[Admiral Nelson]

I'm getting tired of the long period of time it takes to process RAW photos on my current PC, so it is time for a new one.  Thoughts on these components?

Case         Antec P180B
PSU         Seasonic S-12
CPU         Core 2 6600
Cooling         Scythe Ninja
MB         Asus P5B Deluxe
Memory         2GB G. Skill PC6400
Video         EVGA Geforce 7950GX2 1GB
HD         320gb Seagate (x4 RAID5)
Sound         Creative X-Fi Music
DVD/RW         Pioneer
Floppy+ Card reader   Mitsumi7 in one
OS          Windows XP Pro   

I'm really not sure about the MB / memory configuration.
I am also waffling over the video card -- Nvidia or ATI?  Oblivion is something i want to make sure can be run well on this machine.  I am also debating getting a 37" 1080p TV for a monitor.  That means 1920x1200 resolution, and so some serious power will be required.  Otherwise I will heavily use Adobe Lightroom, thus the 960GB fault tolerant storage.  Iam not sure that a Raptor is worth it, but I'm open to suggestions.

[Stealth]

show off.

my computer still > you though.

[Polpolion]

Make an HD partition for your OS. Or better yet get seperate 10gb HD for it.

[Admiral Nelson]

I don't have anything to show off apart from a spreadsheet full of unordered parts...

Now I'm not sure around the raid5 -- it sounds as if a card good enough to provide decent performance would cost as much as just buying a raptor.... UGHH....

[Sandwich]

Ditch the NVidia card - ATI still has the performance lead. Aside from that.... have you been reading SPCR???

[Admiral Nelson]

I have indeed

The 1950XTX is supposed to be hot but quiet, from what I have read.  It seems as if the P180 will move enough air where that won't be an issue.  I can always crossfire it later, if need be.

I am starting again to lean back to 1 150 GB raptor, and perhaps 2 of the Seagate 320s in JBOD. Heh, I am so indecisive!

[Scooby_Doo]

Don't forget the Gigabyte D3 and D6 series too.

[Admiral Nelson]

That is the problem -- so many choices, it is hard to decide....

[Scooby_Doo]

Yup, I'm in exactly the same boat.  Worse yet I had a nice X2 list setup ready to go this spring then conroe made it's appearance...

Well for me I'm getting a cheaper video card and waiting out till DX10 comes along.  As for RAID5, I'm not sure if that will help much converting pics.  It probably would be a good idea to get SATA drives

[Descenterace]

Proper RAID5 is horribly expensive. Software RAID5 isn't worth the little you pay for it. I'd suggest getting one of those nice RAID3 cards from XFX. I think they're about $90 at the moment and they do hardware RAID. The next cheapest hardware RAID is upwards of $500.

Onboard RAID such as nForce provides works with either Linux or Windows. Drives created with software RAID will not work with both OSes, because they RAID stuff at different abstraction levels. Windows does things at the drive level, while Linux does it at the partition level. These are fundamentally incompatible.

And yeah, these XFX cards are good despite being cheap. I have one, and although the drivers are causing the odd BSOD, you don't actually need the drivers in order to use the array. As far as the BIOS is concerned, it just sees some extra ATA drives. So it'll work just as well under Linux.

ATA drives which, for some reason, have sustained transfer rates of about 100MB/sec...

[Fury]

Meh, in home use RAID is next to useless anyway. Save your money and wait until solid state drives have become affordable and their capacities are in the current HDD levels.

Edit: A sneak peek into SSD's: http://www.tomshardware.com/2006/09/20/conventional_hard_drive_obsoletism/

[WMCoolmon]

solid state drives

[Scooby_Doo]

HAHA how long have we been waiting for solid state now? 

[Kosh]

PSU         Seasonic S-12

I've never heard of this brand. Also how many watts is it?

[Scooby_Doo]

Never heard of Seasonic?! 

Only PC&C makes a better psu, and they cost and arm & a leg & a kidney.
Seasonic's are known for their excellent effeciency ratios and quiteness

[CP5670]

I am also waffling over the video card -- Nvidia or ATI?  Oblivion is something i want to make sure can be run well on this machine.  I am also debating getting a 37" 1080p TV for a monitor.  That means 1920x1200 resolution, and so some serious power will be required.

I'm not sure what your framerate tolerances are like, but a X1950XTX (or a 7950GX2 or any other single card) will struggle at 1920x1080 for many people. You really want two of them unless you're willing to turn down some settings or will be replacing the card in a few months.

Never heard of Seasonic?!

Only PC&C makes a better psu, and they cost and arm & a leg & a kidney.
Seasonic's are known for their excellent effeciency ratios and quiteness

The Seasonics are actually rather overpriced for what they are. The 600W one is about the same price as the superior PCP&C 610W and the lower models are comparable to the much cheaper Enhances.

[Scooby_Doo]

PC&C are the ones that are way overpriced LOL

[Admiral Nelson]

The Seasonic is a 600 watt model -- it seems to be de rigeur over at SPCR.

The video is partly what is driving me nuts -- I can get the eVGA card and use their step up program assuming that the G80 comes out in the next quarter, and see how that does at super high res.  Alternatively, I can stick with my CRT for now and upgrade the whole video subsystem later.  The thing about the XTX is I wouldn't want to pay a zillion dollars for two such cards only to find the obsolete when DX10 arrives.

I think I'll dump the raid in favor of the raptor + 2 7200 RPM drives in JBOD.

Someone just tell me what to buy so I can stop being indecisive!!

[ZmaN]

JBOD is a waste.  The only reason I use it is becasue im so cheap I cannot afford two 120 GB IDE drives so I use a 120 and 40 GB drives to make 150 (idk where the other 10 gigs are).  I usually have problems with it.  I think you should go with a raid setup.

For your video.  well, if youre going to wait for DX10, then you should get a crappy card now or just wait till it comes out.  I dont know of any DX10 capable cards out (and I dont think theyre coming out for awhile).

thats all I can give.

[CP5670]

The video is partly what is driving me nuts -- I can get the eVGA card and use their step up program assuming that the G80 comes out in the next quarter, and see how that does at super high res.  Alternatively, I can stick with my CRT for now and upgrade the whole video subsystem later.  The thing about the XTX is I wouldn't want to pay a zillion dollars for two such cards only to find the obsolete when DX10 arrives.

I think you would be better off getting a NEC 20WMGX2 instead of the TV. It wouldn't be nearly as big and impressive, but it would both be faster and have much better image quality (due to the AS-IPS panel and Opticlear coating), and the 1680x1050 resolution would be a lot more forgiving in games.

The X1900XTX (which is only about 3% slower than the X1950XTX) is very cheap at this point and may also be worth looking at. They were going for $300 on Newegg a few weeks ago, so you may want to consider getting one of those and selling it in a few months. That being said, DX10 isn't going to matter for quite some time; the initial line of DX10 cards will all be judged on the basis of their DX9 performance.

PC&C are the ones that are way overpriced LOL

Last I checked, the Seasonic 600W was $150 on Newegg and the PCP&C 610W was $160. At those prices I would take the PCP&C and its huge 50A single 12V line any day. The Seasonic is probably quieter (although most PSUs in general are pretty quiet), but split rails and only 18A on each one are not what I expect for that kind of money.