PC Spec for HDV Editing

[Bill Strehl]

Agreed, although you'll need a Huey Pro to do multiple monitors. The Huey also compensates for room lighting, so if your edit room has variable lighting conditions (lights, windows, etc) it's arguably better than a spyder - and cheaper too

I know the value of color correction but see that there appears many different options from each company. Does anyone have knowledge of both companies offerings to do a comparison?

Pantone offers:
Huey $89
Huey Pro $129

Datacolor offers:
Spider2 Express $79
Sprider3 Pro $169
Spider3 Elite $279

X-Rite
i1DisplayLT $169
i1Display2 $249

I assume there are others out there as I had to add the X-Rite after first posting this when I could find any comparisons on this forum.

All prices are retail

[sailordude]

hey just a quick question about RAM. i have my heart set on the Core 2 Duad Q6600 but there are dozens of motherboards for that chip. As far as i can tell the main difference in price of those motherboards is the RAM speed. So my question is if i went for a $100 to $160 motherbaord and 4 gigs of PC6400 DDR2 800 mhz dual channel RAM, would i notice much of a different or what are the pros of spending like $250 and up on a motherboard and getting DDR3 1333 mhz RAM? Is it worth the extra hundred for the board and probably $200 to $300 more on RAM?
Thanks for the help again!
Gavin

[Napier]

Hey Everybody Im new here and I'm learning alot but I don't understand acouple of things ONE: if my system can support editing HD. Im confused on if I should add more to it or buy a new one the spec are below. TWO If my system can edit HD which editing program should i get? Im totally lost. Thanks in advance I apologzie if this is a repeated thread.

Intel Pentium 4
Processor 516
2.93Ghz
533 <hz
1MB L 2 Cache
Hard Drive 200 GB 7200 RPM SATA
Memory 512 MB DDR SDRAM dual channel
Intel Graphic Media Accelerato 900
Windows XP

[Dennis Vogel]

Hey Everybody Im new here and I'm learning alot but I don't understand acouple of things ONE: if my system can support editing HD. Im confused on if I should add more to it or buy a new one the spec are below.

"HD" is not specific enough. In consumer cams there are two main HD formats, HDV and AVCHD. Your system needs more memory to edit HDV and maybe another disk drive. You generally get better performance if you keep your software on one drive and your working video files on another.

For AVCHD your system is way underpowered. I don't know the minimum specs but people talk about fast, dual core or dual processor systems (and up to, say, quad core and quad processor) when they talk about editing AVCHD. Perhaps someone here can give us more details for AVCHD requirements.

TWO If my system can edit HD which editing program should i get? Im totally lost. Thanks in advance I apologzie if this is a repeated thread.

Intel Pentium 4
Processor 516
2.93Ghz
533 <hz
1MB L 2 Cache
Hard Drive 200 GB 7200 RPM SATA
Memory 512 MB DDR SDRAM dual channel
Intel Graphic Media Accelerato 900
Windows XP

As for which, there are a few good choices. I'm a Vegas user and I think Vegas Movie Studio Platinum is fairly low on hardware requirements. Adobe Premiere Elements and Ulead (forget the version) are the programs I hear mentioned the most. A lot comes down to preferences. The best thing to do is visit each program's site and look at screenshots and read up on each. Pay attention to the hardware requirements and believe them. Then, download a trial version of the ones you think might be for you. All of the ones I mentioned have 30 day free trials but might have a few features locked out. But there's usually enough to get a good feel for whether the program works like you think and works on your PC.

Good luck.

Dennis

[Napier]

Sorry about that "HD" I just want to know what to use to edit HD. Thanks for the help guys the site is the greatest!!

[Dennis Vogel]

Sorry about that "HD" I just want to know what to use to edit HD. Thanks for the help guys the site is the greatest!!

No one can answer your question. "HD" is a catchall phrase that includes several different formats. I tried to explain there are two primary variations used in consumer cams. They have very different hardware needs. Which one do you want to edit, HDV or AVCHD?

Good luck.

Dennis

[Napier]

HDV Thanks Dennis for bearing with me Im new at this but HDV thats what I want to edit on. Better? Thanks again for the help.

[Dennis Vogel]

OK. Now we're getting somewhere. As I said above you need more memory and probably another disk drive. Your processor is fast enough for most HDV work and, assuming you have enough space on it, your hard drive is fine.

Good luck.

