Off topic: computer information

Jayebea wrote:

I hope I am not ruffling too many feathers here, but I haven't been able to
locate the appropriate newsgroup for the kind of information I need. Maybe
someone here can provide a lead to two.

I've been a 35mm film enthusiast for years, but my current computer isn't
set up for scanning, editing, etc.

Now, I want to get another computer that I can use both for digital work and
to scan, store, edit, etc., various film and transparencies.

Can anyone recommend a newgroup that specialized in such things as how to
choose a computer, what kinds of memory, graphic cards, and so forth are
desirable?

comp.periphs.scanners for scanning.

Get a 2. Ghz machine or better. (What else is there these days?).
RAM: 512 MB, acceptable. 1 GB better. The latest boards have faster and more
expensive memory. Consider that you won't upgrade this for 3 years, so get the
boards that support the fastest memory, and buy the fastest memory at the start.

I suggest a large, generic computer tower with a large power supply. It can go
on the floor or side of the desktop. This will allow more peripherals to be
installed over time, and simple swap out of the processor board as performance
increases. I've had my current tower for 6 years and it is on its 3rd
processor... but still has the original hard disk (and 2 more). It had a
CD-burner from my previous tower, now replaced with a DVD burner...

I'm not sure to what degree a Pentium (v. Celeron) will improve image editing.
I have a Celeron and it's good ... but I wonder if a Pentium at the same 2. GHz
speed would be

Scanning film in TIFF at ful res generates files on the order of 10 - 240 MB.
(yes, 240 MB). So disk storage needs to be large, even if most of these files
are temporary. 80GB minimum. Two hard drives (say 2 x 80GB or 2 X 120 GB is
better than one large drive as you can use one drive as work disk and the other
the scratch disk. Helps phototshop work faster.

A DVD burner for backups. I just got the LG 4160, 16x write (DVD). I've
discovered it needs to run off a high speed IDE (133 MB/sec) or it won't burn
files well. DVD disks run from cheaper single layer 4x to more expensive 8x,
12x, and dual layer (which stores more info, of course).

Gaming graphics cards are best for 3D which you don't need for this. Get a
graphics card for graphics work.

Firewire or USB 2 for most of the latest batch of film scanners.

A 17" or larger monitor. Quality counts.

You may want to look at printers as well.

That about covers it.

Cheers,
Alan
--
-- r.p.e.35mm user resource: http://www.aliasimages.com/rpe35mmur.htm
-- r.p.d.slr-systems: http://www.aliasimages.com/rpdslrsysur.htm
-- [SI] gallery & rulz: http://www.pbase.com/shootin
-- e-meil: there's no such thing as a FreeLunch.

Alan Browne wrote:

It's always funny how Mac proponents have to post long winded replies
every time someone askes about a new PC.

There is near 0 defense to the notion that a Mac is 'better' at
anything. 10 years ago, I would have agreed. But that story is long
since dead.

It's equally amusing how PC users make a statement as in the first
paragraph, then state an opinion following it that can be answered only
by a longish reply.

So, this Mac user ain't goin' there, but for God's sake, Alan, do you
have to be righteous about every damned subject?

--
John McWilliams

John McWilliams wrote:
Alan Browne wrote:


It's always funny how Mac proponents have to post long winded replies
every time someone askes about a new PC.

There is near 0 defense to the notion that a Mac is 'better' at
anything. 10 years ago, I would have agreed. But that story is long
since dead.


It's equally amusing how PC users make a statement as in the first
paragraph, then state an opinion following it that can be answered only
by a longish reply.

So, this Mac user ain't goin' there, but for God's sake, Alan, do you
have to be righteous about every damned subject?

I frankly don't care if somebody uses a PC, Mac, *nix's or uses an abacus.

The statement of the previous poster "an Apple will always be a better computer
for you if you buy it primarily for photo editing." is the same, too often
played, scratched and worn record from Mac "proponents" ...the reply for any
question regarding 'what computer?'

