Graphic Editing

[nerdlogic]

Okay, I'm building a computer for some guy and he wants to be able to do some graphical editing and, I think, some video editing. I'm not sure about the video editing, but I will find out soon.

Anyway, I was wondering about performance. I want it to be smooth, but I don't want to have to get the 128 9800Pro if I don't have to. Basically the machine is going to run 1GB RAM, so there shouldn't be any RAM problems for him. I'm hoping to be able to pass it off with a 9500Pro. If not, how about a 9700Pro?

[Illah]

Theres a big misconception that video cards can affect the performance of graphic and video editing. THEY DON'T. You could give him a GF2 and it would just as fast as a 9800pro. What he needs to speed that up is CPU and RAM.

Basically look for max image quality and sharpness. It may not even be ATI or nVidia - maybe Matrox. Even more important is the monitor - a top-notch monitor will make even lower IQ cards look great. Think a REALLY low dot pitch flatscreen or LCD.

For video editing look at my response in this post: http://forum.oc-forums.com/vb/showthread.php?s=&threadid=218339

--Illah

[nerdlogic]

Thanks for the reply. :) I'm planning on getting him a KDS X-Flat 17" monitor. Is that okay?

Here's what I was thinking based on your reply: just get an 8500LE for him and have 1GB Corsair Value Select PC2700 with a 2100+ OC'ed for better performance.

What should I get should he need VHS video editing? Would the S-Video port on the 8500LE work?

[Needitcooler]

If he is still doing VHS video editing, he needs to upgrade his camera before anything else.....

Anyways, if he does require VHS video editing, that means he is using something like a Hi-8 or even older format camera which probably doesn't have an S-video out. Most likely he would need a DV bridge like this one......
http://www.dazzle.com/products/hw_bridge.html

1 gig of ram is plenty. I have been doing video editing on my computer for the last 3 years with just 512 MB memory, and have found it to be sufficient. 1 gig would be much better though.

I don't know how hardcore he is with his video editing, but Flat panel LCD's have a problem reproducing accurate colors, which could lead to a shoddy final product. Imagine editing a video with your new lcd panel, thinking you have the flesh tones right on, making a final product, turning the tv on, and seeing grandma with orange skin. AHHHHHH....

[nerdlogic]

Originally posted by Needitcooler
seeing grandma with orange skin. AHHHHHH....

LMAO!

Well, I'll see if he needs to do any video editing. If he doesn't need to, then I'm good to go. I'll let you guys know what's up ASAP.

[Super Nintendo]

when you mean by graphical editing do you mean working with 3d studio max or CAD. Programs kinda like that? I'm just wondering because if he is I wouldn't get a gaming card but a more CAD/3d card because gaming don't work that well for doing that kind of stuff.

[Emberghost]

Originally posted by Super Nintendo
when you mean by graphical editing do you mean working with 3d studio max or CAD. Programs kinda like that? I'm just wondering because if he is I wouldn't get a gaming card but a more CAD/3d card because gaming don't work that well for doing that kind of stuff.

I run a program called Cinema 4D (http://www.maxon.net) , you may be familiar with it but I dought it. It is similar to lightwave, maya, 3dsm, etc, and I run it on my MSI TI-4200 and it works great. One of the guys that posted previously was right, all you really need in the video card is good image quality. Ram and processor speed on the other hand are very crucial to this type of work. I frequent the cgtalk.com boards and about 7/10 go with a non professional nvidia card or professional *quadro cards*, or even ATI's pro cards. But I am not talking the 9500*pro*, 9800*pro* etc. Most people get weird stability issues with the ati gaming cards, but not with nvidias...

Take my info as you will, just my .02, you might want to start a thread at cgtalk.com because they specialize in CAD programs.

[nerdlogic]

Hmmm...I don't know exactly what he's going to be doing still. I haven't had a chance to ask him, yet. I don't see him often. He says he's going to be using photoshop and some other image editing programs...he may be doing some CAD but I'm not sure. So far, all he's told me is that he will be using photoshop. I might just go with the 9500np and give him my 8500LE. I've been wanting a better gaming card. I will take the difference off the labor price, though. If not, I'll stick with my 8500LE and give him a lower-priced card.

[Emberghost]

It would help if you gave us a budget you are working with. And is he going to be gaming at all or just CAD related apps?

[nerdlogic]

I have no budget, really. I am putting parts together to get an estimate. This is just a desktop for him to do his graphic work, AFAIK.

[DeepScience]

Twin monitors is the way to go if you end up doing audio or video production. I've heard the Matrox dual head implementation is very nice.

[nerdlogic]

hmmmm... :-/ I'd have to ask him if he wants dual monitor display.

