Help build a graphical workstation . [graphic workstation] [professional photographer]
Q: I am a professional photographer, who also reasonably familiar / comfortable with PCs.
My old system begins to show its age, and I need something new.
Unfortunately I have contact with any new technology in computer science and really dont know where start.
Can anyone give me some good ideas on what to build my new workstation? My budget is around $ 1600.00 (I would love it if I could upgrade my monitor too, but that is not so important) I do a lot of batch processing, etc. of large files and need something that can chew by the I / O beautiful good.
Any help would be greatly appreciated.
Best Answer: The short answer, you should be fine with the Dell. Though you've said your getting out of graphic design, if you use photoshop (or especially illustrator which is a memory hog and runs poorly on PC's) you would notice a big hit in performance; though unless you're getting rid of your old MacPro you can just run those programs on there.
For between $350 – $700 you can get a really nice desktop, whether it be from Dell or self made. The i5 you mention there is a kickass cpu at a very reasonable price; while integrated graphics in the past have always sucked, some of this new generation are getting very good. For what it sounds like you'll be doing, 8gb of ram will be plenty, unless you wanna try 3 or 4 virtual machines with server OS's on em 8 is plenty.
Lots of people like to bash Dell's, I've had 10+ years experience with their servers/desktops and I personally like working on them the most of any other brand. The key thing when you purchase is to fork out the extra $$ and buy the longest extended warranty you can, especially if its a laptop! I had to have my CPU replaced on this lapop, which that one item alone made up for the price of the extended warranty. Generally on my laptops (build all my desktops, get my servers for cheap on Craig's list or auction) by the time the warranty expires I'm at a point where I need a faster computer anyways. Desktops don't generally fail as frequently as laptops, though replacing that CPU might be costly after the factory warranty expires; and to do repairs so parts are proprietary so you would end up needing to order the part from Dell directly; which can be very expensive.
Re:Originally posted by: guy
2 x 22" Samsung/Acer/Chimei/AOC LCDs (same panel, same performance) $500
Core 2 Duo E4300 $170
Gigabyte S3 $105
Geforce 7600 (fanless) $80
4 x 1GB DDR2 667 RAM $250
Antec Quiet Case/PSU $80
WD SE16 400GB $100
Samsung DVD Burner $30
Quiet CPU Heatsink/Fan $20
Total: $1350
Thank you so much. This is an excellent starting point. I do not have a problem OC'ing other than the fact I have never done it before and not exactly sure what needs to be done, but I can figure that out.
Thanks again!!!
Re:guy in your sig –
Intel Core Duo T2500 _ 3.2 GHz
AOpen i975Xa-YDG
SeaSonic M12 SS-600HM
Corsair XMS DDR667 4GB _ 4-5-4-13
Fujitsu 73.5GB Ultra SCSI 15K RPM [x4] (LSI RAID 1+0)
WD Raptor 150GB 15K RPM [x2]
x1950 XTX 512mb _ core:812/mem:1277
Creative Sound Blaster X-Fi Elite
Plextor DVD-RW 16x SATA [x2]
where did you get a 15k raptor????
Re:Originally posted by: guy
2 x 22" Samsung/Acer/Chimei/AOC LCDs (same panel, same performance) $500
Core 2 Duo E4300 $170
Gigabyte S3 $105
Geforce 7600 (fanless) $80
4 x 1GB DDR2 667 RAM $250
Antec Quiet Case/PSU $80
WD SE16 400GB $100
Samsung DVD Burner $30
Quiet CPU Heatsink/Fan $20
Total: $1350
The E4300 will easily (at default voltage, without running any of your other components out of specification) run at 2.4GHz. It's the safest overclock ever, and will give you E6600 speeds for about half the price. You can most definitely run it higher than 2.4GHz if you wanted to; the E4300s average around 3GHz overclocking, but since this is a work computer, I don't recommend it.
Besides, a Core 2 Duo at 2.4GHz will astound you in CS2 compared to your Pentium 4.
