Purchasing New Computer Help

[Avery]

Hello. I've been using Affinity Photo for a few years now, on my ancient computer that is over a decade old and currently has Windows7. Affinity Photo has been crashing constantly lately and I can't even use certain functions because I know it's going to take twenty minutes to load and there's an 95% chance of it crashing (tone mapping comes to mind). I'm pretty sure it's not just a bug I need to fix, but my whole computer. I am not very tech saavy, and was wondering if anyone could give me recommendations for what I need to look for in a new computer that is optimal for running Affinity programs. The more budget friendly the better. I mostly use Affinity Photo for making book covers and Affinity Publisher for book interiors.

Thanks for any help or suggestions.

Edited April 23, 2022 by Avery

[RichardMH]

I have 16Gb RAM, reasonable storage (500gb ssd + 1TB HDD built in and several external drives), a reasonable graphics card with  4GB RAM (I would have got a better card if I'd known how much hardware acceleration was going to be used) and an i7 processor. Serviceable rather than spectacular. Mine is a DELL XPS Desktop. Possibly could have done better at a local computer store but I find it confusing and it was easier to get one ready made. If you're not doing a lot of photos could probably get away with less storage. Lower end gaming PCs can be good.

[Komatös]

Hi, @Avery

As a quick recommendation, I would look for a PC with an AMD Ryzen 5600G, Ryzen 5700G or Intel i5 12400 processor and with at least 16 GB RAM, better 32 GB. These processors have an integrated graphics card. Also make sure that the new PC has an SSD with at least 512 GB (for system and programmes) and an HDD with at least 1 TB for data.

[iconoclast]

I think it will not be easy to find a really good solution for a low budget. The best choice might be to buy a tailored PC at a specialist store. That might be the budget friendliest solution too, I think.

I'm working on a Dell XPS 8930 with i7, 8GB RAM and a Nvidia GeForce GTX 1060 with 6 GB GRAM. 8 GB RAM is not really enough. I was planning to upgrade to at least 16 GB later as I bought it about four years ago, but I had so much trouble with this machine and had to invest so much money into it, that I didn't do it yet. My next computer will not be a Dell, as all my PCs were until today, because this company didn't come to be very positive during the last years. Especially the customer service, which once was so commendable, is pure chaos today.

Edit: An additional hint. I don't need a big hard disc because I only use it for stuff I'm actually working on. I store all other data on external hard discs. I got into this habit of doing because I lost all my data that I stored on my local hard disc two times during the last four years. External hard discs are not really expensive today and absolutely worth it at the end.

[v_kyr]

1 hour ago, iconoclast said:

My next computer will not be a Dell, as all my PCs were until today, because this company didn't come to be very positive during the last years. Especially the customer service, which once was so commendable, is pure chaos today.

Interesting. - I recall that they had quite good customer service in the past, even though specific hardware problems had sometimes to be escalated over several supporter stages.

 

For the OP ...

... it also highly depends if you are aiming after a common Desktop PC, some sort of Mini PC or or Notebook computer here then. In terms of future upgrade capabilities most compact systems (Minidesktops, Notebooks ...) are sadly often limited too in the Windows world nowadays, meaning many vendors there follow the Apple ways of soldering/gluing component parts together in a pretty by endusers unchangable way.

However, for an actual Windows 11 based tailored computer system, which should pay off for a few years, I would as a minimum look for ...

1. A moderate AMD >= Ryzen 5700G, or Intel >= i5 12400 CPU
2. That it has a TPM 2.0 Chip
3. >= 32 GB RAM
4. >= 1 TB SSD
5. A moderate GPU dependent on what is actual available yet on the market and price wise still affordable

[iconoclast]

59 minutes ago, v_kyr said:

Interesting. - I recall that they had quite good customer service in the past, even though specific hardware problems had sometimes to be escalated over several supporter stages...

