Alistair -

Though my eSATA port doesn't smell fried, I have noticed an electrical "pop" each time I connect or disconnect the port (heard through my speakers). I wonder if there's an electrical issue here, some kind of conflict with the internal power of the PC and the external power of the eSATA drive?

Thanks Jeff for clarifying that the problem is not with Vista.

Sam

Jeff,

You have the deluxe board. One thing ASUS did was put some extra chipset heat sink cooling on that version. Maybe that accounts for part of it. I know some people with the same board I have are getting higher overclocks, 3.8 - 4.0. In the future I may play with settings again but for now I am more than happy with the speed of the computer. I think it may be the biggest impact upgrade that I have ever done.

Andy

Videoguys DIY7 Update

Now that Adobe CS4, Avid Media Composer and Sony Vegas support Vista 64 we think the time has come to see how they run on the latest hardware.

Our DIY7 machine is up and running geat. THIS BABY SMOKES!!! We used the following parts:

* Intel i7 920 processor (Quad-core, hyperthreaded)
* Asus P6T Deluxe X58 based motherboard
* 6GB Corsair RAM (6GB total: 3 x 2Gb sticks) running triple channel
* Vista 64 Business
* 1TB System Drive
* G-Speed eS 2TB w/ PCIe card for media storage
* QuadroFX 1700 (we will be testing a new QuadroCX card shortly)

So far we are running Adobe Production Premium CS4 and the results are amazing. We will be installing the new Media Composer 3.5 software later this week.

We hope to have our article published in in a week or two. It will be one of the first new featured articles on the new Videoguys website! Videoguys.com

It was the new website that caused many of the delays in our DIY7 project. The same IT team that builds our DIY machines does our internal IT support and was heavily involved in the launch of our new site.

Gary

Gary,

Nice build. I was curious why you used a 1TB drive for the system drive and external g-speed instead of internal video storage drives. All advice I have read in the past recommends a small 80 to 160 GB drive for system .

Disregard post

We don't recommend the skinny boot drive theory. While it's good for office computing and maybe gamers, it's not so good for video editing. You don;t ever want to have a clogged up C: drive in your NLE workstation.

- When a drive fills up past 75% capacity it gets slower, so I recommend keeping the C: drive big and lean. Lots of space, lots of unused capacity.

- We install a ton of programs. Adobe, Avid, Sony, even consumer titles like Pinnacle. All of these programs now install media, help files, even video clips. The drive fills up faster then you think.

- Sometimes with encoding you'll get faster results when you select a separate physical drive from your media drive (or RAID) for the destination drive. We set up a folder on our C: drive for these files to go. This has to do with the fact that encoding requires both reading and writing simultaneously.

- Lets face it, 1TB is HUGE, but the cost per GB is so small. At 7200RPM and around $129 bucks, why would you go smaller.

Gary

Good evening,

I am using my Dell I7 with vista 64.

I have 8.0c and 8.1

2 weeks ago 8.1 would not capture but 8.0 still did; simple capture with 8.0

With 8.0 It now says that my camera is not connected. I restored my comuter to the other day when it was working. then it said preview not available even though device control worked. It only captured audio, weird.

The computer beeps when i turn the xlh1 on. I also tried my xl2 and zr 800. Nothing is working.


Can you guys save me a horrrible call to Dell!!


Frustrated to be sure!!

The Dell eSATA still doesnt fill me with confidence. At times when I connect it up, I get the feeling that my system is bogging down.
As far as the physical eSATA connection goes, it seems VERY easy to dislodge it just enough to break the connection.

Re the firewire, I ignored others saying the same before only to find out they were right. Try a fresh firewire lead!

Also, the front firewire port for me at least appears to be so deeply recessed that I cant get my lead into it. I use the rear one. Have you tried both ports?

thanks for the thought.

I had a 1394 Hub, I hooked it up to the back and low and behold, all seems well!!

that is a rip off to be sure, brand new computer!!!

At least I am in business.

I will have to check my hd link and 8.1 after i am done capturing.

thanks again!!!

I should a thunk it myself!!

Jeff,

It turned out that my power supply was holding back overclocking more than 3.6. I was using an OCZ 520 watt and switched it with an 850 watt Corsair today. Overclocked it to 3.8 GHz and ran Prime95 for 45 minutes with no problem. Maximum CPU temp. was 65 C. Over the next few days will try to take it up to 3.9, then 4.0, depending on temperatures and stability. Upgrading the power supply was also good in case I want to add a few more hard drives in the next year or two. Although, with the recent purchase of a Thermaltake BlacX Sata docking station I am not sure if I will need to add more inside the case and have them powered up all the time.

