Recommend a PC Just for Vegas??

TomOwisc wrote on 3/1/2012, 2:30 PM

I'm getting ready to order a new PC pretty much just for Vegas and Pro11 and Adobe Creative Suite. Do you see any problems or have recommendations based on this system? It's in the $2300 range.

Case: Antec Performance One P183 Mid-tower - 11 Bays

Power Supply: Thermaltake TR-800P ATX12V & EPS12V Power Supply - 86% Efficiency - 800 W

Socket 2011 : Intel DX79TO LGA2011 Desktop Motherboard - Intel X79 Chipset

Intel LGA 2011 CPU (New!): Intel Core i7 i7-3820 3.60 GHz Processor - Socket LGA-2011

Upgrade From Stock Intel Cooler: Intel BXRTS2011LC High Performance Liquid Cooler LGA2011, LGA1155,

DDR3 Memory: Kinston Hyper X KHX1600C9D3K4/16GX Quad Channel RAM Kit - - DDR3 16 GB (4 x 4 GB)

Video Card : XFX HD-685X-ZCFC AMD Radeon™ HD 6850 1GB DDR5

System Bundle: Hauppauge WinTV-HVR-2250 Media Center Kit PCI Express x1 - ATSC

SATA Hard Disk: Crucial 256GB m4 SSD 2.5" SATA 6GB/s CT256M4SSD2CCA
Second Hard Drive: Seagate Barracuda 7200.12 ST31000524AS 1 TB Internal Hard Drive

Optical Drive: LG WH12LS39 Blu-ray Writer - Black - Bulk - Internal

Flash Drives, Readers: iMicro INTCTM04MB All-in-1 Internal Card Reader

OS: WINDOWS 7 PRO 64 Bit OEM 1PK License and Media - OEM - 1 PC - English

Speakers: Logitech S-150 USB Digital Speaker System

Sound : Sound Blaster X-Fi 30SB079200000 Xtreme Audio Sound Card Bulk

Comments

JohnnyRoy wrote on 3/1/2012, 5:00 PM

Just a couple of things that jumped out at me:

If you plan to use Adobe Creative Suite, the ATI Radeon graphics card will do you no good. Adobe doesn't support ATI, get an NVIDIA card instead.

It looks like you're willing to spend some serious cash ($2300) so why build a quad core when hex cores are the latest? I would build something around the Intel Core i7-3930K Sandy Bridge-E Six-Core Desktop Processor.

I also wouldn't bother with the SoundBlaster game card. If you are building a video editing workstation so I assume audio is important. Get a good external firewire audio device from Echo, M-Audio, or PreSonus with studio monitors.

Here is a partial parts list from the rig I'm thinking of building next:

CPU: Intel Core i7-3930K Sandy Bridge-E 3.2GHz (3.8GHz Turbo) LGA 2011 130W Six-Core Desktop Processor BX80619i73930K
Cooler: Intel BXRTS2011LC Liquid-cooled Thermal Solution For the LGA2011 Socket
Motherboard: Intel BOXDX79SI LGA 2011 Intel X79 SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.0 ATX Intel Motherboard
Memory: G.SKILL Ripjaws Z Series 16GB (4 x 4GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 2133 (PC3 17000) Desktop Memory Model F3-17000CL9Q-16GBZH
SSD: Crucial M4 CT256M4SSD2 2.5" 256GB SATA III MLC Internal Solid State Drive (SSD)

I already have an NVIDIA Quadro 4000 graphics card and I haven't settled on a case yet. The ASUS P6X58-E Pro is also a nice mobo but I like sticking with a pure Intel build so there is no finger pointing when things go wrong. It's a "work in progress". ;-)

~jr

NicolSD wrote on 3/1/2012, 6:17 PM

The P6X58-E Pro may be a nice mobo but it wouldn't work with an I7-3930K. You need a mobo with an X79 chipset.

As for Crucial SSD drives, you might be better served with the faster Corsair Force 3 GT or, if you are willing to put in another $300, the Intel 520 series.

I'd stay away from the OCZ drives. From what I hear, they have been nothing but trouble.

As for the WinTV-HVR-2250, I wouldn't bother with it at all. For one thing, it will not display HD television properly. Either ask the store to do it away and put the value towards a better SSD drive or else get them to replace it with Hauppauge's HD-PVR.

It displays HD properly, records in HD using H.264 and, if the source has 5.1 sound... it will record the 5.1 sound track. It is the best TV product in this price range that I know of.

JohnnyRoy wrote on 3/1/2012, 7:46 PM

> "The P6X58-E Pro may be a nice mobo but it wouldn't work with an I7-3930K. You need a mobo with an X79 chipset."

Thanks for catching that. I meant to say the ASUS P9X79 PRO LGA 2011. It has SSD caching which means you can add an SSD as a cache for a much larger (e.g, 2TB) hard drive. Very cool idea.

~jr

Geoff_Wood wrote on 3/1/2012, 10:00 PM

Soundblaster ! Logitech speakers !

Presumably this is not going to be used for critical audio editing ....

geoff

NicolSD wrote on 3/1/2012, 11:51 PM

"Thanks for catching that. I meant to say the ASUS P9X79 PRO LGA 2011. It has SSD caching which means you can add an SSD as a cache for a much larger (e.g, 2TB) hard drive. Very cool idea."

That's exactly what I have in my computer: an ASUS P9X79 PRO. Howver, I decided against the idea of using my SSD as a cache because I believe the TRIM command would not be supported and therefore there would be performance degradation.

