How do I free up my PC while Prem Pro is rendering?

[Canon GL-2 Guy]

Since I'm not CUDA/MRQ enabled, it takes hours for Adobe Media Encoder to render files even though I have a decently speced machine. Yes, I know I should update my profile in that regard here. Sorry! Of course since the rendering process is occuring while CS 5.5 is open it automatically ties down the computer and I can't do anything else but wait for it to finish.

I thought AME was a stand alone application by now and can run seperately!

Please forgive my ignorance, however I need to learn how do get a file rendering and then be enabled to move on to the next task on the same machine while waiting for the processing to finish.

Thanks in advance.

[poisondeathray]

You can set the priority in Windows task manager to something lower for AME. This will allocate fewer CPU cycles to that assignment so when you do other stuff, AME will slow down instead

[Canon GL-2 Guy]

Well,

Further slowing down rendering times which are already slow to begin with is certainly not attractive!

So AME can not be launched as a "stand alone" app then?

I read somewhere that rendering could be done in the '"background" which allowed the user to do other things at the same time.

Maybe I'm losing it here.

[poisondeathray]

Yes AME is a separate application . In 5.5, you can render directly from PP, or from AME. Make sure you are using AME.

You have FINITE computing resources. If you spend more cpu cycles on one thing, the other tasks will suffer.

It's like a budget. If you have $100 to spend on food, clothing and shelter, if you spend $90 on food, you only have $10 left for food and clothing. This is basic resource allocation but it applies to computers as well

CUDA is like a cash infusion. Certain effects , filters , transition and scaling are sped up and rendered by the GFX card almost instantaneously (So it doesn't impact your initial $100 budget, that can be allocated to rendering instead of wasted on effects and filters) . For heavy FX projects it can be 10-20x faster. For no effects/transitions projects, it's just as slow.

[turk690]

I read somewhere that rendering could be done in the '"background" which allowed the user to do other things at the same time.

Some new Premiere Pro users are overjoyed that they can now render while continuing editing stuff on the timeline they forget that resources are finite. While "background" means it can be minimized so you don't see AME it still consumes CPU cycles and hurts you. At least in previous Premiere versions where it was either you edit or render (export) but not both at the same time, we didn't have to face this problem. But you don't want to go back there, do you?
I said problem because it can be solved with a nominal level of brute force: Core i7-2600, Z68, at least 12GB of memory, and
an nVidia GTX580 with 1GB of DDR5 to CUDA your way around with. At this point is only when Adobe's touted "background" thing actually becomes meaningful...

[Canon GL-2 Guy]

All points well taken and clearly stated.

It would be nice to get CUDA capable ASAP if there were a justifiable reason to do so.

Basically, on average, all I do for a project is to color correct, adjust contrast and brightness, normalize audio, sync it to video manually and to slice and dice as needed. That about covers it. Nothing really heavy.

Based on the above, do you think CUDA is going to significantly reduce rendering time in a meningful way?

[Canon GL-2 Guy]

I meant meaningful.

Never was a good speller!

[jagabo]

Reducing the process priority won't slow the program down appreciably unless you are running some other CPU hungry program(s). If you're just checking email and web browsing you'll only slow the encoding down by a few tenths of a percent. Process priority is a scheduling issue. A process running at idle (the lowest) priority still gets all CPU time if no other process is asking for it. I run all my encodings at idle priority. If it wasn't for the blinking drive LED I couldn't tell anything was going on in the background.

[poisondeathray]

It would be nice to get CUDA capable ASAP if there were a justifiable reason to do so.

Basically, on average, all I do for a project is to color correct, adjust contrast and brightness, normalize audio, sync it to video manually and to slice and dice as needed. That about covers it. Nothing really heavy.

Based on the above, do you think CUDA is going to significantly reduce rendering time in a meningful way?

It will . But how much is "signficant" will differ between projects. If you are using CPU heavy effects, multiple layers, yeah it can be a LOT faster, easily 5-10x. Many of the color correction effects can benefit.

You can look at the list of GPU accelerated affects (also look at the links in the comments section)

http://help.adobe.com/en_US/premierepro/cs/using/WSE04091E3-79C1-4014-B4F5-681A65A9AC8...f419c413d-8000

You don' t need a $2000 quadro card either. There is a MPE hack that enables less expensive CUDA cards to work. But you need minium 768MB memory , but you can find some for <$100. There are several threads on different message boards that give more detailed information.

[Electric Rider]

Why not try also reducing system processes running in the background that you don't need? I use two methpods to run a slim system and as you can see from my specs, I need to, with this 300 dollar laptop. After I do these tweaks I can play high end games, record and edit HD quality (1280 x 720) video with added effects, just as well as my higher end 700 dollar desktop with dedicated 1 gig video card. I'm sure your machines are way better than both of mine.

Truth is Windows doesn't need much to run itself or your video programs. Even with a crappy CPU and GPU most bottlenecks are from memory leaks and tons of background running processes and services that are not needed.

I type in Msconfig.exe in the search bar and open it. Under general tab go to Selective Startup and uncheck load startup items. In the Startup tab click Disable All. Then go to the Services tab and type Hide Microsoft services. Now click Disable all. reboot. Your system will be screaming fast now with tons of resources available. But you can make it better by running a program like Iobit's Gamebooster or Game Fire or GBoost. Configure and run one of these tools to let it clean your ram and free up even more extra background processes you don't need. Now try to start and use your video software. If you get an error message saying you need a driver or services to run, go back to Msconfig and only enable those drivers and services you need to run for that software you will be using for that session. You may have to enable two or three software drivers or services if you are using more than one program.

When you are done working just re-enable the settings in MSconfig that you made and reboot to go back to normal.

In this way you tailor your system to have the most resources available for the programs you need at the time. You would not think I could do good video editing on a single core 300 dollar laptop with only 256 mb of dedicated ram from a on board video chip but with these tweaks I can and do it well.

[budwzr]

I NEVER use the computer while rendering. When you get to 97% and Explorer crashes you'll be like me too.

[-t40-]

This thread should be called " How do I free up my PC from Prem Pro " ;=))

[jman98]

I don't know anything about this kind of job, but can you not just let the renders run while you sleep or are at work? I use my computer a lot to do drudgery while I sleep like encoding videos.