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Final Cut Pro X Memory Usage

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diamond3

macrumors 6502a
Original poster
Oct 6, 2005
881
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For those of you with FCPX, have you noticed it requires a ton of memory? I'm getting page outs like none other whenever I run it.

I'm running a 13" 2011 MBP with 8Gb of memory, 750Gb 5400 rpm hard drive. I usually only try to have spotify, FCPX, occasionally safari when I need it.

Some of my thoughts: Since I have an integrated graphics card, is a large portion of my memory being tied up with it? I am editing HD video that's been optimized. It plays it back fine in FCPX, but when I start going through different menus, options, effects etc, I'll get the beach ball. I've tried to setup my project files on a my USB 2 external drive, but I'm now wondering if its making it worse and I wouldn't be better using my main hard drive.

For those of you running FCPX, how much memory do you have? I'm just trying to understand where my main bottleneck is or if I need to look at reinstalling my OS and everything. I'll try to get a screen capture next time I'm working in FCPX look at the memory usage. Right now I'm at 3.9Gb page ins, 4.2Gb page outs.
 
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cgbier

macrumors 6502a
Jun 6, 2011
933
2
You have two issues:
- editing from the system drive (especially a 5400RPM) is a no-no.
- USB2 is not suitable for video editing.

How many events and projects do you have in your library? Get Event Manager or put them into Disk Images that you only mount when you need them.

To speed up editing and keep the beach ball at bay, turn off audio waveforms and thumbnails in the clip view. Only turn them on when you really need them.

I work on a 2010 MBP with 8GB. I only see the beach ball when my external drives (FW800 LaCie) can't shovel the data fast enough, and only when I show thumbnails and waveforms. Regardless if I work with the internal or discrete GPU.

FCP X seems to be a RAM hog. 8GB is about the minimum you should have.
 
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diamond3

macrumors 6502a
Original poster
Oct 6, 2005
881
373
Thanks for the great tips. I'll work on it hopefully before I have to run off to another recording later tonight. I think off the top of my head I have 7 projects. 5 are only a 5-10 minutes long.

I figured usb 2 wouldn't be good for video editing but maybe wrongly assumed it would be better than the main drive. I'm contemplating upgrading to an SSD for my main drive, and then move my 750GB 5400 RPM to the optical bay. I have an old firewire external drive that I'd have to get a 400->800 adapter that I could use for one project at a time. Should my 5400 RPM drive be adequate connected through the SATA or will I greatly wish I had a 7200 RPM drive?

I'll run FCPX in its current state and look at the activity monitor.
Remove projects and compare
Then I'll look into getting a firewire adapter or upgrading an SSD.

I've been holding off on the SSD because they've been dropping like crazy over the past couple of months.
 
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mBox

macrumors 68020
Jun 26, 2002
2,357
84
Keep in mind that you can transcode your footage to the lowest possible format then make a final share version using the higher ones. But for that you might have to move it to a faster computer or have patience during the final process.
Ive had FCPX run on a 2009 17" with 4GB RAM but using eSATA.
Anything less would be brutal.
However some of my projects are 4K and others no less than HD using ProRes 422 HQ.

P.s. if you can use eSATA capable external, do so, it makes a world of difference :)
 
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monokakata

monokakata

macrumors 68020
May 8, 2008
2,035
582
Ithaca, NY
I'm editing a 36 minute piece and when I'm fully involved in it, FCP X takes 7.5 gigs of my 12.

It's amusing to watch it take more and more RAM as it reads the disk that the video's on (not my system disk).

If I run something else, as I often do, then I see up to 2 GB page outs. But if FCP X is by itself or nearly so, its usage is steady at about 7.5 GB, or roughly 60% of available RAM, with no page outs.
 
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linuxcooldude

macrumors 68020
Mar 1, 2010
2,480
7,232
I don't think its necessarily the memory that FCPX uses per say is the problem, but opening up video clip previews, realtime effects ect. I opened up a hours worth of video clips in iMovie with 6 GB of RAM and it bogged it down extensively, till I upgraded RAM to 24GB.
 
simsaladimbamba

simsaladimbamba

Guest
Nov 28, 2010
22,670
30
located
linuxcooldude said:
I don't think its necessarily the memory that FCPX uses per say is the problem, but opening up video clip previews, realtime effects ect. I opened up a hours worth of video clips in iMovie with 6 GB of RAM and it bogged it down extensively, till I upgraded RAM to 24GB.
Click to expand...

