jimjjc Loc: Wisconsin

I will be buying a new desk top very soon. I have never done any post processing before(minimal at best). I intend to buy a Dell with latest processor, etc. I will be getting LR/ Elements and probably more. What do you have and/ or recommend as minimal RAM? I know, as much as you can afford...doesn't cut it as an answer. At what point is it overkill vs. required.

Bobspez Loc: Southern NJ, USA

16 GB works fine for me for editing pics and videos. I'm using windows 10 64 bit.

mas24 Loc: Southern CA

1 TB Hard Drive and 12gb of RAM. Dell is a very good choice.

dirtpusher Loc: tulsa oklahoma

All you can afford. Computer will only display to certain amount. BUT it will be using all of it.

programs start a little faster, games load faster. and windows starts faster but that movie will still take forever to convert. and your games still look the same.

Only buffering will be do to your IP speed.

ebbote Loc: Hockley, Texas

16 gigabytes is plenty.

orrie smith Loc: Kansas

16 gb ram is sufficient for photo processing. When you buy your new dell, consider a gaming computer, they seem to be faster and better for post processing. You can go to the Dell website and build to your specs. When getting your Lightroom, consider Adobe CC for about $10.00 per month. You will be getting both Lightroom and Photoshop and will be able to upgrade whenever an upgrade is available for no extra charge, as if you buy the stand alone programs and there is an upgrade, you usually need to buy a new program.

Erik_H Loc: Denham Springs, Louisiana

I would respectfully differ, I have a desktop and a laptop, both have i7 processors and solid state drives. The main difference is that the desktop has 32 gb ram and the laptop has 16. The desktop blows the laptop away. Granted, the desktop has a discreet video card and the laptop is integrated with the motherboard, but I'm talking about program load times and overall performance, not just graphics rendering.

dirtpusher Loc: tulsa oklahoma

Once you tasted fast. Be hard to go back. I have 2 32s an a gamer video card.

ebbote Loc: Hockley, Texas

You can differ all you want, but even with 32 gigs of ram the laptop will still be slower than you laptop, even if the laptop had a discrete video card the desktop would still be faster. All things being equal, a desktop will always beat a laptop.

a6k Loc: Detroit & Sanibel

Windows will show you its RAM use (as do Mac and Linux). Load it up and see what it's doing. On a new one, you can't ever have too much RAM and RAM at purchase time is not very y expensive. Adding RAM later can sometimes require replacing installed chips so as to have a compatible set. That can be more costly in the long run. In my experience with a Mac, 16 is plenty but I would not hesitate to install 32 if it was an easy option on a new one (given the intended use). That said, I built a Win10 computer for my wife quite recently and 16 was all I installed because she is not doing heavy duty work on it.

For editing photos and movies you want a lot of processing power, too; get all you can afford.

Just to be clear, though, so long as you don't force the computer to use "paging", more RAM won't make it faster. But not having enough to avoid paging will make it a LOT slower. And using SSD's will make it faster if part of its workload is I/O. That means that loading and/or writing large files takes longer from a spinning hard drive. You want not only SSD's but the fastest internal method for connecting them to the bus (PCIe the last time I looked, but it changes as progress is made). A good SSD on a PCIe connection can be, easily, 5X as fast as SATA 6 with a HDD. This is perceptible to the user.

None of this is especially difficult to find out or understand but it can be overwhelming if you are not familiar with terms and concepts. Be confident and spend some time on self-learning, perhaps with a guru if you have one.

Erik_H Loc: Denham Springs, Louisiana

I expect that you're right, but given the choice between 16 and 32 gb, I'd go for the 32. Having said that, I've read that with LR/PS, after you get above 32gb ram, the performance increase is not really noticeable. I don't know how true that is though.

ebbote Loc: Hockley, Texas

I totally agree with you Erik, I have 16 gigs on mine, if I thought I needed more I would go with 32, but I haven't had the need. I think above 16 gigs you will not see a very noticeable difference. I think 16 gigs is the sweet spot.

Peterff Loc: O'er The Hills and Far Away, in Themyscira.

If I were you, - I'm clearly not - I would get one with at least a 512GB SSD and 16GB of RAM with expansion slots to add more, together with a decent - but not insane - video card. Plus a Terabyte or few of HDD to manage backups. A decent monitor or two helps, as does a decent office chair!

At this point in the market I fully recommend Dell. For myself I would probably buy the bits and build it, but I have some experience in doing that. I've had a certain amount of contact with Dell over the years, including with Michael himself. I have more confidence in Dell as a company and their people than most other tech companies I have interacted with. Been in the biz since the mid 1980s.

Good luck.

TriX Loc: Raleigh, NC

Yes to all the above, and a 64-bit OS.

OnDSnap Loc: NE New Jersey

All you can afford, although I do high end cad drawings and a lot of 3D Renderings and walk through's, with at times several views open at once and files large enough to choke a horse, and several other ram hungry programs running in the background... on my Desktop I have 128 and my laptop 64, both have mutilate SSD's (Raid) 64 bit. I started both with 32 and had to keep adding... For Adobe products, double the recommendations. 16 get 32, you won't be sorry.