i need digital video desktop suggestions for the web
Hi,
I'm about to purchase a new computer and dv package because I will be doing streaming video on the web. I know that I'm going to use firewire and Adobe Premiere for editing. I also know that the computer needs to be fast with lots of memory, but I have no idea about the hardware particulars that I need. The emphasis is on low budget.
I do a lot of video editing for a university course. The hardware is pretty high-end but all you really need is a load of RAM (preferably 512Mb+), a firewire card (I've seen one on sale for ~$80 CDN) and of course a digital camera (I assume you already have this). I would recommend that you get something along the Intel line of CPUs like a P3. I realize that P4s are more advanced but, we use P4s at school and they tend to have a lot of problems. Also, you're gonna want a HUGE hard drive. Of course, this depends on how much video you want to store, but I can tell you that a four-minute project cost me around 7 to 10Gb worth of space. The most important thing to consider is that when you bring video into the computer, it is unedited and thus you will no doubt end-up having a lot of video you won't use. In other words remember that if you're aiming for a five-minute long movie, you will most likely end up using one-and-a-half to 2-times the video needed. Also, your hard drive should be fast (7200RPMs +). Personally I would recommend a drive no smaller than 30Gb but then again, that depends on how long a video you want to make. Also consider that you will have to install other programs, an OS etc. as well.
I hate to take this side, but also consider the new G4 Macintosh systems. Most of the professional instructors I have at my school and others I know personally swear by a mac for almost any desktop publishing...
Scud: I agree, Macs are excellent for this kind of application, they simply rule. But you should expect to pay an arm and a leg for such a system.
MMX is a set of extra instructions Intel implemented in thier processors in order to improve multimedia and Internet performance. AMD has thier own set of extras except they go by the name 3dNow!. You'd have to do a little research to get the dirt on which technology is better. I've included a link below that should be able to answer which is better in your case. If there's any advice I can give you, it would be to stay away from Intel's Celeron or AMD's Duron. not that they're bad CPUs but just that DV is pretty demanding and it would be beneficial to have the extra processing power of a fully loaded CPU.
These days, IDE drives are getting up to speed with SCSI drives (with the exception of those monster 20,000 RPM drives!) and if you ask me, I think a fast IDE would be your be your best bet. SCSI drives are expensive and so are the cards used to implement them in your system. You can also expect to pay the same price on a 20 gig SCSI as you would a 60 gig IDE. Don't quote me on that but I really think that SCSI isn't worth the extra coin.
As far as RAM goes I can't really recommend something in particular. If anything, take a look at http://www.tomshardware.com for some sound advice. It's a great site and they can probably also better convince you on the SCSI vs. IDE issue as well as any other questions you have.
Hope this helps,
Matt
p.s.: Here are some things you may find uselful...
I'm not sure if you are talking about streaming the video or authoring the video...
I would agree too, that the newer G4's are going to be a great bet for authoring video.
Our college has a Media 100 Wintel based system and it is constantly having "issues". Furthermore the thing sounds like it is going to explode when doing any heavy processing. The lamest thing is that it only came with a CD rom drive and a floppy drive, so unless you get more peripheals, there is no way of transporting your movies, short of rendering them to tape right away, which is useless for web work.
I wish we would've purchased a G4 with Final Cut Pro.
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