[catia]

Hi,

Is anyone running Photoshop CS on a Pentium II machine? I see the minimum requirements are listed as a Pentium III. I only have a 450Mhz Pentium II. I have been running PS7 without a problem; but, I am concerned about CS.

I know, buy a new computer.

Thanks,
Catia

[Duv]

I would go ahead and get it. Photoshop 7 also calls for Pentium 111 or higher. Also, There's not that much new with PS8 although what's there is pretty slick.

Cheers
Duv

[T Paul]

I just upgraded to PhotoShop CS and I have a 400 MHz Pentium II. I've noticed that PhotoShop takes a lot longer to load up and is very slow once you start working in it. It's still workable, but I do think I will try and upgrade to a Pentium III as soon as I can. If you upgrade to CS and stay with your Pentium II, I recommend saving ALOT... just in case your computer does crash.

[Doug Nelson]

Given a choice between the two, I'd skip PScs and upgrade your motherboard.

[catia]

I hear you Doug.

Of course once I decide to go with a new motherboard, it would have to be a P4 with an 800Mhz frontside bus and HT. I would have to have 1GB of dual channel 400Mhz memory. Oh, a new power supply of course. Oh, and a new video board to get the most out of the setup. Hmmm, new $3K computer by the time that I am done. Yes, I must do the pricing on that new motherboard about once a month.

Catia

[Doug Nelson]

Think of it like software. The Asus top of the line mobo will set you back about $180, but it will take just about any P4 chip currently made. Almost the same story for memory. And even if you stock it with the lowest end components you can find it will outperforum your current setup by an enormous margin. Then, as you can afford/justify it, you upgrade it piece by piece.

The Asus board with a 2.4ghz CPU and 512mb DDR RAM will cost about $400. That's about $250 more than the Photoshop upgrade, but the Photoshop upgrade won't improve the performance of every other app you own. You could shave $100 off by losing .4ghz and running on 256mb RAM for awhile.

Frustrating? Perhaps, but not nearly as frustrated as you'll be trying to run PScs on a PIII. I have a lowend P4 (1.4ghz) and I get frustrated sometimes, especially when working with large brush sizes (which you must do on high-rez images).

Another thought: will XP run on a PII? Because PScs will not run on Win98.

[catia]

Doug,

I don't know about XP. I am running Win 2K Pro. I know what you are saying about upgrading my hardware is true. I am just trying to get that last gasp I guess. I have had this P2 system since 1998 (Wow! 6 years). Of course I have added a few things along the way.

Maybe for my birthday......

[Doug Nelson]

I have a lot of relatives that I only hear from when they need free computer advice. The single hardest thing to convince them of is that a "lifetime" for computers and software is 3 years.

I tell them "marketers try hard to convince people that computers and software are designed for communication or to make their lives easier, when in fact the point of computers and software is to get you to buy more computers and software".

[T Paul]

XP will run on a Pentium II, because that's what I got. Never tried to upgrade a motherboard before...think I am running the first ever created ASUS motherboard and it is stretched to it's limited running all the software and hardware I have on it. Definitely time for a change.