Best parts for HD editing

[mofo]

Hi folks,
I will be building a PC primarily for editing HD videos in AVCH H.264 format and using the Adobe Premiere pro software. What would be ideal? I am starting from scratch. Does the software support dual or quad core? What do you recommend? I would like the best performance with mere mortal budget. I don't need the very latest hardware but something up-to-date that gives good bang for the buck. What do you recommend?

[glc]

Moved to BYOPC. Give us an approximate budget, please, for just the tower and its contents, not including OS or software.

[mofo]

Come to think of it, I do have some parts i can still use, like a monitor, keyboard, mouse, etc. Basically i need to buy a mobo w/ RAM and CPU, I was thinking around 500-600 bucks or so but will consider stretching it out a bit.

[glc]

500 to 600 CDN for just a motherboard, CPU, and ram? What about a video card and drives? What OS are you going to use?

[mofo]

I have a paid copy of XP and a brand new 320Gb WD SATA drive. For editing its best to have another or two? The video cards i have are good but old, do i really need the latest one with high onboard memory?

[mofo]

Maybe i need to rebudget this build to $1000? more? I might have underestimated the costs for such a system. I just thought i'd start with the latest mobo/cpu/ram combo and hook it all up with my old gear...

[glc]

XP should be fine. A 320gb SATA drive should be okay, but a newer and faster drive would be better. What do you have for opticals, and are they SATA or IDE? What do you have for video cards, and are they AGP or PCI-E? What do you have for a case and power supply?

Bottom line, we have to look at all the old gear carefully. Peripherals, no problem. Internal components, we need to be choosy.

What version of Premiere Pro will you be using?

[mofo]

I will be using prmiere CS4.
My HD is only 2-3 months old, i bought it for another project but never used it. It's SATA with 16mb cache, what do you recommend? Can I use it for installing the OS but need something faster for storage?
My video cards are all AGP. I have an ATI Radeon 8500 and a Matrox Millennium P750. Oh an my goold old Vodoo 3500

I've got some generic 300W power supply and tower case, they worked fine with my old systems but the new board may not fit in it now?

Thanks!

[Khalil]

For HD editing you will need a powerful CPU, AGP is out, you are not going to find a good quality motherboard with a powerful enough chipset for HD video editing with agp slot.
You need to start from scratch. An AMD Phenom II 955 or Intel i5 850 is a good way to go. You need a quality power supply, that is the most important part in your system. You really need to do some more reading in our threads. I build a couple of these HD editing machines a month, they have to have fast components or you got nothing pretty much.
The software supports Quad Cores.

[glc]

Yes, you can use the 320 for the OS and software - and you will need a second drive for storage. Khalil is right, you need to start essentially from scratch. 300w PSU's and AGP are out, as are IDE opticals (you still haven't addressed this....). I did a bit of research, and here would be my recommendation, prices from newegg.ca:

Motherboard: Asus P7P55D, $170
CPU: i5-750, $220
Ram: Various brands of DDR3, 2x2 dual channel kit, 1333 or 1600 speed, ~$100, HIGHLY recommended to pick ram from the Asus QVL for that board.
Video card: ATI HD4850, ~$135 (SPECIFICALLY recommended for Premiere CS4)
Power supply: Antec Earthwatts 500, $90
Optical: various brands of SATA dvd burner, ~$35
Hard drive: Western Digital Caviar Black, 500 gb to 1 tb, $75 to $115

This is going to put you in the $800 bracket, plus shipping. Another $100 would get you an i7-860, which adds hyperthreading. This also assumes your case is suitable for this upgrade. If not, you can add about $40 to the PSU price to get an Antec Sonata III 500, which comes with that 500 watt Earthwatts.

When you decide to upgrade to a 64 bit OS, you can add another 2x2 ram kit to get 8 gb.

There are other decent Canadian vendors - NCIX.com in particular, I used Newegg because it's easy for me to navigate.

