Is a Video Card needed for Photoshop?

[zedman3d]

Also CS4 takes advantage of CUDA for some aspects so really just look for a motherboard with integrated Geforce 9300/9400.

For example: Newegg.com - GIGABYTE GA-E7AUM-DS2H LGA 775 NVIDIA GeForce 9400 HDMI Micro ATX Intel Motherboard - Intel Motherboards

 

[meat_helmet]

Photoshop should be fine on integrated graphics. It really doesnt take much to run photoshop in the way of graphics horsepower (yes CS4 does take advantage of GPU power for rendering effects, but not by a huge amount). So the best thing would be to build the computer, see if its fine for what she wants and if its not you can pick up a cheap graphics card later.

 

[veg1992]

Also CS4 takes advantage of CUDA for some aspects so really just look for a motherboard with integrated Geforce 9300/9400.

For example: Newegg.com - GIGABYTE GA-E7AUM-DS2H LGA 775 NVIDIA GeForce 9400 HDMI Micro ATX Intel Motherboard - Intel Motherboards

He could always cut down to a Geforce 8300/8200/9300 if necessary and then use the rest to Hybrid SLI then which would perform better anyways

 

[u4ic_fln]

OK. So this is the build I have for the computer. The main idea is that we will continue to run XP until October when Windows 7 comes out. Again she doesn't play any games. For her, I want a stable system that will last a long time. I wont be over clocking or anything like that. Anyway, here is what I've got:

CPU - Intel Core 2 Quad Q9550 Mo#: BX80569Q9550
MB - Gigabyte Model #:GA-EP45-UD3P LGA775 Intel P45
Video Card - EVGA GeForce 8600GTS Mo#:256-P2-N761-TR
Memory - G.Skill 2GB (2x1GB) DDR 400 (PC3200) Mo#:F1-3200PHU2-2GBNS
HD - Seagate Barracuda 7200.10 Sata 3Gb/s Mo#: ST3250410AS
PSU - Antec BP550 Plus ATX12V V2.2
Tower - NZXT Alpha Black Steel ATX Mid Tower
Monitor - Samsung 22" Black Mo#:220WM

A few questions:

Do you think I need an after market heatsink? Or will the Intel provided heatsink work fine? Again, I wont be overclocking.

Do I need more than a 550W PSU?

Did I forget anything?

thanks for all the help so far, and thanks in advance for the help still to come <3

ps. Once Windows 7 is available, I will upgrade the memory to something more appropriate. I am going to re-use the CD/DVD drives and Mouse/Keyboard combo she currently has.