I'm building a new pc for 4k editing & need advice

Scott050

Newbie Joined: Dec 04, 2018 23:25 Messages: 5 Offline

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Jul 11, 2019 22:31

I'm looking to upgrade to Powerdirector 17 and build a new pc for 4K editing and want some advice on what to get. I currently have Powerdirector 11 an i7 3770K (not overclocked), 16GB DDR3 1333mhz RAM, Crucial M4 256GB SSD (OS & programs), Seagate Barracuda 1TB for source files and no dedicated video card. Obviously PD11 doesn't do 4k editing so I don't know what kind of a step up i need to take but i want something that will edit 4K at LEAST as well as an i7 3770K does 1080p. I'm guessing the Ryzen 5 3400G won't do that? I have been waiting for intel to bring out their new 10nm processors but after realising how long that might take i decided to wait and see what Ryzen 3rd gen perform like. I have never used a dedicated video card in the past but without integrated graphics it looks like i'll need one. I know people say a video card is important for video editing but as i understand it, only the cpu does the work during the editing part, (unless you add in effects or change the brightness/ colour settings which uses the video card) and then when you are ready to render/produce/export the edited work; - the video card does that part (that's why i didn't buy one). Correct me if i'm wrong but not having a video card shouldn't effect the editing process for trimming only??? I only really care about the actual editing part of the process, I don't care how long it takes to 'produce' the final video file. I find it frustrating that when searching/scanning/scrubbing through the video it takes so long to clearly display the video while trying to find parts to keep. Is this the CPU, RAM, Hard Drive, Video Card, or a combination that is slowing things down? What should i really be focussing on upgrading? Is there a limit to the benefit you can get from how fast your SSD is (for example the Samsung 970 Evo Plus or PCIe 4.0 SSD that have just come out?) I don't want to waste $ on a faster SSD if it takes just as long to scan through video during editing!

I am considering 2 possible systems that i've listed below and can afford to buy either but don't want to waste money if it won't have significant performance improvements.

System 1;
Ryzen 3600 $315 (Australian Dollars) or i5 9400 $289
Does the motherboard matter? If so what should i look for?
Corsair Vengeance LPX 16GB RAM $139 or Trident Z or ?
Samsung 860 Evo 1TB $199 (Windows and Programs)
Samsung 860 Evo 250GB $112 or Crucial MX500 250GB $59 (Source Files)
Video Card ? Radeon RX 570 4GB $179

System 2;
Ryzen 3700x $519 /3800x $629 /3900x $789 /i7 9700K $589 /9900K $769
X570 Series Motherboard or Z390
RAM 16GB or 32GB
Samsung 970 Evo Plus 1TB $309 or new PCIe 4.0 SSD (Windows and Programs)
Samsung 970 Evo Plus 250GB $115 or new PCIe 4.0 SSD (Source Files)
Video Card ? RX 570 $179 /GTX 1660 $349 /RX5700 $609 /GTX2070 Super $939

Considering i don't care about how long it takes to render/produce/export the final file, what would really help me with the editing process part? Any advice or information you can give me would be much appreciated!

optodata

Senior Contributor Location: California, USA Joined: Sep 16, 2011 16:04 Messages: 8630 Offline

Jul 11, 2019 23:30

I have no experience with AMD processors, but distilling everything you've posted down tells me that the main thing you should focus on is the CPU. Get as high a benchmark rating CPU as you can afford, along with 16GB RAM and at least a 1TB SSD and you'll be good.

Intel CPUs have built-in (in-built) GPUs that can do H.264/AVC and H.265/HEVC hardware encoding, and so can dedicated AMD and nVidia GPUs, but if your focus is only on editing performance, their presence or absence typically won't have a significant impact. When it comes to producing, you'll definitely notice, though.

My current system specs are in my signature, and I can work directly with 4K 60p clips in HD preview resolution without needing shadow files. It was built just for that purpose.

