Building a Fast PC for Graphics/Design - looking for advice/specs

[robobergz]

I need a fast machine for mostly photoshop and after effects. Would like 2 SS drives, one for OS and another for cache (have heard this is a good idea?) need recommendations for components outside of a case. Budget around $1500. I am a creative professional so heavy usage of large files.

 

[ingtar33]

mm you don't need a 2nd ssd for cache... what you need is a ramdisk... it's a little different.

how many monitors? any gaming? what resolution? do you need an OS? do you care about noise? peripherals? do you want a dvd drive? are you going to overclock?

 

[robobergz]

I have 2 monitors currently. Not much gaming - lets say no. Resolution - 1920. Don't need an OS I have Win8 and Win7. Don't want a loud machine so I guess I care a bit about noise. I haven't used a DVD drive in 10 years so could honestly reuse the one I have which is a dust collector Overclocking - probably not. No to Peripherals other than external HDs that I can think of. Want at least 6 USB ports.

 

[Guest]

It always depends on what do you need, but if you want snappiness and high capacity storage i would recomend going for 2 ssds (intel and samsung ssds are quite good for what i've seen) in RAID 0 and some green drives for storage. For the GPU... well I'm by no means an expert so I don't know if a Cuadro will be for you (again, it depends on what are you going to use it for) or if a good "consumer grade" GPU will be more than enough, so may be other people could help you with this.

 

[ingtar33]

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

CPU: Intel Core i7-4790 3.6GHz Quad-Core Processor ($289.99 @ TigerDirect)
Motherboard: ASRock Fatal1ty H97 Killer ATX LGA1150 Motherboard ($81.05 @ Newegg)
Memory: Mushkin Redline 16GB (2 x 8GB) DDR3-1866 Memory ($178.99 @ Newegg)
Storage: Samsung 840 EVO 250GB 2.5" Solid State Drive ($129.99 @ Amazon)
Storage: Seagate Barracuda 3TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive ($99.99 @ NCIX US)
Video Card: MSI GeForce GTX 780 3GB TWIN FROZR Video Card ($449.99 @ Newegg)
Case: Fractal Design Define R4 Blackout with Window ATX Mid Tower Case ($99.99 @ Newegg)
Power Supply: XFX ProSeries 750W 80+ Silver Certified Semi-Modular ATX Power Supply ($100.00 @ NCIX US)
Total: $1429.99
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2014-08-14 21:05 EDT-0400

this will do what you're looking for. Nvidia has some solid driver support with their gaming lineup cards for photoshop and the like, it will also be as close to silent as i can make a build without putting a noctua cpu cooler on it. (this build should be pretty much dead silent anyway. It would be a respectable gaming machine as well when you get right down to it... though it would be better with an overclockable cpu.

I also color coordinated the parts so you can marvel at your pretty computer's guts through the window in the case 😉 just cause i figured you'd like to show it off to SOMEONE.

 

[robobergz]

This is great info thanks all! a couple more questions ...

1) Is having 2 SS drives the optimal scenario along with a big daddy storage? If so can you recommend sizes for both? Does it matter if they are different? Should the OS drive be smaller? does the recommended Motherboard support 2 SS drives?
2) Thinking I want 32 gigs of RAM - excessive?

 

[ingtar33]

well, no need for 2 ssds, it's not like it's cheaper to buy more. The large storage hard drive is just because some things don't get any faster on SSDs. I keep movies and pictures and music on my hard drive. It doesn't matter how fast you access those, they basically play at the same speed.

32gb of ram is... a lot. though who knows. graphic design, if you get into 3d rendering then you might use it.

 

[robobergz]

Great - thanks for all the help!! Purchasing .. now...