DELL PC for Editing Native AVCHD ?

NC17z

NC17z

Well-known member
Hey everyone,
Someone want to check out some specs I configured at Dell and let me know if they think I'll be able to edit native AVCHD with CS4;
I'm not sure about the graphics card, I want to look into this Cuda codec. Thanks in advance for any assistance,
Len

PROCESSORSIntel® Core™i7-920 Processor(8MB L2 Cache, 2.66GHz)javascript:to_page_mod(1, 2, _Action);OPERATING SYSTEMGenuine Windows Vista® Home Premium Edition SP1, 64-Bitjavascript:to_page_mod(1, 11, _Action);javascript:to_page_mod(1, 29, _Action);MEMORY8GB Dual Channel DDR3 SDRAM at 1066MHz - 6 DIMMsjavascript:to_page_mod(1, 3, _Action);HARD DRIVE500GB - 7200RPM, SATA 3.0Gb/s, 16MB Cache
I'm going to add a second HD myself.
javascript:to_page_mod(1, 8, _Action);OPTICAL DRIVESingle Drive: 16X CD/DVD burner (DVD+/-RW) w/double layer write capabilityjavascript:to_page_mod(1, 16, _Action);javascript:to_page_mod(1, 5, _Action);VIDEO CARDATI Radeon HD 3450 256MB
 
The new Nehalem is fast! Ideal for AVCHD, not sure how well it would be for native editing but Im sure it would be a lot better than the Core 2 Duo thats around now.

Im not sure if its worth spending on that $2k CUDA card though....
 
I would consider building it yourself. A stock dell will be cheaper but once you start adding on the upgrades (they are way overpriced) you lose the cost effectiveness. I built a dual boot i7 940 wth 12gb ram 4drives and dual 4850 gpu for just over 2K last month and its more than enough that I can edit AVCHD natively on the 32 bit OS the 64bit is just blazing.

Two weeks ago I built a fast i7 920 triple boot for 1.1K for a coworker and he loves it.
 
Great timing, I was working on my own Newegg build today! I was planning a cheaper Asus/NVidia graphics card, but aside from that, the builds look similar. From what I've read, you will probably want a CPU cooler as well...

Then I stumbled across this one:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16883229076

$550 for a core2 quad machine. That suits my budget a lot better than the $1500+ that even a home-built i7 will run. I haven't done my serious homework in checking benchmarks, but will a core2 quad @2.33GHz get me to native AVCHD editing (on Edius or Vegas)?

Chris.
 
ctann said:
]

$550 for a core2 quad machine. That suits my budget a lot better than the $1500+ that even a home-built i7 will run. I haven't done my serious homework in checking benchmarks, but will a core2 quad @2.33GHz get me to native AVCHD editing (on Edius or Vegas)?

Chris.
Click to expand...


That should work, but I would recomend the next higher speed processor and an NVIDIA graphics card.

I would get a Core 2 Quad 2.4 and an Nvidia 285 video card.
Something like this:
http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=4425258&CatId=2405


Once you have more than 2 cores, at a speed of over 2.2 ghz, you will get better AVCHD performance out of putting your money into the graphics card that can process the AVCHD content.

Nvidia graphics cards with Cuda support, can speed up viewing, decoding and editing. Premiere pro CS4 can also be sped up in this way.

You don't need a super computer to edit this stuff if you can offload some of the work to the GPU.

If you already have a system, I would work backwards and get the NVIDIA GeForce GTX 285 card, with Cuda drivers
and see if that is enough to do what you want....You might be surprised that you only needed that.
 
Last edited:
NC17z said:
Hey everyone,
Someone want to check out some specs I configured at Dell and let me know if they think I'll be able to edit native AVCHD with CS4;
I'm not sure about the graphics card, I want to look into this Cuda codec. Thanks in advance for any assistance,
Len

PROCESSORSIntel® Core™i7-920 Processor(8MB L2 Cache, 2.66GHz)OPERATING SYSTEMGenuine Windows Vista® Home Premium Edition SP1, 64-BitMEMORY8GB Dual Channel DDR3 SDRAM at 1066MHz - 6 DIMMsHARD DRIVE500GB - 7200RPM, SATA 3.0Gb/s, 16MB Cache
I'm going to add a second HD myself.
OPTICAL DRIVESingle Drive: 16X CD/DVD burner (DVD+/-RW) w/double layer write capabilityVIDEO CARDATI Radeon HD 3450 256MB
Click to expand...

