Omega-TI Posted June 9, 2017 Share Posted June 9, 2017 HELP! Suggestions & comments welcome! Okay, maybe I want too much in my next PC... but for MINIMUM specifications I'd like.... 3 monitors at least 20" in physical size with a minimum resolution of: 1920 X 1080 each (preferably HDMI) and a fast graphics card to match. A minimum of 16GB RAM No clue what processor, but I want to speed up video editing projects. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+adamantyr Posted June 9, 2017 Share Posted June 9, 2017 I do almost all my shopping for PC equipment on NewEgg... they have a great review system and prices that are pretty competitive to Amazon, for more common consumer parts such as monitors. Are you looking to just get a complete PC system without having to muck about installing stuff? If so, you probably want to look at gamer rig's, they require a similar approach to video editing. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+arcadeshopper Posted June 9, 2017 Share Posted June 9, 2017 I tend to build my own systems with newegg supplying the parts.. You are looking at an expensive system if you want something that can do that many monitors etc.. if you go that way Get: I7 processor or better 16gb ram or more Nividia video card that is >350$ in price I say that because there are some cheap versions that don't have the power to do multi displays like you want Asus motherboard Western digital drives or intel/samsung ssd Or just buy one of these: http://www.qvc.com/qvc.product.E290065.html?ref=GAS&cm_mmc=GOOGLESHOPPINGFEED-_-GShopping|L|BrandProduct|electronics|computers-_-pla-_-sXrzoxwtH|dc_193217060102__E290065_&mkwid=sXrzoxwtH|dc_pcrid_193217060102_pkw__pmt__productid_E290065_&cvosrc=pla.google.E290065&cvo_crid=193217060102&matchtype=shopping 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Keatah Posted June 9, 2017 Share Posted June 9, 2017 I9 16-core. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
matthew180 Posted June 9, 2017 Share Posted June 9, 2017 Well, you are not looking at a laptop for sure. Based on your requirements I assume money is not a factor? Triple-headed system is going to require a heavy-weight video card, or a pair of video cards. Big power supply too. At the resolution you specified you might want to consider a single 4K monitor (get a big one if you go 4K, at least 30" or more). One *real* 4K (3840x2160) monitor would be like having four 1920x1080 resolution monitors. I have a 27" 4K monitor on a computer... it is a lot of pixels, and it really needs to be a little bigger physically (that's why I say get one that is 30" or more). Ever since high-resolution wide screen monitors came out I quite doing multi-monitor systems. A single monitor is doing the job these days without all the hassle. If you consider 4K monitor, then you might actually be able to pull off a laptop! It will be a beefy laptop, like an Asus RoC gaming laptop. But you can get business workstation-class laptops too. The mechanical engineers at my work have these for running SolidWorks, Maya, and other such graphics apps. For the CPU I would research your video editing software first. I don't know if video editing and transcoding are CPU intensive or if the software uses the GPU for such tasks? Also, if your software can use it, you might want to look into getting a CUDA-core to speed things up. SSD for your primary OS drive, spinning disks for the bulk storage (video files and such). When I build systems (not very often anymore), I would always buy from NewEgg. These days I would probably also price compare with Amazon since I get free shipping with Prime. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+Schmitzi Posted June 9, 2017 Share Posted June 9, 2017 all of the above, and 32 GB RAM 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+Vorticon Posted June 9, 2017 Share Posted June 9, 2017 I say a 486DX4-100 with 48megs of RAM, Sound Blaster 16 card and Diamond Stealth SVGA VLB card with a beefy 320meg hard drive and 4x speed CDROM drive. Round it off with a nice 17" CRT monitor. Wait, this is not 1995, is it???? 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RXB Posted June 9, 2017 Share Posted June 9, 2017 I use a Mac Pro Tower as it does it all. Ubuntu 750 Gig SATA drive Mac OS X (El Capitan) 1 TB SATA drive Window 7 1 TB SATA drive Windows 10 500 Gig SATA drive And a backup 1 TB SATA drive with partition for Document storage too. