Chris, the numbers you're getting are amazing for a computer costing $999. Makes you wonder if the guys paying 5k-7k for their tricked-out systems are wondering exactly what they paid for.

I was actually going to do an I7 build until I saw what Dell was selling their Studio XPS I7 system for. The base price is actually $899 with 3Gb of DDR3 Ram. While it's not perfect (no overclock on a chip that was built to overclock, and it's a mATX mobo if you ever decide a mobo swap is the ticket to overclocking)...but look at those benchmark numbers....:)

I think I'll pull 3 dimms out and run the benchmark again to see what folks would get with the base configuration.

I'm looking at their newer XPS systems, the ones with the slanted front. The one I'm interested in would run $1099 without a monitor.

...ahhhh...their gaming systems...you can overclock those! Dell even put out a YouTube video with step by step instructions on how to overclock the XPS 700.


...wait!...are you looking at the new XPS 435? Looks like a better case! Why didn't I wait?

That's right, the 435. I like the case better as well. A bit more room to maneuver inside. I would like to see a little bit beefier power supply than the 475w it comes with.

I ran the render test again with the same system with only 3Gb of ram instead to see what the Studio XPS i7 in the $899 base configuration would do...1:11

While I'm enjoying my 435MT, the more I look at the specs on the new 435, the more I wish I had waited. Looks like a lot more upgrade friendly. Mines like a Hemi the factory dropped into a dodge dart...not much room and a limited chasis. The new 435 is at least a Hemi Charger or 'Cuda.

Can one run Vegas 8.1 on XP 64 bit?

I managed to create a double boot system on my Q9450 Quad system, but of course
my serial and passkey for 8.0c is not working on 8.1 so this is theoretical at this point.

I thought one could install 8.1 for free...

Thanks
NS

I rendered it out Vegas 8.1 Build 171 as HDV using the default MPEG2 "HDV 1080-60i" template at the "Best" render setting. My machine rendered it in exactly 108 seconds.

Intel Core2 Quad Q9400 2.66GHz

Vegas 8.1 installs for free as long as you already have a Sony application installed.
JJK

SYSTEM: stock speed Q9450 with 4GB G.Skill memory, ASUS P5KC motherboard


I finally installed Vista 64 and reran my render test to excellent results, chopping my HD render time more than in half
quite respectable times with 4 GB memory

8.0 118 seconds
8.1 50 seconds

An interesting observation however when converting the same file to
MPEG2 for DVD architect, 24P Widescreen--

8.1 is WAY slower than 8.0

Here are my test results, the standard Render Test as shown on this page,
as well as to Windows Media Video, and then to MPEG2 for DVD Architect

3 minute file to DVD Architect test

8.0- 30 seconds

8.1 2:07 (128 seconds)

??????

To WMV default 3 minute file

8.1-- 1:17 sec

8.0 1:26

I triple checked my settings, so nothing missed there.

Anyone?

Well, I got very curious after my initial Vista tests- So I then installed an XXP64X bit OS and ran the tests again.

BTW- I goofed on the render test previously posted, these are correctly done-

So-- here are the results, again 4GB RAM, Asus P5KC motherboard, Quad Q9450 2.66GB CPU

They are in order of best results.

The conclusion is that Windows XP 64 bit runs the best overall, with 8.0 holding its own when rendering AVI to MPEG-2 John Cline's test has 8.1 nudging out 8.0 but not by a lot.

I will rerun the tests with more RAM and see if this changes things. In my system running 7,8, or 16 threads in 8.1 made no difference.

If XP64 betters Vista 64 with 4GB memory, I would think it would still be the better OS with more memory- but I could be wrong there too. We shall see.


AVI to MPEG2 3 minute: Probably my most common render to make DVDs

8.0 XP64 1:21
8.0 VISTA64 1:24
8.1 XP64 1:43
8.0 XP32 2:01
8.1 VISTA64 6:23 quite horrible- and I checked several times



John Cline's HD Render test

8.1 XP64 1:43
8.0 XP64 1:58
8.0 XP32 1:59
8.0 VISTA 64 2:03
8.1 VISTA 64 N/C lost the result, but from my memory, not memorably great

MPG 3 minute to DVD MPEG test
8.0 XP64 15 seconds amazing
8.1 XP64 34 seconds
8.0 VISTA64 30 seconds
8.0 Xp32 49 seconds
8.1 VISTA64 128 seconds good lord this is awful


MPEG to WMV default 3 minute- also common use for web videos

8.1 XP64 1:08 Close race here
8.1 VISTA64 1:17
8.0 XP64 1:20
8.0 XP32 1:26
8.0 VISTA64 1:26

Hi,

Can anyone tell me if rendering in Vegas V7 with i7 core is faster or the same as Vegas V8.0 (same i7)?

