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Top CS4 Machine
I am about to have a killer CS4 machine built but have a few questions. I was hoping to have them answered at Siggraph, but that was a bust (Adobe wasn’t even there).
My goal is the ABSOLUTE MOST realtime layers of video with 3D DVE, animations and 32-bit graphic overlays. The system will be 64-bit Vista.
I am not doing uncompressed work. I work in DV formats and plan on working with EX1 & P2 type devices in the future with formats like DVCProHD etc…
Though HD is important and I want a killer system for that type of work, I’m also looking for a massive increase in realtime layers for my SD work.
It has been my experience with Velocity, that VelocityHD gave me similar numbers of realtime layers in HD that Velicity did in SD, but when you define an SD project in VelicityHD, you get a huge amount of realtime layers. I’m hoping whatever killer HD system is built, I’ll have a mind-blowing number of layers when working in SD (I have engineering clients that give me projects where the extra SD layers would be a big help).
The system performance needs to be such that running Directlink mode with After Effects and Encore etc… are snappy and capable of working with large datasets. I may also want to run Combustion or Toxik on it.
The explosion of GPU processing has complicated the issue…for the better I’m sure.
The best motherboard, CPU’s, memory, bus speeds obviously make for a more capable system. I was under the impression that Matrox AXIO turbocharged the Premier world similar to how my current dps Velocity system is enhanced with dedicated hardware. But can AXIO go 64-bit? Or does 8-core, 64-bit Vista with the right graphics card(s) generate the best system achievable?
Matrox’s CompressionHD card to accelerate encoding for Encore seems like a good thing to have. Time is money. Or does it also not live in 64-bits, and/or does a better solution exist in the GPU?
Raid is everything of course. What is the configuration and data rate that tops the realtime layering capability? I assume there is an upper limit whereby any faster throughput would not give me any more capabilities as other factors come into play.
Any feedback is appreciated. Thanks.
Buck Wyckoff
Buckward Digital Services, Inc. -
2 Replies
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Axio LE is your best bet. It offers real time effects and accelerated rendering and export, along with comprehensive I/O, and nice value added features like input metering and HDV capture window support. Plus, it adds a very nice broadcast quality compressed codec set (I-Frame MPEG) to Premiere.
Go for dual quad core Xeons, an AMD Radeon X-4890 graphics card, and an 8-bay SAS RAID-5 enclosure like the EnhanceTech RS8-SS with SATA drives (700 MB/s) with an LSI HBA. Also 64-bit Vista, and 12 GB RAM. (To be safe, make sure your MOBO or workstation is on the Matrox approved list).
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Thanks for the input.
I think I have it worked out now.
Cheers!
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