Any PC geeks out there

[BuuBox]

I'd go the Nvidia 7800GTX if I were you, assuming it's got 2 x DVI and all that. It also won't make any difference if you run 4 x 512mb or 2 x 1024mb memory sticks, except that in the future your upgrade path will be restricted.

If you're simply video editing, you'll also find that Intel dual core processors have a slight speed edge due to their architecture. For nearly everything else though, a AMD64 system is the way to go.

In my experience, Gigabyte motherboards have always been very stable and feature packed, but lack 'expert' options like overclocking. If you're not interested in any of that, it's another alternative.

Everything else looks good, though if you can wait a week, the Pioneer DVR-110 comes out, which writes DVD-RAM unlike the DVR-110D, and has (potentially) better hardware with means a (potentially) higher quality burn, important in a video editing machine. Make sure you stick with the Pioneer drives though...!

Edit: Make sure you keep the DVD+-RW's firmware updated! The DVR-110D already has an update...

http://www.pioneeraus.com.au/compute...isclaimer.aspx

Originally Posted by BuuBox

I'd go the Nvidia 7800GTX if I were you, assuming it's got 2 x DVI and all that. It also won't make any difference if you run 4 x 512mb or 2 x 1024mb memory sticks, except that in the future your upgrade path will be restricted.

If you're simply video editing, you'll also find that Intel dual core processors have a slight speed edge due to their architecture. For nearly everything else though, a AMD64 system is the way to go.

In my experience, Gigabyte motherboards have always been very stable and feature packed, but lack 'expert' options like overclocking. If you're not interested in any of that, it's another alternative.

Everything else looks good, though if you can wait a week, the Pioneer DVR-110 comes out, which writes DVD-RAM unlike the DVR-110D, and has (potentially) better hardware with means a (potentially) higher quality burn, important in a video editing machine. Make sure you stick with the Pioneer drives though...!

Edit: Make sure you keep the DVD+-RW's firmware updated! The DVR-110D already has an update...

http://www.pioneeraus.com.au/compute...isclaimer.aspx

2 dimms does have an advantage on amd 64 systems, they will generally perform a little better and reach higher clocks than a system with 4.
http://www.madshrimps.be/?action=get...26&articID=305

[XA-Coupe]

For video editing I would get 2 x 10K SATA 8mb drives and a raid 0 controller. The stripe will boost IO performance heaps. I did it and half of my problems with crashing during video editing disappeared. I did a lot of research to find the problem and it turned out to be IO.
High end video cards aren't necessary for video editing as there isn't a lot of graphic processing going on. For stuff like what Firefox7 does it's an entirely different story.
For home, I wouldn't worry about Pro except you should get the 64 bit version because of the processor.

[Tornado]

The motherboard can handle Raid 0
ie:
nForce4 Storage:
- 4 x SATA 3Gb/s
- 2 x UltraDMA 133/100/66/33
- NVRAID : RAID0, RAID1, RAID 0+1 and JBOD span cross SATA and PATA

[parawolf]

Yeah definately a wise move if you are going to be streaming lots of data to have an OS/Application disk and a seperate disk(s) for your work. Oh don't forget FAT32 means 4GB file sizes (last time I checked) you will want to use NTFS on your workspace to allow for larger files

[Tornado]

OK, looks like the important things for video editing is:

1) Fast Disk access
2) Fast CPU
3) Lots of RAM

Originally Posted by Tornado

OK, looks like the important things for video editing is:

1) Fast Disk access
2) Fast CPU
3) Lots of RAM

it is what you also need to play new video games :nutsycuck

[gozza]

get a commodore 64

[DivHunter]

Games are some of the best benchmarks as they use a lot of resources and have sloppy code :P

Video editing also needs a lot of disk space doesn't it?

[Tornado]

I think I will replace the graphics card with a:
XFX Nvida Geforce 6600GT. PCI-E 128mb and use the money I save to buy 2 faster disks instead of one disk and a high end graphics card that is not required for video editing.

[Uncle_Ken]

Originally Posted by Tornado

OK, looks like the important things for video editing is:

1) Fast Disk access
2) Fast CPU
3) Lots of RAM

Hard disk speed is important for the video editing. Software such as Pinnacle Studio and Edition like very fast and defraged drives. CPU speed is probably more important as well. Any time you look at the memory figures in XP a lot of the ram is still not being used but 100% of the CPU power is. Get the 1gig sticks you can always add more ram later (when you have some spare $$).
XP Pro is better than Home. If you build for a fast video editing system you'll also get a pretty damm goog game set up as well.

