OT: speed question Quad vs Pentium

vicmilt wrote on 5/16/2007, 9:58 AM

No better place to ask this, than here.

I'm looking at a feature length project with LOT'S of image stabilization and video effects (color correction, repositioning, etc.)

Am currently using Vegas (of course) and DeShaker.

What kind of speed increase do you think I would get if I spent the necessary $3 Grand to upgrade (meaning buy new machine) my Pe ntium 950 DuoCore 2gig SATA to Quad 6700?

Experience preferred over "good guesses", please...

v
ps - saw the new FinalCut motion stabilization software demoed on OctoQuad Mac at NAB - whoa!! was that sweet ! Click the center of the shaky frame - instantly playback a rock solid image - anything like that on the horizon that anyone knows of for us??

Comments

rs170a wrote on 5/16/2007, 10:17 AM

A project that I did last summer (10 min. video full of chroma key and FX) took 3 hr. to render on my work system which is a P4 3.4 HyperThreaded machine.
My new home machine (quad 6600) flew through it in 27 min.
Last night I rendered an 80 min. school play in 28 min.
Going to MPEG-2 in both examples.

Mike

johnmeyer wrote on 5/16/2007, 10:39 AM

Also, for faster speed on Deshaker, you can often get good results by not using the "no holds barred" settings I recommended in that guide I did several years ago. In particular, if you use the default settings for Scale (Half) and for Use Pixels (Every 4th) in the Pass 1 column, you can process a lot faster, and probably not see too much degradation in the quality of the motion stabilization.

vicmilt wrote on 5/16/2007, 1:13 PM

John!!
you are EXACTLY the guy to tell me if it's "worth it" to spend the bucks.

My "right brain" knows that you are the "DeShaker" guru.
My "left brain" has followed your exploits with the home built Quad, etc.
and my "mid-brain" reminds me what a clever lad you actually are!

So what do you think?
I see that Tiger Direct has a systemax E6700 -
http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/searchtools/item-Details.asp?EdpNo=2967394&sku=SYXS-DB-989540

for under $2k - a major breakthrough for a guy like me without either the time or the inclination to "build it yourself".

Your advice will not only be respected - I'll actually TAKE IT (unlike most of my kids) -

so... should I spend the bucks??

v

fldave wrote on 5/16/2007, 1:30 PM

I've had problems with Tiger Direct lately (past 6 months), bad return policy, every order not correct, either wrong item or broken item.

Systemax is a good brand as of a couple of years ago, though.

vicmilt wrote on 5/16/2007, 1:35 PM

Gosh Dave -
I'm ordering (and returning) stuff from them all the time -
basically hard drives and lately network garbage.

I agree that some of the sales guys are "too damn smart" for anyone's good and have even complained that they need to listen more and talk less.
But the returns have all gone through fine - the prices are great, etc.

Haven't bought a Systemax from them for two years, but this price looks pretty excellent to me - do you understand the "stats"? (I don't)

v

Xander wrote on 5/16/2007, 2:02 PM

The E6700 is a dual-core processor. The QX6700 is the quad-core processor.

vicmilt wrote on 5/16/2007, 7:38 PM

Thanks for spotting that Xander!

So guys - what's the render issue work out to? Any thoughts?

And are there (or are there not) problems with Vegas accessing the 'Quad core' processor. I know the Core 2 Duo is faster and it works. But how much faster in DeShaker and in HDV intermediate renders?

Thanks again for all your input. These are issues that everyone will be addressing soon.

v

fldave wrote on 5/16/2007, 8:03 PM

Here is Tom's Hardware CPU speed comparison. I used the Mainconcept H.264 render speed for comparison, it is very intensive.

Intel 950 ran the test in 5:57
QX6700 ran the test in 2.15 - This is the fastest ever so far.

http://www23.tomshardware.com/cpu.html?modelx=33&model1=437&model2=604&chart=182

Smoking fast, faster than anything most people have seen so far.