Build for video rendering

Streeteh

Streeteh

Streeteh

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Joined
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Afternoon gents,

I work in a Media Studies department in a Secondary school. A huge part of our coursework is the editing and rendering of video based projects using Premiere and After Effects. As a result of strict budgeting we are obviously rather limited in terms of computer hardware, we can live with this (just about) on the editing side of things, however rendering is becoming a nightmare, with 4 min long projects taking 12 hours to render (with up to 60 projects being completed at roughly the same time every term, this is causing chaos).

We need to build a beast of some form, dedicated to rendering out videos as fast as possible. This would also be used to edit some of the more demanding multicam footage (some kids end up with 12-stream 1080p multicam projects, an utter nightmare with a core2duo and onboard graphics!). I've been asked to put together a 'bargain bin, ideal beast and best case scenario' hardware list but don't have a clue where to start these days.

I know i7 and Nvidia are where I ideally want to be going. I also imagine more ram is better, we are limited to 16gb however due to the W7 licence the school owns.

I was thinking of writing a £500, £1000 and £2000 build list, school doesn't pay VAT so budget applies to BEFORE VAT. But looking now at hardware prices I'm unsure whether we would see anything worthwhile from a £500 build.

So gents, how much is the bottom end I should be looking to spend and, if you have the time, where would be the sweet spot in terms of bang-for-buck video rendering hardware?
 
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Ah sorry, would help if I'd said; No, we've got plenty of screens, mice, keyboards etc.

This build is purely the base unit (case is a part of the requirement though)
 
You might be better off with an AMD build to keep costs down.

For video encoding, the FX-8350 is pretty much on a par with the i7 3770k. Likewise the FX-8150 is pretty much on a par with the i5 3570k.

The difference being that the AMD platform should end up a little cheaper - the 8350 and motherboard both being cheaper than the 3770k and motherboard.

There's a lot of propagation of "Intel is best" going on which is partially fanboy-ism, partially based in fact (depending on use and which game, the i7 is better for most gaming), and partly just people repeating what they read others say.

For video encoding, the extra cores on the AMD make up for the better performance per clock and hyperthreading of the i7, giving them performance pretty much on par. Either will give you significantly better than your Core2Duos though.

That's not to say the i7 is bad (in fact, I'm very specifically saying it's not, they're similar) just that the AMD build will usually end up cheaper. If overclocking, the i7 is indeed the best choice - but you're in a school environment so presumably aren't allowed to go tinkering. (Again, the "Intel is best" idea comes from the fact that the i7 is better when overclocked, and overclocks better, but that's situation-specific)
 
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Interesting, I never thought of it like that. It will indeed remain un-overclocked. Working conditions are far from ideal (rooms with 25+ computers, windows with opening restrictors and no aircon make for a rather toasty room in the summer) so heat would be a massive issue as it is. Add to that the fact that whilst I am comfortable with overclocking, if I ever leave this machine will need to be as simple as possible to operate and if it lost its clock it would never get it set back up again.

What's the deal with all this CUDA malarkey? Should I be aiming for a 460 or something along those lines?
 
YOUR BASKET
1 x Intel Core i5-3570K 3.40GHz (Ivybridge) Socket LGA1155 Processor (77W) - Retail £167.99
1 x Seagate Barracuda 2TB 7200RPM SATA 6Gb/s 64MB Cache - OEM (ST2000DM001) HDD £72.98
1 x Asus P8Z77-V LX2 Intel Z77 (Socket 1155) DDR3 Motherboard £69.98
1 x Crucial RealSSD M4 64GB 2.5 SATA 6Gb/s Solid State Hard Drive (CT064M4SSD2) £59.99
1 x Kingston HyperX Black 16GB (2x8GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C10 1600MHz Dual Channel Memory Kit (KHX16C10B1BK2/16X) £59.99
1 x XFX Pro 450W Core Edition '80 Plus Bronze' Power Supply £43.99
1 x NZXT Source 210 Elite Midi Tower Case - Black £39.98
1 x OcUK 24x DVD±RW SATA ReWriter (Black) - OEM £16.99
Total : £546.00 (includes shipping : £11.75).



