Slow fcp?

I have used FCP for editing material shot with my Canon 7D without problem but now both my computers (Macbook pro and Imac) can´t really handle it anymore. Everything is just slow. Any experiences? I guess it´s time for a new computer once the FCP X is released, but do I need to buy the whole studio again to be able to use it since I already instaleld it on 2 computers?

emilfromgothenburg wrote:
... and I have also tried not to use external harddrives ....
Your scratch disk should never be your startup disk, always an external disk. And that scratch disk should be connected via FW 800 or e-sata and have at least 25% free space.
Check how big your project files are ... 100Mb should be the absolute maximum. Make sure you edit in ProRes LT not h.264. Without more details it's hard to give advice from here.
mish

Similar Messages

Slow FCP Startup

Hi,
This is a continuation of my post from over at the COW which is still not resolved:
http://forums.creativecow.net/thread/8/1118518
Here is a screencap video of the launch splash screen to show you guys where and when the launch is happening:
http://reels.creativecow.net/film/fcp-splashscreen-slow-startup
It was suggested I delete the Boris Plugins - but when I deleted them [ie, archived and moved them to a different folder] & rebooted, FCP still seemed to reference the files [!] - and it still hangs.
Is there a cleaner way to delete those plugins?
Also, when FCP launches, it causes Firefox to freeze up - which is strange considering this doesn't happen on my little MacBook Pro
I'm on an 8-Core Mac Pro, 6GB RAM, FCP 7.0.3, 10.6.4
Any advice would be welcome.
Thanks,
Wayne

Hi,
Thanks - I removed all the Boris plugins from the system and lo&behold, FCP launched like a dream.
There is only one plugin I would like to keep, the BCC Units Chroma Key filter.
When I reinstalled it, it gummed up the works and I was back to square one - so I've deleted it again.
I'm going to be in touch with Boris' tech support - but if anyone has any advice on how to keep the plugin installed without slowing down the sytsem I'd appreciate it.
Thanks so much,
Wayne

Exporting is too slow - FCP 7

Hi,
Problem:
I don't know why rendering and exporting are too slow, even when i woke up this morning and found my video exported it couldn't open.
I'm trying to export a 10min footage.
It tells me it needs 35 - 40 min to export and after 30min. the time remaining is still the same (30min).
after a few hours of exporting, the video does not open/play.
Technical Settings:
I converted my footage to ProRess (HQ), the sequence settings are set to ProRess (HQ) too.
the material in the sequence and the sequence settings are exactly the same.
Additional Info.
I tried exporting to my machine instead of a hard drive to check if the problem is from the hard drive, but still exporting at the same speed (too slow).
I've been editing for 10yrs. and never faced this problem.
my machine is an iMac. OS X, Version 10.6.8, Processor 2.66GHz i5, Memory 4GB 1067 MHz DDR3.
Thanks,
Omar

And here are some other troubleshooting tips
https://discussions.apple.com/docs/DOC-2591
Are you running any other programs at the same time? If so, quit them and see if that makes a difference.
Also what are your sources? Prores(HQ) may be way overkill.

Slow FCP on MacPro

I recently got a nice MacPro 8-core computer with 16 Megs of RAM and an NVIDIA video card.
Nice huh?
I though so too, until I opened the Activity Manager and saw that even during Export and rendering from FCP, the 8 processors were barely be taxed. And I looked at the memory usage and it said it had 10 GB free.
*Do I have a machine that will not perform the way I thought?* I called tech support, and the very ill educated person, told me that it should be fine. I then got transferred to a FCP “specialist.” After waiting on hold for over an hour, I was told that he only knew about “installation” and surface level issues. WHAT YOUR DEFINITION OF SPECIALIST?
He gave me a very similar unhelpful answer.
I am a faithful Mac user. And since my severe stroke at the age of only 37, my whole business life now revolves around my Mac.
I feel like the dual-pro G5, which I replaced, may have been doing just fine. FCP doesn’t seem to be running any faster. And I am onlining a national TV show that is graphics-heavy.
We are living on disability, and we took out a special loan just to buy this computer. (10.8M+) The job I have now may bring us up a little, financially, but right now it doesn’t look too promising.
DID I OVER BUY?
Was my $3000 G5 just as good as my $11,000 MacPro?
If there is some way of speeding I up, I would appreciate a call. Soon.
If not, what are my alternatives. I’ve only had the machine for a couple weeks.
Here’s another quandary—I exported a video from FCP and the “info” says it took only 12 minutes. I re-exported it because by first attempt clipped the first few seconds, so I included the video-only seconds. Now the batch monitor is saying that the export will take 90 minutes. HOW COULD THAT BE?
Frustrated,
Dan

