That is true...It all depends on what you're trying to do. I just wnat to do normal movies aka ordinary dvd or bluray home movies but I need the acceleration feature to get rendering times way down. A 1.5 hr movie takes me about 6 hours to render.

If you want to use Neat Video (who does not want to support OpenCL) and really take advantage of Vegas 11 then it should be an Nvidia card of the 500 series.

I have the lowly 430 and it can only do 3 fps with neat video while my CPU can do 15 fps. That is with certain settings. It helps playback a tiny bit. The memory bandwidth is way too low.

I will get a 550ti when the next sale happens.

Important Note: You will need a good power supply for the card. I have a 400 and 500 watt supply BUT the 500 watt one was cheap and has two wimpy rails while the 400 watt has one good rail.

That is the problem in that they tell you to look at the wattage of the supply but not all supplies are created equal. A $30 500 watt supply will not be better or even as good as a $100 400 watt supply. The cheap 500 watt supply would be a great source of Vegas crashes!

So don't waste your money on a cheap anything! Crashes and/or poor results will be the results.

The 430 is for tests purposes.

Vidmus - which of the power supply rails are critical for the video card. Like you said not all power supplies are created equal e.g. a 400 watt power supply could have 30A capacity for 3 volt but a 450watt power supply might only offer up to 24amps..

I am not Vidmus - but some information.

They all seem to require 2 @ 2 x 3 Express supplementary power connectors. The required power is from a 12V rail. My GTX 460 specifies a minimum of 24A on the 12V rail. The original 400W power supply could not keep up when I added the GTX 460 (apart from not having the two required connectors) and I had to replace it. These beasts are power hungry.

Willem.

Thank you for the insight. Where does one find how much current each of the power rails on the video card consume?

Personally I would wait until the new Radeon & Nvidia cards are released. They offer more speed with less heat & power consumption. With our main editing computers running at least 8 hours per day, and sometimes rendering overnight, less wattage & less heat is worth the wait.

According to the latest new prodcut leaks, the new Radeon HD 7000 series will be released in December and the Nvidia 600 series Q1 of 2012. That's not a very long wait considering that Vegas 11 still has a few glitches to fix before we make it our every day editor... By the time the new video cards have been tested-out by others, Vegas 11 will be at 11.0c, etc. and should be fairly glitch-free....

Sounds like a good way to go....

As for the video card, the rail that provides power to it is the most important. My 400 watt supply has one rail so it must provide for the entire system. It is 30 amps so it will supply for the CPU, Motherboard and drives.

The following is the minimum of what one needs for 550 - 560ti cards.

550Ti = 116 max Watts = 116 Watts Divided by 12 Volts = 09.7 amps. Supply should have 15 amps.
560 = 150 max Watts = 150 Watts Divided by 12 Volts = 12.5 amps. Supply should have 19 amps.
560ti = 170 max Watts = 170 Watts Divided by 12 Volts = 14.2 amps. Supply should have 22 amps.

The amps the above should have are the amps times 50% added. The amps are for the supply to the card not the total watts/amps for the supply to the system.

The higher number of streams the more watts and the more power needed.

A good supply will be well regulated and be protected from overloads, shorts and other problems. Cheap supplies will either not provide this or will poorly do so.

As for crashes, it is easy to blame the crashes on Vegas because it happens to be running. It is said that Vegas crashed and took everything else with it. Actually, something else crashed and took Vegas and the rest with it. A poor power supply may not crash as such but if the power becomes inadequate for the video card it can cause crashes.

I over clocked the 430 to the edge of its ability and with the system just sitting there it was fine. Cranked-up Vegas and played with it and within a few minutes it got what I call the 'Milky way' crash and had to be shut down. The display became a little bit wonky as well. I say 'Milky way' crash because it has a milky white look to it like the one recently on the Webinar. I've had the same crash even without Vegas running!

A little more over clock and the system will lock-up intermittently. A little less over clock and it will work fine for a while and then crash.

Problems with drivers and other 'under the hood' software can also cause problems.

A good quality and adequate power supply will make a huge difference in the system’s ability run properly!

Cheap in = crash out!

Vidmus,

Thanks for the detailed expalantion of how to get the power required by the video card. My problem is getting the figures (in your explanation max Watts) even from the card manufacturer's site.

I have had my share of the milky white crashes so now I try to save more often so I don't rely completely on the autosaved version.

Vidmus, how can your computer power supply give 30 amps? Are you on more than a 20 amp household circuit? Just wondering.

My 400 watt supply has one rail so it must provide for the entire system. It is 30 amps 

so it will supply for the CPU, Motherboard and drives.

Let me give it a shot to answer your question then Vidmus can correct me if I am wrong. The 30Amps is on the 12V rail not the 110V AC supply. 30Amps at 12V is 360Watts which if you translate to the mains (AC supply) is 360Watts/110V....roughly 3+amps only.

