Graphics cards question...

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stevewestern

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Can anyone please explain what difference a better card makes to viewing photos on the pc ?
I don't play games, so have a fairly basic card, but would a better one be worth looking at ?
In truth, I am thinking of getting a new pc, and am unsure about most aspects - such as what the different processors do..
My current pc is about 4 years old, was built by Kustom pc's, who made me a wonderful, but expensive (due to top quality componants being used) machine. I ought to go back to them, and may well do, but am just trying to find out a little first of all..
Cheers
Steve
 
Probably won't amke a great deal of difference for just viewing pics unless you wanted to run a higher resolution on your monitor you may need a more powerful card to deal with the increased res.

Other than that it's all 2D stuff so all cards are pretty much the same here, they mainly differ in 3D performance for gaming.

More modern cards do take a lot of the graphics processing work away from the CPU and deal with it onboard now as well so you may notice an improvement in that area more as there might be a small amount of cpu power freed up.

A better option would probably be more memory or a faster processor if you can still get one for your motherboard.

You would probably benefit by running 1gb to 2gb of memory if you aren't already more than a graphics change, and memory is relatively cheap at the moment.
 
Thanks PPP - I guess another part of my question ought to be is it worth messing with a fairly old pc, and when does it become cheaper to buy a new one..? (yes, I know it is a silly question..)
I have 1gb RAM fitted, but still find it runs pretty slow with Elements running.
Given that cheap pc's can be got for just a few hundred, I am tempted, and have been wondering about one of StuvUk's that he is selling here...if I can get one from him for about 300 notes, it makes little sense to be spending half as much on a few components..
 
It can be better sometimes to just change the base unit for something faster, just make sure its a good machine for a cheap price. If you are dealing with pictures I would recommend at minimum 1gb and ideally 2gb of ram. Large (300gb upwards) hard drive, dvd writer, average video card, and the most important thing is the processor at very minimum i would get an Athlon X2 dual core but to be honest by far the best cpu for the money is an Intel Core2Duo processor something like an E6320 or E6420 can be had for good money and are very very powerful. I would NOT go for a celeron or P4 they are not a lot cheaper than a Core2Duo but are much slower and a bit dated now.

Something like that may not be £300 it might be £400-£500 but believe me the extra money spent will be a massive benefit in the long run.
 
I used to build my own PC's sourcing all the bits from computer shows etc - quite a bit of hassle but there were real savings to be made. Nowadays new PCs have reduced in price to the stage where it's hardly worth the bother. Have a good search on the net, you'll be surprised what you can get now for not too much wonga.

If you're long overdue for an upgrade and need motherboard, processer, Graphics card, RAM etc - you might be as well just buying a complete CPU.

Games make the biggest demands on PC power but after that it's graphics and photo applications. Take a 28mb image open in your processing package, duplicate the layer and it's now 56mb, add a mask, and perhaps run a filter and the image is soon huge, slowing your PC down to a crawl.
 
Well, thanks again - I will start looking !
I have emailed Kustom, but will take a look elsewhere as well.
Any good places you know of to buy from ?
 
Me LOL

If you are looking online there are places like Scan, Aria etc but don't underestimate your local independant, we build good machines as well for decent prices and are far more customisable and accomadting than Dell and the like.
 
For a photo processing PC i'd be looking at a :nono: :shrug: :naughty: :razz: load of RAM (2GB is good) a nice Intel Core 2 Duo (E6400/E6600), if you aren't going to play games no need to splash more than £50 on a graphics card, something like an nVidia 7600GS/GT would do fine (or an X1650 if you'd rather have ATi). After all that, slap in a huuuuge hard drive, as big as you are happy with the spend on and then regular ancilleries such as DVD±RW.
 
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