-
AMC7 – GPU usage
Hi!
I’m a freelance Photo/videographer, and to date I’ve been using Final Cut Pro on my ageing iMac for video editing.
Cut a long story short, I’ve decided I’m going to switch to using Avid MC7 for my video editing work.
(I’m sick of the mac taking half a day (literally) to do some render jobs and so I’ve decided to make the move over to a PC platform for a variety of reasons; amongst other things, I already use a PC to do my photo jobs and I no longer want to have two computers, and I have no intention of paying for another Adobe license so I can have it on a mac… but moving off mac means I won’t be able to use FCP anymore)Anyway, I’m in the process of putting together a list of parts for my new PC (I’ve built my own before and am comfortable doing that). I’ve got good advice on most of the parts from some colleagues, but I can’t get a straight answer on one part: the GPU. Some of my mates have Quadros, some have consumer cards. Unfortunately everyone has different CPUs, so I can’t directly compare render speeds :/
From reading around these forums and others, I’m now about 99% sure that a GTX consumer card will be ok, but to help me pick one, what I’d really like to know is: does anyone know… exactly what tasks AMC uses the graphics card to assist with?
(basically, if the GPU can be used to assist in video rendering, I’m willing to get an expensive one to speed things up, but if it’s for playback acceleration only, probably a cheaper one will do me just fine. the CPU in the system will almost certainly be one of the newer intel 6-core or 8-cores with plenty of RAM. So I’m not skimping, but neither do I want to spend money unnecessarily.)
In case you’re wondering about my input files (I understand which codec is being used might make a difference regarding Graphics card acceleration…), I do my shooting on a Canon EOS 5D mk II or a Canon EOS C100, depending on the job etc.
thanks…!
-
8 Replies
-
Unfortunately AMC does not use the graphics card as much as it could/should, especially when comparing it to Adobe Premiere Pro CC. There are some effects that leverage GPU processing, but that’s about it.
Michael
-
Ah well. I was always planning on getting a kick-ass CPU anyway, so hopefully that gets the jobs done fast enough.
thanks for the reply 🙂
-
Unfortunately AMC does not use the graphics card as much as it could/should, especially when comparing it to Adobe Premiere Pro CC. There are some effects that leverage GPU processing, but that’s about it.
Michael
But Master Michael, don’t you expect much more GPU usage when we get 4k support? Surely the playback engine will finally be the 64bit GPU goodness we have been waiting for.
OP, Look at the new 980, but you should wait for the 6gb one.
Y’all be cool,
Robert -
My only guess is that should there be a brand new spanking engine with GPU performance that it would have been mentioned (and highlighted) with all the 2k/4K news at IBC. The fact that the workflows were more centered on the new DNxHR kind of tells me, there is no new engine. As with all things, I reserve the right to be wrong. 🙂
Michael
-
[Michael Phillips] “My only guess is that should there be a brand new spanking engine with GPU performance that it would have been mentioned (and highlighted) with all the 2k/4K news at IBC. The fact that the workflows were more centered on the new DNxHR kind of tells me, there is no new engine.”
You make some good points but with all those pixels to move I would suspect a new engine is needed.
Take care,
Robert A. Ober -
I don’t disagree one is needed, just not expecting it any time soon.
Michael
-
thanks for your replies – is much appreciated. I wasn’t really sure what the IBC announcement meant in terms of new software releases (like, thanks for not putting any dates around your announcements, AVID…) but I think it probably means I’m just going to buy the current software and hope that it’s not superseded by something super shiny and new within a week or three…
Here’s hoping that they offer existing users an “upgrade price” on the new software when it comes out.
– I can dream, right?
-
[Theodore Davids] “Here’s hoping that they offer existing users an “upgrade price” on the new software when it comes out.
– I can dream, right?”
Avid doesn’t sell upgrades anymore. If you purchase a new license of Media Composer it comes with a year support contract which gives you all updates and upgrades during that year. So if you buy MC 8.0 tomorrow and the next day they release version 9, you get the upgrade to 9 for free since you’re under support. Then you buy a new support contract every year for $299 to keep getting the upgrades for the next year.
—————-
Michael Hancock
Editor
Reply to this Discussion! Login or Sign Up