im looking to build a system for video editing, i have a rough idea of what i need but im just interested to see if there are any other editors on here who would like to advise on a good editing system.

im looking at a

asus a8n sli deluxe motherboard,
AMD x2 3800+ dual core
6600gt graphics
2gig ram.

can anyone suggest a better setup around the same price? or do i even need a dual core?

any help would be appreciated

cheers

What software will you be using for video editing? Some apps eat up more memory than others (Pinnacle for example).

Don't forget to use SATA drives.

Hiya
Spec looks good, the bigger the better really, but it depends on what you're intending editing ie simple AB editing (like news) could get away with e descent P4, get on to colour correcting, motion etc and you'll require more number crunching power! And what format too, DV seems easiest.

We edit news and use mostly 3GHz P4's 1Gb ram big HDD's, Pinnacle Liquid Purple. Also a couple of Dual G5 Power macs with Final cut Pro - this one is the dogs knackers as far as I'm concerned!

Check with the software manufacturer too about motherboard compatibility, I had problems with Pinnacle Liquid not working on one PC - found out it was an incompatible motherboard!

yeah ill be using premiere pro mostly but also after effects, editing with DV definately, colour correcting, using motion and all that jazz, i already have a 200gig ide hard drive, is this no good? thanks for the advice anyway people.

hade - do you work in news and current affairs?

yeah ill be using premiere pro mostly but also after effects, editing with DV definately, colour correcting, using motion and all that jazz, i already have a 200gig ide hard drive, is this no good? thanks for the advice anyway people.
That 200 gig drive will fill up before you know it :) Storage is cheap enough these days that it makes sense to not skimp, but you can easily add another drive as and when you need it...

I use 2x 120GB 7200rpm (ATA 100 :( ) HDD's, on an Athlon XP 3200+, with 1GB DDR RAM, and a Radeon x1600 (AGP 8x), I use Adobe AfterFX and Video Vegas 4.0, and I havent really had any trouble, not got annoyed by the speed (or lack of) at-all

I will say though, If your doing video editing, ATI has the best colour reproduction, and AMD and ATI sort of go hand in hand (Intel and nVidia -- AMD and ATI) I dunno why, it just seems the best way of doing things.

cheers all, what about programs - do any programs offer anything more than what i can get from premiere and after fx? Does anybody know of any colour grading programs or plugins to give my DV a little extra touch?

Avid is a pretty good program, I think the BBC use the professional version.

Avid is a pretty good program, I think the BBC use the professional version.

Avid for PC and Final Cut for Mac are the industry standard AFAIAA

Wilf

I may have a limited set of requirements, but there's nothing I haven't been able to do using Sony Vegas.

Editing itself has never been a problem speed-wise, but using a single CPU (XP2600+ overclocked to 3200+ in my case) s-l-o-w-s things down when rendering to mpeg2.

aye,
vegas is definately my favorite for PC just for the easy interface, but at the end of the day, your just generating EDL's - it's the quality of camera and shooting that makes the difference. The BBC have begun moving over to Final Cut Pro, but still use Avid, Qauntel and Liquid Purple.

For interesting things with DV, we're making a film using one of these:
http://www.mediachance.com/dvdlab/dof/index.htm
The camera focuses on a disk of ground glass which spins - this adds slight (natural) imperfections to the image (emulating film grain) the front end of the attachment accepts Normal photo lenses, meaning you can change the depth of field in both extremes. Tested it with a PD150 and it's fantastic & exciting!
Check out magic bullet http://www.redgiantsoftware.com/ for some colour effex

what is magic bullet like? is it going to do wonders for my DV footage and how easy is it to use? Are the film effects any good?

Haven't used magic bullet yet, but it seems to be full of colour correction presets that are comparable to well known films, so you can quickly make your video "look like" well known films. Think there's a Se7en preset etc..