Dennis

[sailordude]

Just put in the order...
Newegg- Antec 900 case, Tuniq Tower 120 LFB (light up one), Arctic Silver 5 grease
TigerDirect- XFX nForce 680i LT SLI mobo, Intel Core 2 Duad Q6600- 2.4 ghx, 4 gigs of OCZ DDR2 pc6400 800mh

im hoping to use 450watt power supply from this computer, video and sound card from this computer and then i still need a few hard drives. im hoping to get it together this week or weekend and il tell ya guys how it works. looks like a nice setup for the $600 i have in it right now.
Gavin

[htid]

I have a core 2 duo E6600 overclocked to 3ghz and find that trying to even open a 1 minute 25 seconds 250mb HD video in either Premiere or Combustion is near impossible!

I'll have to cut the footage down to a lot smaller sizes I guess

[sailordude]

wow that hardly seems right. i just opened an hour long 10 gig file in Vegas Pro. couldnt render it, computer cant handle it but i could get it opened. god i cant wait tell i get my new parts!

[thelostduck]

Here goes....

* 2.8 GHz Intel Pentium D 820 dual-core processor with 800 MHz front-side bus and 2 MB L2 cache
* 250 GB hard drive, 1 GB of RAM (4 GB maximum), dual-layer DVD+/-RW burner (I only have 1 GB right now)
* Seven USB 2.0, two Firewire, one VGA, one headphone, one microphone, one PCMCIA, multiformat memory card reader, composite video, S-Video
* Windows XP Media Center Edition 2005
Graphics and Display

* Graphics Card: ATI Radeon X300
* Graphics RAM: 128 MB

I don't have the canon hv20 camcorder yet. Would my computer be able to handle it? What would I need in order for it to handle it? I use Adobe Premiere Pro CS3.

[Dennis Vogel]

Looks pretty good. Oh, I might add another gig of memory right off the bat for better performance.

I don't think the Media Center OS adds anything to video editing. It might be nice if you want to play a lot of media that you produce but that's a different topic.

About all I can suggest you add is a good high res display monitor--maybe 2, a good audio interface, studio monitors (sometimes called speakers) and some good microphones if you plan to record voice and want good quality in your final products. You didn't say what you are planning to shoot so you may not need all of this.

Good luck.

Dennis

[sailordude]

Dude if i was you i would get another 2 gigs of ram. Depending on your motherboard and what ram you have now, you would pay $100, MAX, on another 2 gigs of ram. i just got 2 - 2 gig sticks of OCZ vista upgrade ram for less than a hundred bucks. You could get 4 gigs but i bet your only running 32 bit windows and you would only use 3.5 gb if you were lucky. If you had some extra money i would get some kind of RAID0 setup. HUGE, HUGE, HUGE improvement in video rendering. hope it helps,
Gavin

[sailordude]

by the way you can get like a 250 gb seagate hard drive for $70 online. if you got two of those and you could use your drive right now as a backup drive. just something to think about.

[thelostduck]

That sounds good. I might do that. And yes, I was thinking I'd buy some more RAM.

[MovieBlog]

I could use some recommendations also.

I just recorded my first HV-20 footage yesterday and downloaded to the computer this morning. Since the machine is a dual-boot XP and Vista machine, I was able to capture it under the Vista boot using Movie Maker.

The footage (played in Windows Media Player 11) looks smooth and sexy gorgeous. The issue comes when I try to edit it. I've tried it in Movie Maker 6.0 and it was laggy and jumpy.

Then I tried converting it to WMV and got exactly the same results. The sound plays back but the video stops and starts every few frames.

Next I tried editing it under the XP boot in a trial version of Vegas Pro 6. The results were exactly the same as in Movie Maker, with starts and stops.

I'm suspecting my system though only a couple years old and a workhorse that has worked for SD DV-AVI, is probably not up to snuff for HDV.

Here are the specs on my machine:

Gateway 506GR
CPU:
3.2 GHz P4 540 with Hyper-Threading
Graphics card:
PNY nVidia PCI-E Overclocked 6800GS (256MB)
Memory:
1GB DDR PC3200 (400 MHz)
Two hard disks:
200 GB SATA
300 GB SATA
Ports:
Firewire, USB2, memory readers, etc.
DVD-R/W
CD-R/W
Monitor:
19" LCD monitor, 1280 x 1024

My questions are:
1) Can this be saved by some minor hardware upgrades?
- Memory would be my first thought. 2 slots are filled up with 512MB, so I could bump this up to 3GB (1GB each in the other slots).
- Would a different graphics card help get rid of the lag?

2) If it is beyond saving, which of my current components would you keep?

3) Finally, what items in a new computer should I definitely have for HDV editing?

P.S. Budget-wise I'd like to aim for < $1,000, but if you tell me that is unrealistic I'd understand.
I'd also like to run After Effects and eventually Vegas Pro 8, if the programs are a consideration.

[MovieBlog]

Anyone? A memory upgrade might help, but I'm thinking the CPU would also be a bottleneck, so I'm leaning toward a new PC. I'd still like the opinion of others though.

