So all components for my system upgrade are pretty easy to figure out..but a video card? I have been stairing at countless lists of specs for video cards, have been to the Adobe requirments section for CS5 and cannot find something that isn't like $500. All I want is a video card that allows 1080i output and can handle HD video from my T2i and isn't a million dollars. Something in the range of $100 or less?

Don't know about things less than $100, but $500 sounds as though you only looked at a very low end Quadro card or ones based on the GTX 580 chipset. Lots more choices than that.

The low end of workable CUDA cards will be those using the GTS 450 chipset and having 1 gb of RAM. (That is GTS not GTX). Last time I checked, Newegg had about 10 versions of GTS450 cards with prices in the range of $110 to $120 (US$). To use an unlisted card like a GTS450 with CS5 and 5.5, you only need to add a couple of words to a text file and save the file. Can you type "GTS 450" and save a file? (This is the so called "hack"). If not, if text files scare you to death, if you are intimidated by saving files, if you will lie awake at night in fear that you will irretreivably break your computer and destroy CS5 if you do this --- which you will not --- this is not for you. If you have those kinds of fears, nobody can reassure you and you need to spend more money to reduce your stress levels. If you can overcome the fears, you have a wide range of choices including GTX460 cards which seem to run about $160 to $180.

For a listed card, you could look at the GTX 470 (Newegg has recertified ones for about $200) and GTX570 cards (which seem to run around $300 to $350).

You will only need ANY nVidia card with at least 1GB of DDR5 RAM and a script found here Adobe Premiere CS5 and CS5.5 Video Cards with CUDA Acceleration Mercury Playback Unlock Enable MPE Hack Mod Tip (http://www.studio1productions.com/Articles/PremiereCS5.htm)
I just bought a cheap Asus GT440 with 1GB DDR5 RAM and Premiere CS5 flies with DSLR files.

Here is a link to some of the lower cost options http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductList.aspx?Submit=ENE&N=100007709%20600030348%20600007779%20600007797%204027&IsNodeId=1&name=%2475%20-%20%24100&ShowDeactivatedMark=False

If you also play games get a better card, if not, anyone of these will be enough

I forgot about the GT 440. They run about $20 less than the GTS450. I've read some complaints that some of the 440 cards run hot and and that some folks think the cooling fans are loud, so it is probably a good idea to read customer reviews. I'm guessing that Spiros did his homework and that the ASUS card may be a good one to check out.

There have been some long running discussions here about the relative merits of various cards. The gist of the discussions seems to be that the higher-end nVidia cards (like the 470 and 570) are better when you edit mulitple layers and multi-cam projects but do not seem to offer a very large improvement over baseline cards when working with a single camera like the T2i. Here's a recent thread which discusses the GTS450, GTX 470 and 480, and some of the older "200" series cards:

http://www.dvinfo.net/forum/adobe-creative-suite/482804-best-graphics-card-cs5-5.html

Awesome!

Currently, I am running CS4 and will be soon upgrading (once finances allow). So what I am trying to do is just plan for the future. This card should be fine with CS4 for the time being right? And afterwards, I will have to use the so called "hack" on the graphics card I choose, correct?

I am not even really sure I know why the files need to be modified anyway..Whats going on with that?

I think I like the ASUS GT440: ASUS ENGT440/DI/1GD5 GeForce GT 440 Video Card - 1GB, GDDR5, PCI-Express 2.0, VGA, HDMI, DVI, DirectX 11, Dual-Slot at TigerDirect.com (http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=7280354&sku=A455-0440) From Tiger it will be around $80 after the rebate.

Thanks alot everyone!

The reason that you need to add the name to the file is that CS5 references this text list when it turns on hardware MPE. If you have a video card that is not on the list, PPro only allows software MPE. The original list has the names of the cards that Adobe actually tested.

And what exactly does MPE prevent? Just the hardware being recognized?

Oh and buy the way, What do you guys think about the AMD 6 core processor - Phenom II 1055T?

