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A new desktop PC
- Thread starter jh82
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- sony a7r iii
jfriend00
Forum Pro
Some Cyber Week sales ideas:
Dell XPS Tower - $1099
Intel i7-8700 processor (6-cores)
16GB DDR4, 2400MHz DRAM
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1060 graphics card
1TB hard drive
Windows 10 Home 64bit
Dual Band WiFi
Dell Inspiron Tower - $949
AMD Ryzen 7 2700 processor (8-cores)
16GB DDR4, 2400MHz DRAM
AMD Radeon RX 580 graphics card
1TB Hard drive
Dual Band WiFi
HP Envy Desktop 795-0050 - $1099
Intel i7-8700
16GB DDR4, 2666MHZ DRAM
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1060 graphics card
256GB SATA M.2 SSD
2 TB hard drive
DVD-Writer
HP Envy Desktop - 795-0025t - $949
Intel i7-8700
12GB DDR4, 2666MHZ DRAM
16GB Intel Optane memory for storage acceleration
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1050 Ti graphics card
1 TB hard drive
DVD-Writer
Dell XPS Tower - $1099
Intel i7-8700 processor (6-cores)
16GB DDR4, 2400MHz DRAM
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1060 graphics card
1TB hard drive
Windows 10 Home 64bit
Dual Band WiFi
Dell Inspiron Tower - $949
AMD Ryzen 7 2700 processor (8-cores)
16GB DDR4, 2400MHz DRAM
AMD Radeon RX 580 graphics card
1TB Hard drive
Dual Band WiFi
HP Envy Desktop 795-0050 - $1099
Intel i7-8700
16GB DDR4, 2666MHZ DRAM
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1060 graphics card
256GB SATA M.2 SSD
2 TB hard drive
DVD-Writer
HP Envy Desktop - 795-0025t - $949
Intel i7-8700
12GB DDR4, 2666MHZ DRAM
16GB Intel Optane memory for storage acceleration
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1050 Ti graphics card
1 TB hard drive
DVD-Writer
How old is your old computer? If it doesn't have 16gb and a SSD you could just get those and it would be a lot faster. A 1Tb Samsung 850 Pro SSD will use nearly half your budget, if your current PC can handle a SATA III drive.
Keekerseeker
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I would go for bigger then 1T of hard drive. Minimum 16GB ram , and 500GB SSd a 1060 GC is more then enough if not editing video. your budget seems a little light for all that,,,at least where I live. If you live in a city,,,,you should be able to custom build one for you,,,then you get exactly what you want-need. If you have a CC that doubles your one year warranty,,,that's a bonus.
jfriend00
Forum Pro
Samsung is coming out with a new QVO product line for SSDs (starts shipping later this month, I think). It's a bit slower than their Pro or EVO product lines, but still way faster than regular hard drives and a lot more affordable for 1TB or even 4TB sizes.
Still not as cheap as hard drives, but if you factor in useful life and performance, they're going to be giving hard drives a run for their money in a lot more applications. This looks like the beginning of the end for hard drives for many uses if you ask me.
Here's an article and a tabular summary:
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John
Thank you all for the great suggestion. I know very litter about the computer. The current computer I have is a six-years old HP computer bought from Costco.
Currently, I saw the Costco has a Dell computer on sale for $900. Here is the spec, is it a good buy? Thanks!
Dell XPS Tower Model XPS8930-7328BLK-PUS
Processor & Memory:
Intel® Core™ i7-8700 Processor 3.20GHz
16GB DDR4 2666MHz RAM + 16GB Intel® Optane Memory
Drives:
2TB 7200RPM SATA Hard Drive
DVD-RW (Writes to DVD/CD)
Operating System:
Microsoft® Windows 10 Home (64-bit)
Graphics & Video:
4GB NVIDIA® GeForce® GTX 1050Ti Graphics
Monitor Not Included
Communications:
802.11 Wireless-AC + Bluetooth® 4.2
Keyboard & Mouse:
Dell Wired Keyboard + Laser Mouse
Ports & Slots:
2x USB 3.1 (1x Type C, 1x Type A)
1x USB 3.1
6x USB 3.0
2x USB 2.0
1x USB 3.1
1x HDMI
1x Media Card Reader (SD, SDHC, SDXC)
1x Combination Audio jack
Currently, I saw the Costco has a Dell computer on sale for $900. Here is the spec, is it a good buy? Thanks!
