Graphic Design Computer Build

d3sign3r

d3sign3r

d3sign3r

Associate
Joined
22 Oct 2011
Posts
18
I am a freelance print and web graphic designer. I design posters, flyers, brochures, websites, emails, that sort of things. One of my clients has asked me about working in their office. I informed them that in order to benefit from me working in the office (rather than at home) they need to buy a computer at least as good as the one I use at home.

My setup (at home)
i7 2600k overclocked to 4.8Ghz
ASrock Extreme4 gen3
8gig Gskills 1600Mhz
Radeon iceq turbo 6970 2Gig
Venom Cooler
Hazro 27in LCD Ips monitor
2 x 60gig SSD Agility in Raid 0 stripped
2 x Baracuda 1T in Raid 0 stripped
Standard DVDRW
Antec truepower 650w
Decent £50 keyboard
Decent £50 mouse

I think that is about it.

The work computer needs:
1: To be as good or better than the computer I have at home.
2: To be solely concerned with graphic design (no 3D Design, or games, no video work)

Although I believe the i7 2600k is probably the best all-round chip available at the moment, would perhaps the Phenom 6core or bulldozer 8core be as good or better purely for graphic design, working in programs like:

Adobe Photoshop
Adobe Illustrator
Adobe InDesign
Adobe Dreamweaver
Adobe Flash

I would like to get the setup as cheap as I can but I think a reasonable budget would be around £1500 but could be more if I can make a compelling argument for something.

I would welcome any comments or suggestions about building this graphic design work station.
 
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i2600k £240

gigabyte z68ap-d3 £85 can oc the cpu to 4.6-4.8ghz you don't need all the bells and whistles of the more expensive mobos

16gb pc3-12800 1600mhz £90

gelid tanquilo £26 oc cpu to 4.6ghz

560ti £180 believe I've read photoshop etc benefit from cuda, I'm no expert

550-650w psu £60-£70

believe that ~£700, leaves you ~£800 for ssd/s, hard disk/s, case(doesn't need to be anything fancy, ~£40-£50 range would do) etc which I'll leave to you.
 
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CS5? CUDA and hyperthreading support.
If you google FX-8150 adobe, you'll see that the 2600k @ stock still beats out the new top end bulldozer:
link1
link2

If you wait a few days I think that SandyBridge-E is being announced and we should see some benchmarks. It should in theory beat the current hardware out, at least the i7-3960x should!

Preview
 
fowler002 said:
i2600k £240

gigabyte z68ap-d3 £85 can oc the cpu to 4.6-4.8ghz you don't need all the bells and whistles of the more expensive mobos

16gb pc3-12800 1600mhz £90

gelid tanquilo £26 oc cpu to 4.6ghz

560ti £180 believe I've read photoshop etc benefit from cuda, I'm no expert

550-650w psu £60-£70

believe that ~£700, leaves you ~£800 for ssd/s, hard disk/s, case(doesn't need to be anything fancy, ~£40-£50 range would do) etc which I'll leave to you.
Click to expand...

This plus a bit fenix shinobi (good cheap understated dont need lots of features if its just for the company) and a crucial m4 ssd. You could go SBE which iirc is being released next week, but thats only worth it if you get a six core which wont be cheap (think 450 for cpu and 150 for motherboard as an absolute minimum, will quite possibly be more).
 
i'm 99% sure that cuda support doesnt work in SLI, so heres my recommendation:

YOUR BASKET
1 x Intel Core i7-2600K 3.40GHz (Sandybridge) Socket LGA1155 Processor - Retail £239.99
1 x Asus GeForce GTX 560Ti DirectCU II TOP 1024MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card **Supplied with BattleField 3 & Batman: Arkham City PC game** £193.99
2 x Seagate Barracuda 7200.12 1TB SATA 6Gb/s 32MB Cache - OEM (ST31000524AS) £109.99 (£219.98)
1 x Gigabyte Z68AP-D3 Intel Z68 (Socket 1155) DDR3 Motherboard £84.98
2 x Crucial RealSSD M4 64GB 2.5" SATA 6Gb/s Solid State Hard Drive £83.99 (£167.98)
1 x OCZ ZS Series 550W '80 Plus Bronze' Power Supply £52.98
1 x Logitech G500 Gaming Mouse and FREE Boogie Bug AimB.Pad XL Gaming Mouse Surface £42.98
1 x Antec Kúhler H2O 620 CPU Watercooler (Socket Intel LGA 775 / 1155 / 1156 / 1366 / AMD AM2 / AM3 / AM2+ / AM3+) £41.99
1 x G.Skill RipJawsX 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C9 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit (F3-12800CL9D-8GBXL ) £41.99
1 x Microsoft SideWinder X4 Gaming Keyboard - Retail (JQD-00006) £34.98
1 x BitFenix Merc Alpha Gaming Case - Black £32.99
1 x OcUK 22x DVD±RW SATA ReWriter (Black) - OEM £17.99
Total : £1,189.32 (includes shipping : £13.75).

i'm not so keen on the RAID 0 thing myself though. i would personally go for a single 1TB HDD and an OCZ revodrive so that you get the silly speeds of the dual SSDs and some extra capacity so the disk can be used for all of your programs, HDD caching, and as a scratch disk

i havent recommended a monitor because i have no clue about them.

keep the three free games for your home PC :)
 
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