Hi dnucks,
It is clear how you feel and the frustration you are in!
We will try to help but in order to do that we need to ask questions, be patient!
An 8-core MacPro with 16GB (not MB) of RAM should definitely be a top configuration.
Do you have an NVIDIA GeForce 7300 GT? Are you using only FCP or Motion as well? Are you using FCP6 or earlier versions?
Are you using externl drives or separate internal drives for your media, renders etc.? Which ones , give specs including type of connection!
Did you get your extra RAM from Apple or you added some cheaper ones by yourself?
Also read this http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RAM ( Check out the pararagraph titled +memory wall+ and the relative links).
What format are you editing on?
Your answers will help us to help you!
Best,
Gig

Slow FCP Writes

I'm trying to optimize my xsan for FinalCut HD. I've got a storage pool made up of 6 Raid5 luns from 3 XServe RAIDS. (1 7 drive lun per controller) Metadata is on an additional RAID box.
Block size is 128 and breadth is 8 for a total of 1MB
Using xsan tuner on a client, I can read 1080i 10 bit FCP files at ~360MBs but i can write at no more than 146MBs. (If I test UNIX file writes, I get about 350MBs)
What have I missed?
What are the optimal settings for writing Uncompressed 1080i 10 bit to an xsan volume?
xsan 1.3
Prefetch 8
Block size 128
Breadth 8
Write caches are enabled
Host flush is disabled
No affinities are used (these seem to have a big performance hit)
Any Ideas?
A
G5 2.5 quad Mac OS X (10.4.7) qlogic switch

Try turning off the Xserve RAID controller write caches except for the one hosting the metadata, but leave the drives' caches turned on (I think).
http://manuals.info.apple.com/en/Xsan1.1TuningGuide.pdf
Page 12
"Although some large write requests might benefit from caching, often they do not. By placing a volume’s metadata storage pool on a controller separate from the data storage pools, you can configure the metadata controller to use caching and the data controller to run without caching. "

Slow FCP start up, really slow!

I have a new MacPro that seems to be running great with all programs except FCP. Whenever I start it up, the FCP startup screen remains up for a good two to three minutes. On my old G4 it was a matter or maybe ten seconds. I've checked other programs, even DVD Studio Pro but they all start up quickly. Any ideas as to why this might be happening? Thanks.

Which version of FCP are you running? Anything prior to FCP 5.1 will be running under Rosetta, an emulator that allows the non-Intel version to run on the Intel machine. FCP 5.1 was designed to run on the Intels natively.
Shane

Slowing fcp footage down to zero

Is there any way of grading footage so that it slows down from, say 50% to zero or close to? Thanks.

Read this.

If I dont embed when sending form fcp how do I get it back?

I’m new to motion so sorry if this is a real stupid question but..
I’m using motion to make my titles. I’ve done some tutorials and I’ve been selecting what I want to add the title to and go send to motion.
When the widow opens I’ve been leaving the tick box for embed motion projects checked.
It has been suggested that I don’t do this. If this is the case and this is the stupid part how do I get it back to fcp? Do I go file export? If so what setting am I best to use?
It’s not a super motion graphic sequence it’s just a basic title so would I be best exporting it as HDV or pro ress? I’ve been told the animation codec is the part that’s slowing fcp down and causing it to take so long to render once the project is complete and that I only need to use that is it’s a motion graphic sequence.
My project is filmed and edited in HDV and the render table for the sequence is set to proress.
Sorry for all the questions.

import the motion file into fcp and throw it on your timeline.
adam

Final cut 7 operating slow on OSX 10.8.5

Hello there
Wondering if anyone can assist me in troubleshooting a super slow FCP 7.0.3 on an iMac ( 3.4 GHz Intel Core i7, 4 GB 1333 MHz DDR3). The system seems to freeze up constantly when scrubbing through/playing/editing clips. Is there a better operating system to use FCP7 with than Mountain Lion? Any help is appreciated
Matt

Hi there. This is the Final Cut Pro X forum. You should post your FCP & question here: https://discussions.apple.com/community/professional_applications/final_cut_stud io
Russ

