Comments on: How to set up a great Photoshop machine

By: Dsel

Dsel — Tue, 29 May 2012 23:43:55 +0000

Tested video cards for Photoshop CS6
Adobe tested the following video cards before the release of Photoshop CS6 . This document lists the video card by series. The minimum amount of RAM supported on video cards for Photoshop CS6 is 256 MB.

Note: Adobe tested laptop and desktop versions of the following cards. Be sure to download the latest driver for your specific model. (Laptop and desktop versions have slightly different names.)

nVidia GeForce 8000, 9000, 100, 200, 300, 400, 500 series

nVidia Quadro 400, 600, 2000, 4000 (Mac & Win), CX, 5000, 6000

AMD/ATI Radeon 2000, 3000, 4000, 5000, 6000, 7000 series

AMD/ATI FirePro 3800, 4800, 5800, 7800, 8800, 9800, 3900, 4900, 5900, 7900

Intel Intel HD Graphics, Intel HD Graphics P3000, Intel HD Graphics P4000

Note: ATI X1000 series and nVidia 7000 series cards are no longer being tested and are not officially supported in Photoshop CS6, but some basic GL functionality may be available for both these cards.

Does anyone know where we can get a comparison of the performance of these cards for PS6? Contacted adobe and they say they don’t have the data……….Didn’t they test the cards?

They range in price from a few hundred dollars to over $10,000. There must be a level that will suit most professional small business photographers vs high end advertising professionals.

Which Geforce is comparable to what Qudro or why are they different pros n cons. etc etc

By: Linda McCarty

Linda McCarty — Thu, 17 May 2012 12:04:33 +0000

Hello,

I too am confused as I don’t understand most of the article.

Would either of these machines below give me what I need for Photoshop cs6 and Lightroom 4?

PS 8500 XPS 8500
Chassis XPS 8500, White Chassis w/19:1 media card reader
OPERATING SYSTEM Genuine Windows® 7 Home Premium, 64Bit, English
PROCESSORS 3rd Generation Intel® Core™ i7-3770 processor 3.40 GHz with Turbo Boost 2.0 up to 3.90 GHz
MEMORY 12GB Dual Channel DDR3 1600MHz – 4 DIMMs
HARD DRIVE 2TB 7200RPM, SATA Hard Drive 6.0 Gb/s + 32GB SSD SRT Enhancement
VIDEO CARD AMD Radeon™ HD 7770 2GB GDDR5
OPTICAL DRIVE 16X CD/DVD burner (DVD+/-RW), write to CD/DVD
WIRELESS Dell Wireless 1703 802.11b/g/n, Bluetooth v4.0+LE
SOUND CARD Integrated 7.1 with WAVE MAXXAudio 4
USB 3.0 Integrated 10/100/1000 Ethernet

HP Z1 Workstation (ENERGY STAR)
Operating system:
Genuine Windows® 7 Professional 64
Processor:
Intel® Core™ i3-2120 (3.30 GHz, 3 MB cache, 2 cores)
Number of Processors: 1
Number of Processors: 1
Chipset:
Intel® C206
Form factor:
All-in-One
Featured Model:
SmartBuy
Memory
Standard memory:
4 GB 1600 MHz DDR3 non-ECC Unbuffered RAM
Memory slots:
4 DIMM
Storage
Internal drive bays:
One 3.5″ OR Two 2.5″
Internal drive:
500 GB 7200 rpm SATA NCQ
Storage controller:
Integrated SATA interfaces with RAID 0, 1 support (2x 6.0 Gb/s and 1x 3.0 Gb/s)
Optical drive:
SATA SuperMulti DVD+/-RW
Display and graphics
Graphics:
Intel® HD Graphics 2000
Expansion features
Ports:
2 USB 3.0
7 USB 2.0
1 4-in-1 media card reader
1 headphone
1 microphone
1 IEEE 1394a
1 DisplayPort
1 RJ-45
1 optical S/PDIF
1 subwoofer out
1 audio line in
1 audio line out
Slots:
1 MXM
3 mini PCIe (full-length)
Communication features
Network interface:
10/100/1000
Integrated Intel 802.11 a/g/n Wireless LAN & Bluetooth Combo Card
Audio:
Integrated High Definition IDT 92HD91, SRS Premium Sound, HP Digital Mic Array

Any thoughts would be appreciated, Thank you very much.

