New computer????

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I have a speedy desktop machine with two monitors that I do all of my serious editing on. I have a basic laptop I take with me when traveling to transfer and backup my images and view my photos. I will at times do a little editing so I can send or post a few quick images. I have also used my iPad to view, quick edit, and send a few photos as well. Here are a couple of my thoughts.

Make a good assessment of what your processing and storage needs are going to be for the next few years. It is a little easier to upgrade a Windows desktop machine than a Windows laptop. Learn a little about the processors, video displays, GPU, and storage components of any computer you are considering. A good example is M.2 SSD drives, they are much faster than other SSD or mechanical drives but they are more costly.

The new Apple M1 chips look pretty impressive and they seem to be pretty price competitive for the processing performance. I believe they still need a little time for native apps to be released to really make them stable and take advantage of their processing capabilities. This is not from my own experiences just a few comments from a web developer I work with.

I have found that I like to view my photos while traveling but I just don't ever find much time to do any real editing. My evening activities tend to be backup and quickly view my photos then clean and prepare my equipment for the next morning. This is especially true when I am in Yellowstone!

My best advice is to decide what is going to work best for you and go with it.
 
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James C. said:
Ralph: What connectors/adapters do you use to connect your D500 to your iPad so as to download your photos to it?
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I am going to chime in here! I hope Ralph doesn't mind! I have an iPad with the lightning port.
I have used the Lightning to USB adapter with charging port to connect a USB card reader to my iPad. It has to have the charging port in order to provide adequate power to the USB port to use a card reader that would handle the XQD cards. I have also used the lightning SD card reader and it does not require power. The Files app in the newer iOS will allow you to copy images without importing them if you want. It is not really fast but it works.
 
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Hut said:
I don't know why I would need to do that??? Order the way you want it in the first place and enjoy a rock stable machine with a killer display for years.
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For me it came down to cost. For instance, when I bought my desktop It had an i7 chip, 16GB RAM, a decent graphics card and a 500GB HDD. Back then I had a decent Dell monitor. Currently, several years later it has 32GB RAM a 500GB SSD for the system, a 1TB HDD for the usual bits and pieces, 3 swappable drive bays for all of my 4TB HDDs and an Eizo monitor. If I had tried to do that right from the start it would have doubled or trebled the cost and was beyond my disposable income - and back then SSDs were not as well developed as they are now.

From what you say, if you had a computer that had HDDs and wanted to get SSDs, you just go and buy another machine. I don't do credit by choice, so getting a good basic system initally then upgrading as and when I can works for me.

Same goes with my car too. I'd like a Ferrari, but make do with a car I can afford.
 
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MartyD said:
I am going to chime in here! I hope Ralph doesn't mind! I have an iPad with the lightning port.
I have used the Lightning to USB adapter with charging port to connect a USB card reader to my iPad. It has to have the charging port in order to provide adequate power to the USB port to use a card reader that would handle the XQD cards. I have also used the lightning SD card reader and it does not require power. The Files app in the newer iOS will allow you to copy images without importing them if you want. It is not really fast but it works.
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All you need is an sd card reader with a lightning connector. You plug the sd card into the reader and then plug the reader into the lightning port of the the iPad. You open the photo app and import. One thing to keep in mind. If you shoot both raw and jpeg on the same card the app will only see the jpeg. So I shoot raw on one card and jpeg on the other so that when I import I am only using the card that contains the raw files.
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James C. said:
Ralph: What connectors/adapters do you use to connect your D500 to your iPad so as to download your photos to it?
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James I posted an explanation above. I thought I did under your name but it is under Marty D. Marty , No problem. I find the sd card reader on my iPad imports quickly but obviously it depends upon how many files are involved. I prefer to import using the photo app. I only use the sd reader not the XQD.
 
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Personally I have 2 computers. One for travel and one to do hard work on.
Screen wise, you'll need to have an external with a good ability to present colors, full S-RGB or Adobe-RGB are rarely found on laptop screens, and the screens are likely pitiful small.
Performance wise, a decent desktop will out-perform a good laptop, as desktops don't consider battery life they run full throttle on the memory frequency and achieve a better bandwidth between CPU and Memory.
The GPU is the real work horse in a modern computer, a good graphics card comes cheaper in a desktop than in a laptop, and can provide even higher performance => faster presentation of your edits and faster exports to final image.
Storage can be more generous in a desktop, in a laptop you are likely to be ruined when going past 1TB (if available at all).

Configuration I would go for a
- mid-range CPU i5 or Ryzen 5 or 7
- 32 GB memory
- A graphics card with 4-6 GB memory and GPU of either latest or previous generation. Not necessarily the top notch model, #2 or 3 can do.
- An NvME disk to boot from e.g 120-500 GB
- 1-2 disks for data, either SSD (using <2 TB) or a fast spinning rust for larger

Of course it will be tied to the desk :-( So for traveling there will be need for a laptop and live with compromises made in design and do final edit at home.
 
dabhand16 said:
For me it came down to cost. For instance, when I bought my desktop It had an i7 chip, 16GB RAM, a decent graphics card and a 500GB HDD. Back then I had a decent Dell monitor. Currently, several years later it has 32GB RAM a 500GB SSD for the system, a 1TB HDD for the usual bits and pieces, 3 swappable drive bays for all of my 4TB HDDs and an Eizo monitor. If I had tried to do that right from the start it would have doubled or trebled the cost and was beyond my disposable income - and back then SSDs were not as well developed as they are now.

From what you say, if you had a computer that had HDDs and wanted to get SSDs, you just go and buy another machine. I don't do credit by choice, so getting a good basic system initally then upgrading as and when I can works for me.

