Good pc build for photo editing

[Geoff]

I am going to build a new pc, it will be built in a thermaltake tower, I would like something
that is very fast, with excellent graphics tv built in option , It will ideally running win 8.1
and have plenty of usb's also a decent card reader.

has anybody any suggestions thanks Geoff

[kerbside]

Personal choice I would build and use windows 7. The guy that builds our works ones recons that 8
&  8.1 are an unstable base to build on, just what I have been told as I do not know that much about operating systems. Sure someone will come along and shoot me down but hey ho.

[Oldboy]

Personal choice I would build and use windows 7. The guy that builds our works ones recons that 8
&  8.1 are an unstable base to build on, just what I have been told as I do not know that much about operating systems. Sure someone will come along and shoot me down but hey ho.

No, you are quite correct. Windows has a habit of producing rubbish software between great versions. WindowsXP great, Vista rubbish, Windows 7 great but Windows 8 rubbish. It's always been like that from version 1, except for Dos 4 and 5 which were both rubbish. 

[Andrew]

DOS 6.22 was pretty much spot on - though wasn't versions 1-3 when it was still under the of Digital Research pre - IBM deal?

As for the Windows version - wouldn't touch 8 or 8.1 with a barge pole.

MS is trying to make a single platform for all its devices in the same way that they think Apple has. But Apple haven't - they run 2 different systems - Mac OSX for desktops etc, and iOS for portable platforms.

Win 7 64bit Pro will give you more than enough control and power over what you have.

What you don't say is what your budget is. Do you want a single monitor system or dual monitor system?

That aside, I would opt for something that can handle 64gb RAM even if you don't start out with it.
Video Card should have 2gb on board video RAM.
An 8 core processor maybe?

Hard drive option - current thinking is SSD for a boot drive with a couple of 4gb internal that are mirrored.

As its Windows, you'll need an optical drive as well.

[donoreo]

Personal choice I would build and use windows 7. The guy that builds our works ones recons that 8
&  8.1 are an unstable base to build on, just what I have been told as I do not know that much about operating systems. Sure someone will come along and shoot me down but hey ho.

No, you are quite correct. Windows has a habit of producing rubbish software between great versions. WindowsXP great, Vista rubbish, Windows 7 great but Windows 8 rubbish. It's always been like that from version 1, except for Dos 4 and 5 which were both rubbish. 

DOS 5 was one of the good ones.  Many went from DOS 3.22 (a good one) to 5. 

[Oldboy]

Personal choice I would build and use windows 7. The guy that builds our works ones recons that 8
&  8.1 are an unstable base to build on, just what I have been told as I do not know that much about operating systems. Sure someone will come along and shoot me down but hey ho.

No, you are quite correct. Windows has a habit of producing rubbish software between great versions. WindowsXP great, Vista rubbish, Windows 7 great but Windows 8 rubbish. It's always been like that from version 1, except for Dos 4 and 5 which were both rubbish. 

DOS 5 was one of the good ones.  Many went from DOS 3.22 (a good one) to 5.

If memory serves correctly then Dos 5 only corrected what didn't work in Dos 4. 

[Andrew]

well, looking at your proposed specs, you are way ahead of anything I was thinking of.

I'm clearly behind on pc technology, though I've always favoured the Asus M/B's.

If it will work - go for it...

[Hinfrance]

Having just had to replace an ASUS component - the graphics card, I'm a bit wary of ASUS. I replaced it with a Geforce GTX 660 which is miles better - so I would definitely endorse the Nvidia choice, especially if you also plan to run a DAW - its system footprint is negligible (unlike the ASUS, which was huge).

