Build for video editing

Damon Blake

Hey there, I'm currently trying to edit AVCHD video on a horrible laptop I bought from Aldi years ago, it's not going the best. So, looking to buy a desktop to make things easier, advice on the below would be appreciated.

1. What is your budget? ~ €500.

2. What will be the main purpose of the computer? Video editing (creative suite 5: premierpro and after-effects), no gaming.

3. Do you need a copy of Windows? Yes (I am a student if that means discounts)(I am cheap).

4. Can you use any parts from an old computer? No.

5. Do you need a monitor? No.

5a. If yes, what size do you need.

5b. If no, what resolution is your current monitor and do you plan to upgrade in the near future? I have an old 19 inch I use, I'm open to buying a new one though.

6. Do you need any of these peripherals? Wireless card, card reader.

7. Are you willing to try overclocking? No.

8. How can you pay? [Credit Card/Laser]

9. When are you purchasing? Soon, although can wait if there is a price drop in anything expected.

10. If you need help building it, where are you based? Should be okay, in Dublin 12 however.

Thanks!

Procrastastudy

Do these programs need any sort of GPU (video card power) or can they run happily off the CPU?

Just search for software "4" students - they are upgrade packs so it would be totally wrong of me to tell you how to use them for clean installs.

Item|Price
8GB-Kit G.Skill PC3-10667U CL9|€37.24
Hitachi Deskstar 7K1000.D 1TB SATA 6GB's|€79.55
BitFenix Merc Beta|€33.20
Antec BasiQ VP350|€34.97
LG GH24NS bare schwarz|€18.16
ASRock Z77 Pro3, Sockel 1155, ATX|€93.44
Intel Core i5-2300 Box, LGA1155|€170.97
Shipping|€18.99
Total|€486.52

I would double the order or RAM and HDDs and run a RAID 0 setup for video editing, budget permitting. I normally limit myself to gaming builds (where I have some clue) so take my recommendations with a pinch of salt.

ED E

pPro can use CUDA but for his budget its not worth bothering with, just pump everything into CPU, RAM and Scratch disks. Once the card is fit to playback 1080p its plenty(AKA sandybridge integrated will do).

Damon Blake

Thank you for the help guys, the last time I was inside a computer was to remove a mouse that had snuck in there over night. Much appreciated.

frozenfrozen

try pick up a 9800gt for cheap, it has the same power for physx as a 580, so if you're working with particles it is very good. You're going to need more than 8gb of ram, just as a comparison for my video work I'm always using at least 20gb of ram, go for 16gb minimum.

instead of one 1tb drive, get two 500gb drives and put them in raid 0, one of your biggest bottlenecks will always be harddrive speed, 5 camera multicam will pull close to 1 GB per second (depending on resolution and compression, of course.)

Also make sure you have a good monitor, or at least if it's bad have it configured properly to display close to true colours.

Until you get this build remember to proxy all of your video if it's HD, you will be able to smoothly edit low resolution footage on a laptop, then just wait through the very long render times with the real footage at the end. Even a super high end pc will struggle with playing compressed HD video, especially with multiple streams

ED E

frozenfrozen wrote: »

try pick up a 9800gt for cheap, it has the same power for physx as a 580, so if you're working with particles it is very good. You're going to need more than 8gb of ram, just as a comparison for my video work I'm always using at least 20gb of ram, go for 16gb minimum.

Maybe you're doing very intensive stuff, but I think 20GB is misleading. Just because your suite reserves ram for its own use doesnt mean you're actually using it. If he's currently working on an aldi laptop and is buying budget its safe to assume this is the lower end of the scale, 8GB will be a huge improvement and probably enough for his needs.

You're bang on about the drives though.

Procrastastudy

Id disagree on 2x500GB - 500GB and even 1TB drives aren't great value for money. I think there is about 2o quid in it between 500GB and 1TB

I'd spend a wee bit more now and get 2 x 1TB at the very least - double the RAM too ideally but get the HDDs first if budget doesn't permit both.

I have to admit my only experience of video editing was selling a machine to a guy that put subtitles on pr0n - but that was ten years ago!

frozenfrozen

ED E wrote: »

Maybe you're doing very intensive stuff, but I think 20GB is misleading. Just because your suite reserves ram for its own use doesnt mean you're actually using it. If he's currently working on an aldi laptop and is buying budget its safe to assume this is the lower end of the scale, 8GB will be a huge improvement and probably enough for his needs.

You're bang on about the drives though.

live link colouring with 5 adjustment layers in AE with premiere with multicam sound intensive enough?

ED E

GCDLawstudent wrote: »

Id disagree on 2x500GB - 500GB and even 1TB drives aren't great value for money. I think there is about 2o quid in it between 500GB and 1TB

His point was more to get the IO, obv for a little more go for the TBs but the primary concern is to be able to read and write simultaneously on two different drives(or more).

Procrastastudy

To clarify defo go RAID with as many HDDs as pos - just spend the extra few quid per drive now and have beans on toast for the week. You'll thank us later.

ED E

A good backup system wont fit in this budget but if you're precious footage is all going in this box you'll want to keep another copy elsewhere.

Damon Blake

Thanks for the additional advice guys, I've got some flexibility on the budget so will go with the two tb if possible. I'm not doing anything fancy, no multi-cam or anything.

Thanks again for the help.

frozenfrozen

ED E wrote: »

A good backup system wont fit in this budget but if you're precious footage is all going in this box you'll want to keep another copy elsewhere.

Raid 5 would be the best bet then. No need for backup systems and he would just lose 1 of the hdds worth of storage but keep full parity and raid 0 speed

frozenfrozen

Damon Blake wrote: »

Thanks for the additional advice guys, I've got some flexibility on the budget so will go with the two tb if possible. I'm not doing anything fancy, no multi-cam or anything.

Thanks again for the help.

if you have extra budget then go for 5 500gb drives and use raid 5, it's the speed of raid 0 but if one drive fails you will be able to replace it and your storage configuration would rebuild its self and you wouldn't lose anything.

ED E

frozenfrozen wrote: »

Raid 5 would be the best bet then. No need for backup systems and he would just lose 1 of the hdds worth of storage but keep full parity and raid 0 speed

Not if it gets nicked/burnt/a hard kick or fall.

Procrastastudy

RAID 5 /shudder!

Only if you have a controller card imo - even then if the controller goes the array is fubar.

AntiRip

Jesus guys you are frightening me
I do the odd bit of video editing on my 4GB Ram, i5 XPS15 laptop with 1080p videos. I'm only using PowerDirector atm.

Was going to upgrade to 8GB of Ram just in case as I will be doing video editing next semester in college.

Do you think I'll struggle with this?

P.S Sorry to OP for hijack

Procrastastudy

Its the sotrage subsytem that gives you issues - 8GB RAM will help but how much on a sloooooow 2.5" puppy killer dell HDD I have not idea sorry

I don't know much ref video editing - I have to learn soon when my 'casting agency' opens :P