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Help Picking New Computer
I am a private user who is looking to buy a new computer to run After Effects and Photoshop CS2.
I want to use two monitors.
Does anyone have a suggestion as to a good setup capable of running complicated renderings. Beyond the minimum, what do you suggest for all things, processor, graphics card, etc…
And do you have a company that you recommend that will put it all together.
Price must be reasonable, $5000.00 or under.
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6 Replies
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Hello,
Click on my profile by clicking on my username and that’s the system I use. It copes pretty much with many SD ediitngand compositing fine.
LEO BAKER
SYNC FILMS
Web: http://www.syncfilms.com
E-Mail: leo@syncfilms.com -
I suggest something along these lines
Athlon 64 X2 4800+ $900
4x1GB PC3200 DDR RAM $320
ASUS A8N-SLI Motherboard $130
2x300GB 7200RPM HDD’s SATA with 16MB cache run in a RAID array $130 each for 300GB
BFG Tech 7800GT PCI-Express video card $400
Matrox RT.X100 Xtreme Pro $600
Creative Sound Blaster X-Fi Platinum $175
2×23″ Apple Cinema Display $1325 eachthis can handle anything you throw at it…you can go with 2xdell 2405fpw’s for a less costly setup…being that people can get them on sale for $800-900 each.
A newbie AE6.5 user 😉
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I wenbt with Boxx Technologies and have been extremely satisified with them. We teach on Boxx computers at Pratt, used them at Nickelodeon Digital when I was there, and I use one as my primary computer now that I work mostly from home.
You can definately get a powerful machine for under 5K – probably closer to 3K for you rneeds, not including cost of monitors.
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Aharon Rabinowitz
aharon(AT)yahoo(DOT)com
http://www.allbetsareoff.com
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Creative Cow Master Series DVD
particleIllusion Fusion Volume 1
available @ http://www.pIllusionFusion.com -
Thanks I’m gonna check em out.
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I second Aharon’s suggestion for BOXX. They make killer systems for fair prices.
I’d also like to point you toward HP’s workstations, namely the xw8200 (dual Intel Xeon processors), or xw9300 (with dual AMD Opteron 64-bit chips, and dual graphics cards). You can go overboard on price with these babies (I’ve priced out a $14,000 xw9300 system and an $12,000 xw8200 system), but on average, you can get a killer system for around $5-$7K. https://www.hp.com/sbso/busproducts_PCwkstn.html Select “Workstations” in the top-right of the screen.
The biggest thing to consider is power (the most you can afford), speed (the fastest you can afford), price (the most you can get for the cheapest) and “future-proofing” (get the best you can so it will work for you for 3 years and protect your investment). Before buying anything, research the required computer specifications your software needs to run. I don’t know off-hand, but does AE 6.5 and PS CS2 support AMD processors? I know a few years ago, back in my old Premiere 6 and AE 5, PS 6 and Illustrator 9 days they didn’t. A LOT could have changed since then. Ensure that the money you’re spending on this computer is for the right components. AMD chips are getting better and better, but AMD is still missing a large number of what I consider to be crucial instruction sets that Intel has, and they’ve made no indication that they have any intentions of adding them any time soon.
With that in mind, I recommend:
* the fastest Intel processor you can get, preferrably dual-Xeon’s and NO slower than a P4 3.2 ghz (AMD dual-core’s if supported and you can afford it)
* if going with dual-core 64-bit chips and your software supports it, Windows XP Professional 64-bit Edition
* the most RAM you can afford, NO less than 1 GB, preferrably 2 gigs (more than that 2 and you’ll have to make some tweaks to Windows to see that extra gig, more than 3 gigs and you’re wasting your money because Windows doesn’t utilize it properly — this will be fixed with Windows Vista when released Christmas, 2006). Get the fastest RAM you can, and ensure it’s the RAM your system takes. If your motherboard takes DDR2 RAM, that’s perfect.
* the fastest graphics card you can get. If you can get PCI-E, that’s the best right now. I strongly encourage you to avoid the GeForce-line of cards (like the card you mentioned), as it’s a “gamer card” and not designed for professional applications, like you want. I’d recommend you look into Nvidia’s professional Quadro-series of graphics cards. Depending on how much you have to spend, look into the low-end QuadroFX 540 (around $200-$300), the QuadroFX 1400 (around $600), or the higher-end QuadroFX 3400 (around $1200). You will be glad you spent the money on a pro-card, vs. a gamer card…especially if you stray into 3D animation software, like Maya, 3DS Max, etc., or when doing high-quality, high-layered complex animations (and especially with uncompressed SD or HD(V) footage).
* the fastest and biggest hard drives you can get. Get 2 of them, one for a system drive (such as C: for Windows and software applications), and one for your media. IDE or SATA will work fine for a system drive (and an 80-120 gig drive will be fine for that), but for a second media drive, get the biggest and fastest drive(s) you can get. I would look no lower than SATA for this, or SCSI if you can afford it, though SCSI is SEVERELY over-priced. A 300-400 gig SATA drive will set you back a few hundred at best. If you can swing it, consider getting 2 drives (of the same type and size, say 2 Hitachi 400 gig SATA’s) and RAID them together for twice the speed, enabling you to work with uncompressed video and HDV. Most motherboards now have on-board RAID–even “lower-end” P4 boards, at prices under $200. If for some reason your mobo doesn’t have RAID, you can get a RAID controller card and be set.
* a SIIG or ADS Pyro firewire card. You’ll need a means to get video into and out of your system and this is it. Even if you’ll be getting all your footage predigitized (on DVD or an external hard drive), you’ll still be better off getting a firewire card, since they’re cheap and you’re providing the means to capture if you need. Plus, with discreet adding firewire capture/output support into combustion 3 and 4, I wouldn’t be surprised if Adobe followed suit with the next version of AE…I know it’s a feature users have been begging for for several years now.
There are other hardware cards I recommend you look into. Matrox Parhelia is a powerful card that offers WYSIWYG (What You See Is What You Get) display and hardware acceleration of AE and (I believe) PS. You can use this card to view your compositions on an external monitor to check for color-balance, flaws, etc. If you’re designing for broadcast, or frankly anything other than home movies, an external monitor and the ability to use it with your software is CRUCIAL. Blackmagic Designs makes the Decklink-series of cards, which double as high-end capture cards and hardware-enhancing cards (kind of like a graphics card, but a little different) that support PS and AE. They’re not cheap, but are excellent cards that will also allow you to monitor your footage externally on a broadcast monitor.
That’s enough to get you started, hopefully without making your head spin. If you have this system built, go through a video vendor who knows what they’re doing (like BOXX, ProMAX, etc.). That way, your system will be specially configured to work properly, will come with a warranty and technical support, and will be easier to troubleshoot in the event you do run into problems. Follow the vendor’s recommendations and you should be set for the next couple of years.
Good luck.
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hmmm… I feel outnumbered here… Dual 2.7 gig G% with two 30″ cinema displays 🙂 Then once you buy it, can you adopt me? 🙂
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