Get nVidia card and not ATI. nVidia will give you more editing power via its CUDA drivers. You simply need an nVidia CUDA enabled card: http://www.nvidia.com/object/cuda_learn_products.html
CS4 will take advantage of your nVidia CUDA card.
Core i7 is fast but VERY expensive. I have to find some related test but I am quite sure that your CUDA enabled SW (as CS4) will be much faster using the nVidia card rather then the CPU. But I am not sure how CS4 will balance the calulcation load CPU and GPU (the Graphic Processing Unit on the nVidia card).
BE also sure you have enough W on the PSU ;)
 
Thank you for all your responses. My budget was going to be about $1000.00 - $1500.00, I say was because I'm still not sure if I'm going to buy the camera. I'm on CS3 and not diggin the fact that I may have to jump ship to a new computer and an upgrade to CS4. Loosing the 4:2:2 Color Space is another factor.
 
NC17z said:
Thank you for all your responses. My budget was going to be about $1000.00 - $1500.00, I say was because I'm still not sure if I'm going to buy the camera. I'm on CS3 and not diggin the fact that I may have to jump ship to a new computer and an upgrade to CS4. Loosing the 4:2:2 Color Space is another factor.
Click to expand...

Oh if you are on CS3, then you can just get Cineform Neo Scene, (or an old version of aspect HD for cheap).

Cineform works great on CS3, and is very fast, no stutter.

CS4 is great if you want to go AVCHD, but if you already have CS3, then cineform edits fine for about $129 on most core 2 duo computers.
 
Ken Steadman said:
I built a dual boot i7 940 wth 12gb ram 4drives and dual 4850 gpu for just over 2K last month and its more than enough that I can edit AVCHD natively on the 32 bit OS the 64bit is just blazing.
Click to expand...

That sounds like quite the machine. I am looking to build an i7 920 (first try at this).

What can or do you run on 64 bit?
Do you have driver issues?
Do you use 32 bit for some apps, then back to 64?

I would be using cs3 for now before an eventual upgrade to cs4.

Sorry for all the questions, but so much on the web is for gamers building machines.
 
Currently I run Vegas 8.1 on 64bit but Magic Bullet looks doesn't work in 64bit mode so I switch back and forth between 8.0 and 8.1. Very little of my other software utilizes 64bit mode but it will just run in 32bit mode without having to switch to my 32bit OS. Havent tried CS4 on my PC yet because my GF runs it on her mac so we switch as necessary.
 
I don't want to get too far off topic here, but I figured I would chime in with some experience I have with NVidia cards and with other discussions I have had on other forums in regard to the CUDA driver.

First off, you can get acceleration with both ATI and Nvidia graphics cards in most Adobe apps, but the acceleration is limited to specific features within each app. In Premiere for example, there are 8 GPU accelerated effects in both the transitions category and the video effects category. Below is a list of tested compatible video cards as outlined on Adobe's website:

http://kb.adobe.com/selfservice/viewContent.do?externalId=kb405445&sliceId=1

Secondly, installing the CUDA driver on a CUDA enabled Nvidia card, will not give you any performance increase within Premiere, or any other Adobe app as far as decreasing preview rendering time, real time effects, real time playback, etc... The CUDA driver is utilized by third-party apps which are typically very specific to certain processes:

http://www.nvidia.com/object/cuda_home.html

There is one CUDA app that will significantly decrease the amount of time it takes to render an H.264 video file and that is BadaBoom by Elemental Technologies. Keep in mind this acceleration is only when converting to H.264:

http://www.badaboomit.com/?q=node/4

Finally, the Quadro CX card is beneficial to those who are looking for a high-end solution to H.264 and Blu-ray encoding. The card will supposedly offer up to 4x faster H.264 video encoding as compared to a standard video card. This is due in part to the RapiHD plugin available from Elemental Technologies and comes with the purchase of the Quadro CX. Again, having this card and a CUDA driver will not accelerate "editing" within Premiere using any codec.

The census is that unless you are doing a lot of Blu-ray encoding, or exporting to H.264, then you should save your money and just buy one of the tested compatible video cards listed in the Adobe link above.
 
digitalcapturegroup said:
I don't want to get too far off topic here, but I figured I would chime in with some experience I have with NVidia cards and with other discussions I have had on other forums in regard to the CUDA driver.
Click to expand...

great post!

avchd editing is all about cpu power for decoding, i'd step up to the i7 for sure... it's not that much more than a core2quad, thanks to the funky intel pricing.
 
Some may say that Nvidia card does not help with AVCHD editing,
but I will say I think it does.

I can edit AVCHD without transcoding with a core 2 duo laptop and Nvidia card.
I have not pinpointed why, but the Nvidia graphics card is the item I belive it to be.

I have not seen any other laptop without an NVIDIA graphics card or quad core that can
edit AVCHD in premiere CS4.
 
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