what is bette? Mac or PC for edit video?

[Element]

Hello I want to but new computer to edit my videos. I want the best computer for it.
I want to know if mac is better then the pc? and if I can use Premiere and PhotoShop on mac?
Thanks all.

[edDV]

With Mac you are mostly stuck with Final Cut Pro.

Premiere Pro is Windows only and Avid is mostly Windows now. There is still a Photoshop for Mac.

[lawnman]

Why wouldn't you get a Mac (INTEL) since it will run windows programs also. They run slower but they will run.

[Gillies]

With Mac you are mostly stuck with Final Cut Pro.

I wouldn't say ur "stuck" with Final Cut Pro. It's a fantastic program. And the above comment about Intel Macs being slower with Windows is false if u dualboot

[dcsos]

There are more application written for the PC
PC's are faster (I own an Intel Mac and its slow as hell), but crash more

But the bottom line is PRODUCTIVITY
if you are doing it for youself, USE A PC its faster despite occasional hair pulling sessions

If you ar doing it for others..USE the MAC, it doesn't crash, and always outputs correctly

[rumplestiltskin]

Premiere has not yet been released for the Intel Mac but Adobe says to expect it in early 2007.

Photoshop is still PowerPC, not "universal binary" (for both PPC and Intel). Adobe says "early 2007", as well. The current version (CS2) runs fine on the Intel hardware but, as it is running in emulation mode ("Rosetta" is what Apple calls it), it's not running at full speed. That being said, running it on a MacPro (two dual-core Xeons) is still pretty darn fast.

I think dcsos summed it up correctly: If you want it not to crash and to provide accurate, consistent content...buy a Mac.

By the way, I use Parallels for running Windows apps without having to reboot into Windows. It's not as fast as Apple's implementation (rebooting into Windows), but my Windows apps are available to me when I need them.

[edDV]

If you are going to build a dedicated editing machine (say for AVID, FCP or Premiere Pro) then reliability of the Mac or Windows platforms would be high. You would first determine the software you want to use, then choose the most appropriate OS and hardware e.g. workstation + I/O hardware.

Home hobbyists usually want more flexibility and want to run a variety of software. In that case, you would choose Mac or PC depending on the application mix that is most important to you, factored by the cost of software.

In theory, an Intel Mac can run Mac, Linux and Windows software, but the support and software costs of running 3 OS platforms should be factored into the reality. For me, it comes down whether a particular Mac program is critical. If so, then a Mac is needed for that person. Otherwise, a Windows platform will do nicely.

[JohnnyMalaria]

I think dcsos summed it up correctly: If you want it not to crash and to provide accurate, consistent content...buy a Mac.

Oh come on - the old "Macs never crash" myth.

http://www.google.com/search?as_q=%22final+cut+pro%22+crash

or:

http://www.google.com/search?q=%22kernel+panic%22+fcp

and (from the horse's mouth):

http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=106227

I have yet to have one BSOD on my current XP box. Some apps crash but that's due to sloppy programming.

The key to the system stability is using Windows Certified drivers, hardware etc.

[deadrats]

Hello I want to but new computer to edit my videos. I want the best computer for it.
I want to know if mac is better then the pc? and if I can use Premiere and PhotoShop on mac?
Thanks all.

if you're serious about building a computer who's primary task will be video editing you need to keep the following in mind:

as important as the OS is and as important as the hardware you choose is (cpu, ram, motherboard) even more important is the application you use and the dedicated harware to compliment it.

now it's true that there was time when Mac's were the bomb if you wanted to do video and/or work but that has since changed.

with the above in mind, here's what i would recommend to anyone that was thinking of doing any serious type of video work AND couldn't afford to spend 10 grand on a pc:

