XL2 editing in vegas question

Eric Shepherd · March 6th, 2007, 04:16 PM

Oh those problems are ugly.. Change 3 things at once and it's anybody's guess what went wrong.

But I don't think his video card drivers are the problem if sending out through the firewire cable is causing the same problem. The quality setting of the preview is the problem, I believe.

John L. Miller · March 6th, 2007, 07:39 PM

After checking my video card, I found that I have an HDMI output, so I used it to connect to my second monitor. The picture is great but even slower here. I have no problem with the picture at all even previewing at best full, as long as I do not engage Magic bullet effects. Some sony effects do the same thing, but not as bad. I can live with it. I am still upgrading my memory from 1GB to 3GB, It certainly cannot hurt. In an article I read last night from Cnet.com, it said that the particular card I have is a great card for the dough, but it must borrow from the RAM in order to function to its potential. So, I will add ram and it can borrow all it likes. Thanks.J

Eric Shepherd · March 6th, 2007, 09:00 PM

Is it a dedicated video card, or a chipset built into the motherboard? If it does share the system memory, it will most likely automatically grab more system memory when more is available. The ATI chipset in my laptop works that way. That will speed up the GPU based effects you may be using.

As a general rule, dedicated video memory cards will have higher performance.

You may want to check with the manufacturer of the Magic Bullet software and tell them about how it becomes unbearably slow and see if they have any advice specific to their software.

John L. Miller · March 6th, 2007, 09:27 PM

Thats a great point Eric. I am certain Red Giant Software will have the scoop on what video card to use. I did download the latest ATI control panel for my card and I must say it is working better than ever. If the hangs get corrected with my new memory upgrade, I will stick with what I have, I am close to where it needs to be. If it doesn't, a new video card is next. Thanks! J

Eric Shepherd · March 6th, 2007, 09:30 PM

Alrighty, cool.

Did the control panel contain the latest driver? I don't remember if they're together or separate with ATI.. An updated driver should help, an updated control panel may or may not help.. You could try overclocking the video card a little bit to squeeze some extra power out of it while still remaining stable. But I would say work out the other kinks first.

I'm interested to see how you make out with the additional ram.. hopefully that'll fix this :)

John L. Miller · March 7th, 2007, 08:44 PM

The card that was tested with magic bullet was Nvidia 7800 GT and GTX. This is recommended by Red Giant Software and they claim they have fastest real time editing with this. At 30fps with no problems. I ordered the 7900GTX with 512MB Ram in the card and all the latest goodies. I expect a huge improvement from this, I will try my memory first with this card to see how it works though, before adding this video card. I will update you once I perform the installation. J

Eric Shepherd · March 7th, 2007, 08:52 PM

Oh very nice! I think you'll be very happy with that. :)

John L. Miller · March 7th, 2007, 10:47 PM

Yes I am certain that between the 3gb of Ram and the new video card, this will provide much better performance. But, as I said, I will install just the memory with my current video card first to see if this gives much improvement. This may help someone else with the same problem. I will report the difference here, and then I will add the new video card and give another report. I cannot wait to get the new parts here! J

Eric Shepherd · March 7th, 2007, 10:49 PM

Sounds good, looking forward to it :)

John L. Miller · March 9th, 2007, 08:12 PM

Well Eric, I got Video card from XFX and I had not received my 2gb memory upgrade yet, so I couldn't wait to see how the video card would improve my system. First, this card is HUGE. I didn't think it was going to fit. After I installed the card and the software I went straight to vegas and opened a file where I had used magic bullet as a video effect. I couldn't believe the difference! I ran the setting on best full and still got a good real time picture from this new card. The card is 512MB onboard ram and the key is the GPU checkbox in the magic bullet effect box. With this checked, all the problems go away. Apparently the processors on the card pick up the slack and allow your CPU to focus on other things. I have not even upgraded my memory yet and I am tickled pink. The voice is just tiny bit ahead, but it will not hurt in editing and it will go away when rendered. If NVIDIA offered an adjustment for this, that would be great. I know when using the 1394 firewire DV card option, you can adjust the frame lag to compensate. Not so with the Dual view monitor mode. At least I am not aware of any. But as I said, it is such a small difference, It will not affect my editing at all. If I decrease picture quality, that problem goes away also. But, when editing, the picture is what I want to have the most power dedication. That is what you are going to be putting on DVD, so it must look right to properly adjust color saturation, etc. I will again update you once I get the new Ram installed. But for now, I can swear by the NVIDIA by XFX 7900 GTX extreme edition Video card. It came with tom clancys new ghost recon game also. (not a big gamer though). The card also came with the VGA adapter for monitor, and an HDMI adaptor so you can use rca cords with it. This card Rocks! For those of you wishing to use magic bullet, you need this card. I will put a fresh post on this site to alert people of the solution from CPU hog from magic bullet. Later! J

Eric Shepherd · March 9th, 2007, 09:41 PM

Awesome! I'm so glad that fixed the performance problems. I'm not sure offhand of any way to sync the audio and video, but you might want to experiment with the different modes NVidia offers. The dualview, clone, span, etc. Each has its pluses and minuses. The big thing is if you're using different resolutions on each screen, you're restricted to dualview, I believe.

