AE CS4 on Windows XP x64

[Todd Kopriva]

I am happily using 64-bit Windows Vista (though I’m typing this on my Mac). After Effects CS4 is not officially supported on 64-bit Windows XP.

Some people who know more than I do about this kind of thing have suggested that the upgrade path to Windows 7 will be less painful from Vista.

None of this is a recommendation one way or the other. I’m just giving you a few facts and thoughts.

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Todd Kopriva, Adobe Systems Incorporated
putting the ‘T’ back in ‘RTFM’ : After Effects Help on the Web
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[Lance Fallon]

It sounds like going with Vista 64 over XP64 might be a bit safer… It’ll probably be supported longer as well.

[Joseph W. bourke]

Here’s my two cents (only worth one cent these days). I just had a system configured around an Intel motherboard (core 2 extreme), running CS4 on Vista 64. No scientific study here, but a project, which I rendered on Windows XP Pro on a 3.0GHz single processor with 4MB of RAM, went like this:

It took one hour and fifty-four minutes to render a project (lots of layers, several effects) on the XP box. The identical project took seven minutes to render on the dual quad machine with Vista 64 bit. Needless to say, I was astounded!

As I say, this is nothing scientific – no benchmarks here – and no desire other than to increase my speed of workflow and efficiency, which this new box has done in spades!

Joe Bourke
Creative Director / B&S Exhibits and Multimedia

[Scott Roberts]

Wow, Joe! That’s quite a difference in speed! What are the specs on your XP box?

I’ve been thinking about 64 bit, but not a lot of people I know are utilizing it. On my Mac at work – which is 64 bit, AE seems to feel about the same speed as my XP 32-bit machine at home.

[Joseph W. bourke]

Hi Scott –

Yeah, I was pretty shocked at the difference in render times – as I said this was not scientific, but it WAS done with identical projects in which I had collected all the files, so the playing field seemed even to me.

My new system, which I had configured by a local shop here in NH, for about 1600 bucks, consists of this:

Intel Motherboard – DP45SG – this has an ESATA connector for a RAID
Quad Core2 Q9550, 2.83GHz, 1333MHz, L2 12M
8GB of PC3-10600 CL9 DDR3 240p DIMM RAM
GEForce GTX 260 – EVGA graphics card
2 – 500GB Seagate SATA2 7200rpm hard disks – one for OS, one for Applications
2 – 750GB 7200rpm 32mb SATA2 hard drives – for media files – this is NOT striped – at some point I will probably add a RAID array for doing HD – I haven’t tried editing true HD on this pup yet
600watt silent fan power supply – this thing is really quiet – I can probably do audio recording in the same room with this running.
Case – X-Cruiser Black system chassis – this is a gamer case with plenty of room for expansion.

That’s about it, other than that it’s running Vista Business 64-bit. I was originally going to go with XP Pro 64-bit, but I think the upgrade path to Win7 will be smoother, plus Adobe recommends Vista 64 for the CS4 production bundle, and so far, I can see why. This thing screams! I just loaded 40 minutes of cloud footage I shot yesterday in 1080i; it loaded fine in .mts (Canon native format) format into AE, and I was able to speed it up 2000 times, giving me a really nice, smooth time-lapse effect, without the usual light stutter you get when you use the intervalometer setting on a camera. It will render about one and a half minutes or better to RAM with the current 8MB of RAM.

Hope this helps.

Joe Bourke
B&S Exhibits and Multimedia