Best computer/screen setup for lightroom

[streetsandtheatres]

So I am rethinking my setup and wondering what you would do. I currently have an iMac, which needs to be replaced.
I work with my photo library all day. Mostly 50mp images, and nearly 1TB of files at the moment, and I want Lightroom to work its best.

Option 1:
Mac Mini M1, 16GB, 2TB = $AU 2599. Add a BenQ SW321C 32" 4K Monitor = $AU 5798

Option 2:
Mac Mini 3.2GHz i7, 64GB, 2TB = $AU 4399 Add a BenQ SW321C 32" 4K Monitor = $AU 8997

Option 3:
27" iMac, 3.6GHz i9, 64GB, 2TB, 16GB GDDR = $AU 7199
(Option 3b: same + 4TB hard drive = $AU 8099)

Option 4:
none of the above: what would be better?

Thanks!

 

[Ray2]

Is PS driving the ram in options 2 and 3? Lightroom certainly don’t need it.

 

[streetsandtheatres]

Is PS driving the ram in options 2 and 3? Lightroom certainly don’t need it.

To some extent. But also just thinking about general useability and some future proofing. (And I admit to sometimes using Final Cut Pro.) Edit - is there a better place to put the money than increasing the RAM?

 

[Fishrrman]

You're driving up prices by choosing "high dollar" options of Apple-installed RAM.
And do you really, really need a 2tb internal SSD?

What would the 27" iMac run, with 8gb of RAM (install more yourself later on), and a 1tb SSD (supplemented by external SSD storage)?

I would not buy the m1 Mini, which is limited to 16gb of RAM. This could give you problems that cannot be overcome, because the RAM is fixed in that one and can't be expanded.

The 2018 Mini (I have one) could be a good choice.
Installing RAM in these is a complex procedure, so it would have to be your decision on either buying it with 8gb and adding more yourself, or paying Apple's outrageous price for factory-installed RAM.
I would compromise, and get 32gb.
Do they have Apple refurbs where you are?

 

[jz0309]

I use an external SanDisk 2TB extreme to store my actual photos and the index/previews are on my internal 1TB SSD, works very smoothly for me. About 75k 700GB photos and Index is around 140GB… so I second what @Fishrrman is suggesting… and given that Photoshop is a RAM hog, I would not get a M1 with the 16GB limitation

 

[||\||]

64GB seems totally unnecessary.

 

[Apple fanboy]

So I am rethinking my setup and wondering what you would do. I currently have an iMac, which needs to be replaced.
I work with my photo library all day. Mostly 50mp images, and nearly 1TB of files at the moment, and I want Lightroom to work its best.

Option 1:
Mac Mini M1, 16GB, 2TB = $AU 2599. Add a BenQ SW321C 32" 4K Monitor = $AU 5798

Option 2:
Mac Mini 3.2GHz i7, 64GB, 2TB = $AU 4399 Add a BenQ SW321C 32" 4K Monitor = $AU 8997

Option 3:
27" iMac, 3.6GHz i9, 64GB, 2TB, 16GB GDDR = $AU 7199
(Option 3b: same + 4TB hard drive = $AU 8099)

Option 4:
none of the above: what would be better?

Thanks!

BenQ SW321 gets a big thumbs up from me. But personally I prefer a pair of 27”. I use BenQ SW271C. But my Mac mini (specs in signature) handles LR and PS just fine.

 

[streetsandtheatres]

You're driving up prices by choosing "high dollar" options of Apple-installed RAM.
And do you really, really need a 2tb internal SSD?

What would the 27" iMac run, with 8gb of RAM (install more yourself later on), and a 1tb SSD (supplemented by external SSD storage)?

I would not buy the m1 Mini, which is limited to 16gb of RAM. This could give you problems that cannot be overcome, because the RAM is fixed in that one and can't be expanded.

The 2018 Mini (I have one) could be a good choice.
Installing RAM in these is a complex procedure, so it would have to be your decision on either buying it with 8gb and adding more yourself, or paying Apple's outrageous price for factory-installed RAM.
I would compromise, and get 32gb.
Do they have Apple refurbs where you are?

My work only buys Apple ram, and no refurbs.

I think I need 2tb of internal SSD. I bought an iMac with 1tb of internal ssd in 2015; surely 6 years later having more internal is a good idea? I thought external SSD was slower?

Good point about the m1 Mini.

