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Editing system questions.
Alright so the other day I purchased a custom computer at an auction. Turns out it wasn't as great as I thought it was but it does have some good features. The processor is an Intel single core 800mgz 64bit. Has only 2gig of DDR. Mother board is an asus socket 775 with 4 eSATA ports and 4 memory slots. Sound card isn't anything great it just has a TV tuner and S-video cables hanging off the back. Has a DVD player and burner and the case is pretty awesome too. Only down side is that it didn't come with a hard drive. Take a guess on what I got it for :)
So of course me being into video, I'm going to make it able to edit video. Doing that and keeping it cheap might be a problem. here are the things I am unsure of and need advice on. 1. Will that processor do the job? 2. How could I use the tv tuner and S-video cables to my advantage for video editing? 3. Hard drive configuration. I would like a minimum of a teribite with a second very fast hard drive for my operating system and programs. But should I go two 500gig raid1 or just get the cheaper 1tb WD 32mb cash hard drive and still run my OS off a faster HD? 4. two 19" Samsung 5ms monitors for $200 sound cheap? |
Answers
1. No, too slow for anything modern 2. Can't do much with them unless you are going to connect a SD TV to the computer. That's about all that card is good for. 3l I'll let others address that. 4. Nope. Sounds small. E Specially if you plan on working with HD I've got 2 22" And would really like 2 24s and one 30 or so. |
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That could be correct, but did you take into consideration the cost of disposing of the rest? So $ 30 for the whole bunch, add $ 60 for disposal and your cash layout is around $ 90.
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Disposal? i'm not following you..
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You can't just throw the old unusable stuff into the trash -- you must pay to have it disposed of properly. Toxic stuff in landfills = bad. Most communities in the US and elsewhere worldwide frown on this and tend to prohibit it.
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or I could just sell it..
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Well it has a DVD burner and player.
I forgot to mention that the processor is an Intel 3gig 800mhz processor. |
Ok, so maybe it's worth $100. Now you only need $1500 to finish up.
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Earlier you said it was an 800 "mgz" so I think we all took that to mean 800 MHz, which can't really edit anything. 3GHz would be okay for DV but not HDV. Is there a 3.8GHz? Even so, a single-core at that clock speed wouldn't handle HDV well. My guess is you mean a 3GHz chip with an 800MHz FSB and/or 800MHz RAM. Either way, too slow for HDV. In any event, your best bet is to go to the web pages for your editor of choice and look at their system requirements, and go "one louder" in every category. |
Yea sorry I meant 3ghz 800mhz FSB.
So that processor is junk for HDV editing eh? Got a suggestion to get me going? I would like to keep this fairly cheap because I have other things I need to make room for in the budget. I need a monitor (or two). Tigerdirect has a sale for 19" Samsung monitors going for $99 with a mail in rebate. That sounds awesome to me. Two of those for $200 VS one 24" for $200? I need Hard drives. I just dont know the best configuration for HDV. The motherboard supports DDR2 and has 4 slots. I think it can handle it. I'll get the actual part number and look up the specs. A RAM upgrade...and i'm set Thats all I can really think of. Thanks for the help, Terry. |
Why are you building a system for HDV when that technology is quickly fading for the horizon? It's like going out and buying a new SD TV and telling us what a great deal you got.
The 2 monitors are probably going to be ok. I don't know the specs on them, but if you're doing this on the cheap, I am sure you'll live with the limitations. HDV isn't very demanding on the drives. Any modern 7200k RPM drive should be fine. Just get two large ones if you can't buy 3. Does the machine have firewire? How are you planning on getting the video into the computer? How do you plan on getting the HD video OUT of the computer? What will you master to? And what will your finished product be? Does the system have any audio capability? Is that important to you? |
Perrone's points are all really well-taken, but let's just assume for the moment that HDV and AVCHD aren't going anywhere soon, even if there are no new HDV cams on the horizon. As an editing format you could do worse than building a machine that can handle those formats.
