It's new PC time. And I hate that.

[jimh12345]

I'm getting into more complex processing with AP,  and it's obvious my PC doesn't have the juice.  With a bunch of layers going, I try some complex selections,  the fan starts whining and everything...slows.....down.....  Task Manager shows AP owning the system and still, the screen labors to update.   Sometimes AP just dies.   

My PC is a few years old and it was never high performance - intel i5-8400, 2.8 gHz,6 cores, 15gb RAM.   My video card has acceleration but I had to turn that off or AP crashed constantly. 

I could buy a new system - and I hate that process.  What specs will be "good enough"?  What makes the difference - more cores, faster clock speed, more RAM, a hot video card?  

I know I can get good input on this forum, but of course not everyone agrees and it's hard to get to a bottom line.

So - anyone want to stick their neck out and tell me what I need to buy?    Does Affinity maybe have official recommendations?

[Michail]

1 hour ago, jimh12345 said:

Does Affinity maybe have official recommendations?

[jimh12345]

34 minutes ago, Michail said:

Ha ha.   Sorry I asked.  

I want to know what it takes to actually enjoy using the program on a serious project. 

 

[Michail]

32 minutes ago, jimh12345 said:

I want to know what it takes to actually enjoy using the program on a serious project. 

For professional use of Affinity Photo 2, you should have hardware that optimally supports hardware acceleration. This means that you should have a GPU with OpenCL technology that communicates directly with the graphics hardware of your system. Also, I would not use less than 8 GB of RAM - rather more.

You can also use Affinity Photo 2's built-in benchmark function to numerically compare the performance of your CPU and GPU. This can help you find the best hardware for your needs.

[debraspicher]

You will like new PC time. You will dislike new GPU time, though.

The best CPU you can afford will be the safer bet. The more cores, the better. A GPU can be upgraded at anytime, but a CPU is very important for the apps. I have a 3080 12G and I can still bring the brush engine to its knees if I'm using very large pattern layers, etc. I'm also not entirely convinced yet that the GPU Acceleration in Affinity is well optimized/utilized.

However, your PC will benefit from a GPU with as much GPU/video memory as you can afford to put into it and imo, that's where most of the future proofing will be in terms of which GPU you choose. Affinity will drink it up as much as system memory. Overtime, I've only noticed 2D apps peg VRAM more, not less. GPUs are improving faster than CPUs in many cases, so this makes sense.

Edit: Also, if you don't under buy in terms of CPU power, that guarantees you won't have a bottleneck there later on if you need to upgrade your GPU (now or again) later on. It basically determines the overall lifespan on your rig. A lower powered GPU can be bought now and upgraded later when a budget can allow.

Do not go below 16GB, but 32GB is highly recommended for both future Windows updates and Affinity. Especially if you're doing any RAW editing, 32GB should be your minimum.

Avoid AMD or Intel GPUs. AMD is barely supported by Affinity (and even that's a stretch in some builds). Intel GPUs are fine for productivity, but they don't handle every task well and there's no guarantee how they will perform in the future. They're an enthusiast product, not something you'd use long-term (2-4+ yrs) in your main rig.

I usually build/rebuild my rig with an appropriate-sized PSU for future upgrades. Then bring over my older video card until I can save up for something within my desired price point for performance. Then update GPU at a different time. 3000 series NVIDIA are "cheaper", but right now everything GPU-related is very expensive thanks to miners, COVID and controlling prices through supply.

[RichardMH]

I went to 32gb ram and a 1tb ssd for my working drive. Runs well now. If you're buying new look at a gaming pc. I have a Dell xps 8940. Could probably do better but the price was good at the time I got it.

[jimh12345]

I feel like I got burned on the last GPU.  I bought an nVidia with pretty good specs for the time.   But image editing applications that used it were never reliable.  I always ended up having to disable hardware acceleration to avoid crashes.   

If I get a new GPU it had darn well better work reliably with AP.  Do they have a list of officially supported cards?

[RichardMH]

There was a thread last year on a similar topic

 

 

[debraspicher]

1 hour ago, jimh12345 said:

I feel like I got burned on the last GPU.  I bought an nVidia with pretty good specs for the time.   But image editing applications that used it were never reliable.  I always ended up having to disable hardware acceleration to avoid crashes.   

If I get a new GPU it had darn well better work reliably with AP.  Do they have a list of officially supported cards?

Check users posting new benchmarks. Only GPUs with acceleration enabled will bench. It will say which version of Affinity in the screenshot and list which GPU(s). You can always price/shop and ask people about it here and see if others have had any issue(s).

30 series Nvidia seem to work fine for desktop. If you are buying a laptop, those are very different than desktop despite similar naming conventions so that would be more difficult to verify. Especially where drivers vary.

Edit: Also many of us post our rig details in our signatures. If you are using the site on desktop, our post signatures will be visible.

[jimh12345]

debraspicher, thanks for the detailed replies.

I've bought, and built, numerous PCs for myself, starting in the 80s. Today I'm totally out of date and don't care - I just want to buy what I need for AP.  

So... does "gamer PC"  capture the type of system you're all talking about? 

[jimh12345]

11 hours ago, Red Sands said:

When I last had to buy new hardware for my rather demanding projects, it took a really long time to research all the different hardware and driver issues and combinations of everything for Windows. I don't want to spend time on either the problems or the big hardware puzzle, I'm a creative, not a basement geek. I got stuck in research over and over again.

