Looking to Build a BEAST of a PC

T

TheOpusFuller

Member
Howdy,

I was considering buying the highest tier of a MacBook pro but came to the conclusion that they are way overpriced. In addition to buying the Pro, I would have to buy all my software over again. No thanks!

So, I'm looking to purchase a new computer. Strictly for video work. I recently purchased a Canon T2i and I need a system that can easily deal with the workload without any hiccups.

ONLY ONE PROBLEM.

I have no idea what to look for when building/buying a PC. I actually don't know how to assemble one myself, but that's okay. I'm willing to learn.

SO HERE'S MY QUESTION.

Should I build from scratch? If so, what should I look into buying? Can anyone recommend something for working with HD video?

OR

Is it okay to go with an already assembled computer? Are there decent systems out there that will handle video without any problems?

I saw mention of this website in another thread. Can you find some really good already built PCs that can handle video?

http://www.cyberpowerpc.com/

I would appreciate the help. THanks so much!
 
If depends on how much your time is worth. For a lot of people, particularly those that aren't familiar with how to build a computer, it's a better idea to get a pre-built machine. The physical building of the box usually doesn't take too long - it's all the auxiliary work, though. Picking out compatible components. Getting the OS and drivers installed. Updating random bits of firmware. Troubleshooting any hiccups. Setting up the airflow to balance noise and heat. Etc etc.

Sometimes, if you're fortunate, everything Just Works - in which case, building a machine will take you less then an hour (excluding installing software and the like). But if something hiccups... there goes a week or two of your life.

That said, if you're interested in become a lot more familiar with your computer and computing in general, I highly recommend taking the plunge and putting a machine together. It's a nifty learning experience, and once you get over the initial hump, you've got a machine that you should be quite comfortable upgrading and repairing yourself. But at that point, it's a hobby - do you have time for another hobby?
 
kgimedia said:
If you want a great computer that can run Windows and all your software check out this site. The prices are very competitive and they build great computers. I believe you can even configure them to run OSX and slowly buy new software for that OS.

http://store.apple.com/us/browse/home/shop_mac/family/mac_pro?mco=MTM3NDc4OTA
Click to expand...


What do you mean check out that site? That's the apple store. Why would I check that site out when I'm looking to run windows and all my software? Confused...
 
C=64 said:
If depends on how much your time is worth. For a lot of people, particularly those that aren't familiar with how to build a computer, it's a better idea to get a pre-built machine. The physical building of the box usually doesn't take too long - it's all the auxiliary work, though. Picking out compatible components. Getting the OS and drivers installed. Updating random bits of firmware. Troubleshooting any hiccups. Setting up the airflow to balance noise and heat. Etc etc.

Sometimes, if you're fortunate, everything Just Works - in which case, building a machine will take you less then an hour (excluding installing software and the like). But if something hiccups... there goes a week or two of your life.

That said, if you're interested in become a lot more familiar with your computer and computing in general, I highly recommend taking the plunge and putting a machine together. It's a nifty learning experience, and once you get over the initial hump, you've got a machine that you should be quite comfortable upgrading and repairing yourself. But at that point, it's a hobby - do you have time for another hobby?
Click to expand...


I think I'd rather buy a pre-built PC as of right now. But in the future I'd love to try and assemble
 
pre-built or not, a good editing PC will have the following:

Processor: Intel i7
RAM: at least 8gigs
GFX card: nvidia geforce 4xx with at least a gig of ram.

the rest is up to you.
 
So would something of this caliber be able to handle t2i footage with a breeze?

This set up would set me back around $1400. Not too bad.



  • CPU: Intel® Core™ i7-940 2.93 GHz 8M Intel Smart Cache LGA1366
  • HDD: 1TB SATA-II 3.0Gb/s 16MB Cache 7200RPM HDD (1TB x 2 (2 TB Capacity) Raid 0 Extreme Performance [+76])
  • MEMORY: 12GB (2GBx6) DDR3/1600MHz Triple Channel Memory Module [+171] (Corsair or Major Brand)
  • MOTHERBOARD: (3-Way SLI Support) MSI X58 Pro-E Intel X58 Chipset SLI/CrossFire DDR3 Mainboard
  • SOUND: HIGH DEFINITION ON-BOARD 7.1 AUDIO
  • VIDEO: NVIDIA GeForce GTX 465 1GB 16X PCIe Video Card [+183] (Major Brand Powered by NVIDIA)
 
sorry, i edited as you replied.

what i meant to say is more hard disks.

for example, one for the OS and installed apps, and one to store and edit your files on.
 
