I'm gonna buy a new machine.

[b-dub]

I'm getting really tired of taking hours to covert my movies. So, I've come to the conclusion of replacing my 8 yr old DELL with something faster. anyone have a suggestion as to how fast a processor I should get?

[AGJ]

or if price too steap can go with the or this and both are less than half the price of i7and just as good. I do not have one yet but do plan to get either i5 or i7 quad next year when I build my computer

[thisizbrian]

more cores the better!

[maineman]

more cores the better!

Bingo!
It's kinda like asking what kind of car should I buy?
How much performance do you want and at what price?

Firstly, are you building or buying factory?

I built a core i7 last Oct to coincide with the Win 7 release.
Threw in an Intel Core i7-920 Bloomfield 2.66GHz 4 x 256KB L2 Cache 8MB L3 Cache LGA 1366 130W Quad-Core Processor for $279 (Oct '09 pricing)
Nothing fancy, but a solid step up for me.
Well worth the price.
Is it "cutting edge"? Heck no, but it's solid, reliable and plenty fast

[Deus_Ex_Machina]

For encoding more cores does make a large impact. You should not rule out the AMD Phenom X6 1055T either. It performs around the i7930 and is only around $230.

The i7 is a more versatile chip as it can disable cores and overclock the remaining 2 to get the best out of dual core applications however if it's encoding you want the AMD is better bang for buck. I cannot say I have check motherboard prices for the two though so factor that in.

[IPopov50]

With all my respects, please stay away from AMD/ATI products.... Nothing but trouble - never work right, no acceleration option, suck.
And AMD fans, don't jump on me, don't try to eat me alive... I came to this conclusion reading your complaints... I'm not starting fight here and wouldn't response on any comments, I just making a suggestion to OP.

Also, b-dub, you may find this thread useful: Please read and see what is appealing to you, look at newegg.com for pricing... I'm pretty sure, soon you will have a great machine you will love.

[signals]

Especially if you will be doing Blu-rays, get all the CPU and GPU you can afford. Nvidia video, lots of RAM. The i7 quads are great, I have one in my laptop. Get lots of fans, more than you think you need.

[Metallica Boy]

Hello, b-dub.
Finished my tenth rebuild ( or so ) yesterday, with an AMD 6-core 1090T Processor,and an Nvidia GTX 470 ( with a Gelid Icy Vision cooler ) to keep it company along with 4Gb of Corsair DDR3 Ram.
Perhaps not the best combination, but the processor and the GPU are easy to overclock, and DVDFab just breezes through dvd's, with no hiccups at all.
Dunno if this is any help to you.
See y'all sometime later.

[Justin]

Quad core machines are definatly the way to go lots of ram as well i myself just bought a brand new computer dvdfab is fantastic with quad core computers. I also have a brand new pioneer blue ray writable drive works great

[Deus_Ex_Machina]

CPU is the only really important factor here for encoding. Obviously you need a decent slab of RAM but 4GB is cheap as chips and is a given for any current system as a baseline. GPU is not really that important unless your playing games. You can get a card for less than $50 that will have H.264 onboard decoding for high def playback and will handle Blu Rays with ease.

Ipopov50's comment is an ill informed generalisation in my opinion. Over the last 15 years I have personally owned.

4X Intel CPU's (Including my current Q9550)
6X AMD CPU's
3X nvidia GPU's
5 ATI GPU's

I have never had a problem with any of them. Most peoples hardware issues come down to 2 factors in my experience, shitty power supplies and inadequate cooling.

AMD/Intel/Nvidia all produce very high quality products and I would simply choose the best bang for buck products from their lines.

Any 4 or 6 core CPU from either side however I would spend an extra $50 on a decent aftermarket cooler for it.

[b-dub]

Thank you very much for your opinions. I'll take all of this into consideration when making my decision. Thanx again

[GregiBoy]

I just would like to say, do not go for the "Home" version of Windoze.

It is a POS as it does not have the control that bigger versions have.

[signals]

Any user that does Blu-ray compression will tell you I think that GPU is equally important for encoding if not more so. I would not attempt it without a CUDA-capable card. The speed increase is astounding.

CPU is the only really important factor here for encoding. Obviously you need a decent slab of RAM but 4GB is cheap as chips and is a given for any current system as a baseline. GPU is not really that important unless your playing games. You can get a card for less than $50 that will have H.264 onboard decoding for high def playback and will handle Blu Rays with ease.

Ipopov50's comment is an ill informed generalisation in my opinion. Over the last 15 years I have personally owned.

4X Intel CPU's (Including my current Q9550)
6X AMD CPU's
3X nvidia GPU's
5 ATI GPU's

I have never had a problem with any of them. Most peoples hardware issues come down to 2 factors in my experience, shitty power supplies and inadequate cooling.

AMD/Intel/Nvidia all produce very high quality products and I would simply choose the best bang for buck products from their lines.

Any 4 or 6 core CPU from either side however I would spend an extra $50 on a decent aftermarket cooler for it.

[Racem22]

I would also have to say that the GPU plays a major role in encoding, if not the biggest role. The GPU is not just for games, there is much you can do with a decent vid card, and I would definitely stick to NVIDIA for GPUs at the moment anyways. CUDA support is a no-brainer for one.

[Deus_Ex_Machina]

I like the idea of CUDA however I have not really seen any application that can really deliver on quality AND speed using the GPU for x264 encoding. ATI have had the AVIVO encoding for years but it has always been rubbish quality.

When we can use something like ripbot264 or handbrake on a GPU I'll be the first one in line but I just don't think the tech is there yet so don't see the point on dropping big dollars on a GPU unless gaming.

I see Fab itself has CUDa in the settings however I have never actually used the compression side of FAB. How does it stack up quality wise o using other software etc and can you use CRF encoding or only set bitrates?