recomendation for new machine

[kas187]

Hi, i have several questions,

1) What is the best way to find out system information i.e. motherboard, processor, ram, etc etc for an existing machine.

The reason i ask is that i have 2 machines one is the below
http://www.vaio.sony-europe.com/eng/products/desktop/rx405/bilder/rx405.pdf
and the other is a TIME computer which i had purchased about 4 years ago. I dont know the specs thats why i ask the above.

I'm thinking of buying or having a PC built dedicated to capturing, converting etc etc because my newest vaio machine has two 30GB drives which i know is much too less to do capturing & converting. Im thinking of having the old TIME machine stripped and have it rebuilt for my needs, although its still in good working condition, im not sure if i should go down this route.

2) What are your thoughts shall i
a) have the machine stripped and lose everything thats on it however it still is in working order
b) have a new pc built from scratch and keep the old machine.

3) What type of system would you recommend, im in the UK, lets say i have a budget for £1,800


thanks guys

kas

[holistic]

OPTION A = best value
FYI : i advise against the likes of SONY, DELL ,GATEWAY - to proprietary.

Ok we start with the age old question - Intel or AMD

My video machine is an Intel PIII-700 O/C to 966Mhz (ish)
My every day net surfing ,everything else machine is an AMD 1 Ghz T-bird

I prefer the Intel product for it's low temp overclockability BUT if you do not intend to overclock the go with AMD - better $$ value

That said : I built a machine for a friend with this motherboardhttp://www.motherboards.org/articlesd/motherboard-reviews/1208_1.html
He is very happy with its stability and I was impressed with its features.

If you don't need RAID , onboard audio and the like the look at some of the other board reviews.
http://www.motherboards.org/rank/AMD/total/motherboard-rank.html

The processor will of course reflect the motherboard . IE : P4 for intel
This one will cause a fight but anything over 1.5Ghz will be good enough. (You can always upgrade the CPU later - if you buy a good mobo)

As for RAM - it a personal thing but using a memory manager I notice I don't even use the full 384 MB in my machine (using XP-Pro) So 512 Mb ram should suffice.

OPTICAL DRIVES
Get a DVD/CDRW combo or if budget permits a DVD burner.

Don't waste money on a floppy drive .All new mobo's will boot to CD or external devices.

HARDDRIVE
Another topic sure to start a war.
If doing DV video then ANY of the latest drives will do YES even the 5200rpm ones.
If the board you get has SATA (serial ATA) then it would be wise to get one of them.
For analog ,consider a RAID setup. Again depends on how you plan to get the video on the computer. "RAW" avi can be over 25MB/second depending on resolution.

Use the old drives as storage for the encoded MPEG's.

VIDEO
Video card will depend on choice of "capture" and use for computer. Gaming will of course lead you to a more expensive card. A 64Mb AIW radeon will be ok for ANALOG. A lot of people here seem to like them. I have a matrox G400 dual head and it is ok for my needs as i "capture" (transfer) with firewire from my camera. I use the dual head feature to view the finished MPEG's on both my monitor and 46" projection TV. A handy feature.

SOUND
Whatever ! . Todays onboard chips are more than up to the task. Especially for listening to shitty MP3's.

.........this should start you off

][

afterthought : Due to the proprietary nature of sony you may not be able to even use the old case. Check into that !. Strip the floppy and CD drive from it also

[pbhalerao]

Kas,

I would also recommend building your own system rather than going in for a branded machine.

My machine specs can be seen by clicking at the 'Computer Details' button. They suffice for me for Video Capture, DVD-Ripping, Encoding, etc. I chose Intel because of low support of AMD in India. Holistic has already put you on the right path. My own recommendations:

a) Choose the best motherboard that you can afford. Asus, A-Bit, etc. make good mobo's. Check out the ratings at Tom's Hardware Guide
b) If you select Intel paltform choose the 800 MHz FSB processor. I am not much aware of AMD.
c) Memory of 384 MB to 512 MB should be more than enough.
d) Buy two hard disks. Keep the primary (O/S) drive and the capture drive on these separate disks. The first disk could be a smaller 30 or 40 GB/5400 rpm; the second should be a biggish 100GB+. Go for 7200 rpm for safety sake. Although 5400 rpm is also good enough, nowadays there is not much price difference. Dropped frames is more due to disk fragmentation than disk speed.
e) Let your power supply be at least 400W.
f) Cooling is essential. Have as many cabinet fans as possible. The cabinet front-side fan could be a blower type, while the read-side fan could be the exhaust type.
g) If this PC is not meant for gaming, you need not purchase a fancy graphics card. I have the ATI Radeon 7000 and that is more than sufficient.
h) You can also think about those Sony Memory Card readers; but you can always add it later on. However, do install a 1394/FireWire card.

Regards,

[kas187]

thanks for the quick replies guys and i do appreciate it, this pc is going to be strictly for capturing, video editing, etc etc, no gaming or word processing or anything like that. I already have a p.c that does that so it's pointless buying all the software again when i know im not going to use it.

kas

[holistic]

This talk of upgrading got me a thinking of my old "dream machine"
The Shuttle SN41G2
Now there is something better from the Shuttle folks and i am drooling.
The SB61G2 [ http://us.shuttle.com/specs2.asp?pro_id=283 ] got 4 1/2 stars on a few reviews i read AND it is in your budget kas187.

Be aware there is limited upgradeability BUT lets look back at the platform changes over the years. P1 (first gen) , o oh cannot use PII on that PII now lets change that to just **** the consumer and make it a socket (socket 370) .... noo no not good enough now we need a PIII with different voltage needs .... now a P4 .. different again thus need a new board.

