John,
When i was talking to Tiger about my build we discussed the P6T, P6T Deluxe, and P6T Deluxe V2 boards and the V2 has no SSD support because according to Tiger, they had issues with the SSD controller on the to previous versions of this series. Since I wasn't planning to do SSD I didn't seek clarification but you might want to run a few searches and see what the issues were. It might be something simple like limited compatibility of drives which is easy to work around, or something more complex like controller instability.
Harm,
Thank you for that link. That information was similar to what the Tiger reps told me but with much more information and specifics.

Sean and Joe,
Agree with you on this one. They are great for mobile editing but in general cost doesn't justify performance upgrades, yet.

Someone's going to have to explain this to me. Specifically, 'scratch' disk for what, exactly? And why should this only affect 'mobile editing' (ediitng on a laptop?)?

I'm remembering Windows swap files, but these days those shouldn't be used much at all in a normal system. Vegas uses temp folders, but I can't imagine any measurable speed increase from putting one on an SSD. Quick, someone try it!

All the constant re-writing can be hard on HDD, with solid-state re-writing is not such an issue. Also they are less prone to shock damage from being moved around, small drops, and the like. I don't know if there are noticeable performance upgrades as much as reliability upgrades because they don't get worn out the same way...

Gigabyte EX-58 UD4P board 12 GB DDR3 with 2.66 Ghz Corei7 Quad
(Hyperthreading equals 8 logical cores)
15 K RPM system drive and SATA2 storage.
Vegas 64 bit on Vista 64 bit Ultimate - tweaked for lean and mean.
I am finding that 95 percent of all my renders are at LEAST half real time if not faster regardless of the number of layers of HD. Nothing seems to slow this system down in the least.
I have not done any accurate or controlled tests, perhaps because the machine is just like a giant can of bug spray now, just point it at anything and yell "KILL!" and that's what it does, so render time just isn't even an issue anymore.

It doesn't matter what I throw at it, the video just melts under the giant rendering oven like butter.

Perhaps I am not a facts and figures person (more like colors and shapes) but all I know is that this system is NHRA ready.

Oh, and preview...it's just full frame rate no matter what you throw at it.
Nothing slows it down.

Jeff H in TX

Totally off-topic here but I just wanted to give a big welcome to Jeff.
I know him well from another Vegas forum and am sure the folks here are going to benefit from his years of experience and love of Vegas.

My experience with the i7 is different than Jeff's. Preview is somewhat better, but still pales in comparison to Grass Valley. With panning and cropping of photos preview is still jittery, add some film effects and it's little better than with an old quad core.

Rendering times are great. I've rendered hour long projects with color correction in 12 minutes. Preview sucks as it alway has with Vegas. I have run overclocked to 4.0 and no difference. AVCHD is absolutely terrible, and multicam forget AVCHD. I know AVCHD is not for editing, but still.

I love Vegas. But the preview is still pretty poor, and the i7 cannot make up for it. My video resides on a raid 0 array built with velociraptors, FWIW. Overall I am used to Vegas' shortcomings, and still love it and work with it 12 hours a day.

Ah, the joys of a new system that works!

I haven't written a review that glowing since I got a 25mhz accelerator for our Amiga. Wow! Real Time video! Well, almost.

I suppose I already mentioned why my own enthusiasm is muted. My old 32 bit Vista install really hasn't taken to replacing the motherboard too kindly, so I can't wait for 64 bit Win7 so I can do a new install.

OTOH, Folding@home is blazing away, using all 192 cores in my GTX 260! Why can't Vegas do that????

Really, come back when we get faster than real time AVCHD. Of course, at this rate, by then we'll all be making the transition to 3D, which will slow us down again by 2X.

Wow that sounds like a beast of a system. I would also side with Jeff Harper and say that my i7 system hasnt made a dramatic difference to my preview. Preview Auto is pretty much 35 the whole time, unless I start adding Magic Bullet. Best Full only hits 35 with straight un altered footage.

Does anyone think the Vegas guys will come out with a ahrdware based alternative for preview?

I have always heard that hardware ANYTHING for vegas is strictly off limits in order to maximize the compatibility & platform install base (and to limit some of the code complexity).

Joe, your complaint is my biggest gripe about Vegas. There must be reasons for it not being designed with GPU acceleration, I'm sure, but being on the outside of Sony as we are it is frustrating to contemplate, not knowing the reason. Nero, of all programs, has it. I personally don't install Nero or use it but once every six months, but their 3D DVD menu templates are awesome also. Not quite sophisticated looking enough to be used for my work, but it just make me wonder why Vegas/DVD Architect can't step up. The pitiful 3rd grade-looking templates are an embarrasment.

Ooops, sorry for the rant and going off topic!

Jeff Harper - I went hunting but can't find your specs (this thread has gotten quite long.) Can you remind me which motherboard and ram you opted for in your build?

Alastair- Same question.

Thanks.

I just did a multicam project with *.mts files and had no problems with it at all. I used Infiniticam.

One thing I have noticed. If I put camera 1 video on the timeline and have the properties set to the same that it is I can preview it with 'Best-Full' and get full playback speed. If I were to choose a setting such as 720x480 then I am lucky to get 1-5 fps. The slow down is then significant!

It is important to make sure that the project properties match the AVCHD properties or playback may be poor.

Also, in spite of CPU requirements I noticed that a faster hard drive seems to help a lot as well. I don't know how to explain that but if I use a slower drive the playback and even render will suffer.

I do not have the specs of my new system on here yet but one thing I did differently this time than in the past is I did not buy the cheepest components for my system. I did not buy the most expensive either. I simply made sure that the entire system would be reasonably fast with good components so there would be no bottlenecks.

I am not assuming anything about your system. I do not know what you have. All I know is that my system and the system(s) of certain others give the desired results and then some.

Something to consider. As long as there are those who CAN get the desired results then Vegas cannot be considered the culprit for those who don't! Sorry, but one needs to take a good look at their system including other installed softwares and apps and determine what it is about their system that is making it not like the ones that do get the results. Of course and as I said, there is also how one uses Vegas and if they use it in such a way to get the results or not.

That's my 2.1 cents worth...

Danny Fye
VidMus Video - Music Productions

Danny, I use 15k Velociraptors in Raid 0 array for my scratch drive and dedicate it to nothing but the video I'm working on. Workstation is pretty capable, i7 overclocked at 3.3 currently. I've run it up to 4.0 but for renders my heat went through the roof so I backed off to where I am.

Bryan: I have the Asus PT6 (or is it P6T) Version 2 and I forget the ram, but it was inexpensive and fast. The board is the most stable I've ever worked with.

Just got my new computer this week from CyberPowrePC.com. It's ASUS P6T Deluxe V2, iCore 920 and 12GB RAM. It's fast and stable.

Bryan, I think Alastair has a Dell.