What is the oldest/minimum Mac Pro and PC needed for 4K video editing?
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Alchroma
Active member
This is an excellent article on 4K gear:
https://www.videomaker.com/article/f6/17135-editing-in-4k-minimum-system-requirements
In general around 2009 Macs and younger are in the zone. GPU of a gig or more and 16 gig+
ram should get you going.
And lots of drive space, USB 3 or thunderbolt. Raid 0 is good.
Al
https://www.videomaker.com/article/f6/17135-editing-in-4k-minimum-system-requirements
In general around 2009 Macs and younger are in the zone. GPU of a gig or more and 16 gig+
ram should get you going.
And lots of drive space, USB 3 or thunderbolt. Raid 0 is good.
Al
dmitrizigany
Veteran
No, even 7200rpm USB3 is gonna be troublesome in 4K. maybe simple things... but also depends on what codec 4K you use.
Forget about USB2 completely.
arniepix
Well-known member
That's an 8 year old computer, with an 8 year old graphics card. You'd be better off spending money on a new computer rather than on upgrading that one.
The CPU bus, memory bus and PCIe bus are all slower than what would be found in any current workstations. A current iMac would be a better investment than upgrading that old Mac Pro.
Hi Arnie,
Do you know if it is better than this computer?
Processor – Intel ® Core™ i7 CPU 860 @ 2.80Ghz 2.79Ghz
Ram: 16gb
System type: 64 bit Windows 8 Pro
GPU: Nvidia GeForce 9600 GT, NVidia Geforce GT430
HD: 120gb SSD for OS, 2tb 7200rpm HD for video materials
Am I better off upgrading the PC?
filmguy123
Veteran
The MacPro processor is fine, but more so for FCPX which utilizes multi core. Premiere Pro CS6 will not take much advantage of the 8 core CPU or the better GPU rendering for that matter either.
Actually, you are better off upgrading the SOFTWARE than the hardware to take better advantage of your multi core CPU and/or GPU.
The older motherboard specs shouldn't bottleneck you too much *depending* on what you upgrade. You are going to better off asking for specific information on the anadtech forum, though.
I'd recommend dropping a GTX 970 or 1070 + a large Western Digital 6TB Black performance HDD into the MacPro and using either Premiere Pro CC 2017 or FCPX. Or a large 1-2tb SSD but it sounds like you are on a budget.
The PC will work but again CS6 is going to be a problem for utilizing your hardware to max, and I'd ditch Windows 8 for Windows 10 which is better optimized. If you upgraded the PC your GPU is a bit better so that could stay (though you could move it to a GTX 1070) and a 7200rpm HDD is good, but there are more to HDD performance specs than just RPM, so a WD Black drive may also help there as well. Make sure the pipeline is clear: SATA straight into motherboard is ideal. USB 2.0 definitely not, and SATA expansion cards can slow this down as well depending on the port they are routed through.
Even older CPUs are holding up pretty well, so while a newer one would clearly be better, it requires a new motherboard and RAM and at that point you basically are upgrading to a whole new computer. So since that's not ideal,, your biggest factors are going to be your data throughput rate (HDD/SSD), your software's ability to efficiently use your hardware, and in last place your GPU for GPU accelerated rendering (which the MacPro will severely lack on and the PC will currently be ok-ish on).
Regarding the Mac Pro vs PC in terms of CPU... hmm... might be a toss up, I think. Check benchmarks. The 8-cores in the MacPro could be really valuable on FCPX and depending on how Premiere Pro CC 2017 handles those. The Core I7 depending is from 2009 I believe so has a newer architecture and more efficiency per clock cycle, but it's half the cores.
CS6 could work, but, you really will be losing any multi-core advantage the MacPro might give you and I don't know how that's going to hold up in GPU acceleration for you either as it's severely limited, even if you can get your card to be supported.
Regarding an actual minimum spec for 4K, I don't think there's an official minimum spec, it's more about a maximum tolerance level on your end
Finally: REMEMBER PROXIES
You can always just render out lower res versions and edit offline, relink to high res for finishing, and export. This is of course made much easier on FCPX and PP CC 2017, but you could still do it manually on CS6 if you need to.
Actually, you are better off upgrading the SOFTWARE than the hardware to take better advantage of your multi core CPU and/or GPU.
The older motherboard specs shouldn't bottleneck you too much *depending* on what you upgrade. You are going to better off asking for specific information on the anadtech forum, though.
I'd recommend dropping a GTX 970 or 1070 + a large Western Digital 6TB Black performance HDD into the MacPro and using either Premiere Pro CC 2017 or FCPX. Or a large 1-2tb SSD but it sounds like you are on a budget.
