• Adobe After Effects

  After Effects on MacBook Pro/nVidia

  Posted by David Tunnell on May 31, 2012 at 7:35 pm

  I have MacBook Pro 17″ with 16 gigs of ram. I run After Effects on Parallels under Win7 because my main computer is a Windows7 work station and my CS6 license is for the Windows version. (the reasons are a long story)

  Anyway, the MacBook is pretty good on everything in AE but Raytrace, because it has an ATI card. I am wondering if anyone knows if this device: Echo Express

  Would allow me to get better performance on the MacBook Pro? I wonder if the Echo device would give the windows system and AE access to the GPU’s processing through the Thunderbolt port?

  Thanks,

  David Tunnell
  TunnellVision Productions

  Roland R. kahlenberg replied 14 years ago 3 Members · 4 Replies
• 4 Replies

• 

  Angelo Lorenzo

  June 1, 2012 at 1:18 am

  I would ask the manufacturer directly. Thunderbolt is now just being built into PC motherboards so the biggest wall is proper driver support within Windows 7. As far as I know, hard drives and displays work decently but features like hot swapping aren’t supported yet.

  This, of course, is contingent on if Parallels is passing access to the Thunderbolt port to Windows programs.

  Angelo Lorenzo
  Fallen Empire – Digital Production Services
• 

  Roland R. kahlenberg

  June 1, 2012 at 2:12 am

  You’ll also want to check with Adobe if such a setup will be supported as I assume drivers will have to be built between AE and the cards.

  HTH
  RoRK

  Intensive AE & Mocha Training in Singapore and Malaysia
  Adobe ACE/ACI (version 7) & Imagineer Systems Inc Approved Mocha Trainer
• 

  David Tunnell

  June 1, 2012 at 1:28 pm

  I contacted the manufacturer, they wrote me back within minutes. They told me they are currently testing this and will have results posted on their site next week.

  One thing I hadn’t noticed at first was that the PCIe on the box is only 4x, while the nVidia cards are 16x. I was told that they may still work. I will wait for the test results and hold out hope.

  If I can get a unit to test I might just try it.

  Thanks,

  David Tunnell
  TunnellVision Productions
• 

  Roland R. kahlenberg

  June 2, 2012 at 9:52 am

  Don’t you have issues with having to purchase plugins for x-platform use?

  You might want to consider selling the Macbook and getting a PC notebook that has one of the supported Ray-trace cards. That additional chasis kinda ruins the mobility aspect of a notebook.

  Cheers
  RoRK

  Intensive AE & Mocha Training in Singapore and Malaysia
  Adobe ACE/ACI (version 7) & Imagineer Systems Inc Approved Mocha Trainer

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