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Jrennen
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Q: Does FCP Use Processing Power Of Final Cut Server?

We are in the process of installing Final Cut Server but we are also in the process of moving from SD to HD as well. This means more processing power necessary. We are trying to weigh if its better to upgrade our current local machines or if it is better to buy new machines such as the 8 core Mac Pro's.

We could upgrade our current machine to the ATI Radeon HD 5770 1GB, and add some RAM. But will will our current Machines with the new Added Server be sufficient to handle an HD workflow?

We are wondering if Final Cut Server will take a lot of the day to day processing power and rendering from the local machine so that it is not worth even having more than 2-4 Cores.

If Server does not take a lot of the processing power than it would seem better to get a more powerful machine.

We also run Motion, After Effects etc. which we are unable to use currently while FCP is rendering jobs. A lot of waiting.

Would you recommend upgrading our current machine or buying new machines taking into account price difference and long term effectiveness?

Thanks,

Mac Pro, Mac OS X (10.5.8), Dual-Core Intel Xeon, 2.66GHZ Proc. - 2 Proc. - 4 Cores - 5GB Ram - 1.33 GHz Bus - NVIDIA Geforce 7300 GT - 256 MB VRAM

Posted on Oct 13, 2010 9:14 AM

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Jrennen

Q: Does FCP Use Processing Power Of Final Cut Server?

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  • by A. Richards,

    A. Richards A. Richards Oct 13, 2010 1:17 PM in response to Jrennen
    Level 3 (625 points)
    Oct 13, 2010 1:17 PM in response to Jrennen
    The only work you can pass off to FCSvr is encoding (as with Compressor). Rendering still has to happen on your local machine.

    Buy the newer machines to shorten your render waits.

  • by Nicholas Stokes,

    Nicholas Stokes Nicholas Stokes Oct 13, 2010 2:59 PM in response to Jrennen
    Level 2 (490 points)
    Oct 13, 2010 2:59 PM in response to Jrennen
    Final Cut Server (FCSvr) can offload video encoding and/or transcoding of files that where normally processed in either Compressor or Episode Engine for example.

    Final Cut Server cannot offload rendering a Final Cut Pro (FCP) timeline for example. It also doesn't handle distributed rendering of an After Effects (AE) project files. I'd like at some of the AE plugins for that.

    For multi tasking between After Effects and Motion, add more RAM to the box, you can new pack a Mac Pro with 96GB of RAM if you buy 8GB RAM modules.

    I'd recommend upgrading your client systems if you want improve you render time with any effects based work.

    Final Cut Server can be a great asset management repository and automate and offload various encoding/transcoding for delivery.

    Hope this helps.

    Nicholas Stokes
    XPlatform Consulting

  • by John F. Whitehead,

    John F. Whitehead John F. Whitehead Oct 17, 2010 8:46 PM in response to Jrennen
    Level 2 (380 points)
    Oct 17, 2010 8:46 PM in response to Jrennen
    Final Cut Server can't offload rendering of Final Cut Pro timelines or After Effects, but Qmaster can. It can get expensive though since you'll need full Final Cut Studio licenses for each node doing FCP rendering. AE rendering is free; AE plugins may require additional licenses. (Don't confuse the above with Compressor transcoding, which is free for each node.)

    It's hard to judge whether you should upgrade your current machines since you don't say what they are. If they are more than 2 or 3 years old you should think about investing your money in current models instead of into the old ones.

    Adding RAM won't help much for FCP if you already have > 4 GB. It will help with Motion and AE, though I'd like to see a price quote for that 96GB, Nicholas!

  • by BenB,

    BenB BenB Jan 14, 2011 12:17 PM in response to John F. Whitehead
    Level 6 (10,041 points)
    Audio
    Jan 14, 2011 12:17 PM in response to John F. Whitehead
    QMaster only distributes across CPU's and Mac's the encoding jobs done by Compressor. "Rendering" is on the FCP local machine, done by FCP, and can not be distributed or offloaded anywhere else. Hint, when setting QMaster to use multiple cores on your local Mac, leave one core free for the OS and other apps. And never make the FSCvr Mac a "client" with QMaster, it MUST always be the Master.

    All Final Cut Studio apps, besides Compressor, only use one core.

    RAM helps on the local machine if you have more than one application open. The OS and all apps can access up to 4GB RAM each. I've had FCP, Motion, email client, Photoshop, and Aperture open all at once, and ate up WAY more than 4GB of RAM. So it depends on how many apps your users normally have open at one time.

    FCP will improve with faster CPUs. Motion will improve with faster GPUs.