Also, reading above I get the feeling that XP64 is better than Vista 64 with vegas V8.1??? How does Vegas V7 compare with XP64 or Vista 64? (rendering).

I've got to upgrade my pc to I7, but not sure about moving to Vegas 8.1 for now (I'm using v7.0)

Thanks!!!

I'm testing with an additional 4GB memory in both XP64 and Vista 64 bringing the total RAM to 8GB

So far, 8GB renders exactly the same speed as 4GB in XP64.

But I've read Vista makes better use of memory, so doubling to 8GB in Vista may be advantageous-- I'll report back in an hour and let you know--

Neil

Turn your preview RAM allocation down to 3gb in XP64 - that's about what you would have available in XP32 for RAM, maybe less - then compare the results to setting it at 5gb. You will definitely see a difference in performance on a complicated render - like 10 minutes of AVCHD containing say 10 events with cross fades and a couple titles. You won't see any real difference with this render test - it's too simple to see the benfits of extra RAM

Okay, will try--- otherwise, memory did not help the Vista64 Vegas 8.1 combination at all. Render times were absolutely miserable with AVI to Mpeg2 renders-- five times slower see for yourself--

AVI to MPEG2 3 minute

8.0 XP64 4Gb 1:21

8.0 VISTA64 4GB 1:24 8GB 1:22

8.1 XP64 4GB 1:43

8.0 XP32 4GB 2:01

8.1 VISTA64 4GB 6:23 8GB 6:20



John Cline's HD Render test

8.1 XP64 4GB 1:43 8GB 1:43

8.1 VISTA 64 N/C 8GB 1:44

8.0 XP64 4GB 1:58 8GB 1:58

8.0 XP32 4GB 1:59

8.0 VISTA 64 4GB 2:03 8GB 2:00

8.1 VISTA 64 N/C 8GB 1:44

Here are my final findings-- and this was after adjusting the video ram preview in Vista 64/ Vegas 8.1 to MATCH the video ram preview in 8.0-- that's what was giving me ridiculously slow renders in V64 vegas 8.1



**********

Either XP64 or Vista 64 is indeed faster than XP32 bit, and I shall assume faster than Vista 32 bit.

4GB RAM memory renders just as fast as 8GB RAM memory in XP64 and Vista64
Save your money.

Disable or minimize video preview RAM while rendering for best times-
If you have high RAM in Vista 64 Vegas 8.1-- it can make your renders significantly
slower when rendering

Vista64 and XP64 essentially render at the same speeds, and XP is much less a pain. I see some claiming Vista64 is faster than XP64-- but I don't see it anywhere.

Use 8.1 to render HD footage to either HDV or DVD Architect (MPEG2)
Use 8.0 to render (standard res) AVI to MPEG2 for DVD media or DVD Architect settings, although the difference is not great

My revised numbers are for the most common rendering I do-- AVI to MPEG (for DVDs) and HD to DVD and HDV


MY FINAL NUMBERS:

Standard Resolution (SD)
AVI to MPEG2 3 minute

TIED (or too close to worry about)

8.0 XP64 4Gb 1:21 8GB 1:21-estimated

8.0 VISTA64 4GB 1:24 8GB 1:22


2nd Place

8.1 VISTA64 4GB N/C 8GB 1:33


3rd Place

8.1 XP64 4GB 1:43 8GB 1:43-estimated


4th Place

8.0 XP32 4GB 2:01




John Cline's HD Render test

TIED

8.1 XP64 4GB 1:43 8GB 1:43 extra mem. no effect

8.1 VISTA 64 4GB N/C 8GB 1:43


2nd Place

8.0 XP64 4GB 1:58 8GB 1:58 extra mem. no effect


3rd Place

8.0 XP32 4GB 1:59


4th Place

8.0 VISTA 64 4GB 2:03 8GB 2:00


John Clines Render Test to DVD Architect Mpeg2

8.1 Vista64 7 seconds

8.0 Vista64 9 seconds

A few more words on my findings-

I did notice that 128MB -256 RAM Video preview is best-- in some cases, down to 10MB actually slows things down. I can't see why anyone would need more- previewing during rendering is useless.

