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Understanding FCPX under the hood.
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[Jeremy Garchow] ” I don’t know what the hell I’m doing, but I would assume I am not alone in that department.”
That’s fair enough – it’s like any complex technical thing the first time (like editing).
Unless you are needing the very fastest machinery – the Ferrari of computers – you don’t need to trip through all that stuff in your post. If you’re not running a render farm but just doing editing and some graphics, you just want straightforward stuff.
Processor – at the top end, there’s mega expensive stuff that Apple like to put in workstations, usually branded Xeon. You don’t need them, just the current “sweet spot” Core something. At the time of writing, it’s the Core i5-3570K . You can pay much more or much less, but that will do the job. It will come with a heatsink.
Next, a motherboard to carry it. It’s a socket LGA1155, so you’ll need one with that socket. Dabs, here in the UK, have 105 to choose from, but you can narrow that down with their selector system. You want the latest chipset – Z77 (down to 49). You want separate graphics (45). You want the full size ATX motherboard (30). Now it’s down to brands, and what options you want. Some will take more memory than others, some will have more SATA connectors, etc etc. For your first time, pick a major brand – Asus or Gigabyte maybe. Arbitrarily picking Asus (I’ve used lots of both makes) I’m down to 19. At this point one has to start doing a bit more research on what each board has on it, and a trip to the Asus website tells all. I’m picking the one I picked earlier – P8Z77-V PRO – although the price cut probably means it’s about to be superceded. Dabs had five makers boards to choose from, and all are generally reliable, so if you have particular needs with inputs and outputs, you can generally find something.
Memory. Go for lots, as it’s cheap at the moment. As it’s a commodity, like pork belly futures, the prices go up and down. Kingston and Crucial are the big manufacturers, and both have systems to select which memory you want for your motherboard. Crucial tells me that I can have 32Gb for my motherboard on part No BLS4C8G3D1609ES2LX0BEU which I can buy from them, or dabs, or someone else. I might not want 32Gb, but I can check around for smaller.
Graphics card. Again, you probably want the current “sweet spot”. You don’t need all that expensive Quadro stuff unless you’re doing 3DsMax or CAD. Editing doesn’t need it. So maybe a GTX660.
After that, it’s just drives and boxes. I highly recommend an SSD as boot drive.
Bernie
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[Jeremy Garchow] “Too bad it will be a “lowly” i7 that constantly gets berated around here for not being quite pro enough. And it will have the absolutely shameful thunderbolt that isn’t going to add any flexibility or capability at all to anything in the pro video space. Oh, the humanity.”
I assume this is said with at least a little wink.
I’m one of the biggest sizzle core/PCIe slot cheerleaders around here, but I also recognize that a Thunderbolt-equipped i7 is a very nice machine — especially for editorial.
There are adjacent spaces, though, where Xeons and faster I/O are worthwhile.
I’m glad we can use Core i7 and Thunderbolt where appropriate, but I’d find it limiting if they were our only options.
Walter Soyka
Principal & Designer at Keen Live
Motion Graphics, Widescreen Events, Presentation Design, and Consulting
RenderBreak Blog – What I’m thinking when my workstation’s thinking
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wow! This got derailed quick! Not in a bad way though. I’ve enjoyed reading all your posts, but I just wanted to learn how FCPX processes imports, renders and exports. If I know what FCPX needs to “eat” in order to do that faster, than I know what to get more of for my computer build. I know the program LOVES lots of RAM and LOVES eating up CPU processing, so I think those are the areas to focus on getting lots of if I go FCPX.
At work we have stand alone iMacs with ONE 3.4 GHz processor with 4 cores. 8 GB of RAM memory. THe GPU escapes me but I believe it is a Radeon HD 6970 with 1GB of on board memory. I had no say whatsoever in which build we got. So I just have to work with what I’ve got. I will say that lately, I’ve be getting a lot of spinning beach balls when in FCPX. Usually so the program can just write the waveform. I wonder if the lag in performance is related to how large to project file or “event” file gets…
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[Walter Soyka] “I assume this is said with at least a little wink.”
A big one.
It is odd to me that we always talk about PC vs Mac in this forum, how much cheaper, how much faster etc etc.
My point here, is that when you start to really look at it, they aren’t that much different in cost and parts.
And what is all of a sudden good enough for a PC (“screaming”, “fast”, etc etc), sucks on a Mac.
I understand you can swap a GPU, but that’s really about all you can’t do with an iMac provided you are OK with an external Thunderbolt chassis or two.
I am trying to point out these inconsistencies in the vernacular.
