Looking for Advise on optimizing my computer performance

[Herrbill]

I have 48 GB RAM installed on my computer and an NVidia GeForce GTX1650 Super graphics card installed on my Dell Inspiron desk top computer.

I am looking to maximizing my computers performance and would appreciate advice on optimum settings for RAM, disk warning value as well as limit.

For editing, I use Affinity photo. I have Hardware acceleration off because I feel my processor, which is Intel i5 10400F ‘2.9GHz, may not up to it.

I do not use my computer for gaming.

All suggestions welcome.

Bill

 

[Ab S]

Install a better videocard RTX 3000 or higher

 

[bmoag]

Lots of issues here.

Without hardware acceleration, a GPU function, lots of things will not run even in Affinity but in all other image processors, some of which won't even launch. While anemic that 1650 is ok for what it is and far better than not using it.

Sadly that Dell likely cannot support a more powerful graphics card. Dell power supplies are minimal and most lack the needed PCIe power cables.

48 gb of RAM is beyond overkill for that chipset and CPU and could be dragging down performance but that's not as big an issue as the GPU.

If you can afford a newer system with an i5 equivalent cpu and an nVidia 3060 equivalent CPU, or better, you will perceive a significant improvement in Affinity.

 

[BobKnDP]

I have 48 GB RAM installed on my computer and an NVidia GeForce GTX1650 Super graphics card installed on my Dell Inspiron desk top computer.

I am looking to maximizing my computers performance and would appreciate advice on optimum settings for RAM, disk warning value as well as limit.

For editing, I use Affinity photo. I have Hardware acceleration off because I feel my processor, which is Intel i5 10400F ‘2.9GHz, may not up to it.

I do not use my computer for gaming.

All suggestions welcome.

Bill

I admit that I have no idea what you mean.

For RAM, the main thing is activating XMP (extreme memory profile), if your RAM and motherboard support that. If it's not enabled, the RAM will run at a lower default frequency and timings. (Caveat: it's possible that doing that will introduce instability. That shouldn't happen, though.)

Windows 10 and 11 have memory compression enabled by default. It seems to have very little effect on performance, though.

I don't know about "disk warning value and limit". What are those? I never run disks at near full capacity.

Affinity hardware acceleration is performed by the GPU (graphics processor unit), not the CPU. A GTX 1650 Super meets the requirements for that.

The GTX 1650 Super is nominally a 100W card. As regards upgrades, an RTX 4060 is spec'd at 115W. The RTX 5060, 145W, which might be too much for an Optiplex power supply.

 

[dj_paige]

It sounds like you want to "optimize" performance but without adding new hardware? Is that correct?

I think for most applications that I am aware of, that's a losing battle. The only real way to get noticeable performance improvement is by obtaining new and more powerful hardware. Yes, you could tweak your existing computer hardware here and there and probably get small performance improvement, but it is unlikely that tweaking will produce major improvement.

By the way, it would be helpful to tell us what specific actions are slow. Some slowness is disk based, some slowness is CPU based, some slowness is memory based, and so on.

--
Paige Miller

 

[Toermalijn]

I have 48 GB RAM installed on my computer and an NVidia GeForce GTX1650 Super graphics card installed on my Dell Inspiron desk top computer.

I am looking to maximizing my computers performance and would appreciate advice on optimum settings for RAM, disk warning value as well as limit.

For editing, I use Affinity photo. I have Hardware acceleration off because I feel my processor, which is Intel i5 10400F ‘2.9GHz, may not up to it.

I do not use my computer for gaming.

All suggestions welcome.

Bill

Hardware accelleration is most of the time GPU based.

Your entry level GPU card, the NVidia GeForce GTX1650 is not up to it.

Your CPU is just fine. It can run Affinity Photo without a problem.

So, if you were looking for an upgrade, i would start with the GPU (graphics card).

 

[TorsteinH]

I have 48 GB RAM installed on my computer and an NVidia GeForce GTX1650 Super graphics card installed on my Dell Inspiron desk top computer.

I am looking to maximizing my computers performance and would appreciate advice on optimum settings for RAM, disk warning value as well as limit.

For editing, I use Affinity photo. I have Hardware acceleration off because I feel my processor, which is Intel i5 10400F ‘2.9GHz, may not up to it.

I do not use my computer for gaming.

All suggestions welcome.

Bill

I admit that I have no idea what you mean.

For RAM, the main thing is activating XMP (extreme memory profile), if your RAM and motherboard support that. If it's not enabled, the RAM will run at a lower default frequency and timings. (Caveat: it's possible that doing that will introduce instability. That shouldn't happen, though.)

Windows 10 and 11 have memory compression enabled by default. It seems to have very little effect on performance, though.

I don't know about "disk warning value and limit". What are those? I never run disks at near full capacity.

Affinity hardware acceleration is performed by the GPU (graphics processor unit), not the CPU. A GTX 1650 Super meets the requirements for that.

The GTX 1650 Super is nominally a 100W card. As regards upgrades, an RTX 4060 is spec'd at 115W. The RTX 5060, 145W, which might be too much for an Optiplex power supply.

Good advice, except don't mess with RAM timings if you don't know what you're doing!

 

[BobKnDP]

I have 48 GB RAM installed on my computer and an NVidia GeForce GTX1650 Super graphics card installed on my Dell Inspiron desk top computer.

I am looking to maximizing my computers performance and would appreciate advice on optimum settings for RAM, disk warning value as well as limit.

For editing, I use Affinity photo. I have Hardware acceleration off because I feel my processor, which is Intel i5 10400F ‘2.9GHz, may not up to it.

I do not use my computer for gaming.

All suggestions welcome.

Bill

I admit that I have no idea what you mean.

For RAM, the main thing is activating XMP (extreme memory profile), if your RAM and motherboard support that. If it's not enabled, the RAM will run at a lower default frequency and timings. (Caveat: it's possible that doing that will introduce instability. That shouldn't happen, though.)

Windows 10 and 11 have memory compression enabled by default. It seems to have very little effect on performance, though.

I don't know about "disk warning value and limit". What are those? I never run disks at near full capacity.

Affinity hardware acceleration is performed by the GPU (graphics processor unit), not the CPU. A GTX 1650 Super meets the requirements for that.

The GTX 1650 Super is nominally a 100W card. As regards upgrades, an RTX 4060 is spec'd at 115W. The RTX 5060, 145W, which might be too much for an Optiplex power supply.

Good advice, except don't mess with RAM timings if you don't know what you're doing!

It doesn't take a lot of expertise to enable XMP. It's not available as a BIOS setting unless it's present in the RAM's SPD.

I admit that it may cause instability, even if it's nominally completely supported.

I also had Intel once refuse a warranty replacement of a CPU because I admitted using XMP RAM with it. That was for an I9-12900k. One might ask why they use XMP as a marketing device, but void the warranty if it's used. (The CPU was fried due to pin damage in the motherboard socket. I'm pretty sure that I didn't do that. I have no idea when it was done to a MB sold as new.)

You may also find that using an XMP gives very little performance increase over the defaults in many real-world apps. I believe that gamers often spend more, trying to eke out a couple of extra frames per second. (I'm not a gamer.)