# PC custom-built for LR or PS?



## PhilBurton (Apr 27, 2018)

In a different thread, Gnits wrote:



> I have a custom built PC, optimised for Lr and PS.  It is now quite ancient in computer terms but I have been amazed for several years now that I have been under no pressure to upgrade.


Gnits,

What about your current (old) PC makes it optimized for LR or PS?  If you were building a new machine today, what components would you pick?  (not necessarily by brand, but by CPU/GPU type, SSD/HD capacity, etc?

Phil Burton


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## Gnits (Apr 27, 2018)

As I have not sat down to study the latest processors, boards, drives, gpu's  for several years, so right now I can only give a general guideline.

I would have an SSD for the C drive (256MB is plenty), which would only hold the o/s and apps. This gives it a small footprint, and allows me to back it up (automatically to my data drive) every day.
I would install a second SSD drive (probably 512MB) which I would use for my Lr  Catalog, Lr Cache files and PS cache files.
My third drive would be an 8GB spinning disk. This drive will store my images and my data (so MyDocs and all the Windows standard Library folders will also live here, as well as my Outlook data files).
My 4th drive will be an almost  exact copy of my 3rd. I have an automated  backup routine which copies all new or changed files from my data (3rd  drive ) to my 4th at 6 am every morning.

This means I have to buy a 3rd 8 GB external disk for offsite storage.

I would look at the price range and performance  stats of the processors.  There is always a point on this curve where the price of the processor drops down from the exotic and still provide decent performance.  I do not see any point in going for the fastest of the fastest. 

I would regard 32 GB memnory as the minimum and would probably go 64GB. 

I would make sure that the motherboard has *multiple *fully specified USB C ports as that is the interface of the future and all my interfaces are been upgraded to USB C as each opportunity arises.

I am totally confused regarding optimum gpu's and would need to seek advice on this.  Maybe some others may comment.

I am seriously considering building my next machine on a wooden board the same size as my 27 inch screen, mounting all of the components on this and fixing it to the wall directly behind my screen. If I want it to look nice (and maybe protect) it I might fix a Perspex sheet over this.  

My current machine is at least 8 years old and still doing well. I built that machine using the guidelines above. I can probably put off upgrading my current machine for a year or two and when I do I can probably start with my current disks and defer upgrading to 8GB drives until my current 4 GB drives fill up.   If I was processing a lot of a7R3 files on a daily basis I would be upgrading tomorrow.


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