Computer spec for high def editing

[Sue Whitham]

Further to my earlier post re HD capture & edit, I've decided to invest in a new PC to dedicate to HD editing, as my Celeron D processor is simply not up to the job.
Taking on board the helpful suggestions from fellow forum members, i am considering purchasing the following;

HP Pavilion M9065
2.4GHz Intel core 2 Quad Q6600
512 MB Dedicated Graphics (nVidia GeForce 8500 GT)
3GB RAM
DVD RW DL
500 GB Hard Drive
350 GB Pesonal Media Drive

My camcorder is JVC GZ-HD7E/EK Everio 60 GB Hard drive

Will the above spec machine handle full HD (1920 x 1080) easily, and is it (as far as it can be these days) somewhat future proof ?

All thoughts and advice would be welcome before I commit to such an expense.

Sue W.

[2Dogs]

It sounds like a pretty decent spec to me. You won't get anything much faster without paying a lot more money. As far as it handling 1920x1080 easily, do read etech's posts regarding his experiences with HD editing with his Q6600 pc.

If you're buying the 350 GB "personal" drive as an additional item, I would suggest you consider upping it to 500GB.

If it's an external drive, I would suggest you get an eSata drive - which will be much quicker than any USB or Firewire connected external drive. If the HP doesn't have an eSata port, you can add an eSata pci card - and some eSata drive enclosures come with these.

Intel will be introducing the 45nm versions of the quad core cpu's this year, so Q6600 prices will fall - though at some point you have to jump in and buy your pc.

[Sue Whitham]

Thanks for the tip to read Etechs experiences.

Re the personal media drive - it's in with the package, though since it's removable (portable) it could be replaced with a higher gig one.

I do already have an Iomega 320 gb external drive, though it is USB connected - I'll look at the options of an eSata drive.

Meanwhile, is there anyone out there with a JVC GZ-HD7 full high def hard drive camcorder, already using it with VS 11.5 plus? If so, I'd value their comments.

The VS11.5+ spec says it can "import and edit .TOD video files in its native form from JVC HD Camcorder"

I can get VS 11.5+ to recognise the JVC, but can't capture into the programme. I can import the files from the JVC hard drive on to the PC, but can't get a media player to play them (even the CyberLink software for JVC Everio that came with the camcorder!). I'm assuming that my current system is just too sluggish to cope.

It means that I haven't yet seen any of my footage on the PC as yet,let alone been able to edit it, though it does look great via HDMI on the HD television.

Sue W.

[etech6355]

Sue,
I use a similar computer, the add-on drive is really just a removeable standard USB external drive.
I've found the Seagate external drives to be extremely quiet and fast, some have the eSATA port on them.
Just using the standard USB connection on a similar HP computer the transfer to/from the Seagate external USB were very fast.
The drive was super quiet. The HP Pavillion Quad's are very quiet machines. The first thing I suggest to do if you get the HP is follow the instructions and make a set of "Restore DVD's (2 Dvd's), the software is great to use. Another feature that HP puts on their computers is they already have Mpeg2 playback capability because there is Roxio DVD software installed including other applications.

As far as I've read the JVC cam names it's files using the TOD extension. Supposedly all you have to do is rename either to mpg or m2t. Then insert them into your video editor. If you name them m2t (which means they are in the transport stream format) you can force WMP 11 (in Vista) to play them by manually selecting "All Files" and then select the m2t files, a box will be displayed where WMP11 asks you to trust this extension, answer yes. After that WMP11 will trust playing back the m2t files.
VS11+ should be able to insert them whether you name them m2t or mpg, doesn't matter, VS11+ will read the file and determine it's correct format.