AMD or Intel cpu - entry level, 3800+/E6300 (avoid the temptation to buy a faster cpu, save that cash apply it to the coup de grace which i will explain in a minute)

ram - 1 gig of super talent (they make some good ram at a very good price) DDR/DDR2 (depending on what the motherboard supports, don't go faster than 533mhz, again use the couple of dollars you are going to save for the most important part of the pc)

motherboard - doesn't matter what brand, make sure you get one with a proven stable chipset, that means intel for intel cpu's, via for amd (if you can find an amd chipset board for a reasonable price, even better), make sure it has 1 16x PCI-E (don't need SLI) and at least one 1x PCI-E (if it has more even better)

power supply - make sure to choose a good stable power supply, the cheapest power supply i would recommend is a comp usa branded one (don't laugh, i have loaded their power supplies for nearly 24 hours straight and there wasn't even a hiccup).

hard drives - 2 western digital SATA 10k raptors, the biggest you can afford, one to read from and one to write to and 2 hard drive coolers.

sata controller card - i recommend against using the motherboards onboard SATA controller, buy a comp usa (no, i don't work for them, but i do have 2 of their cards) SATA add-in card and connect the hard drives to that.

the coup de grace - 1 Canopus FireCoder, costs less than $400:

http://www.canopus.com/products/FireCoder/index.php

http://www.canopus.com/products/FireCoder/index.php

comes with software and also can be used by more expensive professional grade software like EDIUS Pro.

i have seen these boards in action (i'm saving up some dough to get one myself) and if video is your thing, then this is the piece of hardware you want, it can do mpeg-2 and mpeg-4 encoding at full D1 resolutions and bitrates in better than 2x real time.

[Case]

sata controller card - i recommend against using the motherboards onboard SATA controller

Can you elaborate on that?

the coup de grace - 1 Canopus FireCoder

Sounds like a real time-saver!

[edDV]

I can agree with all except the dual Raptors. What advantage do you see over a normal WD 7200 RPM drive that will have twice the size for less money? I can think of few times that a video project is limited by hard drive speed unless doing uncompressed multistream SDI.

[jagabo]

the coup de grace - 1 Canopus FireCoder, costs less than $400:

http://www.canopus.com/products/FireCoder/index.php

often more than twice the speed of realtime in most cases

CCE is faster than that on a C2D E6300.

[OmegaSupreme]

If you want the best, look at what the pros use. When it comes to theatrical releases, there are basically two systems.

Avid (various flavors): pc/mac - pricey
Final Cut Pro: Mac Only - relatively inexpensive

[AntnyMD]

As you can see, the definition of "the best" depends on how long you're willing to go back and forth between camps with inflexible opinions.

So I suggest you buy _what you can afford._ Theres no argument when the credit card is about to be maxed!

[deadrats]

the coup de grace - 1 Canopus FireCoder, costs less than $400:

http://www.canopus.com/products/FireCoder/index.php

often more than twice the speed of realtime in most cases

CCE is faster than that on a C2D E6300.

the 2x realtime speed is for mpeg-2 and mpeg-4 at bitrates up to 15Mb/s, there is no way that any software solution, not procoder, not cce, not vegas with 3 pc's networked is going to touch that.

and for the record, i own a E6400 on a gigabyte m/b with an intel chipset and fast as this combo is, there is no way that it will ever do 2x real time mpeg-2 at full D1 and 9.8 Mb/s, just not going to happen!!!

[jagabo]

the coup de grace - 1 Canopus FireCoder, costs less than $400:

http://www.canopus.com/products/FireCoder/index.php

often more than twice the speed of realtime in most cases

CCE is faster than that on a C2D E6300.

the 2x realtime speed is for mpeg-2 and mpeg-4 at bitrates up to 15Mb/s, there is no way that any software solution, not procoder, not cce, not vegas with 3 pc's networked is going to touch that.

and for the record, i own a E6400 on a gigabyte m/b with an intel chipset and fast as this combo is, there is no way that it will ever do 2x real time mpeg-2 at full D1 and 9.8 Mb/s, just not going to happen!!!