Hangs, Slow performance, Long launch, etc

Hi all,
Okay, I have been working on this for a while, thought I'd bring it to your attention.
FCPX is getting slower and slower, taking 5 to 10 minutes to launch, takes 5+ minutes to load a 3 minute project (of optimized media), hangs for 3 to five minutes every few minutes or so (with beachball) with no background processes (like rendering) active.
The MOST interesting thing I have found in researching the problem is that when launching fcpx, AND when fcpx hangs, the four processors are not being utilized, only one processor shows activity at those points, and that processor is peaked at 100% usage. The remaining three cores show no load at all. FCP will hang like this for three to five minutes (with only 1 core being used), then will finally release and there will be partial usage of all four cores.... then a little while later, it will do it again.
BEFORE I realized that there was odd behavior with the processor utilization, here is what I have done to try to fix the problem (without success):
- all sync services are turned off
- all security and virus software off
- All disk protection software off
- Tossed render files
- created new admin user
- reinstalled FCPX
- tossed prefs
- disabled third party plug-ins
- disconnected all peripherals
- Disk Utility permissions and disk repair
- removed the few extra projects and events
Specs on my computer.....
Mac OS 10.6.8
Model Name:          Mac Pro
Model Identifier:          MacPro1,1
Processor Name:          Dual-Core Intel Xeon
Processor Speed:          3 GHz
Number Of Processors:          2
Total Number Of Cores:          4
L2 Cache (per processor):          4 MB
Memory:          14 GB
Bus Speed:          1.33 GHz
ATI Radeon HD 5770:
Graphics Card:          ATI Radeon HD 5770
Type:          GPU
Bus:          PCIe
Slot:          Slot-1
PCIe Lane Width:          x16
VRAM (Total):          1024 MB

It's an awesome application - you just need to see why it's not working well on your system.
First, check the spec of your iMac against the system requirements:
http://www.apple.com/finalcutpro/specs/
Particularly your graphics card. If it's listed here, it's not suitable:
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT4664
If you are getting crashes, there is some conflict on the OS. Create a new (admin) user account on your system and use FCP X from there - if it runs a lot better, there's a conflict and a clean install would be recommended.
Other ways to improve performance:
Create optimised media.
Hide Waveforms at all times when you don't need them (both in Browser and Storyline / Timeline). They take up a lot of processor power.
Create folders in the Project library and put any projects you are not working on currently, in there. (Twirl it closed to hide them).
Move your Projects and Events to an external HD (make sure it's formatted OS Extended - with journaled on or off) and run from there.
Do you have FCS or FC 7 installed on the same partition as FCP X - not advised by Apple.
Keep Projects Short - the longer the project, the slower FCP X loads, works, and shuts down.
Andy

HDV to DVD interlace field order - depends on export path!

Summary: Export... -> Using Compressor versus compressing an Export... -> QuickTime Movie file, produces different field orders in the resulting MPEG.
In Detail: Here is my HDV to DVD (MPEG2) process;
Create a DV sequence, and drop the HDV into it, it gets resized, and has a filter to shift the fields by +1 added to it, and is scaled to the correct size for 4:3 (letterboxed) or 16:9 (fills 720x480) - which is fine.
Set the Quicktime Video Compressor for the sequence to 'None', and set the Video Processing -> Motion Filtering Quality to 'Fastest (linear)' as I don't like what Normal or Best does to the image (makes it pixally, check in the canvas).
Now, if you Export -> Using Compressor, and setup a 2-pass mpeg 2 encode, you get a very good image, no via - DV artifacts. I also add the channel blur, set to 1 on all channels, if its too sharp - channel blur does not blur between fields, like flicker filter does, so the motion is not compromised, and looks excellent, but it stops sharp still images from flickering.
However, this is really slow, FCP is tied up, and for a 2 pass encode, any blur or colour filters get applied twice, its also harder to hand this off to a second machine to get on with.
So, logically, you would instead, Export... -> QuickTime Movie... -> Current Setting, Make Self Contained and then load that into Compressor, apply the SAME settings you did Using Compressor... At which point, the FUN begins.
I have finally narrowed down, that this changes the field order, although I nearly went mad discovering it - every time I thought my little 10 second test worked, (exported from the timeline) I would save the whole thing out and compress it, only to find, the interlace order changed, and now needed the field shift removed! And, because my little test worked, I would then do the whole thing, some 20+ hours later, only to find it was wrong!
Export... -> Using QuickTime Conversion... is the same as QuickTime Movie...
Anyone else with experience of this ? It was maddening! But I think I am over the worst of it now! Is there any solution for unifying this for all export methods ?
When it works DVD's encoded from HDV look amazing.
When it works.....
FCP 5.0.4
Compressor 2.0.1
PowerBook G4 Mac OS X (10.4.4)

