Since I've been running LR (currently 3.6) under Windows XP on a 6 year old HP desktop with an AMD dual core processer I just purchased a Dell XPS 8500 and plan to install LR 4.1 and move my catalogs and images to this new machine.
The machine came with a 1 TB SATA || hard disk, and I've installed a 240 GB SATA III SSD and installed Windows 7 on it. I currently have my images on an external 1.5 TB eSATA hard disk connected to the old computer, and expect to connect it to new computer the same way.
Currently (in LR 3.6) I find I spend most of my time in the library module culling images and selecting a small number to develop. I generate 100% previews for a shoot, and then switch between grid, loupe, and compare views, frequently zooming to 100% to check and compare critical focus. Since I develop a much smaller number for photos, and typically do pretty minimal processing, don't spend as much time in the develop module. Assuming that I'll do the same thing in LR 4.1, my top priority is library and performance, particularly when zoomed to 100%, and secondarily develop performance.
My question is, to get the best performance, where (on the SSD, internal hard disk, or external hard disk) should I
- install LR 4.1
- store my catalog(s)
- store the Camera Raw cache
- store my images
