Why Buy a $3k Computer to Edit a 1k Camera?

[Ryan P. Green]

Just a heads-up that you don't need a HD-DVD burner to move your files around on shiny discs. DVD Studio Pro is quite happy burning high-def h.264 files onto standard 4.7 GB red-laser discs. HD-DVD players and macs can read them with no problem, once I find my install discs for final cut studio (DVDSP took up too much space on my drive) I'll burn one and see if I can play it on a straight xbox 360 (which, thanks to yesterday's software update, can play straight h.264 files off a disc or drive. I can confirm that it works fine.)

[Kevin Shaw]

Originally Posted by Ralph Bowman

Go to any builder of HDV editing computers like Guy Graphics or B and H and look at the specs and then the price. No one sells an HDV editing computer with compression boards for under $3000. The price is more like $6000. Why? because a $1500 computer is inefficient, complete with workarounds and crashes and render rage sessions.

Dedicated editing systems are expensive by nature so they can offer optimal performance, but you can edit HDV effectively now on any decent dual-core computer with the right software. Such computers start around $1000 or so and you could push the cost below that mark if you had to. The key is finding software which can handle HDV well, which may require something better than consumer-priced programs. But Pinnacle Studio Plus 11 for $99.99 says it suppors HDV editing and HD DVD output (using standard DVDs), so that's a good starting point.

And can you hand Aunt Tillie your Hi DEf DVD to see your kids little league game? She will look at you with fish eyes and wonder if it will make a good coaster. Because she does not live in the world of PS3's...

If "Aunt Tillie" owns an HDTV, which is fairly common these days, you can just take your HDV camera over to her house and play the video from that using a component cable. If she doesn't have an HDTV, make a standard widescreen DVD and let her enjoy the footage from there.

My point is money. To be up to date and be able to communicate this wonderful new technology takes more money than the general public has at this time...So HDV is a nice dream for gear heads and videophiles...but for the general public?

It's not money that's the problem: it's the two competing HD disc formats and the sense that there isn't a compelling reason to upgrade from SD DVD players. Where I live many people either already own an HDTV or are thinking of getting one, but hardly anyone has bought an HD player yet. That's not because of money, since you can buy an HD DVD player for as little as $299 now. A recent rumor is that Wal-mart has ordered 2 million HD DVD players to be sold at this price or lower, so apparently they think the general public is ready for this.

[Joey Atilano]

I have a 3.2ghz intel with 1 gig of ram on a 2 year old computer and I edit HDV just fine. Its about 3-5 times realtime to render but its not to bad.

I play my hd videos on my PS3 from DVD data disks, usb drive or copy them to the hard drive. The PS3 plays m2t's and AVC files, one note if I render to the blu-ray format in Vegas 7 the PS3 won't recognize it.

[Wes Vasher]

I edit DVCProHD (transcoded from HDV) on my seven year old G4. G4s like mine are going for about $200 on eBay right now. That's economical HD editing for you! :)

[George Ellis]

Originally Posted by Peter J Alessandria

Ralph's right guys. I'm going to return my HV20 and pull out my JVC VHS camcorder circa 1991 and get real. What was I thinking?
(BTW - I also have a $1500 PC that edits HDV flawlessly and renders SD mpeg2 at 2X realtime, plus previews HDV full screen on a 32"LCD HDTV [$699 6 mos ago]. My HDV-to-SD DVD's look great on my 42" plasma [$1799 2 1/2 yrs ago]) (Hmmm, maybe I should really get real and go back to my Sanyo 20" CRTV too while I'm at it.)

You too? Funny, I did all the editing of a wedding on my older dual 3.06 Xeon in 1080i with minimal stress. The longest part was creating the M2V and AC3 files. The 1080i to 480i M2V to M2V/AC3 conversion did take a little longer though. My new system is faster but that project was done.

[Joe Marques]

Originally Posted by George Ellis

To play on the PS3, it would need to be H.264, VC1, or MPEG-2 (enhanced) in the correct format to play as HD. The PS3 will not play HD-DVD format as it is Blu-Ray. Different file format in how the startup and menuing is done from what I have seen.

You might be able to play the M2T on the PS3, but you may have to copy it to the hard drive. Don't have one and have not heard that anyone tried, but it might work.

I play the M2T, burned as a data DVD, right from the disk. No nood to move to HD.

[Erik CaPaul]

Originally Posted by Joe Marques

I play the M2T, burned as a data DVD, right from the disk. No nood to move to HD.

I copy some of my favorite AVCHD files (.mt2s or .mts) directly to my PS3 hdd. It plays them great.

Erik

[Terence Krueger]

if you own a digital SLR, you know that the camera is by far the most inexpensive part of the kit. video, particularly HD is even worse.

editing worthy pc's for hdv start around $1000 us for the hardware, but that number ends up looking tiny compared to the software and all the other toys you might want to make the system usefull.

i think you really need to analyze the expense list before you set out. its pretty easy to hit the $10000 mark eveing using a low priced camcorder. its just one small part of the system.

people (here) arent picking the hv20 because its cheap. they are doing it because its cheap, and really really good. so, it may save you 3k over a more pro level cam, but you cant be misguided into thinking that somehow everything else costs 75% less.

anyhow,
the system we set up is a dual core amd 2.6 (5000+) with 2gb ram, black magic card, 19" widescreen lcd, 2 500gb drives, and cost in the range of $1200. all the software that runs on it is prolly over $5000.

terence.