I think I like the ASUS GT440: ASUS ENGT440/DI/1GD5 GeForce GT 440 Video Card - 1GB, GDDR5, PCI-Express 2.0, VGA, HDMI, DVI, DirectX 11, Dual-Slot at TigerDirect.com (http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=7280354&sku=A455-0440) From Tiger it will be around $80 after the rebate.



This is the card I got. It doesn't seem to get hot at all and it's not noisy either.

For low to mid level PCs anything else would be overkill. You will gain more if you spend the extra money on more RAM or an SSD drive.

My PC is an i7 930, with 12GB RAM, 80GB Intel SSD C drive, 3 Samsung 1TB on Raid0 and two 2TB Caviar black.

For a higher end PC I would get a GTX550 but still nothing more expensive than that. I will probably do that when I upgrade to a six core CPU and 24GB RAM

Better spend the extra cash on something else.

Regarding the AMD CPU:

I'm not a big fan of AMD processors but premiere runs well on those six core AMD processors.Maybe a bit better than the similarly priced Intel processors. However Intel beats the 6core AMD in almost every other application.

1. MPE does not "prevent" anything. The file is like a guest list. If you are not on the list, you do not get in to the party.

"Hardware" MPE accelerates playback of HD files (including AVCHD), multiple layers, and avoids the need for rendering some things. When it came out last year, some folks testing indicated a 10-fold increase over "software" MPE in processing capabilities for these things.

2. As for an AMD chip:don't bother. Running CS5 with an AMD processor would be like using a Honda Civic to pull a fully loaded four horse trailer. You can do it but why would you want to? At the risk of sounding testy, please do a search. This question has been answered repeatedly. Here is one thread that discusses why:.

http://www.dvinfo.net/forum/non-linear-editing-pc/490016-amd-cs5-after-effects.html

You can also run CS5 with intel I3 and I5 processors. Again, why subject yourself to the limitations those chips impose?

Well Jay, I did search and that thread did not come up. Is it just that the 950 is pushing 3.06 and the AMD is only 2.8 GHz?

Why limit? Well none of us want to really, just trying to justify spending that kinda money in one spot is what i'm trying to figure out. I don't know this stuff off hand so i'm trying to talk to people who have experience with the hardware so I can get a better idea.

My list is currently..

CPU: pending...but i7 950 seams to be the general concensus.
ASUS GT440 graphics card
Motherboard..whatever comes with the bundle..x58 probably.
RAM: 4gb Corsair or Kingston..

Well, I just tried to do a further search for you and everything turned up with no results. Maybe the forum search engine is down at the moment.

For a good overview of what you need for editing H264 and AVCHD, look at Harm Millard's posting in the Adobe Forums: "System requirements for Premiere Pro CS5".

Adobe Forums: System requirements for Premiere Pro CS5 (http://forums.adobe.com/message/3610347)

This is a good explanation of relating hardware needs to editing projects under CS5. For a general discussion of video editing set-ups see this:

Videoguys Blog - Videoguys' System Recommendations for Video Editing (http://www.videoguys.com/Guide/E/Videoguys+System+recommendations+for+Video+Editing/0x4aebb06ba071d2b6a2cd784ce243a6c6.aspx)

This is a guide by DVinfo sponsor Videoguys. (They do sell some graphics cards but do not sell systems or other components.) Here is another thread with a long discussion of what to get/build for running CS5:

http://www.dvinfo.net/forum/adobe-creative-suite/493902-need-sage-advice-getting-right-cs5-pc-2.html


Regarding your specific question about clock speeds: the issue is not clock speeds but utilization of cores. Specifically, hyperthreading (sometimes referred to as SSE 4.1). You need hyperthreading to be able get many of the advantages of the upgrade to CS5. WIthout the hyperthreading, systems with Intel i/3 and i/5 chips and systems based on AMD processors will be much slower with AVCHD and H264 formats, and will take muccchhhh longer to transcode for delivery formats. Do you understand that AMD lacks support for the hyperthreading that CS5 apps use for rendering and encoding? That is why they are not generally recommended for CS5.

