New Windows PC Build for Post-Processing

If you would like to post, you'll need to register. Note that if you have a BCG store account, you'll need a new, separate account here (we keep the two sites separate for security purposes).

F

French Avocado

Active member
Supporting Member
Marketplace
Member's gallery
Interested in any thoughts on my new Windows PC build. I can't find a pre-built PC that I think works well for processing photos so I am building my own (Am I crazy? Isn't it just an advanced Lego set?). Here is a list of component parts.
Motherboard - Asus ProArt Z790 Creator with Thunderbolt 4
Processor - Intel Core i9-13900K with 24 cores (8 P-cores and 16 E-cores)
RAM - 96GB (2 x 48GB) Teamgroup T-Create 6800Mhz
Internal SSD - two Samsung 990 PRO Series - 2TB PCIe Gen4. X4 NVMe 2.0c - M.2 Internal SSD (one primary and one storage)
Graphics - ASUS ProArt GeForce RTX™ 4070 Ti 12GB OC Edition GDDR6X Graphics Card (PCIe 4.0, 12GB GDDR6X)
Power Supply - ROG Thor 1200W Platinum II (1200 Watt, Fully Modular Power Supply, 80+ Platinum
Cooler - ASUS ROG Ryujin III 360 All-in-one Liquid CPU Cooler with 360mm Radiator
Fans - extra case fans
HDD - 2 x 20TB Seagate drives - either in PC case or separate Thunderbolt OWC enclosure - would Thunderbolt provide faster access?
 
Member's gallery
For comparison I suggest you contact Puget Computer Systems! I have worked with them to build two systems for me. I am very clear about HOW I intend to use the system and how far into the future I want to "future proof" it. (i.e. over spec it now to keep it viable as technologies/requirements increase in the future).

You will pay a bit more than doing it your self, BUT they have tremendous customer support! My current system was built in 2020 and they still take my calls! AND I got exactly what I wanted.
 
Member's gallery
It’s an interesting conundrum and one’s results have to account for budget and intent. A few years ago, the intel Xeon’s blew the I-9’s out of the water and when arrayed in multiple configurations, it was positively jaw dropping. I’m not saying that you need to go there though it might be worthwhile to run it by Puget to see how your specs stack up.
 
Member's gallery
French Avocado said:
Interested in any thoughts on my new Windows PC build. I can't find a pre-built PC that I think works well for processing photos so I am building my own
Click to expand...

What's missing in trying to evaluate your build is - what is your goal of what "works well for photo processing"? You can build a perfectly good photo processing but less aggressive system at lower cost. But without a relevant design goal it's kinda hard to determine what's needed.
 
Member's gallery
It's way over-kill for photo processing unless you are working with very large images (100Mpx+).

Also, that CPU power inefficient and runs a bit too hot, the SSD is prone to rapid wear-out and the power supply is way too much for it all. And everything will be a PITA to assemble and get working right.

So, unless I was doing medium format/large panoramas/8k video editing, I'd go with an AMD Ryzen 9 platform (as it should be easier to cool with roughly the same performance as the intel), drop the RAM to 64GB, downgrade the SSD's to 2x1TB 980 Pro's, bump the GPU to a 4080, maybe slightly downgrade the PSU to a 1000W one from Seasonic.

Also, I would break down the 2x 20TB into something like 4x10 or even 8x5TB.

Then again, if I were to spend that much money on an image editing machine, I'd take a long hard look at a M2 Ultra Mac Studio...
 
Member's gallery
StefanSC said:
It's way over-kill for photo processing unless you are working with very large images (100Mpx+).

Also, that CPU power inefficient and runs a bit too hot, the SSD is prone to rapid wear-out and the power supply is way too much for it all. And everything will be a PITA to assemble and get working right.

So, unless I was doing medium format/large panoramas/8k video editing, I'd go with an AMD Ryzen 9 platform (as it should be easier to cool with roughly the same performance as the intel), drop the RAM to 64GB, downgrade the SSD's to 2x1TB 980 Pro's, bump the GPU to a 4080, maybe slightly downgrade the PSU to a 1000W one from Seasonic.

Also, I would break down the 2x 20TB into something like 4x10 or even 8x5TB.

Then again, if I were to spend that much money on an image editing machine, I'd take a long hard look at a M2 Ultra Mac Studio...
Click to expand...

We have a Gigapan and have some extremely large files. Overkill today may mean barely sufficient tomorrow.
 
Member's gallery
Be careful with regard to the power supply. The latest nvidia graphics cards us a 16-pin connection and the 8-pin adapter they supply was not compatible with the power supply connectors on my HP Z4 workstation that I bought in 2020. A new 12-pin connector is being proposed but it is not in production at this time. I passed on the RTX 4090 as it has been prone to melting of the 16-pin connector.

