What A Difference A Processor Makes. . .

Tomsde wrote on 4/7/2009, 5:36 PM

I just upgraded my Core 2 Duo Quad 2.4 Gig to a i7 2.6 gig. The i7 2.6 processing power is rated on the Intel website as being better than a Core 2 Duo Quad 3.0 gig. I had to get a new mother board and am not running 4 gigs DDR 3 memory on that. All I can say is WOW, what a difference in AVCHD 1920 x 1020 video. I can now play the video with the Good setting set to auto in my preview window without stuttering. fI can't wait to do some rendering and see how much faster it will be.

I'm very happy that I will no longer have to transcode my AVCHD files to get them to work well in Vegas Pro 8. I'm hoping for an even better performance boost when Vegas Pro 9 comes out. The AVCHD handling was better in Vegas Movie Studio Platinum Pro 9--so I expect it to better when Vegas Pro 9 comes out.

My system is running everything much faster and more efficeintly. If someone is going to upgrade or get a new computer I highly reccommend the i7. I wish I could have afforded the 2.9 gigahertz model, but this should keep me in good shape for a while.

Comments

ushere wrote on 4/7/2009, 6:27 PM

what os?

so what, and how much ram are you running?

leslie

rs170a wrote on 4/7/2009, 8:38 PM

leslie, here's a reply from one guy in a thread on the DV Info forum about his experience with his new i7 build.
Unfortunately, if I decided to upgrade right now, my wife would probably divorce me ;-)

Mike

MSI X58 Pro
iCore 7 920 2.67Ghz
6Gig Tri-Channel OCZ 10666
EVGA 295Gtx
Auzentech 7.1 Prelude
3-1TB Hds Seagate
LG Blu-ray Burner
Lite on Lightscribe DVD Burner
800Watt Tagan PS

Replaced my Q9550 Quadcore setup...
Rendering recent HD project with Q9550 quadcore using Vegas 8 Pro exceeded 3 Hours
Same project using the new iCore 7 920 took no more than 1 Hour 10 minutes....
Huge difference......Well worth the investment...

ushere wrote on 4/7/2009, 9:47 PM

hi mike,

you're lucky, mine would probably kill me!!!

still, it doesn't stop me thinking about it, quite seriously. my e6600 is going fine, but i've just landed a couple of biggish projects and my thoughts are running to sectional rendering in both.

till now i've usually had a cup of tea (i know, how english) and returned to editing after it. on more major projects just left it to render overnight. but with the results i'm reading.... well, it'd be very nice.....

now, my questions are,

a. do i wait for win7 and do the whole megillah at once, ie, software, hardware, et al.?

b. 32 or 64 bit? (i'm happy enough with 32bit until vegas 8.1 develops into a fully formed release, ie, plugins, etc.,)

c. 3gb ram (obviously max under 32), or load up on 6gb to future proof?

d. wait till the recessions so bad that i can buy now and pay back in the next life?

leslie

btw - not interested in blu-ray as yet. don't know anyone who has a player, or come to that, interested in getting one, so i'll stick with a couple of dvd burners.

Chanimal wrote on 4/8/2009, 7:22 AM

I second the difference it makes. My previous mobo went out so I had to re-build from scratch.

Picked a gigabyte board, 6 gig ddr3 ram (the memory meter shows I've used up to 5 so far), i7 920, dual radiator water cooled (I can overclock, but I prefer absolute stability to a little more horsepower and I couldn't stablize mine well enough at the higher speeds), 10 HD's, 4 DVD burners, Liam Li tower case, 800 w antec power supply, ATI 4670 card (use the GPU for particle illusion).

This machine SCREAMS! I watch without any stutter on the preview window (it will drop down to 15 fps at the most complex compound sections--but hardly noticable). The render speed is amazing--and it still has the horsepower to feel smooth if I have to touch another application. A project for 3m that took 4 1/2 hours on my previous AMD dual-core 4200, now takes less than 20 minutes.

Great investment.

marcel-vossen wrote on 4/9/2009, 1:07 AM

I'm really curious what quality video are you previewing Chanimal?

I have the same CPU, memory and MB and my 1920x1080 Canon EOS 5D mark II footage can't even preview at 5 fps , not even in draft .

I must say I do sometimes have 5 people in greenscreen in the timeline that I want to superimpose on a background, so maybe that is too much to ask for any system...

But its maybe interesting to know if your graphic card brings an extra boost to the previewing? Because I have a Geforce 9500 , does anyone know if that makes a difference ?

AND..I also have my old system still here with 'Only' a dual core Pentium 6850 with 4 GB ram, but that is only slightly slower in rendering and MUCH more stable when it comes to crashes of Vegas. ...so what I actually do is start rendering the same project on both and the old system is slower but finishes succesfully most of the time. The i7 system crashes often, but it could be Vegas or the footage I am using, still havent found the cause.

