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Using DeckLink HD Extreme™ video card & NVIDIA GeForce 8800 GT 512MB?
Thankyou for your attenction.
3 questions, they could sound ingenuous, I will learn a lot from your answers.I will buy a DeckLink HD Extreme™ video card for a Mac Pro I’m going to buy. I will use it for video editing with fcp and motion graphic. I need understand this Thing, please.
Here the probable mac configuration:
– Two 2.8GHz Quad-Core Intel Xeon
– Mac Pro RAID card
– 4 SAS internal hard disks 300GB 15,000-rpm
– probabily 32GB RAM.The Thing:
Do I really need to mount one of the other graphic card talked about on the apple store web site (for example to connect the Mac Pro to the two computer monitors)? In case of a “yes” answer I would chose the: NVIDIA GeForce 8800 GT 512MB card. Any contraindication?
Now, a second question: between “DeckLink HD Extreme”, “DeckLink HD Pro PCIe”, “DeckLink HD Pro PCI-X”, the correct and more elastic one (considering I coul work with analog and digital input, but not over the DVC PRO HD standard, I understand it is the “DeckLink HD Extreme”, isn’t it?
And, finally, the third question. Realted but not so strictly related with the matter. So, if you thing I’m going out of the path, feel free to answer only to the first two questions.
On this machine I will mount 4 SAS Mac Pro internal hard disks 300GB (15,000-rpm). Do you think this confguration could be enough to work with DeckLink HD Extreme™ video card to process an uncompressed SD video signal (considering I would use one disk for the OS and the other 3 for this job)? I can not spend too much for an external disk array system. And, if “yes”, what raid configuration can you suggest me?
Thankyou very much for the time you spended here for me.
Best things.Stefano Bianchi
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5 Replies
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Hi Stefano
To me it seems like the Decklink Hd Extreme will offer you the best connectivity for what it is you need to achieve. It will offer you SDI, HD component and HDMI, as well as composite and SVideo input and output.
With the HD Pro cards you will only get SDI in, and component monitoring out. You would only need one of these cards if you wish to use Dual link SDI!
The standard Mac Pro 8 core, that comes with an ATI Radeon 2600 can support 2 x DVI monitors, so you already have the ability to have 2 desktops with your standard Mac Pro. You could also then use the extended desktop feature of your Decklink HD Extreme, to provide a 3rd desktop to a HD screen like an LCD TV.
The standard card should have no trouble working with SD and HD footage, although please remember that the Decklink card is not a graphical processor, so desktop previews of footage and effects etc are all rendered by the host machine.
For you disk requirements, at standard def you can get away with using just one drive for your footage. If you want to play it really safe, you could use 2 in an internal RAID 0.
If you are planning to move to HD, you will need an array that can cope with the data rate of your footage. You can measure the speed of your disks using Blackmagic Disk Speed test, available when you install our drivers.
Generally speaking, a 3 drive internal RAID 0 will perform well for uncompressed SD, and compressed HD formats like Apple Pro Res. You may also be able to do uncompressed 8 bit HD, depending on the speed of your array. For high end HD video I would strongly recommend an external RAID array and hardware RAID controller.
I hope I have answered your questions well, please feel free to respond for any further information.
Callum McLay
Technical Support Consultant
Blackmagic Design EMEA -
Thankyou for you very accurate answer.
Probabily the ATI Radeon 2600 + DeckLink HD Extreme™ is the best solution for my needs.Best Reguards,
Stefano -
Hi Callum,
do you know incompatibility beetween DeckLink HD Extreme™ video card and Radeon HD 3870 Mac graphic card? It could be a stronger alternative to ATI Radeon 2600.
What do you think?Thanks a lot for your time.
Stefano -
Hi Stefano
I’m afraid I am not aware of anyone using this card at the moment, so I could not accurately say whether it would or would not work, having not tested it myself.
I don’t see any reason why it would not work, and I’ve never had anyone call me up to say it does not work. It most likely uses the same driver, just a bit more power in the card!
Perhaps someone else in the community is using this configuration?
Callum McLay
Technical Support Consultant
Blackmagic Design EMEA -
Thank you Callum,
very kind from you answering again.All the best!
Stefano
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