8 Replies Latest reply: Feb 2, 2010 4:27 PM by Harm Millaard RSS

    Need advice on performance improvement.

    lchapman66 Community Member

      I have the CS4 suite.  Lately I've been editing 720p60fps footage from a Kodak Zi8.  Even with a single video track a simple cross-dissolve transition won't play smoothly without rendering.  I'm looking for advice to help performance.  I know I can beef-up the video card and wait for CS5 but I'd like an option before that.  I have a killer machine already:    Dual quad procs at 3.2Ghz and 16Gb of RAM running Vista-64.  I've thought about NeoHD.

       

      Thoughts?

       

      Thanks.

        • 1. Re: Need advice on performance improvement.
          Harm Millaard CommunityMVP

          Better use the Kodak included software instead of PR, or WMM or Magix. Those are more suited for this material.

          • 2. Re: Need advice on performance improvement.
            sync2rhythm Community Member

            Awesome sounding Workstation specs but it hurts to  hear that it doesn't give you Real-Time transitions as this is the power & RAM that I'm looking at going to from a single Quad Core.

            (from a Dell T3500 to either a T7500 or MAC Pro)

             

            - Is this only during Transitions or can you add/stack layers and get Real-Time playback?

            - Does it render these elements fairly quickly or does it bother you that you have to wait a long time?

            - Would it help you to Transcode to a more Edit Friendly format/CODEC before adding to the Timeline?

             

            Once your file is Rendered Out and you try to play it in a Media Player and it 'Stutters' (I too have this problem w/ 1080p but not DV)...

            - Could this be because of the file size/streaming from HD?

             

            Personally, I don't see CS5 being the 'Cure All'. I feel that it will be like normal and require a faster processor w/ more RAM.

            • 3. Re: Need advice on performance improvement.
              Harm Millaard CommunityMVP

              To confirm that notion:

               

              I have a killer machine already:    Dual quad procs at 3.2Ghz and 16Gb of RAM running Vista-64.

               

              run the http://ppbm4.com benchmark and submit your results to Bill (and me if you want) and see if indeed you have a killer machine or not.

               

              If you want to improve performance it helps to know what you have and what budget is available for improvement. Otherwise you get remarks like:

               

              1. Get better hardware

              2. Tune your system for editing

              3. Get at least 24 Cheetah 15K7 disks in a raid30 array

              4. Double your memory

              5. Get 4 SSD's in raid10 for boot

              6. Upgrade to Win7 64 Pro

              etc.

              • 4. Re: Need advice on performance improvement.
                lchapman66 Community Member

                The videos I've been doing from this footage are pretty simple.  No multiple video tracks etc.   The system even has some trouble playing a straight, single, video track.  Please remember that this footage is not "typical".  It's from a Kodak Zi8 and is H.264/720p60fps.   I can edit 1080i HDV on this system with hardly a glitch.  You saw Harm's suggestion based on the video format.  I will see what Kodak's s/w can do, not in the studio again until Tuesday.  The final results/renders from Premiere on this footage are fine, with one exception.  I can't get the AME to render a correct mp4 (prefered format for Vimeo).  I've ended-up successfully rendering to Windows Media.

                • 5. Re: Need advice on performance improvement.
                  Harm Millaard CommunityMVP

                  WMV works well for Vimeo in my experience.


                  • 6. Re: Need advice on performance improvement.
                    lchapman66 Community Member

                    Harm - On the last two uploads of the wmv files to Vimeo I had to contact them to get the process completed.  Facebook and YouTube ate the same files without a hitch.

                    • 7. Re: Need advice on performance improvement.
                      lchapman66 Community Member

                      Here's a bit more on Premiere's behavior with these files.  I'm rendering an 8 minute clip

                      right now.  The Performace Monitor in Vista shows that it's using only 20% of the CPU

                      bandwidth and the disk access light is flashing just a couple times a second.  Can anyone

                      educate me on what the issue might be?

                      • 8. Re: Need advice on performance improvement.
                        Harm Millaard CommunityMVP

                        Generally, when you have a powerful CPU and low usage figures, that means other components are the bottleneck, because that CPU is waiting for other components to finish their job. Often this is disk I/O, but also common is other services/processes running in the background, like indexing, compression, defragging.

                         

                        I haven't seen your http://ppbm4.com results yet. What are they?