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Author Topic: Windows 64bit or Vista 64bit for CS3?  (Read 9867 times)

Dinarius

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Windows 64bit or Vista 64bit for CS3?
« on: June 25, 2008, 03:14:08 am »

I intend to buy a new computer to handle the files from my Hasselblad H3Dll. They're just to big to batch process with the computer I've got.

In order to allow CS3 to *see* as much RAM as possible, I intend to use a 64bit OS. But, which one?

A year and a bit later, is Vista OK now? I've read that the next generation of Windows is due out next year. Is this a sign that all is still not well with Vista, or just the natural order of things?

If not, which Vista 64bit is the one to go for? Ultimate?

Not sure what else I should be asking! ;-) I just want to spend less time in front of the screen. It's driving me nuts!

Thanks.

D.
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gmitchel

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Windows 64bit or Vista 64bit for CS3?
« Reply #1 on: June 25, 2008, 08:40:49 am »

Quote
I intend to buy a new computer to handle the files from my Hasselblad H3Dll. They're just to big to batch process with the computer I've got.

In order to allow CS3 to *see* as much RAM as possible, I intend to use a 64bit OS. But, which one?

A year and a bit later, is Vista OK now? I've read that the next generation of Windows is due out next year. Is this a sign that all is still not well with Vista, or just the natural order of things?

If not, which Vista 64bit is the one to go for? Ultimate?

Not sure what else I should be asking! ;-) I just want to spend less time in front of the screen. It's driving me nuts!

Thanks.

D.
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I faced this decision myself recently.

(1) Photoshop CS3 is not optimized for 64-bit. It is a ossible feature for the future, but it is not a high priority for Adobe. There's a blog entry from one of the Adobe system engineers on this point.

(2) Lots of software incompatibilities, especially driver incompatibilities, are likely for the immediate future with 64-bit XP or Vista.

(3) 4GB chips are currently $1000. So even laptops with 64-bit XP or Vista come with 4GB as 2x2GB dual channel memory.

(4) The current Duocore processors can run either 32-bit or 64-bit XP and Vista. So you can buy 32-bit OS today and upgrade later as optimized software becomes available.

(5) Vista offers the ability to use high speed flash drives as a read cache for files. Vista can use up to 4GB in this way. Some people describe it as a substitute for system RAM. Not really. But it can speed operations that make frequent hits to the Windows page file. Photoshop will definitely benefit. This makes Vista more attractive, IMHO.

I decided to go with a laptop with a T9500 Duocore processor, a pair of SLI GPUs, and a pair of 7200 RPM drives using 32-bit Vista Business Ultimate.

The major bottleneck on a laptop is the speed of the memory. Laptop memory is much slower than RAM on desktops. My new laptop has a 6MB cache on the processor and 667MHz RAM. That's about as good as it gets on a laptop. (Regrettably, even on desktops, RAM speed has lagged far behind improvements in processor speeds.)

You get about 3.2 GB of addressable RAM under 32-bit XP or Vista. The other 756 MB are used as shared video RAM. In my case, this complements the 512 MB of GRAM on the SLI cards.

IOW, if you expect an immediate benefit in performance froma 64-bit OS, you're being given more marketing hype than practical advice.

4GB of RAM, 7200 RPM drives, high end video card with lots of dedicated RAM -- those features will get you more performance increase than 64-bit OS.

Cheers,

Mitch
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Dinarius

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Windows 64bit or Vista 64bit for CS3?
« Reply #2 on: June 25, 2008, 09:30:56 am »

Mitch,

Many thanks for taking the time to write such a comprehensive reply.  

Is this the article you were referring to....?

http://kb.adobe.com/selfservice/viewConten...rnalId=kb401088

If not, scroll down (about half-way) to the paragraph headed, "Allocating memory above 2 Gb with 64-bit processors."

It is this paragraph that influenced me. In particular, the comment "Additionally, in Windows Vista 64-bit, processing very large images is much faster if your computer has large amounts of RAM (6-8 GB)."

1. I only want a desktop.

2. This computer will be used only for image editing, nothing else. So, as long as it gets past any compatibility issues with CS3/Bridge/Flexcolor, that's all I care about.

