Case In Point: Navigating The Upgrade Minefield

     This is a good article, and many of the points are very relevant. However; I am currently in this situation, I have a neighbor who wants a PC for photography work. I have several systems lined up on Newegg in wish lists. I am concerned about the sata 6 USB 3 issue, but not to a considerable level I guess. This means I would like to give him that ability from the build stage, but as the article pointed out it is not critical (I can add the in pci-X slots later if needed).

     The thing largely on these two components or capabilities for me on a system for photo work is SATA3. Having this on board specifically for this type of system seems to me a good idea. Plus adding a USB3 card to a PCI-x slot is ok, but when you’re talking about HD tech it is going to be around for probably at least the next 5 years. One issue I have with storage is SSD. Yes I know they are considerably faster, but I see it as a technology with a brick wall coming up rather soon (a year to a year and a half). This is because it has been stated by Intel when talking about their new mem tech, which would apply to these devices as well. When nand hit 22nm that about as far as it can go. Seeing as they just hit 32nm, and they run their research in the tick toc way I see two more upgrades for SSD and they will end because they cannot go any further.

     This is somewhat of an issue so I will most likely set his PC up with 3 hard drives in a raid 5 configuration. The next issue is this; CPU choice especially right now is hard. I could of course go with AM3 and 8 gigs of memory. For about a hundred more I can go for 1156, then for roughly the same price I can go with 1366 with 6 gigs of memory. I am thinking in most cases especially photo editing and media manipulation the 1366/920 is going to perform about the same as an 1156/860 with the memory differences.

     Then I also want to build a system with an upgrade path the dual channel and triple channel difference for me on the uses he requires seems to be a positive, the upgrade path for the two Intel chipsets seems to me to also be the most confusing on the 1156 side of things as it is supposed to accept the Sandy Bridge path. Then the 1366 is supposed to accept the Gulftown which I would think is the best path or socket for the future. Also as I look at the AMD side of things AM3 is supposed to accept Bulldozer as well automatically. So I can build him a great system today, but what will it's future be say 1.5-2 years down the road will I be able to drop in the next CPU, and which of those CPU's is the best choice? I am thinking 1366, but am stuck on this choice all three paths with all the same components (GPU, Ram, and HD throughput and storage amount) are within 100 bucks up or down. The AMD Phenom is of course the lowest prices with 8 gigs, the 1156/860 is next for about 75 more, and the 1366 is about a hundred more with the tri channel config’s at 6 gigs.

Which do I choose looking at the future for him and his usage pattern? I am really leaning toward 1366, but am quite unsure of the future between these 3 sockets!

If you're setting this up for PhotoShop, you should rethink your HD configuration (3 HD in Raid 5):

HD1 -  Fastest drive for OS and programs ( 2 SSD in Raid 0)

HD2 - Scratch disk

HD3 - Storage, largest drive sets you can afford ( 2 in Raid 2 or 4 in Raid 10)

Whoops, I meant 2 drives in Raid 1 for HD3

Good read. The way I do it is to get the best that I can afford with the funds available. This is a far as I can go towards future proofing.

Future Proofing in today's world of technical advances is probably not possible anyway at the rate these advances keep occurring. You need an uninterrupted cash stream to keep up these days, or maybe find a way to get manufacturers to consistently send you new things to test out and review. (wink!)

So a look at the budget is first in the process for me, then I get the best I can by shopping around. It usually works out just fine. My older equipment works well for use in Linux Boxes too.

Hey Neil, how's that new rig of yours doing? :)

If you want to make this even worse, add a requirement for ECC RAM and then you're really in a doozy.  I personally need it for live video and audio work, which obviously is a small segment of the workstation market.  This upgrade has been a total nightmare for me because I'm additionally looking at Crossfire support for the visuals.  My system isn't impossible, but a spare $1,000 is.

Good article though, this would have saved me quite a few hours last week.

EDIT:  Actually you know what, I don't think I'm going to upgrade completely afterall.  I thought about your Core2Quad comment and I think instead of ditching my 965P motherboard that's currently corrupting every RAM stick I throw at it, I'm going to RMA everything in my system and upgrade only the CPU.

Yes, my neighbors budget for me on building this system is 1500. However, he needs everything, display, dvd drives, printer, windows etc.. So that 1500 is not very high, for a half way decent flat panel capable of photo work (not top end just capable) you can drop 175-200, which leaves me 1300. I also need a decent gpu which I'm thinking 5850, that leaves 1050. Now I need to decide the CPU which is the hardest, I am thinking for photo work and everything which goes with it the i7920 would be the best, and that chipset also goes the direction I want. I don't know which I'm going to settle on yet it will be either an i5/860, and i7/920, or maybe a top end Phenom. I am most worried about capabilitie's for photo work, and of course an upgrade or chipset roadmap as well. Of course anything I build him will absolutely floor his expectations, he has not had a computer for 3 years now I think, that was also not top specs either. So anything I put together for him will blow his expectations 100 miles high performance wise I am sure of that.

You still didn't say whether this rig was going to be running PhotoShop. If so at the very least, have a separate disk for OS/programs and storage. (You were going to get 3 HDs anyway for Raid 5 -- I'd use 1 for the OS and two in Raid 1 for storage.) But the most important thing is to get the most/fastest ram you can afford (PhotoShop CS4 can run 64-bit so you can (should) try for more than 4 GB). As for GPU, you could blow your entire budget on a Quadro FX4800 alone -- seriously, at least get a GPU that has support for OpenGL.

Thanks HKo45, I have thought about other implementations. However I also have a 1500 dollar budget, and I need a high end gpu display, keyboard, mouse, printer and everything else. So SSD is not a possibility. I have also thought about 2 in raid1 for OS and apps, with a large drive for storage. I think that a 3 500-1000 GB drives in raid 5 gives me better performance than raid1, and more safety in the functionality of raid5. If I do raid0 it is fast, but I don't want it to go out in 6-12 ad you know if you loose a raid0 array you have nothing left. I have definitely consider the jbod thing as well I just  think raid 5 with 3 drives gives me the best outcome. This computer is going to blow away anything he has ever used anyway. So the performance hit he takes with raid 5 will not be noticed anyways.

Yes the main focus of this computer is going to be Photoshop/or GIMP. The Jbod 1 OS 2 raid 1 storage setup is also one of my options to. I wish I could grab a SSD for the single disk, but a budget of 1500 for everything does not really leave that as an option.

For PhotoShop, your first priority is to get as much ram as you can get (4GB min). Yesterday, when running PhotoShop CS4 on my laptop (4GB), I got a message that it could not do a blend because I had insufficient ram. As you scale back your GPU (for budget's sake), just make sure it can run OpenGL. On the topic of disks: I like to put only my OS and all programs on the C drive (no data) because I can then use an image backup (Acronis) simply on that drive--at which point I care less about safety than speed. My data resides on another drive where I can use whatever backup process I want. In the case of my laptop, I have my data backed up both on an NAS drive and a usb drive. Right now I'm limited to a laptop (Dell Precision M6400 w/ 2 22" monitors) because I'm hoping to move soon so I'm planning to get my dream PhotoShop system after the move.