[Giuseppe Mangione]

I use FCP with a Macbook Pro 17” with 2GB of RAM, 256 MB of VRAM and several hard drives via FW 800. Editing codec: Sony XDCAM EX.

I mostly worked in short video up to 10 minute in full HD 1080. I only see the system slowing down at the end of a project when I had to fill up the timeline with a text layer for subtitling (especially after the 5th minute of the timeline, everything become pretty slow ). With no subtitling, the system works pretty well.

I do some color correction and filters. This takes time, but manageable.
A big issue is when you have to export and convert in H264… It’s really time consuming.

I never had problems with firewire hard drive, so I really don’t think you need e-sata system.

My conclusion: for editing with a Macbook Pro only you have to organize very well your workflow with breaks for rendering and nights for exporting H264 files. But it works for me, and I’m mobile!

For audio mixing I export an OMF file and I do it in Pro tools LE.

Here come my questions…

In the near future I have to do a bigger project up to 1/2 hour (EX 1080, with subtitling). And I want to upgrade my system.

Of course I would like to go for a desktop, but because I travel a lot between Italy and U.S. I’d prefer to stay with a mobile studio.

Do you think the new Macbook pro 17” with 4GB ram 512 VRAM etc… will work fine for this project?
Have you ever had this experience of 1/2 hour?

What’s the best solution for using a monitor with a Macbook Pro?
1 – to use external monitor connected via PCI Express card with a Matrox MXO2 LE or something similar.
2 – use another PC monitor connected to the laptop.
3 – have both… the PC monitor as extra editing monitor, and the external monitor to view the video.

Has anyone tried in a Macbook Pro the Matrox MXO2 LE or the Matrox MXO2 mini with max technology for exporting H294?
Any advise?

ciao
beppe

[Giuseppe Mangione]

I’m having the same problem.
Thank you for your temporary solution. It worked also for me.

did you find a better solution?

[Giuseppe Mangione]

I checked the calibratedsoftware website, but it seems that the codec works only on intel computer not on the Power PC G4.

I can see the video with VLC, not so smooth and I don’t have the timecode
I believe it’s a hardware limitation of the computer I want to use.

I’ll find another solution.

thank you.

[Giuseppe Mangione]

The timeline is a DV PAL, and I exported on the same format.
Then the file needs to be played in a PC laptop. But I don’t know the characteristic of this laptop.
It could be something that as to do with the codec? And that the computer cannot handle it?

[Giuseppe Mangione]

I have a quicktime video in h.294 video format and ACC audio, and I want to substitute the audio only.
The video master with the correct audio, is on HDV, and if I export again from the master, it will take a long time.

I tried to import the h.294 video in final cut, create a new sequence, change the audio. But Final cut works only with uncompressed audio. And If I export the sequence without changing format, FCP does it quickly but I have the audio uncompressed!