Strong GPU, a lot of ram, multicore CPU and fast SSD is something that makes you happy when it comes to editing videos.

If you plan to work with particular format make sure your hardware (most likely GPU/ sometimes soundcard) supports coding/encoding for better performance.

I usually start with my budget. Then shop for the best bang for the buck. Although PD14 does support GPU acceleration for 'some' formats, transitions and effects, IMPO the CPU is most important. Intel i7 4770k, 16GB, GTX1060 3GB, Two 240GB SSD, 4TB HD, Sony HDR-TD20V 3D camcorder, Sony SLT-A65VK for still images, Windows 10 Pro, 64bit
Gary Russell -- TN USA

I use a i.7 processor laptop and this works fine , think the i.3 and quad processors are not up to the work ...

Quote:
Background: I currently have a Dell Optiplex 9020 - i7-4770, 16Gb Ram - R7 - 200 (Old GPU) - 128SSD . I wanted to buy a better card but the PSU is not powerful enough and does not have the connectors to power the modern cards, hence the need for a new PC.

Get a GTX 960 or 950. Power requirements for those are low enough to allow connecting in any PC and you will get the best hardware acceleration on encoding side.

They usually come with an adapter for HDD power:



SSD versus HDD - makes no difference in the actual speed. Processing video files on the SSD it will just ruin the SSD faster.

Thanks for the feedback, so does anyone have any figures on whether GPU's make any significant difference? As it is a video editing program it's quite surprising to see it only relies on CPU? Phill - Cronin Communication
www.phillcronin.com

PC spec: Win 10pro (64) - i7-4770 - 16Gb Ram - 128 SSD - Radeon R7 200

It does use the GPU for a lot of things - some effects (you have to choose them), encoding h264 or h265.
And, true, it doesn't use GPU for encoding other video formats (do you use any of the others?) or some other effects.

I ask a similar question a few days back, with help of the others here I came to the conclusion to get the GTX 960. You can follow most of the important info here
http://forum.cyberlink.com/forum/posts/list/46135.page
It is currently trending right above your post
I was originally going to go with a GTX 970 or R9 390. But after reading and hearing the advice here the cheaper 960 is the way to go.

Also in the link I put there is a link to a spreadsheet that shows different CPU / GTX960, I would guess your 4 core i7 will do well, but of coarse if you can afford new everything and go with the 6 core i7 5820k, x99 motherboard and ddr4 ram or better there could be a slight advantage...worth the money, only you can decide that. I am building with an i7 4790K, the reason is I got it for $250 on cyber monday, I was originally going to go i5 but couldn't pass up the price.

Thanks Sonic & Rogers for your replies, I really appreciate this.
Yes H265 is what I mainly use. My set-up is a CanonXF-100 that is captured through a AVerMedia Live Gamer HD Lite that feeds through to Xsplit Broadcat which records in H265 and then this file is used in all the post editing in PowerDirector (I use Xsplit as it allows me to have a Powerpoint presentation running live in the background which saves me A LOT of time in post production work. Thanks for the advice on the GTX 960, I will take a look at that post. Phill - Cronin Communication
www.phillcronin.com

PC spec: Win 10pro (64) - i7-4770 - 16Gb Ram - 128 SSD - Radeon R7 200

Hey Rodgers, there is a lot of information on that spread sheet. What did you conclude from it? I don't want to blow money i.e. it looks like 8Gb of RAM will do and if a processor is only running at 23% lets go for one that runs at 80% as still not maxing out? Also I did a quick search of GTX 960 and there are lots of different models? so does it matter which one? Phill - Cronin Communication
www.phillcronin.com

PC spec: Win 10pro (64) - i7-4770 - 16Gb Ram - 128 SSD - Radeon R7 200

I just looked at the spreadsheet and compared where I think my cpu/gpu would fall and I think I will be happy. I don't have my system up and running just yet, I got a great deal on cyber monday and have been running Linux Mint to stress test. I still have to purchase Win10 +gpu which I am doing this week so sometime next week I should be up and running so I can actually perform the tests and see what I get. as far as brands, I looked at all the reviews on Amazon and newegg and Micro center and come up with the EVGA FTW 4gb fits my budget, from what I see 2 or 4 gb doesn't help PD, but I may game a little as well (2nd or even 3rd purpose) so the 4gb will help if I decide to do more gaming. They also suggested the GTX950 as well, it seems to depend on what you want to spend, but it looks like the 950 or 960 will get similer results with PD. I'm a total noob at this the responses to my question are here http://forum.cyberlink.com/forum/posts/list/47030.page
Hope this helps, it helped me a lot.

