Config for burning videos on DVD

[baldurga]

Hi to everybody,

My father has, suddenly, realized that he wants a computer for burning his old home videos into DVD so image won't degradate anymore.

It has been really quick, and as far as my knowledge allows me I have done the best config I can. Also bear in mind that money is an important factor:

- 400W power supply.
- Asus A7N8X Deluxe.
- 512Mb Kingston 400 DDR. I was thinking of 1Gb, but not sure if it's worth for the cost.
- XP 2500. I plan to overclock as far as I can with 400 FSB if it's stable. Also I will save some money going for the 2500 model instead of 3200 model.
- 120Gb HD ATA 133 Maxtor
- Pioneer DVD-R/+RW A06
- ATI Radeon 7500LE 64Mb. It's cheap and the only thing that has to do is play video, not anything stressfull (am I wrong?). Also I can upgrade it later.

I know a P4 3.2Gb with HT will rock, but price will rock too. Anyway, I would appreciate any suggestion, criticism, idea, improvement, etc.

Thanks in advance.


Still looking for a <b>good online retailer</b> in Spain :frown:

 

[slvr_phoenix]

I could be wrong, but I would think that the amount of RAM would make a huge difference when working with video editing. I mean them are some huge files!

But hey, the performance improvement may not be worth the price. So just stick to what you can afford.

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[RCPilot]

I don't think your wrong.

Honey, what's that smell? Don't bother me now I'm working on my computer! OOPS!

 

[Schmide]

Not like its going to make a ton of difference, but having a 2 drive system where your system resides on one drive and you have a scratch drive for video processing is probably the most improvement you can get other than instituting a raid.

Dichromatic for your viewing plesure...

 

[baldurga]

I will look for the cost of two 80Gb HD instead of one 120Gb to see the impact in price.

Seems I haven't done a horrible config after all. Thanks for everybody's advices. Any additional input is welcome!


Still looking for a <b>good online retailer</b> in Spain :frown:

 

[jim552]

Is this the ATI Radeon 7500 All in Wonder?

I didn't see anything that would allow you to capture video?

I currently use the Radeon 7500 All in Wonder, and have had no problems. I actually am in the process of doing the same thing that you Dad wants to do. (It has been a goal of mine since 1992.)

Hardware costs, and capabilities, have come down enough now where I can accomplish this.

Contrary to popular belief, I really haven't noticed any speed diferences when using 256mb or 512mb of RAM. It all seems to edit about the same to me. (No official timings here, just my response from use.)

Then when you actually get around to writing your DVD it's much more CPU intensive for the encoding process, and then the writing process is mainly limited by your DVD Drive's Speed.

Just for the record I have been using Ulead v7.5 for the editing, and writing process.

The price for it is great, but there are a few things about it that I don't like.

Maybe v8.0 will fix those things, and I will be completely happy.

 

[jim552]

Sorry.

One more thing!

It seems to make a pretty big difference for me having the drives on separate channels.

I definately recommend having a boot drive, and a scratch drive just for video.

I did some testing, and had quite a few more dropped frames when I was all on one drive.

Also my particular drive preference would be for SATA, but that's mainly just because I like that format.

 

[JP5]

If money is an issue, stick with 512MB RAM. I'm not sure that primary/scratch configuarion is much benefit with low-end video editing programs.

 

[baldurga]

Thanks jp5 and jim552.

Two 80Gb hard drives are quite more expensive, maybe one of 40 and another of 80 ... but when I see the difference between 80 and 40 don't know if it's really worth.

About the ATI card, is NOT AIW. We will buy a pinnacle device (USB) that allow digital and analog input signal. That way my father can use it for it's old and new camera.


Still looking for a <b>good online retailer</b> in Spain :frown:

 

[JP5]

Asus A7N8X Deluxe has 1394 right? If so, all you would need is analog capture.

 

[Guest]

Ya cuz transfering video via usb 1.1 is gonna take a big while...