Computer for video editing

[tlarkin]

i'm not saying he shouldn't get a video editing card instead of a gaming card, i'm trying to get some details on what he is trying to do first. i am however saying that the correct card can make vast improvements to his performance in premiere. everyone here is telling him to go with an i7 system... so i'm not sure why you keep telling him to get a better CPU or more RAM... our suggestions are practically reaching the limits as it is. therefore logic would say that improving the graphics card choice would be the next best option.

I am saying if he is going to do serious work get a Xeon Workstation, 4+ gigs of RAM and high speed SAS drives, which would out perform any i7 system period.

I noticed vast improvements in the areas where gpu acceleration helps out in photoshop cs4 vs cs3.... As the gpu acceleration uses opengl, which works the same essentially on workstation cards and gaming cards. Workstation drivers dont benefit premier in any way, unlike say, 3d modeling programs.

There is no real world data to back up how much you get performance increases, plus there is no hard data to say that one card performs over the other vastly. It seems any DX8 or better Nvidia card will help this. However, like I stated earlier, if you were to look into say a Quadro card which are both hardware and firmware instruction sets built in for such functions you would probably benefit even more performance.

I just upgraded CS3 to CS4 on my Macbook Pro this year and I don't notice any hefty performance increases. Then again I don't do anything that major on it, mostly publishing documents and creating small logos and such.

 

[bomberboysk]

I am saying if he is going to do serious work get a Xeon Workstation, 4+ gigs of RAM and high speed SAS drives, which would out perform any i7 system period.



There is no real world data to back up how much you get performance increases, plus there is no hard data to say that one card performs over the other vastly. It seems any DX8 or better Nvidia card will help this. However, like I stated earlier, if you were to look into say a Quadro card which are both hardware and firmware instruction sets built in for such functions you would probably benefit even more performance.

I just upgraded CS3 to CS4 on my Macbook Pro this year and I don't notice any hefty performance increases. Then again I don't do anything that major on it, mostly publishing documents and creating small logos and such.

CS4 doesnt have any gpu acceleration in osx afaik....

 

[realmike15]

I am saying if he is going to do serious work get a Xeon Workstation, 4+ gigs of RAM and high speed SAS drives, which would out perform any i7 system period.



There is no real world data to back up how much you get performance increases, plus there is no hard data to say that one card performs over the other vastly. It seems any DX8 or better Nvidia card will help this. However, like I stated earlier, if you were to look into say a Quadro card which are both hardware and firmware instruction sets built in for such functions you would probably benefit even more performance.

I just upgraded CS3 to CS4 on my Macbook Pro this year and I don't notice any hefty performance increases. Then again I don't do anything that major on it, mostly publishing documents and creating small logos and such.

dude i realize you're a mac fan... however a Xeon setup is completely unnecessary. the i7 and Xeon that mac uses is based on the same chip. the only real defining factor between a Mac and PC is the OS. i'm not getting into a Mac vs. PC battle.

as to your second comment, that is completely untrue. you've been given several articles given to you that prove otherwise... whether you choose to acknowledge them or not is another story.

 

[tlarkin]

CUDA isnt apple, CUDA is an SDK developed in 2007 by nvidia for nvidia graphics cards to accelerate programs normally used by the cpu.... and its what premier uses, which works the same on workstation and standard "gaming" cards(eg- Folding@Home uses cuda)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CUDA

Hmm, seems Nvidia just used the same name for existing technology and yes CUDA has been around for a while, it used to stand for something else Nvidia branded it theirs and it is a firmware level thing, so I guess they kept the name.

http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1939

 

[bomberboysk]

Hmm, seems Nvidia just used the same name for existing technology and yes CUDA has been around for a while, it used to stand for something else Nvidia branded it theirs and it is a firmware level thing, so I guess they kept the name.

http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1939

Lol yeah, cuda is power management on apple, but for pc's it means Complete Unified Device Archtecture(i think, dont feel like googling to make sure im right on the name though) Btw, not trying to start a flame war here, just the fact that last post first page they want it to be as reasonably priced as possible, and an i7+ decent consumer level gpu would suit that need.

