Hey guys! I'm a amateur graphic designer by profession and I do a bit of cinematography and music production freelance as well. I'm looking to build a cheap pc that will be able to carry me into the next 5 years safely. Now, I am not without my limitations. I am low on funds and have no idea where to start with pc building. All I know is that it is possible to get a great pc cheaper than going to Best Buy and buying one. So, here's what I'm looking to build. Now here's the hard part... I'm only working with about a $700-$900 budget.. so as far as me going commercial, I'm lost. I got my current setup from a friend who built the computer. Everything I list (including monitors and software) cost me a total less than $1000 Needs - Can run the Adobe Creative Suite efficiently (that means running Illustrator and Photoshop simultaneously handling large files) - Able to produce "higher" quality sound without spending an arm - Supports three monitors, which I still have yet to figure out how best to do.(Apple 22" CRT, 2 Gateway 23" LCD's) I'm only running one LCD and the CRT - Able to render video as fast as possible within my budget. Current Setup AMD Athlon XP-M 1.71 GHz 2 GB RAM GeForce 7300 GS 512 RAM Onboard Soundcard I'm running XP and have no problems (unless someone convinces me otherwise) Already have... a case, with (lemme count) 6 fans on it (yeah, that's how bad I am with understanding hardware) and have no idea how to check my power supply (though I hear it is important) and I'm assuming I'll need an new motherboard as well Challenge Can anyone help me figure this out? I know enough about comps, I just don't know how to build one and what would be best. Thanks for your help, I'm just noticing that it is now starting to slow down, and I need to stay efficient. Any tips and or packages you can suggest would be excellent! Should I just get a Mac? (Sorry if this is posted in the wrong section)
Everyone I know who works on Graphics for a living, does it on Mac not PC, there is obvioulsy a reason for this. Personally I can't stand Macs, but I don't work on anything where the Macs come into their own. They aren't going to be as cheap as building a PC though. Still, as its for your occupation/hobby I think you should just bite the bullet and get the kit thats best made for the job (Mac)
I'm usually a windows advocate too, but I'm siding with BigDK on this one - for stuff like that Macs seem to have the edge, but I'm not sure about multi-monitors. If you're used to XP though, that makes it simpler as you can build yourself a PC properly.
Macs have the edge because Apple makes some software(Final Cut Pro) that only runs on Mac. Now if he wants to run Adobe creative studio then a windows machine will do just fine. As far as the budget goes you can do a lot more with that kind of money when you're using Windows. I dount you could have a quad core mac with a budget of 900, but you can with windows and it will come in Handy too because he is using pro apps. You could configure something like this. Intel Q6600 Gigabyte GA-EP35-DS3R Corsair 650TX PSU Nvidia 9600GT(I'm assuming the video card isn't that important. If it isn't you can probably just save some money and get a 8800GS) 4GB of OCZ Reaper RAM DVD burner and harddrive are up to you. Get a SATA harddrive with atleast 16MB of cache. Make sure your case can support a ATX motherboard.
Thanks for the advice everyone. I've noticed that Mac pretty much dominates the design scene. But is there really a performance difference for the extra 2000 dollars you're spending? I understand I can get a dual quad-core Mac for 3000.... but the post above gets me a quad-core PC for 2000 cheaper... so what's the benefit to going Mac?
Like I said, there is some Mac only software. I don't really know what programs you use. Why don't you do this? Make a list of programs you plan on running. Then look up support forums for those programs and see if the Windows version or the Mac version is better. If you find that the software on Windows works fine for you then build a Windows PC, if the software is better on a mac then you have two options. Pay thousands more and get a "real" Mac Or configure a Custom computer and install a Hacked Mac OSX copy on it.
No really, hacked Macs are pretty lame. Think seriously about whether you want a proper mac, or just go with windows. I wouldn't bother using a hacked Mac OS on a normal PC on a serious daily basis.
It fine for me, and I even got updates installed. The only thing is that when the equivalent of a new service pack comes out you will have to do the install all over again.
Does it do everything that Mac does stable? Last I heard, hacked Mac OSes only lasted a few boots before they stopped working or some programs wouldn't work.
It was pretty stable for me. It was a long time ago so I don't remember much of what I did. Maybe you are thinking of Mac OSX on AMD cpus because that doesn't work too well, but it runs just fine on Intels.
I'm amazed it works at all on AMDs to be honest, but no I was thinking of Intel CPUs. Either way though, there's no substitute for the real thing.
