Question about new computer & specs I need

[Jenny]

Ok, in the next month, I'm gonna be getting a new computer. I have some specific needs and need to know what's a) more important and b) what some recommendations for processor speed, memory, etc are. Here's my situation:

I have a capture card that I use to record tv from my cable directly and from component cables connected to my DVRs. So which would be more important? Memory or processor speed? Right now, I have 768mb memory and a 2.8GHz processor and when I'm recording, it's hard to do much else cause if I try, it tends to freeze the recording stuff.

Also, I use Firefox and have a horrible memory leak on it. And normally when I am working, I have multiple windows with multiple tabs open and busy.

What are recommendations for memory, processor, and anything else you can think of?

TIA!

[Jeffbx]

Video capture takes a pretty big toll on resources -

I'd say that your important considerations would be (in this order):
- HD Speed
- RAM
- Beefy video card
- Procesor speed


If you can, get yourself a WD Raptor SATA drive as your boot drive. Capture the video onto your Raptor, and then move it to a large slower drive for storage. If you have money to burn, a better setup would be 1 Raptor to boot from, a second Raptor to capture to, and then a large slower drive for storage. If you just want to get silly, replace the Raptors with SCSI. But that's just getting out of hand.

For the RAM, go with 1GB as a minimum to start - that should hold you for a while. More will be better (up to about 2GB). Above 2GB you won't see much difference.

Get a nice video card - I haven't been keeping up with what the good 'most bang for your buck' cards are, but I'm sure that someone can fill you in on this.

A dual core would help when you're capturing & doing other things at the same time. However, if you just leave the machine alone while it's capturing, you'll be better off with a higher clock speed single core processor.

[bachviet]

At least 1 GB of RAM
Two hard drives (37GB Raptor for boot and 300GB+ hard drive for data storage)
AMD dual core processor

[shocky123]

If you're looking to multitask here, I'd recommend a dual-core AMD processor.

Though I wouldnt consider capturing and browsing the web multitasking... I'd rather call it 'blocking on disk i/o' and browsing the web.
The dual core will help you with your multitasking, but really you'll need a FAST / big disk to store all the incoming video streams to.

If you're planning on doing a lot of video stuff, definitely go with 2GB, it's only about 150bucks for decent stuff nowadays, and I've seen it much cheaper w/ rebates and stuff.

Graphics cards.... take your pic, not sure any of the fancy ones out right now will help you with video encoding.

(oh yeah, 'FireFox has a memory leak' -> is independent of your hardware, so nothing can be done about that! )

good luck
~Kyle

[johnnymk]

Sorry, but from what I have experienced, the speed of the hard drive has absolutely nothing to do with the speed of encoding movies.

I have a SCSI IBM 15K 36 GB hard drive and a 160 GB IDE hard drive. I have the fastest DVD drive (ASUS) on the planet and a SCSI DVD drive.

Regardless of which hard drive or DVD drive I use, the speed of encoding is virtually identical.

The one thing which greatly affects the speed is if the DVD drive is on the same IDE channel as the hard drive, which is not good.

As far as I can tell, the speed of the processor is the greatest factor in the speed of encoding movies.







i

[clutchy]

Jenny,

I would use a Dual core processor of some kind(I would buy AMD)
2 gigs of ram, and 2 different hard drives.

can you poach the old hard drive from your current machine? Transfer TV to second drive, run OS and everything else from the first, and try to use different IDE channels.

I think the problem you're running into is trying to transfer huge chunks of data continuously onto 1 disk. I'm a little surprised though, those capture cards are usually pretty good. Don't they have hardware encoding?

Next time you're recording TV, pull up task manager and see if your processor is pegged. If it is you need a second core to work from.

[Jenny]

*crying from all the information that went over my head*

Thanks. :)

I'll uh, post again when I'm looking at computers. lol

[hapoo]

*crying from all the information that went over my head*

Thanks. :)

I'll uh, post again when I'm looking at computers. lol

what you should do is post your budget and have people fight through different setups until one wins, kinda like a cockfight, whoever isn't banned at the end has the setup you should buy :P

[Jenny]

Oh, very nice idea. LOL I'll do that when the time comes. :D