The PC will work but again CS6 is going to be a problem for utilizing your hardware to max, and I'd ditch Windows 8 for Windows 10 which is better optimized. If you upgraded the PC your GPU is a bit better so that could stay (though you could move it to a GTX 1070) and a 7200rpm HDD is good, but there are more to HDD performance specs than just RPM, so a WD Black drive may also help there as well. Make sure the pipeline is clear: SATA straight into motherboard is ideal. USB 2.0 definitely not, and SATA expansion cards can slow this down as well depending on the port they are routed through.
Even older CPUs are holding up pretty well, so while a newer one would clearly be better, it requires a new motherboard and RAM and at that point you basically are upgrading to a whole new computer. So since that's not ideal,, your biggest factors are going to be your data throughput rate (HDD/SSD), your software's ability to efficiently use your hardware, and in last place your GPU for GPU accelerated rendering (which the MacPro will severely lack on and the PC will currently be ok-ish on).
Regarding the Mac Pro vs PC in terms of CPU... hmm... might be a toss up, I think. Check benchmarks. The 8-cores in the MacPro could be really valuable on FCPX and depending on how Premiere Pro CC 2017 handles those. The Core I7 depending is from 2009 I believe so has a newer architecture and more efficiency per clock cycle, but it's half the cores.
CS6 could work, but, you really will be losing any multi-core advantage the MacPro might give you and I don't know how that's going to hold up in GPU acceleration for you either as it's severely limited, even if you can get your card to be supported.
Regarding an actual minimum spec for 4K, I don't think there's an official minimum spec, it's more about a maximum tolerance level on your end
Finally: REMEMBER PROXIES
You can always just render out lower res versions and edit offline, relink to high res for finishing, and export. This is of course made much easier on FCPX and PP CC 2017, but you could still do it manually on CS6 if you need to.
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thekreative
Veteran
I just shot and edited a series in 4k on a 2013 MacBook Pro using FCPX and it ran like a dream. Of course I did the automatic proxy and just switched on 4k for outputs but FCPX lets out just switch back and forth. As for drives I used all 7200 thunderbolt and a 27" display when I wasn't in the field. I don't know about Premier but I bet it is the same in that you aren't really aware of the proxies and you don't really have to deal with them at all. Just ingest and start editing almost right away.
filmguy123
Veteran
No. Physical cores and virtual cores are different. The Core i7 has 4 cores with 8 virtual cores via hyperthreading.
Whether it's the same as the Mac or not, probably not if your Mac was advertised as "8 core". But I have insufficient info
Whether it's the same as the Mac or not, probably not if your Mac was advertised as "8 core". But I have insufficient info
Thomas Smet
Veteran
Don't forget about generational differences in technology. CPUs get more advanced in ways other than just raw speed. Media instructions are very different between a 2008 Xeon CPU and a 2017 Desktop CPU. The desktop CPUs are usually a generation ahead of the Xeons in terms of media related tasks.
There is render speed and then there is actual editing performance. The act of scrubbing through clips, assembling them, playing them back quickly and seamlessly and using effects without choking the system. It is those areas where a newer generation CPU/GPU help out a lot.
There is render speed and then there is actual editing performance. The act of scrubbing through clips, assembling them, playing them back quickly and seamlessly and using effects without choking the system. It is those areas where a newer generation CPU/GPU help out a lot.
joema
Active member
I've used Premiere since CS4 and have CC but now do most of my documentary editing on FCPX. There is no simple answer since video editing and codecs span a wide range. H264 1080p can be edited natively with good performance using either Premiere or FCPX on most machines.
OTOH most H264 4k codecs are difficult to edit, even on top-end machines, and often require transcoding to proxy for smoothest editing. Exceptions are H264 4k codecs like Canon's XF-AVC Intra; that is very fast to edit. There can also be a big difference between (say) Premiere and FCPX, especially on a Mac. In general FCPX is considerably more responsive, especially for editing H264 4k. It is about 4x faster exporting to H264 since it uses Quick Sync and Premiere does not. However Premiere has gotten faster the last year or so, even without proxy, which it now also has. CS6 does not have built-in proxy support, so that's a significant issue for an older machine editing H264 4k. If you are dealing with smaller amounts of material, you could possibly transcode to a lower-compression codec or even use a manual proxy workflow. Premiere only recently got built-in proxy support so Premiere users have long used manual proxy. If your camera(s) can use an external ProRes recorder that can avoid transcoding since it's captured with a low compression codec.
That's the editing; effects are different. No matter how lightweight the codec, a computationally-intensive effect must be calculated for each 4k frame. Effects can be implemented entirely in the CPU, entirely in the GPU or a mixture of both. Some effects like Neat Video allow CPU vs GPU rendering, a mix of both and how many CPU cores to use. But in general In general H264 4k is really difficult to edit. If you are committed to Premiere I would suggest buying or building a new machine. OTOH you can't keep using CS6 forever so eventually you'll need to pay a monthly subscription to Adobe, or investigate other alternatives such as Resolve or FCPX.