My current workstation is a Intel Q6700 quadcore, 8GB of DDR2 PC6400 RAM, Win7x64bit OP of course, and an old EVGA GX2 video card with 1024mb of memory running in SLI mode. It runs open GL pretty well in LW modeler, I don't experience lag when viewing 1 million polys. Nothing fancy by today's standards. Upgrading to the top of line i7 quadcore cpu and DDR3 memory would only give me @40 percent decrease in render time according to Tom's Hardware website, so I'm holding off. I do have a rendering array of 16 nodes which I put together 6 years ago, and use Butterfly Netrender to control it, but I have to upgrade all nodes to i7 quadcores with at least 4gb of DDR3 RAM when the time comes, and a better switchbox.
Without the rendering array, you're right, it would be near impossible to animate this mesh. For reference, this image on maximum antialiasing, at HDTV resolution (1920x1080) with radiosity on takes @5 minutes with the workstation I mention above.
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Most CGI sequences I create are around 5 to 8 seconds ( I have done a 30 second unbroken sequence that took 5 days to render), so with the render array, I can usually get it done in 1 day (24 hours).