Hi Ben,
Ignore the Apple-0 (zero) part - that's just the key shortcut for the sequence settings. (press the Apple Key, and a Zero key with a sequence selected)
So, from the top: (although I'm not in front of my machine right now, so this is from memory)
Create a new DV sequence, 4:3 or 16:9.
Drop the edited HDV sequence into the DV sequence.
De-select the HDV sequence in the DV time line, bring up the Sequence Settings Dialogue for the DV sequence. (make SURE it isn't the sequence setting dialogue for the HDV sequence)
In the sequence setting dialogue, change the codec from DV to None (note - not the same as Uncompressed). If it's currently HDV, you have the wrong sequence, leave it as HDV, close the dialogue, and bring up the setting for the DV sequence.
On the 'Video Processing' tab, for the DV sequence, set the 'Motion Filtering Quality' to 'Fastest (linear)'
Choose OK to close the settings dialogue.
If you want to, and it depends on your footage, add the following blur filter to the HDV sequence in the DV timeline:
Select the HDV sequence in the DV timeline, right click (or hold ctrl key, and click) on the HDV sequence in the DV timeline, and choose the top item in the pop-up menu, 'Open' (in viewer). Click the filters tab of the viewer, you will see the Shift Fields filter, set to +1, added by FCP, add the channel blur, above the shift fields filter. Set the blur to 1 on each channel. I prefer this to the Video -> Flicker Filter, as channel blur does not blur between fields, so it does not blur motion.
I discovered this by accident
Now Save, the following sometimes crashes FCP. Check it in the Canvas viewer, set to 100%, with the channel blur, around text and sharp contrast areas, you get a nice soft blur, turn off that filter if you think its too much.
On to the encoding:
The simplest step, is to choose the DV timeline, and export via compressor. Pick a 2 pass MPEG preset, that matches the 4:3 or 16:9 of the sequence, and submit. This takes a while, on slower machines.
The alternative, which can reduce the time, is to export the DV sequence as an uncompressed QuickTime file - this does not change the quality at all - but can speed things up, because FCP is quite slow at delivering frames to Compressor, compared to Compresser just reading the frame from an uncompressed file, Compresser has to read them twice for 2 pass MPEG encoding. However, you need a lot of fast disk space to store the uncompressed footage.
Hope this helps.
Keep the replies / mail on these boards, that way they stay useful to all!
It was great weekend in Vancouver, wasn't it ?
Hit the beach on Sunday, good times

SSD drive problem

SSD drive froze while using a slowing FCP X (thousands of video clips due to time code breaks from downloaded miniDV tape despite Fast Forward/Rewind to tighten tape on spool); Force Quit wouldn't work to resolve the freeze. Had to manually restart. Lost the following: all iTune songs, all video clips and projects in FCP X, all bookmarks in Firefox. Other losses may appear, who knows. DiskUtility used to verify/repair startup and RAID disks and permissions repaired also. Relevent .plist items trashed. Nothing has worked. User folder not in finder, can get it to with 'Go>' menu. Using Mavericks 10.9.3. Time machine stopped backups because disk is full (it doesn't rewrite old backups). I can see iTunes songs in Finder window with Search>iTunes, but the songs don't display a file pathway at the bottom of the window and when the empty icon is clicked, it says the alias is broken but Fix Alias won't work because the songs can't be found. Get Info on a song says I have unknown permission to the song. 'Macintosh HD' icon doesn't show up on desktop, not do the RAID drives. I can't scroll this page I'm typing in.
Help
SSD drive froze while using a slowing FCP X (thousands of video clips due to time code breaks from downloaded miniDV tape despite Fast Forward/Rewind to tighten tape on spool); Force Quit wouldn't work to resolve the freeze. Had to manually restart. Lost the following: all iTune songs, all video clips and projects in FCP X, all bookmarks in Firefox. Other losses may appear, who knows. DiskUtility used to verify/repair startup and RAID disks and permissions repaired also. Relevent .plist items trashed. Nothing has worked. User folder not in finder, can get it to with 'Go>' menu. Using Mavericks 10.9.3. Time machine stopped backups because disk is full (it doesn't rewrite old backups). I can see iTunes songs in Finder window with Search>iTunes, but the songs don't display a file pathway at the bottom of the window and when the empty icon is clicked, it says the alias is broken but Fix Alias won't work because the songs can't be found. Get Info on a song says I have unknown permission to the song. 'Macintosh HD' icon doesn't show up on desktop, not do the RAID drives. I can't scroll this page I'm typing in.
Help

