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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 :)

Macbook Pro Crashing on set

My opinion here - you want to play with the big boy toys... Play with the big boy toys. An iMac is not big.

Whatever you decide, try and make sure it has Pro in the name.

iMac.... where's that PD150?
 
estebanred,

What are you working with now?
 
First of all thanks for your input.
We have a suite right now with a G5 with an AJA I/O card with a Rorke Data array. We work on Final Cut Pro mainly. Also, a macbook pro for the set has been doing the job just fine.
BUT we want to set up a couple of new suites so that whenever you shoot with the RED we can adapt to the workflow. I thought the iMac could do the job but after reading some posts all afternoon I now see its not a good idea. I have been seeing the RAID options, the Video Cards (I read a post in which Jim said ATI are the best for macs) and the I/O cards. We finalize all our workflow in Standard Definition. I just dont know how to configure a mac pro optimized for our needs!!!
 
I think most would agree with me on this: fastest processors you can afford and at least 8gb RAM at the min. Then you want fast hard drives.

I understand you finish mostly in SD but I think you should be prepared for as many finishing formats as possible. You never know when a client will want to film out or have an HD master.
 
I'm not sure if this is what you're looking for, but:

Shawn beat me to it, but I'd recommend the fastest processor available too. If you're trying to meet a certain budget I'd only get a slower processor as a last resort. I don't understand people who say "I can get away with a slower processor". It will make a difference, especially working with red footage (and especially when Color can finally work with R3D files). Plus getting a faster processor future proofs your comp as much as a computer can be futureproofed nowadays.

Get the ATI cards. Yes, Red recommends them over Nvidia for mac.

Memory- I have non Apple memory in my G5 (think it's transcend if I remember correctly). It's ridiculously cheaper than the Apple memory (I'd actually like to hear other people's opinion on Apple memory vs. non-Apple). 4GB minimum in my opinion.

Storage- The Caldigit HDPro is getting a lot of good buzz. But if you're happy with Rorke...I haven't used either companies products.

I don't use an I/O card so I can't be of much help there, but I'm sure there are countless recommendations in this forum.

Hope this helps.
 
Sorry to disagree, but I don't think the fastest CPU is necessary – you always pay a premium for it where the speed difference is far less than the price difference.
Buy heaps of RAM instead, 2 GB per CPU core, but not from Apple. Sorry again, I can't give you a recommendation for a dealer abroad, since I'm located in Germany. We never had problems with our memory from DSP-Memory in 8 MacPros. You should get directed to good American sources at the creative cow.
I second the ATI cards, there's soon going to be a new one for the Mac, check barefeats.com.
We use Blackmagic cards for I/O and never had a problem with them, but you will find quite a few users who say AJA has the better support. After all, there are ex-AJA guys working for Red and the reputation of both companies is excellent.

Hope this helps,

Uli
 
Thanks all again..

This has been most helpful!:w00t:

I am currently looking for a MacPro with the fastest CPU available. I think the fastest the processor is today, the longer it will remain up to date. In other words it wont be depreciated that soon. I will check on prices about the ram and try not to buy from apple. Do you have any brand in particular you would recommend? Also, regarding converters, have you tried AJA versus Blackmagic? I think we would need one of those to output to a SD monitor. About the disks, I am looking at that website from caldigit and they look good. We have had problems with rorke data and their tech support hasnt been of much help. So I think we are going to try and risk ourselves with those. Thanks all for your help again. Its very much apprecciated.

EDIT:>>What do you think of B&H's modified mac pros?
 
Harky said:
We did have the restart screen come up (the one that tells you to power down the comp in 50 different languages), during a copy through R3D Data Manager.
Click to expand...

Harky said:
Yet another thing I forgot to mention is that I've tried to run a "repair disk permissions" and it just crashes the computer. Don't know what to make of that.
Click to expand...

Kernel panics (the screen telling you to power down) are caused by hardware, and sometimes low-level driver, problems. When you say that "repair disk permissions" crashes the computer, is that a kernel panic, does the app just crash, the app crashes and the computer sits around with the spinning pinwheel of doom? You may also find some clues as to what exactly is failing in your system logs, viewable with the "Console" application.

I suspect that you either have some sort of hardware problem--such as a loose connection, dirty contacts, or a faulty power supply--or corrupted operating system files or firmware settings. I would start by resetting your computers firmware (can someone chime in on the exact start-up key sequence for that?). Next I would try a completely clean OS and application re-install. If you are still having problems, then I would contact AppleCare for further troubleshooting and possible warranty work.

Hope that helps! :detective2:
 
Okay let me clarify some things about this entire issue.... If you are using ONLY Firewire then thats your #1 problem. Firewire is one Bus, YOU MUST ALSO USE ANOTHER!!!

