Time for a new computer...help.

[shakin360]

My PC is starting to get pretty slow now with all the larger files I'm working on. I think I am in need of a new one. I plan on keeping my current one for the net, music, stuff like that. My new one will be mainly for working on all my photos and all my design stuff. (I'm a graphic designer for a living.) I will likely be upgrading to Adobe Creative suite soon after I get my new machine. (Adobe Photoshop CS2, Adobe Illustrator CS2, Adobe InDesign CS2, Adobe GoLive CS2, Adobe Acrobat® 7.0 Professional, etc.) What should I get. I was looking at some dell XPSs, but I've also thought about building it (actually my sister, she built my last 2).

My budget is around $2000, but I want to get either Dell's 24" widescreen monitor or dual 20" (not sure which one, but I need LCDs now) . So that leaves 1000-1200 left for the computer. I don't play games or anything, I mainly need it to run all the programs above, plus maybe a little video editing. I already have a 160GB external HD and was thinking about getting another external for backing up my photos.

I bought XP Pro last year, can I install it on this new one. For some reason I thought it was licensed for 2 machine, but I don't know for sure.

[tim]

My pick right now is an Athlon dual core chip on a good quality motherboard - I used Gigabyte. Get 2GB of dual channel RAM, more if you can afford it. I use seagate barracuda drives, get two so you can use one as photoshop swap and one as windows/OS swap. Even better get three and put windows and apps on one, windows swap on one, and photoshop swap on the other. Don't put swap on external drives. Not sure what the cost will be.

[shakin360]

I use seagate barracuda drives, get two so you can use one as photoshop swap and one as windows/OS swap. Even better get three and put windows and apps on one, windows swap on one, and photoshop swap on the other. Don't put swap on external drives. Not sure what the cost will be.

What's swap?

[tim]

Swap is using disk when the computer runs out of RAM.

[shakin360]

oh gotcha

[jj1987]

I agree with Tim. Just built a setup like that for a photographer. Make sure your drive that you have clients images on is a raid0

[tim]

I don't bother with Raid, I just do regular backups and store them offsite. That protects me against fire and theft as well as drive failure.

[jj1987]

I don't bother with Raid, I just do regular backups and store them offsite. That protects me against fire and theft as well as drive failure.
yes, I use this method too, but how many photographers are dilligent about this :cry:

[peterdoomen]

My setup has two Western Digital Raptor disks in RAID-0 (for speed) with the OS on it, and two 250 GB normal speed disks in RAID-1 (for backup). That combined with a dual core processor is very well suited for RAW conversions and photoshopping and for storing large amounts of photos.

P.

[20D-Newbe]

In my opinion this should be your priority

1. Memory – 1GB as minimum more if you can afford it – get the largest chips you can get (with DDR you will need two for best effect) – you can always add more later (but only if you have some space slots)
2. CPU – Faster the CPU, faster PS is going to apply your effects/edits (provided there is enough memory, i.e. the whole image is loaded in memory)
3. HD – The largest HD you can afford. With IDE you can add up to 3 (if one is taken by the DVD writer). SATA will depend on your MB and SCSI up to 7 to 14 depending on the version

As you are not looking for gaming – you should go for one which will comfortably support your colour depth and screen resolution at a decent refresh rate. If you are looking to edit video’s you can get an add-on card dedicated for it or look for an all-in-one solution.

As far as RAID goes – just keep in mind

RAID 0 – this can offer fast reads and writes. To reduce “waste” – try to keep the drive types and size the same. BUT REMEMBER using raid 0 and not backing up says that the data is NOT IMPORTANT to you. Also if one drive fails – you loose ALL data – not just one drive’s worth.

RAID 1 – This can offer faster reads and writes. You will loose 50% of your total drive space.

Keep in mind that when people quote drive speeds – they normally refer to random reads/writes (as this is always higher) – but you are more likely to make sequential reads/writes.

Normally XP is licensed for 1 PC (with 2 CPU’s) – you can install it on the new one provided you remove it from the old one. You might have to call MS to get it registered.

I wanted to keep this post short – but ended up being long – doh!!!

[shakin360]

Can someone recommend a video card. Remember, i don't need it for games. Also I has to support either dual 20" monitors or a 24" and a second (17-20)

[Titus213]

In the best of all worlds this is all good advice. I just didn't have the cash for that kind of investment. So I am currently running my new Acer Aspire Athlon 64 X2 3800. It has a fast dual layer DVD burner for backups. With the 250 Gig HD and 1 gig of memory it cost under $600. With the sale of the monitor and printer that came with it it will be under $500. It's networked with my old Athlon Thunderbird for backup to that machines 240 Gig of HD which can be done overnight and allows the storage of up to 400+ gig of images online from any machine in the house.

Yup, I know I'll get razzed for owning an Acer but it's fast and does the job.

[tim]

I owned an acer aspire desknote once... never again.

[claudermilk]

A little more information on RAID:

RAID 0 is striping & is purely for performance. The drives are lumped together as one & each write splits the data between them, so you have X simultaneous write (or reads ) going with X drives in the array. IMHO pointess on a photo editing machine.

RAID 1 is mirroring & is exactlty that: the drives are split in half & part A is live, while part B is a copy of A. if a drive in A fails, B comes online. Just for data protection.

RAID 0+1 is a combination of the above & requires a minimum of 4 drives.

Most controllers will also do RAID5 wich is a compromise. It takes all the drives in the array, lumps them together & then reserved a "parity" space on each. If any one drive fails, you replace the failed drive & the data is reconstructed from the paritry data on the others. I use a RAID 5 on my system & have used the safety net--turned a potential catastrophoic failure into an annoyance.

None replace proper backups of course.

For $1000-1200 you can spec a pretty nice system at Newegg.

[SuzyView]

I got a dual core, but not with all the extra stuff mentioned here. It is fast, and oh the 19 inch screen for me is huge. I only paid $850 for my Dell system that my son ordered for me and it is a wonderful. Make sure you look for the $300-$600 off specials and the $35 off for $.99 on Ebay. I'm definitely techie, but not in need of so much power. I only do PP on my computer, nothing crazy like games. But Dell has really great discounts, you just have to be watchful. My son got himself a $1800 laptop for $1300.

[Titus213]

I owned an acer aspire desknote once... never again.

Yeah, I wouldn't have bought one of those laptops either.:lol: Desknote was supposed to be the new thing in 2003. Never heard of it again. Not a stellar performer to say the least. And I think they retailed for around $2500?

[wooof98]

Erm....how about a Mac?

Especially now 'Boot Camp' is being built into the next OS release
http://www.apple.com/macosx/bootcamp/

[tim]

MacOS is great for people who care about getting stuff done, rather than what machine they use, especially if they don't have an investment in software. Personally I have a bunch of money in PC software, and I would consider running XP on a mac because they look cool. Give it a few months to see the verdict though.

[epolevne]

For a 2D video card that you don't care to run the latest games on I'd check out Matrox.

They offer several dual DVI cards to help make those LCDs look great. I personally use a P650 with dual 20" Dell 2005FPW. Someone recently pointed out that you can get this monitor delivered for $360-ish now (for a short time).

http://www.matrox.com/mga/workstation/cre_pro/products/home.cfm


Enjoy!

[jfrancho]

Make sure your drive that you have clients images on is a raid0RAID 0 won't provide any redundancy.

[CyberDyneSystems]

I agree with Tim. Just built a setup like that for a photographer. Make sure your drive that you have clients images on is a raid0

What JFrancho said,.
I'm assuming this was a mis type and you meant RAID1,. as RAID 0 is essentially doubling your chances of loosing data do to hard drive failure..