Graphics cards like the RTX 4090 are engineered to meet the needs of gamers who can to view 4K games at high frame rates. This is quite different from the needs of those editing either still or video on their computer where with most applications the CPU is doing the heavy lifting and a faster CPU can be useful than a high end graphics card.

Also the cards like the RTX 4090 take up 3 or 4 of the motherboards PCIe slots leaving none for adding ones to gain capabilities. The HP Omen 45L for example with the RTX 4090 provides not a single PCIe slot for upgrading its single 1GB Ethernet port or adding Firewire for a scanner or other important functionality, now or in the future.

I have held off on buying a pre-built PC until later in the year when this and other issues are resolved with the next generation of computers and components.
 
Member's gallery
Overclocking an I9 processor is not really neccesary, by design it will pull more power until it reaches maximum CPU temps. The I9 is designed to run hot and if the load is high will simply draw more power until it reachs maximum temp. You need to rethink the old processor temps guideline of 80°C, an I9 is designed to run at 100°C. If you use liquid cooling the processor can draw more power before reaching 100°C. Prime95 is a good stress test to run to check your cooling is up to the task and hardware info a good way to check the processor core frequencies are optimal.
 
Member's gallery
Calson said:
Be careful with regard to the power supply. The latest nvidia graphics cards us a 16-pin connection and the 8-pin adapter they supply was not compatible with the power supply connectors on my HP Z4 workstation that I bought in 2020. A new 12-pin connector is being proposed but it is not in production at this time. I passed on the RTX 4090 as it has been prone to melting of the 16-pin connector.

Graphics cards like the RTX 4090 are engineered to meet the needs of gamers who can to view 4K games at high frame rates. This is quite different from the needs of those editing either still or video on their computer where with most applications the CPU is doing the heavy lifting and a faster CPU can be useful than a high end graphics card.

Also the cards like the RTX 4090 take up 3 or 4 of the motherboards PCIe slots leaving none for adding ones to gain capabilities. The HP Omen 45L for example with the RTX 4090 provides not a single PCIe slot for upgrading its single 1GB Ethernet port or adding Firewire for a scanner or other important functionality, now or in the future.

I have held off on buying a pre-built PC until later in the year when this and other issues are resolved with the next generation of computers and components.
Click to expand...
Carlson, you nailed the devil in the details.

The later-generation GPU cards are monstrous in size, I was astonished by the volume these cards take, the cards block access to the usable slots on the motherboard, I think I ended up re-cabling the add-on boards with twists and turns, it was a real pain.

Oliver
 
Member's gallery
French Avocado said:
Interested in any thoughts on my new Windows PC build. I can't find a pre-built PC that I think works well for processing photos so I am building my own (Am I crazy? Isn't it just an advanced Lego set?). Here is a list of component parts.
Motherboard - Asus ProArt Z790 Creator with Thunderbolt 4
Processor - Intel Core i9-13900K with 24 cores (8 P-cores and 16 E-cores)
RAM - 96GB (2 x 48GB) Teamgroup T-Create 6800Mhz
Internal SSD - two Samsung 990 PRO Series - 2TB PCIe Gen4. X4 NVMe 2.0c - M.2 Internal SSD (one primary and one storage)
Graphics - ASUS ProArt GeForce RTX™ 4070 Ti 12GB OC Edition GDDR6X Graphics Card (PCIe 4.0, 12GB GDDR6X)
Power Supply - ROG Thor 1200W Platinum II (1200 Watt, Fully Modular Power Supply, 80+ Platinum
Cooler - ASUS ROG Ryujin III 360 All-in-one Liquid CPU Cooler with 360mm Radiator
Fans - extra case fans
HDD - 2 x 20TB Seagate drives - either in PC case or separate Thunderbolt OWC enclosure - would Thunderbolt provide faster access?
Click to expand...
I applaud you for having the skills, knowledge and drive to build your own computer, but I’m surprised that you’re not able to find one available suited for photo editing in the marketplace. I’m certainly no geek, but from my view there seem to be a number of commercially available units that work quite well for most post processing tasks, and serve the professional community well. Personally, I always like to consider warranties and long term support whenever I purchase a new unit, but then I readily admit that I don’t have the skills to do it all myself. In any event, best of luck in whatever you decide to do.
 
Last edited:
Member's gallery
Calson said:
Be careful with regard to the power supply. The latest nvidia graphics cards us a 16-pin connection and the 8-pin adapter they supply was not compatible with the power supply connectors on my HP Z4 workstation that I bought in 2020. A new 12-pin connector is being proposed but it is not in production at this time. I passed on the RTX 4090 as it has been prone to melting of the 16-pin connector.

Graphics cards like the RTX 4090 are engineered to meet the needs of gamers who can to view 4K games at high frame rates. This is quite different from the needs of those editing either still or video on their computer where with most applications the CPU is doing the heavy lifting and a faster CPU can be useful than a high end graphics card.