Andy

Andy, that is great. I have an 850 also. I actually wonder if mine isn't holding me back from 4.0!

I experimented a little more this morning and was able to get to 3.9 GHz stable with max. core temp. of 68 C. I tried 4 GHz and crashed once during boot and then after running Prime95 for about 5 minutes so I am going to stay at 3.9 GHz and be happy. This chip was a real bargain, considering what you can get out of it.

Andy

Kinda good Morning,



I spoke to soon!!!!!

After capturing two hours of video last night today the HD Link says the device is not hooked up !!!! Vegas says Device not available!!!

I hear the beep when the computer recognizes the camera too. Actually it is a double beep so i wonder if it rreceives the input then beeps immediately as there is no connection?

I have a spare fire wire card on the shelf and I am about ready to install it and see.

Update

I switched the dial to the ext.cont. position and back. hd link recognized the camera but then shut down. I popped up Vegas 8.0c and low and behold all was well so I am capturing.


the camera works fine on my old computer it is just to slow to do the job right.

It seems like if you shock the computer somehow it then recognizes the camera.


Go figure??? Is it a vista issue you think?

More frustrated than ever!!

Dale, it sounds like a motherboard issue, but who knows. One reason I ditched my Dell is it was woefully underpowered, and the onboard controllers were flaky. You might for one thing check into seeing if your model Dell has a more powerful power supply unit available.

Jeff,

I have had a dell p4 for 6 years and it has been super reliable with xp pro. Just not fast enough for todays work.

That is why I went with dell. Perhaps I should have gone with the xps730, which is higher powered for gaming.

If I install a pci fire wire card will it work seperately from the existing one??

I did not have this problem till after I used 8.1 to optimize the 64 bit rendering! I restored prior to that and it worked one time then shut down.

I am going to call Dell tomarrow.

I was wondering if others with the XPS 435 MT were having any similar problems.

Here are a list of the programs I have on it, perhaps one interfers?
Vegas pro 8c & 8.1
seneform
Mercalli
Excaliber
Adobe photoshop

some original programs that came with it but most stuff removed. None of the above causes in my xp dual core amd 4200. Two years back I tried to run vista on this "Vista ready Machine" and never got it right and went back to xp.

Dale, good luck, sounds very frustrating.

A separate PCI Firewire card should not interfere with the built-in one. That would definitely be a good test.

As another test, try a different CABLE.

As a third test, try the camera on a different computer as well.

I see no software in your list that would interfere with the firewire usage.

Edward, Jeff,

I was on the horn with Dell for 2 hours, Rebuilt the software clean start.

I tested every thing several times over, shut her down twice and re started and all was well.

I went to shoot an event from 2 to 4. Got home, fired it up, Same problems!!!!


I opend it up and it has no pci slots!!! only pci express, so the spare card I have can't even go into it!!.

On the phone tomarrow morning!!!

NOT HAPPY

fortunately my job today (has to be done by wednesday) is in DV so i I am working on my old media center, however slo it may be!!

Vista has an auto start up program and i was wondering if that is getting in the way as it wants to use a windows program to capture.

Dale, I have had some issues with Vegas 8.1. Most people haven't, but I had preview issues with it. It was just real flaky for me in several ways.

I tried it on my new i7 and it STILL doesn't work correctly (for me).

If you have 8.1 installed, try looking at that. You might uninstall it and forget about it until you get 8.0c working, and then try it again. Personally with your nice processor you could probably live without 8.1 anyway.

It is likely not the cause of your problems, but at least it would eliminate one possible thing until you get your issues straighted out. I can tell you after trying it for the third time on a third PC I was glad to be rid of it, it never did anything for me.

It appears that in some cases the lower end Dell i7 PCs are built using controllers/MBs with issues.

My previous Dell (it was a workstation) had SATA contoller issues, they came out and replaced my MB twice, my firewire card twice.

They were as helpful as could be, but in the end I determined the PC I had chosen was not built for the demands of video and I built my own. The 350 watt PSU was likely the source of many issues. I know when I replaced the Dell I was awfully happy. I struggled with it for 18 months, and got a lot of good service out of it, but was sure glad to see it go. It was my fault...I shouldn't have chosen such a small system...

