Idea Vegas Pro 14 using Asus RX 480 vs. MSI GTX 1070

Here's some information concerning the two listed cards.
PC Specifications: Intel i7-5930K @ 4.0 Ghz on an Asus X99 Deluxe MB; 64 GB Crucial DDR4-2133 Mhz memory; Windows 10 Pro 64-Bit; OS and Apps on Intel 800 GB 750 Series NVME drive; Samsung 960 EVO 1 TB NVME on the X99 Deluxe Hyper M.2x4 riser card with all source media; (1) Samsung 850 EVO 500 GB drive for rendering; (1) Samsung 850 EVO 500 GB drive for all scratch; (1) Samsung 850 EVO 500 GB for other Assets (LUTS, Camera Picture Styles, Music, etc.); (1) Samsung 850 EVO 500 GB drive for Adobe LightRoom and PhotoShop CC. The initial problems I had with the use of the Asus Strix RX 480 8GB OC card, was that I also had a Rosewill e-SATA pci-e 2.0x1 card going to an external Sans Digital 4 drive box with (4) 2 TB Western Digital RED drives, set-up as JBOD only. Believe having that card in there, and with how my BIOS/UEFI is set-up, it was having "Issues" with proper posting. Now all four of those drives are internal in the Corsair 760T case, attached to the secondary SATA controller to use for any other media things I come across. Back-ups done on an internal network server in my basement.
So, the test files consisted of media from a Canon EOS 80D (1080p 29.970 mov (All-i); Canon EOS Rebel T5i (1080p 29.970 mov); GoPro Hero 5 Black (4K 30p downscaled to 1080p 30 mp4). Used some Track coloring, Track White Balance, One New Blue Title, One Legacy Text, One Picture over Title, with the tracks all synchronized to Audio from a Zoom H4N. Total Timeline: 9 Min. 33 Sec. 21 MilliSec. Project was set for 1920x1080 23.976, preview was set to Best/Full.

The Test cards were (A) MSI GTX 1070 Armor 8 GB at stock vs. ( Asus RX Strix 480 8 GB at stock. I ran a total of Five (5) different renders from the aforementioned footage. After each card test, the extra information is Bit Rate, file size from MediaInfo.

Test #1: XAVC S Long 1080p 29.970 A: 7 Min. 5 Sec. (3.64 GB; 52.8 Mb) B: 6 Min. 58 Sec. (3.64 GB; 52.9 Mb)

Test #2: MainConcept AVC - CPU Only - 1080p 23.976 - 24/16 Max/Min Bit Rates A: 13 Min 15 Sec. (1.31 GB; 19.3/24 Mb) B: 12 Min. 59 Sec. (1.31 GB 19.3/24 Mb)

Test #3: MainConcept AVC - CPU Only - 1080p 23.976 - CBR 50Mbps A: 16 Min. 41 Sec. (3.36 GB; 50 Mb) B: 16 Min. 24 Sec. (3.36 GB; 50 Mb)

Test #4: Sony AVC Blu-Ray 16 Mbps - CPU Only - 1080p 23.976 Audio: Sony Wave64 pcm 16 Bit/48 KHz/192,000
A: 7 Min. 58 Sec. (997 MB; 16 Mbps - 1 Sec. Audio) B: 7 Min. 57 Sec. (997 MB; 16 Mbps - 1 Sec. Audio)

Test #5: MainConcept AVC Blu-Ray 30P - CPU Only - 1080p 23.976 - 25/16 Max/Min Bit Rate
A: 15 Min. 13 Sec. (1.32 GB; 25 Mbps) B: 14 Min. 56 Sec. (1.32 GB; 25 Mbps)

So, the AMD RX 480 won the battles, even if they were slight. I still have not put the RX 480 back into my computer, as it still has other issues related to "overall sluggish-ness" in web browsing, desktop applications. I also get a mouse pointer corruption, that I found information about, that seems to happen to a lot of AMD/ATI card users, from years ago, that has not been fully patched/fixed. (Sounds like Vegas Pro/Movie Studio problems, eh?). And even though the RX 480 I have, is an Asus card, it seems to have issues with my Asus motherboard! Which, this also seems to be a recurring problem, especially if you use the AI Suite from Asus on their motherboards. Huh? Though, one problem that I knew I might run into was using MSI Afterburner for the graphics card, as this happens even with nVidia brands as well. ??????? But, since I also do some gaming on the computer, mainly Mass Effect Trilogy (still haven't fired up Andromeda yet), but this RX 480 will not play nice resolution wise on my Ultra-Wide LG 3440.1440 panel. I for the life of me cannot get the card to show a resolution of 2560x1440 in 16:9 aspect ratio. 4K UHD, 1080, 2560x1080 sure, but not 2560x1440! So, will have to deal with the 10-45 Sec. slower render times in Vegas Pro. Guess I really do need that 8 or 10 core behemoth! Come on CompuTex! Lets see those Chip Prices Fall!