Anuser, I see your logic but then it doesn't seem like enough to power everything he is talking about (CPU, motherboard, drives, video card). I already have a 20 amp circuit breaker that pops regularly so the last thing I want is to max it out.

ChipGallo,

Had that same problem a while ago....part of my problem was an old circuit breaker (probably original with the house) and the other loads (microwave, printer, etc) that the PC shared the line with. I replaced the old circuit breaker and reduced the load on the line my PC used and it never tripped after that.

"…but then it doesn't seem like enough to power everything he is talking about (CPU, motherboard, drives, video card). I already have a 20 amp circuit breaker that pops regularly so the last thing I want is to max it out."

I am only referring to the 12 volts part of the supply which is a main concern for the CPU and the Video card.

There are the 5 volts and other parts of the supply to consider.

I bought the supply based on the one rail having enough amps for everything instead of two or more rails which may or may not have enough amps for what I need including the Video card.

The cheap 500 watt card does have enough amps on the rail for the Video card but ONLY if that were all it was to supply the amps for.

I read a card review where one had a 400 watt supply which is a minimum supply for the 550's and yet it would not work. The person said they had to get a 600 watt supply to work. Their 400 watt supply may have two or more rails with insufficient amps for the card.

The power supply MUST supply enough power for the card to work. Some 400 watt supplies can and some cannot.

As for amps in vs. amps out, 12x30=360 watts, 360/120=3 amps. Watts is basically the same but the volts are different. I say basically the same because there is some loss due to efficiency not being 100%. No loss means no heat.

There are x amount of watt ratings on a power supply. Where and how those watts are distributed can make or break if the supply will actually work for the card you get.

NewEgg’s description for the cards says what the max wattage of the cards are. How accurate that info is, is another question.

It is best to stay away from minimums in spite of budget on power supplies and be on the safe side.

The 430 video card I have works fine for rendering, mediocre for playback improvement and a few frames less than CPU only for Neat Video. This is due to its limited memory bandwidth.
The 550ti will most likely meet my needs. According to a chart on another site the more expensive 560 and 560ti will give not give very much more unless one is also into gaming.

So get a 550 series card for Vegas and the 560 or greater series cards for Vegas and serious games.

Vidmus,

I came across a PSU calculator from extreme.outervision.com. Their software will tell you how many amps you will need per rail (3, 5, 12, -12, etc) on a computer power supply if you fill in your computer information. However you pay a small amount to use it ($4.99 lifetime use, $1.99 for 1 week etc). Are you familiar with this website/online PSU calculator?

I just bought a new Corsair 650 watt power supply and an ECS 550ti video card.

Power supply is $80.00 with free shipping today after the promo codes and before the ridiculous-bate (Rebate). LOL!

Corsair has a calculator on their site that is free to use. Do not pay to use what is free!

While even the best companies have their bad days, I still like Corsair because it has one rail so I don't have to do a balancing act to get what I need for whatever it is. Also, Corsair is a quality brand!

The reviews on the Egg were over 1000 and mostly positive.

I will get the supply and card next week, test the new goodies and reply with the results.

fwiw, Corsair is great and they have some quiet ones too. Whatever "free" calculator you use, add 20%. You may want to Overclock a bit or have extra hard drives later. Adding things to your system and have the power supply lacking what you need will make you cry.

Regards,
Dan

Vidmus,

Thanks for the tip. I will visit the corsair website.

I will eagerly await the result of your testing of you rnew board and power supply.

Good to know, Thanks Daniel3D

I guess to add a few other comments,

Personally, I went completely overboard on the powersupply with a Silverstone ST1500 as I do gaming with the machine too. With 3 X gtx480's and a 980X, and 480's overclocked, the power supply overheated and temporarily shut down.

On a different machine, and 3 X gtx580's and 990X, overclocked, the power supply (same) stays up.

Again, my point being get plenty of juice as you might want to add a card later. I good reference is here:

http://www.slizone.com/object/slizone_build_psu.html

Nvidia or AMD? AMD went surround with eyefinity about 3 years ago (2d), then Nvidia went surround with 3D, 2 years ago. In my opinion, Nvidia leads the pack on 3d. Granted they had a LOT of issues with the drivers from April-Oct 2011, but looks like they have things going a lot better.

With the Nvidia glasses, etc. you can mess with 3d photos, and as they work the bugs out of 3D youtube, that will be cool too. They are getting close.

Anyway, I have 4 pc's in my house that have a total of 9 Nvidia cards.

Regards,
Dan

Oh, buy the 500 series!! 400 series run hot, and not all cores are used. Yes, when the 600's come out, I'll end up buying those too, this will never end...

Good insight.

Dan,

You're really a serious gamer! My requirement is only for accelerated video rendering so will probably be a little bit more conservative. But I agree I should choose a power supply that is flexible enough so I can upgrade to more power hungry, top of the line video cards later.