CPU, GTX 1080 GPU (8GB), 32GB RAM, Asus X570 Pro motherboard, 2TB SSD, terabytes of disk space, dual  monitors.
Laptop - Windows 10, MSI GS63VR STEALTH-252, 16GB RAM, GTX 1060 (6GB), 256GB SSD and 1TB HDD

LOL.

I think it was safe to assume Alasandro was talking about component for a high-end "home" computer.
Anyone trying to build a server farm would probably not be seeking advise on this forum.  :P 

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iClone 7... Character Creator... Substance Designer/Painter... Blender... Audacity...
Desktop (homebuilt) - Windows 10, Ryzen 9 3900x CPU, GTX 1080 GPU (8GB), 32GB RAM, Asus X570 Pro motherboard, 2TB SSD, terabytes of disk space, dual  monitors.
Laptop - Windows 10, MSI GS63VR STEALTH-252, 16GB RAM, GTX 1060 (6GB), 256GB SSD and 1TB HDD

sw00000p You are absolutely correct! Quiet as it is kept... I did have the opportunity to work with Dreamworks several years ago during the making of the movie Kung Fu Panda and I have personally seen the "Farms" at work. At Dreamworks they use a proprietary system built by IBM and it was AWESOME to see a room filled with processing units in cabinets on platforms humming around the clock. That experience was what led me to eventually finding Iclone. It fit my budget and allowed me to create marketing material that stood out from the others. I figured people here would understand that I was simply talking about a desktop unit. So yes, I agree a more accurate title would have been Ultimate (Happy Medium) PC for iClone"

In the future I plan on building a system that will maybe cost me around 10K. My desire to up grade to the best system possible will never die so I am working hard to one day get there. Maybe in another year, while allowing my current work to pay for the upgrades. For the work I do now my current system works ok so upgrading as I grow is my goal here.

By the way, what is the model number of the NVidia card that you speak of. I'd like to do some research on that and see if there might be a possibility of getting it sooner than later. The idea of having a card that will simulate one million polygons in real time damn near gives me an orgasm!

Thank you for all the good advice. I used the information given to do a little research and it looks like I'll be able to make the highest upgrade possible for less than 3k. I'll let you all know how it turns out. :)

@Kelleytoons: My reason to do this is that I purchased the iClone Mocap plugin (on sale), which requires Windows 8 or 10 when you want to use the new Kinect (which I intend to get). Otherwise I wouldn't have bothered.

Programs are suddenly called "apps", which I find a horrible term. When setting it up, the system wants to track everything, but you can switch that off. I guess the desire to track everything comes from the mobile world, where the idea is to have a personal relationship with your device and many ways to enhance your experience. I just want things to work...:P
 
Other than that, it works very similar to Windows 7, and there's ways to make it even more similar. For example, I've always liked the sidebar with gadgets, and there is a third-part solution to get it back. I haven't tried all my programs yet, but iClone and related started up without issue. Windows 10 still supports DX9, so that's good when running iClone on a less powerful system.

If you have a spare non-critical laptop or PC, you could just try it.  

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Ani,

A bit OT but after you upgraded your laptop to Win 10 did you feel it was a good move?

Like you I am a bit wary to update my desktop as I'm pretty sure there are things that won't work (at my age just can't deal with that anymore :>).  My laptop isn't as mission critical, but I'd only do it if I felt there was something significant about doing so and nothing I've read so far suggests that.  I'm just curious about your take on it.

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Alienware Aurora R16, Win 11, i9-149000KF, 3.20GHz CPU, 64GB RAM, RTX 4090 (24GB), Samsung 870 Pro 8TB, Gen3 MVNe M-2 SSD, 4TBx2, 39" Alienware Widescreen Monitor
Mike "ex-genius" Kelley

I have started to design a home-built PC a while ago using PC Part Picker, which is very useful to spec out systems.

The link is here: http://pcpartpicker.com/user/zuijlen/saved/#view=Vt9wrH . Total is currently around $2200, but prices are coming down.

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