The photo above is the first photo edited on the new PC in Lightroom. The old PC was getting a little long in the tooth and could no longer be upgraded to meet today’s photo editing requirements. The new PC is a Dell and seems to be built for photo editing. The first impression is that it’s fast with enough memory and a good graphics card. I also purchased a new monitor to replace the 13-year-old one I’ve been using. I’m still using the keyboard and mouse I’ve had for about 11 years. Here is what my new desk looks like now (with some major cord violations):
Anyone who gets a new PC to replace an older PC knows what an adventure it is. On top of that, migrating Lightroom and its catalog to a new PC is an even greater adventure. I was able to do it all smoothly because the old PC was still working and all the photos are located on separate drives. Also, I had a working Chrombook that I could turn to if I ran into problems (which I did). If anyone needs details, just ask.
2clicksaway 
The photo is nice, of course.
Which monitor did you buy? My Dell 3007 WFPHC is now 15 years old, and while it still works, I have to run a DisplayPort to DVI-D Adapter Video Converter to hook it up to my new PC. It works, but the connection has been acting up a bit, and I’m doing research on possible replacements (one large ot going to dual monitors).
I had to switch keyboards a few times (I type a lot), and finally went with a higher quality one (I burned through a couple of Microsoft boards, a few Logitech, and one Amazon brand).
And there’s no getting around a major tangle of wires I kind of have some control over them, but no matter what you do, they always look like they’re having a party you’re not invited to.
Thanks, E. The monitor is an LG 32″ gaming monitor. It has a beautiful display and it plays well with the new Dell. I bought everything at Costco, so I didn’t need to customize anything. The PC has 64G of DRAM and the video card has 8 g. I think it’s more than enough to do what I need to do. In the top right corner of the photo you can see the 3 external hard drives with all the photos and BU. If I have a complaint it’s that Microsoft doesn’t want anyone to use Chrome. I’m using their EDGE (which is very nice) but it didn’t carry over any of the stuff I had in Chrome. I’m sure there is a way around it but at least I can get stuff done now and I’ll tackle it later. I use STARTPAGE so all my bookmarks are in a tab at the top of the browser. Lightroom users with a large catalog should get as much info from others about the move to a new PC. Adobe’s instructions were vague.
Hmm . . . I had no trouble installing Chrome and FireFox. I primarily use FireFox and Edge because of some features in each that I like, and since I use GMail, most of the Google features I’m interested in are available through the menu in Gmail (I run GMail on both Edge and FireFox).
I went away from using Chrome because it opened too many background processes for my liking as well as running in the background when I didn’t want it to. FireFox is faster and with less load, and so is Edge (which is based on Chromium).
Although, I read that Chrome is trying to slim down and not be so bloated (it still has the majority of market share; 66% global and 46% US)
Regardless, there is no problem exporting bookmarks from one to the other and vice-versa. Currently, I have both FireFox and Edge open whenever I’m on the PC.
WordPress seems to work a bit better with Chrome and Edge than it does with FireFox. That probably has to do with that market share thing. In the past, I’d gotten with WP support because of problems with the block editor using FireFox, and they had me try it in Chrome and the problem went away.
What’s annoying is that a given extension (I use several) work a bit differently in each browser, with some interfering with each other in one browser, but not another.
As for drives, I have two 8TB drives inside the PC (one I work with and one that holds copies of the first one), and one of the 4TB drives I had on my original PC (how I transferred files to the new drives). And yes, I have an external drive for tertiary backups.
As for monitors, I’m looking at monitors that have a wider gamut and are geared more toward photo editing, although, truthfully, the difference is minimal. Also irrelevant because most viewer/readers aren’t all that bothered with color accuracy.
As much as I like my 30″ monster, I’m thinking a two-monitor setup would be more efficient for when I run multiple apps. Like I said, still doing research.
They had several monitors I liked at Costco. One was a curved monitor which cost the same as the one I purchased. My concern was that the curvature might make photo editing more difficult if there was some distortion in the curve. I don’t have any experience with that so I just got a flat screen. 32 inches seems large enough (especially coming from a 22-inch screen). Later this year I’ll replace two of the HDs with newer ones with more capacity. I’m pleased with everything but I realized that, for photo editing, upgrading is a continuing process.
I’m with you on curved monitors. I think they work for gaming, but I also am unsure for graphic work. The reason I would like two monitors is that the aspect ratio of my current monitor makes it difficult running two graphic editors side by side. Anyway, still looking, as I said.
I buy the black versions of HD drives as better suited for my usage. I also don’t push platter-based HDs longer than five years (and monitor their health). It’s one of the reasons I have so many versions of backups.
I’m waiting for solid-state drives to drop in price as those will be my next preferred versions (quiet, they be, with supposedly longer life).
I had an SSD die within 2 years so I’m a little cautious about them. It was years ago so they probably have improved quite a bit but don’t buy a no-name brand as they have a greater failure rate than the others.
Congrats! Always a fun adventure getting a new computer.
Yes, fun. And a little scary!
Thanks for showing your desk – it sure puts my mess to shame. Congrats on the new computer and monitor and I hope it continues to go smoothly – well, for the most part. It’s never without bumps. I see that you use a wrist support with your mouse, something I’ve considered – can you tell me about it? And you have one of those ergonomic keyboards, too – I wonder if that’s something that would lessen the right arm, wrist & shoulder strain.
I have faith in your ability to work the LR bugs out!
Thanks, Lynn. I’ve had enough fun, and now I have to get to work. I got the mouse pad from amazon. It has the wrist support and it’s about 2 inches longer than some others. The wireless keyboard and mouse are from Logitech but Microsoft makes something similar (for a little more money. Battery life in the mouse is about a year and about 2 years for the keyboard. Most people I know don’t have any problem going from a standard keyboard to the curved one. In addition to the curvature, it has a soft place to rest your hands as you type. I think you might find some relief from strain with this keyboard.
Lightroom is working beautifully and my catalog imported nicely. The only things I haven’t imported yet are a few plugins and some presets. I hardly ever use the preset and it would be easier to just redo them instead of importing them.
That’s good news about LR! And thanks for the info. Now, looks like you have some weather coming your way, eh?
We don’t have weather in Webster (Where Life is Worth Living). Every day is a beautiful day; Some are more beautiful than others, though.