[chico_stang]

Hey,

I have a Gateway PC with an AMD Athlon 64 X2 Dual-Core Processor, 2 GB of RAM, and an nVidia GeForce 6100. I can edit HDV just fine, with no problems. I believe that the most important thing for a PC to handle HDV properly is the processor. That being said, I think most computers nowdays are capable of editing HDV video. Just my thought.

[Pauly Forte]

I have a 6 month Old Dell with AMD Athlon 64 X2 Dual Core processor 4400+ 2.31GHZ

2G RAM

And about 80G left on my hard drive (but could and will get external for project storage.


Will my system be able to handle editing the HDV editing With Vegas Home Studio Platinum 8d.

I do not have a firewire port so I'll need to install a Firewire PCI card. (no problem)


I dont want to invest in the HV30 If Im going to need to do a computer upgrade to enjoy the edit.

[chico_stang]

I have a 6 month Old Dell with AMD Athlon 64 X2 Dual Core processor 4400+ 2.31GHZ

2G RAM

And about 80G left on my hard drive (but could and will get external for project storage.


Will my system be able to handle editing the HDV editing With Vegas Home Studio Platinum 8d.

I do not have a firewire port so I'll need to install a Firewire PCI card. (no problem)


I dont want to invest in the HV30 If Im going to need to do a computer upgrade to enjoy the edit.

I think your computer can handle HDV (though I'm not sure about what graphics card you have). But to transfer video you need a Firewire card, as you said. If you want to be sure about it, download some RAW clips from the camera and drop them at your NLE. If you can edit fluidly, then you will have no problem at all.

Also, I recommend an external (or additional) hard drive to store the video. Due to the size of HDV, it should be large capacity (perhaps 500 GB or more).

[MovieBlog]

Chico,

Since you mentioned CPU speed, any reason to go with a Quad core vs. Dual Core? Also, is 4GB and 64-bit Vista a better idea than 3GB and 32-bit Vista?
Or would it be overkill?

[Pauly Forte]

I think your computer can handle HDV (though I'm not sure about what graphics card you have). But to transfer video you need a Firewire card, as you said. If you want to be sure about it, download some RAW clips from the camera and drop them at your NLE. If you can edit fluidly, then you will have no problem at all.

Also, I recommend an external (or additional) hard drive to store the video. Due to the size of HDV, it should be large capacity (perhaps 500 GB or more).

My graphics card is an Nvidia GeForce 8300 GS

[chico_stang]

Chico,

Since you mentioned CPU speed, any reason to go with a Quad core vs. Dual Core? Also, is 4GB and 64-bit Vista a better idea than 3GB and 32-bit Vista?
Or would it be overkill?

MovieBlog,

Yes. As far as I'm concerned, I believe that Quad Core is better than Dual Core.

The amount of RAM you mentioned is more than enough. The more RAM the better. I currently have 2 GB of RAM and I do not have problems editing HDV, as I said. My PC supports up to 4GB, so in the near future I will add 2 more GB (which would be a total of 4GB).

I have Windows Vista Home Premium, but it is 32-bit. I haven't used 64-bit Vista nor have I read much about it, so in that aspect I don't know if 32-bit is better than 64-bit.

Pauly Forte, I think that your graphics card is good to go. As a matter of fact, the graphics card of my PC is the stock one (which is integrated) and I don't have problems viewing nor editing HDV.

I say it again, if you want to know if your computer can handle HDV well, download some RAW .m2t clips from the web and drop them at your favorite NLE.

[sailordude]

Hey i dont know if you guys know that any windows 32 bit only supports 3.5 gigs of ram at the most, mine only uses 2.75 of my 4 gigs. Just from a few of the posts above, i have a quad core and i can tell you it makes a HUGE difference. When rendering video, i use about 50 % of my CPU and i can still play music and surf the net! If you can i would get some kind of 64 bit Windows, vista is ok but it uses a TON of ram so i would stick with XP.

The dude above, your graphics card is fine, im using a crappy like $50 one because my motherbaord doesnt ahve integrated so i had to stick that in there tell i buy myself a new one.

Again, i stress the RAID if you can, i have 3 drives running and i can boot up windows like less than 10 seconds, open programs like Vegas pro 8 and Adobe After Effects CS3 in seconds. Just all around, when drives are as cheap as they are now, get a few identical drives and then get a 500 gig backup drive.(only a hundred bucks!)

About the ram, the more the better. You can get 4 gigs of PC6400, 800 mhz ram which is pretty damn fast for less than a hundred bucks. I still need a new copy of windows and then illbe getting another 4 gigs.

Hope i helped some!
Feel free to ask any questions,
Gavin