new build ? dual core v single

[Tom McGrew]

I want to build for the first time. No gaming. just Photoshop work on a professional scale, occasional video work. Dual monitors. Should I stick with a fast single core (AMD) or go for a dual core? How high of a video card do I need? Should I go to the nvidia 7xxx series or is the 6xxxx adequate?( with dual DVI of course) Plan on a raptor HD, at least for the boot disk. How about mobo; should I go for the Asus $200 board, or would a $ 125 board serve me well?
Thanks for your advice as well as your 2 cents worth.

TRM

 

[Clint]

My advice, even though I don't do Photoshop...

Lots of RAM, dual core processor. Wait for a Conroe or AM2 processor, if you can. Get a cheaper video card if you need to in order to get more RAM. If you want an NVidia card (even though I'm not a fan of theirs), get a 7xxx card instead of a 6xxx, although you probably won't see any real benefit. You'd only see the benefit later when when running Vista or games (much the same ). And get lots of RAM. At least 2GB, if not 4. Probably doesn't matter much which motherboard you get, but get a decent name-brand one. Make sure it supports lots of RAM, and get as fast of memory you can get.

I guess you can probably tell what I think is most important. I'm not familiar enough with the the HD issues with Photoshop to comment on the best setup for that. I'd guess as fast as possible, but I think there's also some scratch disk space to get set up somewhere. Possibly having multiple drives to try to split stuff across multiple drives.

Do you have a budget in mind?

Clint
I want to build for the first time. No gaming. just Photoshop work on a professional scale, occasional video work. Dual monitors. Should I stick with a fast single core (AMD) or go for a dual core? How high of a video card do I need? Should I go to the nvidia 7xxx series or is the 6xxxx adequate?( with dual DVI of course) Plan on a raptor HD, at least for the boot disk. How about mobo; should I go for the Asus $200 board, or would a $ 125 board serve me well?
Thanks for your advice as well as your 2 cents worth.

TRM

 

[Tom McGrew]

Thanks, Clint. I need to stay under $2000. I was planning on 2G of RAM, and at least a 500W power supply. You must like ATI better for a video card. I would like to stay under $200 for that./
TM
My advice, even though I don't do Photoshop...

Lots of RAM, dual core processor. Wait for a Conroe or AM2 processor, if you can. Get a cheaper video card if you need to in order to get more RAM. If you want an NVidia card (even though I'm not a fan of theirs), get a 7xxx card instead of a 6xxx, although you probably won't see any real benefit. You'd only see the benefit later when when running Vista or games (much the same ). And get lots of RAM. At least 2GB, if not 4. Probably doesn't matter much which motherboard you get, but get a decent name-brand one. Make sure it supports lots of RAM, and get as fast of memory you can get.

I guess you can probably tell what I think is most important. I'm not familiar enough with the the HD issues with Photoshop to comment on the best setup for that. I'd guess as fast as possible, but I think there's also some scratch disk space to get set up somewhere. Possibly having multiple drives to try to split stuff across multiple drives.

Do you have a budget in mind?

Clint
I want to build for the first time. No gaming. just Photoshop work on a professional scale, occasional video work. Dual monitors. Should I stick with a fast single core (AMD) or go for a dual core? How high of a video card do I need? Should I go to the nvidia 7xxx series or is the 6xxxx adequate?( with dual DVI of course) Plan on a raptor HD, at least for the boot disk. How about mobo; should I go for the Asus $200 board, or would a $ 125 board serve me well?
Thanks for your advice as well as your 2 cents worth.

TRM

 

[Mike T.]

I want to build for the first time. No gaming. just Photoshop work on a professional scale, occasional video work. Dual monitors. Should I stick with a fast single core (AMD) or go for a dual core? How high of a video card do I need? Should I go to the nvidia 7xxx series or is the 6xxxx adequate?( with dual DVI of course) Plan on a raptor HD, at least for the boot disk. How about mobo; should I go for the Asus $200 board, or would a $ 125 board serve me well?
Thanks for your advice as well as your 2 cents worth.

TRM

(my reply)

Anything you build now should be dual-core. Nvidia 6xxx series should be fine for video. Any $125 mainboard will work well. I'd specifically steer away from Asus, though. Many people will disagree with me on that, as they are the most over-hyped brand available. But they have poor reliability, which you would know if you serviced them professionally. Better brands are AOpen and DFI. These usually cost less, too. -Dave

 

[Boba & Ilinka]

I would go with better MB with raid, 0 for performance or 10 for both: performance and security.

boba vankufer
I want to build for the first time. No gaming. just Photoshop work on a professional scale, occasional video work. Dual monitors. Should I stick with a fast single core (AMD) or go for a dual core? How high of a video card do I need? Should I go to the nvidia 7xxx series or is the 6xxxx adequate?( with dual DVI of course) Plan on a raptor HD, at least for the boot disk. How about mobo; should I go for the Asus $200 board, or would a $ 125 board serve me well?
Thanks for your advice as well as your 2 cents worth.

TRM

 

[John Weiss]

I want to build for the first time. No gaming. just Photoshop work on a
professional scale, occasional video work. Dual monitors. Should I stick with a
fast single core (AMD) or go for a dual core? How high of a video card do I
need? Should I go to the nvidia 7xxx series or is the 6xxxx adequate?( with dual
DVI of course) Plan on a raptor HD, at least for the boot disk. How about mobo;
should I go for the Asus $200 board, or would a $ 125 board serve me well?
Thanks for your advice as well as your 2 cents worth.

Dual core for Photoshop, since it is SMP aware.

Fancy/expensive video cards are for 3D work, and don't do much for 2D work like
your Photoshop stuff. Spend the $$ on a fast HD system (more/bigger Raptors)
and more RAM (2 GB min; 4 GB may help in extreme cases).

 

[Ed Medlin]

I want to build for the first time. No gaming. just Photoshop work on a
professional scale, occasional video work. Dual monitors. Should I stick
with a fast single core (AMD) or go for a dual core? How high of a video
card do I need? Should I go to the nvidia 7xxx series or is the 6xxxx
adequate?( with dual DVI of course) Plan on a raptor HD, at least for the
boot disk. How about mobo; should I go for the Asus $200 board, or would a
$ 125 board serve me well?
Thanks for your advice as well as your 2 cents worth.

Dual core for Photoshop, since it is SMP aware.

Fancy/expensive video cards are for 3D work, and don't do much for 2D work
like your Photoshop stuff. Spend the $$ on a fast HD system (more/bigger
Raptors) and more RAM (2 GB min; 4 GB may help in extreme cases).

Good advise. For the price of a high end video card he could set up a couple
of nice and large raid arrays which would help a lot with his video and
photo work.

Ed