More RAM, CPU, or GPU for Sony Vegas Video Editing?

videoeditor

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Aug 3, 2014
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I'm in the market to buy a new computer. In order to speed up rendering times, is it better to invest more money on RAM, CPU, or GPU?

I frequently create videos that are an hour long, 1080p, 10GB in size. It takes an hour or two to render on my current computer. These are my specs currently, but again I'm in the market to buy a totally new computer

AMD Radeon HD 6450 1GB DDR3
Sandy Bridge intel Core i7-2600
12 GB DD3 RAM
windows 7 64 bit
 
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The 480p video was recorded at a lower quality than the 1080p video and was recorded directly to the hard drive on a laptop from a TV using an old Sony Hi8 video camera as a pass through from the TV to the laptop. The 1080p was shot using a Canon T4i DSLR and was of much higher quality. The 480p file...

drtweak

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Sep 17, 2012
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It depends on the rendering. If its video rendering that you have edited then it would go CPU, RAM, GPU. If it was more like 3DS Max stuff it would go CPU, GPU, RAM. Either way CPU's are the number 1 factoring item. I would go for a Intel Xeon. The E3 Series will fit and work in just about any socket 1150 board like the E3-1230 which is pretty much a i7 4770. Just you get no overclocking but its cheaper. If you really want to go big then get a socket 2011 board with a i7-4970k or a Xeon E5 CPU.
 

videoeditor

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Aug 3, 2014
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thank you! yes it's just regular video rendering of PS3 and PC games, no fancy 3D holograms
 

drtweak

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Sep 17, 2012
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yea then want to to focus on CPU and RAM. More so the CPU. more RAM just helps when editing. My roommate's iMac has 32 GB of ram and Adobe can take up to 25 GB when editing video but then we edit RAW 2.5K video so it requires more ram. For now i think 8GB would be ok and if its not enough just toss in another 8GB stick. But with CPU i wouldn't skimp out on. thats the key player
 

videoeditor

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Aug 3, 2014
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4,510


CPU it is then! by the way don't iMacs have Core i5's? How long does it take your friend to render a 25GB video?
 

videoeditor

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Aug 3, 2014
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oh darn! if you can ask him i would be very much appreciative!
 
I agree that the CPU and RAM are critical components. Personally, I wouldn't go with anything less than 16GB of RAM. I edit video using Premiere Pro on an older i7 processor (i7-2600K), 16GB of RAM, and a CUDA enabled GPU and a late 2011 MacBook Pro (I know it has an i7 processor but not sure which one without looking up the specs and 16GB of RAM). Both machines perform well enough to meet my editing needs.
 

videoeditor

Estimable
Aug 3, 2014
8
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4,510


cool! how fast can you encode a 10GB video?
 

I will test it later this evening and will let you know.
 

videoeditor

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Aug 3, 2014
8
0
4,510


thanks looking forward to knowing the results of the testing!!
 
8.9GB File, .mpg file, 720x480, exported as h.264 file (2 pass - match source - high bitrate) took just over 1minute.

22.5GB, .mov file, 1920x1080, exported as h.264 file (2 pass - match source - high bitrate) took 1 hour 21 minutes 06 seconds.
 

videoeditor

Estimable
Aug 3, 2014
8
0
4,510


wow, thanks for those times! i'm very, very surprised the 22.5 GB 1080p took 81 times more time than the 8.9 GB 480p one! i was imagining it would not take more than 30 minutes.
 


The 480p video was recorded at a lower quality than the 1080p video and was recorded directly to the hard drive on a laptop from a TV using an old Sony Hi8 video camera as a pass through from the TV to the laptop. The 1080p was shot using a Canon T4i DSLR and was of much higher quality. The 480p file had a duration of about 1 hour 15 minutes whereas the 108p video had a duration of 57 minutes. I will add that no effects were added to either video.
 
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