Computer Specs For Red Post-Production

[Julio Quintana]

I'm trying to budget for a new Mac Pro, and I wanted to know if someone could give a realistic estimate of what kind of system would be needed to work comfortably with 4K Redcode Raw footage for low budget features(online editing, color correction and masking with shake, etc.).

Please include recommendations for all computer specs from processors, ram, video cards, and raids.

[Panicos]

Hi,
I believe that a Mac will do the work
* Two 3.0GHz Quad-Core Intel Xeon
* 8GB (4 x 2GB)
* 500GB 7200-rpm Serial ATA 3Gb/s
* NVIDIA Quadro FX 4500 512MB, Stereo 3D (2 x dual-link DVI)
* Apple Cinema HD Display (23" flat panel)
* Apple Cinema HD Display (23" flat panel)
* One 16x SuperDrive
* Quad-channel 4Gb Fibre Channel PCI Express card
* Apple Keyboard and Mighty Mouse - U.S. English
* Mac OS X - U.S. English
* Final Cut Studio 2
* Shake
Total of about $12800
and also G-SPEED S
4.5TB
WAS $7,499
NOW $5,999
or MAC RAID Storage
3500GB ADM (7x500GB Ultra ATA)
$8,199.00
and AJA's Io HD not sure for the price
I believe that will do the work, preview will be at 2k if I'm not mistaken.:alien:

[Julio Quintana]

Is there any reason to get the 8-core mac? Or for that matter, 16 gigs of ram (other than it just being awesome)?

Also, why do I need the AJA Io (MSRP $3495)? It doesn't seem to support 4k footage at all. Can't Redcode Raw be loaded directly into Final Cut 2? Maybe I'm not understanding the workflow.

[Emery Wells]

AJA Io HD will let you monitor on a broadcast display. Not 4k mind you, but Final Cut itself is still limited to 2k.

Yes Final Cut supports 4k Redcode Raw but it will only display a max of 2k.

If your workflow is to bring in redcode raw into Final Cut and encode to 108024p ProRes 4:2:2 then Io HD will allow you to display that on a broadcast monitor.

[Emery Wells]

Also I should note that if you are going for a 2k workflow then you will need a Kona 3, Multibridge Studio, or Multibridge Eclipse.

[Scott Webster]

Maybe someone from Red could chime in with the specs of the Mac providing the demo at NAB? Given that the 8 core has just been released I would guess(?) that Park Road were utilising a Quad for 'Crossing the Line'? Field work was done off a Mac Book Pro. Is Dual Quad Core nice to have, not need to have?

[Rob Lohman]

We've been using macbook's and mac pro's with 4 cpu's (so two dual-core chips) mostly. That's what was used for the NZ footage and what was used in the NAB booth.

[Chris Kenny]

AJA Io HD will let you monitor on a broadcast display. Not 4k mind you, but Final Cut itself is still limited to 2k.

Io-HD will only let you monitor ProRes or standard definition uncompressed. It's useless for monitoring a REDCODE timeline.

[laguun]

We've been using macbook's and mac pro's with 4 cpu's (so two dual-core chips) mostly. That's what was used for the NZ footage and what was used in the NAB booth.

rob, does red has a recommended 2k monitoring via duallinked hd-sdi for redcode?

[Lucas Wilson]

rob, does red has a recommended 2k monitoring via duallinked hd-sdi for redcode?

I'm not Rob or RED... : ) but...

in our suites at NAB, we were looking at output via dual-link 4:4:4 HD RGB to eCinema displays. Monitoring RED footage critically is the same as monitoring anything else critically - high quality output to high quality monitors with critical calibration.

Lucas
-----
ASSIMILATE, Inc.
LA, CA, USA

[sander kamp]

Hi,
I believe that a Mac will do the work
* Two 3.0GHz Quad-Core Intel Xeon
* 8GB (4 x 2GB)
* 500GB 7200-rpm Serial ATA 3Gb/s
* NVIDIA Quadro FX 4500 512MB, Stereo 3D (2 x dual-link DVI)
* Apple Cinema HD Display (23" flat panel)
* Apple Cinema HD Display (23" flat panel)
* One 16x SuperDrive
* Quad-channel 4Gb Fibre Channel PCI Express card
* Apple Keyboard and Mighty Mouse - U.S. English
* Mac OS X - U.S. English
* Final Cut Studio 2
* Shake
Total of about $12800
and also G-SPEED S
4.5TB
WAS $7,499
NOW $5,999
or MAC RAID Storage
3500GB ADM (7x500GB Ultra ATA)
$8,199.00
and AJA's Io HD not sure for the price
I believe that will do the work, preview will be at 2k if I'm not mistaken.:alien:

Of course what would be a great system but it all depends on your needs. If finishing in ProRes is good enough for you then you can save a lot of money.