Uncle_Ken
PS Great Thread, I'm nearly in the market for a $3K set up soon. Will follow up on some of the sites listed by you guys.
Ah what could better, Fords and computers

OK Beer, Fords and computers

OK OK Girls, Fords and computers (and friends)

[Uncle_Ken]

Originally Posted by gozza

get a commodore 64

Na, how about a Microbee or an Acorn?
Uncle_Ken :

[Tornado]

My first PC was an Amstrad64

[Tornado]

I have another idea now..
Since I want to drive 2 19" LCD screens via a DVI output, I could use the card I mentioned above which is about $250 or I could buy 2 of them or even 2 MSI NX6600GT TD128E cards for around $220 each and upgrade the motherboard to the ASUS A8N-SLI for $25.
As the motherboard has 2 PCIE x 16 slots I can run each screen off its own card(without using SLI mode which only works with one screen)

New Config:
=========
ASUS A8N-SLI MB $190
AMD64 x2 Dual Core 3800+ $513
128M MSI NX6600GT TD128E $220
128M MSI NX6600GT TD128E $220
Avermedia Digital HDTV card $100
2G (2x1GB) DDR400 Kingston $360
250G 16M SATA2 HDD $167
Pioneer 110d DVD RW $ 70
Case ????
Windows XP Home $125
==============================
Total: $1965 (+cost of the case)
==============================

Thinking about the video editing stuff I will be doing, the STATII disk might be OK, if its not I will add a second and use RAID0. Its not like I will be doing heaps of editing, but I will be doing more editing then game playing thats for sure. I guess Its more of a general purpose PC with a bit of performance for video editing Im after, more so then a gaming PC.

I should of mentioned this earlier.(regarding video editing)
I have a JVC MC500 which records in MPEG-2 format.
Potentially I could be working with 4GB or more, which is around an hour.
The only software I have at the moment is the editing software that came with the camera, which I haven't used 'cause it doesn't run on my old Ultra 60

Uncle_Ken:
If you want a better video editing system this one looks OK(nice disk layout too):
http://quantum-flux.freewebspace.com

[Uncle_Ken]

Originally Posted by Tornado

I have another idea now..
Since I want to drive 2 19" LCD screens via a DVI output, I could use the card I mentioned above which is about $250 or I could buy 2 of them or even 2 MSI NX6600GT TD128E cards for around $220 each and upgrade the motherboard to the ASUS A8N-SLI for $25.
As the motherboard has 2 PCIE x 16 slots I can run each screen off its own card(without using SLI mode which only works with one screen)

New Config:
=========
ASUS A8N-SLI MB $190
AMD64 x2 Dual Core 3800+ $513
128M MSI NX6600GT TD128E $220
128M MSI NX6600GT TD128E $220
Avermedia Digital HDTV card $100
2G (2x1GB) DDR400 Kingston $360
250G 16M SATA2 HDD $167
Pioneer 110d DVD RW $ 70
Case ????
Windows XP Home $125
==============================
Total: $1965 (+cost of the case)
==============================

Thinking about the video editing stuff I will be doing, the STATII disk might be OK, if its not I will add a second and use RAID0. Its not like I will be doing heaps of editing, but I will be doing more editing then game playing thats for sure. I guess Its more of a general purpose PC with a bit of performance for video editing Im after, more so then a gaming PC.

I should of mentioned this earlier.(regarding video editing)
I have a JVC MC500 which records in MPEG-2 format.
Potentially I could be working with 4GB or more, which is around an hour.
The only software I have at the moment is the editing software that came with the camera, which I haven't used 'cause it doesn't run on my old Ultra 60

Uncle_Ken:
If you want a better video editing system this one looks OK(nice disk layout too):
http://quantum-flux.freewebspace.com

Yeah I'd go with the separate drive for editing. I use dual cards at work to split the desktop. Software is a pain to buy but yuo get what you pay for
(a bit like cars).
Check out the Bios to make sure you can easily set up both cards. Recently at work we had issues because the bios kept on defaulting to either the inbulit vidoe or the card, we couldn't get both going at the same time, had to change the video card.
Looks like a sweet system for the specs you have so far, you'l have lots of fun with it.

