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Graphics Card
The hard drive on my old computer is dying. Need to get a new machine. Probably going with a Dell Inspiron Intel Core i5 8GB DDR3 1TB HDD, on sale for $520. Instead of a graphics card, it uses Intel HD Graphics 2500, which I believe is built into the i5 chip. Question: will I still be able to edit in Vegas 12?
There is a much more expensive version with a NVIDIA GeForce GT 620 graphics card.
Another more expensive option is another Dell with AMD Radeon HD 7570 1GB GDDR5 graphics card. And a different brand (Cyberpower) with an AMD Radeon HD 7770 1GB.
These days I do very little video editing, but don’t want to be shut down. Anyone able to tell me how bad off I’ll be with the cheaper Dell alternative?
Rick Wise
Cinematographer
San Francisco Bay Area
https://www.RickWiseDP.com -
6 Replies
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[Rick Wise] “Anyone able to tell me how bad off I’ll be with the cheaper Dell alternative?”
According to Intel’s web site, content creators should be using a Core i7. A Core i5 will not be as good at editing HD in Vegas Pro as a Core i7 would and I say that from personal experience.
Also, personally I would never purchase another Dell after my experience with them so I wouldn’t recommend Dell either. Get an HP if you must get a PC or get a Mac (unless you like Windows 8).
~jr
http://www.johnrofrano.com
http://www.vasst.com -
We have four Dell laptops here and never a problem with them. Don’t know about Dell desktop PC’s since I always build mine.
Steve Mann
MannMade Digital Video
http://www.mmdv.com -
My opinion: integrated graphics (where the GPU is built into the CPU) is strictly for basic computing use. It’s fine for my retired mother who just uses her computer to read cooking websites and read e-mails. Serious computer users should have a dedicated graphics card. Even a $90 graphics card will be better than integrated graphics.
If you really like the i5 Dell (personally, I wouldn’t buy it), you could always install an aftermarket nVidia or Radeon graphics card (and disable the integrated GPU in the system BIOS).
Dave
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I’d personally avoid the Dell. I don’t buy off-the-shelf desktops, but there were a number of Dell’s at my previous day job, and I don’t recall a single one of them not having problems. Not a super significant example, but good enough for me to look elsewhere.
You certainly can edit on a system with integrated graphics. That editing with be slower than editing on a system with dedicated graphics. The problem is, a dedicated graphics chip is sharing memory with the main CPU. It has to fetch that 2-megapixels or so every 1/60th of a second just to display video. So there’s going to be memory bus contention with the CPU, and the GPU always wins. Move to a GPU with dedicated memory — pretty much any GPU with dedicated memory, and you’ll go faster. Some very new system architectures are eliminating most of this contention (moving the CPU to a GPU memory bus, caching graphics memory, etc) but that’s not moving to mainstream PCs yet.
Now, to the specifics. The nVidia GeForce GT620 is a very low-end graphics card… they run under $50 at NewEgg. Now, low-end these days means 96 GPU cores… that’s enough to accelerate AVC playback on the desktop (my old laptop had something like 32 cores and could play back video not even possible to play on the CPU alone). This isn’t enough of a GPU to use for GPU acceleration in Vegas, far as I know, but it’s also pretty low-power. But power is a concern here… what does the basic PC ship with, PSU-wise. Sometimes bundling a graphics card also gets you a better power supply… that may be part of what you’re paying for. I’d recommend at least a 300-350W supply before adding on that level of GPU.
The HD7570 is a bit of an upgrade; these usually run around $100 stand-alone. The GPU is a little bit faster, nothing most people would notice, a percent or two here and there… GPU Boss says “too close to call”. These run a little cooler (lower power) than the nVidia, and usually ship with 1GB video ram, rather than 512MB on most GT620 boards.
The HD7770 is the best of the lot, about $120 stand-alone. Maybe 20-25% faster on most benchmarks than either of the others, and lower power than the nVidia. Also usually comes with 1GB memory.
You can technically do GPU computing on any of these, but I doubt any of them are powerful enough to help out your CPU… much that’s based as well on how slow the CPU is. The i5 is a decent enough mid-range CPU for general computing these days, not something you’d choose, however, for a media PC. Then again, the PC you can afford today gets you much more work done than the one you won’t have until next year.
-Dave
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Thank you, everyone who chimed in here, and especially Dave for his detailed reply. I am stuck with the Dell for now — a money issue. It went on sale at a steep discount, so I grabbed it. (No longer so cheap.) For now I’ll have to make do with the bare bones, which are significantly better than no bones at all. Dave’s last line is so to the point!
Rick Wise
Cinematographer
San Francisco Bay Area
https://www.RickWiseDP.com
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