YouTube/optodata

DS365 | Win11 Pro | Ryzen 9 3950X | RTX 4070 Ti | 32GB RAM | 10TB SSDs | 5K+4K HDR monitors

Canon Vixia GX10 (4K 60p) | HF G30 (HD 60p) | Yi Action+ 4K | 360Fly 4K 360°

follet

Newbie Location: Ukraine Joined: Nov 29, 2015 04:46 Messages: 12 Offline

Jul 12, 2019 02:03

I have I5 2500K / 16Gb ram / ssd intel. 4K was processed very slow but I do not have enought of money. I solve this issue bybuying AMD RX 570 Graphic card. The video (4K XAVCS from Sony a6300 camera) starts play in preview window without any delay and decoded by GPU. Render time decrease too from 1 hour to 20 minutes (duration of timeline was 17 min.). Try to buy GPU and you will realise that new upgrade of PC is notnecessary.

Scott050

Newbie Joined: Dec 04, 2018 23:25 Messages: 5 Offline

Jul 12, 2019 11:40

Quote I have no experience with AMD processors, but distilling everything you've posted down tells me that the main thing you should focus on is the CPU. Get as high a benchmark rating CPU as you can afford, along with 16GB RAM and at least a 1TB SSD and you'll be good.

Intel CPUs have built-in (in-built) GPUs that can do H.264/AVC and H.265/HEVC hardware encoding, and so can dedicated AMD and nVidia GPUs, but if your focus is only on editing performance, their presence or absence typically won't have a significant impact. When it comes to producing, you'll definitely notice, though.

My current system specs are in my signature, and I can work directly with 4K 60p clips in HD preview resolution without needing shadow files. It was built just for that purpose.

When you say get at least a 1TB SSD is that for Windows OS & Programs or for source files? What type of SSD do you suggest for each of these, would the NVME Samsung 970 PRO 1TB make use of the massive speed gains it has over the Samsung 860 EVO as a separate source files drive, and as a separate drive for OS & Power Director?

optodata

Senior Contributor Location: California, USA Joined: Sep 16, 2011 16:04 Messages: 8630 Offline

Jul 12, 2019 12:41

Quote When you say get at least a 1TB SSD is that for Windows OS & Programs or for source files? What type of SSD do you suggest for each of these, would the NVME Samsung 970 PRO 1TB make use of the massive speed gains it has over the Samsung 860 EVO as a separate source files drive, and as a separate drive for OS & Power Director?

In my opinion, you're seriously overthinking this. Obviously you want to make sure that your new machine is going to be worth the money you're spending, but none of those details have any real impact on video editing.

4K 60p AVC/H.264 video from my Canon GX10 has a bitrate of 149Mbits per second, which is 19MBytes/sec. Even a 20 year old, 4800rpm, Ultra DMA (ATA/33) spinning platter disk would be able to play back video data at that speed. The main performance impact, though, is what needs to happen to that data to convert it into displayable and editable form, and that's where a powerful multicore CPU is essential.

Any SSD is going to help your system boot and load programs faster, and it's good practice in my book to have a smallish C: drive for the OS and a much larger D: drive (or more) for data. However you're unlikely to run into any bottlenecks unless you use multiple clips in a single project that use an intermediate codec like MagicYUV.

You may find this thread worth a read.

YouTube/optodata

DS365 | Win11 Pro | Ryzen 9 3950X | RTX 4070 Ti | 32GB RAM | 10TB SSDs | 5K+4K HDR monitors

Canon Vixia GX10 (4K 60p) | HF G30 (HD 60p) | Yi Action+ 4K | 360Fly 4K 360°

Scott050

Newbie Joined: Dec 04, 2018 23:25 Messages: 5 Offline

Jul 21, 2019 03:46

Quote

none of those details have any real impact on video editing.