 

[tlarkin]

dude i realize you're a mac fan... however a Xeon setup is completely unnecessary. the i7 and Xeon that mac uses is based on the same chip. the only real defining factor between a Mac and PC is the OS. i'm not getting into a Mac vs. PC battle.

as to your second comment, that is completely untrue. you've been given several articles given to you that prove otherwise... whether you choose to acknowledge them or not is another story.

No, I google it and there is no benchmarked hard data out there proving how much better it is. I am not saying that it won't be better down the road, I am saying that for video editing you want high end processor, lots of RAM and fast hard disks.

You can have the fastest GPU ever built and have a slow crappy hard drive and video loading and editing large files will still perform like dog shit, and that is because disk I/O is going to be your largest bottle neck.

Also, no the Xeon and the i7 are not the same thing, they may share some underlying technologies but Intel makes both processors for different applications, and I never said he had to get a Mac. I just suggested it since Final Cut and Shake are some of the best apps out there and they are Mac only.

 

[tlarkin]

Lol yeah, cuda is power management on apple, but for pc's it means Complete Unified Device Archtecture(i think, dont feel like googling to make sure im right on the name though) Btw, not trying to start a flame war here, just the fact that last post first page they want it to be as reasonably priced as possible, and an i7+ decent consumer level gpu would suit that need.

Yeah I was agreeing with you all but brought up the main performance increase will be CPU + RAM + Fast hard drives.

 

[bomberboysk]

No, I google it and there is no benchmarked hard data out there proving how much better it is. I am not saying that it won't be better down the road, I am saying that for video editing you want high end processor, lots of RAM and fast hard disks.

You can have the fastest GPU ever built and have a slow crappy hard drive and video loading and editing large files will still perform like dog shit, and that is because disk I/O is going to be your largest bottle neck.

Also, no the Xeon and the i7 are not the same thing, they may share some underlying technologies but Intel makes both processors for different applications, and I never said he had to get a Mac. I just suggested it since Final Cut and Shake are some of the best apps out there and they are Mac only.

I agree with the hard drive, but the i7 and Xeon are actually the same exact cpu except there is a broader range of speed options in the xeon line. I also agree that 6 or 12gb of ram is entirely necessary for high definition video. Also, heres some proof in the pudding i guess you would say:
http://hothardware.com/Articles/Nvidia-Quadro-CX-Workstation-Graphics-Card/?page=6

Bear in mind that is a high end quadro being compared to a 9600gt, so a higher end consumer level card such as a gtx 275 will perform at or above the quadro cx.

Also, some videos are linked to here:
http://www.fudzilla.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=9602&Itemid=34

 

[tlarkin]

CS4 doesnt have any gpu acceleration in osx afaik....

OK well I when I run it on Vista 64 as well since my company has over 250 take home licenses of all Adobe products. I put Design Premium on my current PC build which are specs:

Q9550
4Gi RAM
GTX 260
1TB SATA2 hard drive space
Vista Utlimate 64

Still seems just as fast as CS3. I also get dual licenses for both OS X and Windows since my work purchases mass site licenses and we run both platforms. However, I don't do any real heavy work in any Adobe product. I mainly use it to publish technical documents into PDF files with pictures and logos and such. So, I may not be pushing it to the limit to gain that extra performance.

Also, CUDA is available for the Mac....

http://www.apple.com/downloads/macosx/development_tools/nvidiacuda.html

 

[bomberboysk]

OK well I when I run it on Vista 64 as well since my company has over 250 take home licenses of all Adobe products. I put Design Premium on my current PC build which are specs:

Q9550
4Gi RAM
GTX 260
1TB SATA2 hard drive space
Vista Utlimate 64

Still seems just as fast as CS3. I also get dual licenses for both OS X and Windows since my work purchases mass site licenses and we run both platforms. However, I don't do any real heavy work in any Adobe product. I mainly use it to publish technical documents into PDF files with pictures and logos and such. So, I may not be pushing it to the limit to gain that extra performance.