4GB RAM is absolutely necessary. The two 22" LCDs are a godsend for photo editing; you have an effective resolution of 3360 x 1050 pixels for your desktop, allowing you to edit multiple photos, working in multiple programs.
i would go with something like this too. if you don't want to o/c then do a 6400. obviously different components if you want but this is a very good starting point. plus the gigabyte 965p-s3/ds3 also support the kentsfield quad cpus, so when you need more cpu, you can drop in a quad an be good to go.
honestly, if i was going to build a new rig, this would be what i would go with but add a x1950xt since i game, and maybe a different case since i like larger cases, but all in all, this is definately a good starting point or even go with it as described, i don't think you can beat the setup/price performance ratio
Re:2 x 22" Samsung/Acer/Chimei/AOC LCDs (same panel, same performance) $500
Core 2 Duo E4300 $170
Gigabyte S3 $105
Geforce 7600 (fanless) $80
4 x 1GB DDR2 667 RAM $250
Antec Quiet Case/PSU $80
WD SE16 400GB $100
Samsung DVD Burner $30
Quiet CPU Heatsink/Fan $20
Total: $1350
The E4300 will easily (at default voltage, without running any of your other components out of specification) run at 2.4GHz. It's the safest overclock ever, and will give you E6600 speeds for about half the price. You can most definitely run it higher than 2.4GHz if you wanted to; the E4300s average around 3GHz overclocking, but since this is a work computer, I don't recommend it.
Besides, a Core 2 Duo at 2.4GHz will astound you in CS2 compared to your Pentium 4.
4GB RAM is absolutely necessary. The two 22" LCDs are a godsend for photo editing; you have an effective resolution of 3360 x 1050 pixels for your desktop, allowing you to edit multiple photos, working in multiple programs.
Re:well here's an old system that works, doesn't provide monster speeds like the new Intel chips, but it does good enough:
dual core opteron OC'd to 3GHz
8GB DDR400
Quadro SLI _ top of the line 2006 cards, forgot the model
SCSI 300GB, RAID 1
dual gigabit and wireless N_WPA2
not the best, but it's okay with 3DSMAX
quadcore will outperform this thing, so I'd suggest quad X 2 if you can. quado is such a damn ripoff. 3Dlabs is more accurate with mathematics. fireGL cards are the same as quadro cards, personally. even a gaming card will work with photo. i haven't seen nVidia 8800 cards do workstation stuff, but I'm yet to see how that goes. good luck
Re:The going Processor now is Quad 2 Duo. Quad 4 processors will come out soon. The MAC Pro is using Two Quad 2 Xeon processors. Even if you dont go with a Quad 4, when those processors are released the Quad 2 processors should theoretically drop in price and demand.
I think you should have at least 2 Gigs of ram if not 4. It should make large video images open faster. So if your budget allows it go for 4.
On the video cards AGP is quickly disappearing. Most new motherboards are using PCI-E X16 video cards. Only older motherboards like the one that you have is using AGP video cards. I suggest you try to sell those video cards on E-Bay or something like that. You could still watch TV on that AIW video card if you installed it on your current system.
I am not a big fan of Arrays (using multiple hard drives together). If one goes bad, then they all go bad. So maybe get 2 400 gig hard drives. One for general use and one for backup. You could use your current system for a backup server and just network them together. The external hard drive is ok, but you can almost build a small backup server for what an external hard drive costs.
Re:sadly all of the better performance boards are going to be pci-e for the gpu, not that you need it, but that is what is available.
you may try to sell the 2 agp version as the 6800gt is still a good option for people w/ agp and 9800pros that don't want to move up to pci-e
is o/cing an option?
Re:Thank you for the reply!!!!
I am currently using a 3.0ghz Pentium 4 (H/T) with 1GB RAM.
I have an ATI AIW 6800 and a Nvidia GeForce 6800GT (AGP) that I am currently not using (got them from a buddy who upgraded)
I have Photoshop CS2, and Adobe Lightroom 1.0, but will be upgrading to Photoshop CS3 as soon as it comes out. I also do a little bit of video editing with Vegas Video.
All my photos are 8mpix shots. When I download photos I copy them to an internal hard drive, and an external hard drive simultaneously, the burn them off on to DVDs when I get a chance.
Thanks again…. I appreciate it.
Re:please be more specific – assuming ps but what version? also, if the i/o is disk then a raptor raid0 array may be warranted as long as you do a daily or even 1/2 day backup/image to a secondary internal hdd – with somthing like acronis depending on exaclty how much i/o is involved.
how big are the pics – dpi?
what is old system and what can you bring over?
welcome to the forums 
i don't see why you can't do it pretty easily w/ $1600 (assuming usd and can) even w/ a 1680×1050 lcd….
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Tags: graphic workstation, professional photographer