[Stephen Gentle]

AJA Io HD will let you monitor on a broadcast display. Not 4k mind you, but Final Cut itself is still limited to 2k.

Yes Final Cut supports 4k Redcode Raw but it will only display a max of 2k.

If your workflow is to bring in redcode raw into Final Cut and encode to 108024p ProRes 4:2:2 then Io HD will allow you to display that on a broadcast monitor.

Don't you think that they will support 4K in the new version? Apparently the old version had a limit of 4000x4000px, but you could get full 4K with an XML hack... Does anyone know about this?

Also, with that computer, isn't it better to go with the top ATI card? I thought that someone said that the quadro FX 4500 was outdated.

[Nick Shaw]

I think the Quadro FX is only worth it if you need the 3D port. For the rest of us, the ATI will do just as good a job for far less money.

[Simon Blackledge]

Were running Maya on ATI and it's pretty much stable.. no real moans from head of 3d yet. So I'm gonna upgrade my 7600 today hopefully to an ati to help with color and motion3.

s

[Jeff Kilgroe]

I pretty much agree with most the other posts here, but....



* NVIDIA Quadro FX 4500 512MB, Stereo 3D (2 x dual-link DVI)

Trust me, you don't want this card. Lots of money wasted.

[Chris Kenny]

Yeah, and note that on the tech specs (http://www.apple.com/finalcutstudio/color/specs.html) page, Apple says the (much cheaper) Radeon X1900 XT is "highly recommended" for Color.

[Álex Montoya]

I don't understand why you need an external monitor if you have a calibrated monitor and a program like After Effects that can simmulate viewing in different color spaces.

[Seán_T]

I don't understand why you need an external monitor if you have a calibrated monitor and a program like After Effects that can simmulate viewing in different color spaces.

Well "Need" is a very subjective thing based on the project and client.
If your shooting to deliver for the web your fine with anything. But if your delivering for broadcast you should have a broadcast grade display. Apple cinema displays are really nice but if you put it beside a cine-tal or ecinema display fed by a SDI or DL HDSDI you will possibly see things that the apple display didnt show you (particularly when interlacing comes in to play). And if your delivering for the big screen then a projector is what you "should" be using.

Now can you get away with just usings a consumer grade LCD, possibly, but you might find yourself spending big$$ at the end of your pipeline to fix a problem you couldn't see.

Personally I'm very particular about my picture examination devices and I have to guarantee that the jobs I do will pass international quality control. Its what my clients expect. Your client's and projects might be different.

[Seán_T]

Of course what would be a great system but it all depends on your needs. If finishing in ProRes is good enough for you then you can save a lot of money.

Well you could also say that a faster more expensive box will save you money.

The "theory" goes like this. A cheaper machine will only save you money once, when you buy it. A faster machine will save you time every time you hit render (which will be often). and because time is money that faster box will pay you back a little bit every day over its life. You charge more for a faster machine and tackle more work in your week. Clients are really fond of paying a flat rate for the completion of a job, if you cut your time in half you win.

Now if rendering/waiting is something you never do then go nuts with the base model.

[Nick Shaw]

It's not quite that simple though. If you charge for online editing by the hour, and there is less waiting for rendering you end up billing for less hours. It's not always easy to tell clients "I've just bought a new computer, so my hourly rate has gone up". There is an extent to which you are just expected to keep up with the bleeding edge of technology, and the prices you can charge sometimes come down as that technology becomes more commonly available.

[Bruce Allen]

I agree with Nick.

In a non-client-supervised session, it is similar too. Speed of project completion usually depends on a combination of:
1. management and understanding of client expectations
2. showing them work in progress at the right time (not too early or too late)
3. getting the work looking good as soon as possible
4. luck!

I guess having a fast computer helps with #3. But talent and listening to clients (and selecting ones with good temperaments...) is more important.