There are already plenty of threads on system recommendations for editing various flavors of HD, especially over at the HD editing forum. Mo' power = Mo' betta. A year ago when I built my system, the ideal chips were Quad-Core Xeons, two if you could afford them. Now the hot chip is the i7. So my system is two quad Xeons, 20 GB RAM, a 10K Velociraptor system drive, and 7 x 1TB video drives in RAID3 plus hot spare (5TB capacity) for projects and raw CFHD video captures. I also have four x 2TB eSATA external drives for various scratch disks, but those aren't strictly necessary. I know you've visited at least one of these threads already but they might be worth reviewing: http://www.dvinfo.net/conf/high-defi...ter-build.html http://www.dvinfo.net/conf/high-defi...do-i-need.html http://www.dvinfo.net/conf/high-defi...mputer-hd.html http://www.dvinfo.net/conf/general-h...ing-avchd.html As with everything, compromise will always be the order of the day. While you can get good value and impressive bang for the buck these days, cheap and high-performance do not usually go together. So it's really a matter of how much performance and capability you are comfortable paying for. |
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Terry, you pretty much get what you pay for with computer equipment. After researching this and other forums for over a year and listening to Harm as well as others I ordered a custom built computer from avadirect for about $1,600 to edit P2 DVCPROHD material. In addition to that I bought Edius 5 with the HDSPARk HDTV output card from videoguys($750) and a 19" Samsung HDMI output viewing monitor from Frys for about $290. I now have a decent system that will last me for several years. In case you are interested here are my computer specs. I feel I spent a reasonable amount of money for performance.
ANTEC, Nine Hundred Two Black Mid-Tower Case w/ Window, ATX, No PSU CORSAIR, CMPSU-650TX TX Series Power Supply, 650W, 80 PLUS®, 24-pin ATX12V EPS12V, SLI Ready ASUS, P6T Deluxe V2, LGA1366, Intel® X58, 6400 MT/s QPI, DDR3-2000MHz (O.C.) 24GB /6, PCIe x16 SLI CF /3, SATA 3 Gb/s RAID 5 /6, HDA, GbLAN /2, FW /2, ATX, Retail INTEL, Core™ i7-920 Quad-Core 2.66GHz, LGA1366, 4.8 GT/s QPI, 8MB L3 Cache, 45nm, 130W, EM64T EIST VT XD, Retail CORSAIR, 3GB (3 x 1GB) XMS3 PC3-12800 DDR3 1600MHz CL9 (9-9-9-24) 1.65V SDRAM DIMM, Non-ECC SAPPHIRE, Radeon™ HD 4830 575MHz, 512MB GDDR3 1800MHz, PCIe x16 CrossFire, VGA+DVI, HDMI, Retail WESTERN DIGITAL, 160GB WD Caviar® SE (WD1600AAJS), SATA 3 Gb/s, 7200 RPM, 8MB cache WESTERN DIGITAL, 1TB WD Caviar® Black™ (WD1001FALS), SATA 3 Gb/s, 7200 RPM, 32MB Cache LITE-ON, iHAS324 Black 24x DVD±RW Dual-Layer Burner w/ Smart Erase, SATA, Retail SABRENT, CRW-UINB Black 65-in-1 Card Reader/Writer Drive, 3.5" Bay, Internal USB CREATIVE, Sound Blaster® X-Fi Titanium, 7.1 channels, 24-bit 96KHz, PCIe x1 MICROSOFT, Wired Keyboard 500, Black, PS/2 MICROSOFT, Optical Wheel Mouse, PS/2 + USB, Black MICROSOFT, Windows Vista Home Premium 32-bit Edition w/ SP1, OEM WARRANTY, Silver Warranty Package (3 Year Limited Parts, 3 Year Labor Warranty) |
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Thanks for working through this with me! Terry. |
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LG W2253TQ-PF 22" Widescreen LCD Monitor - 1080p, 1920x1080, 50000:1, 2ms, 16:9, DVI, VGA, Black at TigerDirect.com Quote:
I would also like to know a good format for presenting a reel to say a producer (haha) and maybe submitting to a film festival. If all else fails i'll just make some DVDs for myself and the cast and crew. I suppose I would need a BluRay burner for that, but wouldn't the people watching my film need a BluRay player to get that quality? Mark, thanks for positng your system. Why a single 160G HD with the 8MB cache? Adam, That is an impressive machine.... What do you think about a 60G Solid State drive for the OS? Again, thank you all for the help! |
SSD's are still overpriced in comparison to hard disks. Hard to beat in read performance for single disks, but write performance, specially after several months of use, is disappointing. But technical progress and better controllers in SSD's, as well as declining prices may make them feasible in 1 or 2 years. If you are on a budget, forget them for the time being.