Cheers,
Alan

--
-- r.p.e.35mm user resource: http://www.aliasimages.com/rpe35mmur.htm
-- r.p.d.slr-systems: http://www.aliasimages.com/rpdslrsysur.htm
-- [SI] gallery & rulz: http://www.pbase.com/shootin
-- e-meil: there's no such thing as a FreeLunch.

Alan Browne wrote:

John McWilliams wrote:


It's equally amusing how PC users make a statement as in the first
paragraph, then state an opinion following it that can be answered
only by a longish reply.

So, this Mac user ain't goin' there, but for God's sake, Alan, do you
have to be righteous about every damned subject?


I frankly don't care if somebody uses a PC, Mac, *nix's or uses an abacus.

The statement of the previous poster "an Apple will always be a better
computer for you if you buy it primarily for photo editing." is the
same, too often played, scratched and worn record from Mac "proponents"
...the reply for any question regarding 'what computer?'


I don't care, either; equally, Nikon, Canon, *Ist, etc. etc. Fords *and*
Chevvies, Hondas and Nissans, etc. etc. For the most part.

But not all us Mac users are long winded, nor do we all say our platform
is best in all circumstances. But in another post you state
categorically what the OP should get- a PC, with no mention of alternatives.

--
John McWilliams

Remember to pillage *before* you burn.

Jayebea wrote:
I hope I am not ruffling too many feathers here, but I haven't been
able to
locate the appropriate newsgroup for the kind of information I need.
Maybe
someone here can provide a lead to two.

I've been a 35mm film enthusiast for years, but my current computer
isn't
set up for scanning, editing, etc.

Now, I want to get another computer that I can use both for digital
work and
to scan, store, edit, etc., various film and transparencies.


A newsgroup?.. maybe the digital grougps. However, I think not. I live
in the PC Wintel World because I have to.. ie corporate America has
trouble moving away. I also live in the Sun Solaris UNIX world as my
bread and butter professional world and I live in the Apple MAC OS X
world at home because it is the best of both. I have a Nikon CoolScan
IV Film Scanner, an HP 5200 Flatbed scanner, a Epson 1280 Color
Printer, and HP 1300 Laser Printer, a Apple G4 Dual 1.42 Mac with OS X
10.3, a Dell Dimension XPS 500 running Windows 2000 Professional. On
the Wintel side, I use PaintShop Pro 8x, on the Mac side I use Adobe
PhotoShop 7x. I will make some comments, slightly prejudice toward
the Mac side, because I have the Apple 20" inch Cinema Display (20"
wide) slung of the back the of tbe box. The Wintel side has an
excellent NEC 17" Flat Panel.

My lowly Wintel box did an admiral job for years. Everything worked,
abeit slowly. Speed was an issue, but that could have been cured by
buying a much faster PC. Two major issues made me switch to the Mac.
After living in the UNIX world at work, I learned to love not having to
constantly worry about viruses and trojans. Also, multiple processes
seemed to run much better than on Windows with less resource
contention. The other issue on the Wintel box was color matching. In
the early days on the Wintel box, I would scan , edit and print and the
colors were always a bit skewed on the printer. I added the proper
profiles for my paper/printer and still they never quite matched. I
invested in a Moncao Systems Spyder and color profiling software
(EZColor) which fixed the problem (however, this setup was for a
standard CRT monitor). I did develop reliable profiles. However, moving
to flat screen required another 500 dollar investment in profiling
hardware and software.

One day I ventured into an Apple store, tried PhotoShop on a G4 and was
hooked. It worked flawlessly. I bought a Mac, Adobe Photoshop, hooked
my printers and scanners to it and have never looked back. (Yes the
wide screen is nice, but you can get that one Windows as well). The
big difference is, that colors match with no intervention on my part.
Apple ColorSync just works. I scan edit and print (with appropriate
profiles) and it all matches. No viruses, spyware etc. And, I can
reliably write CD-Rs' and DVD's while continuing to work on the Mac. I
have Windows 2.4 GHz boxes at work, which you I have to leave alone
while writing CD's much less DVD's .

