I am trying to learn video editing but my laptop (Dell XPS 12, i think limited by the onboard graphics?) isn't keeping up; I'm using Adobe Premiere Elements and it's just too slow and any small change takes a long time even with small videos. Following along with video tutorials is a test in patience, and I'm failing it.

We had discussed getting an iMac to do our photo editing on and for me to learn video editing, but is there a recommendation for less-expensive hardware? I don't currently have an external monitor (or keyboard mouse) so that would need to be considered in the cost comparison.

11/12/2014 9:26:53 AM

Assuming you don't want to build your own computer you could probably get a ~$600-700 Dell desktop with a decent processor and video card for video editing. Could probably go lower than that with a refurb or sale. An actual desktop processor is going to perform a lot better than what your XPS 12 has for video editing.

11/12/2014 11:13:33 AM

Years ago I was interested enough to keep up to date with the latest video cards and what was best and what drivers I needed, but I don't know enough now and I don't have the time or desire to learn.

So I should have included that I need something off the shelf (or stupidly simple to do myself). I've seen the build lists and stuff on sites like Tom's Hardware and that's more involved than I want.

Do i just want a video card with as much memory as possible and as much ram as possible?

11/12/2014 11:20:56 AM

You need three things:

An SSD hard drive
16+gb of ram
an nVidia video card with CUDA support (see compatible cards here http://helpx.adobe.com/premiere-pro/system-requirements.html)

You can build a great video editing machine for Adobe's stack (Premiere/After Effects/Encoder) for under $1000, and with a little penny pinching for under $800.

To give you an idea, we upgraded a dell desktop to add an SSD, memory and video card. Before we were able to preview about 3 seconds of video, and realtime rendering was about .7 frames per second.

After, realtime render jumped to 38fps. Final output rendering jumped about 20x faster too.

11/12/2014 11:21:06 AM

looks like lenovo has:
Processor
4th Generation Intel Core i7-4790 Processor (3.60GHz 1600MHz 8MB)
Operating system
Windows 8.1 64
Graphics
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 750 2GB
Memory
32.0GB PC3-12800 DDR3 SDRAM 1600 MHz
Hard Drive
2TB 7200 RPM + 8GB SSHD

for $1,049.99

that would still be a little more than i want to pay when i include a good monitor, but at least its back into a price that i won't get yelled at about

EDIT: nevermind, video card not on the list
Dell's 8700 video card is also not on the list


[Edited on November 12, 2014 at 11:49 AM. Reason : .]

11/12/2014 11:46:06 AM

http://outlet.us.dell.com/ARBOnlineSales/Online/SecondaryInventorySearch.aspx?c=us&l=en&s=dfh&cs=22&puid=10dcedf5

Dell XPS 8700 for $719. Could double the ram and add an SSD for cheap. Nice Haswell processor with turbo up to 4.0ghz stock.

--Oh yeah it's not on the list. I'll sell you my 580 GTX 3GB Nvidia card for $150.

[Edited on November 12, 2014 at 11:55 AM. Reason : s]

11/12/2014 11:54:37 AM

16gb of ram will be fine, the video card is by far the biggest issue. The hybrid HDD/SSD should work pretty well too, good find on that. You might not be able to find a supported video card on an OEM pc (at least not in your budget), so you might want to opt for integrated video and buying your own video card to add in.

11/12/2014 11:55:06 AM

hell, that reminded me that i still have a small credit for newegg. so the integrated video suggestion was good, then i'll just grab a supported card off newegg.

i'll have to ask the wife which computer looks prettiest, because that's the most important thing if we don't get an iMac

11/12/2014 12:03:35 PM

Yeah the cheapest iMac with a compatible video card is $1499 but it does include the monitor.

11/12/2014 12:22:19 PM

I am selling my Dell XPS studio 9000-based video editing rig. It boots into Mac oSX mavericks or Windows 7 and comes with a ton of peripherals and legit software licenses specifically for photo and video editing. I am looking to get 1,500 for it. If that's within your budget, pm me.

11/12/2014 1:04:42 PM

http://washingtondc.craigslist.org/nva/sys/4749929259.html
Here are the specs and all that's included with it.
Has everything that Noen mentioned. Plays HD video with effects and transitions at full frame rate and full resolution real time.
OSX boots of SSD do it really flies on the Mac side.

11/12/2014 1:27:31 PM