Quad Core CPU QX6700 with 1066 fsb RAM.... and expectant results in resolume.

dreamtk · Post by **dreamtk** » Mon Mar 26, 2007 12:24

Hi everyone.

I've decided to go all out as its been 2 years since last upgrade.... i know resolume is a difficult beast to please CPU cycles wise SO i'm wondering....

Would the highest rated CPU for the moment, QUAD CORE QX6700 (1066 fsb) with 2 gig DDR2 RAM (1066 FSB) and Raptor HDD allow for 3 layers with all 3 effect slots filled ? @ 720x576 res ? also allowing for a live feed through a DFG video converter IN. ?

Im guessing that it will 100% but with resolume you can never tell lol ...

Bart and Hard core users please add thoughts

VJ Nexus · Post by **VJ Nexus** » Mon Mar 26, 2007 13:34

you'll be fine man. you know how i am about my raptor raids, and i'd suggest that, but otherwise you'll be more than capable of smooth mixing at high resolutions. you'll have more power than you'll know what to do with! The qx6700 is two ex6700 core 2 duo cores squished together onto 1 chip. i'm running a e6600 and able to run all 3 layers and all 3 effect slots at 640x480 without dropping much below 40fps (depending on which effects are used of course) so i'd imagine you'll be more than fine.

dreamtk · Post by **dreamtk** » Mon Mar 26, 2007 14:04

awesome man !

Im building it in a LIAN-LI v300 so they are a little bigger than the usual Shuttles.. + the fellas im buying from will modify it so it can fit an 850 w power supply and a full sized vid card... 2 raptors in raid and a 750 seagate. should do the trick...

I told the guys building it to do whatever they need to, to keep it cool at full load... gave them full permission to hack away even if it means ruining the case... in which case ill just get another one and get them to try again. I'm dangerous in these kind of moods lol I'm Just adamant i want it all to work in a LIAN LI v300 !

awesome looking case and not too big and have a hunch i can cram everything in there with all the riht cooling! ............ i hope

get back to ya soon... prolly a couple of weeks!

dreamtk · Post by **dreamtk** » Wed Mar 28, 2007 12:54

I'm just not confident with RAID. Just the whole idea of losing everything freaks me out.

So... what are your read results with RAID ? how much faster exsactly ?
and is the difference THAT much in Reslolume ?

Have a feeling you've benchmarked this and know the answer.

also do you run RAID via your motherboard or do you have a dedicated controller aleviating CPU workload?

[Edited on 28-3-2007 by dreamtk]

[Edited on 28-3-2007 by dreamtk]

VJ Nexus · Post by **VJ Nexus** » Wed Mar 28, 2007 15:14

My RAID showed about a 30%-40% increase in the average transfer speed when i set it up. I always keep a backup of my RAID on an external hard drive just in case - you're right there is a higher chance of losing data in RAID 0, but i've never experienced it in over 6 years. The 10,000 rpm raptors also have a 5 yr warrantee on them, which helps boost my confidence. My raids runs off of my motherboard which has 2 completely seperate and dedicated raid 0 systems. This does not put load on the cpu because all raid computations are done by controller chips on the mobo. Software raid solutions (instead of hardware) can sometimes have faster hd speeds, but they do put a little load on the cpu. You don't have to worry about cpu load with quad core though, as it will run on it's own core.

As for the difference in resolume - the biggest difference i noticed was with all 3 layers loaded, playing at 100 speed and random playhead, i had about 8-15 fps more with the drives in raid. For most mixing a single drive could be sufficient, but i prefer my raid.

Everything in my computer is set up in RAID 0. My system drive is a raid array, and my clip drive is raid array. The raid provides benefits beyond resolume, especially in video editing and other applications that torchure your hard drives. Each drive only does half as much work, which in my opinion would lead to extended drive life in general as well. (that's an opinion and a guess - i have nothing to back this up)

Those are my thoughts on the matter. You could be fine with a single 10,000 as your clip drive - you could even try that first. You can always upgrade later if you want.

dreamtk · Post by **dreamtk** » Wed Mar 28, 2007 15:43

cool man, you're definately bleeding edge haha

Have you managed to turn off native command queuing (NCQ) ? Apparantly its better to turn it off when using these Raptors in RAID. If you're motherboard allows it, or if there's some utilty out there do it ! will give you even more performance.

How often do you backup? Is it just a backup or do you re-image your whole array and copy it over to external ? If so how long does this take you and how often do you do it? i guess it depends on how much new clips youve stored created.

