Additional Video Card

I need to buy an extra video card. I have some problems with Red Giant Quick Looks and Motion runs very slow when I run a complex animation. ( See it here [exposureroom.com] )

Should I get it now or wait for FCX? If now, What are my choices? Another ATI Radeon HD 5770 or what?

Model Name: Mac Pro
Model Identifier: MacPro5,1
Processor Name: Quad-Core Intel Xeon
Processor Speed: 2.4 GHz
Number Of Processors: 2
Total Number Of Cores: 8
L2 Cache (per core): 256 KB
L3 Cache (per processor): 12 MB
Memory: 14 GB
Processor Interconnect Speed: 5.86 GT/s
Boot ROM Version: MP51.007F.B03
SMC Version (system): 1.39f11
SMC Version (processor tray): 1.39f11
Serial Number (system): YM0351CVEUF
Serial Number (processor tray): J503405J4BH8B
Hardware UUID: E95F880C-7798-5986-94EC-802B5D564323

God Bless,

Douglas Villalba
director/cinematographer/editor
Miami, Florida

[www.DouglasVillalba.info]
[www.youtube.com]
[vimeo.com]

Don't get an EXTRA one. Get one to replace the one you have. FCP...and specifically Motion and Color...do not like two video cards.

Don't wait for FCP X...unless you plan on using it.

and the card you mentioned is good.


www.shanerosseditor.com

Listen to THE EDIT BAY Podcast on iTunes
[itunes.apple.com]

Hello SHane,

That was the card that comes with my Mac. I wanted to buy it with 2 of them in but my Apple store didn't have it in stock when I bough it back in November.

For some reason when I installed Quick Looks in my old G5 I was having problems with the 256 card that it had, so instead of upgrading the card I bought the latest 8 core. The 8 core was working fine with QLooks until recently and now I am using Motion more and more so in some cases like the sample above it is impossible to work with it.

I have an Apple 27" LED connected through the mini connection and an AOC 19" connected through DVI for extra RE.

So you don't think that an extra ATI Radeon HD 5770 will work even tho Apple offers it as an option?

How about the NVIDIA Quadro 4000 for Mac? or do you think that I may have different problem?

God Bless,

Douglas Villalba
director/cinematographer/editor
Miami, Florida

[www.DouglasVillalba.info]
[www.youtube.com]
[vimeo.com]

Just because Apple offers it, doesn't mean that it is good for VIDEO work...or FCS. There are lots of other uses for Mac Computers that go beyond video. It will be fine for them, but NOT for FCP. Two video cards is bad for Final Cut Studio...period.

You can afford the Quadro 4000? Wow...I can't. Great card.


www.shanerosseditor.com

Listen to THE EDIT BAY Podcast on iTunes
[itunes.apple.com]

Before the economy went bad I would have bought it without even asking first here. Now I am a little more careful with investing on tools of the trade.

It took me about 10 hour to add 9 titles and 4 clips to a Motion Template that I bought to save time editing it my self. If an $800 video card is going to save me a week or more of editing during the life of the computer, Is it worth the investment?

My question to you is, Would it really enhance my quality of life? or Would it just be a waste of money?

I notice that Motion runs only on one core. That is why I asked if I should wait for the 64 bit all cores and RAM upgrade.

God Bless,

Douglas Villalba
director/cinematographer/editor
Miami, Florida

[www.DouglasVillalba.info]
[www.youtube.com]
[vimeo.com]

Isn't it more like $1200 for the mac card?

You can get better prices. [www.videoguys.com]

God Bless,

Douglas Villalba
director/cinematographer/editor
Miami, Florida

[www.DouglasVillalba.info]
[www.youtube.com]
[vimeo.com]

Quote

It took me about 10 hour to add 9 titles and 4 clips to a Motion Template that I bought to save time editing it my self. If an $800 video card is going to save me a week or more of editing during the life of the computer, Is it worth the investment?

Hey Douglas, thats a good fast mac you've posted the specs to, plenty of ram and the ATI card is no slouch, so im a little surprised at how slow it seems to be running for you. Just thought i'd check have you ruled out any software issues etc that might be slowing you down, often one of the early things i do is to boot a clean copy of the OS up and run my work again to see if things have got sluggish...

If i were you right now i would hold fire - 10.6 looks like it could be the beginning of a much larger choice of graphics cards (pc cards at pc prices, no more custom crap for osx) and you'll have a better idea of fcpx and GPU (and cuda) support.

... just a thought a lot of folk might disagree!

Some testing was done on the NVIDIA vs the ATI 5870 in Motion.

[www.ubermediahd.com]

The ATI actually came out ahead.

We have a new MacPro here running two cards, both the 5870 and the NVIDIA Quadro 4000 (for DaVinci Resolve). No issues whatsoever with FCP, Color, or Motion on the same machine.

And yes, Motion runs very well indeed with the 5870.

hth,
Clay

Hi Josh,
I agree with you. I'm going to hold off for a while.
Clay I ran the the Motion project on the link you supplied and runs easily on my computer even tho I have an slower vcard. The project that held my computer to an stand still is a lot more complicated than than.
I am going to try un installing Quick Looks and perhaps even download directly from Red Giant instead of re installing from my computer as Josh suggested as a possible problem.
Thanks guys.

God Bless,

Douglas Villalba
director/cinematographer/editor
Miami, Florida

[www.DouglasVillalba.info]
[www.youtube.com]
[vimeo.com]

No prob, let us know how you get on and if you find the source of the grinding gears!!

Douglas Villalba Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> I notice that Motion runs only on one core. That
> is why I asked if I should wait for the 64 bit all
> cores and RAM upgrade.

Apple has only shown a 64-bit version of Final Cut Pro and given out beta dongles to a few lucky people (not myself unfortunately). There has been no mention of a 64-bit Motion and I have not heard of anyone receiving a beta, so I'm pretty sure it doesn't exist. That's not to say it won't in the future, but as of right now I would not advise waiting for a 64-bit version.

My software:
Pro Maintenance Tools - Tools to keep Final Cut Studio, Final Cut Pro X, Avid Media Composer and Adobe Premiere Pro running smoothly and fix problems when they arise
Pro Media Tools - Edit QuickTime chapters and metadata, detect gamma shifts, edit markers, watch renders and more
More tools...