computer for editing?

[Zakaree Sandberg]

I need opinions:
Im not a professional editor so I most likely wont be editing professionally..
But lets just say I shoot my own little spec commercials or shorts and I wanna edit the footage myself and whatnot.. Would I be ok with a macbook pro? or do I need to step it up to the tower? I think I would like the macbook simply because I could take it wherever I go.
Thoughts? Questions? Comments?

Im positive my current duel G4 quicksilver tower wont cut it on the 4k, 2k sessions.!!!:ranting2:

[Jeff Kilgroe]

Yes, Macbook pro should do just fine. The 17" model with the 1920x1200 screen is real nice. The 15" is just as good and I prefer it for its size, but there's a big sacrifice in screen real-estate. Seriously, I'd do with either and get a nice additional monitor to plug into it for when you're at home base.

Of course, a Mac Pro has a lot more horsepower and you'll appreciate it if you're doing a lot of FX or more than just cutting your clips together. I would recommend the tower unless you absolutely have to be mobile.

[EditMan1]

Will the MacBook Pro work well for 2K or even 4K clips? thanks.

[Tom Lowe]

I'm planning on waiting until the last possible moment and then building a super star-destroying PC with criminal levels of RAM and a video card worth more than my condo. :)

[Ace]

Tom, me and you.. PC people in a MAC world my friend :)

I plan on doing the same thing. Quad core prices will plummet mid July. For the price of a standard 8core Macpro, one could basically build a 3 x 8 core systems with ungodly amounts of ram, Dual SLI for Redcine GPU goodness. The Intels overclock rather well, one could run at 1.5 times the clockspeed with a bigger fan/heatsink.

I expect to be building a 16 or 32 core system by the end of the year.

[Tom Lowe]

Yeah, and I'm not going to build mine until next summer, so imagine the fire-breathing awesomeness available by then!

How come you're getting yours so soon? Most people won't have their REDs until early next year, would be my guess.

[Ace]

By next summer double digit cores will be abound.

I'm building mine by the end of the year for use as a small render farm on an architectural project I am working on. I'm actually including it in the cost of the job I am doing. Quad-core chips will be falling to a couple hundred$ per unit.. Couple 8 of them with some server based architecture and you got some serious ghetto supercomputerage. However, what I am really waiting for, is for AMD to catch up on their "true" multi-cores.. Unlike Intel's processors, AMD's will offer much better performance and memory management. Intel's kinda winging it right now to stay ahead of the game.

[Tom Lowe]

haha.

One thing I really need, though, is at least 1TB or 2TBs of internal performance RAID in my tower. Even editing simple HVX stuff quickly filled up my 500GB RAID array on my editing system. I like to keep everything in one timeline, so having enough space on my editing system could be a real issue, it seems.

What is a REDCODE 4K timeline going to look like for a 2 hour movie? How many GBs?

What is the max amount of internal RAID harddrives you could put into a kickass PC tower?

[Jonathan L. Bowen]

I'm hoping Mac has a 16-core setup out by early next year when I plan on getting a new tower. That'd be fun. ;)

[Ace]

The newest PC motherboards all come with 8x SATA ports. Fitting 8x 500 or 750 gig drives wouldn't be a problem at all. The only problem would be cooling. MacPro's have a pretty good cooling scheme with the perforated grille front and exhaust system. There are PC cases with similar ventilation properties, and coupled with a couple of case fans and it should be sweet. Although I wouldnt put all my drives in the PC case. I would advise building a cheap 300$ single or dualcore server and accessing all your files through a network, with a 500 gig drive as your temp drive on the PC (Maybe even solid state). This way you dont have heat build-up in your working PC, and you don't need to hear the droning sounds of 7 drives at all hours of the night while working. People underestimate working in pure silence.

[Jonathan L. Bowen]

I have a two-hour looping recording of a jack hammer that I play while doing any work, it soothes me and really gives a nice work environment ambience. ;)