Then Apple made the M1, and I've since switched completely to Apple M1 and M2 devices. It's completely brought the joy back into my work, they perform insanely well, and I haven't had to buy anything but utility licenses for macOS and iPadOS. The apps I was otherwise using (and now v2 of Affinity with Universal License) all had licenses and editions for both Windows and Mac. I haven't had so much as a single driver or hardware problem. 

I also bought a new Windows PC - quite good - but that was just to run a few things and older programs on Windows I wasn't prepared to retire. I'm down to turning it on once a week or less. And guess what. When I ran Photoshop or YouTube I got a black screen now and then. Root cause? Of coruse a driver issue for Windows from a major manufacturer. Not entirely fixed yet a year later. I don't care. I ran away.

Just to say, there is an alternative, and if you look at a Mac Mini M1 or M2, the price isn't that bad at all, but performance is conversely wonderful.

That obviously makes a lot of sense.  I've used, and written code for, Windows systems since 3.0 - and I used to tell friends that if they just wanted things to work, they should buy Apple.    

I could conceivably buy a Mac, but I think that although that would eliminate all the analysis paralysis regarding hardware, it would also force me to spend a lot of time learning my way around Apple software, and finding Apple equivalents for all the software I use.

[Horseflesh]

Your system should be fairly capable. I'm using the Affinity products on a much older system.

If you are having problems with the GPU and even app crashes, I would try reinstalling the OS and drivers and see if things improve. Try it on a spare hard drive so you don't blow up your current system. You don't even need to activate Windows... Just do a minimal setup and see if the Affinity suite works better. 

 

 

[jimh12345]

Interestingly, I re-enabled GPU acceleration in AP, and did a fair amount of editing yesterday without crashing.   Maybe the current V2 build doesn't have the problem that caused me to disable GPU some time ago.   

But it didn't seem to make performance difference, and AP soon became unusable - Clone tool, for example, lagging the mouse by several seconds.  Task Manager showed AP's CPU usage bobbing up and down from 40-100% with me sitting there doing nothing!   Clearly, AP is trapped in something, but I have no clue.   Disabling acceleration again didn't help.

These situations are frustrating - when an application just won't run properly, and there are no answers, because the root cause can't be identified.   I really hate to just throw money at this... 

[jimh12345]

It would actually be fun to get an Apple - just to keep my aging brain working.  And I could run Windows apps on it via some sort of virtualization...right?

[v_kyr]

3 hours ago, jimh12345 said:

And I could run Windows apps on it via some sort of virtualization...right?

Yes, see ...

• https://www.parallels.com/products/desktop/
• https://www.parallels.com/products/desktop/pro/
• ... etc.

[Alfred]

11 minutes ago, v_kyr said:

... etc.

http://www.vmware.com/products/fusion/

Another option is to use Boot Camp to install a copy of Windows in a separate partition.

[jimh12345]

41 minutes ago, Red Sands said:

If not now, when?

By the way, MacOS is kinder to ageing eyes.

I think you nailed it with that video.  Since the early days, Apple always courted the creatives.   Microsoft on the other hand quickly aligned with corporate business,  treated home users as a bit of a nuisance, and ignored creatives entirely.     Microsoft didn't sell software to users, they sold licenses to managers.  And they never confused their "users" with their "customers".  

And they never, ever got "design".  Their software was always as ugly as it was irritating.  

[Horseflesh]

Not to get into a Platform War, but I actually left MacOS for Windows as I found MacOS to become much harder to use over the years, while Windows improved in that regard. 

Each has its strengths and weaknesses, but overall I am much happier on Windows.

 

[jimh12345]

2 hours ago, Horseflesh said:

Not to get into a Platform War, but I actually left MacOS for Windows as I found MacOS to become much harder to use over the years, while Windows improved in that regard. 

Each has its strengths and weaknesses, but overall I am much happier on Windows.

 

Of course.  As I said, I've been on Microsoft systems since the 80s.   Today, Windows 11 works very well, boots quickly, and never crashes - it's not the same old Windows we came up with.   I did use a Mac for a while, on a project, years ago and found it pretty smooth - although the Linux file system was a head-twister, and some of the UI conventions seemed a bit contrived.  

[Cadarnfel]

as someone who uses Affinity apps on both macOS and Windows, what sort of system will provide the most enjoyable experience comes down to how much money you want to spend.

Macs are always going to be expensive, off-the-shelf Windows systems with any sort of performance will be less expensive, but usually the specs are throttled in some fashion (great CPU/memory, low-end GPU, for example).

Build to order is still your best bet, if you find a company where you can configure a system online, and they'll build it for you. 

My current Windows box was done this way, I simply couldn't be bothered building it myself, after too many years of doing so.

I'll echo the comments about RAM, more is always better. As far as GPU is concerned I have an nVidia RTX3070 which doesn't struggle very much (although my Affinity usage will probably differ from yours).

In my opinion, the best thing to do, is decide on how much you want to spend, and then look at what's available.

 

 

[firstdefence]

If you aren't obsessed with gaming get a second-hand Mac, it will be more than adequate, an intel 2017 - 2019 with maxed out RAM or 32GB at least and reasonable CPU, GPU will run better than 90% of windows systems and you get a delicious 27" retina screen to boot, oh and the life saving Time Machine. 

I paid £350 for a 27" 2015 with 32GB RAM a 1TB OWC SSD, 2GB AMD GPU and an i7 CPU, it was boxed with keyboard and magic mouse and was in mint condition. 

"Me a Mac fan, whatever gave you that idea Ke-mo-sah-bee?"