There is THIS mobo with a cooler bundled along with. You only need up the multiplier tp OC, even if you set it a 4Ghz that's a nice round number. An i7 would be nice for the hyperthreading but that adds to the cost obviously
 
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Oh I another important note I forgot to say;

As it's a school purchase, it will be VAT free, so my budget would be the cost BEFORE VAT. Will update the op appropriately.


I was under the impression CS6 made use of CUDA cores to improve editing and rendering times? I've only spent today reading into things so I'm very much clueless at present. Attempting to learn as fast as I can though.

Thanks honosuseri, that's a great start. Am i missing something or is there no graphics card there?
 
Streeteh said:
Oh I another important note I forgot to say;

As it's a school purchase, it will be VAT free, so my budget would be the cost BEFORE VAT. Will update the op appropriately.


I was under the impression CS6 made use of CUDA cores to improve editing and rendering times? I've only spent today reading into things so I'm very much clueless at present. Attempting to learn as fast as I can though.

Thanks honosuseri, that's a great start. Am i missing something or is there no graphics card there?
Click to expand...

I left it out mate as there is onboard graphics, I was trying to stay near to the £500 mark.

I would avoid AMD, nothing to do with being a fan boy. The 8350 sucks more power from the wall at stock than an i5K overclocked. The AMD CPU also runs hotter and it's not great for overclocking either.

Adobe does use CUDA. Adobe is now starting to support OpenGL so AMD GPUs can be used. It might well be more cost effective to get the i5K mildly overclock it and get a dedicated GPU than pay the extra for the i7 and hyperthreading.

Would be easier to balance the build to a set budget though fella
 
£510 + VAT 8 core 4GHz with 16Gb 2TB HD7750, cooler can be an optional item.

YOUR BASKET
1 x AMD Piledriver FX-8 Eight Core 8350 Black Edition 4.00GHz (Socket AM3+) Processor - Retail £149.99
1 x Asus M5A99X EVO AMD 990X (Socket AM3+) DDR3 ATX Motherboard £99.98
1 x Western Digital Caviar Red 2TB SATA 6Gb/s 64MB Cache WD20EFRX - OEM HDD £89.99
1 x MSI HD 7750 2048MB GDDR3 PCI-Express Graphics Card £71.99
1 x Kingston HyperX Black 16GB (2x8GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C10 1600MHz Dual Channel Memory Kit (KHX16C10B1BK2/16X) £59.99
1 x Thermalright Silver Arrow SB-E CPU Cooler (Socket 775 / 1155 / 1156 / 1366 / 2011 / AM2 / AM2+ / AM3 / FM1 / FM2) £52.98
1 x Antec High Current Gamer 400W '80 Plus Bronze' Power Supply £40.00
1 x Xigmatek Asgard Midi Tower Case - Black £29.99
1 x OcUK 24x DVD±RW SATA ReWriter (Black) - OEM £16.99
Total : £626.89 (includes shipping : £12.50).



honosuseri said:
I would avoid AMD, nothing to do with being a fan boy. The 8350 sucks more power from the wall at stock than an i5K overclocked. The AMD CPU also runs hotter and it's not great for overclocking either.
Click to expand...

No and no, at full prime runs at 4.6GHz, THE 8350 uses 250W at the wall. The temps are less than 60C. At stock would be much less. I use an 8350 and have tested it thoroughly with watt meter.
.
 
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Tell you what, I reckon I could squeeze £1k out of the school, the amount they spend every year is massive so I'm going to aim big.

So, as requested; A set budget of £1000 before VAT.

[EDIT] Missed your post nkata - Thanks very much man. Will save that as the £500 build!
 