Oddly, on the DELL site, the Precision desktops can be specced with as much RAM as you like.  The XPS machines are limited.

But, the XPS machines come with the Q6600 processor as standard (and claim to be gaming speed machines) whereas the Q6600 processor is NOT available in the Precision lineup, as far as I can see.

If I choose DELL (very likely) it will definitely be either a Precision or an XPS. But, which?

And if I go for Vista, I assume I should be going for Vista Ultimate. Right?

Thanks again.

D.
« Last Edit: June 25, 2008, 09:31:27 am by Dinarius »
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Paul2660

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Windows 64bit or Vista 64bit for CS3?
« Reply #3 on: June 25, 2008, 11:07:50 am »

Few more thoughts,

CS3 will handle your ram much better than CS2.  You are still limited to a 1.7GB per program limit (32bit windows program limitation).  However CS3 can take some of the scratch data into the ram.  If you have 8GB on a 64 bit OS then you will see a improvement especially when working with larger files.  Is it a huge amount, no, I feel at most 20 percent.  

64 bit OS, it's your call.  XP 64 bit is very stable and there is a very good level of driver support now.  In fact most companies have a 64 bit driver standard.   At least for XP, and more and more are starting to show Vista 64 bit.  I have been running XP 64 bit now for 2 years and driver support is no problem for current hardware.

As was previously posted, until the 64 bit version of CS? comes out, you really are still limited to the previsions of a 32 bit OS.  CS3 as I mentioned has some tweaks to use some of the extra ram, but it's still only a 32 bit program.  The rumor is that the next version of CS (Sept 08?) will be a 64 bit version for windows.  That alone would be worth the move to a 64 bit OS.  

Look for 7200 rpm drives and a good SATA bus, you need to research that as not all SATA buses are the same.  Start with 8GB of ram (4 slots of 2GB).  Use a graphics card that has dual DVI output and 256mb or greater Video ram.   You might want to get a 10000K raptor drive just for the scratch drives.  I use a 150GB 10K raptor partitioned into 3 50GB drives for my scratch.  

I would not consider installing 32 bit XP or vista and trying to upgrade later.  Upgrading a OS in windows is really a entire reload.  I have never seen a good upgrade that worked like it was supposed to in Windows.   Microsoft is supposed to drop XP support sometime soon, but their support in general is lame anyway.  I only build OEM licenses, so I can't get their support.  

Paul C
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Paul Caldwell
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Dinarius

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Windows 64bit or Vista 64bit for CS3?
« Reply #4 on: June 25, 2008, 11:20:49 am »

Thanks again.

I'm seriously considering this>

http://tinyurl.com/6atj7l

(The one on the left without monitor)

I would add 2Gb RAM.

Expensive, but I want something that will motor through Hasselblad files. At an hourly rate, I will save the cost of this machine in no time. No more 15 hour editing bouts. I hate them!

Otherwise, you guys approve?

Thanks.

D.
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bill t.

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Windows 64bit or Vista 64bit for CS3?
« Reply #5 on: June 25, 2008, 11:39:06 am »

I frequently edit 1GB+ panoramic stitches.

My CS3 editing experience with Vista64 bit and 8GB or ram is dramatically faster than it was on my 2GB, 3gHz, P4 XP system.  I've using a 2.4gHz, quad core processor with Vista.

Of course, technically speaking, CS3 is a 32bit program and still has memory limitations even in a 64bit OS.  One must carefully understand that BLAH BLAH BLAH.  I don't care.  It just works better now.  I'm happy again.

I'm really glad I made that move.
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Paul2660

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Windows 64bit or Vista 64bit for CS3?
« Reply #6 on: June 25, 2008, 11:49:18 am »

Just one note, I would stay away from water cooling.  It's just going to have problems eventually.     I would look for a good fan system without the water cooling.  Water cooling seems to be what gamers like, but they are also planning on overclocking the chips.  I don't think you will need to do that.  


You should be able to put a quad core, ( I am only running duals) in a desktop and cool it without water.  


I am sure others will disagree, but water to me is just overkill.

Paul C
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Paul Caldwell
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Dinarius

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Windows 64bit or Vista 64bit for CS3?
« Reply #7 on: June 25, 2008, 11:58:20 am »

Paul,

Point taken.