My PC, sans monitors but including the Windows 7 system builder OS, came to just under £750. It's as follows:

Gigabyte MB 970A-DS3, 3xUSB 3 and 6 USB 2, SATA 3 and Dual BIOS
AMD FX8350 8 core 4ghz processor
Some kind of whizzy CPU cooler I can't remember the make of - not liquid cooled, but lots of copper pipes and fins . . .
16GB RAM
Geforce GTX 660 with 2GB onboard
PS is Corsair 750
Couple of DVD writers
Card Reader
Case has 3 super quiet fans
TP-Link dual aerial 300mbps wifi card
No SSD, I started with a 2tb Western Digital drive and added another 3tb later (less than £80 if memory serves). I don't need a fast boot time, 40 seconds is plenty quick enough me - the kettle can't even boil in that time. Everything comes out on the experience index as 8, except the spinning disks which come out at 6 - like I care

One thing I forgot to mention - the physical dimensions of the Geforce card. It is BIG, or rather LONG. So you will need a full size tower case to fit it in.

[donoreo]

Personal choice I would build and use windows 7. The guy that builds our works ones recons that 8
&  8.1 are an unstable base to build on, just what I have been told as I do not know that much about operating systems. Sure someone will come along and shoot me down but hey ho.

No, you are quite correct. Windows has a habit of producing rubbish software between great versions. WindowsXP great, Vista rubbish, Windows 7 great but Windows 8 rubbish. It's always been like that from version 1, except for Dos 4 and 5 which were both rubbish. 

DOS 5 was one of the good ones.  Many went from DOS 3.22 (a good one) to 5.

If memory serves correctly then Dos 5 only corrected what didn't work in Dos 4. 

DOS 4 was the beta for DOS 5. 

[Hinfrance]

If it's only using 3gb that is probably because you are running an older 32bit version of windows. Vista could only address 3.3 gb of RAM, so it was pointless having more. Or your motherboard BIOS might not support the additional memory. Something like that . . .

[2Beers]

I would think for Photo Editing the more ram(memory) the better I currently run with 12 Gb but am thinking of adding more to give me 16Gb

[Andrew]

I would think for Photo Editing the more ram(memory) the better I currently run with 12 Gb but am thinking of adding more to give me 16Gb

that used to be the case - but I know with Lightroom, Adobe changed what parts of the computer are used - and I suspect it was also the same with Photoshop.

The change came around because it was found the Adobe stuff was not releasing resources (RAM, Virtual Memory etc) when an image was closed after you had finished working with it.
Do not remember the details, it only happened to me with LR3.

[kerbside]

When I had to make the choice I went to Apple Mac, yeh, ok not every ones cup of tea but to be honest No troubles what so ever
( that comment has just killed my comp: )
Too many viruses and crap with any Microsoft stuff nowadays, then again its your choice at the end of the day.

[Hinfrance]

When I had to make the choice I went to Apple Mac, yeh, ok not every ones cup of tea but to be honest No troubles what so ever
( that comment has just killed my comp: )
Too many viruses and crap with any Microsoft stuff nowadays, then again its your choice at the end of the day.

All right then, talking about putting the hex on something, I've never had a virus on an MS machine in more than 25 years. I guess you have to go looking for them. Then there's this today. TBH that says more about how awful cloud computing is than any weakness in Apple's OS. And it was in the Daily Mail, so it's probably not true anyway.

[Andrew]

A person without a virus in 25 years is extremely lucky.

A got an Amiga 500 back in the day.
The Kickstarter (boot) disks were corrupt on delivery with a virus. 1988 I believe that was.

Bought a new computer in 1999, got it home, hooked up to the internet, 3 updates later (same day as updates had to be sequential) got a virus that wiped the hard drive.

2001, testing Wireless internet for BT. Plugged in the router, got it activated. Plugged in wifi card to laptop and desk top and within 3 mins the NTLoader files had been deleted. Wireless internet was not available to Joe Public.

And then we get all the virus issues whilst I worked in IT Support - never ending daily affair.

But since a move to Apple, not a hint of a virus. Even though I still user a virus checker etc, the logs come up empty. I'm not saying Apple is perfect, but at this moment in time - I would rather go back to DOS 6.22 than use any of Microsofts Windows options :-(