I have 2 x 1 TB harddrives selected for this build.

1TB SATA-II 3.0Gb/s 16MB Cache 7200RPM HDD (1TB x 2 (2 TB Capacity) Raid 0 Extreme Performance)


I figured this would suffice for now. I can always buy some external harddrives for space later down the road. yeah?

Other than that, does this look like it will hold up and definitely handle video without a problem?
 
How important is motherboard, etc. when it comes to video editing? Something I should make a conscious decision about when making a purchase?
 
If you're going for a pre-built machine, I wouldn't be too concerned about the motherboard; the builder has likely gone through the worry for you. Particularly if you aren't planning on overclocking.

Another random potential consideration - have you thought about setting up a RAID-0 for your "scratch" video editing drive? That'd require 3 drives in your system - one for your main installation, and then the pair of drives in RAID-0 for your video editing.

That said, this is a nicety, not a requirement. :)

---

Oh, silly me - I should have paid more attention. I see you've already gone for a RAID array. Though one word of warning - RAID 0 has a higher chance of failure; if either drive hiccups, the entire RAID goes down. If you aren't too concerned about that, or plan on doing a good job of backing up your machine, no worries. I generally like to keep the main drive as a single drive, and then the scratch video editing drive as a Raid. That way, if the raid breaks, I won't have to rebuild the OS installation. But then again, I tend to be paranoid about RAID (my RAID 0 of Deathstars being a rather painful lesson back in the day).
 
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TheOpusFuller said:
What do you mean check out that site? That's the apple store. Why would I check that site out when I'm looking to run windows and all my software? Confused...
Click to expand...

All the new Intel Macs can run Windows and all your software. The brand new ones are some of the most powerful computers you can buy. 12 cores sounds like HD fun to me.
 
C=64 said:
If you're going for a pre-built machine, I wouldn't be too concerned about the motherboard; the builder has likely gone through the worry for you. Particularly if you aren't planning on overclocking.

Another random potential consideration - have you thought about setting up a RAID-0 for your "scratch" video editing drive? That'd require 3 drives in your system - one for your main installation, and then the pair of drives in RAID-0 for your video editing.

That said, this is a nicety, not a requirement. :)

---

Oh, silly me - I should have paid more attention. I see you've already gone for a RAID array. Though one word of warning - RAID 0 has a higher chance of failure; if either drive hiccups, the entire RAID goes down. If you aren't too concerned about that, or plan on doing a good job of backing up your machine, no worries. I generally like to keep the main drive as a single drive, and then the scratch video editing drive as a Raid. That way, if the raid breaks, I won't have to rebuild the OS installation. But then again, I tend to be paranoid about RAID (my RAID 0 of Deathstars being a rather painful lesson back in the day).
Click to expand...

Hmmm, is this something I should be worried about?

I'm kind of confused. 2 drives is like have a partitioned harddrive, correct? You have your OS running on 1 partition and on the partition 2 you have all your saved stuff. So if anything goes down, you could restore partition A and all your stuff on partition B will be untouched. Right?


Is that kind of what you're saying with two raid drives?
 
Hi there, what C=64 was saying is that you could have 1 physical hard drive as your boot disk (ie the "C" drive) and two other drives raided for your footage/data.

e.g. if you raided two 1 gig hard drives in raid 0, in windows you would only see a single 2 gig disk (it would actually be a little smaller but i havent the maths to hand now).

Raid 0 is the fastest disk method but has zero recovery if one drive fails...

e.g.2. if you raided two 1 gig hard drives as raid 1, in windows you would only see a single 1 gig disk.

Raid 1 means that if one drive fails you can carry on with one disk and replace the faulty one later. the raid can then be rebuilt.

There is also Raid 5 which is a sort of hybrid of the two, you get redundancy and speed but of course needs 3 or more disks (iirc).

I personally also favour having a seperate boot drive and seperate storage drives for safety. If you want all out speed you could always use a solid state boot disk and a raid1 or raid 5 storage partition?

The main speed advantage is having a seperate boot disk and a seperate data disk, windows in its infinite wisdom loves saving temporary data to its swap file no matter how much damn memory you have.

I have never had any problems editing avcintra-100 footage on even a single data drive, most modern hard drives are more than able to keep up.
The reason people like a raided data disk is for safety to make sure you dont lose any valuable customer footage.


I dont know whats available to you over the pond so to speak as im in the UK but maybe this is of some help.
 
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