Also, for the same reasons, I would strongly suggest you get at least 6 gb of RAM (8 gb if you go for an I7/26000 "Sandybridge" system). 12 gb is something of a sweet spot for CS5 and would be better if the budget will allow it. If you are running Vista 64 or Win 7 Pro --- do not even consider a 32 bit version of Vista or Win 7 because CS 5 will not run at all on a 32 bit OS --- you pretty much need the whole 4 gb for the OS, alone. I remember a thread where somebody was complaining about it taking 11 hours for him to render and transcode a 35 minute timeline from CS5.

Of course, it is physically possible to run CS5 on a 4 gb system. Heck, there are people who have claimed to have been very happy running CS5 to edit DSLR footage on a 4gb laptop with a dual core processor and an ATI card and doing everything from the 5400 rpm system disk. Different strokes, as they say.

Jay, thank you for finding all of that for me. It is greatly appreciated.

From Harm Millard's explanation, I am looking at the following:

CPU- i7 950. Why? Hyperthreading and L3 Cache of 8. Pretty self explanitory..

RAM - Minimum of 6 but will go to 8 in the future. i'm thinking 2x Corsair Vengeance 4GB DDR3 PC12800

Motherboard x58..the i7 comes with this bundle.

GT 440 Graphics card.

My comp now already has a 500g HD and a 1tb external, H50 water cooler and a 600 wat power supply.

Power supply seems adequate. That is a thing that some people overlook. Good that you checked.

Is the 1 tb external drive an e-SATA?

If it is a USB, hopefully it is one that spins at 7200 rpm and has its own power supply. (The little HP "Passport" and other such USB drives are too slow to be of much use in video editing.) Even if you have a powered 7200 rpm USB drive, I still recommend getting an additional internal SATA drive to use for your T2i media and projects. My experience is that USB drives which worked fine with SD video, can be okay with single tracks of HDV but become problematic for editing and transcoding AVCHD and H.264 file unless you are working on very, very short projects. Mind, using a USB drive won't wreck any projects, but working with them can result in annoyances such as projects slowing wayyyyy dowwnnnn and sometimes random playback difficulties. Basically, you want a SATA drive with a large cache and 7200 rpm rotational speed. Last time I checked, Hitachi 1 tb Deskstars were running about $59 each. I've used Hitachis without problem for several years and Videoguys recommends them, but most brands are pretty good. (Always a good practice to check the reviews at NewEgg.) These kinds of drives generally are priced in the range of $60 to $70 each (US$) right now. It usually is not a great budgetary stretch to add one of these, and the "bang for buck" benefit ratio is very high with CS5.

Since you've read Harm Milaard's helpful guides, you no doubt know about the benefits of adding two SATA drives. You've also read about the alternative of combining them into a Raid 0. So, no need for me to repeat that information here.

For RAM, 6 gb will get you functional. For your future upgrade, you may want to save up for expanding to 12 gb rather than 8. You will be using triple channel RAM. There's a rule of thumb that even multiples of 3 (that is, 6 gb, 12 gb, 24 gb) are best.

you would be far better off with the 2600k than the slower 950

Scott
ADK

An I7-2600k (and make sure it is a "K") processor seems to perform very well for editing with CS5. These are also referred to as "Sandybridge" systems. I had mentioned them above as a good basis for a budget CS5 editing system. Scott is making good points.

Scott has reported testing in other threads (and others have confirmed) showing that current Sandybridge I7/2600k systems can do more with less RAM than systems using I7-950 CPUs on an X58 mobo. Out of the box. I7/2600K systems surpass non-overclocked I7/950 (and higher) systems in editing tasks. For what Terry wants to do, he would not go wrong if he chose a Sandybridge system over a i7/950-X58 system.