As a suggestion if you purchase the HP Pavillion M9065 the program "PowerDVD7 Ultra" is one of the best High Defintion players for the computer.
It will install special drivers to access the High Def playback for the Nvidia or ATI cards. You will see this option in the PowerDVD7 configuration to use Hardware acceleration, it will say "PureVision", the software can also provide nice de-interlacing and use the hardware de-interlacing feature on the Nvidia video card.
Another nice player is VLC (freeware), easily plays back High Def Mpeg2 video. I've been rather impressed with how well WMP11 works on Vista, it plays my files without any problems, including de-interlacing them.

So even as a test on your slower computer rename some of the TOD files to MPG (or M2T) and other programs should then recognize them.
I think you will like the HP Pavilion M9065, 2.4GHz Intel core 2 Quad Q6600 computer.

[babdi]

Sue
One bit of suggestion.Make the RAM 4GB DDR 3. Vista is a RAM guzzler

[Sue Whitham]

Thanks for your comprehensive reply Etech - it's given me encouragement and confidence in my choice.

Re changing .tod extension to .mpg, my video still plays back jerkily - the sooner I get a more powerful PC the better! (I haven't tried .m2t, since I'm still on XP not Vista).

Re the extra RAM, babdi, the package I've seen comes with 3GB - I presume that can be increased to 6GB by changing the values in the paging file(swap file). Or is that not the case when there are 4 cores in the processor?
And someone told me you can call on extra RAM via a 4GB stick drive, though that seems unlikely to me. Any thoughts on that?

Sue W.

[2Dogs]

One bit of suggestion.Make the RAM 4GB DDR 3. Vista is a RAM guzzler

As you may know, 32 bit versions of Windows can't make use of more than 3GB of RAM without some fancy work-arounds.

At the current time, 4GB of DDR3 costs about $400 - so it certainly wouldn't provide much bang for the buck. It's academic in any case, since DDR3 is not compatible with the HP pc under consideration.

[etech6355]

Sue,
I would let windows handle the paging file. The system comes with Vista Home Premium. You would increase system performance a lot more by installing a 2nd SATA 3GB/s physical harddisk to be used for video/audio/data. Even on a fast computer playing back or recording High Definition can stutter or pause if your reading & writing to the operating systems harddisk. It's called a bottleneck. Everything can't get through the same door at once. (add a 2nd harddisk).
The HP usually comes with 2-1 gig sticks and 2-512meg sticks (Total = 4 gig)
They are usually excellent certified "Samsung Memory Chips".
I removed the 2-612 chips & replaced them with 2-1 gig chips to have a total of 4 gigs.
I would leave the system at 3 gigs for awhile after you install your additional programs. This way if there are problems they are most likely not on the mechanical side. After awhile then you could maybe upgrade higher to 4 gigs.
I think the worst thing one can do is change the configuration of Vista if your not having problems.
Adding a second physical SATA harddisk would enhance system performance over increasing past 3 gigs. Use the 2nd harddisk for video/audio/data files.
I have up to 5 harddisks on my system. Some have different operating system on them and others just data.

Figuring out how Vista uses memory is confusing and not like XP. Even if your video card doesn't use shared memory Vista will report it's using part of shared memory. After you bootup Vista you may see 0 bytes free memory. As far as I can tell Vista puts the extra memory to cache programs & data.
Unless you have problems use Vista's defaults. Under power management the quad at idle runs at 1.5Ghz, then when it's needed jumps up to 2.4Ghz.

To be honest running windows I don't think I needed the extra gig of memory. I went to 4 gigs by replacing the 2-512 meg chips with 1-gig chips.
Most people just go to the store or order 2-1 gig memory chips, that's the wrong way to pair them, when running memory in dual-channel mode (which is the HP configuration) they need to be paired/matched correctly. If you do upgrade the memory call the tech support of the company and tell them exactly what your doing (running them in dual-channel mode) and what to order as a matched pair. They are designed to run in the dual-channel mode.
I upgraded to 4 gigs mainly to run other operating systems like SuSE Linux, which uses memory the correct way, including the 4 cpu's.

