Computer performance?

[dnmilikan]

I am just about convinced to upgrade my computer capability because of the increased demands of some of the new techniques. I presently have a Compaq with a 2.1 Ghz single core AMD processor and maxed out at 2GB of ram. This is going to really make the thing stress when I start stitch a lot of images.

I would love to have a Mac Pro but at $7,000 plus for a dual quad core and a decent amount of ram it makes me stop and consider it a bit. I do have another option to have a friend build a dual quad core (8 cores) 2.33 Ghz processor and a server motherboard holding 12 gigs of ram and upgradeable to 32 gigs of ram. The cost for the home built will be around $4500 including Vista Ultimate 64 bit.

My question is am I looking at this wisely?...I am tired of buying a new computer every couple of years because applications require increasing amounts of processor and ram to effectively run.

Thanks for sharing your opinions on this.

Don

[dnmilikan]

As an update, I have the new computer up and running. The performance is quite astounding from what I had before. I also feel a lot more secure about my images since both drives are mirrored in a raid configuration so that if I have a drive crash, I always have a copy of my work.