OK, So after 24hrs on this forum and being connected to a number of other links this is what I have concluded / been advised to put together. Remember I am looking for the best bang for buck, not a super computer that will only be utilised at 25%. Also I want to slightly future proof it for the next couple of years.

So this is my spec. If I have got it badly wrong, please let me know. Else I hope that this will help others looking for this information.


CPU: Intel Core i7-6700K Skylake (K as a bit higher spec and Skylake as it works better with H264/H265 encoding)

RAM: 16GB (Though I believe you could get 8GB and upgrade later if required, no one testing has shown higher than 8GB usage)

GPU: GTX960 (950 would probably be ok, but for future proofing I will go the 960) Not sure which one so I am going for the Strix GTX960 2GB (Looks like 4GB won't make much, if any, difference)

PSU: 500W as the GPU is a little hungry

SSD: 250GB - A Samsung 850 EVO (Seems to have good reviews) could get a 500 but I will just transfer files after completed

HD: Get what you require for storage and backup

OS: Windows 10 home 64 bit

I hope this helps, I have been working on this for a week and I need to stop somewhere Phill - Cronin Communication
www.phillcronin.com

PC spec: Win 10pro (64) - i7-4770 - 16Gb Ram - 128 SSD - Radeon R7 200

That is similar to what I built, exceptions being I went I7-4970K due to great deal and I went 4gb on gpu just because of possible gaming and I have 2-250gb SSD's which I will be posting a question on later today about the best way to set them up since I have read different setups as well.
Be interested if you do the test for the spread sheet to see what Skylake will get you.

Plan to order it today so maybe later next week I may to to do the test... Now to reinstall everything at set it up!...
Phill - Cronin Communication
www.phillcronin.com

PC spec: Win 10pro (64) - i7-4770 - 16Gb Ram - 128 SSD - Radeon R7 200

If you get that Skylake, you don't need the video card, the embedded video chip (Intel® HD Graphics 530) it has a hardware video encoder comparable with nVidia's and PD can make use of it. maybe not identical but, depending of what you encode, you might not even notice the difference.


Maybe after you set it up, you can run the test in that thread, just to show off

Quote: Background: I currently have a Dell Optiplex 9020 - i7-4770, 16Gb Ram - R7 - 200 (Old GPU) - 128SSD . I wanted to buy a better card but the PSU is not powerful enough and does not have the connectors to power the modern cards, hence the need for a new PC.

What PD editing aspect performance wise are you unhappy with that you are trying to improve relative to what you have?

Your current i7-4770 vs your new plan of i7-6700k both at stock speed, ~10% difference. http://goo.gl/9zykV7 Very difficult to notice that in any aspect of timeline editing or CPU encoding with PD14.

Jeff

The only gain would be the video encoder in Skylake versus the one in Haswell.
But you are right otherwise is a minimal performance boost, it might be better of just adding a GTX960 to his existing system.

Some people though like to get new toys, it's what keeps prices low for the second-hand buyers

Not for me to judge, I am still happy with my first gen i7/Xeon, 6 core HT, CPU.

If you check ebay, you can find off-lease Dell dual-Xeon workstations with huge amounts of RAM for under $1K.

These machines are about 3 years old and usually have industrial reliability hard drives.

Before buying, I check the Dell serial to be sure they were never serviced. After, I install a new SSD for the system drive, and set whatever old drives in the PC for RAID 0.

Quote: The only gain would be the video encoder in Skylake versus the one in Haswell.
But you are right otherwise is a minimal performance boost, it might be better of just adding a GTX960 to his existing system.

This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at Jan 21. 2016 22:40

Phill - Cronin Communication
www.phillcronin.com

PC spec: Win 10pro (64) - i7-4770 - 16Gb Ram - 128 SSD - Radeon R7 200

This answered my question