Same goes with my car too. I'd like a Ferrari, but make do with a car I can afford.
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I bought my Dodge/Cummins new in 2006 and have put 335,000 miles on it and counting. I know good value when I see it. lol
 
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Joe said:
I have a new camera, D780 and it is time to update the computer. New Nikon software won't run on my old Windows program. I'm curious as to whether you all prefer a laptop or a desktop for your work. I'm leaning towards a laptop since I can take it on the road and I spend a lot of time in Glacier and Yellowstone. I hate having to wait until I get home to work on my photos. I worry that a laptop may not have the screen resolution I need. Would love to hear what everyone else is using, thanks.
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Hi Joe
Budget is always a factor
My grandson has just purchased a new MacBook Pro 13" with the new M1 chip, wow! is it fast, and the 13" is not that expensive, with 8GB and 512SSD
Best option would be both, (thats if you want to edit on the road, "I do, because I',m usually away for at least 3 months of the year in our tropical north"
FWIW, the new M1 MBP 13" looks like a MBA
The best would be a ,
MBP M1 chip, and at home,
Perhaps wait for the new iMac, unless you need a desktop right now,
A friend of mine just recently bought a maxed out 27" iMac Pro with 128GB ram, he had a play with a friends new M1 chip MBP and said, "It made his 2020 iMac Pro look slow
............Gary
 
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Just a thought. The new M1 chip is amazing, but the rest of the computer hasn't changed that much. Considering the $$$ I don't think the cost/value is there yet for most users.

I agree with everything said about editing on a laptop vs large monitor! I do use a laptop on trips, but unless it is extrememly obvious I never delete until I can see the photos on a large monitor on my desktop. I like the ipad idea for weight, but how does it do with 1000s of images?
 
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I recently bought a new Dell desktop (tower) with an Intel(R) Core(TM) i9-10900 CPU @ 2.80GHz 2.81 GHz, 32 GB of RAM, and the NVIDA GeForce RTX 2060 with 8 MB of memory. I have a 2 TB hard drive that I use for storing all my RAW files until I finish editing the good ones and put those files (both the .psd and the .jpg) on Microsoft OneDrive (cloud). I load the programs to the 500 MB SSD drive. I have the BenQ Sw2700pt 27 Inch monitor which is fantastic! I use a Datacolor SpyderX Pro to keep it calibrated (super easy to use!).

I was using my HP laptop with the BenQ and it worked "ok". There is no doubt that 32 GB of RAM on the tower helps and the upgraded Graphics card really helps on the Topaz programs.

I hope I have "future-proofed" my set-up!

If you buy a laptop, look at the "gaming" laptops since they have upgraded graphics cards. Does the standard "on board" memory cards on good laptops work.?Yes, probably...for now. But they can be agonizingly slow!

By the way, when I want to just look at my images, I use my Chromebook! Works like a charm!
 
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Ralph Bruno said:
You can edit raw files on the IPad very easily. Any significant changes are made on my Mac mini .
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Ralph, just curious, what software are you using to edit the RAW files on the iPad?

EDIT: Whoops, just saw your comment "...but have been using Apple‘s Photo app on my iPad for 95% of my editing" in another thread. Guess that answers it.
 
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Geezer said:
Ralph, just curious, what software are you using to edit the RAW files on the iPad?

EDIT: Whoops, just saw your comment "...but have been using Apple‘s Photo app on my iPad for 95% of my editing" in another thread. Guess that answers it.
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I use the photo app on the iPad For quick edits. Probably 95% as well. It works for me. Just make sure it only imports the raw files. If you shout both raw and jpeg at same time and they are put on same card, it can’t differentiate during editing. It will default to jpeg.
 
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Patrick M said:
snapbridge is slow for raw files, not so bad for jpeg. If it’s a few shots, you can bear it, but otherwise....
with the card plugged in, can you see the SD card in the Files app, when you browse ? If you can you can , you can copy all your images to a Files folder.
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Its pretty fast. I plug the card in and start the photo app. All the photos will show up in the photo app window and you just select and import what you want. It allows group selections or individual selections. If you have more than one day of shooting it will allow you to select the day or days as well instead of selecting photos individuallly. I usually download everything into the iPad and delete what I dont want later. It works really well and it doesn’t take very long at least according to my standards. 👍. I then Go directly into the editing mode In the photo app.
 
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Ralph Bruno said:
Its pretty fast. I plug the card in and start the photo app. All the photos will show up in the photo app window and you just select and import what you want. It allows group selections or individual selections. If you have more than one day of shooting it will allow you to select the day or days as well instead of selecting photos individuallly. I usually download everything into the iPad and delete what I dont want later. It works really well and it doesn’t take very long at least according to my standards. 👍. I then Go directly into the editing mode In the photo app.
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If there are adjustment that the photo app can’t handle then I will import into Luminar. But truthfully I haven’t had to do that much.
 
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iPad pro 12.5" on the road, iMac 27" 5K for editing. The iPad pro works wonderfully well for a quick look at photos and I put them on an external hard drive from the iPad.
 
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Joe said:
Thanks everyone. I have decided to go with a new desktop and skip the laptop. I thought about it and realized I really don't work on the photos on the road except to see if I got the shot I really wanted. It makes more sense to put the money into a home system.
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I think you won't regret this decision. After replacing an Asus laptop, I decided to go with a custom built tower that could be upgraded. It seems to me the software (particularly AI) keeps demanding more resources. For travel, I found a 13" Razor that was last years model for a good price. I like to see what I have and make any adjustments to how I am shooting the subjects. I store on external HD. If space is really an issue, I have two 1TB SSD that pack nicely for travel. When the Razor dies, I was hoping to replace it with a tablet of sorts that is capable of copying to the externals and then viewing. I don't do much processing on the road. Anybody have any ideas for PC users on this one?
 
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