Intel vs AMD turnkey canopus systems

[Jeff In Ocala]

looks like i might be swinging over to edius for p2 editing they seem to have it down. I am looking at the turnkey systems that canopus offers and would like some input on Intels vs the AMDs I plan on using the NX card with the Broadcast software, is there a difference as far as the processors? any thoughts would be appreciated.
p.s. 99% of my work for RIGHT NOW is SD dvcpro50 but want a good path to HD as my jobs call for it .
:dankk2:

[mule ferguson]

Jeff: I use both systems. The Desktop is Dual Core Xeon 3.5. Edius NX. The Laptop has Dual Core 4800 AMD, Edius Broadcast. I am pleased with the results of both systems.

Mule Ferguson

[Jeff In Ocala]

thanks mule you seem to be the resident canopus guru i have joined the canopus forums and see you on there as well nice to know you have HVX experience too hope you don't mind if i pick your brain while i make my decsion i plan on going to NAB and John at canopus told me to speak to Matt at the booth so hopefully that will push me over the edge and i can get on board with canopus

[bhiga]

Jeff,
My personal preference is dual AMD, since you can upgrade to dual-core Opterons later, but the Intel version is quite capable as well.

[mule ferguson]

:love4:Jeff. I am not a guru. I just happen to be an early beliver of the Canopus system. There are very few lucky people that have received an HVX 200 to be able to upgrade to Edius Broadcast. I am still in the learning stage of the new P2. We all learn from each other. There are less than 10 Canopus users with HVX 200 on the list .
The truth is they ain't that many HVX 200 Owners out there.

Mule

[JimJulian]

List? I hope there are more than 10.
I have 3 HVX/Edius Broadcast NX systems. That leaves only 7 left.
Canopus needs to start marketing better.

jim

[mule ferguson]

Jim I counted you as one user. WRAL has a lot in the news dept but they dont use the HVX like you guys. You guys are smart. Spend the same amount of money and get a camera for everybody. I believe we do have more , but are to busy making money to post on the list.

[spunknoid]

is there a difference as far as the processors? any thoughts would be appreciated. :dankk2:

I remember seeing a comparion on www.cnet.com. AMD blew away Intel in 8 of the 9 comparison/performance tests. Search there for the report.

For what it's worth, we've used AMD and Intel machines to render Premiere videos. AMD machines finish quicker. We've standardized on AMDs for desktops.

[DavidBeier]

AMD is the way to go. Not only is it cheaper but handles graphic files much better than Intel.

[DavidBeier]

Oh, but I hear it handles word processing and sound mixing slightly slower but considering I've never had to wait more than a tenth of a second for either of those, I don't think it's a big deal.

[Jeff In Ocala]

sounds like AMD is the way i will go. anyone going to NAB? i will be there and plan to camp out at the canopus booth and pepper Matt with questions, I just edited 2 commercial spots with the trial version and like the workflow, both spots shot on the HVX, p2 cards transfered to HD then imported right in to Edius edited, output to mpeg uploaded to local cable stations ftp site and On the Air - NEVER TOUCHED TAPE I Love it

[Jarred Land]

Im a AMD guy myself, and have used edius on both platforms, they work about the same. you can however get a 4 proc motherboard and add 4 dual core AMDS giving you a 8 core super system for a pretty killer price.

Anyways... I think there are more than 10, if there isnt I will be in the Pana booth at NAB telling alot of people about edius so after NAB there should be truckloads more users.

[mule ferguson]

Hey Jarred: I was fishing to see if I could get some of the users to answer back . can you start a survey to ask how many own and use Canopus Broadcast. Then maybe we will see.
Mule

[Andreas]

you can however get a 4 proc motherboard and add 4 dual core AMDS giving you a 8 core super system for a pretty killer price.


Whats that ? A link maybe ? Thanks.

[bhiga]

Tyan has a good selection of Opteron server boards
http://www.tyan.com/

[Jarred Land]

yeah.. there are many options for 4 way, and many times more for 2 cpu motherboards with the opteron cpu.. and the opterons just had a 30% price drop as well.