However, simple economics may favor the I7/950 for Terry. I see three factors at play:

(a) Terry is already planning on working with the minimum amount of RAM (so no savings there);

b) I7/950 CPUS are going for about $260 at NewEgg while I7/2600k CPUS are running about $315 (a price difference that basically covers the cost of a second internal SATA drive for his new system);

and (c) the last time I looked, the prices for both 1155 (Sandybridge) and 1366 (X-58) mobos seemed to be clustering around $200.

These things are subject to commodity pricing and can vary week by week. Since Scott is building systems, maybe he has some more up-to-date information on pricing than I do? Maybe Terry already looked at the current pricing?

HI Jay,
your pricing is pretty much dead on. and while i am all about saving money for clients i have to question having to be concerned about $50

for a few $ more he can have a considerably faster system.
for me the X58 platform is dead unless doing heavy animation (6/12 core vs 4/8)

FYI the 950 and 960 are pretty much the same price as well..

Scott
ADK

I agree that a I7/2600k system is preferable for a budget system if all other things are equal.

They may not be equal.

Anyway, Terry cannot go wrong with either CPU. The actual difference in actual PPro CS5 editing performance between and I7/950 and an I7/2600k --- again, Terry, remember that "k" --- is far less than, say, the difference between working in CS5 with an I7 and working in CS5 with AMD processor. Whether the economics of a tight budget favors the 950 over a 2600k is something that can vary from week to week and from vendor to vendor.

For example, it would seems that an I7/950 mobo bundle should cost less than an I7/2600k simply because the I7/950 CPU costs less (at least this week) than the i7/2600k CPU costs. However, bundle pricing may be different. Maybe Terry can get an I7/2600k bundle for the same as or less than or close to the price of his i7/950 bundle? In those cases, the I7/2600k would be the better buy.

Assuming, of course, that the mobos included in bundles would be a good buy. If the reviews/customer comments show a lot of problems with the mobo included in the bundle, then that deal is "a bad deal" and should be avoided. You might find "good" I7/2600k bundles are less than "good" I7/950 bundles or vice versa.

My point about the $50 came because Terry seems to be working with a very tight budget. One thing that jumps out at me is that Terry is buying the absolute minimum amount of RAM. He says he wants to edit DLSR footage from his T2i and will be using an external drive for his media files. If his external drive is a USB drive, I think he will get more benefit from adding an internal SATA drive for media than he gets by paying extra to move from an I7/950-X58 system to an I7/2600k-1155 system. (But, it may be that he does not need to pay extra, though?) If his external drive is an e-Sata, he may till get more of what he wants from CS5.5 by adding another internal SATA drive.

If he has to make that kind of choice. Maybe he does not. Maybe the economics go the other way when he looks at "Sandybridge" bundles?

Hey Jay, Sorry it took me so long to get back to you..

I do have an external drive with eSATA. I also have an internal that runs 7200rpm, though its 500gb.. But I did that to RAID 0 two 500gb drives. So another matching drive is in the budget as well. This was all bought with attention to future planning...I had to finance running off to another country for awhile and just now got back to my system.

You're right. My budget is tight..but I am making it that way on purpose, bassically to get this kind of dialogue going to see what IS usable..and what is not. So far, we have been discussing some very usefull things to consider when building an editing system. I could have just posted that I wanted to build an editing system, what do I need? and everyone would have posted a long list of hardware and not explain why I need it...this way..we get an explination to boot. Which I very much appreciate you taking the time to do!

Right now I am behind the scene of everything I want to do..I am a loan wolf. Have been that way from day one simply because I have no one in a 100 mile radius that has any interest in film what so ever...or even any ambition to do anything other than work a factory and play house with some girl (haha). Only kidding...

Needless to say, I am moving. Probably going to be in a location near a film school (New York Film Academy), though everyone says film school is a waste of money when you could do it yourself. But I find that not aplicable in my situation since I can't do a thing without other people. So bassically i'm going for the connections. But for right now, I have to do something...so shooting what I can to build a portfolio is all I can think of..

Without a working editing system, I can't do a thing. I have the camera, I have the mics, I have built dollys (good ones not pvc home depo weekend projects) and I even built a 12' crane that is still in the works.

