[Joseph Moore]

With the current FCP apps an 8-core Intel machine will runs circles around a G5 system and have time to do a happy dance at the end. The difference in Compressor is the most extreme.

PS. Repairing permissions isn’t related to defragging at all. OSX does a certain amount of defragging on it’s own, but you need a software like TechTools or iDefrag to take full control of fragmentation.

[Joseph Moore]

Slightly off topic, but the two things I recently added to my new system that I simply love are:

1) The Contour Shuttle Pro. At only $100 there is no reason to not have a real/jog shuttle. Plus you get to put your most common tasks on buttons right next to it.

2) KB Covers FCP sleeve for the aluminum keyboard. Used to be, I would immediately trash whatever keyboard came with a Mac, but for editing it’s not so much typing as it is punching buttons, and having the color labeled keys is so nice.

Between these two items, I hardly touch my mouse! 😉

[Joseph Moore]

Finishing up a two hour long concert (with four cameras, so that’s 8 hours of multiclip footage) with no hitches. ProRes 1080p.

[Joseph Moore]

What he said. 😉 I’d edit the piece on a normal PAL sized timeline, then export the finished cut and bring it into a new sequence of the smaller size. Then use the motion tab to position it however you want. If you keep the scale @ 100% (or less) you won’t have any quality issues.

[Joseph Moore]

Alas, it’s doubtful that bumping .2 GHz on my processors will give any meaningful performance benefit.

Aren’t several of the included filters, and more and more 3rd party filters GPU enabled?

PS. Shane, I enjoy your blog. As a fulltime creative director, and only part-time editor, blogs are a great way to keep up with the state of affairs. Keep up the good work.

[Joseph Moore]

Thanks, Kevin. I understand the settings that let FCP bail to a lower preview quality in order to avoid rendering … what I’m looking for are the hardware improvements I can make to avoid doing so more of the time.

[Joseph Moore]

Carsten,
For example, today I’m editing a live concert. It’s a four camera multiclip edit. Each of the angles has the 3 way cc filter on it, and that’s it. If I add a simple cross dissolve between cuts, I get a red line.

[Joseph Moore]

Russ,
I’ve got it set on dynamic, I think. Still, I’m getting red bars with very little effort.

I’m only using Disk Utility’s software RAID capabilities … I wonder if getting a hardware RAID card would offload a meaningful amount of work from the CPU’s? Somehow I doubt it, because my processors don’t seem to be max’ing out no matter what I throw at it.

[Joseph Moore]

Thanks, Shane. I don’t have ready access to an older MacPro to flash it, so I’m wondering if the x1900XT is on option for me? I thought maybe I had heard rumblings that there is a newer version that works with the early 2008 models, but I can’t seem to verify this.

[Joseph Moore]

Ken Stone has a decent primer. That’s what got me started, and I’m 3/4 done with a four camera edit. I’m amazed that everything’s working as advertised. (Knock on wood.)