Anyone using Athlon 64 x2?

[Kevin James]

I'm looking to build a new editing box, the p4 is on it's last legs (mobo caps swelling, etc). I'm still tossing the mactel idea around, just not sure if I can wait. Has anyone (around here) built or used a 64 x2 for HD work? I am not doing HD at this point, but I know at least one of the companies I work with is switching over, so I better be prepared. I am curious as to performance compared to a dual processor standard setup. On paper and in reviews the x2 seems to perform extremely well, but it is difficult to find reviews addressing this particular app. Please feel free to comment on other dual core setups or other hd solutions that fall in the price range of mere mortals that you have experience with. Thanks!

[Edward Borden]

The AthlonX2 is a beast. Recommended. No specific numbers for HD work in particular, but I'm not sure that's necessary. Compatibility with specific video editing hardware is my warning though. In software-only workflows, or using hardware that is firewire-based, like Avid or Canopus, AMD thrives.

Multiple threads about this in the PC forum.

[Sean Livingstone]

Has anyone tried HDV with one of these? is it real-time with PP 1.5.1?

[Kevin Shaw]

My brother's currently helping me put together a dual-core Pentium D system with a SuperMicro motherboard which can take the Canopus NX card if I decide to buy that. It's nice to have the equivalent of 6 GHz of processing power in a standard ATX case, and we'll be testing it for HDV work shortly.

[Zack Birlew]

Oh good grief Kevin, it isn't the equivalent of having 6ghz (we'd be living on the moon by now if we pushed technology so far so soon) =D . It's more like having one of those dual processor setups put into one chip (quad processor setup if using two dual core Opterons). Currently AMD's Athlon X2's are the best you can get for video, there isn't support for four processors in NLE's yet thus making the two dual core Opteron setup I mentioned more for the 3D modeling folks.

The Intel dual cores are pretty sucky when compared to the X2's, they simply are performing better in overall performance. They apparently have some serious work to do over at Intel. If you want dual cores on the cheap, then Intel is for you, but for the current best performance, the AMD X2's are the best choice. Do bear in mind that the AMD X2's are $1000 per chip, so they're not cheap. Luckily, if you already have a current AMD64 Socket 939 system, the dual cores should work with a simple BIOS update (for me this is good but I'm waiting for price cuts and faster speed). I don't know much about Intel's current pricing but I know it's much less, more like $600 or $450 or something like that, for the Average Joe it isn't too cheap either. =P

For HD, these new dual cores are the Holy Grails of performance. What I would ideally do is buy a quad Opteron motherboard that supports dual cores and PCI-Express (possibly SLI capable) and get one or two processors for now and add the other two or three later when software has been multi-thread-enabled enough after Windows Vista comes out. Eight way processing in a four processor package, that would be nice. 8)

[Sean Livingstone]

yeh, I have ordered a AMD X2 3800+ it is costing me AU$517.00 upgrading from a P4 2.4 Northwood.

[Jos Svendsen]

A 3 GHz dual core processor will not run any applcation as fast as a 6 GHz processor. However it will run more tasks at a speed of 3GHz.

The best illustration of this is the cashiers at a store. If one cashier kan handle more than one queue then it hypertheading as the Pentium 4. More than one cashier is multicore or multiprocessor.

Adding more cashiers will not speed up the single payment, but the increased number of cashiers will allow for more simultaneous payements being done in a timeframe.

However this depends on the applications being aware of the multicore archtecture. If you are a customer and unaware of the availability of more than one cashier, then you can add extra cashiers all you like to no avail.

Video lend it self to multiprocessors, as you could imagine that a flock of processors chewing on every GOP in a HDV-video. In this imaginary computer, then no operation on the videostream would take longer than a single operation on a GOP.

Sony Vegas, Avid Liquid. FCP and Canopus Edius is multiprocessor aware.

[Kevin Shaw]

Okay, so one processor with two cores running at 3 GHz each won't behave the same as a single core running at 6 GHz, but it's still impressive what we can buy today for around $300 or so. (I remember when a single 25 Megahertz processor cost at least that much.) My Pentium D 830 (retail version) cost me about $333, and I bought the Supermicro PDSGE motherboard because that's the only dual-core solution I know which may be able to support the Canopus Edius NX boards. In fact this compatibility has now been confirmed by Ashley Guy of Guy Graphics, so I'm ready to go if/when I decide I need the NX board.