Considering the above the motherboard supplied in this 'package' will be suitable for at least 2 to 3 years.

I am considering it now for my next machine (unless the bring out a better AMD board with the nForce2chipset.)

Just thought i would throw that in to confuse you. And i am aware it goes against my proprietary rant ,but hey , it looks cool ! Red ones are faster

][

[kas187]

ok people ive searched around and this is what ive managed to find, this is all custom made so let me know what you think... thanks

Processor
AMD Athlon XP 2700 (2.17GHz)

Case
ATX 300W Midi Tower + Fan (AMD/P4)

Motherboard
Abit AT7 MAX2 Serial ATA

RAM
512MB 333MHz DDR RAM

Hard Drive 1
Maxtor 80GB DiamondMax Plus9 (is this too much)

Hard Drive 2
Maxtor 160GB Plus9 8MB Cache (is this too much)

CDRom 1
DVD-ROM Drive 16x Speed

CDRom 2
Going to buy a dvd-writer, probably A06.

Floppy Drive
Not Selected

Zip Drive
Not Selected

Graphic Card
128MB DDR GeForce FX5600 Ultra ViVo

PCI Card 1
Novatech PCI 4-Port USB 2.0 Card

PCI Card 2
DV Wizard Pro FireWire Card

PCI Card 3
Not Selected

PCI Card 4
Not Selected

Keyboard
Logitech Cordless Desktop Navigator

Operating System
Microsoft Windows XP Home Edition

Software
Premiere V6.5 - WINDOWS CD

Monitor
probably buy this seperatly, can you recommend any, id a like a flat screen

Price :
£1,282.24 ex VAT

£1,506.63 inc VAT


thanks again...

[galactica]

Here's the LCD screen i just got. I love it!

http://viewsonic.com/products/lcd_vx2000.htm

not sure if its avaliable where you are since your spending money in £, but Id recommend it.

[pbhalerao]

Processor
AMD Athlon XP 2700 (2.17GHz)

Motherboard
Abit AT7 MAX2 Serial ATA

RAM
512MB 333MHz DDR RAM

Hard Drive 2
Maxtor 160GB Plus9 8MB Cache (is this too much)

CDRom 1
DVD-ROM Drive 16x Speed

CDRom 2
Going to buy a dvd-writer, probably A06.

PCI Card 1
Novatech PCI 4-Port USB 2.0 Card

PCI Card 2
DV Wizard Pro FireWire Card

PCI Card 3
Not Selected

PCI Card 4
Not Selected

Keyboard
Logitech Cordless Desktop Navigator

Software
Premiere V6.5 - WINDOWS CD

This is perfect.

Case
ATX 300W Midi Tower + Fan (AMD/P4)

Suggest 400W PSU or higher.

Hard Drive 1
Maxtor 80GB DiamondMax Plus9 (is this too much)

80GB not required for OS and programs but if the price difference vis-a-vis 40GB is not much then, what the heck?

Floppy Drive
Not Selected

Zip Drive
Not Selected

No comments. If required can always be purchased and added later.

Graphic Card
128MB DDR GeForce FX5600 Ultra ViVo

Overkill.

Monitor
probably buy this seperatly, can you recommend any, id a like a flat screen

Flat screen is good but do not go in for LCD monitor. LCD monitor does not reflect true video colours, I heard.

Operating System
Microsoft Windows XP Home Edition

Win XP-Pro is better in terms of features, networking, etc. Why not invest there?

[housepig]

if you come in under budget - you might want to consider a dual-monitor setup.

for working with authoring, graphics & video, it's super nice to have the project in one monitor and all your tools in the other...

(this also assumes you have the table / desk space to set it up! )

[kas187]

Here's the LCD screen i just got. I love it!

http://viewsonic.com/products/lcd_vx2000.htm

not sure if its avaliable where you are since your spending money in £, but Id recommend it.

all i can say is wow, looks tempting but way out of my budget, thanks for the recommendation anyway,

kas

[kas187]

I thought of another idea which can also be a possibility. What if i buy a new capture card such as the ATI All In Wonder Radeon 7500, and buy an external hardrive of say 120 GB, as my sony viao p.c already has dual drive 30GB each i think its also a possibility of buy the AIW card and an external harddrive and connect it all up, what are your thoughts.

What would i need to watch out for if i was to go down this route? Would i have to see of the card is compatible with the system, motherboeard (how do i find out what model is my motherboard) etc etc,

thanks for the advice so far...

kas

[flaninacupboard]

just thought i'd say, once you've selected the bits and bobs you want, www.ebuyer.co.uk is a good place to shop.
looks like you can get basically the same stuff (substituitng the mobo for the Asus A7V600, and chucking the USB2 card) for £812 including VAT. although i'd advise against the DV storm card, it does nothing a £30 card can't, but does come with a load of software which you won't use, because you can do all that stuff with freeware. unless you need a proper edit suite, in which case you'd be better off with something like premiere anyway.

[xtreemkareem]

I got a question. Right now all i have is a Maxtor 5400 RPM 80 gb hardrive. I'm thinking of getting a WD 120 GB 7200 RPM hardrive for capture. Though I have Ultra ATa cables, my mobo only supports ATA 100 transfer speeds. Would it be safe/optimal to use the 7200 rpm hard drive to capture/store captures and DVD-rips/un-compd video projects and to encode to the 5400 prm to store the final products (DivX, CVD etc). With the OS files running on the 5400 rpm hard disk, will that slow down encoding TO the 5400 rpm hard drive, or are the encoding aps loaded into the memeory by default? Just a few technical questions for optimal encoding/capture success.