[ribbit]

I'm interested to build a custom system or buy pre-built if it matches my specs. I've not built a computer before:-) I am a freelance designer/developer and typically spend around 10+ hours a day at my machines - I'm currently using 3 laptops but want to consolidate on a top spec desktop. My interests are photography and digital art.

- I need to run lots of apps simultaneously: Photoshop, Flash, Illustrator, Dreamweaver, Open Office, couple of browsers, email, IM etc
- I need fast response
- I need the system to be quiet - very important
- I do audio/music work and will scale this up in the future so I need a decent soundcard and speakers
- I DON'T do any video or 3D modelling/rendering (maybe once in a blue moon)
- I do NOT need this system for playing games
- I want to run 3 flat monitors at pretty hi Res (is 1600x1200 too ambitious?). I need professional calibrated colour on at least one monitor.
- I run a network of 4 Windows machines and 1 OSX Mac

I'd like lots of RAM (4 gig?), nice fast big hard drives(s), usb + firewire, ethernet (guess I don't need wireless in a desktop?), good quality DVD/CD read/writer, wireless ergonomic mouse and keyboard, Vista Ultimate.

Any buying advice based on these specific needs appreciated, especially the monitors. Cheers

[feckit]

How much do you want to spend £££££££

[ribbit]

Around £1500? I realise 3 monitors might bump it up

[feckit]

You could use 2 graphics PCI-Express graphics cards.
Most come with DVI & Monitor connectors, hence you could get 3 monitors off 2 cards.
But i think this needs the brains of others that are more gifted in the latest gear, i'm not
I'm sure others will be able to advise you better than i can, you may have to wait a few hours longer.

[floppybootstomp]

Based on your requirements, I put together the following parts for the central tower system only.

Good solid motherboard; quad core processor for multi-tasking and CPU-intensive software applications; Excellent and quiet CPU cooling; the Case is a subjective thing, it's one's own taste of course, but the suggested case is quality; quiet 500W PSU; Best DVDRW for the money plus a DVD drive for playback only & copying from; Two hard disks (Samsung are very quiet), the smaller one for all your software and Operating System, the larger one for storage; The Matrox graphics card is perfect for your work applications and supports a three monitor display, but is a bit rubbish for gaming; Superb sound card for audio work; and 4Gb of fast memory.

The total price inc VAT & postage is £1059.64

Which leaves you £440.00 for three monitors, keyboard, mouse and speakers, which, frankly, you ain't gonna do.

I think for your needs a £2K budget is more realistic.

However, corners can be cut, but I would strongly suggest, in view of your needs, you do at least stick to a quad core CPU; The Matrox Graphics card and the Creative Sound card.

[muckshifter]

Nice spec' on Floppy's suggestions.


However, there ain't actually any 'true' quad core CPUs, just yet.

Another point is the software ... The software must have simultaneous multi-threading technology (SMT) written into its code. SMT enables parallel multi-threading wherein the cores are served multi-threaded instructions in parallel. Without SMT the software will only recognize one core. Adobe Photoshop is an example of SMT-aware software. I'll let you "check" the other software on your list.

The operating system will play a roll in all this also ... did I say 64bit ?

A dual core processor is different from a multi-processor system. You will, however, be pleased to know that we can actually have a multi-processor system that can accommodate multi-core processors.

Our very own Ady Webb has such a system ... I wonder if he can be persuaded to list the spec' here ... 'cos I can't find the thread he started on that system.

Just some food for thought.

[V_R]

The Matrox graphics card is perfect for your work applications and supports a three monitor display, but is a bit rubbish for gaming

Thts a good spec system, But you will still need a graphics card for that Matrox triplehead.

[ribbit]

Wow this is great stuff guys!

re > Which leaves you £440.00 for three monitors, keyboard, mouse and speakers, which, frankly, you ain't gonna do.

yup - suspected as much - getting a good feel for it now. :-)

[floppybootstomp]

Originally Posted by V_R

Thts a good spec system, But you will still need a graphics card for that Matrox triplehead.

Really?

My goodness, I didn't realise that - you mean to say the Matrox card only deals with secondary grafix and feeds them to a triple output?

I never knew.

In which case I'd guess something like an Nvidia 7300GS would do - correct?