NTSC DV to MPEG2, full D1, no audio, CQ or CBR, varies from about 2.3x to >3x:

[deadrats]

sata controller card - i recommend against using the motherboards onboard SATA controller

Can you elaborate on that?

sure. if you're doing any type of intensive I/O, either extended reads or writes, be it from an extended transcoding session or from heavy uploading/downloading you don't want to bog down the cpu when dedicated hardware could do the job just as well. dedicated hardware also aids in preventing data corruption from a write that went wrong (sorry, i just couldn't resist).

here's a perfect example: on my main pc, the one i'm using now, i currently have 1 dual layer DVD+/-RW, 1 500GB SATA hdd, 1 120 GB SATA hdd, 1 120 GB PATA hdd, 1 160 GB PATA hdd, 1 200 PATA hdd, 1 Comp USA SATA PCI Card, 1 Comp USA PCI ATA 133 RAID Card.

the optical drive and the 120 GB PATA are connected to the onboard IDE, the 2 SATA drives are connected to the SATA card and the other 2 PATA are connected to the RAID card as standard IDE hdd's.

with this setup i can defrag the 4 disks that are connected to the add in cards simultaneously or i can download 4 different 8-16 GB HD transport streams at max download speeds AND launch 2 instances MPEG Streamclip and encode 2 seperate files to Sorenson 3 with AAC audio without any slow down whatsoever.

[deadrats]

the coup de grace - 1 Canopus FireCoder, costs less than $400:

http://www.canopus.com/products/FireCoder/index.php

often more than twice the speed of realtime in most cases

CCE is faster than that on a C2D E6300.

the 2x realtime speed is for mpeg-2 and mpeg-4 at bitrates up to 15Mb/s, there is no way that any software solution, not procoder, not cce, not vegas with 3 pc's networked is going to touch that.

and for the record, i own a E6400 on a gigabyte m/b with an intel chipset and fast as this combo is, there is no way that it will ever do 2x real time mpeg-2 at full D1 and 9.8 Mb/s, just not going to happen!!!

NTSC DV to MPEG2, full D1, no audio, CQ or CBR, varies from about 2.3x to >3x:

very impressive, but the FireCoder does better than 2x real time encoding of mpeg-2 up to 15 Mb/s AND it encodes audio in hardware AND it can do faster than real time AVC with AAC encoding at full D1 at 8 Mb/s bitrate.

can the E6300 do that? can a quad core do that? even better, even if the cpu's could, can CCE do that?

even more importantly, a dedicated hardware encoder frees up the cpu so that you can encode at better than 2x real time AND still play your favorite fps or rts game or some chess or do some 3d rendering.

in the end we can argue back and forth, but what say we put this to rest for now. i will be buying a FireCoder sometime before christmas and at that time i'll be more than happy to post a full review with plenty of benchmarks and we can see how the E6300/CCE combo stacks up to a FireCoder.

[deadrats]

I can agree with all except the dual Raptors. What advantage do you see over a normal WD 7200 RPM drive that will have twice the size for less money? I can think of few times that a video project is limited by hard drive speed unless doing uncompressed multistream SDI.

the reason that a 7200 RPM hdd usually is sufficient is because most people don't use dedicated hardware, no single cpu setup. dual core or quad core, is fast enough to max out a hdd's capabilities. but that changes when you start using dedicated hardware, the FireCoder i recommended is capable of encoding AVC+AAC in full D1 at 8 Mbs in better than real time and mpeg-2 in full D1 at 15Mbs.

with that kind of encoding rates a 7200 rpm hdd just isn't going to cut it.

[dcsos]

Oh come on - the old "Macs never crash" myth. is DOUBTETED by JohnnyMalaria

Yes you notice no one took your bait
that because
..using your flawed technique of GOOGLE to confirm or deny "CRASH BEHAVIOR"

the Query about a WINDOWS CRASH yeilds
31,300,000 for "windows" crash




while a similar MAC search yields:
6,770,000 "mac" crash

[JohnnyMalaria]

You're the one who claimed - without evidence - that you should "USE the MAC, it doesn't crash"

If you are relying on the number of hits for a Google search to prove your point, then take notice that the results for Mac crashes are disproportionately high compared to the percentage of Macs vs. Windows PCs.