Also, CUDA is available for the Mac....

http://www.apple.com/downloads/macosx/development_tools/nvidiacuda.html

Yeah, i know cuda is on the mac but i dont think that cs4 for mac has cuda support

For the OP, i think a system with specs similar to this would be suitable:

X58 Mobo
Core i7 920
12gb Tri Channel Memory
GTX 275 1792mb
Corsair 850TX Power Supply
3x 1TB Caviar Black western digital raid 5 or 2x 1TB caviar blacks for storage and a 300gb velociraptor for video editing/scratch disc.
Good Cpu Cooler such as a Xigmatek S1283

Would you all not agree that this would provide best bang for the buck for the op?

 

[tlarkin]

Yeah, i know cuda is on the mac but i dont think that cs4 for mac has cuda support

Why they are the same exact thing and Adobe has a very large Mac user base so I don't see why they wouldn't support it. I think it would be easier to develop such things in a *nix OS anyway and not have to deal with some clunky bloated registry.

From this article:

http://www.tomsguide.com/us/nvidia-cuda-photoshop,news-2436.html

It seems that Nvidia is creating the plug ins for it, not Adobe. So if it supports CUDA 2.0 and you run at least CS4 regardless if it is Windows 32 or 64 or OS X it should work.

I have yet to find anything that states otherwise.

 

[bomberboysk]

Why they are the same exact thing and Adobe has a very large Mac user base so I don't see why they wouldn't support it. I think it would be easier to develop such things in a *nix OS anyway and not have to deal with some clunky bloated registry.

From this article:

http://www.tomsguide.com/us/nvidia-cuda-photoshop,news-2436.html

It seems that Nvidia is creating the plug ins for it, not Adobe. So if it supports CUDA 2.0 and you run at least CS4 regardless if it is Windows 32 or 64 or OS X it should work.

I have yet to find anything that states otherwise.

Maybe i was thinking about that the 64bit version of photoshop wasnt mac then, im fairly certain that the regular gpu acceleration built into cs4(opengl, not the cuda acceleration) isnt in the osx version though either... Also, take a look at post #30, see if you agree those specs would be about right for the op.

 

[tlarkin]

Maybe i was thinking about that the 64bit version of photoshop wasnt mac then, im fairly certain that the regular gpu acceleration built into cs4(opengl, not the cuda acceleration) isnt in the osx version though either... Also, take a look at post #30, see if you agree those specs would be about right for the op.

That makes no sense because OS X runs completely off of Open GL...

I will look at post 30 one sec...

 

[bomberboysk]

That makes no sense because OS X runs completely off of Open GL...

I will look at post 30 one sec...

Yeah i know, i am not around anything running osx that has cs4 at the moment so i cant check, but the opengl acceration was only photoshop anyhow. The cuda acceleration is where its at, and since nvidia is developing cuda plugins for mac, its great for mac users.

 

[tlarkin]

Yeah, i know cuda is on the mac but i dont think that cs4 for mac has cuda support

For the OP, i think a system with specs similar to this would be suitable:

X58 Mobo
Core i7 920
12gb Tri Channel Memory
GTX 275 1792mb
Corsair 850TX Power Supply
3x 1TB Caviar Black western digital raid 5 or 2x 1TB caviar blacks for storage and a 300gb velociraptor for video editing/scratch disc.
Good Cpu Cooler such as a Xigmatek S1283

Would you all not agree that this would provide best bang for the buck for the op?

As long as it had FW2 and I would run RAID 5 with a spare, that way zero down time if a drive fails.

