Better processor or graphics card for video editing

[vtwiz]

Hi all,

About to jump into the world of the Hackintosh from a 24" iMac.

This Hackintosh build will primarily be used for video editing using FCPX or Adobe Premiere/AE. I mainly shoot on the Canon 7D and GoPro cameras as well as cameras that shoot AVCHD. I don't do any 3D video/graphics work just shoot, edit, simple 2D effects and grade in AE.

I understand now that a lot of the rendering of video in new software editors can be handled by the graphics card. Given my budget of around $1000AUD for a HackPro type system (not including monitor) i can either go for the latest Intel i7 3.5Ghz processor and a GeForce GTX640 or should I look at a cheaper Intel i5 chip and upgrade the graphics card?

Also, forums are usually places that people head to to sort out their problems and so reading the Video thread results in hearing lots of stories about the issues people are having with their Hackintosh's. Are many of you using your Hacks for video editing in a trouble free way?

Would love to hear from you all!

Cheers

 

[TheAquired]

hi
I use my hackintosh for Video editing and I havent experienced any trouble. Its not the fastest thing in the world, but it most likely has mostly to do with my hardware. If I were you I would get a motherboard that works natively with OSX. I have a gigabyte Z77 UD5H and its awesome. As for the graphics card vs CPU.. I think a good processor is definitly needed. And for video I would go with an i7 because it has hyper threading, but whatever you do. Get a card better than the GTX 640.

That is some seriously low end stuff. A GTX 660 or 660Ti is a much better option. If thats too much, look at a 560 or even better, a 570. get a x60 or x70 series card though. anything less, even the 650 is pretty darn weak.

Just be clever and see how you can keep the price down on everything else and make sure you havea motherboard that will work well, a good enough CPU and a strongish GPU. you get some cheaper i7s that will still do you very well. I'm not sure which i7 you were looking at, because theres a lot of different ones. I got the 3770k cause its a very good one. but if your going to be stuck because of money. Get an i5 and a better GPU. no doubt. (especially considering FCPX can use a GPU for background rendering).

Hope this helps!

 

[kpro]

Hi vtwiz,

I also use my Hackintosh(s) for audio and video editing. When I first started with video editing, I thought that a fast processor and lots of RAM would make things go faster. Over time and experience I realized that the best way to speed things up are with fast HDDs or SSDs or both. Though the i7 variant of Intel's Core line up is very fast and efficient CPU, if your bottle neck is Input/Output, it won't make a difference. The same is true for using GPU compute, if the I/O is slow then the whole system will be slow.

Since you mention that you will only be creating simple 2D effects, you might want to consider a cheaper i5 chip and cheaper Nvidia GPU and spend the savings on a RAID array of HDDs or SSDs. Editing video actually doesn't use a lot of compute power, just I/O bandwidth (unless you are editing in the compressed H.264 codec and not re-coding your footage to ProRes). Though getting the best of the best never hurts and I always recommend to get the best hardware you can afford.

I have edited many documentaries and short films using my Hacks and never once have had an issue. I am so confident with the systems that I am now editing client films with them. Most of the problems that occur with Hacks is when a Hack deviates from the recommended builds/parts. Feel confident that any tonymac recommended build will work just fine.

Hope this helps and welcome to the community.

 

[billaridoo2]

I back kpro. Been editing on muultiple platforms and all sizes and shapes of machines now for 12 years. Currently I'm running a TonyMac-guided HacK'n'Mac as secondary editing station - i5 3750, 32Gb RAM, 128Gb SSD = 2x 1Tb scratch drives and my trusted old XFX GTX 285, the GPU picks up natively in all Adobe suits for CUDA support. Premeiere Pro HD video editing, After effects, Photoshop, Cinema4D, Motion 5 all run like a Rolex on the machine( most of the time simultaneously).

Speed = 1.) Separate rendering(scratch) SSDs, 2) Seperate media & cache drives, 3) fast OS SSD. Only then can you look at moving to a i7 CPU and more RAM. In the mix is also a good Cuda supported GPU.

The HAcK is just to do finishing touches in Motion 5 and creating scores in Garage band & Logic + I love the OS! My primary editing station is a Windows 7 64, i7 990x, Quadro FX 5800, 4 x 256GB SSDs and 48GB RAM machine. It is pushed every day with tons of multi-cam edits, MaYa creations and AE motion gfx. I'd have to lay down serious cash for the same supported machine in Mac, so the two current stations compliment the workflow, especially with Adobe's inter platform compatibility.

Buy wisely and try to make do with what you have first ;-) Us editors tend to love our gadgets a little toooooo much ;-)