Video card on beast machine

N
Posted By
NightStalker
Aug 26, 2007
Views
226
Replies
2
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Closed
I’m currently building my dream "beast machine" based around a quad-core QX6850 CPU, DDR3 RAM, a Gigabyte P35 motherboard, and the new Hitachi perpendicular 1Tb HDs configured as RAID 5

My question is regarding the display card. The machine will be used primarily as a Lightroom and Photoshop machine, with video editing as the main other activity (Premiere Pro, Sony Vegas, and ULead stuff).

As an occasional activity, it will be used for a few PC games, particularly flight sims and driving stuff (rally etc).

There will be dual monitors (either Samsung 27" or Dell 24")

The video card I’ve been recommended is the ASUS 8800 Ultra, which is not a cheap card. But the cost is not the issue.

My question is: will this card be any advantage for the Photoshop work and video rendering, compared to a "normal" high end video card, or will its main advantage be for the games? Is there any point in putting in such a high end video card? OK – I know the rest of the machine will be state of the current art, so the video card needs to be "up there" in context, but is the 8800 Ultra TOO good for what I need?

Oh yes – I will be using XP Pro 32-bit as the OS, to maintain compatibility with everything from scanners to printers and all points in between – not to mention all my Photoshop plugins. I have tried and hate Vista with a passion, and I can’t see any advantage of going to XP64 apart from being able to address more RAM. I’ll be having 4Gb RAM, of which only 3.2 Gb will be visible under XP Pro 32-bit. That should be enough, I would hope.

Any comments on the video card would be much appreciated. 🙂



NightStalker

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N
NightStalker
Aug 27, 2007
In article ,
says…
I’m currently building my dream "beast machine" based around a quad-core QX6850 CPU, DDR3 RAM, a Gigabyte P35 motherboard, and the new Hitachi perpendicular 1Tb HDs configured as RAID 5

My question is regarding the display card. The machine will be used primarily as a Lightroom and Photoshop machine, with video editing as the main other activity (Premiere Pro, Sony Vegas, and ULead stuff).
As an occasional activity, it will be used for a few PC games, particularly flight sims and driving stuff (rally etc).

There will be dual monitors (either Samsung 27" or Dell 24")
The video card I’ve been recommended is the ASUS 8800 Ultra, which is not a cheap card. But the cost is not the issue.

My question is: will this card be any advantage for the Photoshop work and video rendering, compared to a "normal" high end video card, or will its main advantage be for the games? Is there any point in putting in such a high end video card? OK – I know the rest of the machine will be state of the current art, so the video card needs to be "up there" in context, but is the 8800 Ultra TOO good for what I need?
Oh yes – I will be using XP Pro 32-bit as the OS, to maintain compatibility with everything from scanners to printers and all points in between – not to mention all my Photoshop plugins. I have tried and hate Vista with a passion, and I can’t see any advantage of going to XP64 apart from being able to address more RAM. I’ll be having 4Gb RAM, of which only 3.2 Gb will be visible under XP Pro 32-bit. That should be enough, I would hope.

Any comments on the video card would be much appreciated. 🙂

No responses so far, but I would like to make a decision re this video card in the next day or two, if possible. Any comments much appreciated – many thanks 🙂



NightStalker
N
NightStalker
Aug 28, 2007
In article ,
says…
In article ,
says…
I’m currently building my dream "beast machine" based around a quad-core QX6850 CPU, DDR3 RAM, a Gigabyte P35 motherboard, and the new Hitachi perpendicular 1Tb HDs configured as RAID 5

My question is regarding the display card. The machine will be used primarily as a Lightroom and Photoshop machine, with video editing as the main other activity (Premiere Pro, Sony Vegas, and ULead stuff).
As an occasional activity, it will be used for a few PC games, particularly flight sims and driving stuff (rally etc).

There will be dual monitors (either Samsung 27" or Dell 24")
The video card I’ve been recommended is the ASUS 8800 Ultra, which is not a cheap card. But the cost is not the issue.

My question is: will this card be any advantage for the Photoshop work and video rendering, compared to a "normal" high end video card, or will its main advantage be for the games? Is there any point in putting in such a high end video card? OK – I know the rest of the machine will be state of the current art, so the video card needs to be "up there" in context, but is the 8800 Ultra TOO good for what I need?
Oh yes – I will be using XP Pro 32-bit as the OS, to maintain compatibility with everything from scanners to printers and all points in between – not to mention all my Photoshop plugins. I have tried and hate Vista with a passion, and I can’t see any advantage of going to XP64 apart from being able to address more RAM. I’ll be having 4Gb RAM, of which only 3.2 Gb will be visible under XP Pro 32-bit. That should be enough, I would hope.

Any comments on the video card would be much appreciated. 🙂

No responses so far, but I would like to make a decision re this video card in the next day or two, if possible. Any comments much appreciated – many thanks 🙂

Hmmm – seems everyone has a lot to say about everything on here, including the OLD PC vs Mac debate.

But a serious question and request for expert comments about video cards gets completely ignored…

I guess I’m new in here, so not one of the "in-crowd".

Thanks for all the help guys! I’ll make my own decisions without the benefit of the expertise of all you Photoshop experts. I just assumed that your input would be worth having, but obviously nobody can be bothered, so never mind. I’ll get the ASUS 8800 Ultra card and be done with it.



NightStalker

How to Improve Photoshop Performance

Learn how to optimize Photoshop for maximum speed, troubleshoot common issues, and keep your projects organized so that you can work faster than ever before!

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