All that being said, any current PC or Mac with a 1.2 or faster
processer, 1 GByte RAM, Firewire 400 or 800 or USB 2.x , Mac OS X or
Windows XP Home or Pro, and 120 GByte or larger Hard drive will serve
you well. On the PC side, buy a name brand monitor so you can get the
appropriate color (ICS) profile for it. Either machine should have a
CD/CD-R and DVD/R for burning and reading CDS and DVD's. I have a
personal preference to the Macs because they just work and don't get in
my way, but I am not going to pretend you can't do the same work on a
PC with Windows XP and get just as good work. (Note: when comparing,
compare like machines, Macs generally come with more stuff, and
processor clock speed is not directly comparable.. ie. a 1.4 GHz Mac
might be comparable to a 2.4 GHz Wintel box)). Pick the one you like
best.





Jim

jpmcw wrote:
Alan Browne wrote:

John McWilliams wrote:


It's equally amusing how PC users make a statement as in the first
paragraph, then state an opinion following it that can be answered
only by a longish reply.

So, this Mac user ain't goin' there, but for God's sake, Alan, do you
have to be righteous about every damned subject?



I frankly don't care if somebody uses a PC, Mac, *nix's or uses an
abacus.

The statement of the previous poster "an Apple will always be a better
computer for you if you buy it primarily for photo editing." is the
same, too often played, scratched and worn record from Mac
"proponents" ...the reply for any question regarding 'what computer?'


I don't care, either; equally, Nikon, Canon, *Ist, etc. etc. Fords *and*
Chevvies, Hondas and Nissans, etc. etc. For the most part.

But not all us Mac users are long winded, nor do we all say our platform
is best in all circumstances. But in another post you state
categorically what the OP should get- a PC, with no mention of
alternatives.

Most Mac users don´t need to be ´proponents´.

I didn´t use the word ´PC´ at all... yes, the ´spec´ I gave used
pentium/celeron, but the rest of it could easilly apply to Mac´s.

Cheers,
Alan.

--
-- r.p.e.35mm user resource: http://www.aliasimages.com/rpe35mmur.htm
-- r.p.d.slr-systems: http://www.aliasimages.com/rpdslrsysur.htm
-- [SI] gallery & rulz: http://www.pbase.com/shootin
-- e-meil: there's no such thing as a FreeLunch.

Judy,

Regarding the computer, any current mid-range computer will have enough
processing power, regardless of whether it's a PC, Mac, or whatever. As
most have informed you, what you need to have is fast memory and lots
of it. 1GB will do, but 2GB is better, especially if you'll deal with
large images, or anything where you'll use a lot of layers in a
Photoshop or whatever flavor editor you like.

Of course, if you can afford more processing power, it can only help,
but make sure you get the memory first. Also, you'll want a lot of
storage space. I would recommend a 160GB secondary drive for storage. I
would also recommend that you use a raid 0 array (two drives in a
striped set) for all of your editing. A lot of the newer PC
motherboards can do this. You'll have to ask someone else if you decide
on a Mac. Either way this can seriously speed up anything that requires
access to the hard drive. And eventually you're editing program will
access it in the most furiating way (read slow).

As this seems to have been mostly overlooked, and is in a way the most
important, another thing you want to do is get a large monitor. You'll
be working with images after all, and you have to see what you're doing
(properly). You can get a 19" CRT fairly cheaply these days. And you do
want a CRT. Flat panel LCDs are nice, but they're not suited to image
editing. Not to say that you can't use them for that, but if you're
interested in ensuring color accuracy, you can't really calibrate an
LCD properly. I'm sure some people will say you can, but the workings
of an LCD simply don't allow good calibration results. I can go into
the details for this, but suffice it to say that it really doesn't work
very well. Now, if you can afford both, then a system with dual
monitors, one CRT and one LCD is ideal. That's the way I've configured
my system.

Finally, as mentioned, make sure you get a DVD-RW drive. You'll need it
to save all those images you spent so much time scanning in and
editing. Again, any current drive will do. If you can get one of the
dual-layer drives that's fine, but I wouldn't worry too much about it.
Hope this helps.