H-264 / i7 / CS-4

[mcsmooth]

What I don't understand is why nobody seems to have been able to edit native H-264 files in Adobe CS4 smoothly with an i7. I've been following this on this forum for a year and the best advice I've gotten is to convert to the files using Pro-res or DNX-HD. I just don't get it.

For one, there are different variations of h.264. Primarily, a lot of people on here are using AVCHD off the HMC150 and 40 which uses B frames (unlike the Canon DLSRs). Bidirectional frames are much more efficient for storage, but require a lot more work to read/write making scrubbing difficult. Your format should edit a lot easier.

Also, the i7 hasn't been around that long, so figure not everyone upgraded at once (or has yet). I happened to be in need for a new machine and built one soon after the 920 came out... and what a disappointment the first release of CS4 was! They did iron out most of the bugs though.

If you haven't already, check out CS5 which decodes even smoother. I still wouldn't say it's as fast as DV if you are hopping all over the place backwards, but doable for most projects. I do still think transcoding is useful for certain applications, especially with lots of layers, each with multiple effects (at least with AVCHD from the HMC150). You can swap back for the original files at any point for final touch ups and rendering. For simple editing, I agree, it is wasteful to transcode today if you have a decent system.

i7 980x six-core 3.33 Ghz with Asus P6X58D motherboard
2 TB RAID 0
12 GB of RAM
Asus GTX285 Graphic card.

Damn! I think I would have gone with a 930 and a GTX480 or maybe 24GB RAM... but I'm cheap! If 6 cores is truly 1.5 times as fast, that must be slick.

 

[ROCKMORE]

Use what!??!

Wiping/Formatting the hard drive would be better. Do things properly :cheesy:[/quote

Deep Freeze is a program that resets system HD back to where it was on the last start. anything on that HD will be gone on the next start unless you tell it to. Setting up system drives with everything from AF PS to 3dsmax 64 bit takes time. Why would i want to format a system that I just set up? I'm just trying to keep the bugs out.

 

[ROCKMORE]

I'm toying with the idea of doing 8 gig, win7 and CS5 on my q6600.

Was it worth the upgrade for you or was it just an incremental improvement?

I don't want to throw money at an older machine just to find out I should have started from scratch.

I just rented my i7 out for a week so I decided to upgrade my old computer with a Quad. They don't come close. I struggled through an edit this week with Sony EX3 HD files, Canon H-264 HD, and Uncompressed HD mov. 10 bit on the same timeline.
The day before I was setting up the edit with the i7 with all the same elements and it was going smoothly. My i7 still only has the 3 gigs of memory I set it up with and works well. I can still toss in the other 21 gigs anytime .
I got through it with the Quad but had to divide the project into pieces.
The i7 comes back Monday and the rental covered the cost of the quad processor which made it worth it, maybe, but it could have cost me my client if things went badly, and it was a panic for the first half.

Go for an i7 from scratch. The best move I've made.