Another What New PC Thread

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Faldrax

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So I've been tweaking and updating my PC for many years, and it's finally go to the point where I need to get a replacement.
The one I have is over 10 years old, originally Win 7, now Win 10 but won't go to Win 11, and yesterday LR told be the CPU is too old to run the latest update.

Main power intensive use is processing photos in LR (A7iv images, 33Mb), I also do a bit of software and Web development, not used for gaming.

So budget wise, I have ~£1000, but will re-use my existing KB, Monitors, etc, it's just the main tower that needs replacing.
I can spend more if I need to, but woudl prefer not to.
I know enough to understand the specs, but not in depth enough to know where the 'sweet spot' is for all the different components to get a decent system.

CPU - I'd like an i7 14700F - but the 12700F is ~£100 cheaper, how much would I notice the difference?
What would be the AMD equivalent?

Motherboard - seems like a lot of different options, I don't need WiFi, as PC has wired network connection. I would like 2.5G Ethernet, as while nothing else uses it, and my current switches are all 1G, woudl be nice to have the upgrade path built in.

Graphics - Nvidia 4060 Ti has been mentioned as a good option, but that would be a fair chunk of the budget - would a cheaper card be false economy? (and what woudl be he equivalent AMD option if I went down the AMD CPU route?)

Case - anyone got a suggestion for a decent Mid/Tower case to take an ATX motherboard - I don't need or want lots of LED's, I would like the option for a cd/dvd drive so I can burn CD's for the car (I could live with an external writer if I have to, as it's an occasional thing). Decent set of USB ports on the case is a bonus.

Memory DDR 4/5 and what speed?

All suggestions (except buying Apple) welcome!
 
As regards the case for a desktop computer conside air flow. The cooler the computer runs the better it is. So look for a case with a front and back exit not one with a front and side exit. Next consider the power unit, something like 750w.should be able to handle any component in the computer.
just ideas thats all
We went to " scan computers" for all our computer parts
 
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realspeed said:
AS regards the case for a desktop computer conside air flow. The cooler the computer runs the better it is. So look for a case with a front and back exit not one with a front and side exit. Next consider the power unit, something like 750w.should be able to handle any component in the computer.
just ideas thats all
We went to " scan computers" for all our computer parts
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I've used Scan for parts many times over the years, never had an issue with them.
My problem is more the wide range of options for everything - it used to be simple, you picked the 2nd best Intel CPU, added as much memory as you could afford, and a mid price graphics card, and made sure the HD was 7200rpm (If you rally wanted fast, and had deep pockets you used SCSI drives) :LOL:
 
How about telling the Scan engineers what you want and the price range and see what they come up with., Possibly let them build it for you or provide the parts for a self build
 
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realspeed said:
How about telling the Scan engineers what you want and the price range and see what they come up with., Possibly let them build it for you or provide the parts for a self build
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I'm quite happy to assemble it myself, install the OS, etc. - just looking for the advice of folks who don't directly benefit from selling me the part that's just a little more expensive... (and giving myself the option of sourcing from multiple suppliers to minimise cost)
 
LR and PS seem to perform better using Nvidia GPUs than the equivalent AMD ones. The 40 series GPUs have only just been superceded by the 50 series which were launched last month. I would even consider a used 30 series GPU like a 3070 or Ti which would save you a considerable chunk of cash and you can always upgrade later.

Make sure you get a modular PSU so you can plug in just what you need, and getting one that is PCIe 5/ATX 3 compliant as well will give you some future proofing: https://gamemaxpc.com/pc-power-supp...s PCIe 5.1,expansion cards to the motherboard.

The AMD equivalent of the 12700F would be something like the 7900X, though the more recent 9900X is now available but doesn't offer a huge uplift in performance. There are plenty of lower cost AMD boards without built in wifi. Something like the Asus Prime B650-Plus has no wifi and 2.5G ethernet. It support 2 M2 drives and 4 SATA drives. The AM5 platform will be supported for at least one more generation of CPUs giving you the option to upgrade in a few years time without needing to change out the motherbaord, RAM, etc.

Memory - super fast DDR5 memory isn't worth paying the premium for for photography use, so just get the basic 5200 or 5600Mhz versions, though you can get 64Gb of 6000Mhz RAM at the moment for not much more: https://www.overclockers.co.uk/cors...00040-6000mhz-dual-channel-mem-crs-02842.html

You probably wont need liquid cooling for a 7900X, and a decent air cooler such as the Thermalright Phantom Spirit 120 would likely be more than sufficient and save a good chunk over the brown/cream Noctua coolers.