As I bought my first computer, about twenty years ago, they had an amazing customer support. I was very enthusiastic about it. I didn't have bigger problems with my first two Dell computers, even I had Linux installed in Dual Boot and tested every software I could get. And if I had a problem, I always could solve it quickly with the help of the customer service. But not so with my XPS, which did cost nearly the double price of the one I had before. Three very bad issues in three years, and I immediately capitulated to also install Linux on it. Fortunately I had a Linux Laptop in the meantime. The customer service wasn't really helpful. For example as I booked a support setting for 60 € two and a half years ago (blue screen), it took weeks to get an appointment - that finally never happened. In the end they transfered the money back to me and referred to some videos on their chaotic, overloaded website, that weren't made for my PC, but for a Laptop. I had to reinstall windows and all drivers and to muddle around in the BIOS of my PC without really knowing what I was doing - because my BIOS looks totally different than in the videos and also most of the functions have different names. One of the service people finally gave me a list of drivers I had to download from their site and reinstall, but one of the drivers wasn't on that site. After a telephone call it suddenly was there. All in all it took me about three month and a lot of telephone calls and investigations on the web to get the PC working again. And last year I had a somehow similar issue, but this time the screen was suddenly black. It took two and a half month this time. I had to send my PC to the Dell workshop and they installed a new main board for about 300 €. After about a month I got the PC back and had to reinstall everything again. It works now, but it is not as fast as it should be. I reckon that it will stop working again during the next year. And I will not send it again to the Dell workshop. I think, I will buy a new one, but it will not be a Dell.

[v_kyr]

2 minutes ago, iconoclast said:

But not so with my XPS, which did cost nearly the double price of the one I had before ...

No on-site service from Dell for the XPS computer?  (Kein Vor-Ort Service von Dell für den XPS-Rechner?)

I once upon a time had a XPS 1330 Notebook from them, had two times issues with that. First when I got it, a build ordered included fingerprint-reader was missing, they managed in 6 hours over night, that I've got a new palm rest (this time with with the finger print sensor embedded) send a priority from Ireland to me the next morning. - Another time the GPU on the XPS MoBo died, due to their bad drivers BIOS settings for the XPS cooler control. They managed to send me for the next day a service technican, who came along at an pre-agreed time and who then exchanged the XPS MoBo under my critical eyes supervision.

So all in all their customer on-site service, as I recall it, was quite good. - Though some of their hardware components and especially their BIOS & drivers software for the installed/assembled hardware, was weak programmed and somehow not particularly well tuned and tested.

[iconoclast]

5 minutes ago, v_kyr said:

No on-site service from Dell for the XPS computer?  (Kein Vor-Ort Service von Dell für den XPS-Rechner?)

I once upon a time had a XPS 1330 Notebook from them, had two times issues with that. First when I got it, a build ordered included fingerprint-reader was missing, they managed in 6 hours over night, that I've got a new palm rest (this time with with the finger print sensor embedded) send a priority from Ireland to me the next morning. - Another time the GPU on the XPS MoBo died, due to their bad drivers BIOS settings for the XPS cooler control. They managed to send me for the next day a service technican, who came along at an pre-agreed time and who then exchanged the XPS MoBo under my critical eyes supervision.

So all in all their customer on-site service, as I recall it, was quite good. - Though some of their hardware components and especially their BIOS & drivers software for the installed/assembled hardware, was weak programmed and somehow not particularly well tuned and tested.

The problem might have been that I didn't buy this long term support for about 15o € per year or so. But I think it should be possible to get help in a concrete case without paying for an expensive insurance you will possibly never need. If not, it's bad service, I think. As I said, I never had bigger problems with my first two Dell computers that worked for almost 8-10 years each. The second one is still alive, but needs a new hard disc and is of course not up to date. And the XPS was expensive enough, even without this additional service contract. I'm not sure anyway if it would help after the end of the warranty (3 years). And no, they didn't offer me on-site service. They only said, that I could also take the PC to a local workshop. But that was already clear to me. I did that as I had the last issue, last year. They didn't find anything, only reinstalled Windows (could have done it myself), took 60 € for it and told me that something must be wrong with the hardware anyway, because it is too slow. After that I sent it to Dell. At the moment it works, but it is not what I payed for.

I already was irritated that the Dell employee rejected me as I asked for a RAM-upgrade as I bought the computer, referring to the warranty. As I bought my first computers there they explicitly offered RAM-upgrades.

Strange! But if you search for customer ratings on the net you will find many experience reportings like this.

 

[v_kyr]

2 hours ago, iconoclast said:

The problem might have been that I didn't buy this long term support for about 15o € per year or so. But I think it should be possible to get help in a concrete case without paying for an expensive insurance you will possibly never need. If not, it's bad service, I think.

As far as I remember, on-site service was negotiable when purchasing or placing an order with a Dell representative. I had got 2 years, which then was increased by Dell for another one or two years since the hardware didn't arrived as initially ordered. In my experiences having next day on-site service or not, makes a huge difference here in how one will be treated/handled by customer service. And that not only at Dell, the same applies for other computer vendors too. - However, it might be that they nowadays are generally and overall gotten worser in this customer service segment in contrast to how they've been operating in the past.

[Avery]

Thanks to everyone for the helpful the replies! This gives me a much better idea of what to look for, since I wasn't really sure where to even begin.