$1,500 Video Editing / Graphics PC

[testing123]

Approximate Purchase Date: Before the end of the year

Budget Range: Preferably $1,500, but would be willing to go up to a few hundred more but not over $2,000 for sure

System Usage from Most to Least Important: Editing HD Video with Adobe Premiere Pro CS5, After Effects, Editing Graphics with Photoshop, Able to handle many programs open at once and swapping between them (e-mail, internet, pdf files, excel files, etc.)

Parts Not Required: Mouse

Preferred Website(s) for Parts: Whatever offers the best deal

COUNTRY OF ORIGIN: US

Parts Preferences: by brand or type: Whatever offers the best price for performance

Overclocking: Not sure

SLI or Crossfire: Not sure

Monitor Resolution: Haven't chosen a monitor yet

Additional Comments: I would like this to be able to take advantage of the Mercury Playback Engine in Adobe CS5 if possible.

 

[mianmars]

Can u wait till 2nd week of Jan next year? New intel CPU's will launch and it better to wait rather then spending lots of money on soon to become old generation components.

 

[nebun]

ok here it goes...if you have the budget get an x58 mobo with an quad cpu i7, about 12gb of ram, preferably 1600mhz if (better for overclocking). for the video card you can get top of the line nvidia, something like the 480 or 580 and you will be set. don't spend your money on the new 6 core cpus...they are not worth it since most apps are coded mainly for dual cores and some for quad cores atm.

most graphics editing software will only utilize one gpu card therefore a crossfire or sli setup will be a waste. nvidia is much better for editing on the gpu, their CUDA software will run circles around ATI's stream processing, since most developers code for nvidia cards.

also if you can afford it get yourself 4 hdd and stripe them in raid 0 if you want raw speed...make sure you back up your data on an external hdd every night on a hdd with a esata capability...it's much faster than anything else out there, trust me

prices fluctuate from place to place so keep an eye for good deals...hope this helps.

 

[nebun]

almost forgot, for mobo i would suggest an asus saber-tooth...very solid mobo, the color scheme is kind of ugly but it does what it says for a reasonable price

 

[Zenthar]

Will "consumer-grade" video card help him in anyway with what he is planning to do? I was under the impression that only "workstation-grade" video cards actually accelerated such processing. If so, he might be better off with an entry-level card and put the money toward the 6-core i7 or go the opposite way and get a lower-end i5-7XX or i7-8XX CPU on a P55 board, but get a workstation video card.

Multimedia isn't my domain so I might be wrong.

 

[aznshinobi]

^ One thing is I completely agree with mianmars.

Wait until SB releases next year on January 5th then buy your editing beast. SB should prove to be 2x better than the current gen of i5/i3/i7. Here is a preview:
http://www.anandtech.com/show/3871/the-sandy-bridge-preview-three-wins-in-a-row

Anyway, as for graphics cards. Nvidia is the way to go since your using premiere and after effects. As you already know you have heard of the Mercury engine. Going with an Nvidia workstation card or normal GPU like the 470 would be alright. The reason being Mercury is optimized to run Cuda cores and so you'll get an extra kick with it. You defiantly will not need the 480 or 580 that's for sure. Those are just wastes of money and they just use to much power. The 470 is the best way to go or the 460. You won't get THAT much difference.

As for HDDs, I recommend getting the Revodrives from OCZ. That is where most of your budget should also be spent. The revodrives will stay alive longer and are about 10x faster than any modern day SSDs. The reason I don't recommend getting drives and striping them in Raid. Is because it'll decrease drive life (by a little) and if one dies your screwed. Of course I do recommend getting a back up. Particularly the Samsung F3 1TB.

 

[testing123]

Thanks for the information. I was able to find an article online at here where they recommend the build below:

ASUS P6X58D-E
Intel Quad Core i7 930
CORSAIR XMS3 12GB (6 x 2GB) DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1600 (PC3 12800)
Hitachi 1TB 7200RPM 0A38016
Antec Nine Hundred Two Black ATX Case
CORSAIR CMPSU-750TX 750W
Microsoft Win 7 Professional OEM
BDR-205 Blu-ray Burner
GTX470

Any thoughts on this setup? Does anyone have a recommendation about a good monitor?

Thanks!

 

[aznshinobi]

Why get a PC now, when SB is coming out so soon... It'd be a waste of money...

 

[mianmars]

@testing123 Seriously you are wasting money on such build when u can get faster and better build in a few weeks.

Right now u should focus on your system storage which is very imp for video editing. Go to premiere pro forums http://forums.adobe.com/community/premiere/hardware_forum and post about recommendations for storage and you will get some seriously gud answer as there r few users who knows wats better for video editing and specially for premiere pro etc.

 

[Wisecracker]

Thanks for the information. I was able to find an article online at here where they recommend the build below:

ASUS P6X58D-E
Intel Quad Core i7 930
CORSAIR XMS3 12GB (6 x 2GB) DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1600 (PC3 12800)
Hitachi 1TB 7200RPM 0A38016
Antec Nine Hundred Two Black ATX Case
CORSAIR CMPSU-750TX 750W
Microsoft Win 7 Professional OEM
BDR-205 Blu-ray Burner
GTX470

Any thoughts on this setup? Does anyone have a recommendation about a good monitor?

Thanks!

That system is horrible - too much RAMs/not enough disk I/O.

Start with the Gigabyte GA-880GA-UD3H.

You need 7 HDDs:

1) OS/Apps: 64GB SSD
2&3) Capture/Scratch: 2 X Spinpoint F3 HD502HJ RAID
4&5) Output: 2 X Spinpoint F3 HD502HJ RAID

6&7) one big green HDD for storage/backup -- second big green HDD (preferably external) for storage/backup of your storage/backup.

6GB (3 x 2GB) DDR3 1866

AMD Phenom II X6 1055T Thuban

Around $950 for a really good start. Two monitors are great -- a third for preview is better. Be sure you smell what the Mercury Playback Engine is cooking.

 

[mianmars]

^^ completely disagree with only 6Gb of ram for video editing. Agree with the storage point some what.

 

[aznshinobi]

@Wisecracker Well not TOO much. 8 gbs is where you want to be at AT LEAST. For large transfers and such purposes.

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/ram-memory-upgrade,2778.html

 

[Wisecracker]

^^ completely disagree with only 6Gb of ram for video editing. Agree with the storage point some what.

Well ... you would be wrong :lol:

Read up on Premiere disk setups. I went easy on him. He could actually split the audio/video streams between capture and output meaning I could have recommended another 2 X Spinpoint F3 HD502HJ RAID for:

1) video capture/scratch; and
2) audio capture/scratch.


He could also split final output into separate video & audio RAID arrays but I guess that would require me to recommend a separate RAID controller card. (I think that is probably as much over-kill as 12-16GB of memory)

@Wisecracker Well not TOO much. 8 gbs is where you want to be at AT LEAST. For large transfers and such purposes.

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/ram-memory-upgrade,2778.html

1) *RAMs* have nothing to do with *large transfers and such*, at least, as far as your disk I/O and network connection exist and perform;
2) The article you linked has to do with disabling the paging file - not a good plan as many apps depend upon virtual memory addressing; and
3) There is a diminishing point of return in having too much RAM - just because 8 is bigger than 6 does not mean it's 33% better in read/write performance, bandwidth,latency and 'multi-tasking'.