When looking at cases, I would look for one which has a front panel USB-C port, ideally USB 3.2 Gen 2x2 which allows you to quickly and easily connect phones for charging and fast data transfer (20Gbps) from card readers without having to plug something into the rear port on the motherboard, though you can buy a small USB hub if required. It's mostly mice and keyboards which are remaining with USB-A ports, and mostly everythgin else is moving towards USB-C
 
The Nvidia 4060 Ti is about 30% faster than the 4060 and about the same slower than the 4070.
The 4060 ti is worth buying, it will make a big difference to photo processing speed.

The 12700 is about 20% slower than the 14700, but won't make such a big difference to the photo processing speed as the GPU, so if it is a case of one or the other, get the 4060 ti with the 12700 which I think can be upgraded later (but check)
 
JohnStewart said:
LR and PS seem to perform better using Nvidia GPUs than the equivalent AMD ones. The 40 series GPUs have only just been superceded by the 50 series which were launched last month. I would even consider a used 30 series GPU like a 3070 or Ti which would save you a considerable chunk of cash and you can always upgrade later.

Make sure you get a modular PSU so you can plug in just what you need, and getting one that is PCIe 5/ATX 3 compliant as well will give you some future proofing: https://gamemaxpc.com/pc-power-supply/3784.html#:~:text=PCIe 5.0 vs PCIe 5.1,expansion cards to the motherboard.

The AMD equivalent of the 12700F would be something like the 7900X, though the more recent 9900X is now available but doesn't offer a huge uplift in performance. There are plenty of lower cost AMD boards without built in wifi. Something like the Asus Prime B650-Plus has no wifi and 2.5G ethernet. It support 2 M2 drives and 4 SATA drives. The AM5 platform will be supported for at least one more generation of CPUs giving you the option to upgrade in a few years time without needing to change out the motherbaord, RAM, etc.

Memory - super fast DDR5 memory isn't worth paying the premium for for photography use, so just get the basic 5200 or 5600Mhz versions, though you can get 64Gb of 6000Mhz RAM at the moment for not much more: https://www.overclockers.co.uk/cors...00040-6000mhz-dual-channel-mem-crs-02842.html

You probably wont need liquid cooling for a 7900X, and a decent air cooler such as the Thermalright Phantom Spirit 120 would likely be more than sufficient and save a good chunk over the brown/cream Noctua coolers.

When looking at cases, I would look for one which has a front panel USB-C port, ideally USB 3.2 Gen 2x2 which allows you to quickly and easily connect phones for charging and fast data transfer (20Gbps) from card readers without having to plug something into the rear port on the motherboard, though you can buy a small USB hub if required. It's mostly mice and keyboards which are remaining with USB-A ports, and mostly everythgin else is moving towards USB-C
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Thanks, that's the sort of info I was looking for.

Looking at Graphics cards, the 4060 8Gb looks to be ~£280, while the 4060 TI is ~£380, for my use, will the standard 4060 be fine do you think?
The AMD 7900 looks to be more expensive than the Intel 14700F (the 7900 appears to be the version without integrated Graphics, which saves a bit), so the 12700F looks a better choice.

Memory wise 64Gb looks to ve £140 (DDR5 5200) vs 32 Gb at ~ £90, so it does look like gettign 64Gb makes sense.

I was thinking air cooling, particularly as the 12700F is only 65W.

Case wise, I'll look out for the higher spec USB C port on the front (I'll need to make sure the motherboard I choose supports it as well), and a USB A Gen 2 woudl be useful for my card reader. I can use a port on the back of the MB for my keyboard/ mouse dongle.
 
I would rather have 32GB RAM and the 4060ti :)

Air cooling is fine, make sure the case has a fan, doesn't have to be big or noisy, and buy a decent heat paste
 
Sangoma said:
I would rather have 32GB RAM and the 4060ti :)

Air cooling is fine, make sure the case has a fan, doesn't have to be big or noisy, and buy a decent heat paste
Click to expand...

I regularly have LR and PS open at the same time, and monitoring memory usage I have seen times where it's been well above above 32Gb.

