Video Editing machine

The Insider

Hi,

Mate of mine wants a machine that he can use for Video Editing, he is going to be creating DVD's and will be using the machine to edit, mix video etc. He wants a lot of storage. He has about €2000 to spend, I specked out the following machine from Dell, came to just over €2000.

Base: Intel® Core® 2 Duo® E6400 Processor (2.13GHz, 1066MHz, 2MB)
Memory: 2048MB Dual Channel DDR2 533MHz [2x1024] Memory
Video Card: 256MB nVidia™ GeForce™ 7900GS graphics card
Hard Drive: 1 TB (2x500GB) 7200rpm SATA Hard Drive - Dual HDD Config
Floppy Drives: Internal 13-in-1 Media Card Reader
CD/DVD Drives: 16X DVD+/-RW Drive
Sound Cards: Integrated Sound Blaster Audigy ADVANCED HD Audio Software

I figured this spec should be able to handle everything he will want to be able to do, should he be looking at a better video card? If he had a bit more money would I be better off with a better video card, more memory, better processor or will this spec be able to handle the workload?

Now he has also mentioned the fact that he wants to be able to capture video in real time from his TV (Sky digital) as well as capturing Video through DVD and VHS. Would this card do the trick?

http://www.komplett.ie/k/ki.asp?sku=321741

Cheers

PogMoThoin

You'd build a much higher spec'd pc than that if ya build yourself. Dell really rip you off when you upgrade from the base systems ie. ram & hd's etc.

Here, i put this together, much higher specs, much lower price: http://www.komplett.ie/k/shoplist.asp?mode=receive&si=389719&su=A6C60C86-E660-4814-AA8E-06C59FB5845C

Note: This is a 4mb cache 2.4Ghz E6600, 2Gb ram, 1Tb hd, the soundcard is not integrated & the same 7900gs as in the dell. Change it to suit his needs. Add a copy of Windows Xp, if you dont have 1. Add a good cpu cooler & he'd be able to overclock that rig to 3Ghz+

8T8

Yeah your not getting the best deal look at what you get from Komplett for a lower price.

For one thing you don't need a high end graphics card a basic unit will do.

For a good video editing machine get
A good fast CPU
Lots of RAM
Fast hard drives
Lots of storage space

From the Komplett machine above click recommended options & buy then make the following changes;

Under mainboards pick

MSI P965 NEO-F, P965, Socket-775, ATX, SATAII, GbLAN, DDR2, PCI-Ex16 -110

Under memory pick

Corsair Value S. PC5300 DDR2 2048MB Kit w/two matched Value Select 1024MB +123.01

Under graphics cards pick

Gainward GeForce 7600GS 256MB Passive, PCI-Express, DDR2, "BP7600GS-256-TV-DVI" -340

Under hard drives pick

Western Digital Caviar SE16 500GB SATA2 16MB 7200RPM +131

Under hard drives (additional) pick

Western Digital Caviar SE16 500GB SATA2 16MB 7200RPM +213

Under sound card pick

Creative SB X-Fi Platinum PCI, Retail +179

Under monitors pick

Samsung 20" LCD Syncmaster 205BW TCO03, Silver, 1600x1050, 6ms, VGA/DVI, 700:1 +300

So it just about comes in under 2K and you get a better machine;
20" Widescreen display
Faster CPU
Dual 500GB HD
High end sound card
2GB of RAM
Silent graphics card

As for TV get one of these instead as it will do the capture and allow you to watch TV as well.

The Insider

Cheers for the replys. I spec out a machine of Komplett.

8T8 will that TV card enable him to watch/capture digital TV? (SKY Digital)

8T8

Yes, the card has an s-video & composite input. You will need to use an adaptor* to convert the scart output into one of those formats.

* Such adaptors only work with composite properly, the s-video part which would offer better picture quality doesn't, in order to get the best picture quality you need something like this scart RGB to s-video converter.

