PC recommendation

[*Michelle*]

After being a PC user for 20+ years, we invested in a 27" i7 iMac five months ago.  Stupid decision, its been nothing but problems and I have very little faith in the stupid thing so its been advertised for sale and once it goes we'll replace it with a PC.

So...we are looking to custom build the best PC (and monitor) I can get in Australia for $4000ish.   Hubby builds computers so he will put it together.

[Brian]

Well, that's a decent budget for a change. My recommendations are based on you using PS CC 2018 and not editing video, only stills.
 

• Intel i7 CPU 8700K 6-Core CPU at a Minimum: Photoshop has been making improvements to take advantage of the architecture that makes a Intel i7 or i9 so fast. The new AMD Ryzen chips seem interesting and they are getting a lot of buzz...but Intel chips are proven for Photoshop. If budget allows, you could go up to a Intel i7 9700 8-Core CPU instead. 

• Motherboard: I like Asus, MSI and Gigabyte Motherboards. Get one that supports your CPU and has at least one m.2 SSD slot.

• 16GB RAM at a Minimum. 32GB or more preferred. I have 40GB of RAM in my iMac computer, and am thinking about maxing it out to 64GB next year.

• A Samsung 1TB m.2 NVMe Drive or WD 1TB Black m.2 NVMe Drive for your Operating System and Programs, or you could go with a traditional SSD Drive. Just make sure it's a least 1TB, for whichever drive you choose as your (main) boot HD.

• A second larger traditional HD, at least 4TB. I like Western Digital Caviar Black 7200 RPM Drives. You could go larger if you choose to, this is where your data files / photos would reside on.

• Video Card: Get one that has it's own dedicated video memory. You don't have to go nuts and purchase an expensive card, though I'd shoot for at least 4GB Video Memory these days, 8GB if you can swing it. Any card made after 2015 should suffice. Here is Adobe's tested video cards list. Personally, I'd look at a GeForce 1060 card with 6GB of Video Memory.

• Power Supply: I'd get at least a 650 Watt Power Supply these days. 800+ Watts if you plan on overclocking and doing other stuff.

• Case: This is a personal preference. One that makes mounting things easy, provides cable organization and has room to grow. In the past, I would recommend a Lian-Li Aluminum case, but there are tons of different brands now. Actually, this is one area that you might want to invest a little more in as you can replace / upgrade things in the future, while still keeping the same case. Now you don't have to spend big-bucks on this, just don't skip out and get a el-cheapo $50 case either.

• Windows 10 Pro 64-bit. You could get Windows 10 Home, but since you are building one, might as well get the full OS.

• Display: At least a 24" or a nice 27" IPS-based Display. Matte Coating or Matte Screen. Dell makes decent ones and there are others out there. Just make sure it has a IPS Screen.