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I have no experience with SSDs, so I will, as always, defer to Harm...
BTW, yes, to play BDs you need a BD player and you usually have to burn them in a BD burner. As has been posted here and there, it is possible to burn short Blu-Ray material to standard discs but you still need a BD burner and BD player. As to the future of HDV, it's hard to argue with anything Perrone says, but it's important to understand that the "death" of this format really applies to the retail supply chain only. I suspect many people will be using this format for years to come, just as some consumers are still using VHS, Hi8 and other formats no longer really supported by new models. They're still making and selling those tapes, even if there are no new cams or decks on the horizon. But that's really sort of a moot point as any PC you'd want to configure for video right now would need to at least be able to handle AVCHD or better, so the advice to just get the best you can afford is solid. |
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It is important to understand how your campus projects. Or if they have any means of projecting HD at all. Quote:
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What is HD? HD = Video file that is 1920x1080 or 1280x720 and encoded in one of a million ways. Popular encoding methods for HD Files: WMV = Plays with Windows Media Player software. Standard on an PC Mpeg4 = Plays with Quicktime, VLC, and many other free players on PC and Mac AVC = Same/similar to Mpeg4 and also used as the file type to burn BluRay. Mpeg2 = ONLY format suitable for SD DVD, and formerly used for BluRay disks. Generally needs a specialized reader. Popular ways to deliver HD Files: BluRay = Standard for Optical delivery of HD material. Need a BluRay burner to make them, need a BluRay reader to view. USB Thumb Drive = Small storage format that plugs into any laptop or desktop PC or Mac. SDHC = Small card based format that fits natively into many laptops, or with a USB adapter, can be used on nearly any PC or Mac CompactFlash = Similar to SDHC but larger, and at the top end, faster. Standard DVD = You can't fit a lot of BluRay media onto standard DVDs because of their size, but you can write them with a standard DVD burner. There are two ways to handle this. One, you can burn a standard data disk that can be played on any PC or Mac. You simply create one of the file types above at a size that will fit on the disk. The other way to do this is to burn these using BluRay burning software. Not all machines support reading plain DVDs encoded like BluRays. The Playstation does, and a a small number of BluRay machines do. This is the least compatible way of getting BluRay out there and is really false economy now as BluRay Discs have gotten pretty cheap. When they were $30, this made sense. Now that you can get 25GB BluRay disks for $2.50, it's a lot harder to justify. Keep in mind that if I encode my HD source media to an Mpeg4/AVC file, I can put that file on my hard drive and play it as HD. I can put it on a plain DVD and play it as HD. I can put it on an SDHC card and play it, I can burn it to a real BluRay disc and put it in a BluRay player and play it, etc. The media is just the delivery container. It says NOTHING about the file, or the quality of the file contained on it. |
Terry,
A few months ago I ordered a Studio XPS Core i7 based computer from Dell for $1100. Had 6GB RAM an ATI graphics card (not the best...but...it works!) with 512MB on board, a 500GB internal drive, and a standard DVD burner. And more. A couple of days ago one of the email offers I keep getting from them offered essentially the same machine with a 640GB hard drive for $958. Some NLE packages that will take your video project from capture/import through editing and on to DVD or Blu-ray authoring (if you have the Blu-ray burner) cost around $100 or so. I would waste no more time fiddling with obsolete components and therefore "trap yourself in the dust" left by the rest as they move with technology. Oh...Both the Dell I bought and the current offer came with a 21.5 inch widescreen monitor. |
Ok let me see if I understand this. What I am doing is transfering a analog information from my tape to a digital signal (high definition digital signal) which can be encoded into WMV, MPEG4, MPEG2 and AVC which are essentially "containers" which only define how the files are stored.