Dell XPS Tower Model XPS8930-7328BLK-PUS
Processor & Memory:
Intel® Core™ i7-8700 Processor 3.20GHz
16GB DDR4 2666MHz RAM + 16GB Intel® Optane Memory
Drives:
2TB 7200RPM SATA Hard Drive
DVD-RW (Writes to DVD/CD)
Operating System:
Microsoft® Windows 10 Home (64-bit)
Graphics & Video:
4GB NVIDIA® GeForce® GTX 1050Ti Graphics
Monitor Not Included
Communications:
802.11 Wireless-AC + Bluetooth® 4.2
Keyboard & Mouse:
Dell Wired Keyboard + Laser Mouse
Ports & Slots:
2x USB 3.1 (1x Type C, 1x Type A)
1x USB 3.1
6x USB 3.0
2x USB 2.0
1x USB 3.1
1x HDMI
1x Media Card Reader (SD, SDHC, SDXC)
1x Combination Audio jack
jfriend00
Forum Pro
Yes, looks like a decent buy to me. It appears to be a better price than the Dell special I recommended earlier, though it's not a completely identical configuration.
morski119
Well-known member
Sounds good and should be up for the task, however there is one important part missing - SSD. I would add at least 250GB one for the system. Intel Optane “memory“ cannot substitute SSD...
jfriend00
Forum Pro
I'm a fan of a system SSD too, but quite frankly if you're not keeping your photos on the SSD (which you wouldn't be for a small SSD), it probably doesn't really influence Lightroom/Photoshop image processing performance at all (other than the time it takes to start the program). So, if one is really on a budget, you can forgo the SSD and not be losing anything for photo processing.
And, for reasons I don't quite understand, buying a system with an SSD built-in (which is probably what this OP would want to do) usually extracts a premium price (out of line with the actual cost of the SSD itself). Certainly, if your tech enough to do it on your own, you could buy the one with the 2TB drive and then get an SSD, install it yourself and reinstall windows on the SSD. But, I know, that requires a little bit of PC know-how or at least a good PC-saavy friend to help you so we have to be careful who to recommend that to.
morski119
Well-known member
Yes, but the cheap ones aren't nearly as fast. Since the OP is looking for faster, that might not be his best option.
Does not look like a good deal to me. If you go to outlet.dell.com, you can get a 3.2 Ghz i7-8700 Optiplex 5060 with a 256 GB SSD for $672. That includes 3-year on-site warranty. Add a $50 TB HHD and you're done. Unless you're playing games or doing something else that actually uses the graphics card, the integrated video is fine.
Another potential difference is that the Optiplex will come without a lot of trial software installed on it.
jfriend00
Forum Pro
Here's a link to that deal. Some notes that might be relevant:
- It's refurbished (never quite sure what that means)
- SSD is the only drive and is only 256GB. For any reasonable photo work, you will need another drive
- Only 8GB RAM, probably need more memory
- Very good processor
- No graphics card (LR and Photoshop do benefit from at least a mid-range graphics card these days)
- 3-Year warranty
- As it's a smaller form factor, I don't know how expandable it is for other hard drives - I would assume you can add at least one hard drive, but don't know for sure
- Windows 10 Pro
It means it's off-lease. It was in a business for two or three years. Dell got it back, wiped the HD, reinstalled the OS, and ran some diagnostics.
In practical terms, that means it's been well burnt in and will probably never go bad.
Dell's stock at the outlet webpage varies daily, so bigger cases are frequently available if one desires; they price out about the same.
Regarding RAM, when my PC was new I watched the RAM usage in Performance Monitor. Running Photoshop, Illustrator and Acrobat; Micrsoft Word and Execl; two different web browsers; ArcMap and a few other minor programs all at once I rarely exceeded more than 8GB of RAM usage.
The biggest user of RAM in my system is Chrome.
Thanks again for all great suggestions. I will decide between HP Envy and Dell XPS. I guess if I go with HP, I will get a 256GB SSD and GTX1060 graphics card over Dell XPS for $200 more. Does SSD and GXT1060 graphics card will help to speed up the image process and get a better view of the image? I will buy BENQ SW2700PT monitor.
