Good Graphics Cards for Photographers

[Matt_Atkinson]

My 3 yr old Dell PC is still ok for most things, but I'm finding that it's a bit slow when I'm doing a lot of digital graphics - RAW conversions being the most annoying thing - it can take ages to apply a change to an image, meaning that it takes me a long time to convert my RAWs, and I'm not as inclined to do it. Photoshop in general is ok, but some filters etc can take a while to apply.

I've spoken to a mate who builds PCs, and he's recommended that I get a better graphics card, and probably at least double the 1gb of RAM my PC has. I'm not sure what card I have at the moment (and I'm not on that PC right now), but my mate found this card: http://www.nvidia.com/object/geforce_9600gt.html, which he reckons might be a good affordable solution (it's about £80 and he could fit it me for free).

He recommended I ask someone who knows about digital photography though, as he's not so into graphics that he knows for sure this is the best option.

So, does anyone here have a clue?

Cheers,

Matt

[Javelin]

I'm not sure a different graphics card is going to make that any faster. larger files need more system ram, RAW conversions need more CPU. Motion video, 3D rendering and vector graphics need more video card.

Your picture mainly resides in system memory and the calculations to make changes on that image are done by the main CPU. Some graphics software uses a few routines that would be done on a GPU (graphics processor) but you will not likely see much difference.

That video card you link is a monster and it'll make CAD rendering absolutely fly (I use older versions them at work) and of course with that card any 3d games you play can have all the video (look good) toys turned on and the detail cranked up. The other thing those high performance cards have is a lot of video memory and thats where textures and things that modify textures are stored. When the game or cad system needs it thrown onto the screen it takes too long to draw it from the main system so it's all cached on the video card.

[Hawk]

If its about speed of image processing (RAW convertions, applying filters etc.) then CPU and memory are the parts you want to look at. Fast CPU will definitely increase speed of image processing, 4 gigs of RAM will allow you to process many large images at a time or use many large layers without windows using swap memory. If you have old hard drive (3 years or more) it may also slow down things, especially when RAM is 1 gig or below and windows swaps a lot. Unfortunately if your PC is older than 1 year it may be using older CPU socket type and CPU upgrade may also require mainboard upgrade In such case it may be cheaper to buy new PC instead of upgrading old one.

Powerfull 3D graphics card will not make any image processing faster. Its 2D graphics so no acceleration is used here. However if you are into 3D graphics (3D Studio etc.) or CAD it will bring performance to highest levels. Most professional graphicians I know are usually using Matrox cards for 2D graphics and high end Nvidia's or Ati's for 3D. Matrox is known to give best image/display quality, especially when used with good S-PVA or S-IPS LCD displays. Many graphicians also still use Trinitron based CRT displays for their great color reproduction.

[01af]

To improve your machine's overall graphics performance, a big graphics card is only forth or fifth on the list.

The single most important thing affecting system performance is RAM. If you have 1 GB or less, add more RAM before considering anything else. RAM chips are cheap these days so you may consider to install 4 GB---even if 32-bit operating systems cannot access more than 3 GB. (2× 2 GB is hardly more than 1× 1 GB + 1× 2 GB).

The second-most important thing is hard-disk size and speed. For Photoshop to run real fast, you need at least two separate disks (not just two logical partitions on one physical disk). The operating system's page file should reside on one disk, Photoshop's scratch file on another. Of course, you may logically divide your disk into as many partitions as you like---but there should be at least two physical disks.

The third thing is CPU performance. However, when RAM is large and the hard disks are fast then CPU performance is of secondary significance. And when updating RAM, hard disks, and CPU then you may just as well want to consider acquiring an all-new machine entirely. Stay away from the top-level CPUs; they consume an awful lot of energy for only a minor plus of performance. Pick a mid-level or lower top-level model.

For Photoshop, you don't need a gamer's or a 3-D CAD engineer's high-end graphics card. Have a modern mid-price card with at least 256 MB or, better yet, 512 MB video RAM. That will be just fine.

-- Olaf

[Matt_Atkinson]

Cheers for that guys, that's really helpful, and probably saved me some money!

I'm pretty sure it's 1gb of RAM I have, so I'll probably give that a boost. I also have a Seagate 500gb external HDD which I currently use for backups (it's only currently got about 60gb on!), and as it's eSATA, it's a lot faster than my 100gb internal drive (some slower connection, forget the name), so I'll probably migrate Photoshop over to that, and use it to work on my images too, hadn't thought of that!

The irony is, my laptop, which I'm on at the moment has a much better spec than my PC - Nvidia 8600M GT, 2gb RAM, Core 2 Duo 2ghz etc, but I don't find the screen as easy to use for graphics, and my desktop has twin monitors which is awesome in Photoshop. Maybe I should buy some games! Always tended to avoid PC games in the past to avoid not having good enough hardware

Thanks,

Matt

[01af]

I also have a Seagate 500 GB external HDD which I currently use for backups [...], and as it's eSATA, it's a lot faster than my 100 GB internal drive [...], so I'll probably migrate Photoshop over to that ...

Do not migrate Photoshop away from the internal hard disk! Instead, just let Photoshop use the external disk---or one of its partitions if it has more than one---as primary scratch disk (see the 'Performance' tab in the Preferences dialog). Make sure the operating system's page file is located on the internal hard disk.

By the way, it generally is not a good idea to use external hard disk drives for working files or scratch disk. However, external drives connected via eSATA are an exception, as eSATA is much faster than USB 2.0 or FireWire ... in fact, it's just as fast as (internal) SATA.

-- Olaf

[Matt_Atkinson]

Cheers man, sounds like you just saved more hassle!

[Glyn R]

I just bought another 2gb for my Dell. I used this site if its of interest.
http://www.crucial.com/uk/index.aspx

[David Kilpatrick]

I always buy from Crucial. They just sent us the memory to (belatedly) take our iBook and PowerBook (old G4 Mac models, but fine for our uses) to maximum memory each. It must have been too expensive when we first bought them.

David