EDIT: This does not address a capture device, but the motherboard has Firewire, a ton of USB, and both PCI and PCI-E slots.

[mofo]

Great input guys. I was checking some benchmarks on cpu's running Premiere, seems like the Phenom II X4 955 and 965 are doing pretty well with that soft, giving the most bang for the buck. What do you think of them and what would be a good mobo?

Looks like I will be needing a newer case and PS, but it seems possible to stay within 1k. My DVD burner is IDE so will need that too... Geez it seems like a long time since my last build (~4 or 5 years) my gear was hot then but is worthless now

[glc]

I'm not qualified to comment on AMD, because I do not build with AMD and do not keep up with their products.

[Khalil]

I like the AMD Phenom II 955 will do great with this Adobe Premier Pro, you also need a solid chipset to go with it so it is stable when working on large projects Asus CSM (Corporate Stable Model) $84
As glc recommended the ATI 4850 is the way to go and it is the best bang for the money for your project, however you may not find it in a good brand, Asus. Diamond and HIS are the only ones I recommend for end users when it comes to ATI. If you can't find a 4850 in these good brands then for another $30 the 5770 will do extremely well and probably out perform the 4850.

[Hufigyed]

Originally Posted by mofo Looks like I will be needing a newer case and PS, but it seems possible to stay within 1k.

If you've got the time and want to save money, go to as many Canadian Vendor's sites as you can find and check their prices on all of your components and then order them at NCIX.com and use the price match feature. They will match any other vendor's price on the identical item provided it is in CAD. They even match sale prices. I was able to save about $150 this way on my build recently. With Black Friday coming up, you might be able to save quite a bit if you're willing to wait that long.

If you do decide to price match, check http://www.directcanada.com/ as I found a number of parts for my build there for less than newegg.ca or NCIX.com.

Other Canadian sites I know of: http://www.memoryexpress.com/ http://www.canadacomputers.com/ http://www.tigerdirect.ca/ http://www.newegg.ca/ http://www.nxsource.com/

[mofo]

Where does newegg.ca ship from? USA? i couldn't find this info on their site...

[glc]

At this time, I believe so. I don't think they have their new Canadian warehouse open yet.

[mofo]

Ok i spent the last couple of hours reading through the QVL for RAM, as suggested by GLC. Problem is, i can't find ANY of the memory sticks listed! Perhaps it is outdated info? But anyhow, I read some more about Abode premiere being optimized for a 64-bit OS and that kinda makes me want to upgrade right away, so here's a new question:

I found a triple channel 3x2= 6gb of memory for arund $135, DDR3 1600. The brand is PQI am I safe using it? There are some other brands near that price range but they always list "optimized for intel i5, i7, etc." does that mean it won't work well if I go with the quad-core AMD or it doesn't matter?

[systempat]

Which motherboard/CPU did you decide to go with? If it was for the Phenom 955, then you don't want 3 memory sticks, you have to go in pairs.

[systempat]

Also even though the QVL list keeps getting recommended around here, I have had problems with trying to use it. I'm not very familiar with ASUS site recommendations as I have not used them in quite a while. BUT when using for some other manufacturers, I find that the memory 'approved' list - or QVL - seems to have been released early and not updated. And that at least half of the recommendations seem to be for Taiwanese parts that we never see over here. I have used the Memory Configurator tools off of some of the name brands of memory - such as Corsair and Crucial. The usual claim for these is that if you order based on their recommendations, then they guarantee compatibility. Which I assume means it works or you return it. Not sure about the what-if the memory is bad. I have never had new memory not work on systems that I have ordered or assembled.

[mofo]

I was eyeing on the Phenom 955... Who needs 3 sticks if you have to install in pairs?

[mofo]

...and the asus mobo that khalil recommended is the one i was interested in.

[glc]

I don't think the QVL is quite as important with an AMD board as it is with an Intel P55 or X58. I would probably be comfortable with just about any major brand DDR3-1333.