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sinphaltimus Posted June 10, 2017 Share Posted June 10, 2017 (edited) As a base line - My computer is several years old and meets your requirements (not it's no for sale). My 4GB GTX 770 is aged so go for something newer - I also have to use 2 adaptors to connect everything as the ports are 2xDVI, one HDMI and one displayport. My PSU isn't listed but it's a 1kwatt evga. The monitors are interchangeable to what you'd want. i actually use a 42" kiosk as my main screen, A TV, a Cintiq (for artwork) and the HP is turned 90 degrees for better page reading. Summary Operating System Windows 10 Pro 64-bit CPU AMD FX-8350 34 °C Vishera 32nm Technology RAM 32.0GB Dual-Channel DDR3 @ 803MHz (9-9-9-26) Motherboard Gigabyte Technology Co. Ltd. 990FXA-UD5 (CPU 1) 28 °C Graphics 42MDT1-A2D (1920x1080@60Hz) HP L1750 (1024x1280@60Hz) ZORAN (1920x1080@30Hz) Cintiq 12WX (1280x800@59Hz) 4095MB NVIDIA GeForce GTX 770 (EVGA) 37 °C Storage 465GB Samsung SSD 840 Series SATA Disk Device (SSD) 31 °C 465GB Samsung SSD 840 EVO 500G SATA Disk Device (SSD) 27 °C 465GB Samsung SSD 850 EVO 500G SATA Disk Device (SSD) 29 °C 465GB Samsung SSD 840 EVO 500G SATA Disk Device (SSD) 29 °C Optical Drives ATAPI iHAS220 6 SATA CdRom Device Audio Realtek High Definition Audio Operating System Windows 10 Pro 64-bit Computer type: Desktop I use it for everything from music creation to game development to video editing etc... Edited June 10, 2017 by Sinphaltimus Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+mizapf Posted June 10, 2017 Share Posted June 10, 2017 Refreshed after Christmas 2016 ... Gigabyte GA-H170 Mainboard Intel Corei7-6700K 4 GHz Samsung 500 GiB SSD Sapphire Radeon RX480 Kingston 16 GiB DDR4-2133 + older 128 GiB SSD for VirtualBox drives + older 1 TB hard drive (magn) The CPU brought an enormous boost, compared to my previous system (Corei7-3820). 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Omega-TI Posted June 10, 2017 Author Share Posted June 10, 2017 Thanks for the input guys. It looks like I'm going to have to re-think the route I had planned to take. So many options... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Omega-TI Posted June 11, 2017 Author Share Posted June 11, 2017 I'm not liking these "combo" microphone/earphone jacks I'm see on a lot of these computers... For example << THIS COMPUTER >> even has one. I've never really been a fan of all-in ones, but am considering it... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+arcadeshopper Posted June 11, 2017 Share Posted June 11, 2017 I'm not liking these "combo" microphone/earphone jacks I'm see on a lot of these computers... For example << THIS COMPUTER >> even has one. I've never really been a fan of all-in ones, but am considering it... Also never buy all in ones as you have more failures by average and if you have one component fail your whole pc is down Sent from my LG-H830 using Tapatalk 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
zzip Posted June 12, 2017 Share Posted June 12, 2017 I say a 486DX4-100 with 48megs of RAM, Sound Blaster 16 card and Diamond Stealth SVGA VLB card with a beefy 320meg hard drive and 4x speed CDROM drive. Round it off with a nice 17" CRT monitor. Wait, this is not 1995, is it???? That's almost exactly my first PC spec, except I have a MASSIVE 850Mb hard drive 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Omega-TI Posted June 12, 2017 Author Share Posted June 12, 2017 That's almost exactly my first PC spec, except I have a MASSIVE 850Mb hard drive Gawd, first PC specs... that could be a thread unto itself! 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Omega-TI Posted June 12, 2017 Author Share Posted June 12, 2017 Also never buy all in ones as you have more failures by average and if you have one component fail your whole pc is down I understand what you are saying, but it's really not much different than a laptop in that respect is it? I'll give this some more thought. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Omega-TI Posted June 12, 2017 Author Share Posted June 12, 2017 Okay, what do you guys think of << THIS >> system? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+arcadeshopper Posted June 12, 2017 Share Posted June 12, 2017 I understand what you are saying, but it's really not much different than a laptop in that respect is it? I'll give this some more thought. Most laptops are designed to be more robust + portable so it's worth the hassle .. Greg 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+arcadeshopper Posted June 12, 2017 Share Posted June 12, 2017 Okay, what do you guys think of << THIS >> system? That'd do it! 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+mizapf Posted June 12, 2017 Share Posted June 12, 2017 64 GiB RAM is gigantic, and I have some doubts that it can ever be reasonably filled with a desktop PC, even when you're doing video editing. My PC does not even fill its 16 GiB RAM. Also, 2 TB is really big for the HD, again, depending on whether you keep your stuff on the HD or burn it to a Bluray. I'd rather go for a bigger SSD (512 GB). The graphics card is from the second line; a faster choice would be GTX1080. But I guess this will suffice for any application including running current games with 4K resolution. