High end video encoding build - $3-4K

[PsychOfMSE]

Hey guys, here's my goal:

I am capturing uncompressed 1080p video. The files are generally 100gb-500gb in size. I am taking these videos and archiving the master captures and then converting the files into varying qualities for streaming distribution and FTP distribution to friends & family.

What is the fastest, highest quality hardware that I can get to transcode these files? I have a budget of $4,000 or so. I am getting mixed messages when it comes to Core i7 vs Xeon vs Opteron vs Gaming GPU vs Workstation GPU encoding performance.

Would I be better off going with (all systems will use 4 samsung 840 series 500gb SSDs in Raid 0):

• 
  Core i7-4960x based system
  Dual Opteron 6380 based system (32 physical cores @ 2.5ghz each)
  Xeon E5 based system (8 physical cores, 16 threads @ ~2.5ghz each)
  Core i7-3930K (6 cores/12 threads @ 3.2ghz) with a GTX Titan GPU doing the encoding
  Core i7-3930K (6 cores/12 threasd @ 3.2ghz) with a Quadro 5000 GPU doing the encoding

Also what software should I be looking at to utilize the horsepower on whichever system will give me the highest quality and quickest encoding times?

Storage of the master captures & converted files is no problem. I will have 2tb of Raid 0 SSD scratch disk space and I have 17tb of Raid 10 storage on my home server.

What would you all do?

 

[mfenn]

Are you looking for a whole PC build or just advice on the CPU? Do you already have any components?

Generally speaking, you will want lots of fast floating-point capable cores. The nuance comes into play when you look at your overall goal. Do you want to optimize throughput or optimize turnaround time for a single video? There is a limit to scaling, so optimizing for throughput would drive you towards the less expensive options so that you could buy more machines. Optimizing for turnaround time drives you towards the fastest chip you can get while still maintaining a high core count.

Keep in mind that newer AMD CPUs only have one floating point block for every two integer blocks (what marketing likes to call "cores"). They probably won't be competitive in the turnaround-optimized build, but will be quite competitive in the throughput optimized build(s).

As for storage, a RAID 0 of four SSDs is ridiculous overkill. No configuration within your budget is capable of taxing an HDD array that costs less than half the price. You just won't be able to convert fast enough to stress the drives.

 

[Ken g6]

I am capturing uncompressed 1080p video.

Hm, OK, 30FPS or 60FPS?

Assuming 60FPS, that's 1920*1080 pixels * 3 colors * 8 bits per pixel * 60FPS ~= 3Gbps. Video recording is very linear, so at worst two HDDs in (preferably hardware) RAID should suffice. At 30FPS, a single fast drive should work.

Also, have you considered doing a little lossless compression on the video before storing it? If you're doing 30FPS, HuffYUV should work with any modern CPU. If you're doing 60FPS, there appears to be a multithreaded version that might work. With that, I'd expect a single HDD to work just fine.

For final encoding, everything's a tradeoff. For high-quality encoding, see Mfenn's suggestions. For medium-to-low-quality encoding, GPU-assisted encoding is an option. And for low-quality encoding, don't forget about Intel Quick Sync. It only works on Intel systems with an integrated GPU, so it's not actually available on any of the processors you listed. Given your large budget, perhaps you might want a separate, cheap Haswell i3 system for this purpose?

 

[ziggy1971]

How are you recording video? With a camcorder, a PC, etc.
What software are you using?
What lossless codecs have you considered using? HuffYUV is good, quick but uses a lot of space; there are others available.
Other than the RAID 10 home server, are you keeping a hard copy backup? If so, Bluray? DVD? This affects the size of the clips stored as well as compression.

Are you serving them to other devices like media players, TV, etc. What format are you using? mkv, mp4, etc.

You mention "...GPU doing the encoding". I've read a lot of reviews and seen a lot of videos using various GPU's, Nvidia CUDA, Intel's Quick Sync, and so on, but I still wouldn't go with a GPU encoded video unless I absolutely had to. For instance, encoding Lord of the Rings to play on a BlackBerry phone (not tablet). Software encoding is the way to go, not hardware, but that's my opinion.

Check here for more advice... Video Guys DIY Guides
http://www.videoguys.com/Guide/C/DIY+Systems.aspx

For that kind of budget, you could build 2 very good machines, which could yield twice the productivity.

I have a Core i7 2600K OC'd to 4.8GHz, water cooled, an SSD as the system drive, 4x 1TB hard drives (2 in RAID 0) used for editing the other 2 in RAID 1 for storage. 16GB RAM, 2 displays, an Antec 1200 case, a Corsair 750watt PSU.

I use Sony Vegas for editing and different apps for encoding, depending on what my target is (ie. Archiving, Bluray, media streaming and so on.)

Really, the only thing I'd like to speed up is x264 encoding or other final renders (ie. Bluray) which take up the most computing time. This system cost less than $2000 and you can get the parts for less now and I'm considering buiding another so I can continue working on one machine while the other does the encoding tasks.

If you're interested, I can list my complete system specs and setup for reference. I've had it for 2 years now, all parts still under warranty and, based on the latest reviews, there's really nothing out there that prompts me to upgrade anytime soon. I'd rather have 2 very good systems than one overpriced one! My opinion.

Hope this helps... 🙂