HDVSplit utility for HDV capturing with scene split - HDV capture utility

You could try capturing using HDV Split. It gets pretty good press and, I think has the benefit of allowing you to silence audio on capture which then allows you to edit another project in peace!

Dale-An interim solution for the project you are currently working on might be to transfer your captures and project file to an external drive (assuming you have one) and then you could at least edit and render on your newer faster system. Like Jeff, I too found my out of the box Dell systems lacking for my video needs and built my own system around a core 2 quad. I am looking forward to building an i7 soon. I loved the tech support with my old Dell and have been generally impressed with them but to get the system I really need i found DIY was the way to go... Good luck with your system and I hope you get the issues worked out.

Good afternoon,


Well after a couple hours on the horn to Dell we have the computer working like it should. Took a reinstall of everything.

I suspected software conflict within the system.

I have run several tests and it is alright.

I have not reinstalled 8.1, 8.0 does just fine, as some on here mentioned prior!! I should have listened.

I am reinstalling my work oriented softwares one at a time and running tests, so far so good.


This computer renders and burns dvd's so fast it is frightening.

I got my job done today for tomarrows deadline!!!

I burnt my first BR onto a dvd and I must say I love the quality.

Hope things stay in tune!!!

Wow, Dale, that IS good news! Hoooray!

dual boot drives and os
 

While this I 7 is an amazing machine and generally the 64 bit has been good. However, apparently Adobe flash 10 is not supported.

Two questions?

Do any of you have a dual boot system with vista 64 on on and Xp on the other?? (is there any problem doing that or would one need both to be xp or vista?)

I have found some programs do not go into the 86x profile.

If I needed flash which I do on occassions the xp would cover that as well.

Or, how would you run a 32 bit browser on a 64 bit machinne?????

I don't have dual boot Dale.

I want to pass along that the i7 920 is at Microcenter for $229.

Jeff, Nice price but that is in store only!

Sounds like you don't have a Microcenter where you live Norm, but I bet if you keep your eye out it will pop up like that somewhere else.

Also, late this year a whole new architecture is coming that may cause i7 to look pretty anemic, so if you end up waiting, you'll probably be glad you did! I read an article that explained that the i7 is a "tock" (as in tick-tock) architecture. In other words, the i7 is merely the continuation of an already existing technology. The next major release will be all new technology.

I just bought a fan for my procesor, the Thermaltake V7. This thing is huge.

My temps when rendering HD were running about 75-80c, so I figured I needed extra cooling.

For those overclocking: I was running stock cooling at 3.8, my temps were running up to 83C when rendering HD avi file.

I installed a Thermaltake V1 and my temps under load dropped 30 degrees and actually cut my render time in half.

I find it hard to believe that rendering speed increased, it is remarkable. Best $50 I ever spent.

What is funny is that idle temps remained the same, 31C. But under load, what a difference in performance.

Jeff, your correct, there is no Microcenter only a Best Buy. In fact, there are several stores that have gone or are going to go out of business.

Where can I read about this new architecture that is coming? Did they give any indication about when it will arrive?

What do you think of the Thermaltake V7? Did it interfere in any way with your motherboard or case? How much did it drop the temperatures?

Sorry Jeff, I guess you beat me to the trigger about the Thermaltake.

Well Norm, needless to say I'm very happy with it. It fit in my case with room to spare, but my case is a decent size.

My rendering speeds were taking longer than I expected for some reason, and now I know that just because I was running under the max temp for the processor, the high temps were still interfering with the speed of the processor. Also, I was finding that mulitasking during rendering was also a bit bumpy at times. It all seems to have smoothed out now.

Yesterday I was tweaking a project, re-rendering and uploading all day to show previews to a corporate client. Having had this fan would have saved me valuable time, possibly up to an hour or more out of my day.

Jeff,

I ended up lowering my overclock to 3.8 GHz, and lowering some of my voltage settings. I was running fine at 3.9 until I was doing a render in Vegas and burning a Blu-ray and I got a BSOD. It seems to be stable at 3.8 . I think there is more involved than just a low CPU temp because I wasn't going over 70C.

I installed Vegas 8.0c because I was trying NeoScene and it is 32bit and not compatible with Vegas 64 bit. Now I have a problem with DVD Architecture making Blu-ray images. I get an "external renderer not working" message. It worked fine on my 32 bit Vista PC. I am not sure what external renderer means.

