Hard drive configuration?

G-man

P4 3.0 HT fsb 800
MSI 865PE NEO2 LS motherboard
1gig PC3200 ddr ram dual channel
Geforce FX 5200 128mb AGP
16X dvd drive
Pioneer A06 DVD+- RW
PCI Firewire card

I am building a video editing machine and wondering which way is better to configure hard drives and why?
Keep in mind I am looking to build this for around $2000.00
I have had a qoute for around $1700.00

Config#1
120 gig 7200 ATX133 for OS & Software
160 gig 7200 ATX133 for capture and editing

Config#2
80 gig 7200 ATX133 For OS & Software
(2) 120 gig 7200 ATX133 for capture and editing

Any other ideas? SATA drives I was considering a later upgrade as they improve

Any thoughts? Suggestions?

Al_Capown

My only problems are your motherboard and video card. Instead of the MSI board Get an abit is7 or asus p4p800 deluxe. As for the video card a radeon 9600 XT should do an excellent job and provide an extremely large upgrade for little more than the 5200FXUltra.

Capown-

Straight_Man

I would take config 2, if you plan to make a career of this or seriously pursue it. You will need LOTSA of space for video editting. 2-4 GB of RAM is not unknown on video editting workstations used by Pros, and very high end video cards are also common.

Lets say you want 15 min of very high quality video stream to edit- 5GB to 15 GB storage need for the base plus work files is easily possible for that amount of video stream. If we are talking HDTV, the space you might use and have commited until you clean house after a project could eat a good 20 GB for 15 min of finished output at end of project.

So build for a fast 10-20X growth of HD storage very quickly consumed.

40 GB is enough for OS itself, twice that is enough for a program suite and XP Pro. Yuo will not need 120 Gb for quite a while if you pick and choose what you use and get the things you do not use off HD once in 6 months.

Is this for web, or for broadcast production, or for DVD distribution, or all the above??? Broadcast editors cut a lot of stuff out that was shot to provide body when they decide what has highest priority, and this is also true of film media. Because web stuff by its nature can be more compact, if you only plan to do web stuff, 2 100's would be plenty. If you want just one and do not mirror then use a 160 for data and capture if you can afford one for now, than get a second if needed. 80 for now for programs and XP is plenty. If for all the above, then buy for most HD using kind, broadcast size specs(at bare minimum total 160 GB storage for just capture and data and clean often, or start with over 200 GB total for just capture and data and clean less often) until you see how long it takes to fill the 2 you buy.

John D.

G-man

Ageek wrote:

I would take config 2, if you plan to make a career of this or seriously pursue it. You will need LOTSA of space for video editting. 2-4 GB of RAM is not unknown on video editting workstations used by Pros, and very high end video cards are also common.

Lets say you want 15 min of very high quality video stream to edit- 5GB to 15 GB storage need for the base plus work files is easily possible for that amount of video stream. If we are talking HDTV, the space you might use and have commited until you clean house after a project could eat a good 20 GB for 15 min of finished output at end of project.

So build for a fast 10-20X growth of HD storage very quickly consumed.

40 GB is enough for OS itself, twice that is enough for a program suite and XP Pro. Yuo will not need 120 Gb for quite a while if you pick and choose what you use and get the things you do not use off HD once in 6 months.

Is this for web, or for broadcast production, or for DVD distribution, or all the above??? Broadcast editors cut a lot of stuff out that was shot to provide body when they decide what has highest priority, and this is also true of film media. Because web stuff by its nature can be more compact, if you only plan to do web stuff, 2 100's would be plenty. If you want just one and do not mirror then use a 160 for data and capture if you can afford one for now, than get a second if needed. 80 for now for programs and XP is plenty. If for all the above, then buy for most HD using kind, broadcast size specs(at bare minimum total 160 GB storage for just capture and data and clean often, or start with over 200 GB total for just capture and data and clean less often) until you see how long it takes to fill the 2 you buy.

John D.

Does it make that much of a difference having that much RAM? I was told by one person there is not that much advantage to more ram. This system will not be used as being on a server, but a stand alone editing machine.

The plan is to use this as a stepping stone for a potential carreer change.
Adobe Video Collection (Premiere pro, After Effects pro, Encore, Audition and Photoshop) are part ofthis machine with XPpro

Eventually I will either Go with SCII or if they get as good SATA drives in the future.

I was considering Maxtor drives

BlackHawk

All I know is that you should atleast get a 9600XT (you can use it for gaming too ) and go RAID 0.