The OP wanted to know which platform - you gave biased misinformation!

If you use a Windows PC that carries the Windows logo, uses Windows Certified hardware, drivers etc, don't add non-certified stuff etc, you will have a stable system. Just like with the Mac - after all, Apple INSIST that you use only their hardware. And, my 'bait' simply shows that Mac users have experienced Final Cut Pro CRASHING their systems - not just program exceptions, but full blown kernel panics.

Cliched statements such as "use the Mac, it doesn't crash" don't help people reach objective decisions about what to purchase.

[rumplestiltskin]

Wouldn't touch anything less than a CoreDuo (or whatever AMD calls theirs). The performance improvement over single-core processors really is dramatic.

[jagabo]

the reason that a 7200 RPM hdd usually is sufficient is because most people don't use dedicated hardware, no single cpu setup. dual core or quad core, is fast enough to max out a hdd's capabilities. but that changes when you start using dedicated hardware, the FireCoder i recommended is capable of encoding AVC+AAC in full D1 at 8 Mbs in better than real time and mpeg-2 in full D1 at 15Mbs.

with that kind of encoding rates a 7200 rpm hdd just isn't going to cut it.

I encoded a 10 minute DV AVI file to 15 Mb/s MPEG2 and 256 Kb/s MP2 audio with CCE on my C2D E6300. Both the source AVI file and the resulting MPA and MPV files were on the same 7200 RPM PATA drive:



As you can see the conversion ran at over 4x realtime. CPU usage was only about 80 percent, so indeed, a faster drive drive or RAID setup might have sped the conversion up a little bit. But a hardware solution that ran at 2x would not be stressing the single 7200 RPM drive. Note that the 4x conversion rate corresponds to about 14.4 MB/s reading the DV AVI file and about 8 MB/s writing the MPA and MPV files.

On the other hand when I switch to a HuffYUV source of the same video (much larger than the DV AVI file) the encoding speed dropped to about 1x with the CPU running around 50%. So those working with HuffYUV or uncompressed YUY2/RGB video may benefit from RAID or RAID + a hardware encoder.

[lordsmurf]

Aside from the "Mac crashes less" bullcrap, I see some pretty good advice here. I actually use both Mac and Windows, and have for probably 15 years now.

Apple charges more than 2x the price for the equivalent that the same dollars buy for a Windows machine. For example, the laptops run about $2500 for a Windows machine that goes for around $1000, both of which have the same hardware specs.

If you're not all gung-ho fired up for Mac OS X and Final Cut Pro and DVD Studio Pro, it's hard to justify the costs. I really like all that Mac video software, for advanced pro editing and authoring work, but I can do the same editing work on Windows, better encoding work, and almost the same authoring work, and at less than half the cost. And I'm talking a $1000 or more, not a few dozen or even few hundred dollars.

So price is a big factor.

Both platforms work very well. Windows has more software, more specialized utilities, more choices for certain tasks (many encoders, editors, authorware, etc), and works fine. Mac is more for camera-shot work (not converting existing stuff or tv recordings), and advanced editing and DVD creation thereof.

So it all depends on what you do. If you're archiving old videos, Windows is a better choice. If you're an independent movie maker, you may like Mac, but Windows could work just as well for you.

There is no "better".

[deadrats]

As you can see the conversion ran at over 4x realtime. CPU usage was only about 80 percent, so indeed, a faster drive drive or RAID setup might have sped the conversion up a little bit. But a hardware solution that ran at 2x would not be stressing the single 7200 RPM drive. Note that the 4x conversion rate corresponds to about 14.4 MB/s reading the DV AVI file and about 8 MB/s writing the MPA and MPV files.

