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  • Hey all, just changed over the backend after 15 years I figured time to give it a bit of an update, its probably gonna be a bit weird for most of you and i am sure there is a few bugs to work out but it should kinda work the same as before... hopefully :)

Can newly released iMac handle RED footage?

Plenty of folks are using iMacs as old as 4 years with RED workflow here in REDUSER.
 
I work on an iMac 2.7Ghz with GTX 680 2GB and you can edit and color native 4K R3Ds at 1/4 resolution with no frame drop at all.

Waiting for benchmarks before upgrading to the Haswell version, the 4GB GPU is tempting but it looks like it's not much more powerful than the 680MX. RedcineX and resolve will probably benefit from the extra 2GB.

The new MacPro is also coming out soon but I'm pretty sure it will cost an arm and a leg. Let's wait and see - in the meantime my current iMac configuration is absolutely amazing.
 
Thanks for the reply. I know you can "use" these computers to handle the footage, but I am not clear if I can use the new imac for proper editing.
It seems by what I read here that before you needed a macpro + Red Rocket to edit properly. Now that RED footage can be edited using the computers GPUpower, the argument is that you no longer need RR if your computer has enough horse power. So again. Does the new imac have enough horse power to do proper editing with RED footage, or we will need the new mac pro to do so?

Thanks again
 
I think you need to quantify "proper editing"

RedRocket was never a requirement for editing, and Redcode has been edited on PCs, laptops, macbooks pros, imacs and mac pros since the Red One was introduced.

The previous versions of the iMac handled REDcode before the GPU enhancements, this new version will handle it even better.
 
Also keep in mind that the new iMac (and even last year's model, as there isn't much difference) will run circles around a 2009 Mac Pro. Current iMac has nearly 4X the memory throughput of an '08 Mac Pro tower with all the trimmings and the GeForce 680M is a pretty decent GPU and now the 780M w/ 4GB is available with the update. Sure, it's a low-power or "mobile" GPU, but still not too shabby for an all-in-one system. A decent iMac with a good external RAID (like the Promise Pegasus Thunderbolt RAIDs), is actually a pretty nice system to work on. The upcoming Mac Pro or a current (2010-now) Mac Pro is going to be better, if configured properly, it's just a different approach.

I think we'll see some nice new abilities and performance boost on the iMac with the October Adobe CC update too...
 
define "handle"...i handle it at 1/16 playback on my four year old core 2 duo just fine :p

but you might have some sort of expectations for what quality playback and what have you/turn arounds so its important to figure out whats ones needs are before you spend 20k kitting a computer system that can handle everything in the world... The machines look awesome but I'm playing the waiting game, buying a Dragon and glass while we wait for the oh so long awaited mac pro. I want to at least view my OSX non hack options before I figure out how to kit a massive DIT cart.

As someone who buys both post and on set gear, lately I find myself looking at the longevity of my purchases much more then I did my first time around (mac, dslr, scarlet). Lets be honest here a consumer computer depreciates differently then good cine glass or an upgradable camera system. That sort of a purchase is best made only by necessity due to the short time its cutting edge and the quick depreciation of these mainstream computers geared for consumers. What I want is a computer like a Red, where you can update all the stuff, and yes I have built wintels, but the problem still is constant depreciation of consumer goods.
 
Jonathan Yonkers said:
Thanks for the reply. I know you can "use" these computers to handle the footage, but I am not clear if I can use the new imac for proper editing.
It seems by what I read here that before you needed a macpro + Red Rocket to edit properly. Now that RED footage can be edited using the computers GPUpower, the argument is that you no longer need RR if your computer has enough horse power. So again. Does the new imac have enough horse power to do proper editing with RED footage, or we will need the new mac pro to do so?

Thanks again
Click to expand...

Did you read my post? You can edit perfectly without any frame dropping at 1/4th resolution on last year's model. The new one should be even better. You can run with the footage and edit FAST with no issues.
 
Alex Mills said:
how about the new imac vs a 12 core mac pro 2.66?
Click to expand...
the 12 core mac pro will obviously faster because the cpu is (and the extra cores, if the software uses them)...it can also be upgraded with video cards (or RR,..) but at a crazy price difference and in reality, we are probably weeks away from the new mac pros which will be on a different level....
funny, but in a way the existing mac pros lack expansion:) with everything and everybody turning to TB and TB2 (soon) the mac pros are out of the loop a bit....
the best thing about the imac today is that it can work as a screen for the mac pro and still run tasks in the background (while the other cpu/mac pro/mbp/...uses its screen)....
 
It is fairly obvious these questions pertain to editing and handling native footage at full resolutions and frame rates. Now we a removing beyond the stop gap solution of the rocket (as others have) to gpu's there is going be a performance change in Imac's. The question is what frame rate, resolution and what codec data rate is acceptable 24p at lowest resolution and lowest data rate, or could it handle anywhere near top spec footage.

So Jonathan, you might have to specify what you are aiming for exactly, otherwise these conversations tend to go around in circles based on what others expect/want. Even then some insist on answering what they want to do rather what is asked.

I was interested in the IMac but is still reasonably mediocre feature wise compared to the touch version that us being held off for years. so I'm interested to but will have to go for a better system, like the upgradable HP z1 or replacement, maybe a mac pro.
 
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