Help me to cut cost.

gamblor101

I'm mulling a self build and speced the system below. It's primary purpose is for photo editing, secondary is as general family PC. Definitely not for gaming (kids are too young and I was never really into it). Won't be tinkering with overclocking. I don't think water cooling is necessary but always open to correction.
I need help bringing the cost back towards €1000. Where can I compromise with minimum performance cost?

Mobo - Something with H97 chipset - approx €120
CPU - i7-4790K - €370
RAM - 16Gb DDR3 - €150
GPU - Gigabyte GeForce GTX970 mini - €335
Hard Drive - Corsair force Series LX 256Gb SSD - €126
A midi tower for approx €100
PSU - 800w - approx €80

Total cost is just under €1300

Lu Tze

gamblor101 wrote: »

I'm mulling a self build and speced the system below. It's primary purpose is for photo editing, secondary is as general family PC. Definitely not for gaming (kids are too young and I was never really into it). Won't be tinkering with overclocking. I don't think water cooling is necessary but always open to correction.
I need help bringing the cost back towards €1000. Where can I compromise with minimum performance cost?

Mobo - Something with H97 chipset - approx €120
CPU - i7-4790K - €370
RAM - 16Gb DDR3 - €150
GPU - Gigabyte GeForce GTX970 mini - €335
Hard Drive - Corsair force Series LX 256Gb SSD - €126
A midi tower for approx €100
PSU - 800w - approx €80

Total cost is just under €1300

DOnt need the GPU if ou arent gaming, unless you are doing something in photoshop that can utilise the GPU. Would have to be using it a lot and saving a lot of time to justify that outlay though!

Also the CPU is about 40 more expensive than it is on hardwareversand. Where are you buying from?

gamblor101

Lu Tze wrote: »

DOnt need the GPU if ou arent gaming, unless you are doing something in photoshop that can utilise the GPU. Would have to be using it a lot and saving a lot of time to justify that outlay though!

Also the CPU is about 40 more expensive than it is on hardwareversand. Where are you buying from?

Got the price on Hardwareversand. It can be infuriating looking at that website. They appear to have the same models at different prices.

In relation to the GPU that could be sacrificed at the start and added later if needed. I do a bit of photo editing and it just feels that it is taking longer and longer when I hit the apply button. Currently using a 5yr old machine and the bump in CPU and RAM may help.

Lu Tze

gamblor101 wrote: »

Got the price on Hardwareversand. It can be infuriating looking at that website. They appear to have the same models at different prices.

In relation to the GPU that could be sacrificed at the start and added later if needed. I do a bit of photo editing and it just feels that it is taking longer and longer when I hit the apply button. Currently using a 5yr old machine and the bump in CPU and RAM may help.

You should look into what benefit the graphics card brings, as in what processes it speeds up. Also search around for some benchmarks, as there may be no benefit in getting almost the fastest graphics card out there for gaming, if lower models perform similarly in photoshop. Have a look at the 960 and 750 ti models.

Sorry, i looked up the non-k version of the cpu. The k version is for overclocking, which i presume you dont intend to do, as you will also need a different motherboard.

check out this site as well. http://geizhals.de/?m=1

Copy and paste in the name of the parts on hardwareversand, and scroll down until you find the link to hardwareversand. Click on it and it will bring you back to hardwareversand, usually with a discount ~5%. Do it for every part and it will knock a bit off your total.

TerrorFirmer

Well that should be easy, you can easily get a motherboard for half that price, processor wise you certainly don't need a k-processor, and you can save even further by getting a Xeon CPU which is an i7 with no integrated graphics.

Graphics card wise GTX970 is totally unnecessary - do you even need any graphics card for photo editing? Even if you did, the price to performance ratio would probably be miles better on a card like the GTX750ti which is about 40% of the cost.

Power supply wise you won't need more than a 300w assuming you ditch the GTX970, even if you opted for a GTX750Ti anything over 300w would still be perfect, something 450w+ will cover any upgrades down the line to a power hungry card if you so wish.

SSD is also a more expensive model, can get a 256Gb Samsung Evo for a good chunk less for example.

smacl

For static photo-editing and non-gaming family use, you could get away with a much much lower spec set-up than what you've listed. At the same time, I'd tend to add an additional cheaper hard drive for storage, as both photos and families eat disk space, and a DVD & Bluray combo. Something like the following;

CPU Amd FX6300 €100.00
ASUS AM3+ mobo €45.17
Crucial 8gb RAM €61.18
ASUS 1gb R7240 graphics €57
Crucial 256gb SSD €96
WD blue 1tb hdd €58
Corsair 430w modular PSU €53
Corsair carbide 200r case €58.50
LG Blu ray, DVD-RW €54
3 x arctic case fans €15

That's just under €600 all in for something that should probably be more than adequate for what you want. IMHO, the i7 would be a good bet for video editing and transcoding, but overkill for photography. Worth looking up the specs on the software you plan to use and seeing what is recommended for optimal performance.

gamblor101

Thanks for the replies.
Will definitely switch to the non k-processor and less powerful PSU.
Did some googling and i7 processor's built in graphics capability is more than enough for the photo editing. So that's the GPU gone!
The plan for the SSD is to have the OS and photo editing software on it. The photos are on a NAS. What features do I need to be looking at for the SSD? What is the difference between a SATA3 and PCIe SSD?
Is upping the RAM to 24 or 32 GB a case of diminishing returns?

smacl

gamblor101 wrote: »

Is upping the RAM to 24 or 32 GB a case of diminishing returns?

You need to see how much memory you are currenty using editing photos, at a guess not that much. I use Xara for graphics editing, and even with a large 8 page brochure containing lots of print quality photography loaded it still uses less than 1gb. An uncompressed 24bit rgbi photograph at 1200dpi which is 12"x12" takes 790mb, and you're unlikely to need that kind of resolution. At a guess 8gb would be fine, and even 16gb is a bit of overkill.

Johnboy1951

I would be inclined to spend on the PSU ....... getting one designed to be near silent and potentially more powerful than required. (You will likely have it near you so noise will be a consideration)

To me it is the most important place to spend the money ..... a failure there can cause damage to any or all other components.

You might also try to ensure that you have good airflow through the case with the least fan noise, for the same reason.

Get all your RAM requirements in one stick (if you have two slots) as that allows upgrading very simply in the future.

ED E

gamblor101 wrote: »

What features do I need to be looking at for the SSD? What is the difference between a SATA3 and PCIe SSD?
Is upping the RAM to 24 or 32 GB a case of diminishing returns?

Considering your current machine I really doubt you need any more than 8GB, 16GB at the very most.

For example I shoot 18MP RAWs most of the time. Open 10x of them at once in PS consumes 1.23GB of RAM. My 8GB rig is still sitting at only 50% usage.

So unless you have a D800 and need to open 30 raw images at a time you really wont have a problem with RAM. Its the CPU when applying filters that will slow you down, and your NAS if your link to it or it itself isnt able to keep up.

frozenfrozen

gamblor101 wrote: »

What is the difference between a SATA3 and PCIe SSD?

SATA and PCIe are like USB or firewire, ways of connecting the drives to your motherboard. PCIe will be extremely fast but stupidly expensive, SATA3 ssds are still very fast (can be 5 times faster than mechanical hard drives in read/write performance).

Go for the sata drives for better $/performance!