Post by Romy Ocon on Feb 10, 2012 22:52:20 GMT
Dear folks,
I'm currently neck deep in non-imaging work, but I just got to share my enthusiasm about my desktop replacement.
My ancient desktop (Q6600, 4 GB RAM, XP, 512 MB GPU) can still crunch the RAW files from the 5D2 with ease, and can even play full HD video without hiccups. But when I edit 1080p video in Premiere, the anemic RAM and dated GPU just cannot do the job. I’ve done some costing and a new desktop (i7 + 12 GB RAM + GTX series DDR5 256-bit GPU + W7 64 bit) can be assembled at around PHP 60K.
My current activities dictate that I should be able to process photos and video away from my Paranaque home. This got me interested in looking at laptops with mobile i7 engine under the hood, hoping that these are already powerful enough to do complex full HDV editing.
And I found one in the grey market with a price low enough to approach the cost of a desktop with similar specs – an ASUS G53SX-XT1.
Price – PHP 63K, grey market, brand new, with 1 year international warranty
Features - Intel Core i7-2630QM 2.0GHz, 8GB DDR3, 640GB HDD, BD-ROM Combo, NVIDIA GeForce GTX 560M, 15.6in Full HD, Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit, 4 SODIMM slots (2 used) and 2 HDD bays (1 used).
I was able to hook up my Philips 24” HIPS screen (1920x1200 res.) to the laptop via DVI+HDMI connector and my DTP94 colorimeter did a nice job in calibrating both screens. When processing, the 1920x1080 laptop screen hosts the program windows, while the photo or video is monitored on the 1920x1200 HIPS screen in a fully color calibrated environment.
Some quick hacking allowed me to force Premiere to recognize the GTX 560M and enable the use of the Mercury engine. This leverages the GPU (192 CUDA cores) to bear the brunt of video crunching and boost processing speeds.
Even with the stock 8 GB RAM and slowish 5400 rpm HDD, video editing with reasonable layers and effects can be done in real time! With multi-layers/multi-effects, the system does slow down a bit and one needs to render the effects first to see smooth results. Rendering is blazingly fast though, given the enabled Mercury engine. I can only imagine how much quicker this machine can go if I stick in 8 GB more RAM in the vacant slots (for a total of 16 GB RAM) and add an SSD as a system disk in the second HDD bay.
My verdict?
Well, it appears that mobile desktop replacements are now powerful enough to edit full HDV. Photo editing of course is several notches lower in processing requirement.
PROS – enough muscle to do full HDV editing, transportability, 1920x1080 resolution, reasonable cost
CONS – serious pro-grade photo editing requires the use of a second screen (preferably IPS-type), not really a laptop because of its weight and size (a transportable desktop replacement is the more appropriate description), the 1920x1080 native res crammed into a 15.6-inch screen might strain the unaided eyes of senior citizens like me, and limited internal data storage.
Overall, I’m happy with the new machine and I foresee myself not buying a desktop for my image processing needs in the future.
Romy
I'm currently neck deep in non-imaging work, but I just got to share my enthusiasm about my desktop replacement.
My ancient desktop (Q6600, 4 GB RAM, XP, 512 MB GPU) can still crunch the RAW files from the 5D2 with ease, and can even play full HD video without hiccups. But when I edit 1080p video in Premiere, the anemic RAM and dated GPU just cannot do the job. I’ve done some costing and a new desktop (i7 + 12 GB RAM + GTX series DDR5 256-bit GPU + W7 64 bit) can be assembled at around PHP 60K.
My current activities dictate that I should be able to process photos and video away from my Paranaque home. This got me interested in looking at laptops with mobile i7 engine under the hood, hoping that these are already powerful enough to do complex full HDV editing.
And I found one in the grey market with a price low enough to approach the cost of a desktop with similar specs – an ASUS G53SX-XT1.
Price – PHP 63K, grey market, brand new, with 1 year international warranty
Features - Intel Core i7-2630QM 2.0GHz, 8GB DDR3, 640GB HDD, BD-ROM Combo, NVIDIA GeForce GTX 560M, 15.6in Full HD, Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit, 4 SODIMM slots (2 used) and 2 HDD bays (1 used).
I was able to hook up my Philips 24” HIPS screen (1920x1200 res.) to the laptop via DVI+HDMI connector and my DTP94 colorimeter did a nice job in calibrating both screens. When processing, the 1920x1080 laptop screen hosts the program windows, while the photo or video is monitored on the 1920x1200 HIPS screen in a fully color calibrated environment.
Some quick hacking allowed me to force Premiere to recognize the GTX 560M and enable the use of the Mercury engine. This leverages the GPU (192 CUDA cores) to bear the brunt of video crunching and boost processing speeds.
Even with the stock 8 GB RAM and slowish 5400 rpm HDD, video editing with reasonable layers and effects can be done in real time! With multi-layers/multi-effects, the system does slow down a bit and one needs to render the effects first to see smooth results. Rendering is blazingly fast though, given the enabled Mercury engine. I can only imagine how much quicker this machine can go if I stick in 8 GB more RAM in the vacant slots (for a total of 16 GB RAM) and add an SSD as a system disk in the second HDD bay.
My verdict?
Well, it appears that mobile desktop replacements are now powerful enough to edit full HDV. Photo editing of course is several notches lower in processing requirement.
PROS – enough muscle to do full HDV editing, transportability, 1920x1080 resolution, reasonable cost
CONS – serious pro-grade photo editing requires the use of a second screen (preferably IPS-type), not really a laptop because of its weight and size (a transportable desktop replacement is the more appropriate description), the 1920x1080 native res crammed into a 15.6-inch screen might strain the unaided eyes of senior citizens like me, and limited internal data storage.
Overall, I’m happy with the new machine and I foresee myself not buying a desktop for my image processing needs in the future.
Romy