[Jeffrey Henigson]

I’m glad you asked, because I was talking about 32-bit processors. The newer Macbook Pros have (or offer) 64 bit processors, but that won’t matter with FCP 7, since it’s written for 32-bit and Apple is not going to change that. You’d have to “upgrade” to FCP X. If you do that, you’ll probably spend even more of your time on Creative Cow!

[Jeffrey Henigson]

You’re welcome, Dammes. A memory upgrade definitely can’t hurt, but the problem is more likely rooted in the inherent limits of a 32-bit system. If you could (and you can’t) install 32GB of RAM into your computer, your OS could still only allot 4GB to FCP, and FCP’s basic operations would consume 1.5GB of that, leaving 2.5GB for operations like log and transfer.

So go ahead and upgrade your memory, because going from 4GB to 8GB will only set you back $35 (if you do it by yourself), but also look at tools that would allow you to break your very large file into smaller files, which your OS would be able to process without bumping up against the memory ceiling (and crashing to the floor).

[Jeffrey Henigson]

In the log and transfer process, you’re most likely exceeding the maximum memory allocable to a single program (which is 4GB in a 32-bit OS like Apple OSX). In other words, the most memory your operating system can give to Final Cut is 4GB. And Final Cut, before doing anything like log and transfer, uses 1.5GB of that memory. You’re left with 2.5GB of memory, and crunching your single 60GB file probably wants more than 2.5GB. The very bad news is that there’s nothing you can do about it in FCP 7. You can most likely find a utility to break your 60GB file into smaller files that can then be pulled into FCP.

Here are two discussions on this topic on the support and discussions sections of the Apple site:

https://support.apple.com/kb/TA27734?viewlocale=en_US

https://discussions.apple.com/thread/3111099?start=0&tstart=0

Good luck.