Q: Premium Final Cut Server setup - Your opinions please

mcfly1954 wrote:
I currently use the Final Cut Studio on a stand alone machine, but another 4 or 5 editors will soon be joining me; so I will need to set up Final Cut Server.

Well, you don't need to. I'd say the most important thing to have is shared storage. FCSvr is a lot more powerful with shared storage (Xsan, Final Share, Edit Share, etc), but FCSvr itself is not shared storage.

mcfly1954 wrote:
For instance, do I need a Mac Pro as the main computer, and can I get away with iMacs as the other machines?

Maybe? Depends on your strorage choices. iMacs are limited in terms of their ability to connect to many shared storage options because they don't support jumbo frames over Ethernet and they don't have PCIe slots.

mcfly1954 wrote:
Does the main computer hold all of the stored files on external hard drive(s)?

FCSvr catalogs the files and they can live anywhere FCSvr can see them. The best layout is one with shared storage so you can take advantage of Edit-in-Place.

mcfly1954 wrote:
Do all of the computers need to be in the same space and connected by cable?

Yes, of some sort. Wireless is not enough bandwidth and unless you have a pretty heavy duty connection, neither does the Internet.

Don't assume you can just buy FCSvr, install it, and have a "premium" setup. You'll need to hire an experienced integrator for that. What you get out of the box with FCSvr is pretty basic.

What is your shooting/capture format? What kind of integration will you need between editors? What is your definition of "premium"?

I have a small shop and set up FCS on the Mac Pro I was using as a stand alone station (added lot's of HDD) and added 3 27" iMac i5's on a gigabit ethernet network. We edit primarily HDV and use ProRes Proxy format edit proxies for finished projects (I can hear the high end guys gnashing their teeth from here) as most of our work ends up on the Internet, 640x360px Flash format. Our projects tend to be short (6-12 min) commercial videos and we find that the ProRes Proxy quality files are just fine with HDV footage and gigabit ethernet is adequate for this use. The iMacs are also quite adequate edit machines. If you are editing a feature film or uncompressed HD footage you will need more bandwidth or shared storage, and more processing power for final renders, but it really depends on your use and your deadlines. I have not yet gotten into the more powerful features of FCS, but it has already done a lot to speed up our workflow and better organize our existing assets. A daunting program at first, but worth the learning curve.

Our setup is slightly bigger.. but I agree you don't need a SAN depending
on the format you use.

We have 3 editors connected via ethernet to xserve for media and one xserve running
Final Cut Server.

3 years later everything still runs great with HDV, XDCAM and ProRes.

I think the key is having fast external storage on the server (RAID5 SATA or better).

Great book recommended to me in another thread:
http://www.amazon.com/Apple-Pro-Training-Final-Server/dp/0321647653/ref=sr11?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1289432200&sr=8-1

Get that book for sure! And find an experienced, qualified consultant to work with.