I need help!

I was given false information from the wonderful
folks at Best Buy and I bought the Sony DVD 505
camcorder which records on mini DVD.

I love the camcorder, but it produces Mpeg 2 files
which I found out too late are not very suitable for
video editing (I specifically asked 3 people at 3
different Best Buys if this camcorder was good for
video editing and they all said YES! That shows how
educated they are on what they are selling! I should
have bought a HD mini dv camcorder, Oh well)

I just built a new computer and upgraded to PP2.

6600 Intel Core 2 Dual 2.4 ghz processor
Asus P5W DH Deluxe Motherboard
Western Digital 150 Gb 10,000rpm Raptor HD
Matrox Parhelia APVe Video Card
Corsair 2x6400 800mhz - 2gb Ram

I have the Seagate 7,200rpm 250GB Barracudas in mind, but Im wondering
if 250gb is going to be enough

Probably not, especially if you want to edit HDV. Try the newest 7200.10 drives from Seagate. They come as high as 750GB. Get two of those for a RAID 0 setup, and a third smaller one (400 or 500GB) for scratch disk.

Also, take that camera back. Explain the situation and get a refund or even store credit towards a MiniDV camera.

Jim,

I wish I could take the camcorder back. I did my research at Best Buy but I actually bought the camcorder from an online company that wont take it back. I also bought an underwater housing that the camcorder goes in (I am a scuba diver and do underwater video)

I may try and sell the camcorder and housing on ebay, but for now I am stuck with dealing with these MPEG2 files.

Thanks for the tip on the hard drives. Do you think that will get rid of the low system memory error by adding a scracth disk and a raid?

I wonder, given the fact that I experience similar memory problems. Take a look at posts on low memory or serious error.

Harm,

I read the post on low memory and Im wondering, what Priority do you have PP2 set at in the task manager?

Currently it is set to normal. should i set it to high or real time? (It gives me a warning that it might make it unstable)

Also, In setting up my raid 0, I cant really afford the 750gb hard drives like someone suggested. The 400 - 500gb are still pricey but more in my range. I would think a terabyte raid 0 with a 400 - 500gb scratch disk could handle the load. Am i wrong?

Does anyone think this will be suffecient for editing mpeg2 files? (I may try and get rid of my direct to dvd - mpeg2 producing - camcorder and go to mini dv but for now I have a ton of mpeg2 files to edit)

Try adding the MainConcept MPEG plug-in for Premiere. From what I understand, Premiere really needs this plug-in to properly edit MPEG video.

I had it at normal, but when that consistently gave me the low error message, I also tried above normal, but that did not help, so I went back to normal and await a solution from Tech Support.

As for disk size, I think the 320 GB disks have the best price/G.
Since PP has, according to some users, some trouble with long form editing, you could be better off with somewhat less storage and editing your movies in several smaller parts and then assembling the parts into a final movie.

I completely concur with Jim's remark. You should get the MainConcept plug-in.

Completely concur? Is that as good as "I agree with Jim"?

This whole agree-with-Jim-thing is approaching (in quantity) the
like-ending, passe-popular, just-before-the-commercialness of
"He's dead, Jim."

Keep Smiling

Even better. What I meant was "I FULLY agree with Jim", so I do not fully agree with you, but what the heck, we're on the same track. Hey, that rhymes.

Harm and Jim,

If I decide to get an HD mini-dv camcorder how much hard drive space do i need? Someone in these forums said to set up my raid 0 with 2 750gb drives, thats seems like overkill to me. 320 or 400gb drives for a raid 0 seems pretty good to me. ??

I agree with you Harm that the 320gb are a great value at about $100 each. I can score 400gb drives for about $25 more each so I might go that way.

How much disk space Do i really need for HD video?

I used the trial version of Mainconcept MPG PRO and I liked it, I didn't like the $400 price tag though.

I didnt notice any loss of quality re-rendering the mpeg files out of PP2 so Ill probably just go that way.