HP Envy Desktop 795-0050 - $1099
Intel i7-8700
16GB DDR4, 2666MHZ DRAM
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1060 graphics card
256GB SATA M.2 SSD
2 TB hard drive
DVD-Writer
Dell XPS Tower Model XPS8930-7328BLK-PUS (Costco)
Processor & Memory:
Intel® Core™ i7-8700 Processor 3.20GHz
16GB DDR4 2666MHz RAM + 16GB Intel® Optane Memory
Drives:
2TB 7200RPM SATA Hard Drive
DVD-RW (Writes to DVD/CD)
Operating System:
Microsoft® Windows 10 Home (64-bit)
Graphics & Video:
4GB NVIDIA® GeForce® GTX 1050Ti Graphics
Monitor Not Included
Communications:
802.11 Wireless-AC + Bluetooth® 4.2
HP Envy Desktop 795-0050 - $1099
Intel i7-8700
16GB DDR4, 2666MHZ DRAM
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1060 graphics card
256GB SATA M.2 SSD
2 TB hard drive
DVD-Writer
Dell XPS Tower Model XPS8930-7328BLK-PUS (Costco)
Processor & Memory:
Intel® Core™ i7-8700 Processor 3.20GHz
16GB DDR4 2666MHz RAM + 16GB Intel® Optane Memory
Drives:
2TB 7200RPM SATA Hard Drive
DVD-RW (Writes to DVD/CD)
Operating System:
Microsoft® Windows 10 Home (64-bit)
Graphics & Video:
4GB NVIDIA® GeForce® GTX 1050Ti Graphics
Monitor Not Included
Communications:
802.11 Wireless-AC + Bluetooth® 4.2
jfriend00
Forum Pro
Off a 2 year lease, huh? I would have expected a much bigger discount.
Probably never go bad is one way to look at it. You could also say that the electronic components that age over time (particularly things with capacitors in them) now have two years less useful life. I'd certainly never want a hard drive that already had two years use on it (fortunately, this has an SSD).
Try and merge a large his res pano with 8MB and you will not be a happy camper. Try and load several large images in Photoshop while processing images in LR while your normal dozen browser tabs are open while a few spreadsheets or word docs you're working on are open. Windows has gotten to be bigger and bigger and there's not as much left for apps with only 8MB these days. RAM's not that expensive. I think it's definitely worth getting 12-16GB these days to avoid ending up swapping when you try to do some larger image manipulation.
Yeah, Chrome is a memory hog. My wife can challenge her 8GB PC with just a zillion Chrome tabs open.
Not many people are going to want them in service that long anyway. I've got a GX280 which has been running since 2005. I'll probably throw it away before too long, as I did with the others that came before it. So far I've not experienced any failures, aside from the drives.
Been there done that. Rarely break 8GB. FWIW, Illustrator taxes a computer far more than PS. But as you say, RAM is cheap and easy to upgrade, so it really isn't a decision maker unless it's a really close choice.
jh82,
Here's my experiences with Dell PCs:
I recommended Dell tower PCs to 3 of my friends and helped them install the PCs, all over 3 years or more ago.
Up to then, I only had self-built PCs. Well my self-built PC died so I bought a Dell XPS8900 from Costco in early Oct 2016. Had an i7-6700 CPU, 16GB ram, etc.
When I started installing it at my home:
- I first discovered that the power supply did not have an on/off switch on it. Didn't like that one bit but could live without a power supply on/off switch. Read "cheap" build by Dell.
- Then I discovered that when a/c power was applied (plug in the a/c power cord or switch on the power strip), the PC would power on for a couple of seconds and then power off. Almost like a power flux to the motherboard. I found in the BIOS a setting to have the PC boot up into Win10 when a/c power was applied that seemed better than the default on/off thing plus my powering on by pressing the power on button. --- All in all, I didn't like either a/c power applied scenarios one bit.
- In Jan 2018, the power supply died. I replaced it with a Seasonic power supply.
- In late Oct 2018, the motherboard died. I decided then that I had enough of that "cheap parts" Dell and bought a MSI motherboard and did a self built PC.
I could be that I was just unlucky and got a lemon Dell XPS8900 PC. But my opinion is that the Dell 8900 that I got was cheaply built and did not conform to normal PC build standards that I'm accustomed to. Two of my friend's Dell PCs are still running OK. One friend's Dell PC mother board died and she bought another Dell PC.
Just sharing my experiences with Dell tower PCs,
Sky
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