Does anyone know if I can even use my current Mac Pro to edit Scarlet Footage?

[Damien Collier]

Hello,
I am about to pull the trigger on a Scarlet purchase. It's gonna take everything I can right now to make that purchase happen, so I'm hesitant to do much else (financially right now). Will my computer even handle it or will it suck so bad it's not worth it?
Could I get by using Premiere 5.5 with this computer configuration? (10 year FCP user )
I would prefer to wait for a new Thunderbolt equipped machine and get the latest architecture later. But..........if there was one or two things that I could do to this machine to make it actually work well......what would they be? If not, then I would like to know that too. Thanks in advance!

This is my machine:
Mac Pro Early 2008
Processor: 2 x 2.8 GHz Quad-Core Intel Xeon
Memory: 10 GB 800 MHz DDR2 FB-DIMM
Graphics: ATI Radeon HD 4870 512 MB
Software: Mac OS X Lion 10.7.2 (11C74)
Blackmagic Intensity Card
Seagate Cheetah SATA drives (additional internal)
G Tech (basic-non RAID ) external

[Thomas Pohl]

Don't expect too much performance. Unfortunantly these modells don't run with a Cuda card. And the inbuilt ATI does not really supports the graphic well. We have 2 of these Macs too and we try to implemate two hacked Cuda cards. I let you know if it works. We're still experimenting. But I'm looking forward to the next Mac Pros. Our dealer said they should have a great perormance - let's see.

Cheers
Thomas.

[jimhare]

You will be just fine! I used a single original model Mac Pro (single quad) to edit 50 major Multicam Red 1 projects for 2 years before upgrading.

Trust me, it's all about workflow.

Plan your time wisely and it will serve you perfecctly.

The key is transcoding to ProRes for editing. You can always go back to the R3Ds later if needed.

I originally saw transcoding time as film processing. That put me in the right mindset.

After your shoot, go home and copy your footage to a couple of drives for safety. Then open your clips in Red Cine X Pro (free) and get them looking close to how you want. This should only take a few minutes. You can copy looks to all takes, save preset looks, it's very fast.

Then start all your clips transcoding to ProRes and go do something else. Depending on how much footage you shot it could take a couple of hours or could be the next morning but BAM, you are now ready to edit and it will be just as fast as editing anything else because it's in ProRes.

I used to come home with 7 hours worth of 4K Red files from a live show (6 Reds) and even I would be editing within a couple of days.

Think about the process and the best way to utilize your time and you'll be fine.

[Damien Collier]

Thank you for your thoughts. It does make the most sense (given what I have) to take the time hit on transcoding, knowing the machine can handle it once it is done. I would prefer to stay in an FCP environment anyway, given all my plugins will still work too!

[Jeff Kilgroe]

Will be just fine for 3K Scarlet. In fact, you can edit 4K and 5K on this system if you're set up right. CUDA acceleration can help some things, primarily transitions, scaling and certain FX, it does not accelerate the decompression or de-bayer processing of R3D.

With the 2008 Mac Pro system, the biggest bottleneck is the memory speed. RAM only operates at 800MHz and it is a terrible bottleneck to the CPUs for any memory-intensive tasks.

I wouldn't dump too much money into the system, but from what you have listed, there are two things you could do to boost performance. First would be to increase the RAM. 10GB suggests that you may have an odd number of DIMMs or improperly matched DIMMs, which could be hampering performance. On the 2008 Mac Pro, it's best to populate all DIMM sockets on both RAM cards with identical modules. For an 8-core system running CS5.5 to its fullest, you should have 16GB RAM or more. The next thing to address would be your graphics card. People often assume that CUDA acceleration is where Premiere CS5.5 gets most of its acceleration. That's actually not true. However, it does help and if you can find a decent deal on GTX285 Mac Edition card, it would be a nice upgrade for Premiere and will give you a noticeable performance boost for many operations. Most noticeably for any effects that are labeled as being GPU-accelerated. Failing that, your next best GPU option is actually a re-flashed GTX285 to have the Apple EFI. Be sure you don't fall victim to the numerous scammers out there selling lesser GTX260 or 270 cards claiming they're the 285. There's another thread on that around here somewhere, recent in the past few days, and even has some info on where you might obtain a card that will work.

[Damien Collier]

Jeff,
Thank you for taking the time to respond to me. I appreciate it. I have been regularly reading the reduser forums since 2008 and have seen many of your posts and how helpful you are.

[jimhare]

Jeff's advice is always the best! My DaVinci system is running like a dream following his tips.

If you're staying in FCP and not likely to go Adobe, the CUDA boost may not be necessary.

For me the Red Rocket changed everything, but it costs more than a new Mac, and really only if you have dozens of hours of footage you need to get through quickly.
Did my first year on the 1st gen Mac Pro without it and got along fine, as long as I kept my expectations in check.

[Damien Collier]

This all sounds like good advice.

[Thomas Pohl]

Hi Jeff,
are you sure that the GTX285 runs on an early 2008 Modell? That's not what I've heard before.
Cheers
Thomas.

[Jeff Kilgroe]

Hi Jeff,
are you sure that the GTX285 runs on an early 2008 Modell? That's not what I've heard before.

As long as it really is a 2008 Mac Pro, you're fine. So, I guess what do you mean by "early 2008 model"? The specs in Damien's original post line-up with an '08 Mac Pro, he should be fine. There is only one revision or model of the '08 Mac Pro. Various CPU and HDD options aside....

The GTX285 is incompatible with the 2006/2007 Mac Pro system. If I recall, the '08 Mac Pro doesn't show the post screen with the GTX285, so you don't see anything on your Mac until the GTX is initialized by the OS. I don't believe drivers for the card were rolled into OSX until 10.6.3. Before that, you had to do the OSX install to the drive from another system or install another graphics card (like the one that came with the Mac Pro) to do the install, then reboot and install the proper GTX drivers first.

http://www.evga.com/support/manuals/..._MacPro_EN.pdf