Graphic card - Better comprehension | Pinnacle Studio Tutorials

By Markk655 - Last updated on Saturday, July 25, 2009
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(Total Votes: 21)
Category: Studio Tips & Tricks, Tutorials / General - Related Articles
Published on Monday, November 26, 2007
Created on Sunday, November 18, 2007 11:43 AM

The GPU ( 'Graphical;Processing Unit') is responsible for all operations that deal with graphics. It is located on the videocard/graphics card and acts as a coprocessor for you main processing unit (Central Processing Unit) which is in large part responsible for the performance of all functions of a computer. It is located on the motherboard. This is the so-called "smart". An effective "GPU" depends mainly on its generation.

Graphics cards that include new graphics processors work much faster than the old ones. Here are some details on the graphics cards.

The graphics card interfaces with the PC monitor
Currently, there are two main developers of graphics card processors that exist: ATI® (now owned by AMD®) and NVidia®. Then, other manufacturers incorporates either an ATI chip or NVidia chip on their graphics card.
Current technologies for managing the 3D revolve around Direct3D Microsoft® and OpenGL®.
If your graphics card has an HDMI connector, it is well suited for the future. However,without the HDCP (High Bandwidth Digital Control Protection), a shield against illegal copying, your graphics card will not be able to display HD content (Blue - Ray or HD-DVD and others).
These days, the amount of RAMis critical for video editing - especially for AVCHD or HD content. Users of Studio with HD footage or proDAD Vitascene require a minumum of 256 MB. Note that proDAD VitaScene (uses the GPU exclusively for rendering. Avoid "TurboCache" on nVidia cards and "HyperMemory" on ATI cards since these "features" rely on system memory in addition to a small amount of RAM on the GPU. Use of the system RAM means that there will be less RAM available for the operating systems or other applications....
SLI® (Scalable Link Interface-nVidia) or CrossFire® (ATI) does not do much for video editing (as opposed to video game enthusiasts who use this technology to run graphics cards in tandem.
Windows Vista® has a new "Aero" interface design which manages the 3D natively. This uses up some GPU processing power. So, one can expect somewhat poorer performance for the same GPU with Vista compared to XP. However, Vista also controls how video memory is being used, so video memory is actually used somewhat more judiciously in Vista.
To relieve the CPU of certain tasks related to HD display, ATI has launched "AVIVO" while nVidia has launched "Pure Video". This gives an additional performance boost for real time rendering and visualization, but the technologies are still in their infancy.

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By # jorokiry @ Sunday, December 09, 2007 12:19 PM

Great Info on Graphic cards on what to look for when purchasing a graphics card Thanks

By # Sammy @ Tuesday, December 18, 2007 1:45 PM

What is the best choice for a new graphic card with HDMI connection and a 21 LCD monitor with HDMI connection.... at good reasonable prices ? Who sells them at "street prices" ?

Thanks.

By # Déclic Vidéo FX @ Tuesday, December 18, 2007 9:45 PM

Hello Sammy,
I do not want to answer on such question, and giving my preference to one card or to another. I gave you all the key in this small article to better understand graphic card. Now, it is up to you to choose the correct one (in addition, I do not want people to come back later, complaining that the choice was not good, because I do not have the full specification of the computer...).
I can just tell you that I have bought one year agao:
GIGABYTE GV-RX16T256V-RH (ATI Radeon X1600XT 256DDR DVI VIVO)
Déclic Vidéo FX

By # Peter Roeland @ Sunday, January 04, 2009 11:20 AM

Hey every one,
I found this site by accident - what a great accident. I love this site and all it has to offer. It's now my home page

I would like to throw my "2-bobs worth in" (Australian expression)
I have just recently installed a Radeon HD4780 1 gig (DDR5) 1080p graphics card (believing this would improve my overall experience with Studio 12 - WRONG !
Talk about wasting $ 600 !! All of Studio 12 new plugis - Boris graffiti, Vitascene and Magic bullet looks, tell me I have limited graphics rendering capability and I should get a more modern card with at least 256 meg of ram.
hello this is n new card!! This card is so new (in Australia) the plugins don't recognise it.
I have had to go back to my Nvidea Geforce 7600GT x 256 meg to be able to have real time viewing of these plugins.

I have been told that the plugins have been designed for these cards:
FAST: GeForce 6600, 7300, 8400 or ATI X-series 800, 1600, 2600
FASTER: - GeForce 6800, 7800, 8600, or ATI X-series 1900, 2900
FASTEST: - GeForce 8800, GT/GTS/GTX, or ATI 3850/3870

Intel GMA will NOT work with Magic Bullet Looks.

Sorry, but in my books, these are "Old cards" not new.

By # Déclic Vidéo FX @ Tuesday, January 06, 2009 11:01 PM

Hello Peter,

Very happy to read such a nice comment. Thanks a lot.

Concerning your comment regarding graphic card, it's a pity but sometimes latest graphic card are not recognised and sometimes not the best choice (as you experiment).... For your information, proDAD recommand to set the "non local video memory" (or "shared memory") in the BIOS, to at least 256MB. Check this proDAD VitaScene FAQ - non local video memory.

DV FX

By # Valentino @ Monday, January 26, 2009 11:17 PM

Hi Peter
Thanks for sharing your experience! There's not much info in the net about (in)compatibilities of Pinnacle Studio with Avivo capable graphics cards.
I'm very glad to have found your comment on time, before buying the same card (ATI HD4870). I was looking for GPU support like AVIVO for HD video editing and encoding with Pinnacle Studio - but found no clear answers. Now I know why: Pinnacle Studio doesn't seem to support yet the most powerful ATI cards with AVIVO. So I'll rahter get a cheaper graphics card, also consuming less and thus producing less heat and noise... I thought about an ATI HD 4670.
Valentino

By # Alden @ Monday, April 27, 2009 3:00 AM

See my recent post on Pinnacle Forum regarding successfully using the ATI HD 4670 with Studio 12 Plus.

