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Activity › Forums › Adobe After Effects › Can’t preview in realtime, however…

  • Can’t preview in realtime, however…

    Posted by Janne Hallenberg on January 15, 2008 at 7:21 am

    Hiya,

    I’m having a problem. I’ve built a new machine for a friend, but when previewing any movie (by hitting the spacebar)
    without adding any effects or anything, I get around 18 fps and AE telling me that its NOT realtime.

    However when doing this on MY machine, with the exact same release of AE and the same movieclip, I can preview it in realtime, or at least very close to realtime.

    And check this out, if you’re watching:
    – My machine: E6300 (dualcore, overclocked to 2,6ghz), 2gb RAM, cheap 7300GT, XP32, just a regular 7200rpm harddrive.
    – His machine: Q6600 (quadcore, at stock speed), 4gb RAM, 8800GT 512MB, XP32/XP64 (tried both, same results), 10000rpm Raptor.

    FWIW: He has a Gigabyte P35-DS4 motherboard.

    And, alright, his cpu is running at 2,4ghz, but still? While the movie previews in ~29fps on mine, his is ~18fps. Quite a difference for 0,2ghz, dont you think? If that is what matters…

    I’ve tried to disable all speedstep/EIST/whatever but to no avail. I’ve updated the AE3. I’ve been fiddling with all possible options in AE3 I can think of (however, knowing nothing
    about AE3, I might’ve missed something). I’m running out of options here, and he’s getting more and more disappointed in his purchase hehehe. I’m going to replace the cpu heatsink
    with a bigger one, and overclock it to maybe 3ghz for him, but I doubt it will help.

    I know I can preview in realtime by pressing NUM-0, but why is this difference? I just don’t get it.

    Please, any help would be appreciated. Thank you.

    Steve Roberts replied 18 years, 8 months ago 2 Members · 1 Reply
  • 1 Reply
  • Steve Roberts

    January 15, 2008 at 2:33 pm

    Initially, AE could only preview at full frame rate if you actually rendered a test video. The spacebar preview was a poor substitute. Then RAM preview became available, but spacebar previews were still a poor substitute. However, with no effects applied, and using today’s processors, the faster hard drive begins to come into play, apparently allowing faster spacebar previews as AE accesses frames on the drive and does just a little bit of rendering.

    If you can get fast previews by hitting the spacebar, count yourself lucky. In your case, it’s probably the faster hard drive.

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