MVC Production Workstations

The overall fastest CPU for Unreal Engine right now is AMD’s Threadripper 7980x
Tasks in Unreal Engine like compiling shaders and baking lighting, are multi-threaded and scale well on CPUs offering a lot of cores. Users running other high-end software packages, and performing complex physics simulations benefit from quad-channel RAM.

Professionals focused on asset creation may prefer to use a less expensive CPU such as the Intel Core i9 14900K or AMD Ryzen 9 7950X, because these CPUs offer enough cores while also offering a higher clock speed that can aid in 3d modelling applications or when working with motion capture data.

Yes, because having more cores has a scaling effect if your application uses the full processor, enabling users to compile shaders or bake lighting more quickly, meaning less time waiting for scene edits while your cast and crew sit idle on set.

Yes, because having more cores has a scaling effect if your application uses the full processor, enabling users to compile shaders or bake lighting more quickly, meaning less time waiting for scene edits while your cast and crew sit idle on set.

Both Intel and AMD offer different solutions that are both extremely competitive. The Core I series currently has more cores while the Ryzen series can be faster on a single thread across all cores. AMD thread rippers have the most cores while intel XEON can offer similar HEDT performance with fewer cores.

Although high clock speeds are sought after by game players, virtual production doesn’t see as much benefit in Unreal Engine, but some 3D modelling and motion capture applications do benefit from higher clock speeds, so you typically want a balance of cores and clock speed.

At the time of writing this the fastest GPUs for virtual production are the NVIDIA RTX 6000 ADA and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090. The amount of VRAM and Sync support is the biggest difference between them, and the RTX 6000 Ada has a competitive edge, while the GeForceRTX 4090 is more affordable and similar in raw 3D performance.

Large LED walls use the extra VRAM and support for a RTX Sync card will make the RTX 6000 the preferred choice, but for a simpler Virtual Production Stage setup, like a green screen, the GeForce RTX 4090 is sufficient and will save you money.

Take into consideration the amount of graphics memory (VRAM) the card has.
UE5 can take advantage of as much VRAM as is available. A minimum of 8GB is advised, but 16GB or more is highly recommended.

Running out of VRAM results in a significant performance decrease, and most motion capture or green screen workstations will want 10-14GB while large LED volumes are better off with 24-48GB.

The clock speed of the graphics card depends on the GPU’s processor die. If it’s the same die, this statement works. eg: a RTX 4080 with a clock of 2505MHz is much faster than an RTX 4070 ti with a clock of 2610MHz.

Ray tracing is also important to consider when selecting your graphics card. UE5 makes full use of ray-tracing, so you want to ensure your card supports the latest raytracing technology, such as DXR (DirectX Raytracing)

You need to make sure that your workstation has enough processing power and memory to take advantage of your graphics card fully. There’s no reason to buy a top-of-the-line graphics card if your CPU and RAM are not up to the task.

Multiple GPUs are useful in only a few specific instances, the most common case is while shooting on an LED volume: one GPU is set to render the inner frustrum, while the other renders the outer frustum. This may require an NVLink bridge between the cards, limiting the selection of video cards and systems which can handle this use case.

GPU Lightmass in Unreal Engine can take advantage of multiple GPUs.

NVIDIA has a significant performance lead over AMD when it comes to ray tracing, if a sync card is needed for shooting on LED volumes, then only NVIDIA will work.

For UE5’s smooth performance and optimum levels, we recommend 32GB of RAM minimum. However, you’ll likely be using film quality (large) textures and photo-real lighting setups, you will want to look at 64GB of RAM or more.
It’s recommended to have at least 128GB as a good baseline for running UE5. For demanding workflows and heavy scenes, 256GB or more may be necessary when the workflow involves several high-end applications being open at the same time.

DDR5 is the latest and you should be using the latest.
There may not be a lot of advantages now, but there may be more in the future. Intel and AMD support DDR5 speeds from 3600-5600MHZ depending on the platform and amount your system has running. The more RAM you add, the more the speed will be harder to achieve so we follow the supported specification from the manufacturer. You may see speeds going up into 7000MHz+ but anything over the manufacturer’s spec is called “overclocking”. Overclocking is trading a large amount of reliability for a small amount of performance. RAM speeds don’t affect the performance as much as a better CPU or GPU. Generally RAM is RAM and we value reliability.

You should buy all the RAM you need in one go, rather than buying bits at a time. Even if buying the same brand and speed, buying in stages can produce unexpected results.

The actual RAM speed (MHz) and specs will need to match your CPU and Motherboard, and at Micro-Vision we take care of those choices so you don’t have to be careful.

20 to 40GB for an unreal engine project is common, and 100+ GB projects aren’t unheard of.
Having both large and fast storage is recommended, like one 500GB NVMe drive for the OS, and another 1 or 2TB NVMe drive for project files. This should be enough for most users, but most artists want a larger drive for their material and reference libraries, which can be handled with a slower SATA SSD or even platter drives. Backup is also important and can be done with a large internal, external or network based storage array.

UE5 requires high-speed storage. Buying a top-of-the-line CPU, motherboard, and RAM won’t matter if you create a bottleneck with the storage.
For max performance, we recommend an M.2 NVME SSD for your operating system and applications and additional capacity hard drives for your project files. A minimum of 500GB is recommended, but ideally you want 1 or 2TB SSD drives.