 

[streetsandtheatres]

BenQ SW321 gets a big thumbs up from me. But personally I prefer a pair of 27”. I use BenQ SW271C. But my Mac mini (specs in signature) handles LR and PS just fine.

Do you prefer the SW321 to the iMac 27"? I have had a retina since they first came out (with an old 27" thunderbolt display for emails...) and they have been ok. One of them has some weird colour shift around the edges.

 

[Apple fanboy]

Do you prefer the SW321 to the iMac 27"? I have had a retina since they first came out (with an old 27" thunderbolt display for emails...) and they have been ok. One of them has some weird colour shift around the edges.

I'm not a fan of Apple Screens. The glossy finish and high brightness and saturation don't really cut it for me. I have the SW271, not the SW321 but just because I prefer a pair of screens than one large one. Full size image on one screen, other screen with the LR sliders etc.

 

[AxisOfBeagles]

FWIW ... I'm on a 27" iMac, 32GB RAM and a 1 GB Nvidia GPU. Love it. But it's old and the OS is frozen at Catalina. I'm choosing to wait on the next generation of Apple chipsets. Looking for either a more expandable Mini (RAM and ports) or an Apple chip version of the 27" iMac, again with expandable RAM and plenty of i/o ports. Personally, I opt for more RAM mostly for video processing (DaVinci Resolve). Certainly doesn't hurt LR and various other photo processing tools performance either.

 

[streetsandtheatres]

FWIW ... I'm on a 27" iMac, 32GB RAM and a 1 GB Nvidia GPU. Love it. But it's old and the OS is frozen at Catalina. I'm choosing to wait on the next generation of Apple chipsets. Looking for either a more expandable Mini (RAM and ports) or an Apple chip version of the 27" iMac, again with expandable RAM and plenty of i/o ports. Personally, I opt for more RAM mostly for video processing (DaVinci Resolve). Certainly doesn't hurt LR and various other photo processing tools performance either.

I totally see the reason for waiting a bit. It does look like we're at the start of a whole new level of computing power. And as you say a few more ports would be great for the Mini.

 

[kenoh]

I use an external SanDisk 2TB extreme to store my actual photos and the index/previews are on my internal 1TB SSD, works very smoothly for me. About 75k 700GB photos and Index is around 140GB… so I second what @Fishrrman is suggesting… and given that Photoshop is a RAM hog, I would not get a M1 with the 16GB limitation

Have you considered a smaller internal SSD say 512GB then buy a NVMe SSD and put it in a Thunderbolt 3 (not USB) enclosure to get the throughput? massively cheaper and future proof.

For info I shunt round large images easily on the M1 mini though I don't do anything bigger than 42mp anymore (just a hobbyist, don't need 50mp).

maybe consider a screen that is not glossy. It makes a good difference when editing.

Caveat: I am a techie nerd not a pro creator so feel free to ignore me.

 

[jz0309]

Have you considered a smaller internal SSD say 512GB then buy a NVMe SSD and put it in a Thunderbolt 3 (not USB) enclosure to get the throughput? massively cheaper and future proof.

For info I shunt round large images easily on the M1 mini though I don't do anything bigger than 42mp anymore (just a hobbyist, don't need 50mp).

maybe consider a screen that is not glossy. It makes a good difference when editing.

Caveat: I am a techie nerd not a pro creator so feel free to ignore me.

Yea, thanks, been thinking that route but I’m hoping to have around 2 years before the iMac needs replacing.
I am contemplating a Mini, it’ll be easier and definitely cheaper to replace more frequently. I tend(ed) to keep my HW for as long as possible, eg 6-8 years.
as for RAM, yea I’d get away for now with my MBA, but I’m looking out for some new PS features that were talked about a year or so ago, namely neural filter for photo restoration. I have thousands of old scanned photos that are 100MB+ TIF that I want to restore…

For now I am sitting back and watch…

 

[kenoh]

Yea, thanks, been thinking that route but I’m hoping to have around 2 years before the iMac needs replacing.
I am contemplating a Mini, it’ll be easier and definitely cheaper to replace more frequently. I tend(ed) to keep my HW for as long as possible, eg 6-8 years.
as for RAM, yea I’d get away for now with my MBA, but I’m looking out for some new PS features that were talked about a year or so ago, namely neural filter for photo restoration. I have thousands of old scanned photos that are 100MB+ TIF that I want to restore…

For now I am sitting back and watch…

So if it helps, I process 2.5GB tif files on my mini just fine - using the apple silicon version of PS. There are feature limitations to this and having to run in Rosetta for plug ins and panels sees a definite performance reduction though not showstopper for me YMMV. It is the 8,8,16,512 config. Here in the UK the 2TB drive is a £600 addition. I access all of my images across a 1Gbps network attached NAS and I have no issues.

and I am a firm believer in the sit back buy only when necessary approach to compute so totally agree on the approach.