You may be able to fix your sync by lowering the image quality slightly.. Go to Display Properties, then Advanced.. then I forget the next click, but anyway go to the OpenGL or DirectX tabs (whichever Magic Bullet uses) and lower the quality setting there. That will speed up the rendering and may be unnoticeable. That should help to sync things up for you. I get your point about the video mattering, but I had a shoot last week and used a laptop as a recorder. The screen was delayed maybe 1/3 of a second or so, and looked good, and I got the general idea. But it wasn't the same as looking up at my lcd viewfinder and seeing it at the same time I heard the person speaking.. perfect sync is way better than nearly perfect, when you can compare the 2. :)

John L. Miller · March 12th, 2007, 06:01 PM

Has anyone had any experience with SLI mode? Installing a second SLI compatible card and using both to get better performance? I bet that would be awesome. I have done a little research, but it mostly talks about 3-D gaming. I just wonder if the results would be worth considering this option.

John L. Miller · March 12th, 2007, 06:14 PM

Hi Jesse, I just now really got to take the time to read your old thread with the frame skipping problem. I have never had a real problem until I tried using the Magic bullet plugin. Apparently it is a pretty serious CPU hog...but, a new video card upgrade to the NVIDIA 7900gtx with 512mb ram did for the most part, solve all the issues. It will still hang a tiny bit on the BEST FULL setting if I add any other effect with magic bullet. But, it is 100 times better. Magic Bullet is great, but uses a lot of power. Fortunately, the GPU on the new video card provides MAGIC bullet with most everything it needs. I am also using two monitors now, the second being a flat panel LCD widescreen 26" TV. I love having the clear picture of my material to edit. Best Regards. J

Eric Shepherd · March 12th, 2007, 06:45 PM

I haven't used SLI mode, but basically it combines the power of 2 GPU's into one. I believe you'll still get dual video outputs from the combination, but can't get more than 2, though you'd have 4 on the computer at that point. Or would it be 5 including the factory video (or was that a card that you removed?)

Anyway, that should give you about an 80-90% boost in performance over 1 card I would imagine. Usually doubling the power on anything doesn't quite give double the performance. Same with dual cpu's vs single.

You *will* need to be sure your power supply can handle the load of the 2 video cards and all of your other internal hardware. If it can't, there are several power supply vendors I can recommend. Not all power supplies are created equal. The more expensive ones will pay for themselves by outputting cleaner power, and wasting less energy as heat (which then needs to be cooled by your air conditioning or whatever, which uses even MORE energy).. And power supplies are rated by the maximum power they will put out, not by their continuous draw.. So you could get a 1200 watt power supply, and it may draw less power than a 400 watt power supply, given the same load. Because the 1200 is most likely a more efficient design. So it costs less to run even though it has a higher number and makes you think it's gonna use 1200 all the time..

But anyway, if you want to run SLI, check the power supply and if you need another, I'd be happy to recommend some for you. :)

Eric

John L. Miller · March 12th, 2007, 06:50 PM

I think I will stick with what I have. I never thought about the power supply not handling it. But that is true. Also, when I spoke with XFX about getting another card to SLI them together, he said the purpose of this is to put the cards together for the benefit of ONE monitor. He said running two monitors would not benefit at all. But he did say the 2GB memory upgrade WILL add to the performance of my new card.

