Which computer hardware?

Forum|Forum|5 years ago
July 5, 2020
4 replies
836 views

Hi, I'm struggling to choose the correct computer for my son (15). I have got adobe creative cloud, he likes to make videos but I suppose he is only at a novive level He prefers to use rush over premiere as it is simpler, though I would like him to begin to learn it. He wants to use animate. My current computer is struggling (it is an old i5 cpu) so I have been looking around the internet and there seems to be lots of threads about gpu issues and premiere (with explanation of fixes way above my understanding) someone suggested an integrated gpu i7-1065G7 rather than non integrated gpu. What do you think? I also understand for animate the ghz will be too low but at some point a fix will come. I wouldn't really like to go over £800. Any advice greatly appreciated, Steven.

Hardware or GPU

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e.motion

Known Participant

He's your son...don't be cheap. He could be the next Steven Speilberg. LOL. Come on dad, buy him a REAL computer!

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A_face_in_a_crowdAuthor

Participating Frequently

That was funny, it did make me smile. If he is the next Speilberg, there is going to be a lot of Pokemon movies hitting the big screen. I am not sure where the boundary is between a 'real' computer and other comments of a 'cheap' computer. I think RJL, above, makes a good point about the balance between cost and actual needs. I have seen HP Envy x360 touch screen with Ryzen 7 8 core 4700U with 16MB Ram - the integrated graphics card is meant to out perform a mx250 gpu. Would this be okay for using adobe cloud apps?

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e.motion

Known Participant

To be honest, I know nothing about PC's. I'm a Mac guy and that's all I can speak about.

I've occasionally had the horror of working in a Windows operating system...and it was like a nightmare. But that's just me. Sorry, you'll have to go elsewhere to find out about the system requirements. I'm sure Adobe has a list of what you need.

I do this for a living so expensive computers do pay for themselves.

But goodluck to your son.

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e.motion

Known Participant

Its simple. Buy him a Mac! with lots of ram.

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RjL190365

Legend

Although the discussion starter did not specify a budget, even the least expensive Mac with a lot of RAM may cost far more money (maybe 3 to 4 times more money) than is justifiable for a beginner. And from there, the pricing on Macs only gets more absurdly expensive. After all, $1,500 is quite expensive for a beginner who's just starting out in video editing, especially if that system has much weaker-performing components than a Windows system of the same cost.

And moving forward, Intel-based Macs are about to begin to be phased out of production, as Apple is transitiong entirely to an ARM-based CPU architecture of Apple's own proprietary design. And there will be a point in the near future (about three to four years from now) at which Premiere Pro may no longer run on an Intel-based Mac any more.

So, your suggestion to spend an astronomical amount of money on a computer that is about to reach a dead end is just plain foolish.

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RjL190365

Legend

Here's the problem:

You're not going to get anything acceptable for video editing in a laptop of anywhere near than low of a price. You see, all integrated Intel graphics steal way too much RAM for themselves (in fact, Intel IGPs steal more than 6 GB of system RAM for itself when running Premiere Pro), which leaves you with a woefully insufficient amount of RAM to run Premiere Pro properly or at all. Adobe requires that you have more than 8 GB of free, unused system RAM to run Premiere Pro properly. With the typical IGP and RAM amounts used in such budget laptops, you will be left with less than 2 GB of free, unused system RAM. Under that condition, Premiere Pro will actually choke badly. And even with 64 GB of RAM in such a laptop, the integrated IGP will not perform any faster or better than a cheap, bottom-of-the-line discrete GPU.

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A_face_in_a_crowdAuthor

Participating Frequently

Hi, Thanks for the advice, the whole availability of RAM with an IGP is really helpful, good to know. I have been reading online about issues where they have a separate GPU and Pro is running slowly and that the computer is using something like 100% of the integrated card and 20% of the separate GPU, I have read a number of these. Is there something I need to be aware of when buying a system or is that typical of Pro? Apologies for another question, I want to get this right. I will be upping my budget I can see that is needed.

Any help greatly appreciated.

Thanks,

Steven

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RjL190365

Legend

Actually, that type of behavior is typical for versions of Premiere Pro prior to 14.2, which was released in mid-May. Beginning with 14.2, a discrete GPU is now supported for encoding to H.264 and HEVC on export. However, not all discrete GPUs support hardware H.264 or HEVC encoding. The cheap laptop that you're considering may have a discrete GPU that doesn't support hardware H.264 or HEVC encoding, and therefore will fall back on the CPU or the integrated IGP. And even if a discrete GPU is supported, if Intel's QuickSync is enabled, the IGP is still used rather heavily for QuickSync decoding of H.264 or HEVC source material.

As for the i7-1065G7 without a discrete GPU, it's workable. Just make sure that that laptop has 16 GB or more installed RAM just to prevent choking in Premiere Pro.