Optimal setup for video editing

[billyb2]

Hi everyone,

I've searched everywhere and want to get some of your opinions.

To begin, this question is only geared towards anyone doing professional video editing. Not editing for personal use.

We ordered a few new Mac Pros and one of them will be replacing our previous editing station. Let me list what hardware we have and how I'm thinking of setting it up, and if you have suggestions, please share. And note, the hardware that is listed is what we have. Thanks in advance!

New Mac Pro Quad-Core with D700
256 SSD
16GB Ram (which will be upgraded soon)
Pegasus R4 (empty)
4x WD Black 2TB SATA III (Raid5)
USB 3 external for scratch disk
USB 3 external for Time Machine backup

 

[phrehdd]

Hi everyone,

I've searched everywhere and want to get some of your opinions.

To begin, this question is only geared towards anyone doing professional video editing. Not editing for personal use.

We ordered a few new Mac Pros and one of them will be replacing our previous editing station. Let me list what hardware we have and how I'm thinking of setting it up, and if you have suggestions, please share. And note, the hardware that is listed is what we have. Thanks in advance!

New Mac Pro Quad-Core with D700
256 SSD
16GB Ram (which will be upgraded soon)
Pegasus R4 (empty)
4x WD Black 2TB SATA III (Raid5)
USB 3 external for scratch disk
USB 3 external for Time Machine backup

Just out of curiosity, what software applications are you folks using?

 

[billyb2]

Just out of curiosity, what software applications are you folks using?

Adobe CS6

Main apps used will be:

Premiere CS6
Photoshop CS6
Illustrator CS6

Quite a few others, but those are the main ones.

 

[phrehdd]

Adobe CS6

Main apps used will be:

Premiere CS6
Photoshop CS6
Illustrator CS6

Quite a few others, but those are the main ones.

I might be a bit out of line here but does CS6 software really take advantage of the ATI graphics (Open CL) with the new Mac Pro? I understand that the new subscription based version does in some cases.

As for Photoshop, the sweet spot was the 6-8 core processor with the 500 series graphics or 700 (using the newer Photoshop via subscription).

 

[puckhead193]

Hi everyone,

I've searched everywhere and want to get some of your opinions.

To begin, this question is only geared towards anyone doing professional video editing. Not editing for personal use.

We ordered a few new Mac Pros and one of them will be replacing our previous editing station. Let me list what hardware we have and how I'm thinking of setting it up, and if you have suggestions, please share. And note, the hardware that is listed is what we have. Thanks in advance!

New Mac Pro Quad-Core with D700
256 SSD
16GB Ram (which will be upgraded soon)
Pegasus R4 (empty)
4x WD Black 2TB SATA III (Raid5)
USB 3 external for scratch disk
USB 3 external for Time Machine backup

From my gathering Adobe CS6 WON'T take adventure of all the goodies in the nMP, only Creative Cloud will.
What are you editing? What is your output method? Are things going to broadcast? If so, what does the station require?
If it is broadcast you will need a broadcast monitor to make sure your levels are legal as well as the colors will be accurate.
Think about thunderbolt drives and whatever you think you need for storage, double it.

 

[Chad3eleven]

Adobe runs best with Nvidia cards because it utilizes CUDA.

I edit daily with Premiere CC (after effects/photoshop/Nuke, etc) and I have a GTX 680..

There have been times when I had to use a temporaty card while we ordered a new one, and we threw in a 5870.. it sucked.. no hardware acceleration because it is NOT CUDA (nvidia) and renders that would take seconds were taking minutes.

heres my rig:
2 x 2.4 GHz 6-Core Intel Xeon
32 GB 1333 MHz DDR3 ECC
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 680 2048 MB

Sorry I cant offer much insight on the new mac pros..but why not use thunderbolt for your scratch drives?

And do you need to hookup a broadcast monitor? How are you viewing your edits? PLEASE dont say a computer monitor..

 

[ChrisA]

Hi everyone,

I've searched everywhere and want to get some of your opinions.

To begin, this question is only geared towards anyone doing professional video editing. Not editing for personal use.
...

You don't say what the video format is nor how many hours (and gigabytes) of footage is shot and edited in a given week. How much video data are generated per week?

I would think you would want Thunderbolt based SSD for scratch.

Finally you can be very certain that software (like CS6) that was released before the new MP does not make good use of the MP's graphic hardware. If using Adobe you will need to buy a subscription but FCPX will work well on the new hardware.

 

[Chad3eleven]

what do you mean a subscription?

Yes for creative cloud you COULD pay per month, but CS6 is a one time purchase.

Besides, he is already vested in the adobe suite, no need to witch to FCPX..

And yes.. what you are editing is important... web? Broadcast? Wedding videos?

 

[billyb2]

Sorry for the late reply.

We are not doing broadcast video. Our video is used mainly for distributing to dealers or media outlets on DVD or Bluray and for viewing in-house. We also share most of it online. No matter what the medium it is shared on, we always edit HD for other use.

Yes, these are viewed on an Apple Cinema display. We also final test on multiple television monitors. But again, not broadcast quality so not detrimental.

Eventually we will end up going to Creative Cloud but not at the moment. For the time being it is CS6.

The video we shoot is on a Panasonic HMC-150 and we shoot in AVCHD. We record anywhere from a few minutes to over an hour depending on what it is for. We are an engineering firm that also races. So our videos range from short engine runs, races, installation videos, educational videos and more.