Looking at new desk tops. What to get.

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Blade Canyon

Senior Member
Expand the RAM as soon as possible. That's where I noticed the most gains.

My GForce video card was acting funky, causing boot problems, so I went back to the video card on the motherboard. Still, with expanded RAM (32GB), the computer handles multiple D800 RAW files easily.
 
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aroy

Senior Member
I have found that "Workstation" grade desktops work much better under sustained load. They last longer, are usually expandable and have a lot of memory slots.

Personally I have a dual Xeon desktop that I assembled over seven years ago, and it is still going strong. It has 16 RAM slots of which I am using just 4. If you can afford it and plan to use the desktop for at least 5 years, then get a dual/single Xeon Workstation from HP, Dell or Lenovo all are robust and have excellent stability.
 
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RocketCowboy

Senior Member
aroy said:
I have found that "Workstation" grade desktops work much better under sustained load. They last longer, are usually expandable and have a lot of memory slots.

Personally I have a dual Xeon desktop that I assembled over seven years ago, and it is still going strong. It has 16 RAM slots of which I am using just 4. If you can afford it and plan to use the desktop for at least 5 years, then get a dual/single Xeon Workstation from HP, Dell or Lenovo all are robust and have excellent stability.
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It's why I like the MacPro on the Apple side of things. On the Windows side, workstations are meant for work, as capital assets, that need to last a long time to pay back the investment.


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Just-Clayton

Senior Member
One reason looking for a work computer. With my lap top, when I use the erase tool It lags and load time for pictures takes forever.

RocketCowboy said:
It's why I like the MacPro on the Apple side of things. On the Windows side, workstations are meant for work, as capital assets, that need to last a long time to pay back the investment.


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Click to expand...
 
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Just-Clayton

Senior Member
  • Down to 2 choices, !st one has less graphics better processor and a solid state drive.
  • 2nd one hasBetter grapics and expandable to 64mb ram.
  • 3.4GHz Intel Core i7-6700 processor with 8MB cache
  • Windows 10 operating system
  • 1TB SATA hard drive
  • 256GB solid state drive
  • 8GB DDR4 system memory; expandable to 16GB
  • SuperMulti DVD/CD player/burner
  • Intel HD graphics
  • 5.1-channel audio support
  • Equipped with media card reader (card not included)
  • Has dual-band Wi-Fi, 10/100/1000 Base-T network, Bluetooth, 7 USB ports, HDMI output, VGA port, DVI port and headphone/microphone jack
  • Does not include monitor
  • Includes wireless keyboard and wireless optical mouse
  • ENERGY STAR qualified saves you energy and money
  • Approx. 6-1/2"W x 16"D x 15-3/4"H; weighs 21.7 lbs



  • 2.7GHz Intel Core i5-6400 processor with 6MB cache
  • Windows 10 operating system
  • 1TB SATA hard drive
  • 8GB DDR4 system memory; expandable to 64GB
  • SuperMulti DVD/CD player/burner
  • NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1060 graphics
  • DTS Studio Sound
  • Equipped with media card reader (card not included)
  • Has Wi-Fi, 10/100/1000 Base-T network, Bluetooth, 10 USB ports and headphone/microphone jack
  • Does not include monitor
  • Includes USB wired keyboard and wired optical mouse
  • ENERGY STAR qualified saves you energy and money
  • Approx. 6-1/2"W x 16-1/2"D x 15-3/4"H; weighs 23.2 lbs.
 
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Blade Canyon

Senior Member
If this is primarily a Photoshop computer, I would go with number 2 and expand the RAM immediately to 32gb. A solid state drive would be sweet, but the RAM is most important if you're working with huge RAW files. That processor is better than the i5-3470 I'm using now, but I have 32gb RAM and no video card other than what was on the motherboard.

Also, I've done plenty of HD video editing on this computer, too. What you're looking at is better, so long as you expand the RAM.
 
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Just-Clayton

Senior Member
Yes will be expanding ram. tired of slow running downloads and slow program.

