need advice for PC setup

**Alpha_One** · May 19th, 2006 01:11 AM

32x DVD writer? Parang puro 16x lang ang nakikita ko ah. Which is irrelevant actually, karamihan ng media na abot kaya (na good quality) ay 8x. Php10k? Mahal ah, yung LG GSA-4167B ay 2.7k nalang (it's what I use personally, mas maarte lang ng konti sa media kesa sa mga Liteon units). The Liteon units are priced similarly. Don't get a Sony unit, they're rebadged (and expensive) Liteons.

LCD na 17" should be around 15k and no higher.

**Jun aka Pekto** · May 19th, 2006 07:11 AM

Capturing DV-AVI to the pc takes up a lot of space in the region of 12GB per hour of footage. Capturing video directly to mpeg2 takes up a lot less space, say around 3GB per hour. But direct mpeg2 capture requires a beefier cpu and more ram because of the transcoding that's done in realtime.

The video-editing/dvd authoring software also matters. Some are easier to use than others and features will vary. I prefer Ulead Video Studio. I'm still using Ulead Video Studio 6 from 2001 although the latest version is already v10 (I intend to upgrade to V10+ later this year). Others I use is Pinnacle Studio 8 (a gift) and Vegas Video. I also have iMovie/iDVD in a Mac Mini plus my daughter's eMac and iBook 800. But, I rarely use them because for one thing, they don't support mpeg2.

If all you want is having your camcorder footage on dvd and you don't care about fancy menus, another option to consider is a standalone dvd recorder. Recording to dvd via dvd recorder yields a better picture quality than rendering in either Mac or pc. The menus are very basic. But, they're functional plus, you can have up to 6 hours footage per dvd platter. The format used for 6 hours footage is VCD. But, the quality is very acceptable and much better than that rendered on a computer.

I have a LiteOn dvd recorder which cost me $90. It came with progressive scan, firewire, S-Video, 3 dedicated composite a/v inputs.

I personally use TDK dvd+rw single layer dvd discs for both pc and the dvd recorder so I can erase and reuse the disc like a vhs tape. I haven't looked for dual-layer blanks yet.......

As for my dvd burner I have a LiteON 8x single layer dvd burner on my old pc while I have a Pioneer 16x dual layer dvd burner on this pc.

Edit: Also when recording via dvd recorder, there's no hours of waiting while the video is being rendered. You record from camcorder to dvd and that's it.

**ph_panday** · May 19th, 2006 08:20 AM

You need:
1. really fast CPU specially during video rendering
2. fast and large HDD - 7200RPM, SATA is good, atleast 2 separate O/S volume and video volume
3. Good video card
4. Video editing tool like Pinnacle, etc those with lots of effects
5. Reliable motherboard like asus, ECS, etc

Before buying...Plan..Research...check the reviews...
links:
1. www.pcx.com.ph
2. www.tomshardware.com
3. www.ecs.com.tw
4. www.pinnaclesystem.com
5. www.google.com for your research

Plan do not rush....

I hope this helps.

**july23** · May 19th, 2006 10:10 AM

Originally Posted by KrisKros

Will you be buying a new computer setup? or you will be upgrading your current computer? Po, with 35K it may be a little hard to find a cpu for dvd writing AND an LCD monitor. If u upgrade, you're going to need tons of space on your harddrive. DVDs take up lots of space.... Hundreds of megabytes to gigabytes at a time! Upgrade your Ram to 512 or above. Those are the two major things that you should upgrade. Working on and editing large files will make slower computers lag, pause, freeze up, or even crash.

salamat sa advice. actually i'm planning to set up new computer pa lang. and initially direct copy from handycam to dvd lang muna plano ko. in the future na siguro ako mag upgrade for editing.

**ozcity** · May 19th, 2006 10:53 AM

sample specs..and guestimate price

Intel P4 630 LGA775 3.0ghz = 10k
Gigabyte GA-81945GMF(PCI-E X16,4xddr2,hdaudio,ieee1394,1066fsb,lan)=6k
DDR2 533mhz pc4300 512x2=4k
Leadtek GeForce 6600TD 256mb PCI-E = 6k
17" LCD LG 8ms = 12k
DVD writer LG Dual Layer 16x = 2k

**Jun aka Pekto** · May 19th, 2006 04:17 PM

I build my current pc last July specifically for video-editing/recording:

AMD X2 4200+
2 x 1GB DDR400 ram
ASUS X800XL PCI-E with Video In and Video Out
200GB UltraATA hard drive
Pioneer 16x Dual layer DVD Burner
MSI K8N Neo4 Platinum - includes usb2 ports for front and back, 6-pin firewire ports for front and back
300GB external firewire hard drive for archiving video clips

With this setup, I can capture video from almost any source and the dualcore cpu helps a lot with speeding up video encoding and multitasking while the encoding is in progress.

NOTE: Make sure you have firewire/usb2 ports up front. It can be a pain having to look for the ports at the back especially if the pc cubicle has limited room.

**city** · May 19th, 2006 05:29 PM

medyo related yung concern ko about PCs. Hope to get inputs from the PC wizards...

i need to install an OS windows 98 sa hard drive ko na 160GB. My problem is the bootdisk i have only recognizes about 21GB using the FDISK.

Need help. Thanks, appreciate any suggestions.

regards,

city

**Alpha_One** · May 19th, 2006 05:37 PM

Originally Posted by city

medyo related yung concern ko about PCs. Hope to get inputs from the PC wizards...

i need to install an OS windows 98 sa hard drive ko na 160GB. My problem is the bootdisk i have only recognizes about 21GB using the FDISK.

Need help. Thanks, appreciate any suggestions.

regards,

city

I'm afraid the only real solution to your problem is use Windows 2000 or better. Win9x big hard drive support isn't too good.

Other than that, you can most probably use the 21GB only. Many (P)ATA harddrives have a jumper setting that limits the reported capacity for old OS compatibility.

**smooth** · May 19th, 2006 06:18 PM

for that budget mahirap ata lalo na kung plano mo mag-LCD monitor. if you're planning to do video editing and DVD-authoring, you're going to need a lot of RAM (at least 1GB), a lot of HDD space (think SATA), and a nice DVD-writer (unless you're planning to have a lot of shiny coasters). the thing is, these "video-editing computer stuff's" usually require other equipments that are also pretty high end (nice video-cards & expensive motherboards). figure on budgeting about 45K for the set-up (without monitor).

the only work-around to this is if you've got a lot of time for your DVD projects.

**Jun aka Pekto** · May 19th, 2006 10:04 PM

Originally Posted by city

medyo related yung concern ko about PCs. Hope to get inputs from the PC wizards...

i need to install an OS windows 98 sa hard drive ko na 160GB. My problem is the bootdisk i have only recognizes about 21GB using the FDISK.

Need help. Thanks, appreciate any suggestions.

regards,

city

If you bought a retail (boxed hard drive), there should be a special utility in a floppy disk that allow pc's with an older bios or Win98 to use all available space in a single partition. If you bought an oem hard drive, you might want to check the manufacturer's web site for such a utility.

If that utility doesn't work, then it's probably time to buy either a new pc or W2k/XP.