The best computer for video processing?

Bec, Luke and I are discussing hard drives in this thread... which got me thinking.

What is the optimum computer configuration for video editing and encoding? Are the new Quad processors the best option? How many gigs of memory would be ideal? Is a SATA RAID 0 hard drive setup best? How important is a top-of-the line graphics card? What is a good reference LCD monitor to use?

Do any of you have a wish list for a dream machine for video work? I'm not really interested in a Mac solution at this point although i know some of you will insist that it's the only solution. Lol.

I'm a Mac/Final Cut Pro guy!

It does it all.

I shoot with SONY HDV cam,
* ingest with Final Cut Pro to internal drive,
* edit with FCP,
* create titles in LiveType,
* import graphics made in PhotoShop,
* add motion graphics made in Motion or PhotoPresenter
* add music created by others, or in GarageBand or SoundTrackPro
* export for streaming in a variety of possible formats
* and author DVDs with DVD Studio Pro.

I do have a SATA tower (not RAID'd), but I don't use it.

Right now I alternate my work between a Mac G5 PPC and an iMac20. I am convinced that I will be able to downsize my footprint by trading off the G5 for another iMac, yet gain productivity (altho the iMac harddrive bus is slower than the G5, eventough the iMac is Intel and the G5 is not).

Lol, I knew I'd only get Mac users to respond in this thread. :)

I would say, for a machine that is going to be used to *encode* a lot of video,

- SATA RAID-5 with a hardware RAID card
- 2 to 4 gigs of RAM
- High-end video card with hardware MPEG and Quicktime encoding
- Core-2 Duo
- Reference NTSC CRT monitor, with a nice high-end LCD display (I'm told the Apple displays can be made to work on a PC)

All in for the above, you'd probalby be looking at $8,000-$9,000.

I don't think you'd see a major increase in speed by going with multiple processors, particularly if you use the hardware encoder card.

Also, if you're editing, most of the processor resources are used only during encoding and rendering. What we have is two lower end machines (core 2 and a P4 3800), with a KVM switch that our editor switches between, so while one is rendering, he edits on the other one. Then we have a third machine (core 2) dedicated to encoding the videos once they are rendered. That's a much better value for us, because our editor is never waiting for a video to finish rendering, and the encoding machine can sit and run all day. But different workflows work for different people.

This is what i use except i upgraded to a 2gig of RAM.

http://reviews.cnet.com/desktops/hp-...-31533898.html

Ive never had any problems with it so far [touch wood].

It just sits there bulk encoding in Sorenson whenever i buy a bunch of new DVD content to use in the members areas.

Regards,

Lee

The only thing I would add is that the new Core 2 Quad processors will definitely help you out with encoding.

You could also go with the Core 2 Extreme if you're feeling spendy, but the Quads are more affordable.

Media encoding benchmarks

Quote:

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Originally Posted by gaybucks_chip

I would say, for a machine that is going to be used to *encode* a lot of video,

- SATA RAID-5 with a hardware RAID card
- 2 to 4 gigs of RAM
- High-end video card with hardware MPEG and Quicktime encoding
- Core-2 Duo
- Reference NTSC CRT monitor, with a nice high-end LCD display (I'm told the Apple displays can be made to work on a PC)

All in for the above, you'd probalby be looking at $8,000-$9,000.

I don't think you'd see a major increase in speed by going with multiple processors, particularly if you use the hardware encoder card.

Also, if you're editing, most of the processor resources are used only during encoding and rendering. What we have is two lower end machines (core 2 and a P4 3800), with a KVM switch that our editor switches between, so while one is rendering, he edits on the other one. Then we have a third machine (core 2) dedicated to encoding the videos once they are rendered. That's a much better value for us, because our editor is never waiting for a video to finish rendering, and the encoding machine can sit and run all day. But different workflows work for different people.

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Hey Chip, can you elaborate on the video card more. I'm only familiar with the gaming cards not professional video cards.

I crank out a lot of work on my $1400 iMac20, with Final Cut Studio.

You need to consider whether you are going to retail DVD, or VOD, or some kind of .mov or .wmv local streaming on your site, to justify anything more than $1400 for an Intel iMac, or $2500 for a Mac Intel G5 Tower.

The only reason why you'd need an $8000 computer system (with RAID and Graphics), before the cost of editing and authoring software, is if you have a horrendous amount of A Roll and B Roll footage to cut down to 70 mins, or really crappy video that needs more post production correction than it's worth for today's market value of DVD or VOD.

I know I don't need a massively over-powered machine. I just want one. :D

As for editing and authoring software, I use the full Final Cut Studio - Final Cut Pro, DVD Studio Pro, LiveType, Motion, Soundtrack Pro.

If $1200 is a bit steep, Final Cut Express is in the $200 range.

I could easily do everything I do with iMovie and iDVD, and GarageBand, all a part of the $100 iLife package. You can create graphics in any program that saves as .tiff, .jpeg or .pdf, and import to FCS, FCE, or iMovie.

I also like the lightbox program Aperture, for organizing my photos, and applying basic size and color corrections. It does so non-destructively, by making a copy and leaving the master alone.

i wan t to know how much it?