Over the past three years my rate has more than quadrupled even though I have kept the same computer (a single-core 2.8ghz Pentium 4) at home. This is for not just editing but also After Effects, Maya work, coloring, etc. I'll admit, I'm mostly working on other peoples' workstations. On the other hand I know a lot of great artists with super-expensive machines that are sitting at home losing value because the artists got jobs at a company that had workstations already. And when I do the occasional client-supervised job from home, I have never had complaints because I work quickly and know how to schedule things so renders aren't an apparent issue.

Also, not spending money on constant computer upgrades means that you can afford to make higher risk / reward job moves because your finances are in better order if everything goes wrong.

Bruce Allen
www.boacinema.com

[Seán_T]

Well I never said anything was "that simple".
Of course theres plenty of people out there making money with old gear. The question being asked here is, "is it worth spending more on a speed bump when buying a new machine" if its for professional work, I say yes it is(well within reason).
If you cant afford the extra cost of the quad core vs dual (yes the mac os is not optimised yet) then maybe your cutting it a bit too close, (hopefully you would have a contingency plan that would absorb the extra $2K)

Nick I never said you up your rates I said you get more work done and move on to the next job. If your not billing by the hour you deffinetly win. If you are billing by the hour you get to make 2 clients happy in the same time instead of one, also a win. (yes of course you need to be busy/good enough to have clients lining up)

I think that all of these billing models have their pluses and minuses.

I also agree that keeping your gear up to date every time an update comes out hurts and is not recommended, but thats not what I were talking about, were talking about a new machine.


It's not quite that simple though. If you charge for online editing by the hour, and there is less waiting for rendering you end up billing for less hours. It's not always easy to tell clients "I've just bought a new computer, so my hourly rate has gone up". There is an extent to which you are just expected to keep up with the bleeding edge of technology, and the prices you can charge sometimes come down as that technology becomes more commonly available.

[Seán_T]

I guess having a fast computer helps with #3. But talent and listening to clients (and selecting ones with good temperaments...) is more important.

Over the past three years my rate has more than quadrupled even though I have kept the same computer (a single-core 2.8ghz Pentium 4) at home.

Bruce this is exactly what I'm talking about. If you buy a fast machine today it could be still useful in 3+ years. And every render you do over the next 3 years those extra CPU cycles pay you back in saved time. And if you can turn that saved time in to revenue then the greater investment will be paid back many times over.

And even if you cant turn the saved time in to more jobs done your fast machine will be useful longer. If your 3 year old machine was a 1.6Ghz P4 you probably would have dumped it already and bought a new machine. And of course were talking about 4K files here lotsohorsepower required for fx colour etc.

[Antoine Baumann]

Hi,
I think it is nice to have 8 cores when rendering, but people do not forget your RAM is divided by each processors.... actually I have 4 gig of RAM in a dualcore machine, so it 2gig of RAM per processor, so when you get to 8 cores you need 16gig of RAM, which cost a lot. But as you said time is money and I totaly agree. But personnaly I think 8 cores is more for 3D stuff, than color grading; ok yes may be compositing with shake if you have really complex comp.

If you are thinking to go for 2k/4k wokflow but need to do compositing work, you will need to work on other codec than REDCODE RAW, meaning you might need really fast drives to handle that, so I would suggest getting an ATTO card, and a lot of hard drives in a nice enclosure.

About the graphic card, I wouldn't go for the quadro fx 4500, unless you are unsing a specific software that requires it.

As for color grading, I do not think shake is efficient for it, and we have to see what color will be able to do, but it will be certainly twicked to work best with prores, so again if you are looking 2k/4k road, you might need to look for better tools.


antoine.

[Chris Kenny]

Hi,
I think it is nice to have 8 cores when rendering, but people do not forget your RAM is divided by each processors.... actually I have 4 gig of RAM in a dualcore machine, so it 2gig of RAM per processor, so when you get to 8 cores you need 16gig of RAM, which cost a lot.

Err? In an SMP architecture (which is what every desktop multiprocessor system I've ever heard of uses), all processors have equal access to the entire memory address space.

[Rob Lohman]

I'm not following Antoine, Chris is correct.

[Jeff Kilgroe]

Err? In an SMP architecture (which is what every desktop multiprocessor system I've ever heard of uses), all processors have equal access to the entire memory address space.