[Richard Mather]

I guess I am pretty much mr general public. I just got a hv10 for family stuff and beyond a sound background in stills photography and I have no special affiliation to video. I do have a reasonable PC but not 3k's worth. I would think its probably closer to being worth 1250 these days. It has no issues editting HDV, right now I just ran through 3 x 1 hr tapes to cut into a 15 minute clip. All in I rekcon maybe 4 hours work tops. No more then I would have spent converting and balancing pictures from an hour long shoot.
Sure right now if you want to watch it on a plasma \ lcd screen then you have to lay out some serious dosh on the screen, but I would imagine if you cant get a video card to output hdmi direct to the screen then you can do it via standard dvi cable which quite a few screens do accept. Yes if you wished to burn it to Bluray or HDDVD you need a burner and a player etc, but its not a requirement if you can site a pc within a cable run of your screen. Or just get a dell 24 inch lcd.
Until the screens drop more in price I probably wont be watching it on anything other than my pc at hd res, however, in a few years time when I do get a screen I will know that for a modest investment in a great camera I have much treasured footage of 'da kidz' in HD rather then SD. Sure I should wait a while until I get the full setup and things settle down, but for now I can record \ edit and watch it on relatively cheap kit.
You want scary, go buy a 40k digital back to go on a 5k body with an 8k lens and a 2k prism finder, then buy yourself a spare of each and a range of lenses, then a peli case to carry them, then insure them, then get your amex broken anytime you try take them on a plane.
I understand your point, however I would respectfully disagree. Im no huge fan of canon but I respect their kit, and a 1k HD camera really made my year. I couldnt justify blowing 8-10k on a video camera for personal use but the HV10 has meant that treasured memories are now stored at 4x the resolution lol. The editting part is easy, even my slow laptop can do it, and viewing in the lounge, yeah maybe it has to wait a while.
Personally Im fairly stoked that I have a justification for buying a ps3, its the cheapest bluray player ;) An argument even the Mrs has to accept.

edit: re software, adobe premier elements (70 bucks from frys who seriously need to open a store in the UK!,) vlc (which is free) and mpeg streamclip ( also free ) seems to be all I have needed so far.

Also I have a server with a gigabit connection (legacy from a previous job) and most of the family are on over 10mbit (mostly 12-24 mbit) broadband so streaming highdef video over the net is great.

[Tony Tibbetts]

I have an iMac core 2 duo with 2 gigs of ram. It cost me around $1900 it edits HDV just fine.

[George Ellis]

BTW, I have an accelerator card that costs $290 (I bought towards the top end). The GPU is finally being used to its potential. Matrox has used that formula for awhile. Pinnacle with ATI's partnership built acceleration around the GPU and others are starting to lean towards limited GPU acceleration. Hopefully, there will be more implementations. With the new Physics accelerators coming, more power for crunching will be on tap that is sold in such quanities that the price will be cheap.

[Sam Ren]

Just ordered $400 worth of computer parts for a dual core setup and hoping to edit hdv with that... ive been using a 2.8ghz p4 and editing smoothly with vegas7+cineform.. imagine a dual core computer??? :P

-Sam~!

[Bert Na]

First, an expensive computer is hardly necessary to handle HDV files, but it may be a nice thing to have. Just like you don't need to buy a $40k fully loaded truck to tow your $15k boat, but it'd be nicer...

[Sam Ren]

Thats right if you shop for specific things for your needs you'll be fine with HDV..

I went for a athlon x2 3800 cpu+cheap motherboard with sata 2 slots / a $80 video card / 2gb ram (from newegg kingston's are $34 a gig) / 2 16mb sata ii hdds ( $75bux each for 320gb seagate baracudas from newegg) ended up at $4xx.00 ... OR i could go and spend 3.5k-10k on a turnkey system from b and h and be fine too... but the key is make what $$ you have work for you... i just spent 3.5k on a canon xh a1 and thats all the $$ i had left after that so i did what i had to do heh :).. anyways with software like cineform around you can get away with alot more.. cineform neo hdv is only $249 and will save you from having to buy a 3k+ system.. if you already have vegas u can download a demo from them..

-Sam~!

[Noah Yuan-Vogel]

In response to the first post on this thread... What?? Are you talking about now? not 3 years ago? HDV is quite editable on pretty much any computer that is currently available for $300+. Yes editing software costs money but it always has... so I'm not sure I get the problem? Is it that you think HD distribution formats arent there? HD DVD and bluray are hardly there, I agree, although not as expensive as you make them out to be. But who's to say you cant burn a regular DVD that contains both HD content playable on a computer and NTSC content viewable in a DVD-Video standalone player? Also, 1080p computer monitors can be had for well under $1000. My HDTV is 1080p native and cost under $900 several months ago. And 1920x1200 computer monitors are available for under $500. If you need a $1500 accelerator card to edit hdv you are doing something wrong. As with all technologies, HDV will eventually give way to another widely used standard consumer video format which will not be AVCHD or probably anything youve yet seen. It's likely HDV will be the consumer video format of choice for consumers until new HD or greater standards come out, and as HD is still finding its way into households, that could be quite a while away.