So, looking at this range, without losing the head entirely, what do you spec it out to?

(no monitor)

http://tinyurl.com/6ntsw6

Thanks.

D.
« Last Edit: June 25, 2008, 11:58:58 am by Dinarius »
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Paul2660

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Windows 64bit or Vista 64bit for CS3?
« Reply #8 on: June 25, 2008, 12:16:29 pm »

The T7400 Quad core Xeon, middle machine on the link.

I would check to see how many ram slots it has, most machine in this class will have 4. It comes with 4GB in 1GB dimms, so if you want to upgrade the ram later, you will be throwing out the 4GB.  See if you can get it with 4GB in 2GB dimms.  2GB dimms in the US are a bargin right now, depending on the speed and latency.  

The OS selected is 32 bit, see if they offer a 64 bit version.

The hard drive is (1) 160GB.  You will need more drives.  
I would see if they will upgrade that base 160GB  to a 500GB minimum.  Your OS will take up 85GB.  

Make sure it has at least (4) SATA ports, I would prefer (6) for future upgrades.  Graphic card is fine and optical drive is fine.  

Also it's a full tower, but you need to ask Dell, how many 3.5" (standard sata drive size) drives it will hold.  I would want to be able to install at least 3 more.  

Paul C
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Paul Caldwell
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ruraltrekker

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Windows 64bit or Vista 64bit for CS3?
« Reply #9 on: June 25, 2008, 02:23:08 pm »

I switch my main workstation to Vista 64 bit and I have to say I wonder why I ordered the machine with XP. All of my Bridge/Photoshop problems are now gone. I do very heavy lifting with those programs and would fall victum to the eventual memory leak when Image processing a few thousand, or even a few hundred, raw files into jpg.

Vista got some weird bad rap but if you are using a newer machine with a decent processor and don't "hang" any antique hardware/accessories on your machine you will find no better way to go than to use Vista 64 bit.

Plus you will be all set for the CS4 64bit version when it comes available.

Do it.

Ken
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Dinarius

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Windows 64bit or Vista 64bit for CS3?
« Reply #10 on: June 26, 2008, 03:32:40 am »

Many thanks.

And just to be clear, we are talking about Vista *Ultimate* 64bit and not one of the others (e.g. "Business").

Correct?

Thanks again.

D.
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budjames

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Windows 64bit or Vista 64bit for CS3?
« Reply #11 on: June 26, 2008, 04:37:25 am »

If you are interested, I switched to Macs a year ago. I have a Dell Precision Workstation 470 with dual Xeon Processors, 4GB RAM, internal RAID 320GB drives, internal fax/modem, Firewire card, and SoundBlaster X sound card for sale - $500 OBO plus shipping.

It works great, but I'm all Mac now so I don't use it anymore.

Bud James
North Wales, PA
EM: bud@budjamesphotography.com
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Bud James
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Dinarius

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Windows 64bit or Vista 64bit for CS3?
« Reply #12 on: June 26, 2008, 04:42:55 am »

Cheers Bud, but I'm about 4000 miles away from you and DELL are about 10!  

D.

Edited:

On the DELL site the Precision CPUs are available as is, in dual form and with "risers".

How much difference would having dual processor setup make?

What's a "riser" and is it worth the (small) extra expense?

Thanks.

D.
« Last Edit: June 26, 2008, 06:50:48 am by Dinarius »
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Paul2660

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Windows 64bit or Vista 64bit for CS3?
« Reply #13 on: June 26, 2008, 10:26:14 am »

I would stay with a single processor with a quad core or dual core.  

You are getting into Server specs.  In the old days before dual core, a dual processor system was not a bad solution.  But with the latest technology out there, Dual or Quad cores with good cooling not overclocked will get you what you need.

