Does My PC Suck?

rgbivens · #1 (**permalink**) 04-20-2008, 09:30 AM

Ok, so I've read around a little on the forum and I've read about the whole firewire card stuff and what not. So here's my story. I bought a Canon HG10 to record my engagement and I'm amazed at the quality even on my SD tv. I wanted to go HD because I know in the future I'll have an HD tv and I'll want to have memories like my engagement in HD to show the future kiddos.

My problem is I can't do anything on my computer with the video. I currently don't have a firewire card but I have dumped the video from my camera and tried opening in the supplied software that came with my camera, Adobe, and Vegas. The video is all jumpy when I try to play it back on my computer in these programs. Not quite half-speed but close. Is this my computers fault or because I didn't use a firewire card to bring the video in on to my computer?

My system specs:
Custom Built
Win XP SP2
Intel Celeron 2.53 GHz Overclocked up to 2.57
2 GB RAM
300 GB WD Caviar SATA HDD

I just reformatted this PC and did a fresh install of XP.

Thanks for any help you can give.
-Grant

Nikosony · #2 (**permalink**) 04-20-2008, 01:37 PM

You say you've 'dumped' the video from the camera, how exactly did you do that if you haven't got Firewire? Was it with a USB cable? Your computer spec isn't up to what is needed for working with Hi Def video, especially that Celeron processor. You need either a dual core Intel Pentium or AMD processor running nearer to 3Ghz, 2GB Ram should be ok (running at 667Mhz at least) and a SATA hard disk just for video capture (and the largest one you can afford). Other members of the forum are more experienced than I am using Hi Def video so they may give you addtional info as regards to the spec of computer you need.

rgbivens · #3 (**permalink**) 04-20-2008, 08:32 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Nikosony

You say you've 'dumped' the video from the camera, how exactly did you do that if you haven't got Firewire? Was it with a USB cable? Your computer spec isn't up to what is needed for working with Hi Def video, especially that Celeron processor. You need either a dual core Intel Pentium or AMD processor running nearer to 3Ghz, 2GB Ram should be ok (running at 667Mhz at least) and a SATA hard disk just for video capture (and the largest one you can afford). Other members of the forum are more experienced than I am using Hi Def video so they may give you addtional info as regards to the spec of computer you need.

Thanks for the reply Nikosony. Yes I used USB. My camera has a USB, composite, and a Mini-HDMI outputs. Is USB the only way or can you go out the composite or HDMI to PC?

I looked at my Windows Task Manager when I was trying to play a video and my CPU usage goes all the way up to 100%.

If anybody has anything else to add that would be great but I guess the next step I'll be taking is to upgrade my cpu and mobo. With that might come RAM upgrade. I can't remember what speed my RAM is at the moment and I'm not at that computer.

I look forward to using this forum as a great learning tool in the future.

-Grant

Nikosony · #4 (**permalink**) 04-20-2008, 10:07 PM

Does your camcorder not have a Firewire socket? It defeats the point of having a Hi Def camcorder if you use composite video to connect it to your computer as composite video is analogue and not digital. It has a really low resolution aswell. If your camcorder has Firewire, then purchase a PCI Firewire card for the computer and install it in a free PCI slot (takes about 5 minutes) and get a Firewire cable, that's all you need to get going on the connection front. Try that out first before you spend money on a new computer to see what happens.

rgbivens · #5 (**permalink**) 04-21-2008, 05:43 AM

No I don't use the composite to transfer the video. I use the usb. My camera is a HDD model so I don't have to "capture" the video off the camera (I believe thats the correct term). I simply copy the digital files over to my computer via USB.

-Grant

LukeD · #6 (**permalink**) 04-21-2008, 06:40 PM

doesnt the HG10 work on the good old HDD format, Which means he has quite rightly just coppyed the rushes over onto his own hard drive with the USB. I know from working with other HDD footage thats been dumped on me that Adobe PPro dosn't handle the footage very well....or at all tbh! Where as Vegas worked perfectly for it! I have persnally always found NFTS a bit better for video editing persnally, so you could maybe start a new partition and try that. Just to confirm-You have put the rushes on your computer?

Mark W · #7 (**permalink**) 04-21-2008, 11:20 PM

An intel celron is just fast enough for SD video work - NOT hdv - think p4 3mhz minimum.

HDV is horrid to edit, needs lots of poke, even more so for HD HDV. This is the main reason why I decided to stay with SD for my most recent camera purchase.

rgbivens · #8 (**permalink**) 04-22-2008, 02:04 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by LukeD

doesnt the HG10 work on the good old HDD format, Which means he has quite rightly just coppyed the rushes over onto his own hard drive with the USB. I know from working with other HDD footage thats been dumped on me that Adobe PPro dosn't handle the footage very well....or at all tbh! Where as Vegas worked perfectly for it! I have persnally always found NFTS a bit better for video editing persnally, so you could maybe start a new partition and try that. Just to confirm-You have put the rushes on your computer?

Yes, I have copied the 'rushes' or video files onto my computer. My system is NTFS. Is it better to have the 'rushes' on a different hdd? Does making a new partition on a drive make any difference really? The data would be coming over the same SATA cable as the editing software was. What would be the reasoning for using a partition?

Quote:

Originally Posted by Mark W

An intel celron is just fast enough for SD video work - NOT hdv - think p4 3mhz minimum.

HDV is horrid to edit, needs lots of poke, even more so for HD HDV. This is the main reason why I decided to stay with SD for my most recent camera purchase.

Thank you both for your replies. The main reason I wanted to go with an HD HDD unit is because I probably won't buy another camera for 10 years so I wanted something that would not be 'ancient' in 5 years. With the upcoming switch of tv to HD in a year or so I wanted to have the best quality video I could capture.

Also my brother-in-law worked at a wholesaler company of electronics and he got my camera for me as a 'bad-box special' The box just had a corner a little crushed in and I got the camera for $550. At the time the lowest price I found was on newegg and it was for like $850.

So I have done some research on new computer hardware and I found a Mobo + CPU combo from Tiger Direct that I thought might work and wanted to know what everybody thought. It's an AMD and I don't want this to go into a Intel/AMD debate or anything but It seems like this is a pretty fast processor and it's fairly cheap. So if you want give me your two cents on the package.

Abit AN52V Motherboard CPU Bundle - AMD Athlon 64 X2 6400+ Processor 3.20GHz Retail at TigerDirect.com

Thanks,
Grant

Mark W · #9 (**permalink**) 04-22-2008, 11:57 PM

Looks like a good deal to me, that will edit your footage easily.

Nikosony · #10 (**permalink**) 04-23-2008, 02:38 PM

That's an impressive computer and should do the job alright.