Chris is mostly right as far as desktop workstations go. But moving into the server market, even in the world of x86 systems, we do see some NUMA (non-uniform memory architecture) implementations and some of AMD's Opteron configurations that bridge the gap between server and workstation also have dedicated RAM blocks per CPU. The memory controller in AMD64 CPUs is right on the CPU and they don't scale well beyond two CPU sockets / four CPU cores at the moment. In fact, for high-bandwidth applications it still makes far more sense to dedicate each CPU socket with its own RAM bank. Just about any 2-way and 4-way Opteron board is an example of this. Now all CPUs still have global access to the entire RAM heap, but the RAM that's associated with each CPU socket is available at a much higher speed to their corresponding sockets, than RAM on a bank tied to another socket. Most of these boards provide BIOS hooks and through MPS info in the firmware about which RAM locations are optimal for which CPUs. But it's up to the OS and software to make use of this information...

A couple mainboards with RAM dedicated to individual CPU sockets would be the TYAN h2000M dual socket <link> (http://www.tyan.com/product_board_detail.aspx?pid=235) and the TYAN 4-way Opteron Thunder n4250QE <link> (http://www.tyan.com/product_board_detail.aspx?pid=271)

[Bruce Allen]

I think what laboprod is trying to say might be "don't expect you can get a 4x speed increase over a 1-core sytem just by buying a 4-core system. You need to buy 4x the amount of RAM as well, if what you were doing has a RAM bottleneck."

Eg if your Mental Ray scene uses 1.5GB RAM and is taking 20 minutes per frame to render on a single core system with 2GB RAM, don't think you'll get 5 minutes per frame on a four-core system with 2GB RAM. You'll need 8GB RAM, which might get exponentially expensive because greater density chips are more highly priced.


Bruce this is exactly what I'm talking about. If you buy a fast machine today it could be still useful in 3+ years. And every render you do over the next 3 years those extra CPU cycles pay you back in saved time. And if you can turn that saved time in to revenue then the greater investment will be paid back many times over.

And even if you cant turn the saved time in to more jobs done your fast machine will be useful longer. If your 3 year old machine was a 1.6Ghz P4 you probably would have dumped it already and bought a new machine. And of course were talking about 4K files here lotsohorsepower required for fx colour etc.

Gotcha. I agree. But the P4 I got years ago wasn't top of the line when I bought it then. It was a little bit below top of the line, which is often where the best value lies. The graphics card was mid-range even then. The whole thing cost me < $1000.

If I'd bought a 4-core $5000 computer 3 years ago with top-of-the line gfx card, RAID, etc back then, it would still be out of date pretty soon after the $1000 system I bought then.

Yes, I'm glad I didn't buy a 1.6Ghz P4, but I'm also REALLY glad that I didn't buy a "top-of-the-line" computer back then either.

Bruce Allen
www.boacinema.com

[Antoine Baumann]

Thanks Chris and Rob for the technical precision.

And thanks Bruce, that is exactly the point I wanted to raise.

I also think that the best value is always a little below the top of the line.

antoine.

[Jeff Kilgroe]

Eg if your Mental Ray scene uses 1.5GB RAM and is taking 20 minutes per frame to render on a single core system with 2GB RAM, don't think you'll get 5 minutes per frame on a four-core system with 2GB RAM. You'll need 8GB RAM, which might get exponentially expensive because greater density chips are more highly priced.

Yep. I take that as a given, especially with my 3D work. So I don't really think of it. I suppose a lot of people new to the multiprocessor multi-core world may not initially realize this. I'm often setting individual render nodes per CPU/core because it usually gives better results than the brain-dead thread "scheduling" when trying to run a multithreaded render. Other apps beyond 3D render node software works this way too. Database systems are a good example.

[Rob Lohman]

Luckily REDCODE stuff doesn't require that much memory, so I wouldn't go overboard unless you're also using it for other stuff that benefits from it.

[Bruce Allen]

True, I can't imagine RedCine using too much RAM.

Maybe there should be a "REDBENCH" which we can convince all of the hardware review sites to run every time they test a new computer... kinda like CINEBENCH. It'd be much more useful for pros doing video work than the stupid "Microsoft Media Encoder / iTunes MP3 conversion" benchmarks they do now and would be one of the few benchmarks that measures a combination of CPU and GPU.