Anyway...back to the editing system...(sorry I went on a long rant)

The difference between the i7 950 and the i7-2600k bundle is $50 correct?
i7-2600k http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=165459&CatId=6982

i7 950 MSI X58M Motherboard and Intel Core i7 950 Processor BX80601950 Bundle at TigerDirect.com (http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=171571&CatId=4139)

With the GT 440 - $80

2x corsair Vengeance 4GB DDR3 sticks of ram - $65

and another HD - $80

I am looking at $675 total with the i7 2600k set up..

1. An I7-950 is definitely very "usable." My system is an I7/950, ASUS P6T Dv2 mobo, 12 gb RAM, GTX260. An I7-2600k would be "better" -- and probably $50 better --- simply because you will get more out of your 8 gb of RAM with it (faster encoding, etc.) The Tiger Direct page indicates that both bundles are overclock-capable ("unlocked"). Both come with ASUS boards and most ASUS boards have an "AI" function which enables some mild, automatic overclocking. Either way, the stock configuration of either bundle will be suitable for what you want to do.

2. 500 gb is fine for a system drive.

3. Do I understand that you want to combine your existing 500 gb system drive with a second SATA drive to make a RAID 0? Don't do it. Under no circumstances should you put your system functions on a RAID 0 that you will use for anything else. Actually, there is no reason for you to build a RAID 0 unless you are going to add two drives. There is no real benefit to be gained from having your system run from a RAID 0. As a practically matter, it would not speed things up to any noticeable degree and would not be worth the hassle. As others have explained, using a RAID 0 for both a system drive and media editing creates a bad bottleneck that seriously slows down your system to the point of being unusable for editing. Far better to simply add a second internal SATA drive. A Raid 0 could be worthwhile if you left your system drive as is and added two more SATA drives and made the RAID 0 out of them. If you added two 500 gb SATA iii drives, you would have a 1 TB RAID 0 with significantly greater throughput and a noticeable increase in speed. You could render from that out to the e-SATA drive for your DVDs or HD files. For what you are doing, and with your budget, you are better off adding an internal SATA drive and using it in combination with your e-SATA drive for the media files.

4. I'm guessing that you will be using the same computer case. Most video cards (including your GT440) are pretty long compared to what used to be common. Check the measurements and case space to make sure it will fit your current case when you get the new motherboard installed.

Thanks alot Jay!

Hey 2 more questions if I still have your attention..

Can I mix PC ratings of ram? like 10666 with 12800... I am sure the answer is no but I thought i'd ask anyway..

Also..Do I need to have CS4 installed on my computer to upgrade to CS5? or do I even need CS4 to purchase the upgrade?

Thanks!

1. Can you mix? In theory, yes, but you probably should not mess with this. It is possible assuming the two types have the same operating specs and settings (e.g., voltages, CAS Latency, etc.) The computer should throttle down to the lowest stick's capabilities. In theory. As a practical matter, the mixing you asked about can be a can of ever moving and shifting worms. You might actually wind up slowing things down and diminishing capacity in undesirable ways.

2. CS4 does not need to be installed for installing an upgrader's version of 5 or 5.5. CS5 and 5.5 are each a major install. They do not overwrite prior CS versions. Instead, they install alongside the prior versions. In theory, one could have and run CS 2, 3, 4, and 5 after installing 5.5.

You will need to have your CS4 serial numbers etc. to hand because an upgrade version will ask for them during installation. If you have a boxed disk set for CS4, the numbers will be on the case. If you have a download version of CS4, check your Adobe e-mails or go to the Adobe web site and log-on on to your "My Account" to find the numbers.

Well I had a downloaded version...of which I thought would have been fine..but apparently Adobe doesn't think so and is asking for verification of which I do not have..All I had was a burnt CD that someone installed on my computer for me. It worked just fine..untill I did a reformat.

