£5000/ $9000 to Spend on a NLE system???

[Rooster]

Evening all,

I've got some cash to burn. I know a little about editing systems but not enough not to make a big mistake on the components.

Does anyone have any suggestions on what system I should build or buy for around £5000 or $9000????

I'm shooting on a DVX100a 'PAL' and really like Premiere, AE, and Magic Bullet.

Cheers fellas

 

[morten]

Build your own PC

Build your own PC

Hi Rooster

I recomend you build your own PC. Unfortunately I don't think you'll be able to spend that much money just on the system unless you start splurging on overpriced pieces but you can sure try. One tip is to take a look at the DIY PC setups on the Videoguys website:

http://www.videoguys.com/DIY.html

All these setups have been tested and "certified" for long video editing.

Here are my recomendations:
- Get the Adobe Production Studio Premium package. It contains everything you need: Premiere Pro 2, After Effects Provessional, Audition CS2, Encore CS2, Illustrator CS2, Photoshop CS2 and Adobe Bridge. it's a solid package and it's incredibly well interconnected (for instance you can import unrendered After Effects projects directly into Premiere or Premiere projects directly into After Effects. You can also capture video directly in After Effects and create DVDs from Encore without rendering them out of Premiere first.)
- Get a Dual Core system. Both Intel and AMD provide dual core systems but my research tells me the Intel processors are better. If you want to you can get a 64bit processor but even if you do run the 32 bit version of Windows XP! The 64 bit version is rediculously unstable and Vista is still a long ways away.
- Get at least 1gb of ram (with your budget you could easily get 4gb in 4 1gb sticks)
- Get a solid motherboard with enough expansion slots, SATA Raid and PCIe. There are many motherboards out there that do what you want. ASUS has a pile of good ones. Just make sure they are prepared for future upgrades. and that they have many expansion slots (8 USB2 slots, FireWire etc etc etc)
- Get the power you need. Get at least a 550W power supply. Again, with your budget I'd get more. This is to make sure you don't burn out because of too little power.
- Get plenty of harddrive space. Have one drive dedicated solely to your system and program files, one or two or three dedicated to projects and scrubbing and put your documents on a separate drive. SATA drives are more than fast enough but if you want you can set it up in a RAID system. This makes sense if you're going to be doing HD editing.
- Get a video card that gives you two DVI outputs. That way you can connect two huge wide screens if you want. lots of space.
- Get two nice big screens. The market changes all the time. Not my forte.
- OPTIONAL: Get a capture card. If you want to track from other sources and/or you want to monitor your projects without going through your camera you should get a capture card. Get one of the Certified Third-Party capture cards: http://www.adobe.com/products/premiere/6cards.html
The Maxtor cards seem to be a good pick. I've never heard anyone complain about them.
- OPTIONAL: Get a monitor. Makes it easier to preview what you're editing. Again not my forte.
- OPTIONAL: Get a DV deck. Will save your camera heads in the long run.
Pro monitors and DV decks are VERY expensive. good way to bust your budget.

Other stuff:
- Get a virus killer. Norton or any other will do
- Get a router even if you don't have a network. The router works as a firewall and makes your computer "invisible" on the web. They are also really cheap.
- Do the XP tweaks on the Videoguys website for your Editor profile. they make your computer insanely fast and gives the editing programs complete dominance in the hierarky. http://www.videoguys.com/TweaksWINXPVE.html


Hope this helps )

Mor10

 

[David Jimerson]

You're talking about $8500-$16,000? Wow. That's probably a lot more than you need to spend.

As for the virus protection, et al, you've got enough in your budget there to have your editing computer completely off the web, and another computer specifically FOR the web. Virus protection and other such programs are processor hogs and slow down editing -- you don't want them running on your editing machine.

Any updates you need, you can download and transfer from machine to machine.

 

[Rooster]

Great advice Morten.

Been looking into systems today. A lot of what you said makes good sense. The only conflicting advice I've had is people telling me Premiere doesn't compare to Final Cut in terms of stability and power.

This would mean me investing in a Mac, where as they look the part it's just difficult as I'm such a PC man through and through, so all yr advice may be taken up!

Not going to rush in just yet even though a shiny kick ass pc makes me droll.

Primarily I want to shoot a low/no budget full length feature film, edit, grade and output to a format that will be suitable for a 35mm blow up. I'd like as much real time effects and colour grading as I can get as waiting around just kills the creative mood.

That's all if I don't fall flat on my face and produce an amateurs piece of you know what from my DVX.


And yes David having a second machine would make sense and as I'm getting a new one I'd have the one I'm currently writing this reply on to use online! So thanks for that.

Well it's off for a think, thanks again guys for the advice!

 

[Noel Evans]

http://www.videoguys.com/TweaksWINXPVE.html[/URL]


Hope this helps )

Mor10

Hey is there a mac version of this?

Also you have that money? First sell your DVX and get an HVX, then buy items as you need them.... I would say first of some solid books on lighting and then buy lighting to practice your techniques. Even after that you have enoough money to get a new pc and NLE... or Mac and FCP.