I understand Andy. I can't run over 3.8 for any length of time. I am not into tweaking enough to find out the issue. I would love to run at 4.0 though, that is kind of the magic number to me. When I do the speed increase is certainly noticeable, until I crash.

I tried it today after adding the fan, and it ran at 4.0 and almost rendered a complete project until it froze 3/4 the way through.

I haven't tried burning Blu-Ray, so I can't help you there. I don't know what external renderer is either. Maybe you should start a thread. I'm sure you're not the only one who has had that happen to.

Heat is the enemy! You have to provide adequate cooling and airflow. In the long term heat will shorten the life of all your components. It will also effect the reliability and operation of your system.

We are not against over-clocking. It's a cool way to get more performance out of your system. You must be careful. Gradually overclock. Run for a day or so, see how the system is handling, monitor temperatures. Then try pushing it some more. repeat process. If you see any instability or quirky behavior, take it back down a notch. If you plan on overclocking get a big case with at least 3 fans in it to move the air around. If you dare, go water cooling.

BTW - we run all our DIY machines at factory pre-sets for our articles. Eventually I end up taking the machine home, or deciding it's time to have more fun with it. Then I'll overclock and experiment.

Gary

Well, my temps are back up again, higher than before. I can't imagine why.

The temps are running now 10c higher at stock CPU speeds then they were running when OCing. The only thing I can imagine is the fan has lost perfect contact with the CPU plate.

Under full load overclocking I hit 90c, which is very undesirable, of course. I may uninstall and reseat the fan and see what happens.

Edit: I have just lowered my temps somewhat by doing the opposite of what you would expect. I actually lowered the CPU fan speed to lowest speed, and disconnected the side fan on my case, which apparently has improved the airflow dynamics. Temps are OK, but still too high, as I'm still peaking in the upper 70s. I also removed the RAM cooling fan.I must say my case is so quiet now I cannot even hear it.

Apparently too many fans /or CPU fan set too high can create a pocket where air becomes trapped as the CPU fan can push more air than can leave the case. So if the CPU fan is moving air at a faster rate than the air is being removed from the case then you can have an issue, which apparently I had, and didn't know it. This is NOT the cause of my temps being too high, but it is good to know that I was running two fans unnecessarily, which lowers the power demands on my PSU, which is always a good thing.

Ok, cause of rising temps found, I think.

When I was at Microcenter talking to the salesman about CPU fans, he said he isn't a fan of CPU fans than mount with clips (as opposed to the kind you have to mount with nut on the underside of the MB). I told him I wasn't looking to uninstall my MOBO to mount a cooling fan, and he said fine.

Well today, the day after I installed the fan, my temps went up. Why? I think because the fan is heavy and tall, and gravity is pulling on it, lessening the contact with the CPU backplate.

Edit: I've removed and reinstalled fan, and temps are better. Leaving case lying on its side till I find better cooling solution.

Those after market I7 motherboard CPU Fans/coolers are huge. I was surprised when I received my Monsoon but ordered it at the same time of the motherboard because of the back plate that had to be installed. I can't imagine having that tugging at the motherboard without a back plate. You probably want to get one with a back plate and install it sometime when you are in the mood for taking your motherboard out of your case.

Jeff

I'm using a Noctua cooler NH-U12P SE1366 I like it a lot it is big though but it came with a nice backplate

I might replace mine with yours Ken, it seems like the best option out there, unless I can find a way to "brace my fan" to support it.

Another eSATA problem
 

Just tried my eSATA port on my 435 the other day and apparently it does not work. Would not recognize the HD connected to it. Rechecked connections, same problem. HD will also connect via FW and connects fine thast way, but I would like the eSATA to be working.
Several; calls with Dell supportand we made numerous changes in BIOS etc all to now avail. BIOS says eSATA device is not detected. After reversing all the changes we made they suggested that I try a different eSATA HD, that perhaps the problem was with the HD (Seagate). However I have no other eSATA device. They suggested I go out and BUY another HD and try it. If that does not work I can return the second HD to the store (they'll love that) and I THINK DEll said that they may have to replace the MoBo. This call will be tonight. They have been good about getting back to me when they say they will. WEnt out and bought a WD drive to try tonight. Not sure whether I hope it works or not???