Desktop Requirements for 1080p 128fps editing

[Deathwish]

I frequently need to edit short clips of video from action cameras. Frame rates of 120fps are becoming common. The video clips are usually less than 60sec. I recently was editing some footage of 1080p 120fps video & my current setup wasn't able to play the video in real time. Editing was near impossible.

This is my current setup:

Windows Live Movie Maker Version 2011 (Build 15.4.3508.1109)
Windows 7 64 bit
Intel Pentium CPUG630@ 2.70GHz
8GB RAM (maxed out)

Any suggestions on changing software? Hardware? for easier editing.

I am thinking of going back to my old routine of using "Video TO Video" to edit out the short clips I need & then just use Windows Live Movie Maker to merge them together & add music. This routine was much more time consuming but if it works, I guess it will allow me to put off purchasing new hardware but I also may need to edit 4k video (from GoPro Hero4 Blacks) in the future as well.

[sum_guy]

Personally, I"d be looking for workstation, Xeon processor, more ram, huge hard drive, or you could go with a Intel i7 processor based machine, but processor and ram and where to put the money. You can find refurbed workstations like this one under $600.

http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=8935927&CatId=120

[newpball]

Editing short HD clips?

Minimum Core i7, Core i5 is pushing it.

The fps does not really matter, if you deal with a 60 second clip at 120fps (I assume the 128fps was a typo) , that is the same performance wise as a 2 minute clip at 60fps or a 4 minute clip at 30fps.

[Bjs]

Good info at videomaker on 4k editing system requirements and component costs.

Gpu is where it's at so don't be lean on coin when buying that component.

[newpball]

You can find refurbed workstations like this one under $600.

http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=8935927&CatId=120

Surely you must be joking, that is old technology, a complete waste of money.

[newpball]

I also may need to edit 4k video (from GoPro Hero4 Blacks) in the future as well.

4K is currently prohibitively expensive. You need a seriously performing current technology Xeon solution for this.

[newpball]

Good info at videomaker on 4k editing system requirements and component costs.

Gpu is where it's at so don't be lean on coin when buying that component.

Don't know the person who wrote this article but he should fix the "Dual NVIDIA GeForce GTX 760M" that does not make any sense.

And actually I seriously question the point in having a dual GPU for video editing. SLI does not work with CUDA (and OpenCL).

[sophisticles]

And actually I seriously question the point in having a dual GPU for video editing. SLI does not work with CUDA (and OpenCL).

Professional grade NLE's like Adobe's Premiere Pro can use multiple GPU's just fine:

http://provideocoalition.com/f/story/adobe-premiere-pro-and-multiple-gpus

If you're building a video editing workstation for 4k editing, then a beefy high end cpu, preferably greater than 4 cores and a decent video card or two is definitely needed.

[newpball]

If you're building a video editing workstation for 4k editing, then a beefy high end cpu, preferably greater than 4 cores and a decent video card or two is definitely needed.

Well the test seem to indicate you are right. But I must say I am rather surprised by the test results. The results seem to suggest that doubling a GPU almost halves rendering time and that I think is completely non-typical and synthetical.

I must wonder if those tests were specifically constructed to make people believe that doubling a GPU halves render times.

[poisondeathray]

They only accelerate GPU tasks, like scaling, GPU effects. Actual encoding is hardly affected. Sure if you have FX heavy timeline you might get 100x speedup . But you can argue those are "typical" tasks - transitions, scaling, fades etc... those are all GPU accelerated. So the ACTUAL performance gains will be dictated by the project specifics

Decoding isn't affected by GPU in PP, so if he can't play back 128 fps on current system, he can't playback 128 fps with 4 K6000's ($20K)

[sophisticles]

Actual encoding is hardly affected.

There are plugins available for PP that enable GPU powered encoding:

https://forums.adobe.com/thread/1243687

What one user said:

This plugin works well on Windows 7 x64 with Core i7 @ 3.6 GHz. I'm using it with GTX 780 Ti.

My encode time for a 40 min 1080p video in H264 went down from several hours to just 20 minutes !!! Even better, CPU usage remains at around 15% during encode, whereas before it was stuck at 99% !!! So before, my PC was useless for hours during encode, whereas now I can still use it with the encode happening in the background. Not to mention the lightning fast encoding. Quality wise the result is perfect for me, as a hobbyist.

Here's a video of the plugin in action:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U3erDsiqzw0

There used to also be a plugin called Elemental Accelerator but it doesn't seem like it was ever updated to work past CS4. Sony Vegas also supports GPU accelerated encoding with a wide variety of codecs, I have personally tried it with a low end AMD 250x and a i7 4790k and can attest that the GPU is being used during encoding to all sorts of formats, including mxf, lossless, even with MagicYUV which was odd, mpeg-2, h264 and I confirmed it with both GPU-z and tests with the video card removed from the system and it installed and checking render times.

I have read that PP does something similar, that while there may not be an explicit encoding option that allows one to encode using a GPU that it implicitly uses it once a compatible video cards is detected.