Also the cards like the RTX 4090 take up 3 or 4 of the motherboards PCIe slots leaving none for adding ones to gain capabilities. The HP Omen 45L for example with the RTX 4090 provides not a single PCIe slot for upgrading its single 1GB Ethernet port or adding Firewire for a scanner or other important functionality, now or in the future.

I have held off on buying a pre-built PC until later in the year when this and other issues are resolved with the next generation of computers and components.
Click to expand...
Many editing programs now take advantage of and are more dependent on the graphics card power for processing. Even something LR exporting RAW to jpg utilizes the GPU. One recent benchmark I saw between the 3090 and 2070 had the 3090 halving the export time in LR.

When you start to get into AI features like denoise I believe the difference is even bigger.

Now I’m sure there are diminishing returns as you go higher end (like most things) but having a strong GPU will definitely help in many use cases.
 
Member's gallery
The heart wants what the heart wants I guess, I've know that feeling with some expensive lenses that I wanted but didn't need. While I've built many systems/servers in the past, I'm with @Abinoone on the warranty concern. Individual component warranties are different than a system warranty...but it sounds like you're beyond that in your process and knowledge level.

If money is no object, full steam ahead! Just know that I'll be envious of your new system while I dream of one from myself 😫
 
Member's gallery
There is the concept of bottlenecks and with my batch processing of PSD files it was the available memory. Much faster with the same hardware on a computer running the Mac OSX that allowed the application to address more than 3.5GB RAM as with Windows XP.

Most editing applications do not make use of multiple GPU cores and performance depends primarily on the CPU and the clock rate. For gamers a i7 CPU and a RTX 4090 provides the best performance for their needs. For content creators a i9 CPU is more important than a particular GPU. If all use a computer for was email and gaming then the i7 plus RX or RTX board would be the way to go.

For my needs a i9 GPU (and the latest have double the performance of my 2020 version) and lots of RAM and fast I/O with the onboard data storage and a 10GB Ethernet for connecting to a NAS and a Firewire board for connecting to a film scanner is what are important. I have been using dual internal drives with RAID1 for the past 10 years to maximize performance. I started with hard drives and later with SSD ones and most recently with NVMe M.2 "drives".

The NVMe are what the computer manufacturers have migrated to in order to compensate for the space lost to very and very power hungry large graphics cards. The downside I have found is that the NVMe are very heat sensitive and rely on passive cooling with heatsinks. I have had two of mine fail after 12 months of use. I am thinking of switching back to dual 2.5" SSD drives with my next workstation.
 
Member's gallery
One thing to be careful of: I have a similar system I built last year using the same CPU. The only thing I haven't added yet - probably this year - was a new GPU, so I still have my old one, a 1660Ti. This is admittedly older than what you're considering, but I still wouldn't consider it super ancient and I have used it to play even games released in the last year without trouble.

Yet even with that CPU my editing just *chugs along* - even for non AI stuff. Put a few masks on an image in LrC and it sllloowwws to a crawl - it's pretty bad. Looking into it, most answers suggest that the GPU really will make that much of a difference. I may suggest prioritizing stronger GPU over stronger CPU if possible.
 
Member's gallery
Calson said:
There is the concept of bottlenecks and with my batch processing of PSD files it was the available memory. Much faster with the same hardware on a computer running the Mac OSX that allowed the application to address more than 3.5GB RAM as with Windows XP.

Most editing applications do not make use of multiple GPU cores and performance depends primarily on the CPU and the clock rate. For gamers a i7 CPU and a RTX 4090 provides the best performance for their needs. For content creators a i9 CPU is more important than a particular GPU. If all use a computer for was email and gaming then the i7 plus RX or RTX board would be the way to go.

For my needs a i9 GPU (and the latest have double the performance of my 2020 version) and lots of RAM and fast I/O with the onboard data storage and a 10GB Ethernet for connecting to a NAS and a Firewire board for connecting to a film scanner is what are important. I have been using dual internal drives with RAID1 for the past 10 years to maximize performance. I started with hard drives and later with SSD ones and most recently with NVMe M.2 "drives".

The NVMe are what the computer manufacturers have migrated to in order to compensate for the space lost to very and very power hungry large graphics cards. The downside I have found is that the NVMe are very heat sensitive and rely on passive cooling with heatsinks. I have had two of mine fail after 12 months of use. I am thinking of switching back to dual 2.5" SSD drives with my next workstation.
Click to expand...
Most editing applications do make good use of the GPU these days. There is a significant difference in just exporting RAW to jpg in LR when using the GPU.

nvidia has a list of all the GPU enabled apps
https://www.nvidia.com/en-us/studio/software/
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top