Okay now I'm thinking of Installing my system on a 750 gig Barracuda. PArtitioning 30 gig for System C:/ D:/ for software, including Resolume. (would it be better to install resolume on the RAID ?)

and maybe RAID 2 raptor 10,000 (for clip triggering) and just buying another external HDD for keeping a backup of that 300 gig.

Can you see a negative in having my system on a 7200 rpm HDD along with resolume ? (in such a partitioned way on top of all that?)

will it affect the maximization of the RAID Raptors for mixing/triggering ?

also do you make use of a large swap file ? would this give you even more performance? if so what partition should i set it to ?

sorry for the bombardment hehe

[Edited on 28-3-2007 by dreamtk]

VJ Nexus · Post by **VJ Nexus** » Fri Mar 30, 2007 12:02

I'll try to start from the beginning.

1) no i haven't turned off ncq - i'll look into that.

2) I backup every time i have a significant number of new clips. I usually have my clips subdivided into folders, so i just copy over the new folders to the external.

3) Should be fine running windows and resolume off a 7200 drive, with clips in raid. I like my windows on a raid for reasons other than resolume - boot time, opening programs and such are faster.

4) having a 7200 drive for windows will not slow down the raid array

5) swap files are only used if you run out of ram. hopefully you won't have to use the swap file. But if you are concerned about swap speed, it is almost always better to have your swap on a drive other than windows (not just a seperate partition, because this will still use the same pipeline as windows. don't worry about this if you have enough ram, which it sounds like you will)

The other thing to be soncerned about when setting up your raid is the stripe size (also called cluster size). The larger this is (128kb is usually the highest) the faster the raid will be, BUT the more space will be wasted. Eg: a 10kb file will still take up 128kb of hard drive, because you can't put seperate files in a single cluster. This matters less if you are only using it for large files such as video clips, but it does make a difference say if you're installing windows on the raid, as all the tiny system files will take up 128kb of space each. Hope this makes sense. The stripe sizes range from 8kb-128kb usually, and are determined during formatting and can't be changed once set.

dreamtk · Post by **dreamtk** » Fri Mar 30, 2007 21:08

Thanx for taking the time to answer so thoroughly.

Can't wait to pick iit up over the next week or so....

messhead · Post by **messhead** » Tue Apr 03, 2007 11:59

Can i just interupt this post if you dont mind

Are these external Raid HDD (2 in a box) anygood? I'm getting a laptop so i canplay out as well and going put Seagate's 10K /RPM Savvoi in it but externally i would have to go SCSI to get 10K/15K which is way out of my budget for what you get. So i looked into these external Raid HDD. THere well overpriced though with the biggest been a Maxtor 1.5TB (2x750GB). Cant i buy an external RAID bay case for 2 HDD from somewhere and put what HDD i want in it?

CHeers guys

P.S - Quad COre will be a waste of money, No programs (Except likes of CAD/3D Designer programs) utilise 4 core threading. Alot dont even use duel core still!!! I'd save my money (Â£400+) and get the E6600 or even E6700 (which is way overpriced still). Resolume will not use the 4 cores so the E6600 will be faster than the QX6700 hands down as its clocked faster. Just a word of warning

Plus its not an actually propper 4 core processor, its 2x2core processrs on 1 die. IUts like saying i have 2x 32bit processors so i have a 64bit system. Its just not true! 64-bit is completly different than just adding 2 32-bit processors together, just as putting 2x duel core chips together is different than having a propper 4 core processor

[Edited on 3-4-2007 by messhead]

[Edited on 3-4-2007 by messhead]

[Edited on 3-4-2007 by messhead]

VJ Nexus · Post by **VJ Nexus** » Tue Apr 03, 2007 12:23

First off - quad core would not be a waste. It's not about a single program using all the cores at once, its about being able to multitask. Render in 3d, batch process in photoshop, edit some video, all while resolume is running without any lag in performance.

And the core 2 processors are already 64-bit. It does not matter that there are 2 dual cores on the same chip - I understand this. I currently have a core 2 duo e6600, and let me tell you, if my motherboard could take it, i'd add another one! No questions asked!

As for the raid in a box solution... have no idea how that would work. Is the raid controller chip part of the external unit? or is it a software driven solution? If the benchmarks for the external raid's ae as impressive as internal solutions, i'd say go for it. I'd do plenty of research first though before such an investment.