Thanks for that optodata i won't worry about the hard drive then, there's so much conflicting information out there, and people keep saying that it all depends on the specific video editing program that you're using. So much info on the web focuses on other video editing programs (more RAM the better for example BUT powerdirector never uses more than 8GB of my 16GB RAM). It's hard to find out specifically what works best with powerdirector!!! I've been waiting a while to get some more feedback on the new ryzen 3000 series but it looks like the i7 9700k is a slightly better cpu and comes with integrated graphics so i might go with that unless anyone can tell me that the 3700x is better?

This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at Jul 21. 2019 13:15

SoNic67

Senior Contributor Joined: Sep 27, 2014 14:14 Messages: 1308 Offline

Jul 21, 2019 11:58

Quote
Thanks for that optodata i won't worry about the hard drive then, there's so much conflicting information out there, and people keep saying that it all depends on the specific video editing program that you're using. So much info on the web focuses on other video editing programs (more RAM the better for example BUT powerdirector never uses more than 8GB of my 16GB RAM). It's hard to find out specifically what works best with powerdirector!!! I've been waiting a while to get some more feedback on the new ryzen 3000 series but it looks like the i7 9700k is a slightly better cpu and comes with integrated graphics so i might go with that unless anyone can tell me that the 3700x is better?

I concure with optodata, the HDD speed has little importance during editing and producing. GPU decoding/encoding helps a lot, and if your intel CPU has integrated GPU will be fine. It just need to be newer generation to support the 4K - the i7 9700k (Coffee Lake generation) is fine in that aspect:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intel_Graphics_Technology#Capabilities_(GPU_video_acceleration)

Personally I have a workstation with two Xeon CPU's (no integrated GPU in those) and therfore I needed a dedicated GPU.

This message was edited 4 times. Last update was at Jul 21. 2019 12:04

the King

Senior Member Joined: Jun 30, 2010 04:10 Messages: 296 Offline

Jul 23, 2019 09:52

With the same price, AMD Ryzen 3000 beats Intel in almost every part except gaming. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
PowerDirector 365

SoNic67

Senior Contributor Joined: Sep 27, 2014 14:14 Messages: 1308 Offline

Jul 24, 2019 05:40

Quote With the same price, AMD Ryzen 3000 beats Intel in almost every part except gaming.

And also except video encoding.

This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at Jul 24. 2019 05:41

the King

Senior Member Joined: Jun 30, 2010 04:10 Messages: 296 Offline

Jul 24, 2019 07:05

Quote

And also except video encoding.

Hmmm, we must read very different reviews.

https://www.anandtech.com/show/14605/the-and-ryzen-3700x-3900x-review-raising-the-bar/10
https://www.pcworld.com/article/3405567/ryzen-3000-review-amds-12-core-ryzen-9-3900x.html?page=3
https://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/ryzen-9-3900x-7-3700x-review,6214-12.html
https://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/amd-ryzen-7-3800x-review,6226-10.html
https://www.guru3d.com/articles_pages/amd_ryzen_5_3600_review,17.html
https://youtu.be/z3aEv3EzMyQ?t=498 ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
PowerDirector 365

SoNic67

Senior Contributor Joined: Sep 27, 2014 14:14 Messages: 1308 Offline

Jul 30, 2019 08:39

They use Handbrake encoding for testing. That's not video editing. Activate Quick Sync and be done... Users here use PowerDirector, with the same options for fast encoding. Using CPU for NLE is different than encoding/transcoding.

Also... think of different Intel CPU's. I have paid $360 for two E5-2667 V2 and...

This message was edited 3 times. Last update was at Jul 30. 2019 09:08

Bill W

Newbie Joined: Dec 12, 2019 15:17 Messages: 1 Offline

Dec 12, 2019 15:31

Quote

When you say get at least a 1TB SSD is that for Windows OS & Programs or for source files? What type of SSD do you suggest for each of these, would the NVME Samsung 970 PRO 1TB make use of the massive speed gains it has over the Samsung 860 EVO as a separate source files drive, and as a separate drive for OS & Power Director?

What model DVD burner/player are you using/