 

[jz0309]

So if it helps, I process 2.5GB tif files on my mini just fine - using the apple silicon version of PS. There are feature limitations to this and having to run in Rosetta for plug ins and panels sees a definite performance reduction though not showstopper for me YMMV. It is the 8,8,16,512 config. Here in the UK the 2TB drive is a £600 addition. I access all of my images across a 1Gbps network attached NAS and I have no issues.

and I am a firm believer in the sit back buy only when necessary approach to compute so totally agree on the approach.

Good to hear that your M1 meets your needs. the 2 TB is $600 here, so for that price I can definitely get a TB3 enclosure and NVMe SSD ... at the same time there are quite a few exciting developments going on in computing, not only Apple so for now I feel comfortable that I can wait and monitor for a year or 2, but the itch will come .

Is your LR index/previews also on your NAS? I've been thinking just for fun to move my index from the internal onto the external and see how it performs (internal r/w is ~ 2000MBps vs ~ 900 for the external), but it would make it totally portable and I could easily take it with me and use it on the MBA ...

 

[kenoh]

Good to hear that your M1 meets your needs. the 2 TB is $600 here, so for that price I can definitely get a TB3 enclosure and NVMe SSD ... at the same time there are quite a few exciting developments going on in computing, not only Apple so for now I feel comfortable that I can wait and monitor for a year or 2, but the itch will come .

Is your LR index/previews also on your NAS? I've been thinking just for fun to move my index from the internal onto the external and see how it performs (internal r/w is ~ 2000MBps vs ~ 900 for the external), but it would make it totally portable and I could easily take it with me and use it on the MBA ...

The M1 is fine, I am thinking you might be a heavier user than me but the M1 was offered as a don’t discount it too soon option.


My catalogue is on my internal right now. It is only 500MB that references a picture archive split over two NAS devices Images are about 2TB in total (about 57,000 last time I paid attention) as I am tight fisted with storage and so minimise the preview creation etc then my catalogue is quite small.

The TB3 external delivers about 1800MBps

 

[jz0309]

The M1 is fine, I am thinking you might be a heavier user than me but the M1 was offered as a don’t discount it too soon option.


My catalogue is on my internal right now. It is only 500MB that references a picture archive split over two NAS devices Images are about 2TB in total (about 57,000 last time I paid attention) as I am tight fisted with storage and so minimise the preview creation etc then my catalogue is quite small.

The TB3 external delivers about 1800MBps

so, my catalog is ~ 575MB for just over 75k images, but my previews are ~145GB on the internal SSD.
I started using LR ~ 2.5 yrs ago when my Aperture db crashed and I could not recover, never really looked into the various preview options, it is "embedded & sidecar" and I build smart previews. I am using ~440GB on my internal 1 TB so it hadn't crossed my mind to be cautious about the previews ... what I like about the way I'm using it that I can browse through all 75k photos in no time

 

[kenoh]

so, my catalog is ~ 575MB for just over 75k images, but my previews are ~145GB on the internal SSD.
I started using LR ~ 2.5 yrs ago when my Aperture db crashed and I could not recover, never really looked into the various preview options, it is "embedded & sidecar" and I build smart previews. I am using ~440GB on my internal 1 TB so it hadn't crossed my mind to be cautious about the previews ... what I like about the way I'm using it that I can browse through all 75k photos in no time

Yep, by using the smart previews and sidecars, you can flip through the images faster for sure and also do edits using the smart preview rather than letting Lightroom read the actual image and render it each time.

I think your use case warrants the use of the previews IMHO. Mine doesn’t really need it so I can cut it right back and wait a second or two while it loads. I don’t know, I find it more than pleasant an experience loading the files off a NAS on demand with no previews.

The other thing about using an external NVMe is that should disaster strike, you can recover your external drive and carry on relatively easily. If the internal goes, it is a trip to Apple now to get it fixed. As I work in IT, it is no surprise I prefer to do my own hardware maintenance and repairs. You may of course feel differently.

 

[wondercrew]

I chose the 1 option and am satisfied with the productivity