Desktops forum: Desktop PC buying advice needed for editing home videos

Do not mess around with external drives in the movie business. It will drag you system down so slow, you wouldn't believe it? And don't fart around with you system main drive. As they techs above mentioned get the largest drive you can afford. A 1TB or 2TB can handle those movies with a great deal of ease.

Hope you well.

Mike H.

Sorry to be so late to the question. I have been doing this for a while and this is what I know.

You need to buy a new computer 32 bit Windows 7 with 4 Gig of ram and multi-core processor, the more the better when it comes to cores (which means you do not have to automatically rule out AMD), and laplink's software mover. The big time killer in video is rendering and rendering is processor intensive, so the more cores your processor has, the quicker the process. Also, do not buy an SSD drive. Too slow for the price. Rather buy 2 identical WD Blacks and run them in RAID 1 (mirrored). The performance will be almost SSD fast with more space for half the money. To avoid a new learning curve, use the laplink software ($40) to move your applications from the old machine to the new one, and avoid the Mac route if you are unfamiliar with the OS.

I went through the same deliberations you're going through. I wanted my hi def camcorder to work well with my PC and my software. I ended up buying a Mac (and a Canon camcorder). The iMovie software that comes with the Mac is more than I need, and the machine is more than capable. The combination of the Apple hardware and software, and free training classes, was a better solution/bargain than upgrading my PC and buying appropriate video software. You don't even need to be a Mac owner to take their classes. I recommend attending an iMovie class to see if Apple hardware and software will meet your needs. I still maintain a PC, but for photo and video editing, you can't beat a Mac. (Get at least a 640GB hard drive.)

While this advice re the Graphics side of things has some merit, there is no gain in using many of the Geforce 400 series VGA cards when using a Z68 chipset, unless perhaps with the higher end versions, which then means a need for a heavier duty power supply, as the top end cards are power hungry.

Given that video editors generally say that (prior to the Z68) integrated on board graphics are only suited to home media computing, I would have agreed, but now with the new integrated Intel, & from what I have now read with the new AMD version, these GPU's are more powerfull than the Geforce, 430/450 Chips anyway.

When I initially looked into this, over the past month I was looking at either a 430 or 520 card, on the advise of a computer shop, but a bit more research & reviews of the particular Mobo & the Z68 chipset, showed these cards to be a waste of money & would add nothing to what I was going to do, & for what the original poster is seeking.

If the need is for video editing primarilly, & then say photo, & then office work the integrated type is all thats needed, if the computer is then to be considered for gaming, we enter a different level again.

I have my parts & ready to assemble, & no VGA card, although I would say that IF, & that is the big question, & vagary in this IF, the onboard GPU does prove inadequate, then its easy to then add a dedicated card. The reverse of course is that if the on board GPU works, then I save over $100.00+ which can be used in more ram, which means a win.

a good source of info on this, since I only have slightly over 1200 videos on YouTube. And most of them are rather short. But I have been VERY happy with my six-core AMD processor and 8 Gbytes of memory running Windows 7 Home Premium 64 bit. The software package I'm using (Corel DVD MovieFactory 7) seems to use the cores and memory quite enthusiastically, processing videos FAR faster than my previous dual-core XP 32 bit machine with 4 Gbytes of RAM. You CAN pay more for a Mac or an Intel i7 if you want, but dollar-for-dollar, this combination seems to work quite well for video editing. Do check the software you plan to use, of course, to see how well it can use additional cores and memory over 4 Gbytes, but I think you'll do well with something similar. I have made this same recommendation to several other friends doing video editing as well as graphics editing, (using Adobe software products) and they seem to be EXTREMELY happy with the capability they got for the $$$ they spent.

Assuming your existing computer handles the VHS to digital conversion well, keep it. Spend a modest amount of money to upgrade the memory to 2G. Buy a esata or usb3 card for it. Dedicate it to doing your VHS to digital conversion.

Buy a new machine and set it up for editing.

Regardless of the specs you've just doubled your productivity as you can be editing on one system while the other is converting analog video for another project.

As to the specs... There are a lot of good recommendations in here but in general keep these things in mind.
1. Look at a Mac but consider you will need all new software plus the learning curve for a new OS.
2. Most high-end video cards on the market are geared for gaming. The software you spec'ed can't take advantage of them. Newer higher-end software can but most of that power is still wasted.
3. USB 3, thunderbolt, esata for your external drives.
4. Get separate internal drives for your system and your video files / scratch drive. External drives are great for storage and/or transferring files from one machine to another but you don't want to edit on them.
5. Buy the most advanced CPU/Motherboard you can afford. Adding memory, hard drives, etc later is relatively painless.

Check out Videoguys.com's recommended hardware they have some great info. You're probably most interested in their minimum and budget recommendations.

I appreciate all the specific figures. They'll really help me make a choice. --DB

Thanks, Stephen. Before I started doing video at all I tried 3 or 4 video editors (Win Movie Maker, Pinnacle, Premiere) and different levels of capture including Mpeg2. Did a lot of reading on the web and in a couple of "Video for Dummies" books too. I thought the AVI files came out better on DVDs and decided to work exclusively in that format, especially since my VHS tapes are clearly degrading (the oldest is 23!) and I want the highest quality archive DVDs I can get. So I only burn about 60 minutes of video per DVD (2 DVDS per VHS) which isn't that much trouble and virtually no expense. When I start doing serious editing I will, as you show, need a new machine. I admire your skill at upgrading but am just not confident I can manage it as well as you have. Thanks again, Dennis

Thanks! See my reply to ajtrek above and weigh in again if you have time. I'll certainly consider both of these Dell alternatives since money is always an object. --DB

Another tempting budget alternative and one I could do myself. I am persuaded that spending the dough now will pay off in the future, however. Thanks for helping me save $$, though! --DB

As told ajtrek and rebride above, I'm leaning this way with either HP or Dell. I like my Inspiron office machine and have wondered if the XPS would be sufficient for my purposes. Your post sure helps! Thanks, DB

As I've said above to others, I am considering Macs, but those Dell options sound pretty good to me, too. What's always held me back on Macs is compatability and versatility, but those may be lesser criteria since 90% of the work I'll be doing on this machine is video editing. It's nice to hear you like both Premiere and Final Cut. You sound like a pro! --Thanks, DB

You're right, and I've been keeping track of all the software suggestions. I tried a few before settling on Premiere Elements, and am used to it, but will check out Corel and the others mentioned in other posts. Thanks, DB

I'll definitely take your suggestion before I decide for sure. Am leaning pc at this point. Thanks, DB

I'm intrigued by the Z68 mobo but since I'm reluctant to buld my own pc (time and skill lacking) I'll probably go with a built machine that includes a card. Most have advised an ATI 58xx r 68xx. Thoughts? Thanks for the post, DB