Help upgrading my system?

nessonite · Post by **nessonite** » Sun Jul 02, 2006 3:00 am

Ive got a home-built system but I really don't know much about how any one component directly effects video editing. Right now I can't do much at all and I'd really like to get started.

I have a 945 mhz processor
704 megs of RAM
64 megs of shared video memory (I fried a 128meg card while installing it which also killed my good MOBO)

Ive got a good case, good optical drives, and a new 450 watt power supply so I don't want to sink money into an all-new system and replace parts I don't need to replace. Just want to replace the components above. And the MOBO too I assume. Since it carries a 945mhz chip I assume it's pretty dated (I didnt buy it, my brother gave it to me to replace the one I fried).

long story short...(too late)...I want to eventually replace all of those parts but I would like to put my money where it'll make the most difference first.
So what is it that causes my editor (Vegas 6) to run like crap and render things slowly? Is it my RAM or my processor or my video memory?

thanks to anyone who can advise me in this. =^_^=

BasharOfTheAges · Post by **BasharOfTheAges** » Sun Jul 02, 2006 3:28 am

It seems you're in a bit of an odd situation to say the least. If you want to upgrade to something cuting edge (even piece by piece) you're most likely going to have to do it all at once. A new MOBO runs the risk of not being compatible with your RAM, and (of course) your CPU and MOBO kinda need to form the basis of your system).

That said, I doubt the RAM is the issue. I doubt the video card has anything to do with it either (I can run Premiere pro and AE with an integrated video from a dell Laptop...) . The processor, on the other hand, is a bit slow for a modern system.

You'll most likely need a new MOBO and processor; and because of this the RAM may need to be replaced too.

If you don't already know, www.newegg.com is a great place to buy components. Good luck. And i'm sure someone with a hardware knowledge far beyond mine will come in and give their two cents soon enough.

nessonite · Post by **nessonite** » Sun Jul 02, 2006 11:54 am

That's what I was afraid of. If I can get away with replacing the MOBO and the RAM though and holding off on a video card then that'd doable.

Just how vital IS a good video card? I saw the 256 meg ATI Radeon card at Walmart yesterday for $100 but haven't done enough research into these things to know if that's a good enough deal. I don't do computer gaming at ALL. I do a lot of photoshop and I want to get into video editing though. But I have no idea how much of that would be helped by getting a beefy video card. If you're running on integrated video on a laptop then maybe not nearly as much as I thought.

I know about the awesomeness of newegg. ^^ I bought RAM for my laptop there and that's where I got the video card that I fried. Their shipping is so cheap and rediculously fast. ^^

Hopefully someone else can chime in and tell me more about how much of a roll the different componants play in video editing (and photoshopping).

Also, totally off topic, if I got a beefy processor would I run into cooling issues. My case is pretty old and has no side ventes. Would I need to cut a hole in it and add a fan? I'd rather not buy a new case if I can help it.

oldwrench · Post by **oldwrench** » Sun Jul 02, 2006 6:19 pm

For video editing and movie viewing and other tasks, the video card is the least important of your upgrades. Hot video cards are mostly needed for extensive 3d such as gaming. Your small amount of memory is killing you, and the slow processor is also dragging you down. First thing to do is replace motherboard, processor, and memory.

The low cost way to go would be to find a new board with onboard video, a new processor, (AMD is the best performance for price right now), and 1gig of ram memory.

For a bit more you could get a good atx board and a low cost pci-e video card that would lend itself to more room for upgrades.

Check www.newegg.com or www.tigerdirect.com for deals. Newegg has reviews on many of the components, this can help decide if a part is worth buying or not. You can also enter the part number on google and check for reviews.

nessonite · Post by **nessonite** » Sun Jul 02, 2006 8:41 pm

Wow, that is a real surprise. I always thought that a video card was really important. Shows how much I know, eh? XD
Thanks so much for your help! That cuts a good chunk out of what this upgrade was gonna cost me!

Joe88 · Post by **Joe88** » Sun Jul 02, 2006 9:08 pm

Well make sure the PSU have a PCI-E 6-pin power connector on it requirred for most PCI-E gfx cards.
Also intel is great for muti tasking while AMD has great power behind it.
So if you are planning on encodding mutiple vids and such at the same time then get a intel core duo or wait a little while more to intel core 2 duo comes out.

OmniStrata · Post by **OmniStrata** » Wed Jul 05, 2006 8:51 am

I rarely visit this forum but here's some deadly advice you need to consider...

priorities go this way and if you can overclock, all the better...

Processor
RAM
Graphics Card
HD Speed

For gaming, it's a slightly different priority scenario but here's what I've learned the hard way...

AMD Processors do NOT like Corsair RAM, Corsair is Intel's bitch sadly and if you use premium corsair ram [like my stupid ass did] on an AMD, it'll give you half-assed performance... My recommended upgrade would include:

Opteron - used for servers but VERY RAM friendly since you can cram a lot into it and this chip can handle it. dual cores are a plus for editing

RAM - OCZ. The lords of RAM > better than Corsair who've designed their ram almost solely on intel chips... :p to you intel... :p Other big names in RAM are Crucial and Ballistix, everything else is questionable.

Gfx Card - 7600 GS from EVGA. On newegg.com, you can get one with no fan, that's right, heatsink only making your system nice and quiet and gives you great performance at barely $110! Going SLI with a good MOBO is expensive but more than worth the price...

HD - 250 Gb Western Digital 16 MB cache and 3.0 GB SATA interface. Very noticeable performance increase in windows when I installed this beast. 250 GB makes for a good $/Gb margin. you can squeeze in another $0.20 per gig for anything past 300Gb and just recently, Seagate made a collossal 750Gig monster for $450!! YOW... Big is good for HD Space...

trythil · Post by **trythil** » Thu Jul 13, 2006 12:37 am

Joe88 wrote:Also intel is great for muti tasking while AMD has great power behind it.

The operating system and specific application matters quite a bit. It's very misleading to ignore the effect of software.

...not to mention that, well, you've also not mentioned any specific model of processor from either manufacturer.

trythil · Post by **trythil** » Thu Jul 13, 2006 12:57 am

trythil wrote:
Joe88 wrote:Also intel is great for muti tasking while AMD has great power behind it.
The operating system and specific application matters quite a bit. It's very misleading to ignore the effect of software.

An example based on HyperThreading, which is Intel's big claim for "multitasking improvements" (and I'll guess that you were referring to it here):

In HyperThreading, data cache is still shared between two simultaneous threads. If you have a program that loads about a meg or so of stuff into memory without much locality (say you've got maybe a linked list-like structure scattered throughout RAM) and accesses that data frequently, there, being able to maximize usage of the fast cache can be critical for performance.

But with HyperThreading, you lose a part of that cache for another thread. That forces access to other, larger, slower levels of the memory hierarchy.

This can easily hurt "multitasking", if you include the speed at which "concurrent" processes or threads complete in the definition of multitasking "speed".

OmniStrata wrote:AMD Processors do NOT like Corsair RAM

I've been running 2 Corsair ValueSelects PC3200 512MB sticks in my Athlon64 3400+ box for about three years now. They work great.

What sort of improvement can I expect if I blow a few hundred bucks on OCZ stuff?

trythil · Post by **trythil** » Thu Jul 13, 2006 12:59 am

trythil wrote: What sort of improvement can I expect if I blow a few hundred bucks on OCZ stuff?

I guess with all the talk of software, I should mention that I usually use my Athlon64 for 3D rendering, software development, and video editing / compositing / encoding, and tend to keep a lot of applications and files open.