4K Video Editing; My needs and wants; please advise

[iamchrisstone]

First of all, let me state that this is my first post on here and I want to thank each and every one of you for being part of and building some a great community! I have found what feels like an unlimited amount of information. You guys ROCK!

Ok, so I have been anti Apple for years (personal preference). Over the past 3 years I have ended up with a 2016 13" MacBook Pro, 2016 iMac, 3 iPhones, 4 iPads and even an Apple TV. A few months ago I finally realized that I am officially "that guy".... an Apple guy.

I used to do music videos and thinking of getting back into it. I currently do a ton of drone work and usually shoot in 4K. None of my current machines can handle it well as my old Super PC that I built in 2013. So, long story short, that leads me to wanting to build a Hackintosh. Wanting a super PC and wanting the compatibility with my other devices. Plus, I'm genuinely excited to learn Final Cut Pro.

So my needs and wants:
1) To be able to edit 4K video, possibly sometimes 8K video and I need it to load, play and render smoothly
2) Stability - If you don't have a stable machine, that can truly KILL productivity.
3) Space - my old machine I had many hard drives and a couple of RAID set up. Below I will post the specs. But, I'd like to set up RAID and have many hard drives if possible.
4) Multiple OS's - I'd like to run OSX and Windows
5) Longevity - I want a machine that SHOULD last me years in regards to power, performance and technology.

In my mind I'm thinking the i7 8700k, Nvidia 1080, 64gb ram (id love 128gb but the cost would probably be too much). Also, do these mother boards have the "c" port and thunderbolt and all of that, or do we go without when building these?

I'd like to keep this build under $3k if possible. If that's not possible, I can make adjustments or even spend more money if I must. BUT..... Would any of you be willing to lead me to a build that is posted that would fit these parameters or help me get a parts list together?

I'm sorry for my ignorance in this area. I really will have no clue what I'm doing, but from looking through this forum for months, I'm confident that every problem can be answered here.

And I'm wanting to run dual monitors. If I could run 3 monitors, that would be even better.

 

[luckyal]

I'm generally asking questions on this forum myself, but I'll try to address several of yours b/o the knowledge/experience I have.

1. Processing power - You need great single core performance mostly when you're working with real-time tasks. Gaming, Audio production and live mixing are some of these tasks. Very little in video editing is "real-time." The only thing that I can think of is timeline responsiveness especially if you're previewing material being processed through a plugin. So, you need decent single core performance, but not i7-7700k level.

2. Stability - Before you spend a dime, spend a lot of time reading this and other forums. Synthesize and organize the data you collect so that when you actually begin your build process, you know what to expect.

3. Storage - For your OS, Applications and plugins, I would go with a M.2 NVME Drive. I went with a 960 EVO 512GB (couldn't justify the PRO - cost to benefit just isn't there for me). For your projects that are "in work" I suggest going with a RAID5 set up but with 5 SSDs in an array. With this set up, I was able to achieve over 1.5-1.8 GBs transfer speeds on a Power Mac G5 several years ago. Personally, my strategy (considering NAND prices at the moment), is to go with cheaper SSD's that have decent warranty, and when one fails, have another cheap one ready to go so you can quickly rebuild your data. Essentially, I will treat those SSD's are disposable, throw away drives. Just make sure that you import your video to the RAID5 array and before you begin processing it in FCPX, back it up to an external FreeNAS, Synology, QNAP raid array. Once you're done with your project, offload the content to the external NAS.

Sidenote: I built a FreeNAS box with 48TB of storage for under $1500, ton's of used server grade equipment going on eBay for next to nothing. Your biggest expense will be your WD Reds, which BB recently had on sale for about $140. Set up an alert on Slickdeals. Shuck the enclosure, and get your red out (youtube is your friend).

4. If you must run Windows, get a second M.2 NVME drive (just make sure your mobo supports it), or just boot off of a USB live drive if all you're using Windows is for menial tasks.

5. Longevity - if you want it to last for a while, $3000 isn't going to cut it. If you're going for video editing in FCPX and not going to be gaming a whole lot, go for more threads and reasonable clock speed, and instead get 2X of the best Hackintosh proof AMD GPU money can buy, especially if you want to run multiple 4K monitors, and DO NOT neglect a solid external NAS solution. None of that drobo/buffalo crap.

Judging by your needs, the best example I can think of is a build by @kgp Good luck!

 

[iamchrisstone]

GREAT advice! Thank you.

Stability was huge for me. I ended up going with the fully maxed out iMac with the following specs:

iMac Retina 5K 27-inch, 2017
Processor 4.2 GHz Intel Core i7
Memory 64GB 2400 MHz DDR4
Startup Disk 512GB SSD
Graphics Radeon Pro 580 8GB
External SanDisk 1TB 3D SSD
(4) 3TB 7200RPM HHD's set up in a RAID 0 (for workflow) (when tested, it would read at 780 mb/s and write at 610mb/s)
(2) 27" LG 4K Monitors

I use online backup to store all of my extra files. I also have several external HDD's that I use to backup footage and files that I store after I am done with them.

Anyway, I hope this works for the next few years. The fact that I can add a different video card later down the road as an external if needed feels like a winner to me.

With this setup, anything you feel I can do to boost performance? My RAID will end up as all SSD's, but not at this time.

 

[luckyal]

With this setup, anything you feel I can do to boost performance? My RAID will end up as all SSD's, but not at this time.

I would say that you should be good for now. I think you made good choices with onboard SSD, 64GB Ram, etc. Just be very cautious about your temps. iMac's are sexy, but there's simply not enough airflow as it is. When you add dust to the mix, you will pay the price. As silly as it sounds, I'd place a decent air purifier in the same room and run it during your off hours to reduce air dust. It will go a long way at keeping your machine cleaner longer. Otherwise, once your warranty is up, learn how to open it up and use an air compressor and vacuum to clean the machine out.

Your weakness is the 3D SSD. It's a marketing gimmick. The chips are jam packed and generate a lot of heat, so expect a shortened life on your Sandisk. There's a reason why Samsung Pro line is much more expensive and it's because they're SLC. Once a sector dies inside the NAND chip, it's nearly impossible to recover. I spent a year listening to a podcast that is no longer in production, called MyHardDriveDied. Wealth of valuable information! Scott Moulton, the expert behind the show has a ton of YouTube videos teaching people to recover data.

With that said, your most immediate goal should be to set up a solid RAIDZ2 (RAID6) backup solution away from your workstation, have it connected over 1Gbps at a minimum (I recommend 10Gbps), set up Time Machine backup job to run during off hours, and on the FreeNAS itself, schedule it to run cron jobs, data scrubs, and data snapshots regularly. You will catch data corruption when it happens, and IT WILL happen. I'm sure you have pictures where half an image is missing/pixelated. For any archived footage or material you absolutely can't stand to loose, pay for an offline backup service or set up another FreeNAS box at your old folks' house and sync your FreeNAS over iSCSI.