Video Editing System

[Theiananator]

1 Tyan "Tiger K8W (S2875ANRF)"
2 AMD Opteron Model 146, 2.0 GHz 1MB L2 Cache 64-bit Processor
4 CORSAIR 184-Pin 512MB ECC REG DDR PC-3200, Model CM72SD512RLP-3200
1 RAIDMAX Beige 10-bay Case, Model "ATX-208"
2 Western Digital 250GB 7200RPM IDE Hard Drive, MODEL WD2500JB"
1 Seagate 7200.8 300GB 7200RPM IDE Hard Drive, Model ST3300831A-RK
1 Codegen 500W ATX Power Supply For AMD/Intel, Model "PS-500"
2 ZALMAN CNPS7000B-Cu Copper CPU Cooler for Socket 478/462/754/939/940 CPUs
1 POWERCOLOR ATI RADEON 9700PRO Video Card, Model "EVIL COMMANDO 2(XF97-C3G)"
1 HighPoint PCI to ATA Controller Card, Model "Rocket100"

I am building this system to video edit. I'm not a big gamer. I want to have a dual monitor display. 1 on VGA and 1 on DVI. I would like to get the price below $2,000. At the moment it is $2,048. I was planning on using the Red Hat distrbution of Linux and use Cinelerra to edit. If anybody see's a place I can save money, or a component that isn't good, please suggest something else. Thanks.

 

[Matthias99]

1 Codegen 500W ATX Power Supply For AMD/Intel, Model "PS-500"

This PSU is probably not very good. I'd go with a name brand like Antec, Enermax, ThermalTake, OCZ, Seasonic, etc.

1 POWERCOLOR ATI RADEON 9700PRO Video Card, Model "EVIL COMMANDO 2(XF97-C3G)"

Useless for video editing. Get a cheaper video card unless you want to play games on the side, or you know you'll be using apps that can make use of DX9 video cards to accelerate rendering (not sure about Cinelerra; the only one I know of that does this now is the newest version of Pinnacle).

You may want to consider SCSI and/or RAID, for both speed and reliability. The high STR of RAID0 and RAID10 can be very useful for working with huge video files, and having mirrored/parity RAID (RAID1, 10, or 5) for your data is probably worthwhile, unless you're backing it up regularly and the drives you have listed are just for holding files you're working on.

 

[Vegito]

I been benching between my WD 200 JB & Seagate 200 drive.. the seagate is about 10-15% faster on hd tack.. you should find someone to run the test for you.. in case mine is not valid.. both were on same system...

 

[Theiananator]

Is 500w enough? The HighPoint PCI to ATA Controller Card is for raid 10.

 

[Baked]

If you're gonna run dual Opteron, you'll need MP capable Opteron CPUs. The pair you chose are singles, you'll need a pair of 246. And that case? Damn, you better get a bigger or better ventilated case unless you want to bake a cake in there.

It's not the 500W PSU that's the problem it's the quality of the PSU. The rail ratings listed for the Codegen is unrealistic.

 

[Matthias99]

Originally posted by: Theiananator
Is 500w enough? The HighPoint PCI to ATA Controller Card is for raid 10.

You don't have enough hard drives there to run RAID10 (you need four). Do you have some drives already?

 

[Theiananator]

Is this a better case?

I already have one of the 300 gb seagates

Also which fan is better? This one or this one?

 

[Matthias99]

Originally posted by: Theiananator
Is this a better case?

I already have one of the 300 gb seagates

Also which fan is better? This one or this one?

I think your first case choice would be fine if you just added some fans to the front and back (it has the slots for them, it just doesn't come with them). It might be a bit cramped in there with all those drives, though. You might want to consider a full-tower case rather than a mid-tower, especially if you plan on expanding the number of drives at some point in the future.

Generally for RAID10/01 you need four identical drives. I'm still a little unclear on what you're trying to do there... for video editing, you probably want one big drive/array for storage, and several smaller arrays (maybe RAID0) for storing temp files, so that you can render/encode from one physical drive to another. If you try to read and write to a RAID10 array simultaneously, your performance will not be very good.

 

[jose]

If your going to run Linux then you may want to get a Nvidia based card. I'm not familiar w/ Cinelerra, but if it's OpenGL based then go w/ Nvidia.

Also for the Dual Opetron, get a quality EPS power supply. ie Antec550EPS

Take a good look at the CoolerMaster Stacker case because it has alot of room to work in & has great cooling.
http://www.newegg.com/app/View...=11-119-042&depa=0

You do know that the K8W has 4 sata ports.. You may want to pass on the Highpoint controller it's a 32bit pci adapter. You'd probably get better performance out of the onboard sata ports.. Later you could get a 64bit/66mhz/133mhz hardware based controller. ie 3Ware 4-12port sata controller or a LSI 320-2 Scsi 64bit/66mhz controller ..

Either of which is much better than the $21 highpoint controller...

Regards,
Jose

 

[halfadder]

Video editing recommendation:
Any modern PC with any modern CPU with 512 MB of RAM with any modern 7200 RPM drive... Avid Free DV software and you're good to go.

 

[teutonicknight]

Originally posted by: halfadder
Video editing recommendation:
Any modern PC with any modern CPU with 512 MB of RAM with any modern 7200 RPM drive... Avid Free DV software and you're good to go.

Avid Free DV is really good for free, but spend a few bucks and get a decent editing program:

Sony Vegas
Adobe Premiere Pro
Etc.

Leagues better than the free avid programme