Maybe someone with access to PP and the necessary hardware could give it a try and report back.

[poisondeathray]

Yes, vegas is different, GPU encode actually speeds video encoding itself, but it is full of problems and errors, and quality sucks . Just go look at the vegas forum or creative cow forum. It seems like every third posts deal with GPU encoding issues and the recommendation is to disable

Premiere does have third party plugins, but encoding isn't sped up "out of the box". And the old Elemental only worked with quadros

NVEnc produces terrible , terrible quality with lots of errors

It was mentioned above, but the current state of "GPU encoding", where the GPU is doing the actual heavy lifting isn't as good as CPU encoding quality wise. There are severe problems (mixed up frames, distortions, and overall lower quality)

Quicksync is probably the "best" out of them. Fastest on a Haswell , faster than CPU x264 on the fastest settings, but it too produces errors, sometimes randomly

[sophisticles]

NVEnc produces terrible , terrible quality with lots of errors

Quicksync is probably the "best" out of them. Fastest on a Haswell , faster than CPU x264 on the fastest settings, but it too produces errors, sometimes randomly

I admit I haven't tested it out myself but this is the first time I have heard anyone claim that NVENC "produces terrible , terrible quality with lots of errors", are you talking about the dedicated hardware chip found on NVIDIA cards since Kepler or are you referring to the old CUDA based NVENC? Every time someone has talked about the hardware chip I have heard that it's encodes are just fine.

Ditto with the Haswell QS, I have read that with the new lookahead and b-frame additions to QS that it now approaches x264 quality but is much faster.

In all honesty, it doesn't make much of a difference anyway, HEVC is slowly taking over just as AVC slowly took over from MPEG-2 way back when.

I'm more interested in seeing what the new NVENC found on the new Maxwell's can do with regards to HEVC encoding, maybe NVIDIA learned a few things about hardware encoders and the quality and speed will be good.

[poisondeathray]

I haven't seen any good tests on Maxwell with the new NVEnc either . Even if they improve 200%, it will still be "bad", so I'm not keeping my hopes up

I had huge expectations for GPU or GPU assisted encoding, and every generation they are just bad or mediocre. Even more serious problem than the quality issues commonly mentioned are frame defects - sometimes they will be missing frames, or completely messed up frames.

Haswell QS is actually worse in quality now, but faster. They made some changes to the API, even on the highest quality settings, it didn't compare to previous generations

But GPU is fantastic for effects, and especially 3D applications like modelling, 3D rendering. The limitation there is actually GPU memory. Even 12GB with a quadro isn't enough for many scenarios

[budwzr]

I bought this http://www.amazon.com/N550JK-DB74T-Full-HD-Touchscreen-Laptop-Aluminum-Body/dp/B00LO3K...s=n550jk-db74t a couple months ago. Is it any good?

NOTE: Qualified responses only please, no bozos.

[sophisticles]

Haswell QS is actually worse in quality now, but faster. They made some changes to the API, even on the highest quality settings, it didn't compare to previous generations

I think the problem may have been with the way the app coders implemented the QS encoder rather than the underlying technology itself. I find it hard to believe that a company like Intel, with all the money and resource it has, wouldn't thoroughly test it's encoder before releasing it to the public.

This test seems to agree with my view, it directly compares x264 with q264 on Sandy Bridge, Ivy Bridge and Haswell and granted only PSNR values where looked at but it does seem like QS, when properly implemented does hold it's own with x264, at least under some tests.

I wonder if anyone in this forum has a Haswell and would be nice enough to do some tests with q264 and x264, using SSIM and or short test clips so that we could see the results for ourselves.

There are some good quality clips here if anyone is interested in doing the tests:

http://www.elementaltechnologies.com/resources/4k-test-sequences

I would really like to see a comparison like this, with a Haswell with lookahead set to 100 and max settings against x264 at superfast, medium and very slow.

[sophisticles]

I bought this http://www.amazon.com/N550JK-DB74T-Full-HD-Touchscreen-Laptop-Aluminum-Body/dp/B00LO3K...s=n550jk-db74t a couple months ago. Is it any good?

NOTE: Qualified responses only please, no bozos.

For $1300? I certainly wouldn't buy it, I could build a much faster desktop for much less and buy a cheap tablet to keep it company.

[budwzr]

For $1300? I certainly wouldn't buy it, I could build a much faster desktop for much less and buy a cheap tablet to keep it company.

Hmmm... but finding a backpack to tote that around, and gas generator to run it, etc. would drive up the price, no?

But yeah, I notice the OP did ask for a desktop machine so I'm OT, and hijacking the thread. Oops.

But I would like to comment that realtime playback is rare in the non-Hollywood editing world, and not having it does not stop anyone's work. There are all kinds of ways to reduce hardware demands in your workflow. The easiest is just using a proxy, or downgrading the preview window.

Unless you need superfast rendering, I don't think it's worth the extra money to get realtime playback.