Instead, I opted for an SSD as a boot drive and a second larger SSD as a temporary work/data drive. After a while, I just move older files onto a third (standard) HD.

Steve Mann wrote on 3/2/2012, 12:11 AM

I wouldn't waste the money on SSD. All it gives you is a faster boot. It provides absolutely nothing for editing performance.

Serena wrote on 3/2/2012, 1:05 AM

I have a Vertex SSD in my desktop. Recently I noted this report:

"One local computer consultant recently counselled four of his clients to install a 60GB OCZ Vertex solid-state storage drive (SSD) as the boot-up drive to improve start-up time and speed up applications. Three of the drives failed, one within two days of purchase.

They were all covered by warranty but the retailer informed the unfortunate owners they could not replace the drives or refund the purchase cost (about $129 apiece) until they were checked by the manufacturer. The drives would have to be shipped back to Asia. It would take from one to two months before they could be replaced."

Read more: http://www.theage.com.au/digital-life/computers/drivetime-turns-into-tour-de-farce-20120215-1t4mp.html#ixzz1nwNMx1oH

TomOwisc wrote on 3/2/2012, 10:57 AM

Geoff - I'm not a studio engineer or anything - a little voice over now and then. Mostly stuff for friends and family....do you have some inexpensive ideas of what I need to do "little" stuff? I do have a Yeti Blue USB mic

NicolSD wrote on 3/2/2012, 11:54 AM

Steve Mann wrote: "I wouldn't waste the money on SSD. All it gives you is a faster boot. It provides absolutely nothing for editing performance. "

Yes, editing performance wouldn't be affected because the bottleneck is usually located 18 to 24 inches in front of the screen. However, when time comes to load programs and to load all the data files linked in the .veg file, you do get another performance boost.

Anything involving writing and reading data to and from a drive is dramatically improved. Even SAS drives pale in comparison.

Hulk wrote on 3/2/2012, 3:55 PM

@ Steve Mann,

While your statement is technically correct, but as a convert to SSD it is my experience that you couldn't be more wrong.

If you consider booting your computer, opening Vegas, opening any application used to support Vegas, checking e-mail or using the internet while editing, part of "editing" then editing will be much faster. Opening multiple instances of Vegas for example is MUCH faster with an SSD. Until you move to a fast SSD on your boot drive you really don't know what you're missing. The overall response of windows is just so much faster it's amazing. In short and SSD will give your system so much more snap you won't believe it. And that Crucial M4 is a fantastic drive.

@OP,

You have spec'd out a great system.
First as others have suggested ditch the Soundblaster. It's a huge virus-like install. Definitely a no no for a stable system. I suggest a Presonus external box. They're really cheap and sound great.

Second, these are minor. Go with an Asus mobo. Just as stable as Intel but more flexible. Also I personally don't like Kingston RAM. I'd go G. Skill. But you're right on with going 1600 Cas 9. Cas 9 keeps it stable and 1600 speed gives you the biggest speed increase while keeping stability.

- Mark

TomOwisc wrote on 3/2/2012, 5:28 PM

Thanks for the input. I was about to ditch the SSD until I read your comments. SSD is back in.
Looking at doing the following based on forum suggestions:
Upgrading mobo to: ASUS P9X79 Pro LGA2011 Desktop Motherboard - Intel X79 Chipset
Upgrade Video card to: ASUS ENGTX580 DCII/2DIS/1536MD GeForce GTX 580 Graphics Card - PCI Express 2.0 - 1.50 GB GDDR5
Uprgrade RAM to: Kinston Hyper X KHX1600C9D3K8/32GX Quad Channel RAM Kit - - DDR3 32 GB (8 x 4 GB)
Ditch the Soundblaster Card
Ditch the Hauppauge WINTV card

It is now a $2700 machine...OUCH!!!!!

Sould I get a Can I get by with a mid-tower case or will I need a full??

Stringer wrote on 3/2/2012, 5:53 PM

No reason for a full tower unless you expect to have more than 6 HDD's ..

Do you need firewire ( 1394 )?

When I first put together my X79 system, I bought the Asus P9X79 Pro, assumming it would have firewire.. It didn't .
I was going to have to add a firewire card, but I had some other problems and settled on an Asrock X79Xtreme 9 .. I believe the Asus " WS " model does have firewire., if you need it and want to stay with Asus.

Are you putting this together yourself ?

TomOwisc wrote on 3/2/2012, 5:56 PM

Thanks for the Firewire heads-up...going to need that!!!

I'm looking at having a local company here in Madison, WI put it together....CPUSolutions.com

If you go to their site - you can see what I've been working with..Custom Core i7 LGA2011 Video Editing PC

Suvin111 wrote on 3/28/2012, 12:03 PM

Did you ever get this machine and does it work with Vegas Pro 11?

Steve Mann wrote on 3/28/2012, 2:47 PM

Get the GTX 680 and give us a performance report....

Laurence wrote on 3/28/2012, 4:59 PM

This may sound like a joke but I'm serious. Get an iMac and run Bootcamp. I am pretty sure that both Spot and JR run Vegas on Macs, and both of them report having no issues whatsoever running V11.

Steve Mann wrote on 3/28/2012, 9:55 PM

"I am pretty sure that both Spot and JR run Vegas on Macs, and both of them report having no issues whatsoever running V11. "

I'm not sure who JR is, but if you mean DSE, then yes, Spot has reported problems, but he doesn't automatically blame Vegas for problems with his computer:

http://www.sonycreativesoftware.com/forums/ShowMessage.asp?ForumID=4&MessageID=797495