The right machine for FCPX?

[Phil Gadd]

Hi Guys

After struggling with FCPX on my imac 21.5 2010 (intel core duo) seemed to take an eternity to add an effect or render, I decided to bite the bullet and order a new machine.

I went with a imac 27, i7, 8gb ram (i have bought 32gb to install), 1tb fusion drive and 680mx 2gb graphics.(plus an external drive)

Cost a few pennies this, will this solve my 'slow working' problem as I bought into FCPX from day one and need to turn around the videos/films I make faster?

[Dave Partington]

Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes.

We use various machines around here, one of which is like your 21.5" core 2 duo. That's the slowest machine we have ;)

Our 2.4Ghz i7 MBP screams compared to the 21.5" iMac, so your iMac 27" is going to scream too :)

Congratulations :)

[Phil Gadd]

thank god for that Dave, phew.... ha

hopefully will arrive this week, I also use a 2010 macbook pro and that struggles too, not worth swapping the hard drive in this though, probably better buying a new one when the bank mgr is speaking to me again :-)

[Sabyasachi Patra]

I use a 17 inch Macbook Pro with 8 gb ram. I bought it just a few days before Apple killed the 17 inch model. It works fine with FCP X. I have got a 4 TB G-RAID and things work out well.

And I am really happy that I am able to edit C300 files where as my editor who is stuck in FCP 7 is having a hard time. I had been repeatedly told that "FCP X is a bad idea" and now I am having some child like fun at the expense of FCP 7 guys.

[Phil Gadd]

The top of the range iMac I bought is actually having some issues with FCPX and the video card (2gb 680mx) random crashes etc

so whilst I love the interface, I am still waiting for the correct software to work with my top machine... im sure apple developers are on the case though :-)

[Steve Benner]

The top of the line iMac has major issues with titles which causes a system wide freeze. I have one and can attest to this. Really hope it gets addressed soon.

[Mathieu Ghekiere]

I'm sure it will be a great machine. One tip is to add some RAM.

I have an older MBP and iMac, both with 8GB RAM.
At work we have Retina Macbook Pro's with 16GB RAM. I find FCPX to be much smoother on these systems (and not only because of the RAM, but I think it helps).

[Phil Gadd]

Originally Posted by Steve Benner

The top of the line iMac has major issues with titles which causes a system wide freeze. I have one and can attest to this. Really hope it gets addressed soon.

Hey Steve, You are soooooooooo right.

In the first day my machine crashed 3 times on FCPX!!

I added another 16gb ram today (gives it 24gb) and so far its fine.

I have added to the list of concerns on the apple website

[Dave Partington]

Originally Posted by Phil Gadd

I have added to the list of concerns on the apple website

Posting on the apple web site won't necessarily help, you need to fill in bug reports or suggestions via the FCPX menu. That's a direct line to the developer team. The Apple web sites are not officially monitored.

[Phil Gadd]

Thanks Dave I did that too on your advice.

Lets hope they fix it in the next update

[Neville Hayes]

Hi all i have a problem which no one can help with so as it relates to mac i thought i'd try here. The problem is my mac won't see clips filmed with my Sony FS700 video camera AVCHD format when i film timelapse or when i tried 50p, everything else is fine. They just don't show up when i open import clips with FCPX or iMovie which tells me it's a mac issue seeing these clips. My mac is reasonably geared so i don't think that's the issue but here's it's specs 2 by 2.8 GHz Quad -Core Intel Xeon, Memory 14 GB 800MHz DDR2 FB-DIMM, Graphics ATI Radeon HD 5770 1024 MB, Software OS X 10.8.2 (12C60)

Thanks your help will be appreciated, Neville Hayes