I'm sticking with a DUAL BOOT system, XP32 and XP64-- after having messed around with Vista Ultimate. I wasn't able to discern any improvements of Vista64 over XP64-- they are equally matched in all my tests, with XP nudging barely ahead in a few instances. And boy, XP is so much nicer to me- clean, simple, familiar. Everything is faster on my XP64 than it was on Vista64- instantaneous response, where as Vista was just so clumsy. Now bear in mind, this was after tweaking Vista to run öptimally clean"- My Xp64 is bare bones, so it is very efficient and no fat at all- and I can really tell- it's night and day between it and Vista. Vista- bye bye

So, since I'm using XP32 for my daily use- and this is because I have a million programs, and hardware set up-- many of them older programs I love-- this is the easiest solution to getting more speed out of Vegas. I don't need 64 bit for anything but Vegas and rendering. Heck, I could edit on XP32 and 8.0 and then just render in XP64 and 8.1 and 8.0 to save time if I needed to go fast.

It definitely seems to be good to have both 8.0 and 8.1 available on XP64 as I've noted that AVI to MPEG2 is better in 8.0, as is MPEG to MPEG--- whereas the HD renders, and MPEG to WMV is better in 8.1--- and for me, this covers all my projects.

I can get better render times with overclocking my CPU, but this doesn't change things that dramatically, a few percentage points gained as shown. I could probably go faster than shown, but, I like the idea of a long life out of my CPU.

It may be that the 8GB RAM will be noticed in more complex and bigger projects, and I'll have to test for that. Otherwise, my own results seem to bear out what my research on the web points to-- doubling from 4GB to 8GB RAM is hardly noticeable at all in any case and when it occurs, its a very small gain. Perhaps with another operating system on the horizon, or other programs, perhaps Vegas 9, the memory will be put to better use-- I don't know.

For those looking for a single OS to use with Vegas-- it may be that Vista is the better choice. For me-- everything works for me in XP32, and XP64- and I will wait until Windows 7 is out, with bugs removed, and then perhaps will consider another daily OS-- till then, I've tried Vista, and I'm not interested.

That's my 10 cents
Thanks, and I hope this has been helpful to people

Neil
neil@neilslade.com

AVI to MPEG2 3 minute

8.0 XP64 4Gb 1:21 8GB 1:18

8.0 VISTA64 4GB 1:24 8GB 1:22

8.1 VISTA64 4GB N/C 8GB 1:33

8.1 XP64 4GB 1:43 8GB 1:34

8.0 XP32 4GB 2:01





John Cline's HD Render test

8.1 XP64 4GB 1:43 8GB 1:42 O/C CPU @ 2.8GH-1:38 2.9GH-1:34

8.1 VISTA64 N/C 8GB 1:43

8.0 XP64 4GB 1:58 8GB 1:56

8.0 XP32 4GB 1:59

8.0 VISTA64 4GB 2:03 8GB 2:00

BTW an interesting point of note of XP32 versus XP64 and VISTA64

I over clocked my CPU from 2.66ghz to 3.4ghz (using the ASUS AI application)
and the results in XP32 bit with Vegas 8.0 beat both
Vista64 and XP64 Vegas 8.1 (without over clocking and with moderate OC) -- so there you go.

Try a little over clocking, and save the trouble of installing a new OS alltogether.. :-)



John Cline's HD Render test

8.0 XP32 O/C to 3.4ghz 4GB 1:34

2.66ghz (stock)
8.1 XP64 8GB 1:42

OC
2.8GH-1:38
2.9GH-1:34
3.1GH-1:27

2.66 (stock)
8.1 VISTA64 8GB 1:43

Your results overclocking compare almost exactly to mine both on 8.1 and 8.0 for a Q6700 at 3.3ghz

I had a project today where I edited about just over eight minutes of WMV files back to WMV at 15 fps, Widescreen

You can see the results here if you're interested:

Captain Sherlock


-- needed to do some cut and paste,
with a little bit of Text Generated Media added.

I rendered on XP32 bit and XP64bit using both Vegas 8.1 (64 only) and 8.0 (both)
This is with 8GB RAM installed, Q9450 CPU stock speed

XP64 bit on Vegas 8.1 is roughly 25% quicker than XP32 on Vegas 8.0
I used 8 threads to render-- 16 threads was slightly slower at 4:12

As noted previously, Vista 64 rendered my projects at virtually the same time as XP64, so I won't be testing any more on Vista

XP32 8.0 ---5:10
XP64 8.0 ---4:22
XP64 8.1 ---4:12 16 rendering threads
XP64 8.1 ---3:52 8 rendering threads

62 seconds to render using the settings John gave at the top of the thread: HDV using the default MPEG2 "HDV 1080-60i" template at the "Best" render setting. My previous time was 124 with Vegas pro 8 64 bit.

34 seconds with good selected as opposed to best.

Edit: All program settings were at defualt. This was in the 64 bit version of Vegas Pro 9 with the same system spec's as my previous posts in this thread.

j razz

Render times cut in half, this bodes well. I hope more people try the test on v9 and post their results here.