It doesnt matter about CPU or GPU, (for a macbook pro on set). It matters about Hard Drive speed ONLY. THIS MACHINE IS NEVER ALLOWED TO DO CONVERSIONS!!!!!! The times are almost 20:1, c'mon an 800mhz FSB processor is too crappy to ever do Transcodes while you have to dump more footage on set. It will crash and you will lose time.

I am using a 15.4" 2.16ghz Macbook Pro with 4GB RAM, 667FSB, and ATI 128VRAM. I have 10.5.2, QT 7.4.5, FCP 6.0.3. (This is what production bought me for a two camera 12 week shoot)

I am able to play _M proxies Full speed. And I am able to have RED ALERT open at all times. I play _H in 12 fps. I never have to bother with _P...

I am however using an e-sata to express card. Having Full bandwidth to 3Gb/s Drives is the ONLY thing that matters. If you are trying to Daisy chain a FW800 CF reader to a another FW800 Drive and trying to play footage from that very same bus while having Red Alert open with the same files from that drive working and having FCP open transcoding files all from that same drive. YOU WILL MELT YOUR MACBOOK PRO. Its common sense to only have one active process from a Drive with low bandwidth (like FW800)

I am able to dump a magazine and Back it up three times in less than 12 minutes. And I hand the formatted card right back. We shoot up to 200GB / day. Once its backed up there is no reason to wait to format them. I'm abnle to check TC, Blue frames, and Scene #'s all in this small amount of time. I'm basically a Loader, I help with Camera Dept all day too.

In short, Firewire is in the past you MUST use esata if you want to sucessfully work on set. FW800 is slow as crap...

esata= 3000 mbs
FW800 = 800 mbs

Also an imac only has Firewire 800, so completely forget that if you want to work in a timely fashion.
 
incredible how these things never seem to get dead clear. Now that Shawn trashed (:biggrin: ) my hopes of working with a macbook pro only for editing I started looking better at the macpro and saw that you can get 4 harddisks working at 15000rpm. Is that something to take into serious consideration?
Hans
 
I can second this, a MBP is fully up to the task on set with an eSata-card in the Express slot and a small RAID like the Taurus or a Sidecar. FW800 is still fine for HDTV, but not for digital cinema.
A MacPro is a very different beast, the octo, heaps of RAM and a few RAIDed drives will give you one of the best workstations for digital film you can get. BTW, there's now a cheap solution in the market to add to external drives without a controller card, just routing the spare connectors to the back.

Regards,

Uli
 
Some of the same issues here, with my 17" MBP 2.4 4GB 160GBHD 7200RPM, ended up taking both FCP6 and SHAKE out as well as other apps, the FW800 works great for Pics even those of 25MB sizes, but it is slow for the RED footage, didn't get the esata card and drives, but also I'm not a Pro at this, in fact I'm just starting to learn this stuff right out of Photography.

Now seriously thinking on also going to the MacPro, and was thinking the same thing as Hans, would it be any worth the extra cash to go with the 15000rpm drives, especially if and when using G-Raid which go to 72000RPM?


I know the new MBP (with LED screen) are faster and have better Graphic cards as well 512 vs 256, but not sure about the overall performance if it is going to be any better then the one I have, so I think in my opinion it is best to go with the Tower, and just carry it on set with a cart.


Obviously as already said don't have much experience, but learning something new every day, and looking for the best solution for my workflow and that of those working with me, as it sucks not to have the horse power when you need it.

Some one else here might have more experience and give some insides.

thanks.


Ciao
 
working with fw800 is a joke, seriously. if you Want to excell In this business you need to learn about technology every single day... if you don't use esata I would never recommend you to a production . its that simple... you use 800 it will take you 3 times as long to do the same things, when im doing thevsame work with a slower mac... it has nothing to do with computer... 90% of errors are people who have no clue what they are doing... seriously... you hire a dam for a reason... so you have nothing to worry about... this is what I do... if you don't take advantage of technology you will be left in the dust...
 
basically it doesnt matter the model of your macbook pro, it is all about hdd speed.MacBook is fine YOU must have esata... my hackintoshes have on board esata... cmon apple am I going to have to hack your operating system to get the normal benifits of a normal computer? apple I won't buy your hardware if there Is not an onboard esata bus in the laptops... I build mac pros for 1200 apple sells them for $3000, and they have esata... however I can use an sata to esata cable to transfer information... as a last resort...
 
hanselblat said:
incredible how these things never seem to get dead clear. Now that Shawn trashed (:biggrin: ) my hopes of working with a macbook pro only for editing I started looking better at the macpro and saw that you can get 4 harddisks working at 15000rpm. Is that something to take into serious consideration?
Hans
Click to expand...

That's what I have. I also have the Macbook Pro... How did I trash your hopes? I was saying everything about using an iMac.