Madball

More ram it good. I use Adobe Premiere and it really uses a lot of ram. I have 512mb and it takes up most of it to edit or convert a file. I would get a 40gig drive for your OS and programs and two of the largest drives you can get and Raid 0 them. Or get 4 74gb 10,000 rpm Raptors .

primesuspect

G-man wrote:

Does it make that much of a difference having that much RAM? I was told by one person there is not that much advantage to more ram.

Whoever told you that has no idea what they are talking about. I build video editing machines for a living, and the most RAM you can afford is the best. You can NEVER HAVE ENOUGH RAM in a video editing box. Adobe applications are written very well in that they will use as much RAM as they can in order to increase performance. 1gb of ram is minimum for anything other than "Little Johnny's 3rd birthday party" home video hobby stuff. If you plan on doing this commercially, even on a small scale, you need 1gb of ram, preferably 2gb.

DRIVES:

You cannot touch SCSI. even with SATA. Putting a decent 19160 Ultra 160 controller card, which is pretty cheap, and 2x74gb scsi drives in SOFTWARE RAID 0 will be a very high performance combination. This is what I would do:

Adaptec 19160 from Mark One Computers for $144 - not a bad price, and they are a reputable vendor.


2xSeagate Cheetah 10,000 RPM u160 73.4gb drives from
Computer Giants, for $235 each.

This puts you at $614 for ~146gb of space. You should use Windows XP software RAID 0 and you will get monster performance, with extremely low latency, which is what you need for video editing.

You get a third drive, preferably a cheap low capacity (40gb?) SATA drive for your OS and applications. I don't know what this does for your budget, but you can easily skimp on the video card. If you won't be gaming on this computer (and if you are building a dedicated video editing box, you shouldn't be) then you should get a Matrox video card - excellent color fidelity and 2D performance. You will be wasting money on a high-end 3D card like the Geforce series - you won't need it for video editing.

Just some advice from the trenches

Geeky1

//Edit

See revised config. farther down.

Tex

primesuspect wrote:

Whoever told you that has no idea what they are talking about. I build video editing machines for a living, and the most RAM you can afford is the best. You can NEVER HAVE ENOUGH RAM in a video editing box. Adobe applications are written very well in that they will use as much RAM as they can in order to increase performance. 1gb of ram is minimum for anything other than "Little Johnny's 3rd birthday party" home video hobby stuff. If you plan on doing this commercially, even on a small scale, you need 1gb of ram, preferably 2gb.

DRIVES:

You cannot touch SCSI. even with SATA. Putting a decent 19160 Ultra 160 controller card, which is pretty cheap, and 2x74gb scsi drives in SOFTWARE RAID 0 will be a very high performance combination. This is what I would do:

Adaptec 19160 from Mark One Computers for $144 - not a bad price, and they are a reputable vendor.


2xSeagate Cheetah 10,000 RPM u160 73.4gb drives from
Computer Giants, for $235 each.

This puts you at $614 for ~146gb of space. You should use Windows XP software RAID 0 and you will get monster performance, with extremely low latency, which is what you need for video editing.

You get a third drive, preferably a cheap low capacity (40gb?) SATA drive for your OS and applications. I don't know what this does for your budget, but you can easily skimp on the video card. If you won't be gaming on this computer (and if you are building a dedicated video editing box, you shouldn't be) then you should get a Matrox video card - excellent color fidelity and 2D performance. You will be wasting money on a high-end 3D card like the Geforce series - you won't need it for video editing.

Just some advice from the trenches

And... you know I love scsi Prime but.. I have used almost every controller you could ever even name and in general the LSI's are much faster and half the price. Yo can get a nice dual channel lsi u320 for maybe 65 to 75 bucks and they kick adpatec booty up and down the street and twice on sunday

I have a very very nice pair of u320 73gb Atlas 10k IV's that hit about 73,000 in atto I need to sell and would make someone a very nice package deal also... Pair of drives and a dual channel u320 LSI for $150 or more under your estimate. These are one of the two or three fastest scsi 10k drives ever made and have only been on the market for 8 months to a year. And I like them because they are not hot and as quiet as my ide drives in general.

tex

Straight_Man

G-man wrote:

Does it make that much of a difference having that much RAM? I was told by one person there is not that much advantage to more ram. This system will not be used as being on a server, but a stand alone editing machine.

For other uses, NO, that much RAM will not be used. For video, lets say you want to be able to undo edits-- nice thing to have, right???

Then you have RAM used to track undos, RAM for BASE file, and RAM for editing space in program workspace.

