Hardware capable of AVCHD playback/edit

[tekdad]

Anyone out there with 'playback and editing' experience with AVCHD format camcorder content? My 3yr old P4 3Ghz PC pegs out at 100% CPU when trying to do anything with the .M2TS files it produces. Is it time for open heart surgery of the PC again, or can anyone advise of the optimum spec/price/performance for this content? cheers

[dark_shroud]

2-3gigs of memory, a duel core processor, & possibly a video card update.

What socket type is your processor and what memory type do you use?

[tekdad]

2-3gigs of memory, a duel core processor, & possibly a video card update.

What socket type is your processor and what memory type do you use?

LGA775 and Dual Channel DDR2, but my motherboard is a Gigabyte GA-8I915P-D which I don't believe suppports Core 2 Duo (so major surgery seems required).

It seems that anything to do with H.264/AVCHD hits the CPU hard and everything I have read on the subject (AVS forums included) point to so many different hardware/software issues, this seems more like a black art than consumer ready.

My options seem to include;
1. Hardware - (ditch what I have)
-- upgrade to the fastest PC rig on the market today
-- is H.264 performance boosted by Core2 or Quad Core, and does any rendering/editing software take advantage of this today?
-- graphics cards today seem to play little role in H.264, but the new ATI HD4850 supports Unified Video Decoder 2 (UVD 2) for H.264/AVC, VC-1, and MPEG-2 video formats, but does any software take advantage of this today? and will it work with my rig today without other upgrades ~ the quick/cheap fix?
-- new Toshiba Qosmio laptop provides Quad–Core HD Processor which seems to offload the work to dedicated a device http://explore.toshiba.com/laptops/qosmio/G50 ~ looks promising but pricey and untested
2. Switch to a Mac
-- and hope that software like Premiere or FinalCut supports AVCHD, there seems to be questionable support of .m2ts files created by camcorders
-- there are few options down the road for output to Blu-Ray for playback and storage
~ switch to a mac looks least likely option
3. Specialist hardware encoder/decoders
-- for the Mac ~ Elgato Turbo.264, for the PC ~ ADS Instant-Video-To-Go H.264, both of which don't seem to get good reviews and are limited to use the software supplied and codec support
4. software
-- the AVS forums quote many tools for capturing, converting, rendering, editing, burning... but it seems to be a soup and format nightmare...

Did I jump into HD too early????

[davmoo]

Let's hit this right off the bat, before you make an expensive mistake. Adobe Premier (still) does *not* support AVCHD out of the box. You have to buy a third party multi-hundred dollar plug in if you want to use Premier. I'm not sure about Final Cut, since I don't edit on my Mac...but last time I checked (which I'll admit has been a while) it does not support AVCHD either. I use (and have been very happy with) Ulead Video Studio 11, and it supports AVCHD no problems...at most, depending on which version you actually buy, you may have to download a (free) update from Ulead. The latest version of the Pinnacle video editing software also does AVCHD, but I have no personal experience with it.

The first thing you want to do if you're using Windows, regardless of processor, is go to http://www.coreavc.com/ and buy CoreAVC's codec ($7.95 or $14.95, depending on if you get "standard" or "pro"...I'm not talking high dollars here). It is so much better and so much more efficient than the standard Windows codecs for AVCHD that its like night and day. The combination of Ulead and the CoreAVC codec has performed most excellently for me.

The second thing I would suggest is, if you can, go with a 64-bit version of Windows instead of a 32-bit version. The 64-bit version is more efficient with memory.

Which brings us to the third item...lots of memory. The more the merrier here. I'd call 2GB a minimum, and 4GB would be what you should strive for.

I currently do most of my AVCHD editing on a Dual Core e8400 box. But I've also done it to some extent on my Pentium D 805 box...its not blazingly fast, but it does work acceptably for both playback and editing. So if your fundage is limited, I'd say put your money in to more memory first, and then a faster CPU.

And I guess I should mention that my cam is a Canon Vixia HF-10. So no, I don't think you jumped on the AVCHD bandwagon too soon. Welcome aboard! When I bought my cam a couple months ago, I did *serious* research on what was available with my $1000 budget. I spent weekends reading operating manuals cover to cover and crap like that. I hung out in every applicable forum I could find. In the end, I decided flash memory and AVCHD were the way to go. Yeah, they have a bit of a learning curve, and bit of a "pain in the ass" curve right now, but its the way the world is going...tape is just *so* 20th century, and hard drive based camcorders are just plain noisy.

Hmm...I didn't mean to write a new chapter to "War and Peace" here :o

[bmwt]

I'm not sure about Final Cut, since I don't edit on my Mac...but last time I checked (which I'll admit has been a while) it does not support AVCHD either.

fwiw, final cut pro does indeed support avchd, since 6.0.1(ish?). imovie 08 does as well. (tho i rarely recommend imovie unless you're on a budget and got it free)

[tekdad]

I spent many hours researching the camera too, and ended up with the same HF-10. More memory and 64-bit... OK, gotcha. Did you end up there by trial and error or was there a particular forum or advice that directed you this way?

[davmoo]

Did you end up there by trial and error or was there a particular forum or advice that directed you this way?

Some of both. I decided to try 64-bit Vista because everyone I look to for advice was saying to give it a try because it was more stable than 32-bit Vista. Plus 32-bit limits you to just slightly over 3GB of ram regardless of how much you stuff on your motherboard...64-bit will use every drop of ram you throw at it. I went with the e8400 processor because an e8400 and a new motherboard was on sale silly stupid cheap at Fry's (I think I paid $169 for both) right about the same time I bought the cam. I figured if I was dropping all that coin on a new cam, what's a few more for a new motherboard and processor. And finally, the "more memory" advise comes from my own experience. I've edited video both commercially and for personal use for several years, as well as still images. And more memory is always better. There is no such thing really as "too much memory" when it comes to editing.

Edit: If you haven't already been there, the forums at http://www.hv20.com/ are an *excellent* source of info. They are primarily covering the Canon HV-20 and HV-30, as the name implies. But a number of folks there are also diving in to the HF-10 and HF-100 waters, so they are both welcomed and discussed quite heavily also.

[dark_shroud]

Alright, going by your motherboard (http://www.simpletech.com/configurator/lyme/384/gigabyte/ga8i915pd/ga8i915pdintelpentium4/) specs I found some parts for you. Just make sure if you want to replace your CPU that you will be allowed to. Some mobos get locked by BIOS, my gateway is like this.

Pentium D 915 Intel Pentium D 915 2.8GHz 775pin LGA 4MB 800MHz (http://www.pricewatch.com/cpu/pentium_d_915.htm)

DDR2-400 PC2-3200 1GB (http://www.pricewatch.com/system_memory/ddr2-400_pc2-3200_1gb.htm)

[jukey]

For Core AVC, the pro version will allow you to take full advantage of a multi-core PC. That's probably the only reason you'd want to use it over the standard version unless you need interlaced support.

Just a question. Is coreAVC only a decoder? what do you suggest for encoding then?

[davmoo]

Just a question. Is coreAVC only a decoder? what do you suggest for encoding then?

For encoding, I can't offer any suggestions...I never go that way. If I have to (re)encode something, I go with something with more "across the board" support than AVCHD.

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