Thread: Premiere Pro proper footage

Hi Everybody,

i have a 2.4mHz Athlon, 256MB Ram, an ATI Excalibur-dualhead, and an firwire-interface. I used to cut with premiere 6.5 and i always had a proper running footage after i rendered all the clips - everything ran prefectly. Now that i´ve upgraded to Premiere Pro i am very dissapointed. Even if i render the whole sequence, the footage doesn´t run smooth - it looks like it only plays back every 3rd or fourth frame. Even if i switch to a lower quality or a smaller size the footage doesn´t run any better. I can´t understand the discussion about the realtime-playback, cuz i see that it doesn´t even work after rendering the clips.
Can anybody help me ? Is there anything i need to setup in premiere, or is my computer a big piece o´shit ?

Mark

You need more RAM, at least 512MB and preferably 1Gb, and you should run windows XP. Apart from that your PC looks fine for the job.

tonga

Hey,

i´ve already tried it when i´ve added another 512BM from my friend there. Nothing happened. It was just the same. And i already run the machine on XP-Home. What else ?!?!?

Mark

Did you check that the extra RAM was recognised in the bios?

I'm sure this is caused by lack of RAM as premier pro needs at least 512Mb and preferably more to run smoothly. Try more RAM again and make sure it is the same type (or compatible with) your existing RAM and Mobo. Other than that maybe your hard drive isnt up to scratch - try defragging it and see how you go.

In premier ensure your project settings are the same as your imported footage - pal/ntsc etc.
Your processor is plenty up to the task so apart from whats been written I cant see what else to do although I'm certain its a RAM thing.

Tonga

seems like i really need to try it again with more ram.
My HD isn´t the problem i guess, it is a 7200rpm 60GB IBM. I defrag it once a week so i guess this can´t be the problem neither.
I heard that i should use two HD´s, one for the captured clips and one for the preview files. Is that true or just smart ass b...s... ???

What about my CPU, is it fast enough ? Or do i have to get a video-card ? Way too many questions.. i know...

Mark

You should be fine with your captured footage on the same drive as the preview files, I am. It is better however to have a seperate drive dedicated to video editing with your OS on its own drive (not logical partition). If you only have one HDD consider getting a second, their dirt cheap
As far as your processor goes it should be fine, I used an AMD xp2000+ to run premier pro and it was fine, I did have a gig of RAM though.

Premier does'nt really use your graphics card at all (unless its a dedicated capture/edit card- like canopus etc) as all the effects/encoding etc are handled by the processor.

tonga

so what do i need a video-capture-card for ? What kind of advantage do i have when i put a canopus or pinnacle card into my computer ?

And about the ram: iám a poor student (media designer) and i´m not well situated. I mean can´t go to the store to buy me some stuff that doesn´t have a positive effect. I hope it´s really the missing RAM that causes my problems. Otherwise it would mean i spend my few money on sh....
BTW: tonga, is your PRO running the real-time-preview with you 2000+ ?

Mark

I dont run the 2000+ any more but it ran the real time previews fine, there was the odd slow down but rendering preview file of your effects speeds it up again.
A video capture card will apply certain effects to your footage using hardware so there's no need to render, it will come with its own custom effects and it will use its own miniDV codec as oposed to windowsDV codec. It may well come bundled with and optimised for Premier Pro.

256Mb of RAM is never gonna cut it for any serious editing/compositing app - Adobe states 512 as a minimum requirement to run Premier Pro. If you buy another 256 it will cost $20-30, see how you go then get another 512 if needed.

tonga

Hi,

i will tra to get 512mb 333mHz from a friend to check it in my system. I hope it worx.
But another question: is it possible that i have a older version of PRO wich doesn´t run proper ???