12Gi of ram may be over kill too, depends on their applications they are going to use. My good friend works for take 2 studios here where I live and one of the guys wrote a script that generated all the rain in the movie Sin City and they run pretty much a strict Mac deployment, but do have a few PCs for those PC only applications. They do some awesome stuff, and they don't use anything that crazy, but they do have a few Xeon work stations.

I'd have to ask him since he shoots, edits, post edits, cuts, and produces film for all sorts of different clients.

 

[bomberboysk]

As long as it had FW2 and I would run RAID 5 with a spare, that way zero down time if a drive fails.

12Gi of ram may be over kill too, depends on their applications they are going to use. My good friend works for take 2 studios here where I live and one of the guys wrote a script that generated all the rain in the movie Sin City and they run pretty much a strict Mac deployment, but do have a few PCs for those PC only applications. They do some awesome stuff, and they don't use anything that crazy, but they do have a few Xeon work stations.

I'd have to ask him since he shoots, edits, post edits, cuts, and produces film for all sorts of different clients.

Yeah, thats why i was thinking raid 5 would be the way to go, only ~1.5TB usable space but parity allows redundancy and performance. Now if we can get someone of a ballpark budget we could put together a list lol. 12gb is probably overkill yes, but in the end more ram is always better

 

[JoeBloggs]

Video

I have tried to clarify a few things with him. He will be using this to do a bit of video editing alongside his day job and works at some events putting on background displays so he wants his computer to be able to take a few live feeds and control what is output on the screens. What sort of hardware would he need for this? The computer would have to be a windows pc as he has invested in a number of applications so far that will run on a windows system.

 

[realmike15]

No, I google it and there is no benchmarked hard data out there proving how much better it is. I am not saying that it won't be better down the road, I am saying that for video editing you want high end processor, lots of RAM and fast hard disks.

You can have the fastest GPU ever built and have a slow crappy hard drive and video loading and editing large files will still perform like dog shit, and that is because disk I/O is going to be your largest bottle neck.

Also, no the Xeon and the i7 are not the same thing, they may share some underlying technologies but Intel makes both processors for different applications, and I never said he had to get a Mac. I just suggested it since Final Cut and Shake are some of the best apps out there and they are Mac only.

i completely agree with you about the fast processor, lots of RAM, and fast hard-disks. however i do think you're downplaying the benefits of a good graphics card. i think he should distribute the money evenly, for the best performance... if he's going to get a good CPU, Ram, and Hard Disks... he should have a good video editing card... because it will impact his performance significantly.

i never said Xeon and i7 are the same thing, i said they are based on the exact same chip, which they are. Xeon is actually a processor tuned towards Servers... but the benefits for Video Editing between an i7 and a Xeon would be very little. Xeon processors command a much higher price tag and is completely unnecessary for what he's trying to do. i think it's great that Apple uses Xeons to get that little extra boost in their Pro series computers... but for what this guy wants to do... the Cost to Benefit is just not worth... not even close.

 

[realmike15]

I have tried to clarify a few things with him. He will be using this to do a bit of video editing alongside his day job and works at some events putting on background displays so he wants his computer to be able to take a few live feeds and control what is output on the screens. What sort of hardware would he need for this? The computer would have to be a windows pc as he has invested in a number of applications so far that will run on a windows system.

honestly i've never looked at Broadcast solutions, i'm on the Recording end which is slightly different. you should probably hit up a forum that specializes in Video I/O solutions.

we've given you the basic guidelines, but without knowing what the requirements are on your I/O solution it's really difficult to go any further. i'd hate to suggest a specific motherboard or processor and find out it's completely incompatible with what he'll be using.

this is probably the most widely used I/O solution company... http://www.avid.com/ they are a division of Digidesign who makes Pro-Tools... which is for the most part the industry standard in the recording world. i'm not necessarily saying go buy one of their systems, but this is the kind of I/O you'll need to hook all that up to a computer. once you've talked to people on a Video forum, and you know which I/O you're going to buy... come back with that information and we can help you pick hardware that is compatible and optimized to you're I/O.