On the other hand when I switch to a HuffYUV source of the same video (much larger than the DV AVI file) the encoding speed dropped to about 1x with the CPU running around 50%. So those working with HuffYUV or uncompressed YUY2/RGB video may benefit from RAID or RAID + a hardware encoder.

i just downloaded the demo and tested CCE and i have to say i am shocked at how fast it is. it almost doesn't seem possible, i honestly think that if you were to have a "race" between a QX6700 encoding a DVD compliant mpeg-2 with either procoder or main concept's encoder and a E6400 (the cpu i use) doing the same encode with CCE, i really believe the E6400/CCE combo would win.

even more amazing is that raising the bitrate from 8 Mbs to 15 Mbs doesn't slow down the encoding speed. it's too bad that it doesn't support more input formats (know of any good frame servers for frame serving VOB's) and it's way too bad it doesn't encode to H.264. it also seems to top out at 15 Mb/s which is too low for mpeg-2 HD encoding (unless you have some really high quality source), but i will definately play around with this some more and maybe even buy the basic version (i.e. the one i can afford).

having said that, i still think i'll pick up a FireCoder, if only for the mpeg-4 capabilities.

[jagabo]

Even though CCE is fast and produces decent output (better than TMPGEnc Plus for instance) I don't really like the program. I use it rather begrudgingly. I frameserve to it with AVISynth, VirtualDubMod if I'm lazy.

The FireCoder does sound nice for AVC.

[ffooky]

Apple charges more than 2x the price for the equivalent that the same dollars buy for a Windows machine. For example, the laptops run about $2500 for a Windows machine that goes for around $1000, both of which have the same hardware specs.

Now who's talking bullcrap ?

[hiptune]

I used PC to start with and was very happy with ease of use, high quality, and cost. Vegas & Procoder never let me down. Tmpgenc encoder and authoring were wonderful and are a major bang for the bucks. It was fantastic, I have two Pent 4s, 2.4g, and a gig of memory in each.

But when I got offered my first paid movie I had to go out and get a mac quickly and learn Final Cut Pro in 5 days.

Macs do crash here and there. But I needed the Mac to go pro and get paid more for my work.

I really think it's a good idea to have both if you can afford it. Start out on PC, and move to Mac and keep both running. I like having two machines so I can follow a guide on one while doing the work on the other. May as well have a good fast PC on hand, and a Mac for the bigger gigs that can come your way.

[lordsmurf]

Apple charges more than 2x the price for the equivalent that the same dollars buy for a Windows machine. For example, the laptops run about $2500 for a Windows machine that goes for around $1000, both of which have the same hardware specs.

Now who's talking bullcrap ?

Oh please.

Apple hardware costs more than twice as much as PC hardware. The software is comparable, but only when comparing to mid-range priced Windows software. Lower end Windows software is much cheaper or outright free. There's not a lot of useful free Mac software.

Please stop with the Apple fanboy line. It's as bad as those Apple commercials, which are so misleading it should be criminal. Since you missed it last time, remember THAT I USE BOTH MAC AND WINDOWS PLATFORMS!

I value them both, but it's a much larger financial investment to grab a comparable Apple system. About $1.000.00 USD more, on average. I don't know about you, but $1k is a lot of money.

I get so tired of pro-Apple keyboard warriors that lie to people who are trying to choose between platforms. Facts are helpful, not the Apple PR spin.

I really think it's a good idea to have both if you can afford it.

I totally agree. Start with Windows, and if you need more later on, get the Mac. Basically, if you have to ask the question ("which one should I get?"), you don't need the Mac, it's for more specialized purposes. Very few times would I advise a person to get a Mac first.

It all depends on what is needed.

The original poster still hasn't clarified his or her specific needs.

[ffooky]

Oh please.

Apple hardware costs more than twice as much as PC hardware. The software is comparable, but only when comparing to mid-range priced Windows software. Lower end Windows software is much cheaper or outright free. There's not a lot of useful free Mac software.

Please stop with the Apple fanboy line.

Nothing remotely fanboyesque in pointing out that Apple hardware is not twice as expensive as comparable PC kit. More expensive, certainly but by a margin of around 10-15%.

If you're going to make such claims, back them up with evidence.