CPU for Photoshop

[Dingleberry88]

I'm going to be building my sister a PC in the coming weeks. I wouldn't say she's a heavy PS user, but she still uses it a fair bit for college and other things.

I'll be going for a C2D (and overclocking, hence my thread in the motherboard section), but would I be able to get away with an E2XX or would the 1mb cache kill it?

Would I be a lot better off with the 2mb cache of an E4500?

 

[rpstewart]

While CPU grunt is important for Photoshop, RAM will be more useful. It's still a 32bit app so there's no need to go nuts but if you can stretch to 4Gb then do so.

 

[Dingleberry88]

I'll be sticking 2GB in at first - if it really needs it I can add another 2GB at a later date.

So summing up my first post, what I basically want to know is; is it worth the extra ~£30 for an extra 1mb of cache (GHz is irrelevant as they should both hit 3 no problem).

 

[Makhaira]

Why are you bothering to overclock a brand new proc for PS use? Pointless imho. You want 2Gb for PS for doing any decent level of editing. Cache won't really make any odds with PS operation.

 

[Dingleberry88]

Why are you bothering to overclock a brand new proc for PS use?

It's not just for PS, but it will be used quite a bit.

It's also illegal to leave a C2D at stock.

 

[uv]

My e2180 @ 3.2 makes photoshop fly

The extra cache performs ~5/10% faster at the same clock speed - you really won't notice the difference in Photoshop at all.

Biggest thing for me was going from XP to vista64 - Photoshop, with a ton o' fonts and plugins, opens faster than I can say "omg ninja 'shop time".

 

[Tooks]

The Custom PC Media Benchmarks I ran comparing an E2140 at 3Ghz and an E4400 at 3Ghz showed no appreciable difference in the image editing test, which uses GIMP.

I expect Photoshop (although depends on which versions) to be no different even though it is partially multithreaded, as you are comparing two dual cores. I would expect some difference between a dual and a quad though, especially when applying filters (the multithreaded part).

 

[Grimley]

It's also illegal to leave a C2D at stock.

Guilty as charged, better send the overclocking police round my house to arrest me...

 

[Lightnix]

Why not overclock a processor for Photoshop use? Try filtering an entire image of sizeable dimensions (i.e. 1200x1200 or something) and you'll see what I mean. Seconds can mean everything when you just want to get on with something.