[Stedeman]

For CAD type of work (SMP 2X # crunching not so much speed) CPU power is the way to go, if he is doing video (uncompressed) he will be better off with a RAID stripping setup
Twin monitors is the way to go if you end up doing audio or video production. I've heard the Matrox dual head implementation is very nice. Ya Matrox is geared more to this type of market

[DeepScience]

Originally posted by Stedeman
For CAD type of work (SMP 2X # crunching not so much speed) CPU power is the way to go, if he is doing video (uncompressed) he will be better off with a RAID stripping setup
Ya Matrox is geared more to this type of market

I just use the 7200rpm barracuda drives, no raid, and never drop a frame. WinXP with NTFS (unlimited file size), Firewire capture.
Apparently Premiere Pro (7) has some realtime features and a dedicated capture card not necessary even with version 6.
But Pro is also hyperthread enabled ;)

[scoobiedoo]

All of my picture/video editing i do is on my dual mp2100 machine.

I can't stress enough how big of a deal it is having dual cpu's when doing something in photoshop :D Then again i could just be spoiled too.

anyhoo, picture editing and video editing are more cpu/ram intensive applications.

video also has alot more to do with the hd's.

Umm an xp2100, 1 gig of ram, with a matrox vid card.

With a 80 gig or bigger harddrive preferrably an 8MB cache one.

That should basically do it. :D

scoobie

*goes to look for the folding section again*

[Stedeman]

Depending on what and how you are capturing you could need RAID. Uncompressed AVI @ 640*480 will need RAID as for having 8MB buffers on the drives thats nice but once you exceed the buffer limits you will be running strictly on the HDDs sustained transfer rates so if your doing large files 1GB or more it becomes irrelevant for the most part. But 7200RPM will be a big help in the sustained transfer rate

[Tyranos]

Actually, the high end gaming cards are also high performers for 3d applications. Even the geforce3 was rated higher than other dedicated cards in its time. If he is only doing photoshop/premiere etc, then a geforce 2 mx would be fine. 1024mb of ram is ok, more would be good, but keep in mind even though Windows XP can handle a theoretical ~4gb, not all applications can. 3D Studio MAX 5 can only use 2gb of memory for instance. As for the rest, you should run a raid array, and I also suggest dual xeons, or dual opteron 244's if he can afford it. If he's doing serious professional 3d work, a dual cpu workstation coupled with multiple slave systems for rendering would be optimal. A gigabit lan connection would be an excellent conduit between them. He does NOT want render times to shoot up because his huge scene is overwhelming a 10/100 connection.

Those are my honest, professional opinions. Everything is just hinged on how much money he has, how serious he is, and what his focus is on.

[DeepScience]

Originally posted by Stedeman
Depending on what and how you are capturing you could need RAID. Uncompressed AVI @ 640*480 will need RAID as for having

Just not true. Capturing DV via Firewire is perfect just using a modern 5200rpm IDE drive let alone the 7200 rpm drives. I've tested it for four years and it works brilliantly. And PAL DV is 720x576 pixels. Plus, capturing is only a part of video editing and 8MB cache does help significantly in other areas.

My suggestion for video would be to go with two 7200rpm 8MB cache 80GB (at least) IDE drives that are NOT set as RAID. The 8MB cache drives from Seagate have the 3 year warrenty not just a one year warrenty. And for video you'll very quickly appreciate the extra space two drives. It actually makes things run better with the OS on a different drive the the capture one.

my 2 cents anyway and all beside the point cos I think they said picture editing not video.

[Stedeman]

Originally posted by DeepScience


Just not true. Capturing DV via Firewire is perfect just using a modern 5200rpm IDE drive let alone the 7200 rpm drives.
Thats true because "DV is already digital" BUT you can't capture Uncompressed AVI that way and U/AVI is a higher quality allowing you to adjust your compression types and rates. Spend some time here http://www.doom9.org/ to learn about different capture methods and the requirements for each there is also many tools and information on how to tweak them.
more to my point
http://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?s=&threadid=32575

[DeepScience]

Originally posted by Stedeman

Thats true because "DV is already digital" BUT you can't capture Uncompressed AVI that way and U/AVI is a higher quality allowing you to adjust your compression types and rates. Spend some time here ...

It's true because UATA100/133 is darn fast. No I don't want to spend time there because my system works fine. Considering the cost of DV cameras and scanners nowadays why do anything differently on a home workstation? Are you thinking corporate Betacam solutions? And again, how does this relate to a computer not being used for video editing?

[Tyranos]

When I was in school for animation, we captured video on anything from imacs to dual processor editing machines with raid. If I can remember right, even the imacs were fine for that, and we also did most of our editing on them.