BluRay is standard for HD because you can fit much more information on a BluRay disc than you can a standard DVD. But to distribute them, people will need a BluRay player..? I could encode my footage as a MPEG4 or AVC file and play it as HD right off of my computer or put it on a DVD and play it as HD (but the file can't exceed the DVD size) So. My best bet for showing this film in HD in my university's theatre is keep it on my computer unless of course they have a BluRay player which can be projected on the big screen. If so, I should need a BluRay burner. Or I could put my film on a thumb drive or external hard drive and show it on a projector from someone else's computer. Well my computer build I hope can reflect some of the informaiton layed out by everyone here. I have chosen the following equipment to work with Sony Vegas 9. 1. Core i7 920 2. Biostar TPower X58A Motherboard (Biostar TPower X58A Motherboard - Intel X58, LGA 1366, ATX, Audio, PCI Express 2.0, CrossFire Ready, SLI Ready, Dual Gigabit LAN at TigerDirect.com) 3. 1TB Western Digital 7200rpm 32mb cache 4. OCZ Tri channel memory DDR3 PC15000 (3GB) 5. Monitor. I chose (LG W2253TQ-PF 22" Widescreen LCD Monitor - 1080p, 1920x1080, 50000:1, 2ms, 16:9, DVI, VGA, Black at TigerDirect.com) I compaired the specs to the Dell UltraSharp 2009W that you gave me the link to and the LG provides 50,000:1 Dynamic contrast ratio, 2ms response time and 1080p Full HD resolution where as the Dell has a 2000:1 ratio and 5ms response time. Is there something I am missing? The sixth item on my list was a super fast hard drive for my operating system but I can't find a decently priced one. Then there would be a bluray burner but as they are around $200, I will hold off for now. Sound decent? |
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Just a warning on the Hard drive. HD takes up a LOT of room. HDV like your camrea is HIGHLY compressed. And when you put it on your computer you can either choose to edit in that highly compressed format, or you can expand it into a format that is more suitable for editing. If you choose the later, you'll be looking at about 1GB per minute or more. Uncompressed HD is 550GB per hour, but not many people try to edit in uncompressed. But it would not be unusual to see something like 100GB per hour or so for a good editing format. Plan accordingly. Quote:
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Nice job, Terry -- looks like you've got this pretty much nailed. Just a couple of minor and possibly irrelevant clarifications:
The tape from your cam is digital, too, not analog (assuming we're talking DV, HDV or even Dig8. VHS, Hi8, etc were analog). But doesn't really change anything you said. There is, however, some debate about how fast your system drive should be. Remember, your NLE (Vegas) will likely be on that drive as well, and maybe even your project files, so there will be a lot going on. Many people feel it's necessary to have a really fast system drive for that reason -- mine is 10K so I obviously drank that Kool-Aid. Maybe foolishly. Anyway, something to think about. |
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The outline for my system that I have currently is just to get me going. I definately plan on upping my Hard drive space in the future. As for now, I am building a system that is prepared to take on any challenge I may encounter. Maybe not ANY, but atleast be equipt with equipment that I can add to in the future and the machine still be adequate.