March 9th, 2007, 08:12 PM	#25
John L. Miller Major Player Join Date: Feb 2007 Location: Huntington, WV Posts: 260	NVidia 7900gtx Well Eric, I got Video card from XFX and I had not received my 2gb memory upgrade yet, so I couldn't wait to see how the video card would improve my system. First, this card is HUGE. I didn't think it was going to fit. After I installed the card and the software I went straight to vegas and opened a file where I had used magic bullet as a video effect. I couldn't believe the difference! I ran the setting on best full and still got a good real time picture from this new card. The card is 512MB onboard ram and the key is the GPU checkbox in the magic bullet effect box. With this checked, all the problems go away. Apparently the processors on the card pick up the slack and allow your CPU to focus on other things. I have not even upgraded my memory yet and I am tickled pink. The voice is just tiny bit ahead, but it will not hurt in editing and it will go away when rendered. If NVIDIA offered an adjustment for this, that would be great. I know when using the 1394 firewire DV card option, you can adjust the frame lag to compensate. Not so with the Dual view monitor mode. At least I am not aware of any. But as I said, it is such a small difference, It will not affect my editing at all. If I decrease picture quality, that problem goes away also. But, when editing, the picture is what I want to have the most power dedication. That is what you are going to be putting on DVD, so it must look right to properly adjust color saturation, etc. I will again update you once I get the new Ram installed. But for now, I can swear by the NVIDIA by XFX 7900 GTX extreme edition Video card. It came with tom clancys new ghost recon game also. (not a big gamer though). The card also came with the VGA adapter for monitor, and an HDMI adaptor so you can use rca cords with it. This card Rocks! For those of you wishing to use magic bullet, you need this card. I will put a fresh post on this site to alert people of the solution from CPU hog from magic bullet. Later! J

March 12th, 2007, 06:01 PM	#27
John L. Miller Major Player Join Date: Feb 2007 Location: Huntington, WV Posts: 260	Has anyone had any experience with SLI mode? Installing a second SLI compatible card and using both to get better performance? I bet that would be awesome. I have done a little research, but it mostly talks about 3-D gaming. I just wonder if the results would be worth considering this option. Last edited by Douglas Spotted Eagle; March 12th, 2007 at 06:12 PM. Reason: Let's keep on-topic?

March 6th, 2007, 04:16 PM	#16
Eric Shepherd Major Player Join Date: Feb 2007 Location: Orlando, FL Posts: 404	Oh those problems are ugly.. Change 3 things at once and it's anybody's guess what went wrong. But I don't think his video card drivers are the problem if sending out through the firewire cable is causing the same problem. The quality setting of the preview is the problem, I believe.

March 6th, 2007, 07:39 PM	#17
John L. Miller Major Player Join Date: Feb 2007 Location: Huntington, WV Posts: 260	After checking my video card, I found that I have an HDMI output, so I used it to connect to my second monitor. The picture is great but even slower here. I have no problem with the picture at all even previewing at best full, as long as I do not engage Magic bullet effects. Some sony effects do the same thing, but not as bad. I can live with it. I am still upgrading my memory from 1GB to 3GB, It certainly cannot hurt. In an article I read last night from Cnet.com, it said that the particular card I have is a great card for the dough, but it must borrow from the RAM in order to function to its potential. So, I will add ram and it can borrow all it likes. Thanks.J

March 6th, 2007, 09:00 PM	#18
Eric Shepherd Major Player Join Date: Feb 2007 Location: Orlando, FL Posts: 404	Is it a dedicated video card, or a chipset built into the motherboard? If it does share the system memory, it will most likely automatically grab more system memory when more is available. The ATI chipset in my laptop works that way. That will speed up the GPU based effects you may be using. As a general rule, dedicated video memory cards will have higher performance. You may want to check with the manufacturer of the Magic Bullet software and tell them about how it becomes unbearably slow and see if they have any advice specific to their software.

March 6th, 2007, 09:27 PM	#19
John L. Miller Major Player Join Date: Feb 2007 Location: Huntington, WV Posts: 260	Thats a great point Eric. I am certain Red Giant Software will have the scoop on what video card to use. I did download the latest ATI control panel for my card and I must say it is working better than ever. If the hangs get corrected with my new memory upgrade, I will stick with what I have, I am close to where it needs to be. If it doesn't, a new video card is next. Thanks! J

March 6th, 2007, 09:30 PM	#20
Eric Shepherd Major Player Join Date: Feb 2007 Location: Orlando, FL Posts: 404	Alrighty, cool. Did the control panel contain the latest driver? I don't remember if they're together or separate with ATI.. An updated driver should help, an updated control panel may or may not help.. You could try overclocking the video card a little bit to squeeze some extra power out of it while still remaining stable. But I would say work out the other kinks first. I'm interested to see how you make out with the additional ram.. hopefully that'll fix this :)

March 7th, 2007, 08:44 PM	#21
John L. Miller Major Player Join Date: Feb 2007 Location: Huntington, WV Posts: 260	The card that was tested with magic bullet was Nvidia 7800 GT and GTX. This is recommended by Red Giant Software and they claim they have fastest real time editing with this. At 30fps with no problems. I ordered the 7900GTX with 512MB Ram in the card and all the latest goodies. I expect a huge improvement from this, I will try my memory first with this card to see how it works though, before adding this video card. I will update you once I perform the installation. J

