Panasonic HMC-150 footage

[John Rofrano]

> I am using an HP DV5 1007 Laptop with 4 GB of RAM, Centrino 2, and Vista 64 bit.

You didn’t say how fast that Centrino 2 is? Vegas is CPU bound and that is the only thing that really matters when editing AVCHD.

> The only other thing I can do is add the other 4 gigs of RAM to it, but I don’t want to waste my money if it won’t improve performance.

More memory will not help.

> I have read on this forum that AVCHD is tough to edit….is this what you are talking about?

Yes.

> If so, what do you suggest? The camera shoots great footage, I’d hate to use it as a paperweight because I can’t edit the footage. 🙂

I’d suggest a desktop with a Quad Core for editing AVCHD.

> Do you think I’d see a marked improvement if I wait for Windows 7 to come out?

No, the OS has nothing to do with it. Vegas is CPU bound and the only thing that will help is a faster multi-core CPU.

> Sorry if I seem lost. I had just gotten very comfortable with DV over the years and now I’m changing formats again with all of the headaches that come with it.

Ahh… DV… life was so much simpler then… DV was DV. Different cameras could play each others tapes. It was a real “standard”. HD is the wild wild west. No two camera brands seem to be able to read each others HDV tapes. No to cameras seem to shoot the same AVCHD specs. It’s a mess! (Good luck)

~jr

http://www.johnrofrano.com
http://www.vasst.com

[Mark Moss]

Hey John…thank you for the great info. I am glad to know that I am not the only person fighting through the HD thing. I found a desktop for a reasonable price, and wanted to get your opinion if I would get better results for editing AVCHD with this machine.
Below are the specs…

Processor – AMD™ Phenom™ X4 9650 Quad Core Processor
Processor Speed – 2.30 GHz, 2MB L2 + 2MB chared L3 Cache
Bus Speed – 3600MT/s System Bus

Memory – 8192MB PC2-6400 DDR2 SDRAM
Video Graphics – Integrated Graphics
Hard Drive – 750GB (7200RPM) Hard Drive (SATA)
Optical Drive – SuperMulti DVD Burner with LightScribe Technology
Card Reader – 15-in-1 Digital Media Card Reader (SD, MMC, RS-MMC, MS, MS Pro/Duo, Pro Duo, SM, xD, mini SD, CF I/II, MD, MMC Mobile, MMC+

Thank you for all of your help

Mark Moss
Mossman Productions

[John Rofrano]

I haven’t kept up with the AMD line but that processor speed seems a little slow to me. Sony recommends 2.8Ghz or better for HD work. I have an Intel 2.66Ghz Quad 2 Extreme and it works well. I would not want a 2.3Ghz cpu. Don’t forget… while the processor has 4 cores, it also needs 4 things to do at the same time in order to be able to take advantage of all of those cores at once. So if you encounter an FX that is “single threaded” it will only use one core and you effectively have a 2.3GHz single core PC at that point.

If I had to build a new PC today, I would use nothing less than the Intel Core i7-920 8MB cache @ 2.66 GHz. These new Core i7’s process video faster than my Quad Extreme at the same speed and I’m guessing a lot faster than an AMD at 2.3Ghz. If you were using HDV I’d say maybe but for AVCHD you want a faster processor.

Also make sure that you buy from a builder that uses industry standard parts so that it’s easy to upgrade later.

~jr

http://www.johnrofrano.com
http://www.vasst.com

[Norman Willis]

Hi John.

>>If I had to build a new PC today, I would use nothing less than the Intel Core i7-920 8MB cache @ 2.66 GHz. These new Core i7’s process video faster than my Quad Extreme at the same speed and I’m guessing a lot faster than an AMD at 2.3Ghz. If you were using HDV I’d say maybe but for AVCHD you want a faster processor.

I am curious to know why you said earlier that more RAM would not help. As comparatively inexpensive as RAM is, don’t we want as much RAM as we can get? And won’t more RAM help the processor complete its tasks (especially easing the load for the swap file)?

Also, in an earlier post you said you were not altogether sure but that the hyperthreading of the Core i7 hyperthreading might not be the cause of some instabilities. Have I misread, or did I perhaps misunderstand you? Or does it seem to you now that hyperthreading and ‘virtual cores’ is not the problem that it once may have seemed?

[John Rofrano]

I said that more RAM will not help the stuttering problem because it’s not being caused by not having enough RAM… it’s being caused by the CPU not being able to process all the bits that make up a frame 30 times per second. So adding more RAM will not help the stuttering. It’s always better to have more, but it’s not the solution in this case.

I have not heard anymore about the hyperthreading issues. It is easy enough to turn off in the BIOS if it causes problems so it’s not a reason not to buy an i7.

~jr

http://www.johnrofrano.com
http://www.vasst.com

[Norman Willis]

Cool. Got it. Thanks.

Norman Willis
http://www.nazareneisrael.org
servant@nazareneisrael.org

[Mark Moss]

Hey John,

Do you think I can take my raw footage from the HMC and render it to something that my computer can handle while not losing quality? I am going to take your suggestion on the new desktop, I just want to see if there is something I can do in the meantime to make editing easier.

Thanks again for all of your help.

Mark Moss
Mossman Productions

[John Rofrano]

> Do you think I can take my raw footage from the HMC and render it to something that my computer can handle while not losing quality?

You can convert the footage to CineForm and that will be easier to edit and will have outstanding quality. CineForm Neo Scene comes with a standalone batch converter.

~jr

http://www.johnrofrano.com
http://www.vasst.com

[Mark Moss]

Thanks John. I am so sorry for all of the questions, but I am really trying to get a grasp on the whole AVC thing. Once I convert to Cineform, will I be able to just edit those in Vegas and output them as usual?

I promise I won’t ask anymore questions…..

Mark Moss
Mossman Productions

[John Rofrano]

> Once I convert to Cineform, will I be able to just edit those in Vegas and output them as usual?

Yes but I would download the trial first and convert a few files and make sure the conversion works and editing in Vegas is smooth. I don’t know how well the Panasonic files work with Neo Scene but Sony AVCHD works great. So please download the trial and test it.

You also might want to look at VASST AVCHD UpShift. This will produce HDV M2T files from AVCHD files. Those may or may not edt smoothly on your PC. Once again, try the demo and see before you buy anything because AVCHD UpShift was created long before the Panasonic format came out so it may or may not work.

> I promise I won’t ask anymore questions…..

Ask all the questions you want. That’s how we learn. 😉

~jr

http://www.johnrofrano.com
http://www.vasst.com