Everyone, so far, that we’ve talked to and mentioned here that is building a PC is building an iMac tower. The newegg comment was a Xeon based motherboard, that one not withstanding.
And all of a sudden, it’s pro enough.
Jeremy
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[Bernard Newnham] “Unless you are needing the very fastest machinery – the Ferrari of computers – you don’t need to trip through all that stuff in your post. “
So you are telling me I don’t need any of that?
Sorry, Bernhard, you are losing me.
Everything you just mentioned is pretty much what I listed.
[Bernard Newnham] “Processor”
[Bernard Newnham] “motherboard”
[Bernard Newnham] “Memory.”
[Bernard Newnham] “Graphics card. “
[Bernard Newnham] “drives and boxes”
So, I do in fact need to “trip up” on everything you just mentioned.
While I have no idea what exact components are best, I do know what goes inside of a computer.
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[Jeremy Garchow] “So, I do in fact need to “trip up” on everything you just mentioned.
While I have no idea what exact components are best, I do know what goes inside of a computer.”
You quoted a load of stuff –
“…an overclocked and watercooled SR-2 will cost you half the price and operate at nearly the same speed as the SR-X when rendering 3D…..”
etc, etc, and then implied you were confused.
So was I.
It’s badly written material, and it’s all about stuff that people who are just doing editing don’t need. I was suggesting some standard components rather than this week’s very fastest and most expensive.
Just trying to be helpful.
Bernie
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That was a quote from a comment on a computer part store.
He’s a guy, running a VFX business, and building a machine.
My point is, you can’t just pick what you want, it’s not as easy as “just change it”.
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[Jeremy Garchow] “That was a quote from a comment on a computer part store.
He’s a guy, running a VFX business, and building a machine.
My point is, you can’t just pick what you want, it’s not as easy as “just change it”.
“I think you misunderstand. That was a guy building a super hot rod and looking at his options. Everything he was testing was for speed vs. cost, not whether something functions or not. Basically, he was trying to decide if an over-clocked i7 was competitive for his needs or whether he needed to shell out for dual Zeons. He was sharing his findings like we do here. It may seem foreign or over-complicated to you, but it really isn’t any different for him than it is for us arguing about what camera or NLE is best. You don’t HAVE to be that in to it to roll your own, but it can be a whole lot of fun if you are. One of the things I really miss living on planet Mac are all of the options.
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[Chris Harlan] “Basically, he was trying to decide if an over-clocked i7 was competitive for his needs or whether he needed to shell out for dual Zeons”
I always wonder why people bother with that stuff – I it think might be “gear porn” stuff that gives them a thrill.
Getting the very fastest machine at any point in time might be good hobby, but it isn’t good business. Those processors they were talking about cost more even than an iMac, and give a few percentage points of speed gain. Add on water cooling – a slightly dangerous option – and you’ve spent a very large amount of money. Then a few months later AMD or Intel come out with some basic chip that’s much faster at a tenth of the price.
For the price they were spending they could have built a good few ordinary machines and used them as a render farm, then passed them on for office use when they got slower that whatever came next.
Bernie
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[Chris Harlan] “I think you misunderstand. “
With all due respect, I think I get it.
What is happeing here, and what I am trying to point out, are the inconsistencies.
There has been much blood spilled over the “death of the MacPro” and of course, some are scrambling, some are waiting, some have moved to the i7 platform, some have moved to the Xeon PC platform.
What I find ironic about this whole situation is that all of a sudden, on the PC side, i7s are good enough and as a matter of fact are “recommended”, yet on the Mac side, they aren’t.
I point out a guy trying to build a MacPro (Xeon) equivalent, and it gets called a “Ferrari”.
By my shitty deductive reasoning, a MacPro = Ferrari, but it is a travesty that we are still driving the 3 year old model. The Ferrari in PC land is too fussy and I shouldn’t bother with it.
[Chris Harlan] “It may seem foreign or over-complicated to you, but it really isn’t any different for him than it is for us arguing about what camera or NLE is best.”
Except for the simple fact that I don’t build our cameras or program our NLEs.
DIY has been made to seem simple, and maybe it is. But if you look closely at the fine print “just change it” is a loaded comment.
Even the DIY videoguys blog says they found out from a reader that the current recommended motherboard, for $50 more, is worth the added stability. Added stability? I have to pay more for that? What if I “just changed it” to the shittier board without me knowing that it’s less stable? Who do I call about that? Who’s accountable?
And what if 2-3 years down the road when I’m ready to “just change” something, are the parts going to be available?
I’d rather pay a few extra bucks and get a system that’s tested and built. And if it doesn’t work and there’s a recall, I can make a phone call to get a new one.
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