Streeteh said:
Tell you what, I reckon I could squeeze £1k out of the school, the amount they spend every year is massive so I'm going to aim big.

So, as requested; A set budget of £1000 before VAT.

[EDIT] Missed your post nkata - Thanks very much man. Will save that as the £500 build!
Click to expand...

YOUR BASKET
1 x Intel Core i7-3820 3.60GHz (Sandybridge-E) Socket LGA2011 Processor - Retail £229.99
1 x MSI GeForce GTX 660Ti Black Knight OC 2048MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card £215.99
1 x Gigabyte X79-UD3 Intel X79 (Socket 2011) DDR3 Motherboard £179.99
1 x Corsair Obsidian 550D Quiet Midi Tower Case - Black £119.99
1 x Plextor M5 Pro 128GB Extreme Series Solid State Drive - (PX-128M5P) £99.95
1 x Seasonic G series 550w '80 Plus Gold' Modular Power Supply £76.99
1 x Seagate Barracuda 2TB 7200RPM SATA 6Gb/s 64MB Cache - OEM (ST2000DM001) HDD £72.98
1 x Alpenföhn K2 Mount Doom CPU Cooler (Socket 775 / 1155 / 1156 / 1366 / 2011 / AM2 / AM2+ / AM3 / FM1 / FM2) £51.98
2 x Corsair XMS3 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-16000C9 2000MHz Dual Channel Kit (CMX8GX3M2A2000C9) £49.99 (£99.98)
1 x OcUK 24x DVD±RW SATA ReWriter (Black) - OEM £16.99
Total : £1,181.34 (includes shipping : £13.75).



nkata said:
No and no, at full prime runs at 4.6GHz, THE 8350 uses 250W at the wall. The temps are less than 60C. At stock would be much less. I use an 8350 and have tested it thoroughly with watt meter.
.
Click to expand...

Video review of 8350. Guess you are saying Tiny Tom tells pork pies then ;)
 
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I don't quite follow your reasoning here. The problem is that the rendering takes too long on the current computers. You have about 60 students, some of whose work is taking twelve hours to run. Which is a long time.

Your solution is to buy one very fast computer, which will bang through the projects in a few hours each. Or allow more complex projects.

I don't think you want this. Since you have more than one student, you want the best performance / £ possible in a single machine. You then want as many of those single machines as you can buy. Better to have four £500 computers than one £2000 computer, as the £2k box will not be four times quicker than the £500 box. Make sense?
 
JonJ678 said:
I don't quite follow your reasoning here. The problem is that the rendering takes too long on the current computers. You have about 60 students, some of whose work is taking twelve hours to run. Which is a long time.

Your solution is to buy one very fast computer, which will bang through the projects in a few hours each. Or allow more complex projects.

I don't think you want this. Since you have more than one student, you want the best performance / £ possible in a single machine. You then want as many of those single machines as you can buy. Better to have four £500 computers than one £2000 computer, as the £2k box will not be four times quicker than the £500 box. Make sense?
Click to expand...

Very true, however as stated in my op we also quite frequently have students attempting to multicam up to a dozen 1080p feeds live in Premiere which obviously doesn't work at all on our current hardware. The advantage to having one 'beast' is that we can simply chuck a student onto it for 30 mins so they can multicam their footage, save the project then add extra filters etc to their cut version on the slower computers as I understand that you do in fact need something rather hefty to edit multiple HD SLR streams.

Also, thanks to CS6 allowing you to easily queue project renders, we plan to just line up several students projects at the end of the day and allow them to render overnight rather than render several at the same time.

Many computers would allow faster rendering at the end of the day, however giving the students the ability to multicam in real time with loads of HD footage will be an excellent addition and sorely needed. Also, if this proves to be as successful as we hope, we will eventually expand out the 'high end' computers and have a few as you have stated. Even if it was a £500 computer we would probably only start with one as, schools being schools, you have to prove to the higher ups that it benefits the department before they'll let you go loose.
 
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