So, as Prime said, get as much RAM as you can afford, 2-4 GB if you plan to morph things a lot or layer things on top of backgrounds or blend and fade a lot. AND, video streams as opposed to game production or use of holgraphic displays in CAD\CAM for car shape or airplane design and wind tunnel emulation designing, only need lots of 2D and minimal 3D and AA and AF. So a heavy 2D card like a Matrox makes sense in this case instead of a gaming card that uses lots of its GPU processing for AA and AF and 3D pseudo-effects generation.

To give you an idea, you can easily use 4-5X input file size in RAM with very good video editors-- I have seen 10X in use. You might want to layer vector text on one frame of a video stream, or 10 of them in succession. When the file is output, those become graphics layers-- including the text laid on top, but during editing and before they are embedded as graphics, the vector space needs to be in RAM for the text to be temporarily stored also. Think of vector text as edges, then you could have a gradient fill and that color gradient takes lots of RAM compared to a monofilled vector text. TrueType and ClearText are vector text by def. They are much less jaggy as they are letters with vector curved edges.

So, yeah, you need lots of RAM and those are only the BIG reasons.

John D.

Geeky1

Tex, what kind of speed would he be looking at for a 2-drive SCSI RAID 0 array using new 8MB/10,000rpm drives? I'm guessing 150-250MB/s, but I don't know for sure. Those two Maxtor 160GB drives ought to be just as fast as mine are, and my two RAID 0 arrays (2 160GB ATA-133 Maxtor DMax 9s on SATA adapters) top out at about 100MB/s reading and writing.

Newegg also has a LSI SATA RAID controller with 64mb of onboard RAM; it's a PCI-X 64-bit controller, too. *drool* I don't know if it'd be worth it for $250 over the onboard raid on that dual opteron board.

And does anyone have any idea how the Opterons compare to the Barton core Athlons in terms of video editing speed?

Tex

He's on a normal 32bit pci bus so anything in the 110 to 120,000 is probably tops without really jacking stuff around.

And really for what he is doing seperating the scsi stuff manually across differant drives and putting temp files on one and page on another etc... aps on vdeo files on a third would outperform software raid-0 in real life.

As it works you want the I-O going to seperate scsi drives. So when he has a huge file he is working on or whatever its working on one and paging to another and his app probably is writing temp files also so you want all that going to differant scsi drives. Raid-0 isnt always the best answer in real life. Only on some benchmarks and when you can read single things sequentialy. If the heads have to move much like to temp files and a pagfefile on other parts of the disk you realy need a bunch of drives in raid to mask it. With only a couple you kill yourself. fast scsi drives mask it much better then sata or ide in raid.

Tex

Geeky1

Hmm. Ok. One other question then. I thought that the worst part of DV editing was the encoding (at least it was for the only video I've ever done), and that the encoding process was just a very long sequential write anyhow, so the most important thing is to have the highest sustained transfer rates you can. Is that right? Because in that case, wouldn't a RAID array be better?

primesuspect

Geeky - The dual xeons would be better for video work than the dual opterons.

Opterons are fantastic database and server chips. For media work, you really can't dispute that the P4s are better. Now that opteron is out, I would look dismally upon anyone who built a server around anything other than an opteron. But for video workstations..... sorry, opterons just aren't as good.

Geeky1

Hmm. Ok, I didn't know that. I thought it was the other way around. Oh well... back to the drawing board. I assume the Athlon MPs fare the same, then? The Xeons are faster?

Geeky1

Ok, here's a revised version:
<b>Cables - Round</b>
Antec Cobra A26 Round 133 ATA Cable, Model "77226" -RETAIL
Specifications:
40-pin 80-conductor cable, ATA133/100/66/33 compliant for high speed data transfer
Highly flexible 26" round cable (16" + 10") with two device connections, one motherboard connector.
Wrapped with nylon mesh plastic tubing for maximum air flow improvement.
Shielded with aluminum foil and braided silver mesh with ground, for maximum shielding. more info>
N82E16812105001 $10.00
$20.00

Antec Cobra F16 Round FDD Cable, Model "77216" -RETAIL
Specifications:
Highly flexible 16" round cable with one device connector, one motherboard connector
Wrapped with nylon mesh tubing for maximum air flow improvement more info>
N82E16812105003 $7.00
$7.00

<b>Cases (Computer Cases, ATX Form) </b>
Enermax CS-10181-W (Beige/white) 12- Bay Entry Server and Workstation Tower, Retail.
Specifications:
Case Type: Workstation Tower
Color: Beige/White
Material: 1.0mm SECC Steel
Drive Bays: 5.25'' x4, 3.5''(External) x2 3.5''(Internal) x6
Expansion Slots: 7
Front Ports: USB 2.0 x2,IEEE1394 x1,Mic x1,Audio x1
Power Supply: N/A
Cooling System: 80mm Fan:Front(Optional)x2,Side(Optional)x2 with bracket,Rear x2 with bracket,Top x1
Motherboard Compatibility: ATX,Dual Xeon
Dimensions: 558Dx205Wx520H mm
Special Features: Easy access HDD cage:Hidden HDD cage opening faces to side panel more info>
N82E16811124032 $75.00
$75.00

