Edius NX Express on Mac Pro 8 Core

[STORMDAVE]

It is working!

I routed the audio from the line out of the NX to the Line in and didn't use the small audio cable that came with it.

Edius recognizes the card and it is on the output list. Scrubbing is smooth as butter. Component connection works so does all the rest of the connections.

Few screens:







In the few hours of testing, I haven't found any issues. I'll be rigorously testing it with Edius 4.24 and will keep you guys updated.

So yes, if you plan to buy a new computer, why not a Mac Pro and an Edius NX Express? :D Best of both worlds??

I have one slot left for "other" things...probably an eSATA card or better yet, another capture card so I can do my compositing in AE under OSX, it's so much better.

Windows does not see past 2GB under Bootcamp beta, probably the final will fix this.

[Rusty]

I can't believe XP is still trapped behind the 2GB limit!

Rusty
Nice to see an Edius ornament on your "Shiny Alumiminum Christmas Tree" all you need now is a colored/rotating light!

[STORMDAVE]

XP can see more than 2GB, with the /PAE and /3GB switches in the boot.ini, but it seems that Apple has to fix this from what I gathered. It is emulating a BIOS so....

If Edius worked under OSX, that would be really cool. This thing is really quiet.

[Geoff]

Great news, StormDave, just what I've been waiting for! The rendering and performance improvements over FCP should cause quite a stir in the Apple Mac Camp.

Geoff

[GrassValley_MD]

Just to let you guys know this is NOT supported. You will be on your own as far as tech support goes.

This is an APPLE venture with the bootcamp stuff and has nothing to do with Grass Valley or even Microsoft for that matter.

So just know that this is not supported when you are making your decisions. :)


Mike

[Geoff]

I'm finding that Edius is about 4 times the speed of FCP, when it comes to rendering and outputing an m2t hdv file! This is on a MacPro 2.66GHz quad core with 3GB RAM and an internal SATA RAID and the tests were made using 3 x 10 second clips, one with 26% Gaussian Blur, one with colour corection and one with 50% slomo.

StormDave, do you get RT with Xplode using the ATI X1900 card?

Geoff

[STORMDAVE]

Hey Geoff, yep Edius is much more speedier than FCP in certain situations, but they are a bit in different leagues so we shouldn't really compare them...

With the X1900, I get RT with Xplode Pro 4.5 in Edius

Do you have problems with the bluetooth keyboard?? I have to turn it off and on everytime I go into XP. Also it seems that the yellow exclamations in the device manager don't really matter, because XP found the NX board and daughter board without issues. And does Windows see more than 1.98GB of RAM?

[Geoff]

Hi StormDave,

You're right, Edius and FCP are different animals, each withits own strengths and weaknesses; I presume that you are using the 'doctored' ATI drivers when in Windows mode on the Mac.

I can confirm that my system sees only 1.98GB of RAM, but I cannot comment on BlueRay as I do not have it on my system.

At the moment I'm using the Mac's Firewire connection to the Z1, but now intend getting an Intensity Pro card and will later add the NX and HD extion cards.

Geoff

[STORMDAVE]

Hi Geoff, I was using the bootcamp drivers for the X1900 (Which came with the system) but it seemed to have a few issues so I went to the ATI site and lo' and behold there are recent drivers just for XP for Bootcamp which fixed a few issues for me.

[STORMDAVE]

Just an update: NXExpress won't let the Mac Pro sleep, even under OSX...even in the manual it says the same for Windows. So it's a hardware limitation. But so far so good, it works flawlessly because the Mac Pro uses a slightly modified (No BIOS) Intel 5000X chipset. By the time Bootcamp final comes with Leopard in October, Apple should be releasing a firmware update which updates the BIOS emulation and they have no other choice but to make it better because it is now a feature from Apple and their tech support has to support it.

[bashvideo]

hi STORMDAVE ,

thank you very much for this information .

please which edius nx do you have ? pci-e or pci-x 64bit ? and pci-e there is 1x - 4x - 16x , which size you have on your mac ???

i saw the picture but its not clear , so what is the slot on the motherboard that you put the nx card on it .

i want to Purchase mac , and this is first time for me with mac , please what do you recomend for me to do at first time .

thanks alot .

[STORMDAVE]

Hi there,
it is the PCIExpress version (NX Express). Both cards are PCIe. I put the 2 cards right above the ATI X1900 graphics card. It is the Mac Pro 8 Core 3.0Ghz version.

These computers don't have PCI-X slots, only PCIe.

Bootcamp is still beta, and I seem to be having a few issues with it so I am reinstalling XP Pro again to fix the problem. Final is coming out in October (included in Leopard). Like Mike Downey said in this thread, it is not supported, but if you're a techie and think you can handle it, go ahead...but I'm sure if you call Grass Valley support and tell them your PC specs, they won't support it...so you're on your own and if others will help.

My recommendations for a Mac would be to hold off until October, I think Apple is going to release a new version of the Mac Pro by then and Leopard will be included for free. Also your budget matters as well. I wanted to go with the top of the line one (Check my specs in my signature).

If you are only going to be using Edius, then I don't think you need to get a Mac. I got a Mac because of After Effects and OSX.

Check out www.macrumors.com there is a bunch of info there. Also this is my first mac as well, but I was familiar with OSX already, and it's been a great experience so far.

[bashvideo]

dear STORMDAVE ,

thanks alot , i want to go to mac beacuse its good hardware , im working on aftereffects and photoshop also . and i like edius more than final cut .

im asking about the slot on the main board , you said its pci-e

which one ? the small or the long one ?

edius nx has the small slot 1x
do you have clear picture for mainboard slots on mac .

thanks .

[STORMDAVE]

I didn't specifically pick any slots, I just put the main board above the graphics card and the Component card above the main NX board.

All the Mac slots are 16x. The NX set uses 1x cards. Since 16x slots are backwards compatible, you won't have any issues. There are 3 slots left after the graphics card, so a total of 4 slots.

[STORMDAVE]

Just an update, I just installed a fresh copy of XP through Bootcamp Assistant, right now everything is so smooth.

Just make sure to follow this direction:

1) Install Bootcamp under OSX, run it
2) Make a partition (I used 50GB)
3) Install XP (Follow bootcamp instructions) and then all the updates from Windows update. Restart.
4) Use the Mac Drivers disk to install the drivers, make sure you don't do anything while this is happening.
5) Restart your computer when it asks you to
6) Run Edius installer and install Edius and it will install the NX drivers as well

Everything is really smooth for me, I had some issues before and I think it was a bad install. I am editing a 4 hour event right now, the project is 80% complete and I opened this project over the network, and it's all working perfectly. Don't mind the 4 yellow exclamation marks in the device manager, they don't mean much because NX is working properly.