New computer Spec is this ok?

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Decided to look into a purpose built computer in the hope of saving some £££££'s. Uses will be the usual emails, web use, photo editing and storage.
Is this a suitable spec? Do you think I need to change anything?

Intel® Core™ i5 Six Core Processor i5-9400 (2.9GHz) 9MB Cache
Motherboard
ASUS® PRIME Z390-P: ATX, LGA1151, USB 3.1, SATA 6GBs - RGB Ready!
Memory (RAM)
32GB Corsair VENGEANCE DDR4 2666MHz (2 x 16GB)
Graphics Card
4GB NVIDIA GEFORCE GTX 1650 - HDMI
1st Storage Drive
2TB SEAGATE BARRACUDA SATA-III 3.5" HDD, 6GB/s, 7200RPM, 256MB CACHE
1st M.2 SSD Drive
1TB INTEL® 660p M.2 NVMe PCIe SSD (up to 1800MB/sR | 1800MB/sW)

Thanks in advance. Hopefully the money I will save will give me the better monitor :D
 
It looks like an okay spec for that usage, In terms of photo storage where will your photos be stored / edited from? if they're due to be stored on the 2TB HDD look into an SSD as they're faster.

Do you have a specific budget in mind?
 
Not been into PC building for a while so i might be wrong but ::::

You could go 10th Gen intel instead of 9th Gen i think.

Change the motherboard to this :

ASRock Intel H470 PHANTOM GAMING 4 ATX Motherboardoard

With the saving from changing to this motherboard, spend it on this CPU instead.

Intel Core i5 10400F, S 1200, Comet Lake, 6 Cores, 12 Threads, 2.9GHz, 4.3GHz Turbo, 12MB Cache, 65W, Retail

The F at the end of the CPU means it doesnt have an intergrated GPU but you dont need it because you have a dedicated GPU anyways in the GTX 1650

The benefit may not be felt at first but i am a firm believer in getting the newest CPU / Motherboard combo possible because PC gear ages fast.
 
Joshpowell said:
It looks like an okay spec for that usage, In terms of photo storage where will your photos be stored / edited from? if they're due to be stored on the 2TB HDD look into an SSD as they're faster.

Do you have a specific budget in mind?
Click to expand...
He has a 1TB SSD for the OS, conventional hard drive for storage is fine if not better.
It will soon fill up though, once a year or so transfer most of it to external drive(s)
The graphics card looks good, increasingly this is a major factor as program use it more and more - video editing especially.
 
That i5 actually looks like really good value for an Intel chip - I was going to suggest a Ryzen system but you'd probably be looking at a 3600 to get better multi thread performance than the i5 & it's more expensive (but it does have 12 threads rather than 6).

What I would say is that depending on what you want to install on the system drive, 1TB might be overkill & you could save a lot of cash by reducing the size. As an example I run a ~250GB NVME for my system drive and I have:
- Windows 10
- Ableton Live 10 & LOTS of audio plugins
- Lightroom, Photoshop
- Davinci Resolve

and I still have capacity. Something to think about.
 
4wd said:
He has a 1TB SSD for the OS, conventional hard drive for storage is fine if not better.
It will soon fill up though, once a year or so transfer most of it to external drive(s)
The graphics card looks good, increasingly this is a major factor as program use it more and more - video editing especially.
Click to expand...

I'm intrigued, why do you find a HDD better than a SSD for a secondary drive?
SSD's are faster, non mechanical, more durable and more energy efficient.
 
Joshpowell said:
I'm intrigued, why do you find a HDD better than a SSD for a secondary drive?
SSD's are faster, non mechanical, more durable and more energy efficient.
Click to expand...
a) Cost
b) Potential fail rate still not well known.
c) For storage you don't need blazing fast access.
 
I'm using a HDD for images/storage and I doubt I'd see any difference if I switched to an SSD or nvme for that matter as it's instantaneous as is when I open folders/images. My main drive is an nvme, for the OS, LR/PS and the main few games I play - I know there's a big difference there as I also have some games on the HDD and they do take a little longer to load. But for static images, or say music files - HDD is just as good

I still have a spare port that I plan to add an SSD to, but it'll be for software not images, think just for storage an SSD/nvme is a bit of a waste
 
Last edited:
Joshpowell said:
It looks like an okay spec for that usage, In terms of photo storage where will your photos be stored / edited from? if they're due to be stored on the 2TB HDD look into an SSD as they're faster.

Do you have a specific budget in mind?
Click to expand...
Ive already specced a SSD into the build.

Looking to spend around £1k I've the ability to go over a little.
 
fujilover said:
Not been into PC building for a while so i might be wrong but ::::

You could go 10th Gen intel instead of 9th Gen i think.

Change the motherboard to this :

ASRock Intel H470 PHANTOM GAMING 4 ATX Motherboardoard

With the saving from changing to this motherboard, spend it on this CPU instead.

Intel Core i5 10400F, S 1200, Comet Lake, 6 Cores, 12 Threads, 2.9GHz, 4.3GHz Turbo, 12MB Cache, 65W, Retail

The F at the end of the CPU means it doesnt have an intergrated GPU but you dont need it because you have a dedicated GPU anyways in the GTX 1650

The benefit may not be felt at first but i am a firm believer in getting the newest CPU / Motherboard combo possible because PC gear ages fast.
Click to expand...
Thankyou I did um and ahh about having newest processor and suitable motherboard. re looking at these.
 
LongLensPhotography said:
You might want to see if you can push to i7 CPU and 8GB video RAM (4GB is minimum spec today for a few apps). This would be more mainstream package.
Click to expand...
just looking at Intel 7 processors and 10th generation this morning. will definitely be keeping large RAM memory
 
Andy Into The Wild said:
That i5 actually looks like really good value for an Intel chip - I was going to suggest a Ryzen system but you'd probably be looking at a 3600 to get better multi thread performance than the i5 & it's more expensive (but it does have 12 threads rather than 6).

What I would say is that depending on what you want to install on the system drive, 1TB might be overkill & you could save a lot of cash by reducing the size. As an example I run a ~250GB NVME for my system drive and I have:
- Windows 10
- Ableton Live 10 & LOTS of audio plugins
- Lightroom, Photoshop
- Davinci Resolve

and I still have capacity. Something to think about.
Click to expand...
Ive priced the Ryzen up this morning. Not really anymore expensive than the I5 give or take a few £££'s. Will read a little more first.
 
HeartandSoul said:
just looking at Intel 7 processors and 10th generation this morning. will definitely be keeping large RAM memory
Click to expand...

i would not bother with i7. Too much extra money for the very limited times that you might actually need the extra cores and threads.
 
Thanks for all the responses to date

I will be sticking with the OS being ssd and likely to keep it at 1TB may decide 512GB is enough. The jury is out on this one at the moment.
HDD will be used for storage and a portable HD for back up. second HD will be used for transferring storage annually. Just need to decide on processor and motherboard. Just reviewing a few options before I decide. Im likely to upgrade processor though as I was completely sold on the one in the spec.
 
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