March 7th, 2007, 08:52 PM	#22
Eric Shepherd Major Player Join Date: Feb 2007 Location: Orlando, FL Posts: 404	Oh very nice! I think you'll be very happy with that. :)

March 7th, 2007, 10:47 PM	#23
John L. Miller Major Player Join Date: Feb 2007 Location: Huntington, WV Posts: 260	Yes I am certain that between the 3gb of Ram and the new video card, this will provide much better performance. But, as I said, I will install just the memory with my current video card first to see if this gives much improvement. This may help someone else with the same problem. I will report the difference here, and then I will add the new video card and give another report. I cannot wait to get the new parts here! J

March 7th, 2007, 10:49 PM	#24
Eric Shepherd Major Player Join Date: Feb 2007 Location: Orlando, FL Posts: 404	Sounds good, looking forward to it :)

March 9th, 2007, 09:41 PM	#26
Eric Shepherd Major Player Join Date: Feb 2007 Location: Orlando, FL Posts: 404	Awesome! I'm so glad that fixed the performance problems. I'm not sure offhand of any way to sync the audio and video, but you might want to experiment with the different modes NVidia offers. The dualview, clone, span, etc. Each has its pluses and minuses. The big thing is if you're using different resolutions on each screen, you're restricted to dualview, I believe. You may be able to fix your sync by lowering the image quality slightly.. Go to Display Properties, then Advanced.. then I forget the next click, but anyway go to the OpenGL or DirectX tabs (whichever Magic Bullet uses) and lower the quality setting there. That will speed up the rendering and may be unnoticeable. That should help to sync things up for you. I get your point about the video mattering, but I had a shoot last week and used a laptop as a recorder. The screen was delayed maybe 1/3 of a second or so, and looked good, and I got the general idea. But it wasn't the same as looking up at my lcd viewfinder and seeing it at the same time I heard the person speaking.. perfect sync is way better than nearly perfect, when you can compare the 2. :)

March 12th, 2007, 06:14 PM	#28
John L. Miller Major Player Join Date: Feb 2007 Location: Huntington, WV Posts: 260	Hi Jesse, I just now really got to take the time to read your old thread with the frame skipping problem. I have never had a real problem until I tried using the Magic bullet plugin. Apparently it is a pretty serious CPU hog...but, a new video card upgrade to the NVIDIA 7900gtx with 512mb ram did for the most part, solve all the issues. It will still hang a tiny bit on the BEST FULL setting if I add any other effect with magic bullet. But, it is 100 times better. Magic Bullet is great, but uses a lot of power. Fortunately, the GPU on the new video card provides MAGIC bullet with most everything it needs. I am also using two monitors now, the second being a flat panel LCD widescreen 26" TV. I love having the clear picture of my material to edit. Best Regards. J

March 12th, 2007, 06:45 PM	#29
Eric Shepherd Major Player Join Date: Feb 2007 Location: Orlando, FL Posts: 404	I haven't used SLI mode, but basically it combines the power of 2 GPU's into one. I believe you'll still get dual video outputs from the combination, but can't get more than 2, though you'd have 4 on the computer at that point. Or would it be 5 including the factory video (or was that a card that you removed?) Anyway, that should give you about an 80-90% boost in performance over 1 card I would imagine. Usually doubling the power on anything doesn't quite give double the performance. Same with dual cpu's vs single. You will need to be sure your power supply can handle the load of the 2 video cards and all of your other internal hardware. If it can't, there are several power supply vendors I can recommend. Not all power supplies are created equal. The more expensive ones will pay for themselves by outputting cleaner power, and wasting less energy as heat (which then needs to be cooled by your air conditioning or whatever, which uses even MORE energy).. And power supplies are rated by the maximum power they will put out, not by their continuous draw.. So you could get a 1200 watt power supply, and it may draw less power than a 400 watt power supply, given the same load. Because the 1200 is most likely a more efficient design. So it costs less to run even though it has a higher number and makes you think it's gonna use 1200 all the time.. But anyway, if you want to run SLI, check the power supply and if you need another, I'd be happy to recommend some for you. :) Eric

March 12th, 2007, 06:50 PM	#30
John L. Miller Major Player Join Date: Feb 2007 Location: Huntington, WV Posts: 260	I think I will stick with what I have. I never thought about the power supply not handling it. But that is true. Also, when I spoke with XFX about getting another card to SLI them together, he said the purpose of this is to put the cards together for the benefit of ONE monitor. He said running two monitors would not benefit at all. But he did say the 2GB memory upgrade WILL add to the performance of my new card.