Digital Photography PC

Browncoat

Senior Member
As many of you already know, I work for a tech company. We also build PCs, so I've been working with our engineers on a new configuration that is based on one of the gamer models. I will take delivery of this beast today:

Windows 7 Pro 64-bit
Intel Core i7-950 3.06GHz
12GB DDR3 memory
1TB HDD *coupled w/ my new 2TB backup, I should have enough space to store photos until 2099.
Lightscribe DVDRW 24x
USB 3.0
850W 80+ power supply
Dual ATI Radeon-6850 1GB graphics cards, in crossfire mode​

My fellow tech nerds may have just wet their pants a little. :cool:
 

Browncoat

Senior Member
LOL Bill!

I'm stoked about the dual graphics cards. Will be interesting to see if Photoshop detail editing continues to bog down the processor. My guess is no, but I will definitely have to put it to the test.
 

Browncoat

Senior Member
Playing on the new PC finally. :D

Yes, it's lighting fast, a very impressive machine. But even more than that is this 24" HD monitor I got to go with it. Holy cow, this thing is huge. Major step up from the 15" laptop screen. 1080p sure makes those photos look gooooooood.

My tax refund is practically gone already LOL. But, I think there were some good investments made this year. Got some studio lighting and a backdrop, PocketWizards, new filters, and this computer. Now I just need more clients to help make it all worthwhile!
 

Eduard

Super Mod
Staff member
Super Mod
Ummm one small suggestion would be to add a small SSD for the operating system (and if big enough your core apps). Then use the 1TB for data and all other apps. You WILL notice a difference.
 

johnwartjr

Senior Member
Sounds like a pretty powerful machine.

I've been building one up, tried to go 'on the cheap' and made some mistakes along the way. On the cheap is now out the window - I'm just trying to salvage the machine for about what a decent desktop would've cost me. Should've known better, there is no free lunch!

New motherboard arrives tomorrow, and my dual quad core xeons should be here on Saturday or Monday. I went with velociraptors instead of SSD. My motherboard supports RAID and SAS drives, so I thought about mirroring a couple 15k SAS drives, but I think the performance from the velociraptors will be OK.

I'll be interested in your opinion of the lightscribe drive, I've looked at them and found mixed reviews. My thoughts are, as a photographer, it would be awesome if I could burn an impressive logo on a disc that I hand to a client.
 

Browncoat

Senior Member
I'll be interested in your opinion of the lightscribe drive, I've looked at them and found mixed reviews. My thoughts are, as a photographer, it would be awesome if I could burn an impressive logo on a disc that I hand to a client.

Ya, that was exactly my thought as well...that it would be cool to put some custom stuff on client discs. Unfortunately, I haven't been able to find any LightScribe discs locally, so I have some on order. I've been kinda antsy to test it out. I'll definitely post a review!
 

Eduard

Super Mod
Staff member
Super Mod
The Lightscribe drives work well. The concept and implementation is top notch. The media that I've seen and used is generally matte and flat in color. That is a bit disappointing. In case you haven't found it yet, get the latest drivers and software here: LightScribe - Downloads - Windows

One more option to consider is Epson's Direct CD/DVD Printing. It works pretty well, too.
 

Browncoat

Senior Member
I haven't, John...though it's on my to-do list.

I have the images I want to burn, and have a stack of DVDs here...just haven't had time to sit down and fidget with it just yet. I will get to it soon though and post the results!
 

fotojack

Senior Member
You guys are just getting around to using Lightscribe now? That's been out for a few years. I've used it many times, and the only downside is, it takes forever to burn an image on the back of a Lightscribe disc. I don't use mine much anymore, if at all. Still nice to have, though. :)
 

Mike150

Senior Member
I'll be interested in your opinion of the lightscribe drive, I've looked at them and found mixed reviews. My thoughts are, as a photographer, it would be awesome if I could burn an impressive logo on a disc that I hand to a client.

I've been using the lightscribefor about two years. I found that if you want to put pictures on the disk, keep it simple. It is monochrome and fairly low resolution, so a detailed photograph won't show all that well. I got it because I hate the "SHARPIE" look, and those print and "Glue On" labels look tacky. I have been describing the disk using text, such as "2009 Jan-Jul Photos".
I must add though, I just bought my new windows 7 system which also has the light scribe. I'm hoping that the newer technology will work a little better. I'll be doing some testing with the new one when I get a little free time and a few more DVDs to work with.
 

theregsy

Senior Member
System, HP HDX9430EA dragon laptop, T9100 dual core, 4Gb RAM with Nvidia graphics and 2x320Gb SATA drives and 20.1" widescreen WUXGA monitor.
Nothing exciting about that really, although the screen is awesome, but it handles photoshop CS5 and Lightroom 3 very very well. The lightscribe option I have only used when supplying DVD's/CD's commercially and while it tends to be a flat gold background with mono etched text it looks 100 times better than a white top with magic marker. The lightscribe isn't fast and for the life of me I can't remember what the alternative system was called????
Hope you are enjoying the new machine, sounds like it should be amazing, I think I will be stopping with laptops for the future, much easier to do my photo editing while slumped on the sofa with teh F1 racing on in the background ;)
 

Mike150

Senior Member
Just an update on my lightscribe.
I burned several disks this weekend. Keeping in mind that the new burner is slightly faster than my old one, I got a small improvement on speed. The emphasis is on small. You will still have time to go out and listen to the grass grow.
 

johnwartjr

Senior Member
I've been playing with my lightscribe drive a bit - I grabbed a $25 IDE version from newegg.com - the only reason for IDE was that my image editing workstation still uses IDE optical drives, as I've used the SATA ports for drives.

I downloaded the various drivers, software, etc and downloaded a trial version of 'SureThing CD Labeler Deluxe'.

About 15-20 minutes later, I had this

P365_Mar242011.jpg


I like it. Pretty neat. The time involved with 'burning' the image is a bit of a bummer, but it's still neat :)
 

Browncoat

Senior Member
Yes, welcome to the Shiny Head Club!

Although...mine is done on purpose (at least for now)! I forgot all about posting some disk photos. I've burned a couple Lightscribe labels recently, and I'm pretty impressed with the results. As John said, the 20 minute burn time kinda sucks, but other than that, it's pretty spiffy.
 
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