EDIT: Yeah, I reread all my posts in this thread and I never said anything bad about using a Macbook Pro.
 
Just to clear things up a bit, the FW800 bus is faster than even a RED Drive can deliver. The importance of an eSATA (or even just a second FireWire) bus attached via an ExpressCard/PCI-express slot is that while you can read or write to a card/drive over FireWire 800 at full speed, you cannot read AND write at the same time and still maintain full speed.

In other words: to get the fastest transfers possible, you must put each device on a separate bus. Use an eSATA card reader with a FireWire drive, or a FireWire card reader with multiple eSATA drives (better).

Also, no matter how much you are asking of your computer, Mac or PC, it should NEVER crash. Slow to a crawl? Sure. System crash? Never.
 
x86box,

to make a clarification, my MBP never crashed, some applications from time to time have quit on me, but never has the computer crashed on me, and this is my personal computer, not my work computer, reason why I asked if any one knew anything about the 15000rpm drives as I like to have more then one opinion when purchasing something for the business, and trust those of the users here.

That is why I say some of the same issues here, the fact that I tucked out some of the apps to see if thinks got faster, was out of not having experience and trying out every possible solution.

Don't quite understand if you are been harsh or am I miss understanding your statements, however, I'm a professional and as such I work and will continue to work with the top of what this industry has to offer, I learn new stuff every day and at an impressive rate, might I add, considering the many apps I'm learning all together, what I don't know I ask, as I just deed here, this issues are none existing on any of the productions were I have been part of, as I do not full my self or any one else in thinking that knowing it all, and always hire other Professionals to work for me with me on the Jobs.

Don't want to sound arrogant, but at the same time I don't like what you have written, at list the way I have understood, please forgive me if that statement was not directed at me, or if I miss understood in any way, but like any one else would do if they fill they have been unjustly attacked, they respond.


I own my company, and I hire people to work for me, but I do like this industry to the bone and try my very best to learn as much as possible, but one man can't and will never be able to do it all, I just try to learn the basics of everything and know the language to speak with my crew.


ciao
 
KETCH ROSSI said:
x86box,

to make a clarification, my MBP never crashed, some applications from time to time have quit on me, but never has the computer crashed on me, and this is my personal computer, not my work computer, reason why I asked if any one knew anything about the 15000rpm drives as I like to have more then one opinion when purchasing something for the business, and trust those of the users here.

That is why I say some of the same issues here, the fact that I tucked out some of the apps to see if thinks got faster, was out of not having experience and trying out every possible solution.

Don't quite understand if you are been harsh or am I miss understanding your statements, however, I'm a professional and as such I work and will continue to work with the top of what this industry has to offer, I learn new stuff every day and at an impressive rate, might I add, considering the many apps I'm learning all together, what I don't know I ask, as I just deed here, this issues are none existing on any of the productions were I have been part of, as I do not full my self or any one else in thinking that knowing it all, and always hire other Professionals to work for me with me on the Jobs.

Don't want to sound arrogant, but at the same time I don't like what you have written, at list the way I have understood, please forgive me if that statement was not directed at me, or if I miss understood in any way, but like any one else would do if they fill they have been unjustly attacked, they respond.


I own my company, and I hire people to work for me, but I do like this industry to the bone and try my very best to learn as much as possible, but one man can't and will never be able to do it all, I just try to learn the basics of everything and know the language to speak with my crew.


ciao
Click to expand...

I don't think the comments were that personal Ketch, but I understand there's some frustration on both sides. Like you I come from photography and am trying to feel myself into areas that even the technicians in the field can't seem to get unanimous about. I myself get the feeling that I always ask the wrong questions, because there are usually not many full answers. Maybe the experts are tired of questions that sound like they come from amateurs.
It would be nice if red in the near future could come up with a list of final recommendations for hardware. Then again, it may be hidden in some of the gazillion posts and threads already, or they're still learning themselves.
 
I haven't read this thread in full so I don't know if it's already been mentioned.

In my experience Mac laptops (all models and I've used around 60 Mac laptops over the past couple of years) are prone to over-heating. When doing heavy work like handling and/or processing video files I've noticed their temperature can rise considerably. The ventilation/cooling systems inside Mac laptops are not fully up to the job of handling such conditions. And this can often lead to crashes.

Simple precautions often help prevent such issues. Raising the base of the laptop off whatever surface you are sitting it on allows for more heat to be dissipated. This can be done by sitting the rear of the computer on a book. A couple of cm or an inch is all that is needed to make a difference. Even better, though not as convenient, is to raise the base of the laptop as mentioned and place a desktop fan nearby to constantly move air over the computer (the base of the laptop is the most important place to cool though) - this is especially useful when shooting on set when the combination of computer workload and set lighting raises ambient temps above "normal".

Just thought I'd mention it...

JohnF
 
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