After Effects PC Build, Need Some Advice On part selection and Performance

[gageb97961776]

Hi, I build a PC about a year ago which I was mainly using to edit 1080p video in CyberLink's power director 14. I have since moved on to some light 4k editing in premiere and after effects but my PC build is nowhere near the specs to be able to even see a fluid preview in after effects. The preview is just fine in premiere but I can't get anything out of after effects without caching the whole preview which takes like 20 to 60 seconds after every change I make. Not to mention that it can barely preview the entire timeline after I make over 4 layers. Without a cache, I am getting around 15-20 FPS on a 30 FPS clip and that is with the settings at 1/16 of the resolution along with all my computer ram being dedicated to Ae. The specs for my current PC are as followed...

- Intel I7 4790k

- MSI GTX 960 4gb

- ASUS Z-97-E Motherboard

- Kingston Hyper X 16gb DDR3

- Seagate 2TB 7200RPM Hard drive

I have looked up every way possible to try and speed up after effects but nothing will give me a preview of decent speed. So I have decided that it will be necessary for me to build a new computer to allow for an actual working preview. Does anyone know of any good PC configurations around $1100 that would work for 4k editing in Premiere, After Effects (In dynamic Link), along with some gaming at 1080p? So please let me know of any configurations because I also made a parts list that I think should work but I am more of a novice at this.

- Intel I7 6700K

- EVGA Super Clock GTX 1070

- MSI Z170M Mortar Micro ATX LGA1151 Motherboard

- G.Skill Ripjaws V Series 16GB DDR4-3200

- PNY CS1311 480GB SSD

- Seagate 2TB 7200RPM Hard drive

NEED HELP! All suggestions are appreciated and I would love some other possible configurations!

Thanks,

Gage

[deimosphobos · Accepted solution]

Hi.

As for your specs:

- Intel I7 6700K

- EVGA Super Clock GTX 1070

- MSI Z170M Mortar Micro ATX LGA1151 Motherboard

- G.Skill Ripjaws V Series 16GB DDR4-3200

- PNY CS1311 480GB SSD

- Seagate 2TB 7200RPM Hard drive

you don't specify how you are going to set up your disk configuration. I would have 1 ssd for a source and 1 for a target.

Also, go with as much ram as you can. 16GB is not a lot. Consider at least 32gb.

[gageb97961776]

Thanks for your reply! I will definitely bump it up to at least 32gb DDR4, but I was also wondering if I should use the GTX 1070 as a graphics card or do you have any other suggestions for a card that is better integrated?

Thanks,

Gage

[P.M.B]

Your current system is fine for eveything you want (except you need a second SSD)

You don't need to upgrade everything.  You will not see the improvement you think you will.

1)  There's no reason to be previewing anything longer than a minute ever!

2)  Your first mistake is that you are dedicating all of RAM to AE...this is slowing you down immensely as

     you're not leaving any RAM for other programs, like for instance your Operating System.

     AE works best when you designate 75% of your RAM.  If you have 16gigs of RAM designate 12gigs for AE.

     If you have 64gigs of RAM designate 48gigs to AE.   75%.

3) You need a dedicated SSD cache drive. Also Ideally you should have AE  and your OS installed on a fast SSD.

So really all you need to buy is second SSD drive (OS and AE on one & the second as a dedicated cache).

Also stop letting AE use all of your RAM...it's bogging down your system.  75%.   Bumping up your RAM to 32gigs

will help you get slightly longer previews but your playback issues are likely due to one of your two drives not being SS &

not leaving any RAM for your system.   If you don;t correct those two things everything else will be wasted.

And even then I think you may have slightly unrealistic expectations of what changes you will see.

You say you have to cache the whole timeline....this leads to me to believe you are using AE incorrectly as an NLE.

You really should only be trying to preview 15 to 20 seconds at a time...if that much even.

AE is for creating shots, not for editing video.

Of course all of this assumes there is nothing else bogging your system down elsewhere like unwanted or unneeded BG processes.

Not enough space on your HD....ect.   There are too many variables to know for sure.  What I can say for sure is that you current

CPU, GPU, MB and RAM are just fine and upgrading them will not make any huge difference.

[imeilfx]

As all of guys above said - what you have now should be enough for AE - maby more ram, better ssd/hdd setup - and of course AE workflow optimalization. If you really need - i think not (i don't know your exact workflow and kindf of work you do) but if you need - you should invest in x99 chipset and LGA 2011-3 it is more expensive than lga 1151 but it gives you mucgh more room for upgrade. f.eg. on 2011-3 you could start with 16gb of ram in one piece and upgrade it up to 128gb (if you wil buy a motherboard with 8 slots), you can starty with cheaper i7-5820K (or my favor 6800K) and if your needs will grow upgrade it to i7 6950X.

[P.M.B]

5820 does not support 128gigs of Ram.  I believe 6800s & up are the only i7s that will support more than 64gig of memory.  Else you need a Xeon.

[imeilfx]

Gutter-Fish napisał(-a):

5820 does not support 128gigs of Ram. I believe 6800s & up are the only i7s that will support more than 64gig of memory. Else you need a Xeon.

That is absolutellky correct - that is why I said what is mny favorit, and that he can start cheaper with 16-32gb of ram and 5820 and later upgrade even to 128 and 6950X. Sorry if that was not clear enough.

[P.M.B]

h, sorry.  I misread it.