New build for professional image editing

[Benh89]

Hi there! A belated happy new year to all! This is my first forum post, although I've been "lurking" for a few months and buying from here for 3.5 years.

I currently work at home at my Dad's large format print studio (not sure if I'm allowed to post a link so I haven't). Our main focuses are reproducing artwork & photography and printing posters & graphics. We work with fairly large image files/documents - hundreds of megabytes and sometimes gigabytes in size. These files are edited and multiple instances of the files are saved to different locations and transferred between computers before being printed. That is a very brief generalisation of what we require from our computers.

What we currently consider to be our "main" computer is as follows:

Processor: AMD Athlon 64 X2 6000+ @ 3 GHz
CPU Cooler: Arctic Cooling Freezer 64 Pro
Motherboard: ASUS M2N32 WS Pro AM2 socket
Memory: Corsair 4GB DDR2 XMS2 DHX PC2-6400C5
Graphics: BFG GeForce 8800 GTS 640MB
Power Supply: OCZ GameXStream 850w Silent SLI Ready ATX2
HDD: 500GB Samsung Spinpoint HD502HJ (this is only a few months old)
OS: Windows XP Pro 32-bit
Optical Drive: ASUS 18x DVD±RW SATA
Case: Antec 900

This computer is 3.5 years old and the first one I ever built so it probably isn't optimised for image editing. The graphics card is only just paying off as we have upgraded from CS2 to CS5 and Photoshop can now utilize it! At £275 is was the most expensive component! 3.5 years seems like a reasonable life span for a system given how rapidly new components are hitting the shelves.

Sometimes the computer feels fairly quick and responsive and sometimes it's the complete opposite. Dad's been harping on at me for a few weeks about building another computer (next week he's ordering another Eizo monitor so now might be a good time) so I did some research. He has exceptional eyesight for colour and detail and no imperfection will escape him so I cannot afford to choose the wrong components or spend too much money.

Unfortunately OCUK don't stock them, but I'm considering either an ATI FireGL or Nvidia Quadro graphics card which can output 10-bit colour through the new monitor (via DisplayPort). This could be expensive, but will it be worth it? Also, what would be the most important components? Am I correct in thinking cpu and memory? I've never done any overclocking, but I'm willing to try if it will help. We are not interested in benchmark numbers or gaming, just a machine that will bring about a real world performance boost without being overkill and hopefully last another 3-4 years.

Any help would be greatly appreciated,

Ben.

(Sorry if I waffle Just thought the background info would help. Damn would you look at the time!!!)

 

[bremen1874]

Given the situation you've described have you given any serious thought to your warranty and support requirements?

What would it cost the business for each day this machine is unavailable?

 

[95thrifles]

Hey
Yeah you want a good CPU and lots of RAM, depends on what sort of budget youre looking at, but given the monitor and gfx cost I guess its prob flexible
You can look at Intels new SB, their slightly older X58 platform which uses triple channel RAM or go down AMD route again and get their nice 6 core CPU, bang in as much RAM as you ideally
OCing can give free performance boost, but normally with business stability is more important so OCing tends not to be considered

 

[Benh89]

Thanks for the replies.

I also think that warranties and support will be very important, so I'll skip the overclocking.

I'm considering the new Sandy Bridge processors. Would the Hyperthreading enabled i7 be vastly superior to the i5 when using Photoshop CS5? Also, which applications does Hyperthreading benefit the most?

Secondly, a website called "CPU Benchmark" ( http://www.cpubenchmark.net/high_end_cpus.html# ) shows the i7 2600K outperforming the i7 2600 even when both are running on stock settings. Is this purely down to the better GPU in the 2600K? Although there is no question the i7 2600 outperforms the i5 2500, is it necessary to spend the extra as from what I've read the i5 is still a very capable cpu?

Finally, has anyone here had any experience using a 10-bit colour enabled monitor? Would the likes of an ATI FireGL or Nvidia Quadro graphics card bring about a significant benefit, or would I be more wise to put money into one of the K series processors and an H67 board and just use the onboard HD3000 graphics? Then use the money saved from buying discrete graphics and a P67 board on more memory and better HDD's and/or SSD's?

Cheers, Ben.