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Nvidia or No?

themattcastro

themattcastro

I just decided to switch over to the PC world of editing opposed to the MAC world (needed a new computer since my g5 wasn't cutting it anymore)

Now I have an i7 hp 870, 8gigs ram, ati radeon 5770, and running Windows 7 64bit

I want to change my card to an Nvidia, but was wondering if you guys have much experience editing on either PrPro or Avid without one. Did it work well? Should I purchase a new graphics card?

I'm running PrPro right now, but it constantly crashes. Has anyone else had this problem with PrPro, or is it just because my computer can't handle it? Is more RAM the solution?

Sorry, not that much of a tech person
 
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Well, now we're getting somewhere. Windows 7 Home basic will only allow 4GB of RAM to be used. Professional or Ultimate will get you up to 24GB and maybe higher.

Currently, only certain NVIDIA graphics cards will allow you to utilize the Mercury Playback Engine of CS5 which will drastically reduce render times. They are expensive, so hold on to your seat and offer varying performance depending on the model.

If you're just running Premier Pro, 8GB of RAM will work, but not if you're running After Effects at the same time.
 
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Your HD5770 is more than enough to handle the task, although if you require 10-bit with OpenGL (like in Photoshop), you will need a FirePro card, not a Radeon, and a 10-bit professional display. Radeon only renders 10-bit (10-10-10-2, talking color gamut here) with DirectX. You can still edit 10-bit content, but won't be fully representated on the display device.

I use a FirePro V7700 in my editing system.
 
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CamVader said:
Well, now we're getting somewhere. Windows 7 Home basic will only allow 4GB of RAM to be used. Professional or Ultimate will get you up to 24GB and maybe higher.

Currently, only certain NVIDIA graphics cards will allow you to utilize the Mercury Playback Engine of CS5 which will drastically reduce render times. They are expensive, so hold on to your seat and offer varying performance depending on the model.

If you're just running Premier Pro, 8GB of RAM will work, but not if you're running After Effects at the same time.
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I just said I'm running Windows 7 Home Premium :hmm:

Besides, w7basic allows up 8gb ram to use in 64-bit, premium allows up to 16gb in 64-bit: which is what I'm running.

I know PrPro is supposed to run fine, but it's just not! :grumpy:

It's constantly freezing when I edit too quickly...but the rest of my computer runs perfectly fine.

Is the program just hanging up because of my graphics card? I'm editing h.264 from a 7d...is that too intensive?
 
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themattcastro said:
I just said I'm running Windows 7 Home Premium :hmm:

Besides, w7basic allows up 8gb ram to use in 64-bit, premium allows up to 16gb in 64-bit: which is what I'm running.

I know PrPro is supposed to run fine, but it's just not! :grumpy:

It's constantly freezing when I edit too quickly...but the rest of my computer runs perfectly fine.

Is the program just hanging up because of my graphics card? I'm editing h.264 from a 7d...is that too intensive?
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My apologies. I had the 32 bit number in mind. :(

Your graphics card isn't hurting, but it's not helping either. What do you have your playback resolution set at? H.264 is CPU intensive and you're not getting any GPU support to ease that. Try setting it to 1/4 and then render the sequence when you're done to make sure everything is smooth. It should be without a problem.
 
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Yeah I'm already running it at 1/4, but it's still freezing up.

Would getting another internal drive help the situation at all, or should I buy an Nvidia card first? My projects deadline is coming close, and I don't have enough time and money to purchase both.

Having to render the footage when done kind of defeats the purpose of CS5 lol
 
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themattcastro said:
Yeah I'm already running it at 1/4, but it's still freezing up.

Would getting another internal drive help the situation at all, or should I buy an Nvidia card first? My projects deadline is coming close, and I don't have enough time and money to purchase both.

Having to render the footage when done kind of defeats the purpose of CS5 lol
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I hear ya'. It was really designed for use using the CUDA acceleration, especially for H.264.

Getting real simple here, you have your OS and CS5 on one drive and your video files/project files on at least one other?
 
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CamVader said:
I hear ya'. It was really designed for use using the CUDA acceleration, especially for H.264.

Getting real simple here, you have your OS and CS5 on one drive and your video files/project files on at least one other?
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I guess I'm getting the gtx470 then...

Yeah I'm working off of footage on an external harddrive connected through a firewire cord. Maybe getting an internal drive might be a better solution? It's looking more like just the graphics card since the rest of my comp doesn't freeze up when PrPro freezes, so everything else is able to work out perfectly...it's just PrPro that's not co-operating
 
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I blame disk through put. If you move the same footage to your internal drive does it work better?

For external check out ESATA (external SATA) very common and as good as internal drive performance.
 
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themattcastro said:
I guess I'm getting the gtx470 then...

Yeah I'm working off of footage on an external harddrive connected through a firewire cord. Maybe getting an internal drive might be a better solution? It's looking more like just the graphics card since the rest of my comp doesn't freeze up when PrPro freezes, so everything else is able to work out perfectly...it's just PrPro that's not co-operating
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Sorry to hear of the difficulties. You know, most externals only spin at 5400 RPM and that could be your problem right there - bottlenecking. The internals spin at 7200.
 
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wheatgrinder said:
I blame disk through put. If you move the same footage to your internal drive does it work better?

For external check out ESATA (external SATA) very common and as good as internal drive performance.
Click to expand...

On my g5 I have use eSata, but my PC unfortunately didn't come with a port.

I've got a Firewire 800, would you think that would work out better than a Firewire 400?

Thanks for the help guys. I want to transfer the footage over, but the deadline is coming up fast and I don't want to spend that 6 hours that the transfer is telling me to get all the files moved over to my internal hd, so working on the external hardrive is probably the best for editing right now for this project.

I think I'm still going to buy a gtx470 though...
 
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your "system" is only as strong as your weakest link, in general terms. In your case, you need to find the weakest link (which might be your graphics card) and do: elevate it, replace it, substitute it. ...replace it!

cs4 used to crash with mine until I got cineform neoscene
 
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The more I think about it, the lack of a second 7200 rpm internal drive seperate from the OS/Premiere Pro drive appears to be Matt's problem. An external drive just isn't going to cut it without the rpm's and esata.

Memory is cheap and, if it were me, I'd try that option first.
 
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this is why you build your own computer to your own specifications.

word on the web is that a 295 gtx would be faster than the 470 for around the same price range, minus the direct x11 of the 470. $250-300

1.5tb of hard drive is around 100. So if it were me I'd upgrade the hd first.
 
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It is highly unlikely that the problems you are experiencing have anything to do with your graphics card. I've encountered some really marginal memory over the years. First thing I would do is run a memory diagnostic. I was getting freezing and major corruption until I isolated some bad memory modules with memtest. Haven't had a problem since.

And, yes, you'll want 7200rpm drives at a bare minimum. Remember that there's a swap file on the hard drive that's caching data as you edit. Your system is only as strong as its weakest link. And that HD5770 definitely isn't a weak link. CUDA is dying, getting replaced with OpenCL and DirectCompute.
 
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Just to let everyone know, the problem was that I was working off an external hard drive through a firewire 800 cord so the files were bottle-necking, making PrPro crash constantly.

After I moved everything to my internal hard drive, I have yet to see a crash. This is all working off my main internal hard drive, but I'll be adding a new 7200 rpm one on my next paycheck. Afterwords, I'll be upgrading my graphics card to help utilize PrPro more.

I'll probably either get an nVidia 470 or 4000, depending on how much of a difference there is between the two.
 
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