Blade Canyon said:
If this is primarily a Photoshop computer, I would go with number 2 and expand the RAM immediately to 32gb. A solid state drive would be sweet, but the RAM is most important if you're working with huge RAW files. That processor is better than the i5-3470 I'm using now, but I have 32gb RAM and no video card other than what was on the motherboard.

Also, I've done plenty of HD video editing on this computer, too. What you're looking at is better, so long as you expand the RAM.
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RocketCowboy

Senior Member
RAM won't affect your downloads, but will affect programs.

I would go with option 2 as well. The CPU is better in option 1, but the limit on memory is too low, and the graphics card is just okay. Option 2 give more memory and better video, and you can always add a SSD and have a better rounded system for your needs.


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Just-Clayton

Senior Member
My thoughts too.

RocketCowboy said:
RAM won't affect your downloads, but will affect programs.

I would go with option 2 as well. The CPU is better in option 1, but the limit on memory is too low, and the graphics card is just okay. Option 2 give more memory and better video, and you can always add a SSD and have a better rounded system for your needs.


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Click to expand...
 
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Just-Clayton

Senior Member
Right. When using background eraser it lags. and the speed of uploading from sd chip is slow.

RocketCowboy said:
RAM won't affect your downloads, but will affect programs.

I would go with option 2 as well. The CPU is better in option 1, but the limit on memory is too low, and the graphics card is just okay. Option 2 give more memory and better video, and you can always add a SSD and have a better rounded system for your needs.


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Click to expand...
 
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aroy

Senior Member
It is strange that an i7 MB has less RAM slots than i5 MB. Normally it is the other way round. If your software needs a lot of RAW computing power - large RAW files or video editing then an i7 is better bet. Extra RAM will benefit only if the software can use it, else it is just an idle resource.

My suggestion is to find an i7 system that has more RAM slots - 4 minimum, 8 optimum. After all that is what a desktop is good for - lots of RAM slots and lots of Hard drives.

A good graphics card van always be added at a later stage, so I would not be much bothered if the system comes with an ordinary card.
 
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samona

New member
I'd echo the shouts for an i5 (or even i7) processor wise (and at least 8GB of ram). What I've really found made a huge difference with photo and video editing though was upgrading to a solid state drive. It's a pleasure to click on the photoshop icon now and for it to load up in about a second, rather than waiting for minutes (felt like hours) before I could do anything. My current setup is an i7 with 8GB and upgrading my drive to SSD made an unbelievable difference. It's worth every penny.


 
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Llionny

New member
are you building or buying a desktop? i have an i5 7600k system and an i3 7350k system...both seem the same to me when using LR...the Pentium G4560 is a chip to consider given it's price. that's if you're building...


 
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Blade Canyon

Senior Member
Saturday morning my main hard drive was clicking. Knowing that's a bad sign, I took it out of the PC box and got to my local PC store right when they opened. They cloned my drive (which contains the operating system, Photoshop, and all of my other apps). The great news is that the new drive is a 1 TB Solid State Drive! I took it home and plugged it into the slots from the old drive, and it worked just like the old one, except much faster to boot up and Photoshop loads in 7 seconds, even with the added step of the Nik Collection plug-in. Solid State Drives are simply giant SD cards.
 
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Blade Canyon

Senior Member
RocketCowboy said:
Just like SD cards, SSD drives will also fail. Unlike spinning disks, SSDs will fail more spectacularly and without the clicking sound to warn you of the impending crash. Please take good backups.
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Good point (though in over a decade I have never had a single problem with any SD card or even the old Sony Memory Sticks). All of my picture files back up automatically each night to an external 2TB Raid Drive.

I guess technically the clicking hard drive is still a back up of sorts to my OS and current apps. That drive still works, though it's not plugged in.
 
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aroy

Senior Member
The difference between normal drives with spinning disks and SSD is that in case of a major failure, data recovery from SSD is practically impossible, while with normal HDD data recovery has excellent chance. Hence the SSD are best suited as scratch/working storage where loss; when it happens; is not catastrophic.
 
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