New Computers! Anyone have any preferred vendors?

[SolitaryT]

I need a solid design station (preferably PC... I know, I know... but yeah, PC) and a solid RIP station. One will be for design exclusively. The other will handle RIPing, cutting, and that's it. Everything else... if I get my way, SignVOX and it won't matter.

I don't want a Dell. I don't want to go to WallyWorld and get some cheap Acer or HP. Want something to hold me over for at least a year or two. Any advice?

 

[Baz]

I prefer to build my own. I buy parts from Tiger Direct and New Egg.

If that's not an option for you then i would say that Signburst has enjoyed some really good feedback on his machines (he is a member here). Give him a try.

I built a pc for my new printer last year for about 1500.00$ in parts.
Intel I7 4770, Asus motherboard, 16 gig ram, Intell SSD and WD 1ter. hard drive, Radeon HD 77XX

I can rip high res 4'x8' pannels in about 45 seconds .... :Big Laugh

 

[Mike Paul]

http://signburst.com/

I bought one from Casey and love it. Very well built computers for design and rip stations.

 

[Milo]

Signburst.com or xicomputer.com

 

[Pixels Are Bad Mmmkay?]

We bought my graphic design computer from a local computer building company that has been in business for close to 20 years, if not longer, and I am really happy with it. For around $2400 I got a Samsung 24" monitor, Intel Core i7 3770K 3.5 chip on an Asus mobo, 32GB DDR ram, a 1 terabite hard drive for storage, a 120 GB solid state hard drive to run Windows and software. It runs on Windows 7 Pro 64 bit. We got a nice Antec solid metal case with the maximum number of cooling fans (I wanna say that's at least 3 fans). It has a corsair 750 W power supply, a 1 hour battery backup and surge protector with 6 outlets to protect other peripherals as well. Aside from that, we got a generic dvd burner,Logitech keyboard, some Logitech speakers, and a logitech G700s gaming mouse with it too. I frigging LOVE that laser gaming mouse.

I think it was a fair price and I got to build it exactly the way I wanted it and needed it, and got some great advice along the way. It was built and ready for pickup within 48 hours and has a one year warranty on all parts and labor. I enjoy buying locally when I can and I feel this is the best overall experience since I was able to really interact with the builder and create a system economically and quickly that suits our needs perfectly.

I would at least look around for local shops that are experienced and see what they are willing to do for you. I'm not trying to take anything away from SignBurst, Dell or any other big player, but these small computer shops are widely available and are a nice option. I really just like the overall convenience of it. And when it needs serviced, it's just a short drive away.

 

[binki]

We just get the $500 mini tower from Office Depot, the Lenovo's. They hold up pretty well. They will even deliver for free if you order online. Our monitors are rarely replaced. They seem to last forever.

 

[SignBurst PCs]

http://signburst.com/

I bought one from Casey and love it. Very well built computers for design and rip stations.

Thanks Mike! I appreciate it.

SolitaryT, I am always more than happy to help in any way that I can.

We build and support computers specifically for the sign and vehicle wrap industry and are a Merchant Member here on Signs101.

Please feel free to give me a buzz.

 

[Marlene]

we are also needing a new computer and I sure hope our budget people will get me the Inferno from signburst. Casey has been extremely wonderful answering my questions and if it were up to me, I'd buy it today from him.

 

[danno]

Casey at Signburst has always been there for our computer needs. I wouldn't go anywhere else. He helps us before, during and after we have installed it.

 

[signs2trade]

Let me say this.....we have appx. 10 of Signburst computers. They run 24 7. Some of them are 4 years old. We virtually have no problems with them. We are one of the largest online sign companies on the web. We will not use any other computer.
Keith

 

[SolitaryT]

I think we're sold. I've done my part, and I'll stand by the results of my "research". Thanks everyone! Now I get to play the whole "we'll get you better equipment once you make us some money" game. Wish me luck. Hopefully I'll be ordering a computer within the month.

