Building PC....What should I get?

Rellik · Post by **Rellik** » Tue Jan 28, 2003 12:37 pm

Just a hint: Don´t get a DV500. It is a horrible card. We swapped out almost all components of a perfectly good system till it worked flawless. And it was used only with dv camera mind you so it shouldn´t have been that complicated.

But honestly, what do you intend to DO with the PC(besides editing) and what do you use a footage (VHS,LD,DVD)?

Don´t mean to be rude, but from your post you I gather this will be your first rig to build yourself?

I will be glad to offer a good list of components if you tell me what your budget is and what you need the pc for

shadow-the-hedgehog · Post by **shadow-the-hedgehog** » Tue Jan 28, 2003 9:19 pm

Yes, it is my first PC....to build. I am also gonna use it for gaming, image creation and web design.

The Wired Knight · Post by **The Wired Knight** » Tue Jan 28, 2003 10:40 pm

Biggest damn hard drive you can afford. That's just simple little advice from me ^_^ oh and a firewire port, those things are becoming more and more usefull every day.

Org Profile · Post by **Vlad G Pohnert** » Wed Jan 29, 2003 1:32 am

Actually, I would get at least two 80 gig drives and a Promise ATA controller and run them each on a separate channel as video drives. Then you can put your system drive, burner / DVD drive on the motherboard. That way you have lots of HS space and also a independent drive to backup projects to (just ask people who's hard drive crash)

In terms of video capture card, there are a few options. Cards like the DV500 or Matrox X1000, etc are economical but for some they work great, for others they have nothing but horror stories to tell. Quite frankly, unless you want to spend huge $$$$$ for a rock solid editing system, there is no way to guarantee complete compatibility. If you do decide to get a capture card, ensure to research all the compatible MB and other add on cards to ensure it will work with them....

Vlad

Rellik · Post by **Rellik** » Wed Jan 29, 2003 5:25 am

Some more info:

Storage: I agree with the above. Get one drive for OS and programs, and
another one for video only. Don´t go for too big single drives as you tend to loose much more spce after formating (80GB yields 75GB,120GB yields 111)
I would go with a 40 or 60 GB system drive and a 80GB capture drive. Put them on a promise ide pci card so you can use the pors on your mainboard for DVD-ROM and CD-burner.

Also, if you want to learn about good ways to capture footage from DVD and turning them into divx or mpeg, go to http://doom9.org

You need to decide at which level you are going to doing editing(I mean life-action DV, not AMV) If you just get started, get a Pyro DV Firewire card. It uses the Texas Instruments chip which works flawless and you can connect any DV cam as well as firewire harddrives. I just bought a 120 Maxtor 5000DV, which is a firewire HD. It is great for getting huge amounts of data from a to b as it works on every passive (The DV500 does not work as it is an active card only accepting cams) card.

Important parts:

512MB RAM. Don´t use any less. It is cheap now and editing projects eat
ram for breakfast.

a 19 inch monitor will certainly make it easier. I own a 17 inch one and it is a pain too edit on it.

Ashyukun · Post by **Ashyukun** » Wed Jan 29, 2003 8:13 am

I'd definitely throw my agreement behind separate system and A/V drives. My main A/V drive died a few weeks ago, which sucked something fierce, but at least I didn't lose all the core system since it was running on a separate drive.

A good sized monitor is very very nice. Even better, IMO, is having two of them, either running on a dual-head card or two cards (just about all the Windoze OSs will run this now, I'd heard W2k was the flakiest about this but that's what I use and it's worked just fine- you just need a card with VGA disable). I've got a 19" and a 17", and it is -really- nice to be able to use one monitor as nothing but the preview window for the video and the other for the timeline and the rest of the controls.

SS5_Majin_Bebi · Post by **SS5_Majin_Bebi** » Wed Jan 29, 2003 7:48 pm

RadicalEd0 wrote:get this:
AthlonXP 2700
200gb 7200rpm 8mb cache WD hdd
1024mb pc3700 DDR ram
Geoforce FX Ultra 128mb video card
SoundBlaster Live Platinum 5.1
Pioneer A05 DVD-R burner
24" LCD monitor
Kilpsch THX 5.1 speakers

that should only set you back a few k

Ack! Thats one solidly kick ass system u have yourself there. Ye gads!! Ill never look at my PC the same way again!!!

RadicalEd0 · Post by **RadicalEd0** » Wed Jan 29, 2003 7:52 pm

pfft I dont have that I was just saying its what he should get :\

SS5_Majin_Bebi · Post by **SS5_Majin_Bebi** » Wed Jan 29, 2003 8:12 pm

Oh

Man, i would KILL for a system with those specs!

Sinime · Post by **Sinime** » Wed Jan 29, 2003 9:33 pm

Barton CPUs will be out soon, maybe wait a week or two...