<b>CD/DVD Burners (RW Drives) </b>
Lite-On Beige 52X32X52 CD-RW Drive, Model LTR-52327S BEIGE, Retail
Specifications:
Write Speed: 52X CD-R, 32X CD-RW
Read Speed: 52X CD-ROM
Interface: ATAPI / E-IDE
Buffer: 2MB
OS Support: Windows 95/98/NT/ME/XP/2000
Features: Innovated SMART-BURN technology
Remark: Retail box (see pictures for details) more info>
N82E16827106198 $35.00
$35.00

Lite-On Beige DVD-RW/+RW Drive, Model LDW-451S, Retail
Specifications:
Write Speed: 4X DVD+R, 4X DVD-R, 4X DVD+RW, 2X DVD-RW, 40X CD-ROM, 24X CD-RW
Read Speed: 12X DVD-ROM, 40X CD-ROM
Interface: EIDE/ATAPI
Buffer: 2 MB
OS Support: Windows 95 / 98 / ME / 2000 / XP
Features: SMART-BURN, SMART-X
Remark: Retail pack, This is an upgrade to Model LDW-411S (see pictures for details) more info>
N82E16827106927 $107.00
$107.00

<b>Fans, Heatsinks (Case, CPU, Chipset) </b>
7x Thermaltake SMART CASE FAN II. Variable Fan Speed Control, by temperature sensor.
Specification:
Compatibility: Case
Dimensions: 80x80x25mm
Bearing Type: 2 Ball
Nominal Speed(RPM): 1300~4800
Max Air Flow:(CFM): 20.55~75.70
Max Pressure: 1.45~8.43 mm H2O
Heat Sink Material: N/A
Rated Voltage: 12 VDC
Noise(dBA): 17~48
Special Features: Temp.control fan speed. more info>
N82E16835999111 $8.70
$8.99 @1pc
$8.9 ea.@2+
$8.8 ea.@3+
$8.7 ea.@5+
$60.90

<b>Floppy Drives </b>
SAMSUNG SFD321B/LEB 1.44MB 3.5inch Floppy Disk Drive, OEM Driver Only
Specifications:
Capacity: 1.44MB
Average Access Time: not specified
Interface: 34 Pin Standard Floppy Connector
Form: 3.5 inch
Media Type: All Standard 1.44MB & 720KB 3.5 Floppy Diskettes
Features: Easy to Install, Just Plug & Play, For IBM5 & 100% Compatible Computers
Remark: OEM 1 Year Warranty more info>
N82E16821103202 $6.25
$6.25 ea.@50+
$6 ea.@70+
$5.75 ea.@90+
$6.25

<b>Hard Drives </b>
Maxtor 80GB 7200RPM IDE Hard Drive, Model 6Y080P0, OEM Drive Only
Specifications:
Capacity: 80GB
Average Seek Time: 9.3 ms
Buffer: 8MB
Rotational Speed: 7200 RPM
Interface: IDE ULTRA ATA133
Features: Maxtor Shock Protection and Data Protection Systems
Manufacturer Warranty: 1 year
Remark: OEM Drive Only more info>
N82E16822144205 $81.00
$81.00

2x Maxtor 160GB 7200RPM SATA Hard Drive, MODEL 6Y160M0, OEM Drive Only
Specifications:
Capacity: 160GB
Average Seek Time: 9.3 ms
Buffer: 8MB
Rotational Speed: 7200 RPM
Interface: Serial ATA
Features: Maxtor Shock Protection and Data Protection Systems
Manufacturer Warranty: 3 years
Remark: OEM Drive Only more info>
N82E16822144322 $131.00 x2
$262.00

<b>Memory (System Memory) </b>
Corsair XMS Extreme Memory Speed Series 184 Pin 512MB DDR PC-3200C2PT - OEM
Specification
Manufacturer: Corsair
Speed: DDR400(PC3200)
Type: 184 Pin DDR SDRAM
Registered/Unbuffered: Unbuffered
Error Checking: Non-ECC
Cas Latency: 2-3-3-6 1T
Support Voltage: 2.6V
Bandwidth: 3.2GB/s
Organization: 64M x 64 -Bit
Special Features: with Platinum Heat Spreader
Warranty: Lifetime more info>
N82E16820145420 $119.00
$238.00

