To Mac Pro? The TV Station Dilemma

[bawpcwpn]

Here is my case:

I've recently been hired by a few local investors where I am living to work on the local TV station which they are buying. The station in its current form is powerpoint advertisements and videos running from a laptop.

What my bosses and I would like to know, is what the best setup is.

We plan on running FCS2 to create content for the station, however this is where the trouble arises. What is the best setup for us?

We have considered a Mac Pro (Quad Core, 8GB of RAM, Dual Monitor, Couple of TB of space), however what we would like to know is this going to handle the video editing of HD video and content creation, while acting as the primary broadcasting machine? The broadcasting machine needs to be able to playback HD video, while also some live changes. Would it be better for us to buy a high end iMac for the video editing and broadcast off a Mac Mini or any other options.

I know there are some gurus with video editing and broadcast and if any of you are able to suggest an ample setup, I'd be very grateful.

[BLINDER]

Sounds very much like you should talk to some experts in the field! I'm not one even though I use FCS2 on Mac Pro and MBP systems.
I'm going to recommend a Sydney based company - but you'll have your own Brisbane based ones - in this case - H Digital.

[funwithstuff]

Originally Posted by bawpcwpn

Here is my case:

I've recently been hired by a few local investors where I am living to work on the local TV station which they are buying. The station in its current form is powerpoint advertisements and videos running from a laptop.

What my bosses and I would like to know, is what the best setup is.

We plan on running FCS2 to create content for the station, however this is where the trouble arises. What is the best setup for us?

We have considered a Mac Pro (Quad Core, 8GB of RAM, Dual Monitor, Couple of TB of space), however what we would like to know is this going to handle the video editing of HD video and content creation, while acting as the primary broadcasting machine? The broadcasting machine needs to be able to playback HD video, while also some live changes. Would it be better for us to buy a high end iMac for the video editing and broadcast off a Mac Mini or any other options.

I know there are some gurus with video editing and broadcast and if any of you are able to suggest an ample setup, I'd be very grateful.

I haven't dealt with live broadcast, but I'd be loath to suggest that you use a single machine for editing as well as broadcasting. You shouldn't need too high end a machine for playback -- an iMac should be fine -- but you really don't want your playout to potentially stutter under heavy load.

A Mac Pro is fine for HD editing and content creation; an iMac could be OK depending on what HD format you're using. HDV is MPEG-2 and can be edited natively (I edit HDV on my 2006 MacBook Pro). Some other formats require transcoding, upping your ingest time and storage requirements.

I'd contact a professional who can spec a machine or two for you.

[marc]

Originally Posted by funwithstuff

I haven't dealt with live broadcast, but I'd be loath to suggest that you use a single machine for editing as well as broadcasting.

Agreed.

Sounds like you'll definitely want to have a separate and well specced Mac for playback.

[bawpcwpn]

Ok great. Thanks for the help guys. I've found out that we are going to use DVD playback mainly for the show and then sometimes if we want to do live broadcast, we would switch to the edit machine (and we wouldn't be editing on it at the same time) and then later down the line buy a dedicated machine for broadcast.

I think we are going to go with a Mac Pro for editing. Thanks again for the advice.

[Jimbo]

I would not dream of broadcasting directly from a final cut pro system... the environment is not designed to do that, its an edit suite.

If you want to go with a hardware/software solution, and you're dead set on using a mac...

I'd suggest using one or two of these cards in your playout system...
Blackmagic Design: DeckLink HD Extreme Workflow
And then finding some playout software (i think blackmagic do include a basic one)

But that is an expensive hammer to crush an ant.

Look at a hardware based solution.