I'm a little confused about your situation. I gather you have hit on something distressing, but I'm not quite sure what it is that got formatted and why you cannot log-on to Adobe's web site and find your serial numbers.

Is this a case where you completely reformatted your existing system drive so you can no longer call up CS4? (If you could call up CS4, you find your old serial number). Did you, maybe, decide to do a clean install of Win 7 for moving to CS 5.5, and completely wipe out your system disk? And, you do not have make any back-ups that you could use to restore your previous OS and applications? (If I'm wrong, then you have some obvious solutions such as restoring your previous installation and copying the serial numbers before starting over.)

Or, is this a situation where you had somebody build you a computer and had them install and activate everything, including CS4, and then, at some later time, you had to reinstall everything but cannot do it now? If that is the case, this should not be a problem. Your copy should have been activated on your computer and registered to you. even if somebody else did it, Adobe will have an online record of serial downloads and serial numbers. If your installed registered it to themselves, you can have them do this, You go to Adobe's site, go to "my account" (creating a log-on and account if you haven't already done so), and check into orders to find out the serial number for your copy of CS4. If somebody else did the activation and registration for you, you may need to have them do this for you or provide you with the serial number and activation key.

Or, did you reformat on the DVD with the CS4 install files? If so, this does not matter unless you are trying to reinstall CS4. In that case, you will need the install activation info from Adobe's "my account" if your installer did not write it down for you. It does not matter that somebody else downloaded the CS4 software. If your copy is registered to somebody else, you will need to have them change ownership to you. Unless the DVD was a mirror image of your Adobe files, the install files on a DVD will not have the information that CS5.5 needs to properly install. The activation key/serial number should have been written on the CD/DVD you have or else you need to retreive it from whoever installed it for you or from Adobe itself.

In the meantime, I gather that 5.5 will give you a fully functional 30-day trial period so you can be working as you try to straighten things out.

Hey Jay, Sorry for the late reply...I hadn't seen your reply until now.

I purchased the GT440, 8gb of ram and the i7 2600K. Everything works great. However...

Apparently I had a "pirated" copy of CS4 master collection. I had my friend install the program on my computer but come to find out he used a CD Key loader... Therefore I do not have a CD key. I am a little confused on what my options are now because I think that the program is legit..but I just do not have a CD key. I have the program saved on my external.

I still am not clear about what has happened. You copied something to your external drive. Did you copy the CS4 downloadable installation files or did you copy an actual installation? If your external drive has the installed files, can you still run your CS4?

If you still have a functioning copy of CS4, you should be able to find the product key by clicking "Help-->about." If you still have your previous operating system installed someplace, you can probably find the product key in the Windows registry. (If your a leery of going into the old registry, google for software to recover product keys from the registry. There are several free or testable programs out there.)

I am mystified by your saying that your "friend" provided a a "legitimate" copy of CS4 but used a "key loader." A "legitimate" copy could be downloaded from Adobe's web site. The download is indeed Adobe's program and "legit" in that sense. However, until you have an Adobe product key, you have only a demo version and it functions for for only 30 days. If your friend gave you a hacked product key that bypassed Adobe's activation and registration process, you do not qualify for the upgrade version of CS5 and you will not be able to install it.

If your friend's CD Key Loader hacked activation, your choices are: (a) buy a legit copy of CS 5.5, maybe even just the PPro package (which is PPro and Encore) or (b) buy something else that is less expensive such as Vegas or Edius.

Oh, and one other option. If you are enrolled in a college or university, you probably qualify for educational discounts which can be as much as 80% off list price. See, for example,

Adobe Creative Suite 5 Student and Teacher Editions (http://success.adobe.com/en/na/sem/products/studentandteachereditions/design.html/?sdid=FXNQO&skwcid=TC|22183|adobe%20education||S|b|6153760102)

...Yeah..So what i'm saying is that its a legit copy..he just used a CD Key Loader to bypas it. I thought he had a legit CD key and everything so I was just going to upgrade from there. But I guess I can't.

Not much of a friend, when you think about it.

Andrew