<b>Motherboards - Server </b>
ASUS 875P Chipset Server Motherboard for Dual Intel Xeon CPU, Model "PC-DL Deluxe" -RETAIL
Specifications:
Supported CPU: Dual Intel Xeon Processors
Chipset: Intel 875P MCH + ICH5R
FSB: 533MHz
RAM: 4x DIMM for Unbuffered DDR333 Max 4GB
IDE: 2x UltraDMA 100, 1x UltraDMA 133 up to 6 Devices
Slots: 1x AGP 4X/8X, 5x PCI
Ports: 2xPS2,2xCOM,1xLPT,1xLAN,8xUSB2.0(Rear 4),Audio Ports
Onboard Audio: AD1985 AC97 Codec
Onboard LAN: Intel 82547 Gigabit Ethernet
Onboard SATA/RAID: Promise® PDC20378, 2x Serial ATA;RAID 0,1,0+1(0+1 across SATA & 3rd IDE)
Onboard 1394: T.I. TSB43AB22A, Supports 2x IEEE1394 Ports
Form Factor: ATX more info>
N82E16813131055 $209.99
$209.99

<b>Power Supplies </b>
Antec 550W Power Supply, Model "TRUE550 EPS12V" -RETAIL
Specifications:
Type: EPS12V/ATX12V
Maximum Power: 550W
PFC: No
Power Good Signal: 100-500ms
Hold-up Time: 17ms min.
Efficiency: 68% min.
Over Voltage Protection: +5V trip point<+6.5V;+3.3V trip point<+4.1V;+12V trip point<+14.4V
Overload Protection: Latching Protection+5V @&lt;47A;+3.3V @ <48A;+12V @ <18A
Input Voltage: 115 VAC / 230VAC
Input Frequency Range: 47Hz-63Hz
Input Current: 10A/6A
Output: +3.3V@32A;+5V@40A;-5V@0.5A;+12V@36A;-12V@1A;+5VSB@2A
MTBF: 80,000 hrs. @ 25ºC
Approvals: UL, TUV, CB, VDE, FCC CLASS B, DEMKO, NEMKO, SEMKO, FIMCO more info>
N82E16817103918 $100.00
$100.00

<b>Processors </b>
2x Intel Xeon 2.66 GHz 533MHz FSB, 512K Cache, Hyper Threading Technology - Retail
Specification
Model: Intel Xeon 2.66 GHz w/ Hyper Threading
Core: Prestonia
Operating Frequency: 2.66GHz
FSB: 533MHz
Cache: L1/12K+8K; L2/512K
Voltage: 1.5V
Process: 0.13Micron
Socket: Socket 604
Multimedia Instruction: MMX, SSE, SSE2
Warranty: 3-year MFG
Packaging: Retail box (with Heatsink and Fan) more info>
N82E16819117017 $278.00 x2
$556.00

<b>Sound Card </b>
Creative Labs Sound Blaster Audigy2 ZS PCI Sound Card, Model "SB0350" -RETAIL
Specifications:
Channels: 7.1
Max Sampling Rate: 192kHz
Signal-Noise Ratio: 108dB(SNR)
Hardware Decode: Dolby Digital EX
Digital Audio: 24-bit
Hardware Polyphony: 64 Voices
PC Interface: PCI
Connectors: Line-out,Line-in,Mic-in,Digital Out(5.1),Firewire(IEEE1394),Analog/Digital CD Audio in,Telephone Answering Device in,GAME/MIDI port via extension header,Internal IEEE1394 header and AD_EXT extension header to Audigy 2 ZS Internal I/O Drive(See Details)
External Box: N/A
Remote Control: N/A
Package included: See pics
Special Features: DVD Audio,THX certified,EAX Adva more info>
N82E16829102162 $89.00
$89.00

<b>Video Cards </b>
SAPPHIRE RADEON 9600 Video Card, 128MB DDR, 128-bit, DVI/TV-Out, 8X AGP - BULK
Specifications:
Chipset/Core Speed: RADEON 9600/325MHz
Memory/Effective Speed: 128MB DDR/400MHz
BUS: AGP 1X/2X/4X/8X
Ports: VGA Out(15 Pin D-Sub)+TV-Out(S-Video Out)+DVI Connector
Support 3D API: DirectX®9, OpenGL®2.0
Cable/Accessories: 1 Cable, Driver CD
Max Resolution@32bit Color: 2048X1536@85Hz more info>
N82E16814102305 $101.00
$101.00

<b><u>Subtotal » $1,948.14 </u></b>