Alastair,
http://tomshardware.com is a good resource for getting this sort of information. They have nice reviews, comparative charts, etc. It's always an optimization between the price and the capabilities.. I am also trying to choose a desktop for myself, so I can share with you some of my search results. I am choosing between Core Duo and Intel I7 (Quad Core). If I go for the latter, I will probably choose something close to this set: I7 2.66 or 3 GHz ASUS P6T motherboard, Otherwise: Intel Core 2 Duo system: ASUS P5Q SE, E8400 or E8500 CPU For either: At least 4 GB (DDR3 with P6T Motherboard, DDR2 with P5Q), but probably 6GB (I am considering a 64-bit OS, otherwise, no more than 4GB) Antec 300 case or maybe the one step up, Thermaltake 500W or 600W PS. You definitely want to have at least 512MB of memory in you video card. I've been considering Radeon 4770, but just recently somebody posted a link to Adobe's page describing how CS4 is capable of using 3D features of some GPUs (video cards) http://kb2.adobe.com/cps/405/kb405711.html However, I am not sure how important this enhancement is, - as it seems to only improve the visual effects, not the performance (at least that's how I understood the discussion). HDD: I had good experience with WD RE3 recently, but it's been 1 year since that, - so there may be better models now. I would not go for striped RAID - too much complexity and potential for a problem to happen. I'd rather have one HDD for the OS and applications, and a separate one for all the documents & images. I'd configure Photoshop to have its temporary space on the latter. If you are considering a custom-configured computer, but don't want to waste your time putting it together and testing, - I'd recommend kc-computers.com. Kevin provides good pre- and post-sales support, but post-sales is not an on-site or "white-glove" service, - you'd have to test things under his careful guidance. He is very responsive to questions and problems. You can read what I wrote about this shop: http://www.resellerratings.com/profile.pl?user=346323 Read other reviews: http://www.resellerratings.com/store/KC_Computers HTH, Igor On 09/08/2009, Alastair Robertson wrote: > thanks for the great info re a suitable monitor(s) for the > workstation. Now, how about the CPU, RAM, graphics card etc? I am > sure that bigger, faster etc is always better but what makes a > sensible tradeoff between features and price? -- PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List [email protected] http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and follow the directions.