Where the graphics card makes a big difference in processing speed is using the AI Denoise function, where it can reduce the time per image from 30-60seconds down to under 10. For my own use, I very rarely use the AI Denoise as most of my stuff is up to 1600ISO at most, and the standard LR noise reduction works just fine and it's nearly instant.

It also makes a difference when using some of the masking functions like select background, select subject etc. but even using my ancient 1070Ti it's not too bad taking a second or 2 at most.

In a recent LR update, the default for exporting batches of images defaults to use the GPU if it has above 6Gb of VRAM, but I found this was much slower than my old 8 core CPU (6900k) so disable the GPU for this under preferences.

Due to the age of my existing system (parts date from 2014) I've been looking at various specs myself, and hope to get a new desktop later this year. I've been looking at solutions with built in 10Gb ethernet, as I'm planning to migrate my internal HDDs to a NAS (with SSD cache and 10GB ethernet) at around the same time.
 
 
I had similar requirements for a PC case and went with a Fractal Define R6 case. It was one of the few cases that has a 5.25in drive bay in a mid tower size, has no RGB with an understated look and a good case to work with. It doesn't have the newest USB-C ports on the front but does offer a USB3.1 port, a couple of USB2 ports and a couple of USB3 ports which covers most of my needs.
 
JohnMcL7 said:
I had similar requirements for a PC case and went with a Fractal Define R6 case. It was one of the few cases that has a 5.25in drive bay in a mid tower size, has no RGB with an understated look and a good case to work with. It doesn't have the newest USB-C ports on the front but does offer a USB3.1 port, a couple of USB2 ports and a couple of USB3 ports which covers most of my needs.
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Looks like the R6 has been superseded by the 7, which is similar, but has an uprated set of ports. It's one I had looked at, but one review suggested the solid front panel had a negative impact on the internal temperatures, and suggested leaving it open when doing anything power hungry made a 10C difference!
Other than that, it certainly looked a good option.
 
You'll be fine with anything newish.

I just built an i5 9th gen as I had the processor knocking around (upgraded from an i5 3rd gen).

I have 32GB 2600mhz RAM, a 2GB M2 NVME and an "old" Geforce 1660S GPU.

It flies along in LR & PS.
 
Faldrax said:
Looks like the R6 has been superseded by the 7, which is similar, but has an uprated set of ports. It's one I had looked at, but one review suggested the solid front panel had a negative impact on the internal temperatures, and suggested leaving it open when doing anything power hungry made a 10C difference!
Other than that, it certainly looked a good option.
Click to expand...
I saw similar claims when I bought mine but I have a Ryzen 3900x and an Nvidia 3080 with mine (and initially four hard drives sitting at the front) which I've not had any temperature or noise issues with, Maybe different if running heavily overclocked systems but given the hardware you've mentioned is lower power I can't see there being an issue.
 
JohnMcL7 said:
I saw similar claims when I bought mine but I have a Ryzen 3900x and an Nvidia 3080 with mine (and initially four hard drives sitting at the front) which I've not had any temperature or noise issues with, Maybe different if running heavily overclocked systems but given the hardware you've mentioned is lower power I can't see there being an issue.
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Thanks, that's good to know. I had a suspicion that the temperature issue might have been down to the 'test' being a case of 'what happens if we try and push things', so it's good to get a 'real world' opinion.
 
I also have a FD R6, with a Noctua D15s cooler on a Ryzen 5700x. Highest temp gaming is 46°, PS it runs around 35°. They're lumps, but bloody good cases.
 
Paulie-W said:
I also have a FD R6, with a Noctua D15s cooler on a Ryzen 5700x. Highest temp gaming is 46°, PS it runs around 35°. They're lumps, but bloody good cases.
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Thanks, looks like the FD 7 will be a good choice.
I think I saw that the front cover hinge can be set either side - It's pictured with the hinge on the right, but as my PC sits on the left, it would be easier if it hinged that way, do you know if I'm correct that is can be swapped, or was that something I saw on one of the many other cases I looked at while searching?
 
Faldrax said:
Thanks, looks like the FD 7 will be a good choice.
I think I saw that the front cover hinge can be set either side - It's pictured with the hinge on the right, but as my PC sits on the left, it would be easier if it hinged that way, do you know if I'm correct that is can be swapped, or was that something I saw on one of the many other cases I looked at while searching?
Click to expand...
I swapped the door on my R6. If it's the same (and can't think of any reason why it wouldn't be). It takes about 5mins. Super easy job (y)
 
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