That Time Again

[LunarMist]

It is time to build another machine. I am so confused about all the newer CPUs and chipsets (AMD vs. Intel), but what can I get that will provide ~50% improvement in speed over an ~2-year old P4 Northwood 3.4/i875/4GB PC3200 setup? Primary killers are 1Ds MK II RAW file conversions and various processing of large image files, including a bunch of 6x7 scans. Next year I will get a 1D MK III (or whatever the next body is named), so the situation will be even worse.

Right now I am only interetsed in CPU/chipset/RAM choices, not other aspects of a system. I would start with 4GB of RAM and 32-bit XP, but need future upgradability to utilize 8GB of RAM and 64-bit XP. TIA.

 

[Bozo]

Looks like you need to move to dual core or dual CPUs.
A Pentium D 830 on a D945 series motherboard would work. It supports 4GB of DDR2.

I'd recommend an AMD 64 something or other, but I don't trust the motherboards. Seems the only reliable and trustworthy ones are for servers. $$$$$

Why not move to a couple of Seagate Cheetahs in RAID 0 first? Even installing a separate Cheetah as the Page/scratch file drive. By carefully choosing the right RAID controller, it could be migrated to a new MB/CPU/RAM setup later.

Bozo :mrgrn:

 

[LunarMist]

The CPU has been the primary bottleneck in my system since Q1 '04 when the RAM was increased to 4GB. I don't care about hard drives much anymore except in capacity. In fact, I may dispense with a SCSI adapter altogether and replace the 1999 flatbed scanner.

 

[Mercutio]

I'd suggest something in a dual Opteron. Say, a Tyan K8WE, with support for two dual core CPUs, PCI-X and PCI-e, and as much as 16GB RAM.
That ought to cover all your bases for I/O and CPU horsepower.

Back in the land of reality, Gigabyte and Soltek make great Athlon64 boards.

At this point I do not see any application for Intel CPUs. Even Intel says their dual core stuff is teh suck.

 

[LunarMist]

I'm kinda limited on funds at the moment. What is reasonable in the sub $3000 range for only the CPU, mainboard, and 4GB of RAM?

 

[ddrueding]

Gigabyte Socket 939 motherboard
AMD X2 4400+ CPU
Keep your 4GB PC3200 for now

 

[ddrueding]

keep in mind the solution I gave would cost less than $600. If you're looking formore power, Merc has the right idea.

 

[LunarMist]

Thanks. That seems like a possible temporary solution if the performance is improved. Which Gigabyte board and chipset do you prefer? Are they reliable? I had some problems with both AMD and VIA chipsets in the past which is the reason for switching back to Intel in late 2003.

 

[Mercutio]

Adobe's software does seem to work better on Intel. I'd say that's a mistake on their part.

Personally, I use Gigabyte and Soltek boards with Via chipsets, and they're fine. I have gobs of them. I sell gobs of them. I'd build them every day of the week, no problem. For myself, I won't consider anything else.

I'm guessing you need to look up a little higher on the food chain, though. Circa-2003 hardware is pretty damned good hardware for most people. Most of my PCs are around 3GHz, and I think they're really fast machines. If you've outgrown that, I think you need to look at something like the system Pradeep's employers just bought for him.

 

[Pradeep]

CPU speeds really haven't advanced much past the 3.4 you are currently using. At work we use the 2MB L2 cache P4 3.6Ghz. We'll prob move to the 3.8GHz shortly. Going from a Xeon @ 2.8 to the 3.6 gave us about a 30% improvement in general image processing.

There was a review on the Net where they benchmarked a bunch of RAW conversion programs, can't find it now.

We tried an 820 (dual core 3GHz), slow as bloody mollases unless it was something that was SMP aware (such as ABBYY background recognition).

BTW Merc, that system is for work, not for me personally. If it's any good I might fund one myself tho...

 

[Pradeep]

http://www.sphoto.com/techinfo/rawconverters/rawconverters.htm

Here it is. Seems like Bibble is the fastest.

 

[Bozo]

With you running at 3.4GHz already, it doesn't seem cost effective to try and move up.
If your software is capable of running on dual processors, that would be better. A dual core CPU and motherboard would be well under your price point.

Bozo :mrgrn:

 

[Santilli]

Faster scanner might help. I found dual xeons work very well for Photoshop scanning, combined with USB 2.0 Epson 3170 scanner. FAST.

I had problems with an old scanner, scsi and usb, maxing out a 1.4 gig Athlon.
Switching to the dual Xeon 2.8's really did the trick.

Even if your software is NOT multiprocessor aware, the duals might be the way to go.

Supermico motherboard, with dual Xeons might do the trick.

Can you do quad processors for 3 grand?

GS

 

[LunarMist]

I'm not sure what you mean by Photoshop scanning. Do you actually scan into PS rather than using the native scanner software as a standalone? That seems odd to me. Anyway, I have an old Nikon 8000ED for scanning film and it takes about an hour to do one 6x9 frame at the maximum sampling settings and single line CCD mode. I don't shoot MF now, so only a few old origianls woudl ever be scanned in the future. The speed of the 8000ED basically is independent of the system, so I use an old P3 notebook and 1394a Cardbus adapter for that. I was only mentioning the old flatbed scanner since it is SCSI/USB 1.1 (useless for USB) and I wish to eliminate SCSI from a new system. Any good and fast USB 2 flatbed scanner with a sheetfeeder will do since I use it so rarely - mainly for documents.

 

[sechs]

If your scanner is TWAIN or WIA, then Photoshop can plug into the native software for scanning. Cuts out the middle man.

 

[Mercutio]

WIA scanners are evil. TWAIN! TWAIN! Nothing but TWAIN!

Anyway, unless you're scanning negatives or slides, it's pointless to scan more than 600dpi, and if you're scanning negatives or slides, it's pointless to use a flatbed.

This information is primarily for posterity. I'm sure everyone here already knew these things.

 

[LunarMist]

Then you sit around twiddling thumbs until the scan is completed instead of working on a different file in PS simultaneously?

 

[Mercutio]

The TWAIN app is distinct from photoshop. You should be able to work in both at once.

 

[Pradeep]

Bringing this back up for Lunar.

With our Dell Precision 380s, and P4 3.8GHz, we can convert a 1Ds-MkII RAW file into an 8 bit TIFF in 12 seconds using DPP 2.xxx

 

[LunarMist]

8-bit conversions take a little over 15 seconds on the 2-year old system. I am not sure that it is worth much going to a faster P4, but if the dual-core Pentium D is not good, what can I do?

 

[Santilli]

Ok:

I've had a my dual 2.8 ghz Supermicro machine next to an Athlon 3000+. The dual boots off a -320 LSI single Channel Megaraid card, and, it boots off a Raid 0 dual 36 gig SCA 15.3 Cheetah setup. I have a seperate 15.3 for a page file, and, two 146 gig 10k's for storage. All refurbs that work fine, and were cheap.

The Athlon uses one 15.3. ATTO gives me about 70 mb/sec for the single drive, and about 100-120 for the dual boot.

I notice the Supermicro to be snappier, with fewer lag spots, and, in ripping, and burning, it's way faster then the Athlon.

I think, though I can't prove it, that the Supermicro motherboards are a bit higher quality then the Gigabyte I used. Still the gigabyte is a great value, even if I was the only guy on the planet to end up with a board with a dead ATA channel. The Gigabyte also did not work with XP 64 bit.

You might try a Supermicro Opteron setup, multi-processor board, with the Athlon processors. That should sort of fit your budget, and, give you plenty of up room.

Even a quad Xeon might work...

gs