 

[TyrantDesigner]

Eventually I want to get a signburst system ... but it depends on your needs. I have been building systems since '95 so modding systems and even tooling with the OS to do what I want isn't out of the norm. My design system is a quad core with 16 gigs of ram and two 1tb hd's and a 3gb radeon hd vid card with tri monitor support. (still working on getting my three 24" monitors) and I only spent about $900 on my system ... but I built it myself. where as my print/cut system is a modded office depot beast that I loaded 16gigs of ddr3 ram and usb 3 ports into just so I could print large files without issue ... but it won't ever have the processing power of my design system (which will last me 3 years before I outgrow it) And I think I spent about $600 total on my printing computer. It's no where near the level of attention I put into previous machines (water cooled monstrocities with custom cases and other silly stuff for example) but It gets the job done until I can get a nice design machine.

 

[GAC05]

How about one of these:
https://www.apple.com/mac-pro/
A little pricey but looks like it could do double duty as a spittoon or ashtray.

wayne k
guam usa

 

[synergy_jim]

HP offers the Phoenix 800 series with 16gb of ram. I needed something quick and cheap as an extra rip station, and it performs flawlessly. I think it was around $800. No monitor.

 

[Supergirl]

i'm just gonna hijack this thread and ask a question...

i build my own, so i'm good there, BUT

currently i use only one computer for printing/designing/cutting and i see you guys talk about more than one machine?

do you store files on the network (wouldn't that make for a slow ripping, or do you copy them over locally to the other machine first) or what kind of external/network/cloud storage do you use?

just kind of roughly, what's the procedure with more than one machine.

design, save somewhere, go to other machine, load, rip, print, cut?
what i do is, design, save, rip, print, cut.

Or do you guys do this because you have more than one person operating this and while one designs, he/she might not be the one who prints?

So multi setup would be for more than one person using it?


thank you in advance!

t.

 

[synergy_jim]

Typically you don't want to be designing on the same machine you are ripping files with. I'm not saying it can;t be done, but when you rip large files and you are designing large files, you can see the bottleneck with processor speed and ram limitations. When we were small ( just myself) I used one machine for everything. As we got busier and the workload started to cause problems, we quickly transitioned to dedicated design stations and rip stations.

 

[Supergirl]

Typically you don't want to be designing on the same machine you are ripping files with. I'm not saying it can;t be done, but when you rip large files and you are designing large files, you can see the bottleneck with processor speed and ram limitations. When we were small ( just myself) I used one machine for everything. As we got busier and the workload started to cause problems, we quickly transitioned to dedicated design stations and rip stations.

Okay, makes sense jim! Thank you.

I AM small and i haven't had to rip anything big, so far not a problem.
I have enough hardware to split the load.

Just one more question, how do you share the files? Network storage, over the network directly on destination machine?

Thanks,

t.

 

[SignBurst PCs]

I really like storing files on a high quality NAS device and share them across the network, independent of any one production computer.

There are many other advantages of this solution, including RAID 1,5, or 10 for data redundancy. You can back up the NAS both locally and offsite, with local backup rotation for a great disaster recovery solution.

Just be sure that your network is up to snuff and everything is moving at gigabit speeds. Over a good network, even the big files transfer in a timely manner.

 

[Supergirl]

I really like storing files on a high quality NAS device and share them across the network, independent of any one production computer.

There are many other advantages of this solution, including RAID 1,5, or 10 for data redundancy. You can back up the NAS both locally and offsite, with local backup rotation for a great disaster recovery solution.

Just be sure that your network is up to snuff and everything is moving at gigabit speeds. Over a good network, even the big files transfer in a timely manner.

Thank you!
Yes, great idea!!!!! recently installed a seagate one. maybe time to get one myself.
you can actually map "my documents" of all devices to share the same location.

Thank you, sir!! Didn't somehow even cross my mind really. :ROFLMAO:

 

[synergy_jim]

We are using a Buffalo Terrastation.