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Omega-TI Posted June 12, 2017 Author Share Posted June 12, 2017 64 GiB RAM is gigantic, and I have some doubts that it can ever be reasonably filled with a desktop PC, even when you're doing video editing. My PC does not even fill its 16 GiB RAM. Also, 2 TB is really big for the HD, again, depending on whether you keep your stuff on the HD or burn it to a Bluray. I'd rather go for a bigger SSD (512 GB). The graphics card is from the second line; a faster choice would be GTX1080. But I guess this will suffice for any application including running current games with 4K resolution. You make some good points there, thank you. I suppose it will also save me some money. I guess I can cut the RAM down to a more reasonable 16GB. I currently have 8GB on my current system, but that does not appear to be enough and I cannot extend it further. Yeah, on the HD I have a 3TB WD as a backup, and only keep about 250GB on my primary drive at one time, so yes that would be overkill. With the money I save on the PC side, I can put towards a larger 4K monitor. I'm hoping the setup I end up with will have a serviceable life of at least 5 years. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tursi Posted June 12, 2017 Share Posted June 12, 2017 16GB was not enough for me on my last PC as I often let multiple large jobs run in the background while I do other things - it depends on how you use your system. When I upped it to 24GB I was finally happy, my current machine has 32GB. Likewise, a packrat nature combined with the desire that everything always be instantly available to me, I found 2TB not quite big enough for my use. BUT! Upgrading RAM and upgrading HDD are both things that get cheaper all the time, so as long as you leave yourself some room, I wouldn't worry about it. Since you're coming from 8GB RAM and very little on your main drive, doubling both will keep you happy for a good while! 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
matthew180 Posted June 12, 2017 Share Posted June 12, 2017 ... With the money I save on the PC side, I can put towards a larger 4K monitor. I'm hoping the setup I end up with will have a serviceable life of at least 5 years. You just *can't* spend a lot on a monitor any more. I got my 4K about 2-years ago for something like $450 I think, if that. Hell, I spent $750 *each* for 19" LCD monitors back in 2003 when I was going from CRT to flat screen. There are two things I'm willing to spend money on to get a better product, monitors and printers, but these days you just can't get a quality computer product by spending more money. It seems low price is the only factor these days, and products are so cheap and crappy. :-( Makes me sad and want to program my 99/4A. :-) A system like that will easily give you service for 5 years. Computers are not getting any faster, and have not for about 10 years. We hit a speed limit of about 3.5GHz to 4GHz back in the early 2000's, and that's when things started going "wider" (think more cores, etc.). But for typical desktop use, a 3GHz computer from 5 years ago is just a good as a 3GHz computer today, and that will be just as good (or bad depending on how the future goes) as a 3GHz computer in 5 years. IMO. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+mizapf Posted June 13, 2017 Share Posted June 13, 2017 But for typical desktop use, a 3GHz computer from 5 years ago is just a good as a 3GHz computer today, and that will be just as good (or bad depending on how the future goes) as a 3GHz computer in 5 years. IMO. As I said above, my impression is different. Although there are only few visible changes, the switch from Core i7-3820 ("Sandy Bridge", 3.6 GHz) to Core i7-6700K ("Skylake", 4 GHz) gave a significant boost. When I run "mame64 ti99_8 -bench 10" for measuring performance, I get a 200% for the first, but a 350% for the second - and MAME is largely single-threaded. Other things like compiling time are harder to compare because the storage device plays an important role, as does the graphics card for video/image editing. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Keatah Posted June 13, 2017 Share Posted June 13, 2017 You just *can't* spend a lot on a monitor any more. I got my 4K about 2-years ago for something like $450 I think, if that. Hell, I spent $750 *each* for 19" LCD monitors back in 2003 when I was going from CRT to flat screen. There are two things I'm willing to spend money on to get a better product, monitors and printers, but these days you just can't get a quality computer product by spending more money. It seems low price is the only factor these days, and products are so cheap and crappy. :-( Makes me sad and want to program my 99/4A. :-) Oh sure you can, build your own. There's no shortage of premium parts like sound cards that control lighting strips. Memory modules with LEDs on them. Or liquid-cooled M2 drives. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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