So my current build's main stay is the Core i7, the 22" LG monitor, the Biostar mother board, 8 gig of RAM, the 1tb WD hard drive and a seperate hard drive for my OS. When more money is free I will add another hard drive, maybe more RAM and a second monitor. The problem now is that my money is being spread out into different projects all in the effort to make a film. This little system will cost me quite a bit of that budget but I feel it is necessary. The only thing I haven't added to this system's cost is Vegas itself which retail is $600. I am also considering Cineform so that I can remove pulldown from the 24pf of the HV30. |
Why would you opt for 8 GB of RAM on an i7 system, when the only sensible options are 6 or 12 GB with DDR3?
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My C: (system) drive is small but fast, because all I have on it are the OS and Programs, and as this is an editing-only dedicated machine, there's not a lot on it other than Windows, Premiere and Cineform. I have the swap file on a different drive. Perrone's advice, above, is best: "the OS and Vegas on one, the original [captured raw video] files on [a second] drive, and render to the third." WRT RAM and Harm's question above, I think many people are confused because previously, RAM always seemed to be installed in multiples if 2 or 4, but with the new i7 it seems to be in multiples of 3. I'm not smart enough to know why. |
Adam,
I think I know you somewhat and you are intentionally inviting me to add some background info for others. Well, I fell for it. You succeeded. On computers, memory was either organized as DDR2, dual channel memory or lately as DDR3, triple channel memory. In the old ages we had DDR or single channel memory. Compare that to a road, single channel memory is comparable to a single lane and when you meet another car going in the opposing direction, you have to slow down, get to a bypass and let the other driver pass you. With dual channel memory you get a dual lane for traffic, so one can easily drive on on his designated lane, while a driver from the other side can drive on his lane without delays. A lot of improvement. But still we got traffic jams, so we invented a new approach, triple channel memory or triple lanes in traffic, as we see them in France for example. It makes for better flow of traffic, as it does with better flow of data to and from memory. Currently the most economic memory sticks are 2 GB sticks. On DDR2 (LGA 775) boards that will allow for 4 sticks of 2 GB each, totaling 8 GB. This will allow dual channel/lane operation as designated in the number 2 in DDR2. On DDR3 (LGA 1366) boards that will allow for 6 sticks of 2 GB each, totaling 12 GB. This will allow triple channel/lane operation as designated in the number 3 in DDR3. This is a very simplified approach (and therefore not very accurate for the techies here) that may help to understand the bare basics of memory. BTW, I was asked by my son to help him (mostly it is the other way around) to design a new server for his own use (not business) and he only required VM ESX/ESXi support, so we ended up looking at the HP ProLiant G6 with dual X5570's, 72 GB RDDR3 ECC (18 sticks), 4 FlexNet NIC's, HP Smart Array and separate housing for 6 G SAS SFF disks and iLO capability.....I'll tell you about that by private mail. |
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Adam, I suppose I didn't understand what you mean by your post. Maybe you meant its not necessary to have a super fast system drive? Should I just get a low GB hard drive that spins 7200rpm or..? Something else I forgot to ask about - Graphics card. I have heard that a good one isn't really necessary you just need one better than the onboard for Vegas. |
Terry,
For the boot disk capacity is not really important, anything with 150+ GB will do. It is a waste of space to use a 1 TB disk, when you only have 60-80 GB in use. But the faster the disk is, the better, because during editing the program (in your case Vegas) will need certain DLL's, depending on your editing, Windows will need to perform housekeeping chores and they all need to come from the boot disk. As always it depends on your budget. If you can afford it, get a WD Velociraptor 150, but if that is just a bit much, consider a 7200 RPM 160 G or larger disk. For a graphics card, I am partial to ATI. Most NLE's will not profit much from the top cards. If you do not use 3D applications, nVidia Quadro cards are a waste of money IMO. In a direct comparison ATI usually is a lot cheaper than comparable nVidia cards, so my personal preference would go to an ATI card in the 48xx range, rather than the nVidia GTX 28x/29x range. All of these cards are good, but if you can get a 4890 for $ 200 instead of a GTX 285 for $ 300, consider investing in the ATI and use the saving for another disk. Performance wise you will be hard pressed to notice any difference between these video cards for editing. |
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