Paul C
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Paul Caldwell
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Dinarius

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Windows 64bit or Vista 64bit for CS3?
« Reply #14 on: June 28, 2008, 10:36:57 am »

For the record, this is what I ordered:

T3400 525W Intel Core 2 Extreme QX9650 (3.00GHz, 12MB,1333MHz)  
Precision Vista Resource DVD
Vertical Chassis : Orientation (Minitower, W: 170,2 x H: 447.3 x D: 468.4 mm) with IEEE1394 Front Connector

Memory : 8GB (4x2048) 800MHz DDR2 Dual Channel ECC
Floppy Disk Drive : Not Included
Hard Drive : 500GB (7200Rpm) Serial ATA II
Additional Hard Drive : 500GB (7200Rpm) Serial ATA ll
SATA ,RAID 1, 2 Hard Drives
Roxio Creator 9.0 with Media
16X DVD+/-RW +16x DVD -ROM
Display : Not Included
512MB PCIe x16 nVidia Quadro FX 1700 (MRGA14L), Dual Monitor DVI or VGA Graphics Card

Sound Card : SoundBlaster Xfi Xtreme Music Card & 1394 Firewire Controller Card

Speakers : Not Included
Logitech - MX3200 - Cordless - Desktop
English - Genuine Windows Vista Ultimate (64Bit OS)
English - Genuine Windows Vista Ultimate 64Bit Backup Media


Thanks to all for your input.

D.
« Last Edit: June 28, 2008, 10:37:50 am by Dinarius »
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ChrisGolden

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Windows 64bit or Vista 64bit for CS3?
« Reply #15 on: June 29, 2008, 01:03:13 pm »

Quote
For the record, this is what I ordered:
...
I realize that you already placed your order, but I thought I'd mention another alternative for anyone else reviewing this thread who might be in the market for a new desktop: Mac Pro, but running both OS X and Vista 64.

Despite the smiley, I'm dead serious.  For US$ 2800 you get a dual-processor (4 cores per processor, so that's 8 cores) equipped machine.  The value of 8 cores over 4 (or even 2) is arguably not that great for some Photoshop tasks (at least for CS3; future versions may well be different in this regard), but what I found so compelling about this deal is that the RAM is expandable up to 32 gigs.  For anyone who wants to keep their machine for a few years and/or works with very large images (either medium format, or as in my case, multi-row panoramas), this is crucial, as many machines and motherboards sold these days can't handle the installation of more than 8 gigs of RAM.

I bought the basic $2800 Mac Pro machine (minimum RAM and hard drive), and then added 8 gigs of RAM (bringing the total to 10) and plugged four 750 gig hard drives in (for a total of 3 terabytes of storage space).  The result is a blazingly fast machine that still manages to be as quiet as an everyday low-powered desktop machine.  It's also a joy to upgrade:  RAM slots are easily accessible, and the four hard drive bays feature slide-out cradles.

I went with Vista 64 for a variety of reasons, but this post isn't intended to ignite the Windows-versus-OSX powder keg.   You could easily purchase the system I got and run OS X exclusively.  Or, get Vista 64 and create a dual boot configuration as I did.  The latest Mac Bootcamp version (2.1) provides all the drivers I needed for the Mac hardware (audio, Bluetooth, Firewire, etc.).  The machine has been used for my work and Photoshop nearly continuously for the last few weeks, and has been rock-solidly stable.

A caveat:  If you're a gamer (which I'm not), you'll be limited in the choices of graphics cards you use if you want to use OS X.  But if you use Windows exclusively, I believe you can run high-end cards.

I'm sure there are many good choices for those looking for a new desktop.  But this is definitely one of them.

Hope this helps!
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Henry Goh

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Windows 64bit or Vista 64bit for CS3?
« Reply #16 on: June 29, 2008, 01:20:47 pm »

Quote
I realize that you already placed your order, but I thought I'd mention another alternative for anyone else reviewing this thread who might be in the market for a new desktop: Mac Pro, but running both OS X and Vista 64.

Despite the smiley, I'm dead serious.  For US$ 2800 you get a dual-processor (4 cores per processor, so that's 8 cores) equipped machine.  The value of 8 cores over 4 (or even 2) is arguably not that great for some Photoshop tasks (at least for CS3; future versions may well be different in this regard), but what I found so compelling about this deal is that the RAM is expandable up to 32 gigs.  For anyone who wants to keep their machine for a few years and/or works with very large images (either medium format, or as in my case, multi-row panoramas), this is crucial, as many machines and motherboards sold these days can't handle the installation of more than 8 gigs of RAM.

