Just for fun, I thought I’d throw in this article from Custom PC mag. in the UK
[url]Custom PC magazine
they describe a goodlooking recipe for a super-cheap PC that would b able to do pretty well with Touch Designer.
I am actually toying with the idea of starting to build but I think that I will start with the P35 version of the motherboard they talk about so I can get a bit more ram in there. I guess I’d be also forking more out for graphics card (and therefore power supply!) as well.
The gigabyte ga-p35-ds3l above looks quite good for a cheap build and I have some weird old sound cards so the three PCI slots I need. I wish it also had firewire but otherwise looks handy and is reputed to overclock quite well.
because I want it for doing music stuff, Im also tempted to try water cooling - more for sheer geekiness and silence than for a practical thing to take to gigs (although gamers haul all sorts of weird rigs off to LAN parties it seems).
I’ve never built a machine from scratch before but I’ll share my progress if I manage to make any! 
Rod.
The machine described above would be limited to 2Gb of RAM for various reasons.
do people think that this would be a real limitaion for general Touch use?
I know that more RAM would be handy for dealing with movies etc. but what about for rendering geometry etc.?
If 2Gb is basically okay, I think I’ll go for a cheap build, just to have a spare machine that can run touch happily, but content not to go to extremes.
I guess the benchmark for Touch hardware is whether it runs Greg’s Mixxa project without grinding to a gasping halt.
Rod.
It all depends on the amount of content you are using. 2GB is ok if you your .toe file uses up less than 2GB.
Rendering geometry and TOP aren’t really affected by CPU RAM though. Each individual SOP will take up memory, but the act of rendering them isn’t affected by CPU RAM.
I’m probably going to build from this board as it allows for more RAM than the p31based one above:
[url]http://www.overclock.net/intel-motherboards/254734-gigabyte-ga-p35-ds3l-thread.html[/url]
I have particular need for some legacy connectors, 3 x PCI and serial and parallel ports. otherwise, I think there are better ones for Touch a this one does not have RAID (which I really don’t need for this particular machine).
For example, Ars Technica have some nice ‘hot rod’ recipes including this GA-EP45-DS3L based one:
[url]http://arstechnica.com/guides/buyer/guide-200809.ars/3[/url] which allows for RAID
Substituting the slightly more expensive GigaByte GA-EP45-DS3R would give you IEE1394 (firewire) and a few more luxuries.
[url]http://arstechnica.pgpartner.com/rating_getprodrev.php/product_id=76744540/id_type=masterid/st=product_tab[/url]
I am also tempted by this as I could get extra cards to handle serial and parallel ports
[url]Computer parts, laptops, electronics, and more - Newegg United States
… but I need that extra PCI slot for my whacky old sound cards (3 creamware pulsars with 18 of the old AD SHARC chips)
… and this is sooooo the case for running touch!
[url]Antec Skeleton Black ATX Tower Computer Case - Newegg.com
well, I’m going for silent running so I might not use this one, probably something simple, fugly and heavy to keep the noise down. 
Rod.