Im assuming there are quite a few mac folk round here but I finally got "the pc of my dreams"its an e machine with a gig of memory,200 gig hard drive,3500 athalon processor.I bought the most I could get and bought blind as well thinking the numbers sound big so its gotta be good.I have two questions.First,will this computer have no problems when I learn do do serious editing?And second,I have a maxtor 80 gig external usb hard drive.Should and how do I use this extra drive to maximize my performance? Thank you gurus!
proper pc management
- Thread starter airbayforce
- Start date
Well, I'm a Mac user, but computers are computers are computers for the most part.
1 GB of memory. Get more if you can, but this should be sufficient. But more will not hurt, only help.
200 GB hard drive. Tons of space, but you'll fill it up quickly if you're shooting digital.
Processor. Not sure, I'm not up to speed on processors for Windows machines, but I know Athlon has always made decent processors. You should be okay.
As far as the external hard drive, just hook it up and use it as extra storage. If this computer is going to be used solely for digital film making, then the more hard drive space, the better. Hook it up and use it as a normal hard drive. You'll probably experience slower transfer times, so don't put anything on there you're going to need quickly. Maybe use it for backup or something.
1 GB of memory. Get more if you can, but this should be sufficient. But more will not hurt, only help.
200 GB hard drive. Tons of space, but you'll fill it up quickly if you're shooting digital.
Processor. Not sure, I'm not up to speed on processors for Windows machines, but I know Athlon has always made decent processors. You should be okay.
As far as the external hard drive, just hook it up and use it as extra storage. If this computer is going to be used solely for digital film making, then the more hard drive space, the better. Hook it up and use it as a normal hard drive. You'll probably experience slower transfer times, so don't put anything on there you're going to need quickly. Maybe use it for backup or something.
I've got an Athlon 3500 with 2GB of RAM. For drive space, I have three hard drives:
(1) 30GB for the OS and editing software
(2) 120GB for data (captured video) - This should ALWAYS be on a seperate drive!
(3) 200GB (firewire drive) for nightly backups. (In case you need to leave in an emergency, just take the drive!)
Depending on the editing software you use, 1GB of RAM should be sufficient (Adobe Premiere, Pinnacle, Ulead). I believe Avid requires 2GB, but I may be wrong.
This is the best setup I can think of for a PC user.
(1) 30GB for the OS and editing software
(2) 120GB for data (captured video) - This should ALWAYS be on a seperate drive!
(3) 200GB (firewire drive) for nightly backups. (In case you need to leave in an emergency, just take the drive!)
Depending on the editing software you use, 1GB of RAM should be sufficient (Adobe Premiere, Pinnacle, Ulead). I believe Avid requires 2GB, but I may be wrong.
This is the best setup I can think of for a PC user.
you should always import video to a secondary drive. The best reason I can offer is this: your operating system management, cache management, and program file management all read from and write to the (c: ) drive. If you try to write DV quality video to the (c: ) drive while all of the other system processes are also using the (c: ) drive, the machine may get overburdened with tasks -- at which point it will start stacking up things to do in some "order." This will eventually result in possible dropped frames during the import process and you get jerky video. An ultra performing machine may be able to handle this better than others, so it might be worth giving it a try. If you get jerky video, then you should switch your importing to your external drive.