I don't expect my new setup to be quite as powerful as I'd like for heavy HDV editing, but if I can successfully capture directly to the Canopus HQ codec and edit two layers of that effectively, I'll be fine. If I need something better next year I'll evaluate the options available then for quad-core systems.

[Andrew Clark]

Originally Posted by Jack Felis

The Intel dual cores are pretty sucky when compared to the X2's, they simply are performing better in overall performance. They apparently have some serious work to do over at Intel.

Hey Jack -

I thought the same until I saw this at Tom's Hardware site:

http://www.tomshardware.com/cpu/20050603/index.html

But this is LAB test; not a real world scenario test. It seems that the (Intel) HT function does have a substantial (positive) effect for video processing / encoding.

Intel and AMD are both great in there own and similar ways. It just boils down to personal preference and how you can make the most of either configuration.

AC

[Van Lam]

Originally Posted by Andrew Clark

Hey Jack -

I thought the same until I saw this at Tom's Hardware site:

http://www.tomshardware.com/cpu/20050603/index.html

But this is LAB test; not a real world scenario test. It seems that the (Intel) HT function does have a substantial (positive) effect for video processing / encoding.

Intel and AMD are both great in there own and similar ways. It just boils down to personal preference and how you can make the most of either configuration.

AC

Hm... did you take a look at their log page?

http://www.tomshardware.com/cpu/2005...sstest-10.html

That a lot of "replacements" on the Intel side. LoL. (I'm actually laughing at Tom's Hardware Guide, for their idiotic testing methodologies and bad site design [beige and grey? What?])

Anyway, Pentium's *were* nice (before the era of Prescott ovens), but I would choose an Athlon X2 right now for a video system. Reasons? Runs cooler (especially compared to the P4) and faster (most of them time as Andrew mentioned).

If you factor in the cost of DDR2 RAM and the special MOBO's requried for the Pentium D's, the Athlon X2's really reveals its self to be a better value. X2's can run on any off the shelf board that runs regular A64's, in addition to being able to run on the much cheaper DDR ram. (Also if your a silent freak like me, you can quietly cool the Athlons easier ;))

[Sean Livingstone]

I just brought a 3800+ X2 and using it for HDV 720p and it loves it with Premiere Pro.

[Kevin James]

I started looking seriously at just going Dual g5 after starting this thread.....but have since abandonded that. For me Vegas works well, so back to PC.

I had pretty much settled on a PD 830, but am now hemming and hawwing again. I assume that the DDR and DDR2 speed difference isnt going to be that great in real world usage?

[Zack Birlew]

Well, Kevin, now you've gone and done it! =D

Ok, if you're worried about DDR vs. DDR2 then you are obviously thinking about future proofing your investment. AMD currently doesn't use DDR2 simply because:

a) It's not faster than regular DDR in most instances
b) It's a little unproven, too new
c) They'd have to reprogram their processors and chipsets to use it
d) They fear that DDR3 will be out before they finish with the above
e) DDR is much cheaper than DDR2

Intel on the other hand, embraces new technology as soon as it comes out (remember RDRAM?). Currently AMD does plan to use DDR2 in the future when it gets faster but that's a year or two away apparently. So, if you want to future proof your system for RAM, go Intel. But, if you want to future proof your entire PC for 64-bit computing with Windows Vista, go AMD dual core with as much DDRSDRAM as you can get, I use 2gb but I'll upgrade to 4gb later down the road when 2gb PC3200 modules become at least somewhat common. Anyway, hope that helps.

[Kevin James]

It does, thank you.....led me toward some google searches that cleared the RAM tech pipeline up a bit.

[Kevin Shaw]

Another way to look at this is that Intel adopted DDR2 sooner because it's easier for them to do so based on their platform design. Looking at Pricewatch just now, I see 1 GB of DDR2-533 listed at $76 versus 1GB of DDR-400 at $64. No big deal there, and I'm pretty sure all the Intel dual-core processors are 64-bit compatible.

As it turns out, the Pentium D 830 system my brother and I put together works fine for editing HDV using Canopus Edius Pro 3. Given the lower cost of a dual-core computer compared to a dual-processor setup, I'd say dual core options are definitely worth considering at this point.