2Dogs, Those systems are using DDR2 memory, the video card probably has DDR3 on it (which is nice).
It's not expensive to upgrade the memory but you should use the correct chips (in paired dual-channel sets, certified).

[etech6355]

Sue,
Many programs just don't associate the m2t extension as being an mpg file. You have to tell these programs to accept it, like WMP11.
I keep mine separate so I know which ones are "Transport Stream" (m2t), and the ones that are "Program Stream" (PS) are mpg (usually).

[Ken Berry]

you can call on extra RAM via a 4GB stick drive, though that seems unlikely to me

In fact Vista allows this -- it is called memory boost, though it is nowhere near as fast as proper RAM...

[etech6355]

I haven't used any of those features in Vista.
I don't even have Virus Protection on it, only use it for video/audio apps and don't use it for browsing web yet.
The XP install on the same machine has Virus Protection so on occasion I'll scan the Vista drive from XP.

[Clevo]

Vista 64 bit.....

The OS was hardest decision to make at the end.

I am very happy with my Vista 64 bit choice.

[Sue Whitham]

Thanks again, everyone, for your input.

My intention is to keep my current PC and use that for design and graphic projects, as well as general work and the internet.

Therefore, I will only be loading VideoStudio 11.5 plus on the new HP's operating drive, and dedicating it to film making - I will use my 320gb external drive for video/audio data storage.

When the films are completed and burned to disc, I keep the master which can be copied at any time, so they don't have to be kept on the PC.

This being said, can I take it that the HP Pavilion M9065 system will satisfy my HD editing needs without alterations or additions?

Sue W.

[2Dogs]

Hi Sue,

I think the HP should be fine as it is - but here is a list of tweaks I would apply if it was mine.

1) Create a data partition on the hard drive, so that I have a small OS and programs partition, and a separate data partition.

In use, Windows tends to fragment the drive, whereas data tends to stay fairly unfragmented, so having the arrangement I describe allows you to defragment the OS and programs partition much more quickly. It's not that difficult to partition the drive, but you will need some software - such as "Partition Magic" to do so. Although you can create a new partition with Windows, you can't resize a partition to make room for it in the first place.

I believe the HP will come with a "restore" partition, possibly hidden, which may take up a few GB of the 500GB drive capacity.

2) Set the pagefile to a fixed size - probably 1024MB.

3) Disable the indexing service on all drives. I find the indexing service to be a major resource hog.

4) Disable Remote Access - too much of a security risk for my liking.

5) Install Diskeeper to replace the built-in Windows Defrag - it's many times faster and can work with less free space on the drive.

6) Once all programs are installed, I disable System Restore. This is only because I use Norton Ghost to make drive images for restore purposes, and it's a personal preference. I do turn on System Restore at times.

7) Install Comodo Pro (freeware) firewall and AVG Free antivirus once the crappy (in my opinion) Norton Antivirus usually intalled on HP's runs out, after 90 days. Norton antivirus seems to slow down the pc more than AVG - it's altogether more invasive. AVG updates come just about twice a day these days, more frequently than the NAV ones ever did for me. It used to bug me no end when the first thing that NAV would do when updating would be to update the registration status - I would have been happier to see it download the new virus definitions first.

8 ) Purge all unwanted programs - eg AOL, MSN etc. In practice, however, I've found that the only way to truly get rid of all the unwanted "fluff" is to do a clean install of the OS - too big a deal for most users!

Happy new pc!

[GuyL]

Vista 64 bit.....

The OS was hardest decision to make at the end.

I am very happy with my Vista 64 bit choice.

Same here. I am very happy with VISTA 64 and I have no idea what all the fuss was about with VISTA. It works great and in my case my PC responds faster then it did with XP. I think this has a lot to do with the indexing and superfetch features.

Where I think the problem lies is that too many people try and run it on average hardware and Microsoft doesn't want to say what the "true" system requirements are so they low ball them. Funny, I remember the same exact problems when XP came out. We forget so quickly....