Computer (user malfunction) set up

3 replies [Last post]

December 26, 2012 - 23:26

Brenden

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Joined: Mar 16 2010

G'Day all who read this post, i hope you all had a great Christmas.

I have been using Sony Vegas for about a year now, i just completed a video and tried to render it, the warning i recieved was insufficiant memory, i even tried to render it in 10sec intervals to no avail.

This is where i got unstuck, i rang my brother for advice, he said that i needed to un partition my drive so i could use all the hard drive to render with, so he did that for me, then he said (as he handed it back) by the way, any informatin you had on the partitioned bit is now gone forever. Needlesss to say i now have absolutely no video to render now.

and now it will not s, tart up even angrier.

So to move on i am starting again,this time however i am asking for some good advice first, on set up of drives and the hardware i am running

1. should i have a partitioned drive? to help-- the computer will only be used to edit video and surf the net, possible the odd job appplication, no gaming ever gets played on the computer.

2. i have windows 7, 32 bit edition, should i go 64 bit. I want to but will i get gains from my set up?

My hardware is:

-AMD Quad Core Processor

-Gigabyte motherboard Dual Bios

-Gainward Ge Force GTX 550ti Graphics Card

-2x4gb ram plus 2x2gb ram total 12 Gig of Ram

-120G hard drive and a seperate 80 g hard drive

-Total of 2 tb storage external. one is portable one is permanently plugged in.

Not having a lot of money to put into the computer at this time of year, what should i improve?

I am handing the computer to a friend, He does know what he is doing so he will be able to get my computer working again, however i want to be able to tell him what set up to use.

Back to my first question, should i run a partitioned drive? i can only install Vegas onto the operating drive, i tried to store it onto the 1 TB storage system but it would not let me...

Thanks for reading my ramble, and thanks in advance to all of you that try to help me.

My videos are always entitled EIGIP it means Everything Is Good In Progression...

TI think this suits this situation also.

December 27, 2012 - 09:25

RayL

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Joined: Mar 31 1999

Re: Computer (user malfunction) set up

Brenden,

My preference is always to run editing projects on a separate physical drive from the C: drive that has the operating system and the editing program. This overcomes all the problems that you have had with partitioned drives and is generally regarded as 'good practice'. Your 80Gb drive would be more that adequate as a C: drive if you run your editing projects on separate drives (you haven't said how big your projects are).

If you want the best speed for your C: drive invest in a SSD (Solid State Drive). The 60 gig ones are now down to less than £50 and 60 gig is plenty for Windows and Vegas.

Hard drives that are directly connected to the motherboard (ie true 'internal') will allow faster data flow that those that have their data squeezed through a USB connection.

You have lots of RAM on your motherboard but your 32 bit Windows will not be able to make full use of it.

Ray

December 27, 2012 - 13:06

Brenden

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Joined: Mar 16 2010

Re: Computer (user malfunction) set up

Thanks, i am going a 64 bit system this time, i realise i may have to upgrade the mother board for this.

The projects i render are usually no more than 5 minutes long.

If i understand you correctly, i should be running my operating system on my 80g hard drive, then install vegas onto the separate hard drive? both inside the computer box although connected by ribbon. I tried this but vegas would not install on a separate hard drive that was not running the system.

or do you mean, run vegas on the 80g, but the video for editing on a separate drive, i kind of was doing this but the drive was partitioned.

I will definitely price up a solid state drive for the system though, they sound much quicker.

Thanks for taking the time to reply :)

December 27, 2012 - 15:39

RayL

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Joined: Mar 31 1999

Re: Computer (user malfunction) set up

Yes, I mean install Windows and Vegas on the 80 Gb (or on a new SSD) and have your editing projects on a separate physical drive. For 5 min projects, 120Gb will hold several.

Make sure that ALL the data to do with a project is actually on the project drive. As an example, if I was editing an interview with John Smith, I would create a folder on the project drive and call it 'John Smith Interview'. Within that folder I would then create the following folders:- 'Project Files', 'Captured Files', 'Rendered Files', 'Titles', 'Stills', 'Music' and 'DVD'. Then, when starting the first project file, I would Save As in the Project Files folder. The camera files (captured or transferred) go into Captured Files, the opening music into Music, the opening captions into Titles, etc, etc.

Not only are my editing projects on separate physical drives, but they are not even in the computer unless I want to work on them. For about £20 from Maplins you can buy a simple SATA drive bay where the bare drive simply pushes in and is locked in place. As far as the computer is concerned it sees an internal drive, so data transfer is at full speed. When you have finished editing, or if you want to send you computer for servicing/upgrade, take out the project drive and put it on a shelf or in a cupboard - safe and secure, and you will never lose another project again !

Ray