PC vs Mac
Like pkp. suggested. The hardware performance / Cost ratio is better on a PC than a Mac. But then some people found Mac OS easier to use, so that you as a user can do your work quicker.
As for the monitor, while it is important to get a decent monitor, color correction, and color match is a relatively complicate matter. In most cases, it depends on where you images ends.
Say, view by average consumer monitor (sRGB)? Printing them at pro. Lab, using your own printer, which aren't or are color calibrate??
I am also find many photography add-on or tools are updated or release as PC software first, before Mac. This is something that you may also want to keep in mind. if I remember correctly, Adobe CS4 64bit or LR 64bit was release on PC 1st.
My 2 cents.
I saw a Dell 23" IPS LCD for just a hair over $200 bucks la. And the thing is HD capable (something x 1080, I think?) as well. Hardware is crazy cheap these days. But a 24" IPS LCD at an even higher resolution was $400+ as you were saying.
IPS LCD isn't just good for its wider viewing angle. The colour gamut of the device is also wider than the TN panels and produces richer and more intense colours. For any type of photography work, they are definitely worth every penny, esp when they are so cheap.
Mac is good for the job, but you can get something similar for less. You should get a decent computer for under $1400, IPS monitor included.
Photo editing/processing is best to work with a multi-core processors, the i5 or i7 is highly recommended. Video card, you can get anything around $150 and it should sufficiently handle anything. Even the Intel HD Graphics on the new Sandy-Bridge CPUs are very capable. HDD, I would go for RAID option because of the increased speed. I will do 3 discs RAID if budget allow so I can do mirroring at the same time.
Dell Ultrasharp series are all IPS, if on sale, 24" could be had for about $400. It is the cheapest IPS display compare to Lacie, Viewsonic or Apple.
If going for Apple, I would get a Mac Pro over 27" iMac because the new iMac is expensive to service as EVERYTHING except RAM has to be bought from Apple, even hard drives are running special connector and Apple firmware.
I think my raw editing software (image data_)consumes alot of cpu resources, like the c5s, single target editing.
I'm sure the LR is great since many users highly recommend it, multi-targets editing with very few cpu demand.
There's a slight chance that my oldie pc can run the LR with no waiting time. I will find out later. But I'm not sure if my copy of win xp sp3 still exist in my home. LR3 requires SP3.
I've googled IPS monitors, it's strength is the super wide viewing angle 178 degree without color distortion. In my situation, I don't really need IPS because 2 of my samsungs, 24" tft & 22"lcd, they both don't have any angle viewing problems. But,......, these samsungs are not reliable. Once it dies, I'll switch to LG/asus 27s. Anyways, photography is only one of my hobbies, I don't have any clients.
But, the apple mac store has the 27"imac which catches my eyes. $1699 + tax , so around $1900
Been using pc for 16 years since 1995, maybe it's time to try a mac. it has i5 quad core, 4GB ram, 1TB hd, ati6000 series video, plus a thundbolt port if I remember correctly. and it has 4 usb2.0, not the 3.0
the hardware should be an overkill since I only have one usage, photo editing. and it's not commercial, just personal use.
But, I'm still missing the 1635 2.8, it's about $12000 hkd
how long it opens files? I open faster than I bling. In this age, if you have to wait, it is tooooo slow. (expect transfering file from camera to PC)
About IPS monitors, all Apple monitors are IPS I think. You have to see it yourself. if you are try to show it to client, get a Macbook just for the monitor.
Others have already told you that your RAW pics are automatically shown by LR as previews (after you imported them into the LR library), so you have instant access to all the features you need. Even on my 4 year old piece of crap machine (dead slow Athlon 64 X2 with 4GB RAM), all the adjustments are instant. I don't recall LR2 having any noise reduction features (or maybe it does, but I've never used it before), but I think LR3 has a pretty good NR function. No idea if it is as good as Noise Ninja though...
Still, even though Lightroom may sound like an answer to your problem, I'd say you might as well just upgrade to a new computer while you're at it la. With desktops, even $400 - $500 can buy you a lot more processing power than your ancient single core computer la.
發表於 2011-7-3 09:28
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