Final Cut Pro 5 vs Premiere Pro 2

[Jeff Chandler]

Interesting discussion. I teach an Emmy award winning high school television class. We have in our studio (and I am reasonably proficient on all since I have to teach them) FCP. PP2, Avid Xpress and Liquid. My students prefer PP2. They find it to be more intuitive. But, frankly, if you can use one you can easily adapt to the other. Both are stable, mature programs. While I prefer DVD SP for authoring, it's hard to beat the integration of AE with Premiere. So in the end I think it comes down to which program (and perhaps platform) that you are most comfortable with. For my own personal side business, I don't use either. I use Edius, which can't be beat for real-time capabilities (whether through ohci or hardware accelerated).

[William Hohauser]

Originally Posted by Tony Tremble

The "don't use your NLE computer for anything else" was largely spread about by Avid. I was a long time Avid user and got pee-ed off with that type of nonsense. A well written piece of software should not come to its knees when someone has an email client open in the background!! The problem with Avid was it was tested on such a narrow set of PC configs and had very specific requirements for OS and driver versions it was impractical to use the PC for anything else. I regularly came up against graphics driver problems when using the PC for 3D animation and editing. Lightwave needed a later driver than Avid would work with!! PITA. There was also a Windows auto-update that crippled Xpress Pro that many users fell for. Stop auto updates if you are connected to the net and don't update software mid project or you could be in for some hair pulling.

I currently have Firefox, Mail, VLC, Motion and Shake open on my Mac and have no issues. The only issues with this approach is the amount of memory. More apps require more memory so don't stint yourself and everything will be fine.

I don't want to sound like a stereotypical Mac user when it comes to viruses and malware but the lack of them is a huge peace of mind. It is something to bear in mind if deciding which platform to choose for editing etc.

TT

Yes, the peace of mind is good.

Having lived thru the Avid propietary nightmare in the past it's obvious why they recommended their NLE to be a stand-alone system. However I recommend it for other reasons. Mainly to reduce the amount of time your system is on therefore reducing wear on the components and a possible (although remote) failure in front of an important client. Also to prevent possible hard drive corruption. My editing computers all have a suite of programs related to my editing needs and the computers are connected to the internet when on. Never a problem.

Right now I'm using an older G4 that used to be an editing system to do all my finances, e-mail, web and layout work. Call it a quirk but it's a relief to sit here with the main editing systems off and cooled down at the end of the day while I do more prosaic office work on a computer that's seen it's day. I have moved all my older editing computers to other jobs; DVD duplication, lable printing, invoicing, etc. If you can afford it, do it.

I work with a Windows based facility and the control room computers are disconnected from the internet to prevent problems and upgrade distractions during sessions. They do online upgrades but only at very specific times. They would go Mac except that much of the control room equpitment can only be controlled thru Windows.