Even though iMovie is not 64-bit and can't take advantage of that much RAM?
 
Z

Zwhaler

macrumors 604
Jun 10, 2006
7,090
1,564
Like others have said editing through USB 2 is the biggest bottleneck... I've noticed a substantial slowdown when doing this versus editing with files stored internally. I run 24GB of RAM and I hardly ever see Final Cut Pro X using more than around 18 at the most... maybe its hit 20 at one point. Average use is less than 10 and occasionally runs at 10 while editing projects that reference several different events. Has anybody seen it use more RAM than 20GB?
 
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linuxcooldude

macrumors 68020
Mar 1, 2010
2,480
7,232
simsaladimbamba said:
Even though iMovie is not 64-bit and can't take advantage of that much RAM?
Click to expand...

Yeah, I totally forgot about that. It is not 64bit. But use FCP X for most videos now. That one project I just happened to use a very big file a the time in iMove. Most are very short, no longer then 10 minutes long.
 
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mBox

macrumors 68020
Jun 26, 2002
2,357
84
ran FCPX for a few hours, editing mostly and never got the app to go past 700mb used in RAM here.
editing mostly Drift HD files transcoded to ProRes 422.
about 6 hours of footage spanned across 7 projects.
this is on a Mac Pro 2.66 w/32GB G-Tech GRAID 4TB on FW800.
 
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yellowbunny

macrumors 6502
Jun 27, 2010
284
448
Graphics card seems to be biggest issue with fcpx. It was painfully slow for me until I upgraded to 5770. It's great now. I edit from USB 2 sometimes without problem and have only 4gb ram.
 
illegalprelude

illegalprelude

macrumors 68000
Mar 10, 2005
1,583
120
Los Angeles, California
Issue I have with Final Cut is that I have a iMac i7 with 1GB video card and 12GB RAM. FCPX is 64bit and uses Grand Central Dispatch yet after about 4GB sucked in, Final Cut stops using my remaining ram.

My system free ram drops to about 200MB yet inactive will stay around 3-4GB. I wish Final Cut would know that there is unused ram sitting around. So instead, I have to quit FCPX and reopen and work for a while, rinse, repeat.
 
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Zwhaler

macrumors 604
Jun 10, 2006
7,090
1,564
illegalprelude said:
Issue I have with Final Cut is that I have a iMac i7 with 1GB video card and 12GB RAM. FCPX is 64bit and uses Grand Central Dispatch yet after about 4GB sucked in, Final Cut stops using my remaining ram.

My system free ram drops to about 200MB yet inactive will stay around 3-4GB. I wish Final Cut would know that there is unused ram sitting around. So instead, I have to quit FCPX and reopen and work for a while, rinse, repeat.
Click to expand...

Most likely FCP is using the inactive RAM. I go a lot of times with FCP only using a few GB while 16 or more GB is sitting inactive. I don't think anything is wrong here.
 
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diamond3

macrumors 6502a
Original poster
Oct 6, 2005
881
373
Alright so I've been working for a little while today, watching my activity monitor.

I restarted my computer, deleted/moved some projects and started editing. I'm still using my usb setup for the moment, but I still can't figure out why I'm getting page outs when I have inactive memory that could be utilized. I attached a screen capture to show this. If FCPX uses inactive ram, what differentiates it from active? Thats bizarre if that is the case.

Also, what is the reason for the wired and active memory down at the bottom not equal to the sum of all the processes? Is that including whatever the video card (integrated graphics) tries to utilize?

One last question, if I did get an SSD for my main drive, wouldn't that still be the better option to use instead of the hard disk drive attached in my optical bay? I know the system will be utilizing it, but won't the speed more than compensate for the slow down caused by the OS? What's the major drawback? I'd obviously only have on project open on that drive at a time and then transfer the ones I'm not using to the hard disk.
 

