Hardware configuration for Premiere 4 Master Collection

Question

Hello everyone and thanks for your help in advance.  I recently purchased a Toshiba Satellite laptop for my duaghter who is interested in getting started in film editing.  We have a Sony HDR500 which shoots in HD.  The laptop is 2.9 ghz AMD processor, 4 gb memory with 750 gig hard drive.  Display is HD graphic.  So the only thing I think that is missing is multiple hard drives.  However, when trying to edit the imported HD video, the sequence freezes and is virtually impossible to display correctly.  I then used Adobe Media encoder to convert the clips into FLV files.  Whiel the playback in the editing was improved, it still was very broken.  I udnerstand the issues of editing HD video, but I thought the FLV files owuld be lightweight enough to not have problems.  I'm trying to figure out if the hardware is insufficient or if I am doing something else wrong.  Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Answer 1

FLV is not an edit file... for your lightweight computer you want Standard Definition
Tools to Convert to DV-AVI http://forums.adobe.com/thread/415317?tstart=0
Convert http://premierepro.wikia.com/wiki/FAQ:How_do_I_convert_my_files%3F
Convert your files to DV-AVI Type II with 48KHz 16-bit Audio
I have NOT used the products below, I only forward due to other mentions
$99 http://www.corel.com/servlet/Satellite/us/en/Product/1175714228541#tabview=tab0
$99 http://www.womble.com/products/mvw.html
$90 http://www.magix.com/us/movie-edit-pro/ plus $5 Ship
$80 http://www.nchsoftware.com/prism/index.html
$75 http://www.videoredo.com/en/index.htm
$70 http://www.nchsoftware.com/prism/index.html Converter
$40 http://www.daniusoft.com/dvd-ripper.html#135
$40 http://www.deskshare.com/dmc.aspx Digital Media Converter
$20 http://www.topsoftwareol.com/product/Video/Video_Converter_Standard.html
$00 http://www.dvddecrypter.org.uk/ or http://www.mrbass.org/dvdrip/
$00 http://www.squared5.com/ MPEG Streamclip Converter
$00 http://www.erightsoft.com/SUPER.html Multi-Converter <-- supposed to be very good
$00 http://www.virtualdub.org/ Mpeg to AVI Converter
Laptop Video Editing PC http://www.sagernotebook.com/
Read Harm on drive setup http://forums.adobe.com/thread/662972?tstart=0
- click the embedded picture in Harm's message to enlarge to reading size
- you need AT LEAST 2 drives for video editing, 3 is better
- some HD formats work better with (require) RAID
Read Hunt on Partitions http://forums.adobe.com/thread/650708?tstart=0
A link with many ideas about computer setup http://forums.adobe.com/thread/436215?tstart=0
And even more hardware discussion http://forums.adobe.com/community/premiere/hardware_forum
Trying to use only ONE Hard Drive for Video Editing
You are a music conductor, with a baton that you use to point to various parts of the orchestra... this is like Windows pointing to various parts of the hard drive to do Windows housekeeping or to load program segments for various functions
Now, at the same time and with the same hand... while still using the baton to conduct the orchestra... pick up a bow and play a fiddle... this would be doing something with your video file at the same time as all the other work
You as a person cannot do both at the same time with the same hand
A computer is a LITTLE better, in that it can switch from one kind of task to another very quickly... but not quickly enough for easy video editing
One hard drive is not as good as two which is not as good as three