How much computer power for scanning?

[Julio Fernandez]

You ask about power for the scanner but the real issue is what you must do downstream with the scan. Need big memory? Yes, of course, the bigger the better. My computer has 1.5 GB, several drives so the scratch disks are in separate drives. I watched the task manager in Windows XP while Photoshop was processing a 400 MB file. Memory use was a breeze, lots left. CPU usage was something else, it was at 100% usage most of the time the file was being processed. Previously I had thought increasing memory to 2GB to speed up the very slow processing. Lesson? Wrong! What I need is a faster CPU. My 1.8 GHZ CPU does not cut it anymore. Also, my memory is old 133 MHZ SDRAM, not high speed DDR. Thus I have enough but slow memory and a slow CPU so there is a bottleneck at the memory, even though there are lots of it, and another at the CPU.

There is a great deal of freedom and savings in putting together a superb top end PC and benefit in the tremendous range of excellent software available at competitive prices.

[Alan Davenport]

Just to add in another tale to this thread: I use a 1.8GHz CPU, 768MB of RAM, 80GB hard drive. Scanner is an Epson 2450, so my 24 bit scans run around 300MB. My system is adequate for editing, but just barely. It desperately needs a second drive for the scratch files, and double the memory would be nice. I drink a lot of coffee when my files start getting up to around 1.5GB and I ask PS to do something complex...

[Frank Petronio]

FWIW, I used to operate a pre-press, scanning, and digital imaging business in the 1990s. I had several maxed-out Macs, Scitex scanner, Iris printer, multiple Pressview monitors, etc. Now I do all my work with a 1ghz G4 Apple Powerbook with a gig of RAM and a 60gb hard drive. The 15 inch LCD is just fine, and although I often refer to the numerical values and proofs for final color, I'm happy judging color relationships on screen. I use an Epson 3200 and a cheap Epson C84 printer. I mostly scan 4x5s at ~ 300mb and downsize from there. Once in a while I will use my friend's Imacon but only for film that has an extreme contrast range. And sometimes I get larger prints from a Epson 2200 or 9600 as needed. All in all, I don't have alot of money tied up in hardware and it works really well. But maybe I am more patient because I was doing digital imaging using really primative equipment back in the early 1990s.

In addition to the advice to buy RAM, buy yourself the time to read the manual and learn how to use the software well! Ignorance is by far the biggest bottleneck. Oh, and get a Wacom tablet - a big productivity booster once you get used to it (it takes a few days - be patient.) Good luck.

[Ben Calwell]

Fellers,

Thank you for the kind and overwhelming advice. My eyes glazed over at some of the computer terms -- I'm afraid I'm not very sophisticated, yet, on digital imaging. As a non-pro LFer, all I want is a machine that would let me print out, say, a decent 5x7 or 8x10 b/w image from a 4x5 neg. Decent enough to hang on my walls for my own amusement. And also, would Photoshop Elements be Ok for my amateur needs? Thanks again for your guidance.

[Frank Petronio]

Yes, Elements is a bargain and will suffice for modest use. Also check out the possibility of a student or teacher in your family purchasing Photoshop (and other computer items) with their education discount.

[Bob._3483]

Another way to approach this is that given you only want to go to 8x10 inches, what size file do you need to manipulate? Assuming you scan at 48 bits per pixel colour depth & want to print at 300 DPI (which is typical) to 8"x10" paper you will need a printer file of 8x10x300^2x4 = approx 28 MBytes. This means scanning a 5x4 inch neg at 600 DPI (just to check: 4x5x600^2x4 ~ 28MB...yes!).

The problem with this is that if you do a lot of manipulation, you will loose quality which is one reason why people usually scan at a higher resolution and then downsize the file to suit the printer (but note, given a 8x10 inch print, even with a 512MB PC you still have room to overscan by 2-3 times (4-9 times larger file). However, you do not NEED to do that if the manipulation is minimal (cloning for dust removal, contrast/brightness adjustments etc).

The Epson 3200 comes bundled with Photoshop Elements and good quality scanning software for negatives and chromes (at least it does here in the UK). One problem with Elements is that it only allows 8-bit B&W mode (16-bit would be better), but if you are printing to a low/medium end inkjet, whether you will see the difference is moot.

In short, in IMO (Humble not being a thing we Do here ;-)) if you are restricting yourself to 8x10 to 10x16" ish size prints, the system you suggest (with preferably a bit more RAM) will suit you fine.

Have fun.... Cheers,

[Larry Gebhardt]

If your requirments are only for 8x10 output 512MB will be adequate. Look at Picture Window Pro from dl-c.com - it wll do most things as well or better than PhotoShop. Also think about picking up a used Epson 2400 instead of the 3200 - put the money saved into a DVD writable drive.

[Ben Calwell]

Many, many thanks for everyone's input.

[Bruce Watson]

Ben,

Sorry for the "late" reply - I've been on the road. Basically, the answer to your question of "what's enough" depends on your file sizes.

I drum scan 4x5 negatives to fairly large sizes. My files typically are 500MB and up. If you are going to be handling large files a lot, here is what I recommend. Clearly, very clearly, YMMV!

1) Photoshop wants you to have about 5 times more RAM than your file size. My 2GB is not enough, but that's all Photoshop can recognize (stupid 32bit program!). With less "excess" memory, Photoshop sends more data to disk, and writes to disk are many orders of magnitude slower than writes to RAM.

2) It really helps to have two physical "spindles" for Photoshop. That's two physical disk drives. The second drive is for Photoshop's scratch disk - to keep Windows/MacOS from competing with Photoshop for disk I/O time.

3) Processor speed *does* matter. Photoshop is not necessarily limited by disk I/O speed. It depends on what you are doing. Get a fast processor.

4) If you can afford it, go with SCSI disks. Get 160UW SCSI or better. Use 10k rpm disks or faster. The higher throughput will really make a difference. Without it, you can spend quite a lot of time waiting for Photoshop to close a large file. I've seen Photoshop CS take over a minute to close a 500MB file on a system with ATA 133 disk drives.

5) Photoshop version matters. The faster Photoshop for large files seems to be v7.x. File opening/closing/updating (writing to scratch disk) seem to be about the same speed for v6.x and the new CS. Photoshop v7.x is considerably faster, at least for me.

In general, the smaller your files, the less the above matters. Really, any old PC seems to work just fine with files less than 128MB. As you increase above that, you really begin to see the effects of faster hardware. As I said, YMMV.