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diamond3

macrumors 6502a
Original poster
Oct 6, 2005
881
373
Even worse after tonights editing. 5 GB page ins, 8 GB page outs. One crash on FCPX that luckily restored just fine thanks to the autosave feature. If I can find me a 128 GB Samsung 830 SSD for <$1/GB I'll probably pull the trigger. It's getting close. Until then, I'll wait for my firewire 800->400 adapter so I can at least use my 7200 RPM firewire drive instead of the 5400 RPM usb drive.
 
matteusclement

matteusclement

macrumors 65816
Jan 26, 2008
1,144
0
victoria
diamond3 said:
Even worse after tonights editing. 5 GB page ins, 8 GB page outs. One crash on FCPX that luckily restored just fine thanks to the autosave feature. If I can find me a 128 GB Samsung 830 SSD for <$1/GB I'll probably pull the trigger. It's getting close. Until then, I'll wait for my firewire 800->400 adapter so I can at least use my 7200 RPM firewire drive instead of the 5400 RPM usb drive.
Click to expand...

I ripped out my optical drive of my 13" MBP and put in a hard drive caddy. With a 500GB WD black in there, the things SCREAMED!
Who uses a optical drive anymore?

I also use prores lite, none of that AIC crap.
 
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diamond3

macrumors 6502a
Original poster
Oct 6, 2005
881
373
matteusclement said:
I ripped out my optical drive of my 13" MBP and put in a hard drive caddy. With a 500GB WD black in there, the things SCREAMED!
Who uses a optical drive anymore?

I also use prores lite, none of that AIC crap.
Click to expand...

Yeah, the next SSD deal I find I've convinced myself to get it. I figure as much as I want to hold out, having an SSD drive will probably help my resale a bunch anyway if I decide to get the next one. After a few hours of usage tonight I had 3x the page outs as page ins using only fcpx. Im also convinced at this point that it's my USB drive creating the problems which has done a few things for me: 1)confirm my knowledge about how terrible USB is compared to the available standard at its time (FireWire, now thunderbolt) 2)made me hope that there is no way FCPX could be this bad utilizing memory or else everyone else would be having the same problem.

My hope is to get the SSD, sell my 13" mbp just before new ones are released an upgrade to the 15" if there is no 13" with a gpu and quad core.
 
M

mBox

macrumors 68020
Jun 26, 2002
2,357
84
diamond3 said:
..Im also convinced at this point that it's my USB drive creating the problems which has done a few things for me: 1)confirm my knowledge about how terrible USB is compared to the available standard at its time (FireWire, now thunderbolt) 2)made me hope that there is no way FCPX could be this bad utilizing memory or else everyone else would be having the same problem...
Click to expand...
Its your USB drive period and not FCPX. Try doing the same with Avid MC, Adobe PremierePro or FCP legacy.
No one edits off a USB drive and lives to tell about it ;)
 
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diamond3

macrumors 6502a
Original poster
Oct 6, 2005
881
373
Just an update:

I ordered an SSD tonight, got the 128GB Samsung 830 for ~$133. I've also come to the conclusion that my 8 GB of Corsair (Mac certified mind you) memory is also causing kernel panics. Ever since I put my original memory back in, my computer started running normal again. I started getting numerous kernel panics toward the end of my project. Haven't had a single one yet since the switch. I still have my Firewire 400 -> 800 adapter for my external hard drive.

I just need to run a memory test, RMA the things with Corsair and hopefully get some replacements quickly. I'm going to do a complete fresh install of Lion, not even migration assistant. I'm sure it will be a better experience editing from hear on out.
 
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Zwhaler

macrumors 604
Jun 10, 2006
7,090
1,564
mBox said:
No one edits off a USB drive and lives to tell about it ;)
Click to expand...

It's really rough editing from an external drive, I did it for a recent project and it was pretty horrible. Everything was laggy even on my fast computer. But the project turned out fine, you just have to be patient while editing.
 
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diamond3

macrumors 6502a
Original poster
Oct 6, 2005
881
373
matteusclement said:
you gonna keep your optical bay or swap out? :apple:
Click to expand...

Swapping it out, keep my media (music, pictures, videos, docs) on the hard drive that will be where my superdrive is at now. This will help when i'm editing video as well since I won't rely on any external connection. I'm going to try and see how long i last without a superdrive before i spend any money on an external enclosure for it.
 
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