{A hack described here for those little scart adaptors to get them working in colour didn't work for me on two of the units I tried, maybe it will work for you}

Takeshi_Kovacs

That is an awful price he was quoted by Dell, I just recently built a pc with higher spec parts for a good few hundred euro cheaper, dunno if your mate wants to go through the hassle of diy'ing it though.
The Core duo is great as well for dvd editing. I converted 4 video files to dvd in the same length of time it took 1 video file on my pentium 4, (and it could have been faster if i used lower quality settings..)
Also if a fella knew what he was doing then you could get one of those free to air pci cards (such as skystar 2), and by using the core duo cpu, you would be able to view mpeg 4 high def channels as they become more popular, along with all the fta channels. (just don't go using it for more grey area purposes as that would be very bad...)

unklerosco

8T8 wrote:

Yes, the card has an s-video & composite input. You will need to use an adaptor* to convert the scart output into one of those formats.

* Such adaptors only work with composite properly, the s-video part which would offer better picture quality doesn't, in order to get the best picture quality you need something like this scart RGB to s-video converter.

{A hack described here for those little scart adaptors to get them working in colour didn't work for me on two of the units I tried, maybe it will work for you}

afaik it aint possible to convert Svideo to scart... Those adapters only work if ur able to output a composite signal over svideo or vice versa...

obrienb

You should get faster ram than the 533Mhz! You'll be creating a bottleneck. Also, have a look on eBay for an nVidia Quadro gfx card if it's going to be used as a workstation. The mainstream gfx cards are good for pushing around loads of little polygons for games using dx, but if you want a serious workstation card then the Quadro is the best OpenGL card available. You can pick up some really powerful ones from eBay quite cheaply.

PogMoThoin

obrienb wrote:

You should get faster ram than the 533Mhz! You'll be creating a bottleneck.

:rolleyes: Wrong, there is no difference in 533,667 or 800mhz at stock speeds in core 2 duo. You need 2 read this: http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/memory/display/core2duo-memory-guide.html

Its only when overclocking ie. pushing up the fsb that there becomes a difference.

obrienb

Well now that is interesting. It differs to what I had read in PC Plus a couple of months back but then again this is definate benchmarks. Thanks for bringing this to my attention. Although there is a speed increase in certain cases it may warrant the spending of an extra ~80euro on the faster RAM.

unklerosco

obrienb wrote:

You should get faster ram than the 533Mhz! You'll be creating a bottleneck. Also, have a look on eBay for an nVidia Quadro gfx card if it's going to be used as a workstation. The mainstream gfx cards are good for pushing around loads of little polygons for games using dx, but if you want a serious workstation card then the Quadro is the best OpenGL card available. You can pick up some really powerful ones from eBay quite cheaply.

Quadro FX cards really only excel in 3D work, animation etc... For home Vid editing n that the nvidia 7 series r grand.... For pro work u'd be looking at something like this matrox card http://www.planetdv.net/Content/Video_Editing_Cards/Matrox.asp These cards are designed with vid editing in mind and work along with the software.. But that card along eats up nearly all of ur budget..

I built an vid editing pc for an AV company earlier this year...

Specs here http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showpost.php?p=51020495&postcount=83

obrienb

What's the point spending a fortune on a geForce gfx card if he can spend the same on a Quadro and use it for post-production such as Combustion, Smoke, etc. The expensive gF is going to hae no effect on his ability to edit video yet the Quadro will have some. I agree on the Matrox though, even on eBay the prices are extortionate!

I have a gF6800 that cost a bomb but could have got a Quadro for the same price. By 6800 performs only marginally better than the gF5200 in college for Combustion and 3DS Max. After seeing what a Quadro is capable of in comparison I wish I had went for that option. I mean, I have a 6800 but don't even play games on it. Waste of $$$.

unklerosco

The reason i went for the 6800 is because i'd to buy new so a second hand Quadro was out and after going through allot of AV forums on whar card to get the nvidia 6 series and 7 series where the ones to go for, over the Quadro series....

Combustion and 3DS Max will take advantage of a Quadro card a hell of allot more than say Adobe Premiere...

If ur mate uses AVID for editing, they also produce hardware specifically designed for their sofware, ie. their mojo... These make a huge difference as all editing is done in real time...

Also, make sure the mobo has firewire, if not get a firwire pci card... U'll need it for DV hardware..