Still uncertain which way to go?

Cliff Etzel wrote on 11/28/2014, 2:22 PM

I've been doing alot of research, reading and such on upgrading my post production suite.

I'm totally confused now by which way to go. I did an edit with Vegas Pro 13 and although it went without issues, it was somewhat unintuitive compared to PPro (I know, I know there are those on this forum who would say the same thing about PPro but that's best left for another thread)

My confusion lies in which graphics card to go with. I'm planning for the future when I move to a better camera setup sometime next year (I'm currently eyeballing the Canon C100 MkII with an Atomos External recorder next year). I do want a system capable of editing 4K but I'm at a loss as to the expense required to edit that kind of footage. On top of that, info is sparse on external HD setups for Vegas as compared to the plethora of info for PPro for editing high data rate footage like 4K or other footage. My biggest concern is I don't want to move to the Adobe Creative Cloud and pay the monthly or yearly ransom to Adobe and the stories I've read on the Adobe forums about software all of a sudden not working in the middle of a deadline project has more or less confirmed what I said to the study group 4 years ago when they were exploring the subscription based software model.

I want as stable a workstation that can edit quickly and efficiently as I can get given my budget constraints.

Having said that, my initial thinking is to upgrade to a fast single Hex core processor, max out at 24GB ram on my EVGA X58 mobo, add an SSD drive as the boot drive. My concern now is whether to upgrade to a newer nVidia card or take the chance and go the AMD Radeon card route since it appears to work better with Vegas. Or do I keep myself back a little on the video card and stick to something like the nVidia GTX-570 recommended by OldSmoke as it appears to work pretty well with Vegas Pro 13.

I've debated whether to consider a refurb HP z800 workstation with dual Xeon 2.93 CPU's and 48GB RAM and build the rest of my post production around that. As you can see, I'm trying to find the best bang for the buck option before year end.

any thoughts on this?

Comments

OldSmoke wrote on 11/28/2014, 2:32 PM

I doubt a single processor will ever allow you satisfying 4K editing. As I mentioned in my other post, if proxy workflow doesn't bother you, even a X58 system will do the trick. Certainly, render times will be long with a X58 system and 4K but most users in this forum don't really care about that.

I also have to admit that I recently switched to 2x R9 290 instead of the 2x GTX580 setup. The only drawback I can see is that the MC AVC encoder doesn't support the R9 200 series but everything else is faster and some, like XDCAM is super fast. NB and BCC are also working finally as many plug ins are OpenCL rather then CUDA.

Aside from a HP Z800 there is also the option of an older used Mac Pro dual Xeon off eBay but you may have to change out the GPU.

I know it is a dilemma not to know which way to go but it is not an easy decision and a reason why I haven't upgraded yet either.

Cliff Etzel wrote on 11/28/2014, 5:34 PM

@OldSmoke, I could initially just swap my current GTX-550ti card as a stop gap into the hp z800 workstation and probably see a huge improvement over my current setup right now.

Proxy file editing on a 4K project isn't a big deal for me, but then again, am I putting a stop gap bandaid on the situation and would be better off just biting the bullet and getting the HP workstation? OTOH, the Adobe PPro forums have made mention that in their benchmark testing, the Z800's only faired mediocre in their speed for rendering their benchmark project file but I"m left wondering then if whether or not the same could be said for the Vegas reference project file or would it be alot better?

I'm still hesitant on the Mac Pro tower option if only because I"m so use to upgrading my own hardware and by going that route, I've locked myself into the hardware on the machine that will basically be set for the life of the machine.

IN addition, I'm not too keen on buying all new software to support the MAC, albeit FCPX comes in at $300 and other apps to support it for less than $50 in most instances. And to swap out the graphics card means a MAC specific card that usually has a premium price tag attached to it as compared to the windows version of the same card.

OldSmoke wrote on 11/28/2014, 5:44 PM

Why don't you first try and get a second hand R9 290 off eBay? Those go for around USD200-250 depending on brand. I got 2 simple Asus Radeon R9 290 and both work very well. I am now waiting for my watercooling blocks for the two cards but they do fine as they are. Video editing isn't as taxing as gaming hence the cards are fine with just air cooling but I already have the custom water-cooling setup. If you like the R9, sell the 550Ti on eBay.