I really appreciate your trying to help. Yes, TRIM is and was enabled on the SSD. I tried your Option/Restart suggestion, but that did nothing. I did a reload of the Mavericks OS over the Internet from Apple, but the pathways to iPhoto library, Quicken data, and everything else that is wrong was not fixed by reloading the operating system. Time Machine doesn't work because it's been reset, too. It had stopped working before the crash because the backup was full and Time Machine doesn't write over old files and I haven't bought a new backup disk to use as a new Time Machine. I can find old copies of some files in the Time Machine folder on my backup disks, and I have manually transferred them to their former places, but now I feel like I have two copies of many files, with the old files hidden somewhere. I have no idea where my iPhoto library and settings went, or where my downloads folder contents are. I did not upgrade iPhoto before the crash.
All software is up to date. I have a Mac Pro 5,1 Running OS X 10.9.3
Processors: 2 x 2.66 GHz 6-Core Intel Xeon (12 Cores total)
Memory: 24 GB 1333 MHz DDR3
L1 Cache 256 KB/core
L3 Cache /processor:12 MB
Boot ROM: MPS 1.007F.B03
PCI Cards: ATI Radeon HD 5770
Startup disk: internal Apple SATA SSD 500 GB, with 238 GB available. I primarily use this as the residence for my applications.
I have 2 other internal hard drives (the types that spin) that are configured as 2 RAID sectors to hold most of the files I work with.
All disks have been examined by Disk Utility, verified, repaired where needed (not much needed repair), and permissions were repaired. I also deleted relevant .plist items.
It seems to be a fatal pathway problem. Otherwise, the Startup disk 'works'

Looking for advise on workflow

I'm about to start a project where I want to take sequences from about 40 different projects and nest all the sequences into one master project. I'm assuming that all of the projects will have to be open to do this. My question is, will this slow FCP down? My thoughts are if i break it down into smaller projects and were to have unforseen problems, it would be better to have to rework 1 project than to lose 1 large master project. Does anyone have experience with this? Thanks!

I'm assuming that all of the projects will have to be open to do this. My question is, will this slow FCP down?
No, you don't need all the projects open at at the same time (and yes, it would slow your machine down) ... just copy and paste the needed sequences from each of the projects into your new master project and close the original projects.
Alternatively, just identify and export your selects from each of the original projects/sequences and then import those selects into you new project as master clips

FCP 6.0.1 Running and previewing extremly slow

Ever since I upgraded to 6.0.1 FCP is running extremly slow.
In my current project, I brought in a HDV QT.mov that needed to be Chroma Keyed and color adjusted. Previewing the chroma keyed file looks horrible (all jagged) unless I render it. That takes time. Then I added a piece of stock DV footage under that, blurred the background and it played back like crap until I rendered it. More time. And so on.
I can't make any adjustment and see how it looks without rendering.
When I was working in 5.1 FCP I was able to add all type of files and zip right through them pretty much. Now I can't seem to get my settings right or something...so as I apply different effects or filters I can never see on the fly how it looks without rendering it first. Then of course...if it's not right...I tweak it again but can't see how that looks until I render it again.
All my video files resides on a RAID that I created from 2 of my internal drives and it also is my scratch & render disk.
It's eating my lunch on production time.
Any suggestions Please.

You could try setting the render in the sequences you work with to ProRes. Found in that sequence setting's video processing tab.
But the real fix is to not work in HDV at all. If you have an Intel mac, a capture card like the Kona LHe card will transcode your HDV directly to ProRes... or AJA's Io HD (at the high end of this workflow) will transcode the HDV to ProRes on board the box itself... The Io will take your HDMI signal directly from the camera and transcode it to anything. It starts shipping any day now.
You're a brave soul attempting chroma keys with HDV... they are nigh on impossible to look good. But ProRes will make the rendering times go way down, and give you more real time playback of effects.
Jerry

FCP 4.5 running slow in latest OS

Hadn't edited at home on my G5 with FCP 4.5 in a while, but have since updated my MAC to 10.4.10 I noticed a drastic slowness in FCP after a while (pinwheel popping up, some functions not computing at all).I have 2.5 GB of SDRAM - could it be possible that I just need more RAM?
Thanks,
Dan.

Daniel, As David suggested
"The BEST workaround is to do a clean install of OS 10.3, then update until you reach OS 10.3.9 and QT 6.5.2.
FCP wasn't written for OS 10.4 or QT 7, although it can run. It IS optimized for OS 10.3 and was/is very stable on OS 10.3.9 and QT 6.5.2."
FCP 5.1 will run very well with those versions. If you want to take advantage of the myriad improvements to the programs as well as the addition of Color, you will need to buy FCS2. Everything will run on 2.5 Gigs but yes, you will want more Ram.
And to take full advantage of color you will need one of the Intel based machines.

Slow fcp?

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