Cineform on Xeon CPUs

farss wrote on 12/15/2004, 5:56 PM

just wondering if anyone has been able to run the Cineform HDV codecs on a Xeon based system. Only reason I'm asking is I understand they use the SSI instruction set in the P4 CPUs and I'm far from certain the Xeons have the same instruction set.
Bob.

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imageshoppe wrote on 12/19/2004, 10:17 PM

<I'm fairly certain you can even avoid SCSI drives for this, SATA RAID 0 is fast enough. <Transcoding to DVCPRO HD means you are going down in resolution, hard to believe but it's <true, the FX1/Z1 is better res than Varicam, of cause the optics maybe another story.

On my system specs I posted earlier, I left out the card that the system was built for... a Leitch VelocityHD. I hope to splinter off a new box just for Vegas and HDV, but am running it on my dual Xeon for the moment alongside Velocity. The VelocityHD card is my "gateway" to and fro the world of HDCAM, as it handles 8 and 10bit material, uncompressed or with variable compression.

Yes, a SATA RAID can handle uncompressed 10 bit 1080i. How do I know? I do it all the time. I've got a 4-250gig SATA RAID 0 set up based on a Highpoint 1820a controller card as storage for the Velocity HD, and even at the half full point the array reads 220 meg/sec and writes 200 or so. With controller card and 4 drives the RAID cost about $800 for 1000 gigs. Not bad.

On a side note, last week we had an FX1 side by side with a Sony 700a camera, alternately feeding my HP 2335 monitor via component. With the same subject framed up there's no question that the 700 is a crisper camera with better apparent definition of details. However, the FX1 was amazingly good, and it's hard to tell how much of the difference is due to the glass...

Regards,

Jim Arthurs