As for dual Xeon setup; I have not seen any report from a user in this forum about their dual setup performance with regards to 4K editing. I also haven't seen any massive improvement with 5960X over the 3930K or 4930K when it comes to 4K editing.

So, like you, I am bit puzzled where to go. nevertheless, the 2x R9 290 are a great improvement over the 2x GTX580 since I don't use MC AVC anymore for Internet delivery, I use frame serving to HB now.

Geoff_Wood wrote on 11/28/2014, 6:58 PM

"I'm totally confused now by which way to go. I did an edit with Vegas Pro 13 and although it went without issues, it was somewhat unintuitive compared to PPro (I know, I know there are those on this forum who would say the same thing about PPro but that's best left for another thread)"

That's an understatement ! If you use a computer for anything, Vegas uses the same paradigm, and the first thing you think of if you don't know, is usually the easiest way to do it. And then there are usually at least two more ways.

As to which way to go - get the biggest fatest you can afford, but bear in mind the the bleeding-edge will cost double technology a little older, maybe for minor benefit. And a modest investment may already be head and shoulders better than what you have.

geoff

Cliff Etzel wrote on 11/28/2014, 9:01 PM

So the "modest" investment would be a single hex core processor (probably a 2.93ghz Xeon) along with maxxing out my ram to 24gb on my EVGA x58 sli3 mobo and adding a 256gb SSD drive for booting and apps and then determining which way to go for a graphics card.

But as I said I'm trying to determine if this is patching a bigger issue that requires my biting the bullet and just going to a dual processor z600 or z800 with as much ram I can afford.

OldSmoke wrote on 11/29/2014, 8:39 AM

@Cliff

Which of your systems would you be upgrading, 1 or 2?

Cliff Etzel wrote on 11/29/2014, 10:00 AM

@OldSmoke - Upgrading #1 (my desktop) - #2 is my laptop

OldSmoke wrote on 11/29/2014, 10:13 AM

@Cliff

Don't bother upgrading it; sell it and get a refurbished Z800 with dual processors or one from eBay. Make sure it has at least a Sandybridge 2011socket MB in it that supports PCIe 3.0. Get a R9 290 for it and you are good to go for a while, 2-3years I would say.
When JohnnyRoy finds the time to run the SCS 4K Benchmark project we will also know if a dual CPU setup is worth it or not; look at this thread.

Cliff Etzel wrote on 11/29/2014, 12:37 PM

@OldSmoke - 2-3 years is about what I've gotten out of my current home built machine hence why I stated am I bandaging a computer that should more or less be sold off and replaced.

Any advice on CPU speed? Given the number of cores, is CPU speed as critical as it has been in the past when we were relegated to single CPU's? The machines my budget can allow start at dual 2.26 and go up to 2.93 ghz.

Here's the spec sheet for the HP Z800

OldSmoke wrote on 11/29/2014, 12:46 PM

Yes, CPU speed matters and always will. Go as fast as you can afford. I am even inclined to say that 8cores at 2.9 are better then 10cores at 2.6. I would love to test all that but it would require substantial funding.

Cliff Etzel wrote on 11/29/2014, 1:13 PM

@OldSMoke - I hear ya on the funding aspect. One other thing I'm considering is doing a mobo/Dual CPU upgrade to my current box. Been crunching the numbers and as @GeoffWood pointed out - staying slightly behind the curve on technology might not be such a bad investment. If my calculations are correct, I would only need to replace my existing mobo and CPU for the dual setup. MY RAM could be utilized as well as everything else and I would save over half the cost of going the HP Z600/Z800 workstation route. I'd still be using socket 1366 technology but from what I've read, it seems it was rock solid and had little if any issues as compared to current tech. In fact if I'm not mistaken, JR's Mac Pro is using the same tech in his recent 12 core computer. I could be wrong though.