Cheers

By # Peter Roeland @ Monday, April 27, 2009 1:57 PM

Hi Alden,
Thanks for the link.
I have deleted all my drivers and reinstalled current ones from the web site.
Studio works better, but the plugins still do not run in real time.
I still get an error message saying - "Get an up to date graphics card"

My son has purchased Studio 12.1 and runs it on his machine.
Only difference mother board is a Asus P5 deluxe (mine is Asus P5) and GeForce 8800GTX with 5oo meg ram. His computer boots studio 12 faster and all the plugs-in run full time.
I am trying to get an 8800GTX for my machine, but they are very hard to come by

By # Alden @ Tuesday, April 28, 2009 6:09 PM

Peter,

What plug-ins are you trying to run in real time when you get the error message? I would like to try to see if I get the same results as you.

Thanks

By # Peter @ Friday, May 01, 2009 9:09 AM

Alden,

I have trouble with Boris graffiti, Vitascene and Magic bullet looks

Boris Graffiti is very slow and the effects are stop motion.

When I use the 7600 the rendering is better and I get real time on most Borris graffiti effects.

My son's 8800GTX is instant rendering and the graphic are smooth as

All the other plugins like RTFX etc all work ok

By # Capt. Ron @ Saturday, August 08, 2009 6:42 AM

Seeking knowledge!
Step 1. I've have just bought Ultimate Studio 12 after using Studio 9 for years
Step 2. Build a new computer
I have just read Graphic Card- Better comprehension. Great information.
Is there more information on the hardware parameters for a motherboard,
dual processors, and is 4gigs better than 3 gigs of Ram.
Is a Terabyte hard drive too big? Are 2 hard drives the way to go?

By # Déclic Vidéo FX @ Sunday, August 09, 2009 12:30 PM

Hello Capt. Ron,

We have recently done a complete article regarding this topic, but as you may already know, this website need some people to help us to translate... Currently, we are running out of translator. Consequently, we have not been able to present the english content. I will shortly answer:
- terabyte hard drive is not too big, depending of what you intend to do. I would rather prefer a RAID configuration, switching your size in multiple drive (keep a reasonable size for system, and giving the highest size to video drive)
- 2 hard drive is a good solution, but try to opt for RAID configuration.

For additionnal details, please contact us through usual forums (links on our home page).
DV FX

By # Gert Reitner @ Saturday, September 12, 2009 8:39 PM

With the ever increases in Plug Ins etc looking towards Studio 14 I am hoping you would take a look to see if there are new requirements keeping in mind that everything including Plug Ins from Studio 9 to 14 is in the system to be used !

By # Déclic Vidéo FX @ Saturday, September 12, 2009 10:17 PM

Hello Gert,

I am still working with my old graphic card without any problem, so I would answer that there is no new requirement regarding new Red Giant plugin or new features. Have a look to my current configuration in my article "Pinnacle Studio 14 - first impressions"

DV FX

By # Sunil @ Sunday, January 10, 2010 8:25 PM

Dear Sir,

I want to know that which perfect configuration of pc for pinnacle studio 12 or later with all plugin & effect? please help me for this. Please suggest which type of system, how many ram, which graphic card etc., how many ram required for real time view of effect & plugin in studio?

At this time i used pinnacle studio 10.8 fully.... i have a core to duo system with 2 gb ddr ram, 160 & 250 gb hard disk & nvidia graphic card 256mb ram.

I want to purchase new system for best & better output of video. So, please
help me....

thanks....

By # Peter @ Saturday, January 16, 2010 1:18 PM

Hi Capt Ron,

The 4 meg of Ram is ok, but Windows 32 bit only sees 3 meg.
Two drives are better than one - Every video website will stress that point.
Some people prefer Raid some do not. I do not use raid, but I am still working in SD video.
I have a friend who is into HD and used Raid. I Think the term is called Stripe Raid. He uses three drives. One for the operating system and programs, the other two for video capture Stripe raid shares the information
on two drives. Writes some info to one and then to the other and it alternates between the two when recording This works very fast BUT has one big draw back - as my friend found out - if either of the hard drives fail, you loose all the information !!!. This is rare, but it does happen. Keep in mind this can happen if you use one drive. The other Raid configuration is called mirror, where the information is identical on both drives.
Also keep in mind the bigger and fuller the drives are, they can slow down.
It is best to keep the number of projects to a minimum, erase all the data including the render files when you have completed your project and defrag the hard drives frequently

Happy editing,

Peter

By # Buddy @ Saturday, February 06, 2010 6:59 AM

Using Pinnacle ver. 14 and downloading HD video from a Canon HV30. It is dropping frames when capturing no matter what I change the mode DV, MPEG, or Custom. Called Avid spent an hour with no solution.. Wondering if I need to install a graphic card and if that will help. If so any suggestions.

By # Déclic Vidéo FX @ Saturday, February 06, 2010 10:14 PM

Hello Buddy,

Unfortunately not, graphic card is of *NO* help for capturing... Have a look to your hard disk, or processor/memory. Try freeing up some resources, and have a look to our tutorial: Optimize your computer before you start editing

DV FX

WARNING: this comment section only relates to the current article. All technical and/or general questions regarding software detailled in our article *MUST* be asked through various forums; we won't even answer to comments which do not comply to this basic rule, and we might even moderate it. Thanks in advance for your comprehension.

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