Tomsde wrote on 4/10/2009, 5:27 AM

I am running XP Home Edtion 32 bit currently because I did not want to shell out the extra money for Vista 64 bit when Windows 7 will be out in less than a year. I am also waiting for the software vendors to catch up with 64 bit compatibility. Both Windows 7 and Vista 64 require clean OS installs--definitely don't want to do that 2 times in less than a year.

If I don't get optimal performance out of my current configuration I may rethink that though, and get Vista 64 bit and add another 4 gigs of ram. Some of my 3D applications would definitely benefit from the RAM increase.

From the test editing I performed, I can see a definite performance boost to Vegas Pro--no crashes here (knock on wood). I did have a funny issue with Photoshop CS 3 though--when I opened bridge it gave me a warning that I needed at least a Pentium 4 Processor and if I proceded that there might be performance issues. I am wondering if Adobe will have a patch for that--Bridge (which I never use anyhow) opened fine.

Chanimal wrote on 4/10/2009, 11:14 AM

Dude,

I am using SD video with up to 7 layers at times. No green screen this time--that may be it. What OS are you running?

I'm using VISTA 64 business (without as much junk).

My system is stable as a rock, but then again, this time I had dedicated the machine to just video work. I have office 2007, Ultra, Photoshop, and all the main Sony apps--that's it. Just the essentials. I transfered all my web stuff, main consulting and dozens of other apps to a different "Dell" machine.

marcel-vossen wrote on 4/10/2009, 2:01 PM

I use Vista 64 , but more important might be that I have Canon EOS 5D mark II input files that are known to be a bit troublesome because of the format.

At the moment I am testing with a trial verison of CineForm NEO, and it looks very promising, its superfast in converting all my files to intermediate files that can be handled very well by Vegas, so it might be superfast once I put these new files in my 'slow' HD project.

Jim H wrote on 4/10/2009, 8:17 PM

MSI X58 Pro
iCore 7 920 2.67Ghz
6Gig Tri-Channel OCZ 10666
EVGA 295Gtx
Auzentech 7.1 Prelude
3-1TB Hds Seagate
LG Blu-ray Burner
Lite on Lightscribe DVD Burner
800Watt Tagan PS

Mike, is the 800W PS a bit overkill for this rig? I thought the i7s were more efficient? I have a 500W and was thinking I could reuse it with my upgrade.

rs170a wrote on 4/11/2009, 5:00 AM

Jim, I have a 650W supply for my quad core and I don't have as many internals as this guy does.
All the reading I've done suggests that too much is better than too little.
The other advantage is that you can add more hardware and overclock as well and not have to worry about stressing things out.

Mike

warriorking wrote on 4/11/2009, 7:46 AM

The specs you are looking at actually belong to me, as for the power supply, the 295GTX video card requires a 650 Watt or better in order to run it properly...thus the reason for the 800 watt....I am really happy with the performance of the i7 Core setup...

LivingTheDream wrote on 4/11/2009, 4:35 PM

Tomsde: "I wish I could have afforded the 2.9 gigahertz model, but this should keep me in good shape for a while."

I got the Core i7 920 as a Christmas present (along with a few other necessary components to go with it. See my specs). It's been running very stable with a slight overclock. I'm not a big oc'er or anything. All I did was decrease the multiplier from 20 to 18 and increase the bus speed from 133 to 166 (to also give the RAM a little boost) to get to 2.988 GHz. It's been staying cool and very stable with the stock fan/heatsink. AVCHD and HDV files run well on the Vegas 8 timline, but will get choppy with multiple layers, transitions, and FX. I'm using Windows XP 32 bit.

Here's a before and after upgrade test I ran in Avid Liquid 7 (before purchasing Vegas). Old system: AMD64 4000+ single core CPU with 1GB Corsair DDR, ATi x1950 Pro, MSI K8NEO mb. Applied a Magic Bullet Movie Look to a 20 second SD clip. Rendering took 6 mins 45 secs with the old setup. With the Core i7 system it took 2 mins 30 secs (using 2GB DDR3 GSkill RAM). After switching to 3GB Triple Channel Corsair and overclocking, the same clip rendered in 2 mins 5 secs.

So actually I'd say you can afford a 2.9 GHz Core i7 processor. Try a little overclocking and you're there, if your motherboard is up to the task that is. And I believe the ones that have been sold so far for this processor can all be overclocked. I was always leary of trying any overclocking prevoiusly because it didn't work with my old rig, but this Core i7 seems to handle it no problem.

Steve