How far can i push a macbook pro?

[Phil Bloom]

yeah uncheck all would be great as would play without effects which wouldn't effect the render. I am in the bad habit of playing with grade as I edit. Very slow way to edit that!

[Daniel Alexander]

so do you rekon that unlimited rt switched on would play back 1080hq footage in realtime with magic bullet applied on say an 8 core 4gb mac? Or am i still subjected to pre-renders/choppy playback?

[Phil Bloom]

no chance!

[Daniel Alexander]

I may aswell just get a macbook pro then, as the main thing i wanted to get was as close to real time previews as possible, but if im going to have to do pre-renders on clips anyway I think i can live with long render times when it comes to the final output. However, is there a major difference in time when you have to render clips for playback from the timeline when comparing a macbook pro and say an 8 core/quad core, or is the main speed difference seen when it comes down to the final rendering?

[Phil Bloom]

yes its a huge difference. about 7 to 8 times faster!

[Chris Leong]

Don't get a Macbook just because everbody else has one. If you're not sure, use a PC and Edius or just stick with your Vegas. I believe they're announcing RT plugins soon, plus there's a set of Looks-like plugins available for Edius already. Plus Apple's sure to upgrade something or another soon - their rollouts are quite a few times a year these days, and I have current model pencils that last longer than current model computers or camcorders...

[Malcolm Hamilton]

For what it's worth... I really wanted a Mac Pro, but decided to get the MacBook Pro... A. because I'll need it in the field, and I know I'll be more than happy editing on it for the next year; and B., because in a year's time, the next-generation Mac Pros with the new Nehalem processors (they're already being demo'ed and from what I gather they represent a huge step forward) will be out.
It's my plan to get one then (by that time I'm sure I won't need to take a laptop into the field to download clips - - that will seem so old-school by next spring)
Malcolm

[Daniel Alexander]

Good points again, it's interesting to hear how people are managing their ex1 files on a macbook pro. Unfortunately it's not an easy task getting hands on 'try before you buy' experience due to some of the lengthy complex tasks that are required for this kind of work so i'm really relying on user feedback here to sway my decision. So far ive gathered that the macbook pro CAN do what i want it to but at the expense of being more than twice as slow as a mac pro. I know it's hard to comment if someone is only using a macbook pro or only using a mac pro, but for those who have or are atleast using both, how do you find the speed difference affects your workflow?

[Dennis Joseph]

Originally Posted by Malcolm Hamilton

For what it's worth... I really wanted a Mac Pro, but decided to get the MacBook Pro... A. because I'll need it in the field, and I know I'll be more than happy editing on it for the next year; and B., because in a year's time, the next-generation Mac Pros with the new Nehalem processors (they're already being demo'ed and from what I gather they represent a huge step forward) will be out.
It's my plan to get one then (by that time I'm sure I won't need to take a laptop into the field to download clips - - that will seem so old-school by next spring)
Malcolm

My friend is actually waiting for the new design of the tower and monitors to come out before getting a mac pro. They are due a redesign just about any week now. Anybody have word on when or what is to come?

[Phil Bloom]

Originally Posted by Daniel Alexander

Good points again, it's interesting to hear how people are managing their ex1 files on a macbook pro. Unfortunately it's not an easy task getting hands on 'try before you buy' experience due to some of the lengthy complex tasks that are required for this kind of work so i'm really relying on user feedback here to sway my decision. So far ive gathered that the macbook pro CAN do what i want it to but at the expense of being more than twice as slow as a mac pro. I know it's hard to comment if someone is only using a macbook pro or only using a mac pro, but for those who have or are atleast using both, how do you find the speed difference affects your workflow?

its really only the grading that gets slow, mostly it works really well

[Matt Davis]

Originally Posted by Daniel Alexander

In other words, lets say i just graded a music video with magic bullet on a 720p hq timeline, how would the macbook react when i want to view the entire piece back before a final render. Would i have to sit through hours of rendering just to see what it looks like?

You're going to see chosen frames frame by frame in full quality just like any motion graphics setup. Unlike most motion graphics, you're going to see a half or quarter resolution version to preview in real time.

The more effects you add, the lower resolution you're going to watch it in until it says 'no way am I going to do this in real time unless you render or I do it a pixel at a time'. That's when I put the kettle on (or more often open a nice bottle of something).

M. (opening a nice bottle of something)

FWIW, Guzzi 850 T3 for those who appreciate such things.

[Mathieu Ghekiere]

Originally Posted by Dennis Joseph

My friend is actually waiting for the new design of the tower and monitors to come out before getting a mac pro. They are due a redesign just about any week now. Anybody have word on when or what is to come?

I agree about the monitors, but the Mac Pro line is just renewed in january, I don't think they will renew it again any moment now...
And the old design is still very sexy and good, look at the design of the Macbook Pro/Powerbook. It hasn't changed in a very long time, because it's a good design, with a pretty timeless look.

[Matt Davis]

Originally Posted by Phil Bloom

unless i am mistake there isn't a play without effects option anywhere in fcp. I wish there was.

Other than un-checking the filters or duplicating the sequence and removing all filter attributes?

Maybe a bit like sawing your legs off to remove shoes, but they're only virtual legs after all.

[Pat Sipes]

I have a fiarly new MBP that is very nice. But I have to say that I rarely use it. My main system is a PC and uses Grass Valley Edius Pro Broadcast. Runs circles around my FCP set up for most things. I finally got Bootcamp and put Edius on the MBP

[Evan Donn]

Originally Posted by Phil Bloom

unless i am mistake there isn't a play without effects option anywhere in fcp. I wish there was.

Actually there is - to play back without filters go to Sequence > Settings > Render Control Tab and uncheck 'Filters' under "Render & Playback". Now everything on your timeline will playback as if it had no filters - unless it had been previously rendered, in which case it will play back the render instead.

In the RT menu on the left side of the timeline there are a lot of options as well which can affect your preview performance. If you select 'Play Base Layer Only' it will do just that and also ignore any filters on the base layer.

In the default mode 'Unlimited RT' will do its best to play everything back in real time, dropping first picture quality and then frame rate to keep up. However you can change the 'Playback Video Quality' and 'Playback Frame Rate' from dynamic to high-medium-low in order to force it to prefer one over the other. i.e. if you need to see full quality set video quality to High and leave frame rate on dynamic and you'll always see full quality but the frame rate will drop as you push more layers/filters.

I just did a quick test with some HDV footage on a sequence using the HDV 1080/24p preset on my macbook. I can get full quality playback with two layers (one scaled down on top of the other) with the 3-way CC on both.

If I add a third layer with CC the video quality drops, looks like it's maybe half vertical res - looks soft when previewing full screen but not noticeable in the canvas window at 50%. A fourth CC'd layer drops it down to half vertical & horizontal res - this starts looking blocky in full screen playback and begins to be noticeable in the canvas window @ 50% only on the base layer which isn't scaled.

At this point (4 layered, CC'd layers of HDV) playback is still at full frame rate and in my normal editing layout (with viewer & canvas @ ~40%) the resolution drop is completely acceptable while working - it only really becomes apparent when I enter full screen, full res preview mode. Overall at this point editing & navigating the timeline is perfectly smooth & responsive.

If I tell it to give me full quality preview I get about half normal framerate with 3 layers and maybe 1/3 with four layers. If I force it to render everything at full quality 30 seconds of timeline takes a little under 2 minutes (using the option to render to ProRes instead of back to HDV).

I'm converting a clip to ProRes now so that I can do the same test with it instead of HDV - theoretically this should take some load off the processor and improve the real-time performance.