Uncle_Ken

If your not using 3d at all id get even cheaper video cards and get the 4400 x2. They have 1mb cache instead of the 3800 and 4200s 512kb. With a better cooler the 4400 can probably reach the same speed of a 4800 as well.

[Uncle_Ken]

I use this to share use two screens at work. Ver 2 is free.
its simple and easy to use.

http://www.mediachance.com/free/multimon.htm

Uncle_Ken

[Tornado]

Originally Posted by lizardmech

If your not using 3d at all id get even cheaper video cards and get the 4400 x2. They have 1mb cache instead of the 3800 and 4200s 512kb. With a better cooler the 4400 can probably reach the same speed of a 4800 as well.

I went for the 3800 'cause of price.

ie:
3800 - $513
4200 - $708
4400 - $810
4800 - $1350

There is a big price jump between the 3800 and 4400. Not sure if the performance difference is worth $297.

[parawolf]

Hi Goran,

I know you know this, but remember it anyway (for the input of other users) that RAID0 offers no data protection. Yes it can be fast, but if you lose a drive all data is gone. Therefore the disks in RAID0 config should be your scratch space only. Do not use them for finalised footage or long term copies of things you cannot bear to lose.

I would have RAID1 of 2 x 160GB disks or there abouts for my regular hard disk usage, and then say a single 250 or there abouts single for video scratch work and then append to that in extra disks.

Or have a single 160GB internal disk for OS and app's, and a RAID0 in either single or dual disk stripe and an external firewire disk of about 300GB for backing up data.

Regards,
Ian

[Tornado]

Originally Posted by Uncle_Ken

Check out the Bios to make sure you can easily set up both cards.
Uncle_Ken

The motherboard is an SLI mother board, which is made for 2 graphics cards, so it should be able to handle it. But after reading a bit more about how SLI works, I think I am better off using one card that has more memory and 2 DVI outputs then the 2 MSI 128MB cards I listed(1xDVI, 1xVGA).

Even though the mobo has 2 PCI express x16 slots, both of the slots can not be run at x16. If you are using 2 cards and you have SLI configured, both cards run at x8, but only one monitor is supported. If you have 2 cards and you are not using SLI, then 2 monitors are supported, but one card runs at x16 and the other at x1.

ie:
There are two x16 PCIe slots that allow you to connect two x16 cards to the motheboard, but don't actually have x16 lanes of PCIe going to to them. Your choices are limited to having a x16 connection and a x1 connection (where the secondary x16 slot is able to utilize only a single lane of PCI Express) or having two x8 connections

So I think I will buy the SLI motherboard and one card with 256MB memory and 2 DVI outputs. the SLI mobo only costs $25 more and comes with a 1394 port(The A8N-E doesn't) and then if I wanted I could add a second graphics card and enable SLI. Using the SLI mobo gives me an upgrade path.

A cheap SLI enabled 256MB card is the XFX Geforce 6600GT which I can get for $295. Or maybe I should go back to the origanol card I had in mind or even higher, since I will be using one card to drive 2 monitors.

[Tornado]

Originally Posted by parawolf

Hi Goran,

I know you know this, but remember it anyway (for the input of other users) that RAID0 offers no data protection. Yes it can be fast, but if you lose a drive all data is gone. Therefore the disks in RAID0 config should be your scratch space only. Do not use them for finalised footage or long term copies of things you cannot bear to lose.

I would have RAID1 of 2 x 160GB disks or there abouts for my regular hard disk usage, and then say a single 250 or there abouts single for video scratch work and then append to that in extra disks.

Or have a single 160GB internal disk for OS and app's, and a RAID0 in either single or dual disk stripe and an external firewire disk of about 300GB for backing up data.

Regards,
Ian

RAID0 or one disk is still a single point of failure. I will be backing up important data, don't care about the OS or apps, thay can always be re-installed. I use DVD-RW for backups, but I think I will get an external USB/Firewire drive for this system.

[parawolf]

Originally Posted by Tornado

RAID0 or one disk is still a single point of failure. I will be backing up important data, don't care about the OS or apps, thay can always be re-installed. I use DVD-RW for backups, but I think I will get an external USB/Firewire drive for this system.

