RAM

[butterfm]

Hi,

I'm looking at buying a new PC which will be used for video editing and games amongst other things.
As I'm on a limited budget I can only stretch to a system with 512mb DDR Ram or 256mb Rambus RDRAM.

which would be my best option in terms of performance improvement for video and graphics.

Thanks, M

 

[butterfm]

I should have mentioned that machine is likely to be a P4 2.4 Ghz or P4 2.53 Ghz.

M

 

[Grenage]

I'd personally go with the 512 DDR due to the storage size. If you are going to be using an operating system such as XP you will especially want that extra space.

 

[cbestengineer]

butterfm,

Hello. Ok, first you do know what you want to do with the system, so thats good. And you did investigate what types of RAM there is...thats god too.

But, did you know there are different speeds of RAM. ie. (you can get 265MB of 333MHz DDR RAM, and it will be better than the 512MB of 100MHz Rambus or SDRAM RAM)

Yes, you will have more storage, but if your system is having to fill up and dump all the time, its not worth it.

Determine what your motherboard FSB, (Front Side Bus), speed is, and purchase RAM accordingly.

In my opinion, I would recommend the DDR ram. Also check your AGP card size and speed, (8X AGP and 128MB is what I recommend for high graphics)...shoot, you might as well go ahead and make sure the HD also matches the IDE ATA speed of the Motherboard as well.

Good Luck!
Craig

 

[butterfm]

Thanks Craig,

I'm choosing between 256mb PC1066 RDRAM 533mhz and 512mb PC2700 DDR 333 mhz. The motherboard I go for will depend on the type of RAM I think is best.

I think I will be best with the DDR RAM. It's also cheaper for future upgrades.

The graphics card I was looking at was nVidia GeForde 4 MX420 (64mb) Would this be sufficient for ameture video editing and games. I'm not attempting to do anything too spectacular as far as the video editing goes. The price difference between 128mb and 64mb is quite a lot and I'm not sure it would be worth it for my requirements.

I was looking at getting a 60gb 7200 rpm HDD, maybe a seperate HDD in the future to dedicate for video.

Hardware is not really my speciality, although i'm learning a bit reading through these threads, so any comments would be appreciated.

M.

 

[cbestengineer]

M.,
Good deal!

I agree with your findings.

Sounds like your going to have quite the nice system.

Just remember, make sure you get a HD that is rated the same as your MB. A lot of people over look this, and it can make a noticable improvement. I recommend the Maxtor 40GB, 7200RPM internal IDE with an ATA speed of 133MHz.

(I can't get the link to work, but you can copy and paste)

http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?sku=THD-40M3 P

and FYI, I have the same video card, and I love it.

Craig Keep Learning!

 

[cdogg]

In your scenario:

- need system for video editing
- will be running XP
- P4 2.4GHz or 2.53GHz


It really is a close one, but you would benefit more probably by going with 512MB of PC2700 DDR. PC1066 RDRAM really does the P4 justice, but the money saved on DDR would be better spent on a high-end video card or faster HD configuration.

If you are only going to be using this system for video editing, you may want to consider going with a semi-professional card from Matrox. They deal more with applying video effects in realtime. Other cards from Nvidia and ATI would let you "capture" the video, but you'd have to use the CPU to apply effects. Using the CPU takes much longer. The type of Matrox cards I'm referring to are models like the X.10. There is a ton of info on their line of cards on the net.


~cdogg

"The secret to creativity is knowing how to hide your sources."
- A. Einstein

 

[butterfm]

Thanks for the advice cdogg.

The video editing will just be used for a few home videos of the baby, family etc and doesn't need to be anything too spectacular. The system will also be used for games, digital photography and office apps so I will need something that will deal with all these.
The time taken to do the editing with a nvidia or ATI card is not really a problem because it is not something I will do very frequently.

I think the DDR RAM is the way to go and agree that the money may be better spent elsewhere.

Thanks,
M.