By: ILLFLO

ILLFLO — Thu, 02 Feb 2012 15:59:44 +0000

hey. i’ve been looking at an 2008 MacPro 8-core/12gbs RAM as an upgrade to my 2006 MacBookPro core2duo/3gbs RAM to better run: CS5, FCP, & LOGIC.

is this a good choice?

considering my budget is about $1200 at the moment. Or should i just save up and get a 2011/2012 machine?

By: Joe

Joe — Mon, 30 Jan 2012 05:06:01 +0000

Would using MicroSD be better than SSD for scratch disks?

By: rajith

rajith — Mon, 21 Nov 2011 23:23:32 +0000

I was wondering whats the better choice btw the following CPU for photo editing (there will be no video work)

1. intel i5 2500k
2. Amd phenom ii x6 1100t

All though the AMD has 6 cores it’s cheaper than the 4 core intel CPU. So I’m wondering what’s better?

Also I’d appreciate your opinion on a good graphics card for photo editing.

By: Robert Knapp

Robert Knapp — Thu, 25 Aug 2011 16:04:03 +0000

Jimmy Gonzalez:
With a memory device, the bottleneck is in the I/O. Since data flowing into/out of the SSD has to go through the same channel, regardless of whether it’s addressed to the OS VM or the Adobe scratch area, it would be best to have them on separate devices. Partitioning only sets up software parameters directing data to certain addresses, and does not actually create a separate disk.

By: Jimmy Gonzalez

Jimmy Gonzalez — Sun, 07 Aug 2011 06:54:02 +0000

Great information!!
Question: If I was to use a second SSD drive as a scratch drive, could I partition that same SSD to also house the OS virtual memory?
The reason I asked is because the Adobe Optimization article said that the scratch shouldn’t be on the same disk as the OS or virtual memory, but I was wondering if partitioning them actually separates them: “Scratch disks should be on a different drive than the one your operating system uses for virtual memory.”

By: Chris Cox

Chris Cox — Wed, 03 Aug 2011 18:07:26 +0000

If you have a RAM drive on a card, maybe. (though I thought those died off years ago)

But if you’re using your system RAM, no — that should be used by Photoshop as RAM. IF you have 32 Gig of RAM, assign 70% to Photoshop and let it use the RAM. It’ll hit the scratch disk less often, and won’t have the overhead of using the file system.

By: Paul

Paul — Wed, 03 Aug 2011 09:13:33 +0000

will ram drive set as scrach be an even better solution than a raid0 or ssd? in a home photoshop station with 16 gb of ram, if i would asign 8 gb as a virtual ram drive for win cache and temp and for PS primarily scratch would this be a good solution? or even 32gb of ram?

so in conclusion what about virtual ram drive and what would be a optimal set up of it?

By: Mustafa Sazak

Mustafa Sazak — Wed, 18 May 2011 18:08:08 +0000

Great tips indeed. Thank you very much. But I wonder, which one is better to use Photoshop on? Mac platform or Windows platform? Thanks.

By: Ben Philips

Ben Philips — Mon, 07 Feb 2011 00:18:36 +0000

I have spent the last 2 weeks trying to design a Win 7 CS5-centric machine with a budget of $3,000-$5,000. It has been difficult to parse through all of the “facts” that exist, and assemble a PS optimized workstation with any confidence that I’m on track. This thread is a life saver, thank you for the solid info without filler.

By: Adam Jerugim

Adam Jerugim — Fri, 28 Jan 2011 00:07:39 +0000

Simon,

The short answer is “no.”

We are familiar with AVX and we are currently investigating whether or not to take advantage of this technology for future versions of both products.

By: simon

simon — Thu, 27 Jan 2011 23:25:04 +0000

can LR/PS utilize a new instruction set from new Intel’s processor /sandy bridge/? this instruction is called AVX. simon

By: Connell Smith

Connell Smith — Fri, 15 Oct 2010 02:03:37 +0000

John,

If I have a machine that can only have two internal drives, am I better off configuring them as seperate drives and using one as scratch or configuring them as a single Raid0. Thanks.

By: lorin duckman

lorin duckman — Mon, 04 Oct 2010 17:27:26 +0000

I don’t know enough to understand most of this discussion.

What is a scratch disk and when do I use it?

How do I find out if my machine is efficient. I have a Mac Pro with 8 gigs of memory. Not yet at the raid level. Have a one t and two t external drive. Using Lr3 and cs5.

Please forgive me.