Premiere Pro CC 2018 is Too Slow!

[RyanW.]

Not too pleased with the latest update of PP.  It is so slow that it is practically unusable to me.  Just trying to play my timeline with simple unmodified videos is not possible anymore as the lag is too much.  I have cleared my cache, turned down playback resolution, and tried everything I can to at least make it usable but it is just too slow.

I am running an aged PC Windows 10 workstation but I have a processor with 6 cores, 16GB of RAM, and a decent video card.  Just a few weeks ago before the 2018 update everything was fine and PP was quite peppy.  I am not sure if there is anything else I can try or not.  To me it seems like something is just bad with the latest update.

[SitonSystems]

Very disappointing software. Very slow. I am UI/X and web designer - I made a video and I regretted the moment. You need 45 tutorials, 52 setting changes, 16 articles, 405 tricks and ideas for this software to work fine (Great).

[Warren Heaton]

SitonSystems  wrote

Very disappointing software. Very slow. I am UI/X and web designer - I made a video and I regretted the moment. You need 45 tutorials, 52 setting changes, 16 articles, 405 tricks and ideas for this software to work fine (Great).

Just a quick response to this statement:   Video editing. like many creative fields, is a craft best learned through mentorship.  It's highly unrealistic to assume that one can jump into the role of video editor without having put in the time as an apprentice editor, assistant editor and then lead assistant editor.  Not to mention the other roles involved in telling stories with picture and sound (creative director, producer, director, sound mixer, composer, dialog editor, color correctionist, video graphics, etc.).

An "easy edit" type video editing application like iMovie might allow someone to skip most of these steps, but those type of applications rely heavily on templates and an on a specific type of video being edited (vacations, birthdays, special events, etc.).

One could argue that Premiere Pro needs an "easy" mode, bit that's not the case in its current form as a full-featured video editing application.

-Warren

[SitonSystems]

Great answer. Thanks.

[MK93]

2018, same issue.

Just ordered 16GB pair, CL16, 3000Mhz so hopefully that will help...

My system is NOT the bottleneck.

PC Setup: Enthoo Evolv ATX Tempered Glass - Galaxy Silver /1080ti Zotac OCed 2050Mhz/6155Mhz + EK-FC1080 GTX Ti backplate/block / Ryzen 7 1700 @ 3.9Ghz + EK-Supremacy EVO / EVGA 750W G3 PSU / G.SKILL RGB 3000Mhz 16GB RAM / Samsung 960 EVO M.2 Boot Drive / Samsung 850 EVO x2 Game Drives / 2tb Seagate Barracuda Data Drive / Cooling: EK-CoolStream PE 360 @ TOP / EK-CoolStream PE 240 @ FRONT / EK-XRES 100 / DDC 3.2 PWM Elite Pump+ Drain Valve Peripherals: LG 39UC99 Monitor 3840x1600 /

[R Neil Haugen]

As noted in the information from trade builders Puget Systems and Safeharbor Computing, just looking at specs doesn't mean it will actually work well in video post. Many of the high power expensive CPUs perform less well in video post than some middle priced units.

And mobos are another problem as frequently they are set so that by the time we load all our cards and other devices in, there are resources conflicts. Sometimes you can get around those by simply moving a GPU to a different slot, sometimes  ... not.

Yea, it's ridiculously complicated. And too much of a crap shoot. So what is precisely the issue on any system can be a pain to trace. I did ask Puget about one system we had I was thinking of upgrading to a backup video rig, and as soon as I mentioned the mobo the reply was forget upgrading that one.

It's a notable gamer's mobo, yea, but ... in their experience, poorly set for lanes and resources allocation for video post.

Don't know what of the above may or may not apply in your particular case, but it all is something to be aware of.

Neil

[4bordeaux]

This is insane. I spend 5K or more to build myself what I thought would be an amazing 4K editing beast. Here are my specs:

i9 12 core processor

32 GB RAM

MSI 1080 Ti graphics card

MSI SLI Plus X299 motherboard

M.2 drive 500 GB, 2 TB hard drive, 500 GB SSD

Soooo disappointing to constantly have a lagging editing program. I love how adobe interacts with Adobe AE but honestly this slow performance is just unacceptable. I never thought that I would even be considering Final Cut but now I may need to.

Can someone tell me why on earth my computer isn't able to scrub through this 4K footage seamlessly? I'm open to all ideas and suggestions. I just want to edit.....

[R Neil Haugen]

Best to check on the Hardware forum. It is listed on the right side of the Overview page of this forum.

Neil

[Ann Bens]

What is your drive setup.

[Rob Ainscough]

The problem is Adobe can't work efficiently with some codecs anymore (especially MP4).  I've got Adobe working better (but it does introduce long delay in my workflow) by converting my MP4 footage over to another more Adobe friendly codec.

It's time consuming and a 2GB MP4 ends up as a 115GB MOV ... so storage space is consumed rather rapidly.  However, PP CC2019 works smooth with the 115GB MOV and none of the issues I get with MP4.

Caveat, CC2017 has NO problem working with the very same 2GB MP4.  So something significant did change at Adobe and it's NOT for the better for MP4s ... my hunch is the licensing of the codec's used in MP4s ... Adobe either elected to NOT buy appropriate licensing and went their own route on decoding (read slow and problematic), or the licensing was no longer offered and/or some legal battle.

It's definitely NOT a hardware issue, but an Adobe issue.  I have some very fast M.2s NVme on a very fast CPU/MB with 128GB RAM and even a small 2GB MP4 clip can bring PP 2019 to it's knees with an eventual lockup.

Adobe not addressing the problem with MP4 and some codecs is certainly a "worry" ... I can only assume this ended up being some legal constriction with no solution in sight ... world of corporate combat ... perhaps with Sony, but it's unlikely we'll know the real reason.  So your options:

1.  Go back to CC 2017

2.  Convert footage to MOVs

Cheers, Rob.

[Ann Bens]

1.  Go back to CC 2017

That is no longer an option.

[Warren Heaton]

Just to take step 2 "Convert footage to MOVs" from Rob's post a little further, convert to a CODEC in a QuickTime wrapper that supports Smart Rendering in Premiere Pro.

A list can be found here:

Smart rendering in Premiere Pro​

In addition, I cannot recommend AppleProRes highly enough.  If a project is starting with MP4 as the original footage, I'd go with Apple ProRes422 (LT).  If a project is starting with high-end source (like Red for example), I'd go with Apple ProRes422 (HQ).

The conversion can be done in Media Encoder prior to importing the footage or the Premiere Pro project ingest setting can be enabled to do it.

Once you have your ProrRes422 (LT) source, make sure your Sequence is set to ProRes422 (LT) for Video Previews and export your edited master to ProRes422 (LT) as well.  (You could skip the LT export and go right MP4 or whatever delivery format is needed, I'm just very much in the habit of making an edit master.)

MP4 is a delivery format.  While there are some video recorders that record it, it's still a delivery format.

-Warren