Building a new Sandybridge system for Photoshop use

WA7ER · 12 Mar 2011 at 20:19

Hi there.

I'm building up a new system, it's going to be used almost exclusively for Photoshop work, no gaming whatsoever, hence the mid-range graphics card.
Oh, and the drives will be in a RAID 5 array.

A little feedback a to whether you'd change anything would be hugely appreciated, or else I think I'm pretty much ready to go ahead and push the order button

Thanks for any help you can offer

Biz.Kid09 · 12 Mar 2011 at 21:01

6850 mid-range?
How about just a 5770?

Also i would get a SSD, big increases in load times which is essential for programs like Photoshop etc.
the 5 WD Caviar is good but i prefer Samsung F3 1tb.

WA7ER · 12 Mar 2011 at 21:15

I've considered an SSD, but I think I'd prefer the 5 drives in a RAID array for this build, maybe at a later date I'll give an SSD a try, when the price for a larger capacity drops a little more perhaps.

Downgrading the GFX card seems it could be a good idea, I know that I don't need a huge amount of horsepower, I was just going for the latest generation of card, expecting lower temperatures and perhaps greater efficiency.

Thanks for the advice.

Edit: I think maybe it'll be worth keeping the more powerful card, due to the fact I'll be using dual high resolution monitors?

King Damager · 12 Mar 2011 at 22:21

Would definitely replace the WD Caviar's with Samsung F3's and used the money from that to buy a 64GB HDD so you can stick Photoshop on it

Also as above go with the downgrade suggested on GPU's

kd

Biz.Kid09 · 12 Mar 2011 at 22:23

WA7ER said:
I've considered an SSD, but I think I'd prefer the 5 drives in a RAID array for this build, maybe at a later date I'll give an SSD a try, when the price for a larger capacity drops a little more perhaps.

Downgrading the GFX card seems it could be a good idea, I know that I don't need a huge amount of horsepower, I was just going for the latest generation of card, expecting lower temperatures and perhaps greater efficiency.

Thanks for the advice.

Edit: I think maybe it'll be worth keeping the more powerful card, due to the fact I'll be using dual high resolution monitors?

If your spending 1200 and have no SSD there is something wrong

Grab a Crucial C300 64gb for Adobe and Windows. You wont regret it.
The 5 in RAID is a good idea depending on what RAID your doing?
A 5770 will run resolutions up to 2560 x 1200 i think. It has multiple outputs also so you will have no problem with multiple monitors.

infernox · 12 Mar 2011 at 23:28

you will notice hardly any difference with sata 3 raid drives unless you are using a perc card.

get 5 samsung f3's 1tb and save plenty of money

Redmint · 13 Mar 2011 at 01:06

What resolution are the screens you'll be running?

If it's 1920x1200 or lower then you'll be fine with basically any card which has DVI + HDMI outputs. (such as this which is also silent). If it's 30" resolution (2560x1600) then you'll need a card with displayport for the 2nd screen such as the 5770 or 6850. If you're not running 30" screens then you'll be doing yourself a favour going for the card I linked as it'll be silent and draw less power.

biuro74 · 13 Mar 2011 at 01:22

I can't see any reason to use 5850 card for Photoshop only, too.
For 2D purposes any card sold on the market today is fine, even discrete one, built into 2600K chip. But if you want to use CUDA acceleration in Photoshop (CS4 ? for example: real time image rotation, instant zooming and panning) buy GeForce, 96 CUDA cores (Stream Processors) should be reasonable minimum for that. Dual monitor is not a problem for most of external cards, but you have to ensure which sockets (DVI, D-Sub, HDMI, DisplayPort) you need.

http://www.overclock.net/graphics-cards-general/389996-cuda-significantly-accelerates-photoshop-cs4-premiere.html

Cupra · 13 Mar 2011 at 01:58

id get 16gb of ram and ssd and buy just 1x 2tb hdd for now and upgrade them later, photoshop would run a lot better than the op's setup

Calm · 13 Mar 2011 at 07:07

biuro74 said:
I can't see any reason to use 5850 card for Photoshop only, too.
For 2D purposes any card sold on the market today is fine, even discrete one, built into 2600K chip. But if you want to use CUDA acceleration in Photoshop (CS4 ? for example: real time image rotation, instant zooming and panning) buy GeForce, 96 CUDA cores (Stream Processors) should be reasonable minimum for that. Dual monitor is not a problem for most of external cards, but you have to ensure which sockets (DVI, D-Sub, HDMI, DisplayPort) you need.

http://www.overclock.net/graphics-cards-general/389996-cuda-significantly-accelerates-photoshop-cs4-premiere.html

Those are OpenGL features, not Cuda, they work perfectly fine on AMD cards.

Adobe tested cards: http://kb2.adobe.com/cps/831/cpsid_83117.html

Cr416 · 13 Mar 2011 at 13:00

Cupra said:
id get 16gb of ram and ssd and buy just 1x 2tb hdd for now and upgrade them later, photoshop would run a lot better than the op's setup

This.

Calm said:
Those are OpenGL features, not Cuda, they work perfectly fine on AMD cards.

Adobe tested cards: http://kb2.adobe.com/cps/831/cpsid_83117.html

And this lol

WA7ER · 13 Mar 2011 at 13:08

Ok, thanks for your feedback. I'm going to go for this build, ordering it in a moment

Thanks once more!

matt_griff · 13 Mar 2011 at 14:03

WA7ER said:
Ok, thanks for your feedback. I'm going to go for this build, ordering it in a moment

Thanks once more!

personally i would wait for the vertex 3 SSD which will be out very soon 21/3 overclockers are expecting them in stock.
http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=HD-071-OC

much better performance over the current drives.

i havent read the whole thread but do you need windows professional?
windows 7 home premium might do you for what you need.