Raptor RT2 - Would it make me happy?

[Lars Siden]

Hi,

I'm thinking about buying a Raptor RT2 card ( or a STORM2, but they are really expensive in Sweden ).

I thought I'd pick your brains and get some input on the cards.

The features I would like to have H/W accelerated are:

1. Crossfades/Dissolves
2. Color correction
3. Median/Blur
4. Titles/Text
5. P-I-P ( Picture in picture )
6. Keying(Chroma)

If possible:

H/W accelerated MPEG2 conversion ( AVI->MPEG2 ) for DVD making.

Analogue output ( I belive the RT2 can do that ).

Question: Would the Raptor 2 cover all my needs? Are there other cards that you can recommend? Like the Matrox RX10? Pinnacle DV500?

I have all the software I need ( Vegas / Premiere Pro / Photoshop / Encore / After Effects ) so I'm not in the need for any "bundles".

Best regards ... and Happy new year!!!


Lars Siden

[Matthew de Jongh]

i have the raptor rt2, i wouldn't buy it again, i am just not sure what i am getting vs. just using the 1394 port on my motherboard!

i would look at the matrox stuff, goto www.videoguys.com they have some decent advice on capture cards, but unless you in a hurry just try premiere pro with your 1394 port on the motherboard.

matthew

[Lars Siden]

<<<-- Originally posted by Matthew de Jongh : i have the raptor rt2, i wouldn't buy it again, i am just not sure what i am getting vs. just using the 1394 port on my motherboard!

i would look at the matrox stuff, goto www.videoguys.com they have some decent advice on capture cards, but unless you in a hurry just try premiere pro with your 1394 port on the motherboard.

matthew -->>>

Hi Matthew,

That sounds strange - You mean that you don't feel that you gain time (rendering) when using the RT effects on the Raptor board? I mean, sometimes when I use Vegas with color correction, a medianfilter and unsharp mask the render time goes up to 300% on my P4 2.53ghz/1.5gb machine - something that should be realtime with RT/Storm card.

// Lazze

[Rob Lohman]

Keep in mind that such a hardware accelerated "improvement"
only works with Premiere (to the best of my knowledge). And
usually ONLY with the version THEY SUPPLY. In other words, it
will do nothing for Vegas or After Effects (INCLUDING analog out!).

ALSO, in my mind the performance gap is ever closing with the
increasing CPU speeds. An application like Vegas can do almost
anything fast enough on current CPU's (espeically the high-end
models).

Keep in mind that software is easily upgradable and hardware
isn't.

You are aware of the analog<->firewire converters like the
Canopus ADVC if you are interested in having analog in and out?

[Lars Siden]

Hi Rob,

<<<-- Originally posted by Rob Lohman : Keep in mind that such a hardware accelerated "improvement"
only works with Premiere (to the best of my knowledge). And
usually ONLY with the version THEY SUPPLY. In other words, it
will do nothing for Vegas or After Effects (INCLUDING analog out!).
-----------------------

It is true that you only will benefit using programs that there are support for. The DVStorm supports EDIUS and Premiere Pro, and after effects ( that is, you get all H/W filters available in AE and you get true TV analogue out from AE ). Of course, if you use an effect that isn't accelerated - then you will gain nothing having a HW card ( except the better DV codecs ).


>>ALSO, in my mind the performance gap is ever closing with the
increasing CPU speeds. An application like Vegas can do almost
anything fast enough on current CPU's (espeically the high-end
models).
------------------------

That may be so. Today I have a fairly potent machine and when I apply some filters in Vegas I get about -15X RT performance, to compensate that with raw CPU power I guess I'd need like a 5ghz machine - and to the best of my knowledge - such a machine isn't showing 2004.... maybe 2005

>Keep in mind that software is easily upgradable and hardware
>sn't.

This is true....and not ;-) Raptor2/DvStorm2/RX.100 they all use scalable technology - ie. more cpu power will get you more RT tracks/effects.

One of the main reason I find a HW card so intersting(especially DVStorm2) is the HW MPEG encoder / decoder. I produce a fair number of DVD:s each month ( mixing video and still-picture shows ). Using a software MPEG encoder takes alot of time and doesn' really encourage you to experiment with the settings - I mean there are only 24 hrs / day ;-)

I do really like Vegas, but I can learn to like Premiere Pro if I have to - and the gain is maybe 10 hrs rendering time / project.

One thing that surprises me abit is the lack of ANY HW support for Vegas, such a good program should get more attention from the HW vendors!

Best regards,

Lars Siden

[Rob Lohman]

You are right on your remarks, althought I've not encountered
that much performance loss (15x) with my work, but it all depends
I guess.

The reason I think there isn't any (much?) HW support for Vegas
yet is because the application is only now getting very popular,
and it is already very fast, ofcourse (faster than Premiere in
my humble opinion with the main editing job). I saw from the
other thread you were having speed problems with the median
filter. I haven't used that one yet, so that might explain why I'm
getting better results?

I didn't know the Raptor also supports EDIUS & AE, that certainly
makes the product more interesting. You say that their DV codec
is better as well, but do keep in mind that Vegas is *not* using
the Microsoft codec and it is regarded as very good by many.

HW mpeg encoding is certainly interesting. Asus (or Aopen?) is
coming with an USB product that accepts a firewire input and
then can realtime encode that to mpeg.

Anyways, I haven't really worked with a lot of HW cards so I
can't really answer your originally question as to which card
would be interesting for you. I hope someone else will chime
in for that.

Good luck on your search!

[Arnaldo Paixao]

Hi Lars.

I have a Matrox RT-X100 and been very happy with it.

Works with Premiere 6.5 and Premiere Pro.

Renders in real time your avi files to MPEG-2 for DVD authoring.

Will give you lots of very good looking transitions and video effects in real time. You can tweak and completely change the included transitions. You can go to the Matrox site and download more.

It has a Firewire port, S-Video and composite, and audio in/out.
The analog video and audio ports are in a break box that you can put close to your equipment rack.

Here in Portugal they sell a striped down version (no software) wich is much cheaper, look for that.

Best regards,
Arnaldo

[Tim Borek]

<<<-- Originally posted by Rob Lohman : You are right on your remarks, althought I've not encountered
that much performance loss (15x) with my work, but it all depends
I guess.

The reason I think there isn't any (much?) HW support for Vegas
yet is because the application is only now getting very popular,
and it is already very fast, ofcourse (faster than Premiere in
my humble opinion with the main editing job).
I didn't know the Raptor also supports EDIUS & AE, that certainly
makes the product more interesting. Anyways, I haven't really worked with a lot of HW cards so I
can't really answer your originally question as to which card
would be interesting for you. I hope someone else will chime
in for that.

Good luck on your search! -->>>
Canopus makes a new card called ACEDVio that ships with Vegas. Canopus claims the card is "compatible" with just about every popular NLE program, but my concern is that "compatible" just means I/O and not hardware acceleration for transitions, FX, etc. Does anyone have experience with the ACEDVio? I use MediaStudio Pro 6.5 and 7, which is software based RT. I'm getting ready to buy a new, fast P4 system, and I'm wondering what benefits, if any, I might get from an ACEDVio card.

T.J. Borek