I'm looking into a building a new editing rig in the next few months and I had a few inquires. Read through some forum threads already, but still don't have a complete answer, so I'll multi-question....

So basically I had my heart set on Windows XP Professional (64-bit edition) and benefiting from it's expanded per program memory access capabilities. Alas however, I just realized that I can't find any video editing cards (as in cards comparable to the Matrox RTx2) that have any 64-bit XP drivers. So my question is, are there -ANY- video editing cards with 64-bit drivers... even bad ones :p

My second question is more of a need for validation then a question.. buy anyhow... I plan to run duel quad-core Xeons (plenty of CPU power) and as much RAM as I can actually utilize. I will be using the full line of Adobe applications.. but the primary purpose of the new rig is to speed up my workflow. Now.. considering multi-track editing and aggressive color correction is the slowest thing in my workflow, would everyone pretty much aggree I shouldn't forsake an editing card like the Matrox and go 64-bit instread, because the increased video processing capabilities I get from the editing card should probably far outweigh the performance increase I get the extra RAM accessibility?

Again.. high end duel quad-core Xeons.. at least 4GB RAM.. SCSI drives. So everything else is up to spec. So the basically, again, I'm weighing the benefit of each Adobe program being able to address.. what is it.. 3GB or 3.8GB of memory each.. while using 64-bit OS (do I got that right?) versus the power of an editing card (particularly the acceleration of color correction). So definately the Matrox right?


Also.. last question... I know supposedly Premiere 2.0 and up has extended usability of the GPU to accelerate rendering. My question is HOW much does it utilize the GPU (how much of a performance gain) and on what operations. Also, goes After Effects CS3 do so as well? What I'm basically aiming at is How important is the video card gonna be to me (especially if lets say I don't have a Matrox) and what specs on the video card are most important for the benefit of my Video Editing and Post Production in Premiere/AE.

~THanks
Mike

Also... can (with effort) the /3G switch option work for XP 32-bit running the Adobe CS3 production line utilizing a Matrox card, does anyone know?

--Edit ---

Also, even if there is no 64-bit compatible editing cards.. feel free to recommend other cards instead, anyone. I've also been a little fuzzy on how those editing/effects accelerator cards work on the technical level, so any light shined there would be also appreciated.

Check out BlackMagic Decklink or Multibridge. I have Decklink HD, and it has Win 64-bit drivers. I also think AJA cards have 64-bit drivers as well.

Bart, the difference between a display card and an actual video acceleration card are profound.

The RTX2 is a Hardware HDV/DV encode/decode card, premiere will have pretty extreme boosts in its abilities, however not everything is as peachy as it seems. Pre-rendering is still required on certain elements irrespective of whether you have an RT or not.

The BlackMagic cards you've mentioned are interface cards, in turn, next to zero improvement on actual performance.

Personally, with CPU grunt like the type Micheal mentions, I'd forego the RT2 and juice out the video cards and run 2 Nvidia SLI cards and have Premiere tap into those instead. Premiere will take advantage of this.

Upgrades in the future would also be easier as you don't have to conform the system build to Matrox RT recommendations.

Decklink and the other Blackmagic stuff actually looks rather promising. It's format support is certainly nice. However, it doesn't mention much in terms of Real Time or Accelerated effects that it supports.. that I can see... especiallt compared to Matrox. Editing in RL with my choice of high quality formats is nice... but how about once I need to do color correction? Does it have any benefits there.. other then increased range inherent in the better formats (colorspace, resolution, etc)?

Also, not to sound like a complete dunderhead.. but where doesn't regular DV via Firewire fall into plan with the Blackmagic systems? I do plan to do alot of analog capture.. but when I'm using MiniDV, do I just capture off any firewire port on my comp. Does it still accelerate my DV editing performance and if so does it use a proprietary DV codec and do I have to use the Blackmagic capture software/plugin.. or can it work (accelerated) with regular DV AVI.

~Mike

---- edit -----

In regards to the first paragraph... just to elaborate the question.. for instance, Matrox claims it can allow me to play an Adobe Premiere Pro timeline in realtime, with 5 tracks of regular SD video -WITH- color correction, as well as a some audio and graphics tracks. Can Deckling or Multibridge manage that? In other words, does it or any other cards for that matter allow for the hardware acceleration of certain effects and transitions like the RTx2 does (and lists with a large degree of detail on their website).

They are both just ingest/output cards, no acceleration that I know of. I think Matrox is the only hardware accelerator that is produced specifically for Premiere, although I myself had rather unfortunate experience of hardware conflict with my mainboard.

Blackmagic has its own codec, which does Uncompressed, DV, and MJPEG, but you can work with regular DV AVI as well. I don't know about AJA. I suspect similar.

Firewire is absent in Blackmagic cards, simply because you can use the port which you have in your computer.

After careful perusing, I've found that the various Blackmagic cards supposedly have some degree of Real Time effects... which I generally take to mean hardware rendered/accelerated effects... though I could be assuming too much. Their own website only mentions it in briefly and vaguely... although after searching some other sites, I've found mention of real time transitions, color corrections, etc... which can supposedly be even updated at times via downloads. I'm not entirely sure what to make of all that though... how the Matrox cards handle that stuff is made alot more clear cut... though I understand the main purpose of the Blackmagic boards is I/O as appose to acceleration.

Still.. they mentioned it.. so does anyone else have any info into these "real time effects" and any what the hardware of the cards might actually do to "accelerate" my editing/post production experience. It's pretty important for me to find out, because if it will juice even just some of my editing experience, with some hardware accelerated effects and such.. then I'm DEFINATELY buying the 64-bit OS compatible Blackmagic over the WinXP(32-bit) or bust Matrox.