Fair enough - i find utilities like ghost really handy for rebuilding the OS and 'basic' apps + drivers from scratch REALLY useful. Build an OS image, and then have a bootable cdrom with the ghost.exe so you can restore your image rapidly. Just means you don't spend a few hours getting those drivers downloaded again, screen resolutions configured and network interfaces organised.

Once you have that you can just do your dvd-rw's for restores of your "My Documents" directory or whatever. Just saves time which means you don't go looking for original media disks to get your NIC functional so you can get newest display drivers or such.

Just a suggestion.

[Tornado]

Originally Posted by Uncle_Ken

I use this to share use two screens at work. Ver 2 is free.
its simple and easy to use.

http://www.mediachance.com/free/multimon.htm

Uncle_Ken

Thanks, it has some cool features.
I use 2 monitors at work aswell and when I'm at home using one it feels strange. I can't wait to get the new system up and running.

[Tornado]

Originally Posted by parawolf

Fair enough - i find utilities like ghost really handy for rebuilding the OS and 'basic' apps + drivers from scratch REALLY useful. Build an OS image, and then have a bootable cdrom with the ghost.exe so you can restore your image rapidly. Just means you don't spend a few hours getting those drivers downloaded again, screen resolutions configured and network interfaces organised.

Once you have that you can just do your dvd-rw's for restores of your "My Documents" directory or whatever. Just saves time which means you don't go looking for original media disks to get your NIC functional so you can get newest display drivers or such.

Just a suggestion.

Yea it is a good idea. I have never used ghost or any other PC software to help with OS recovery. I have only had to rebuild my PC 2 times in the past 10 years, so I haven't looked into OS recovery software.

[Uncle_Ken]

Oh.... lots of choices.
This is why getting a computer is not as straight forward as it looks. The problem for video at home is the raw files are large. I suppose unless you are running a network server with tape back up the issue of making copies (what ever type/format) will always be an issue. I would tend to KIS it. (Keep it simple). Burn to DVD or just drag and dump the files to an extra HD used only for backups.
Uncle_Ken

[parawolf]

Originally Posted by Tornado

Yea it is a good idea. I have never used ghost or any other PC software to help with OS recovery. I have only had to rebuild my PC 2 times in the past 10 years, so I haven't looked into OS recovery software.

I haven't had a Windows PC in about 8 years but I figure with the amount of mal/spy/whatever/ware there is out on the internet you are going to get done once in a while, regardless of viruses or firewalls. I did this setup once back with Win95 when I went to go to Linux, but didn't like the slackware distribution that I had so I restored in about 25 minutes with all drivers and documents in place. I eventually went over to RedHat 5.0 i think it was at the time...

[Tornado]

OK Guys,

Here's what I ended up with, I did go over my budget by a bit..

ASUS A8N-SLI mobo
AMD x2 Dual Core 4400+
2GB (2x1GB) DDR400 Kingston memory
XFX 660GT PCIe 16x graphics card
250GB SATA2 16M Western Digital HDD
Pioneer 110D DVD RW
DVICO Fusion HDTV DVB-T Plus
17 in 1 internal Card Reader
Thermaltake VA700BWA Shark case
Microsoft KB
Windows XP Home

All Up $2514

Plus I already have 2 x 19" LCD screens, All I need now are some decent speakers

[Tornado]

Originally Posted by parawolf

I haven't had a Windows PC in about 8 years but I figure with the amount of mal/spy/whatever/ware there is out on the internet you are going to get done once in a while, regardless of viruses or firewalls. I did this setup once back with Win95 when I went to go to Linux, but didn't like the slackware distribution that I had so I restored in about 25 minutes with all drivers and documents in place. I eventually went over to RedHat 5.0 i think it was at the time...

Ian is that you ?
You've changed your ID.

[brenx]

hehehe. Thats normal. I needed a new vid card to play a game. $1300 and an upgrade later I was able to play the game ;)

I ended up with

P4 3200mhz 2mb cache (640)
Gigabyte 8I915P Duo
1GB Kinstone ram DDR 2 PC-4200 (2*512 matched pair)
256mb Gforce 6600
Centurion Case
Seagate 200gb SATA hard drive
1.44mb floppy
16* dual layer DVD writer (Liteon)
Microsoft keyboard and mouse

After I played the game for a bit. I hated it! :