Final Cut Pro X freezing on top spec new 27" iMac, help!

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Final Cut Pro X freezing on top spec new 27" iMac, help!

I finally received my new 27" iMac today and installed all the latest updates and then the latest versions of FCPX and compressor.

Spec of new iMac:

27" Late 2012

3.4Ghz Intel i7

8GB RAM (I also added 16GB of third party RAM to the machine to take it up to 24GB RAM but remove this later)

GeForce GTX 680MX 2048MB Graphics card

1.12TB Fusion Drive (1.09TB free)

OS X 10.8.2 Mountain Lion

Immediately I noticed performance issues and then it kept freezing whilst running FCPX - the whole OS would freeze resulting in me having to actually turn off the machine and turn it on again. It happened repeatedly so have done all the obvious things but still have the issue.

So far I've tried (with no luck):

- removing the third party RAM

- restarting the computer, multiple times

- making sure everything is up to date

- removing the FCPX preferences

- doing a PRAM and SMC reset

- fully uninstalling and reinstalling FCPX

- running the short and long Apple Hardware Tests (no problems found)

I am working with a large quantity of video files off an 8TB Thunderbolt drive but I've been using FCPX on my old 27" iMac and had no problems with that at all, the spec of that being far less powerful:

27" mid 2011

3.4Ghz Intel i7

8GB Ram

Radeon HD 6970M 1024MB

1TB hard drive

I'm thinking it could possibly be the graphics card or a software issue?

Any help or advice would be great!!!

Thanks!

Jon

iMac, OS X Mountain Lion (10.8.2)

Posted on Jan 14, 2013 1:51 PM

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Answer 1

Russ H

Level 7

22,432 points

Jan 14, 2013 5:53 PM in response to jonuk85

I would guess software. Do you have many plug-ins and/or third party A/V apps?

Russ

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Answer 2

Jan 14, 2013 7:13 PM in response to jonuk85

If you have some USB peripherals connected, might also try disconnecting any non-critical ones and restarting. I've had a couple of instances where the presence of USB devices caused problems. Disconnecting, restating, and reconnecting fixed that.

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Answer 3

jonuk85 Author

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Jan 15, 2013 2:14 AM in response to stumbleone

Funny you should say that stumbleone, because the new iMac only has thunderbolt and USB ports I've had to resort to using the USB 2 cable to connect my G-Drive rather than the Firewire 800 cable I was using previously with my old iMac.

Since I've unplugged that it's been working fine without any freezing issues. I'll test it for the whole of today and report back if that has solved it.

Thanks!

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Answer 4

jonuk85 Author

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Jan 15, 2013 3:25 AM in response to stumbleone

Well it worked for about an hour absolutely fine after I unplugged my USB hard drive but eventually the same problem happened again - whilst working in FCPX, usually when a background render is happening, the whole system freezes up meaning I have to turn the computer off and on again.

Any other solutions you can think of or should I get it swapped for another one?!

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Answer 5

jonuk85 Author

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Jan 15, 2013 3:30 AM in response to Russ H

Russ H - nope no plug ins or third party apps at all, just the latest version of FCPX and I've also installed Compressor.

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Answer 6

furrytoes

Level 2

235 points

Jan 15, 2013 4:56 AM in response to jonuk85

If it's crashing while rendering, I would have thought the disk would be the most likely problem.

I didn't see "Verify Disk" or "Repair Disk Permission" in your list of troubleshooting...

I'd also delete any render files - File | Delete Project Render Files.

System hangs that require a restart are usually the fault of hardware or drivers, in my experience.

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Answer 7

Russ H

Level 7

22,432 points

Jan 15, 2013 5:18 AM in response to jonuk85

If I understand correctly where you are in your troubleshooting, you tried running some (new?) projects with both events and the projects on the boot drive…and it still crashed? If they weren't new projects, try creating one in a new user account with a new event as a test. (Of course, that's only if Ft's excellent suggest that you delete renders doesn't work.)

Good luck.

Russ

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Answer 8

Jan 15, 2013 5:28 AM in response to jonuk85

You may want to try this: http://store.apple.com/us/product/MD464ZM/A/apple-thunderbolt-to-firewire-adapte r?fnode=51

It is a firewire 800 to thunderbolt cable. That way you could use your G-Drive.

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Answer 9

Jan 15, 2013 5:37 AM in response to jonuk85

Hmmm. Might also try getting a USB 3 cable if your external drive supports that. FCP X of course can use all the bandwidth it can get. I've never had much luck with USB 2 drives for FCP X projects. And running off the boot drive seems to be in disfavor by some of the cognoscenti here, with external FW/TB drives recommended. Not sure what else to suggest.

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Answer 10

Russ H

Level 7

22,432 points

Jan 15, 2013 6:01 AM in response to stumbleone

stumbleone wrote:

And running off the boot drive seems to be in disfavor by some of the cognoscenti here, with external FW/TB drives recommended.

In this case, I'm not recommending best practices; I'm trying to narrow the possiblities.

Russ

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Answer 11

Jan 15, 2013 6:07 AM in response to Russ H

Russ -

I'm certainly with you on that. This is clearly a tricky problem and doing whatever Jon can to eliminate possibilities is worthwhile.

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Answer 12

jonuk85 Author

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Jan 15, 2013 7:05 AM in response to furrytoes

Great suggestions, however:

- I've eliminated the possibility that it's an issue with the USB/FW G-Drive because it still happens even if that's not plugged in. So I guess regardless of what peripheral and cable I use it's still going to happen.

- I've run Verify Disk (no issues found) and have Repaired Disk Permissions, and it's still happening

- I've got my old 27" iMac and my 13" Macbook Pro here and when I plug the 8TB Thunderbolt G-Raid (that has all the event and project files on) into either of them Final Cut operates absolutely fine with no freezing issues. So it's definitely something wrong with the new machine.

- I've tried working on the projects/events on both the boot disk and the extrenal G-Raid and it still happens

- I've tried working with new projects/events and existing projects/events and it still happens

- I've just tried removing the render files and will test it now, but Im guessing that wont make any difference given that it works fine on both my other machines without having to do that?

Jon

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Answer 13

Tom Wolsky

Level 10

152,008 points

Jan 15, 2013 7:10 AM in response to jonuk85

You might try creating a new user and see if it persists. If yes, you should take it to an Apple store. They will probably want to do a wipe and clean install.

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Answer 14

jonuk85 Author

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Jan 15, 2013 7:18 AM in response to Tom Wolsky

Will try that now. That's probably the only difference (apart from hardware) between the new iMac and the old one - the new iMac only has one user account (because I only just set it up) whereas the old one has four user accounts and has been operating FCPX with no issues.

Will let you know how it goes.

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Answer 15

jonuk85 Author

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Jan 15, 2013 9:21 AM in response to Tom Wolsky

Created a new user and have been using Final Cut for about two hours now without any freezing. Pessimistic that this will last but will update again if I have any more issues!

Thanks!

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