Need sage advice in getting right CS5 PC

[Harm Millaard]

Bruce,

HP is notorious for the deviant dimensions of their PSU, that are slightly different than standard PSU's. This makes installing any PSU that you can get on every street corner a very challenging effort and may not work at all. I just hope that the person who offered you to do it, is aware of this weirdness with HP machines.

[Bruce Pelley]

Thanks for that input.

Do you think they did that perhaps intentionally?

Here's a response that I got from another well known video forum which confirms what you wrote!

Pre-built PCs sometimes use PSUs with non-standard dimensions or screw positions for mounting in the case. Measure the physical dimensions of the PSU. Use Newegg or some other website that provides physical dimensions and look at some of the better quality ATX PSUs having an appropriate wattage. Better quality means Thermaltake, Antec, PC Power and Cooling, Silverstone, Seasonic, Corsair, or OCZ, not the cheapest brands. Compare the measurements you took against those for the PSUs you find and see if any are a good match for size. That will tell you if you are likely to find a replacement. Sometimes the aftermarket PSU manufacture's product page will have diagrams that show the position and dimensions of everything. The PSU fan and cables may need be in the same place as the original, if the case is crowded.

[Jeff Dean]

Originally Posted by Bruce Pelley

Need help finding the right CS5 Prem Pro PC. Please help

Gents:

Based on recent developments, I’ve finally decided to have a PC specifically built to for an upcoming upgrade from Premiere Pro CS3.2 to CS5. Since I can’t build it myself, would you please be willing to offer some recommendations for online solutions that are: safe, reliable, reputable, reasonably priced, fair and offer some kind of a guaranty or warranty?

I’m thinking that a custom configured system from one of the major manufacturer would be overly pricey part per part and offer limited choices. My budget is roughly $1,000-1,200.

For parts, (considering I don’t want to spend $1,500 or $2,000 for a top of the line or upper end machine) please list in detail what combination would you choose if you were in my shoes that would meet the following goals/criteria:

It doesn’t have to have the best and speediest components, just be reliable, stable, yield smooth playback quality and render well at a reasonable speed. I’m not a power user by any means so it will receive moderate use, the CPU won’t be maxed out.

I can't offer you advice in your budget range but if you want to spend a little more I would highly recommend having ADK (ADK Video Editing offers, NLE, Video Editing Computer, Video editing computers, Video Editing Workstations, Video Editing PC, Custom Built Computers, Turnkey video computer, Digital Video Editing software, VT5, Toaster, Tricaster, Lightwave, Matrox R) put together your system. I had them put together a CS5.5 system for me this last month and it's spectacular, fairly priced, and comes with great support coverage. I would do it again in a heart beat.

[Peter Rush]

Folks am I missing something here? With an added HDD, Firewire card and Blu-ray writer, this could be a good system no?

Intel Core i7-2600K 3.4GHz Quad Core Processor
Corsair 8GB 1600MHz CL9 DDR3 Vengeance Memory Two Module Kit
Asus P8Z68-V Socket 1155 Motherboard
Noctua NH-U12P SE2 Dual Fan Quiet CPU Cooler
120GB OCZ Vertex 3 2.5" Solid State Drive
2TB Western Digital Caviar Green Hard Drive
CCL Choice NVIDIA GeForce GTX 580 1536MB Graphics Card
LG CH10LS20.AUAU10B 10X Blu-Ray Reader / DVD ReWriter - OEM
Fractal Design Define R3 Computers Case - Black Pearl
700W OCZ ModXStream Pro Modular Power Supply

[Randall Leong]

Originally Posted by Peter Rush

Folks am I missing something here? With an added HDD, Firewire card and Blu-ray writer, this could be a good system no?

Intel Core i7-2600K 3.4GHz Quad Core Processor
Corsair 8GB 1600MHz CL9 DDR3 Vengeance Memory Two Module Kit
Asus P8Z68-V Socket 1155 Motherboard
Noctua NH-U12P SE2 Dual Fan Quiet CPU Cooler
120GB OCZ Vertex 3 2.5" Solid State Drive
2TB Western Digital Caviar Green Hard Drive
CCL Choice NVIDIA GeForce GTX 580 1536MB Graphics Card
LG CH10LS20.AUAU10B 10X Blu-Ray Reader / DVD ReWriter - OEM
Fractal Design Define R3 Computers Case - Black Pearl
700W OCZ ModXStream Pro Modular Power Supply

Peter,

There are a few major drawbacks to that system:

1) There are not enough total drives on that system. Adobe requires a minimum of two drives (one for the OS, one for projects and media). But Premiere Pro performs better with three or more drives (some of them in RAID 0, which I call "AID 0" due to the lack of redundancy).

2) The 2TB WD Green drive that you selected is too slow for use as a media/projects or a pagefile drive. (It is perfectly fine as a backup drive, however.) You will need a couple of true 7200 RPM hard drives. And despite the claim of "variable speed" by WD for its Green drives, all of the Green drives actually spin at a fixed, slow speed (in this case, 5400 RPM).

3) The OCZ ModXStream cannot really provide the full 700W without going way out of the ATX +12V spec in DC output quality. That could kill your system's components very early. It can really only provide 580W while keeping the output within spec. This is because OCZ cheats on this PSU by rating it at its claimed wattage at an internal PSU operating temperature of only 40°C - but most PSUs actually operate normally at internal temperatures closer to 50°C. And higher temperatures are tougher on PSU output quality than are lower temperatures. Go for a known good 80+ Gold certified PSU such as a Corsair AX750.

4) Be advised that Sandforce-based SSDs such as that OCZ Vertex 3 may suffer from the random BSOD issue just running Windows at all. Worse, their performance deteriorates more than most with use - and the only way to fix that would be a complete secure erase and a complete reinstall of the OS and programs. This deterioration of performance may start occurring in as little as a few weeks or even a few days.

In addition to the above, I'd recommend doubling the total amount of RAM from 8GB to 16GB. And the most cost-effective way to do this would be to buy four matched 4GB modules or two 8GB dual-channel kits of the exact same model number and revision. Filling only two of the four DIMM slots might increase gaming performance but actually hinders video editing performance by increasing the overall latency within the memory controller. Prosumer video editing programs like Premiere Pro runs best with all of the DIMM slots filled with double-ranked modules.

[Peter Rush]

Cheers - that's good advice - I'm guessing a solid state drive is really no good for the OS?

[Randall Leong]

Originally Posted by Peter Rush

Cheers - that's good advice - I'm guessing a solid state drive is really no good for the OS?

No, not at all. An SSD is faster - but only for booting into Windows and for launching programs. But once you are already into the editing program, a system with an SSD would not be any faster than an otherwise identical system with a conventional hard drive for the OS and programs. In other words, at current prices you're effectively paying a lot of money just to save a few seconds in boot and program launch times.

And my example above pointed out that there are better choices for SSDs than that Vertex 3, especially in terms of reliability.