Dell Precision Workstation 650 Video Editing Computer Review (page 2)
Diminishing Returns
With computers, you always pay a premium on the latest/greatest/fastest, and the harsh law of diminishing returns strictly applies here, with the extra real-world performance costing quite a lot of money over a single CPU Pentium 4 machine. In fact, in a single-thread pure render test, there was no performance advantage over an equivalent single Xeon 3.06GHz system. Still, if you commonly find yourself with a looming deadline, Premiere editing to be done and a complex AE composition to render - or, more simply, you wish you had another PC dedicated to renders - this machine can do it all.
STRENGTHS
- Rock stable
- Fastest machine we've seen
- Comprehensive, professional video software bundle
WEAKNESSES
- Premium price
- Hyper-Thread hype
TECH SPECS
- Model Precision 650
- Platform PC
- Operating System Windows XP Pro
- Processors Dual Intel Xeon 3.06GHz (HT)
- RAM 1GB (DDR266 SDRAM)
- Hard Disk (system) 40GB (7,200 rpm)
- Hard Disk (system) 80GB (7,200 rpm)
- Sound Card Integrated on Motherboard
- Display Card ATI Fire GL E1
- Disc Writer NEC DVD+RW (ND1100A)
- Video In/Out FireWire
- Additional Hardware
- 10/100 NiC
- Ultra 160 SCSI
- Optical Mouse
- Keyboard
- Editing Software
- Premiere 6.5, After Effects 5.5
- Production Bundle, Photoshop 7.0
- MPEG-2 Render Speed 21.03fps