Of course, I imagine you'll be tweaking the algorithms and quality for a while so it won't be as set in stone... but the advantage would be that the graphics card manufacturers watch those benchmarks like a hawk, so if you got REDBENCH on the regular benchmark list, they'd probably become REALLY keen on making their drivers play nice with RedCine ;)

Bruce Allen
www.boacinema.com

[Rob Lohman]

We're working hard at all the code we need to ship with the camera :)

A lot of programs (including REDCINE) can benefit from more memory to cache. However, on 32-bit systems there can be problems with going over 2, 3 or 4 GB of memory.

[Brook Willard]

Forgive me if this has been asked before. Rob, does REDCINE populate a system with multiple instances to take advantage of 4-8 cores? Also, does it address higher quantities of RAM in a 64-bit system? It may be complete overkill... you know its performance better than anybody here... but curiosity gets the best of me. :)

[KETCH ROSSi]

Hi,
I believe that a Mac will do the work
* Two 3.0GHz Quad-Core Intel Xeon
* 8GB (4 x 2GB)
* 500GB 7200-rpm Serial ATA 3Gb/s
* NVIDIA Quadro FX 4500 512MB, Stereo 3D (2 x dual-link DVI)
* Apple Cinema HD Display (23" flat panel)
* Apple Cinema HD Display (23" flat panel)
* One 16x SuperDrive
* Quad-channel 4Gb Fibre Channel PCI Express card
* Apple Keyboard and Mighty Mouse - U.S. English
* Mac OS X - U.S. English
* Final Cut Studio 2
* Shake
Total of about $12800
and also G-SPEED S
4.5TB
WAS $7,499
NOW $5,999
or MAC RAID Storage
3500GB ADM (7x500GB Ultra ATA)
$8,199.00
and AJA's Io HD not sure for the price
I believe that will do the work, preview will be at 2k if I'm not mistaken.:alien:

Hi Panicos,

I like your option, similar to the one I intend to built but with 750GB 7200-rpm..., not sure on the screens I like better the 30inc, is there a reason why you choosed the 23inc?

I like to know, thanks.

Ciao,

KETCH ROSSI
www.KETCHFRAME.com

[Anders Holck]

Note that Apple highly recommends the ATI X1900 for Color, not the Quadro or any other Nvidia card.

http://www.apple.com/finalcutstudio/color/specs.html

In the Final Touch days I believe they endorsed ATI as well.

Maybe Graeme has some info about this...

[coboman]

G-SPEED S 4.5TB


Why the SCSI version of GSpeed? Is it good enough, or is the 4Gbit/sec Fibre Channel a better option?

I would really like to know the difference between these two, and the GSpeed eS (SATA), with 3 Gbit/sec sounds like a great choice (when it is available), costing a third of any of these other options.

Any info on the subject is greatly appreciated.

[Chris Kenny]

There's really not much reason to buy something like a 4.5 TB G-SPEED for working with Red footage. It's not really large or fast enough for an uncompressed 4K workflow, and the speed is overkill for a compressed workflow. You can get a similar amount of storage for 1/3 of the price by just buying commodity eSATA enclosures (that do port multiplication) and loading them up with lots of bare drives.

[Rob Lohman]

Forgive me if this has been asked before. Rob, does REDCINE populate a system with multiple instances to take advantage of 4-8 cores? Also, does it address higher quantities of RAM in a 64-bit system? It may be complete overkill... you know its performance better than anybody here... but curiosity gets the best of me. :)

The decoder will take advantage of multiple CPU's. The image processing is done on the GPU. Memory we'll have to see. Without caching we don't really need that much.

[sNovaK]

Note that Apple highly recommends the ATI X1900 for Color, not the Quadro or any other Nvidia card.

http://www.apple.com/finalcutstudio/color/specs.html

In the Final Touch days I believe they endorsed ATI as well.

Maybe Graeme has some info about this...

Is there any part of Color's color processing that is hardware accelerated? I mean, if the actual color grading processing or final render takes advantage of the GPU's processing acceleration, this will make a difference.

I may be wrong here, but otherwise, I don't think it would make a considerable difference as to what graphics card your using whether it's the Quadro or another NVIDIA, or ATI.... as long as the card displays the GUI correctly and efficiently, the color grading process and rendering shouldn't be improved by any large stretch.

If Color's processing pipeline is the way I think it is, you're better off investing in more RAM and CPU "ommf".

Sean
Cineworks, Miami (www.cineworks.com/?tag=red-post-production)