I bought the basic $2800 Mac Pro machine (minimum RAM and hard drive), and then added 8 gigs of RAM (bringing the total to 10) and plugged four 750 gig hard drives in (for a total of 3 terabytes of storage space).  The result is a blazingly fast machine that still manages to be as quiet as an everyday low-powered desktop machine.  It's also a joy to upgrade:  RAM slots are easily accessible, and the four hard drive bays feature slide-out cradles.

I went with Vista 64 for a variety of reasons, but this post isn't intended to ignite the Windows-versus-OSX powder keg.   You could easily purchase the system I got and run OS X exclusively.  Or, get Vista 64 and create a dual boot configuration as I did.  The latest Mac Bootcamp version (2.1) provides all the drivers I needed for the Mac hardware (audio, Bluetooth, Firewire, etc.).  The machine has been used for my work and Photoshop nearly continuously for the last few weeks, and has been rock-solidly stable.

A caveat:  If you're a gamer (which I'm not), you'll be limited in the choices of graphics cards you use if you want to use OS X.  But if you use Windows exclusively, I believe you can run high-end cards.

I'm sure there are many good choices for those looking for a new desktop.  But this is definitely one of them.

Hope this helps!
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Dear Chris,

I think you have a fantastic suggestion.

Could you just enlighten further since I have stopped using Macs after OS 10.0 - do you need two separate sets of software since you run both Vista and OS X?  By this I mean will I need PSCS3 (Mac) and also PSCS3 (Win)? etc

Thanks for any input.

Henry
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ChrisGolden

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Windows 64bit or Vista 64bit for CS3?
« Reply #17 on: June 29, 2008, 04:10:55 pm »

Quote
Could you just enlighten further since I have stopped using Macs after OS 10.0 - do you need two separate sets of software since you run both Vista and OS X?  By this I mean will I need PSCS3 (Mac) and also PSCS3 (Win)? etc
I think you would need two separate licenses for CS3, unfortunately.  But I'm honestly not sure, as this isn't something I've explored.  I don't really use OS X; I'm keeping it around on the machine just in case I decide to go that route at some point.

For the foreseeable future, though, I'm using Photoshop (and mostly everything else) in a Windows context.

Perhaps someone who runs CS3 in both Mac and Windows environments could enlighten us?...
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Paul2660

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Windows 64bit or Vista 64bit for CS3?
« Reply #18 on: June 29, 2008, 04:41:07 pm »

You would need pretty much 2x of everything.  In older days, alot of Windows actions and plugins would cross over to the Mac, but now, at least from what I own, everything is separate.  CS3, will require 2 separate licenses.  

When you run Windows on a Mac, you have 2 main options,
Boot Camp, or VM Ware Virtual PC.  
With Boot Camp, you will pick at boot the OS you want to come up in.  Once booted into that OS, you can't see any of the Mac app's or run anything but a windows app.  You are running in the Full Windows OS, no Mac running in the background.  There are some major disadvantages to this in that you can't really control the partioning of drives etc.  (At least I have never been able to).  

With Virtual PC, you boot into your Mac OS, then launch a window for the Windows OS to work in.  This allows you in theory to run both Mac and Windows apps at the same time on the same machine.  It's very dependent on how much machine you have running.  You still need to have a separate version of everything from the OS up with either solution.  It gets very expensive, very fast.  

You can also run a Linux Kernel and have all three OS's running.  

Paul C
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jerryrock

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Windows 64bit or Vista 64bit for CS3?
« Reply #19 on: June 30, 2008, 09:57:19 am »

Quote
There are some major disadvantages to this in that you can't really control the partioning of drives etc.  (At least I have never been able to).

I don't know what you mean with your statement about controlling the partition.
I run OSX 10.5.3 (64bit OS) on my MacBook Pro. I also run Vista64 bit Ultimate on the same MacBook Pro. Boot Camp 2.0 allows you to specify the size and location (for MacPro with multiple hard drives) of your partition. There really are no disadvantages.

With both operating systems installed, I am not limited to which programs I can run.

Adobe does require a separate license for each operating system. They will do a cross platform transfer for just the price of shipping new software.

Jerry
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