[bhiga]

One important thing if you do build your own AMD machine, pay extra special attention to the RAM. Opterons in particular are very picky and the general rule of "faster is better" often does not apply.

Brandon

[Rob]

If you want to use tyan boards the S2895 Thunder K8WE is certified with Canopus . And also works with the the NX boards very stable and fast.

[OldManVideo]

Gee Whiz, I have 2 eduis broadcast systems, so that leaves only 5 out there.

[bhiga]

I'm pretty sure Jarred was referring to folks here... There are way more than 10 EDIUS Broadcast users "out in the world"

[Jarred Land]

hey i didnt say 10.. someone else said there where only 10 registered users at Canopus.com that used the HVX..

[bhiga]

Ahh, there's where the 10 came from... Yes, 10 users using HVX, that sounds reasonable.

[yochua]

...you can however get a 4 proc motherboard and add 4 dual core AMDS giving you a 8 core super system for a pretty killer price.

I have been spending time figuring out the details of a killer 8 core HD editing system. I am about to give it up and drop it down to 2 dual cores so I can run Win XP and Premiere. I just got off the phone with Adobe. Premiere 2.0 does not handle or take advantage of 4 processors. I would have to get special rights to get it to work on Win 2003 Server and then the NLE doesn't take advantage of the CPUs. I am bummed.

Does any other NLE work with Win 2003 Server and take advantage of 4 processors?????

Is it similar to Premiere? Is it worth learning a new program for real fast editing/rendering etc.

yochua

[mule ferguson]

See my orginal post on page 1 . Thats my story and I sticking to it. If you own more than 1 that does not count.
Mule

[bhiga]

Yes, the operating system itself will limit the number of cores - "workstation" class OSes support up to two CPUs (physical packages), and with XP that means 4 cores (2x2). You need a Server-class Windows to support more than 2 packages, unless you somehow get a special OEM build from Microsoft.

As far as the applications go, it's not so much about supporting N CPUs (cores), it's more about how much you are doing.

Most operations are not infinitely slice-able, meaning that the amount of concurrency of most operations does have limits. For example, if you're starting an orchard (with an empty field), you can't harvest the fruit at the same time you plant the trees because the tree haven't produced fruit yet.

Unless you're running many layers of processing or running multiple tasks simultaneously, the gains diminish after 2 cores.

Brandon

[yochua]

How about for rendering, this 8 core system amounts to a rendering farm. Can ProCoder or any other video rendering software utilize all 8 cores? This should be no problem because I assume that video is rendered one frame at a time or is that only the case for computer graphics. I am assuming 8 cores make a really awesome rendering farm for CG, assuming Win 2003 server and the render software can do everything any queuing software can do. (Many assumptions, wish someone else already tried this.)

The question remains weather it will speed the rendering of anything into anything. Can the rendering software break up the work into small pieces?

[bhiga]

Now we get into an interesting discussion of multithreading and concurrency.

Multithreading is often attributed to concurrency, but it's a little more complicated than that. Multithreading allows separate threads (operations) to run concurrently, but that doesn't mean that things will actually run any faster.

For example, if you're making an apple pie from fresh apples, you can't bake the pie at the same time you're peeling and slicing the apples - it just doesn't work that way.

Similarly, if your process requires the results of other operations before it can begin processing, having it running in another thread doesn't help much since it's just waiting around for the results it needs in order to being.

The game programmers have been doing a lot of work to increase the amount of concurrent processing that can occur.

So, back to your 8 cores, eventually it becomes more a matter of doing more things versus doing things faster. Once you run out of concurrent operations, the speed gain from adding cores is minimal at best.

Brandon

[dregenthal]

Hey Jarred: I was fishing to see if I could get some of the users to answer back . can you start a survey to ask how many own and use Canopus Broadcast. Then maybe we will see.
Mule

Got mine today. Using it on an older Dell Workstation . . . dual 2gig Xeon with 2gigs of Ram. Appears to run well on my 3gig Toshiba laptop as well (both systems are XP Pro).

I really like the capability of exporting back to P2 structure, MXF files. Can't wait for that free upgrade to version 4.