Hope this helped out some of you looking to utilize either of these cards.

Mike "The Chief" O'Sullivan

Edit: Sorry. Test #1 should be listed as "23.976"

Hi Mike,

Thank You for publishing the results of your render test. I don't have either of these cards and no plans to upgrade from my current AMD R9 390, but for those who may be considering a purchase, this will hopefully be helpful. Do you think the problems you have faced with these cards are in the card, or perhaps also a combination of card and system?

You are shooting at 29.970 fps, and rendering at 23.976 fps. Just curious as to why?

Hi George,

Yeah, this was posted to the forum, since we tend to get questions concerning this type of thing occasionally. Fairly long process, with all the different tests, but pretty insightful to me, at least.

For the graphics card, namely the RX 480, I pretty much purchased it due to the known "OpenCL vs. CUDA" rendering/workflow issues, or recommendations, or whatever, in all the forums or YouTube videos, Google Searches, etc. that I have come across. Always (Me, to make this clear for others!) seem to have, shall we say "considerations" when it came to ATI, and now AMD cards. But, from what I have read everywhere, with recommendations for which card(s), decided to try the Asus Strix RX 480 8 GB OC version. Is it the card? Still not sure. I believe there are contributing factors from both hardware and software problems. Do know that the ATI/AMD cards have produced the "mouse pointer corruption", and even found on an older ATI forum about it. Google search said using GPU Tweak II from Asus, on their boards (Intel or AMD based) using the AI Suite software has caused problems. Sluggishness could be the card actually not "Powerful" enough to run my LG 34 inch 3440.x1440 IPS display, or I might just have a crappy cable! Though to be fair, sometimes the "sluggishness" that I experienced on the RX 480, I have seen time to time on my GTX 1070 as well. Might put the RX 480 back in, get a new Display Port cable, and give her a go!

For the video resolution, just took the stock footage from the cameras (Canon 80D, Canon T5i, GoPro Hero 5 Black), as a test for what Vegas with the newer technology can deliver to us, the end user. Not only was I doing it for the testing of the Video Cards, but also wanted to see how much I could push the Processor/RAM/etc. in this testing. Also wanted to see the comparisons of quality, size, length as well. Quality wise, pretty much all the tests on the whole, were actually about equal to me. Though, sure the "Old Eyeballs" don't exactly "cooperate" from time to time! :whistle: Plus, it also helped me to learn a bit more about the program. Though, (insert shameful plug) some helpful hints from forum members in posts (searches), including "Re-Sneak_Peeking" some of the Docs great tutorials were "exercised"! :idea:

I will say, that even with the "issues" I've had with the RX 480, my computer and both cards actually did a fantastic job at what I set out to do. Some of the testing shed a little light on what I was looking for, personally, so it was a worthwhile investment in time and effort. And, like you said, hope it gives some of our other Forum Members that small shed of light into things. The computer I used, CPU/Memory/Motherboard at least, are now almost 3 Years Old, as I put the original build together in September 2014, after the release of X99 and Haswell-E. Will wait to see what Computex brings to us hardware wise next week, then decide if I just go for an upgrade for the processor, or total new platform...which one? Not sure at this point, as the only information I've heard is concerning Intel, with AMD possibly showing off their Vega GPU. Though, no matter how you look at it, the companies get the money I have frugally saved. Damn, when will it ever be the other way around? :silly:

Hope your rig is keeping up with the demands you are putting it through.

Happy Editing!

Mike "The Chief" O'Sullivan

Hi Mike, Thank You for the reply and information. Your expertise and knowledge about systems and components is so far above me, my head spins sometimes when I read you post. Great information and I certainly appreciate. My head spinning is my short fall, not yours. You always take the time to explain things well, and at my age I certainly do appreciate that.

I read back through your opening post and I think the one thing missing, or I missed it, was what operating system (I would guess Windows 10) and what version of Movie Studio or Vegas and the build number you used for these test. That info may also be helpful to others. Please forgive me if I missed that. I see it in your signature tag line, but not sure which version or build you used.

Hi George,

Yeah, getting "OLDER" does suck! :S I definitely am finding that out the hard way!

Oh well. Thank you for pointing out those "Omissions" of mine! As you said about "Old"... Did list my OS, which is Windows 10 Pro 64-Bit. Don't keep up with the build numbers, as Microsoft being Microsoft, they don't follow a "Normal User" pattern! It is just "slightly" buried in all the Detritus of my post early on. I do really need to do better for that.

The version of Vegas I was using is: Vegas Pro 14, Build 252. Did all the tests after I waited for a couple of weeks after downloading that build, then checked out on the Vegas Forum to see if there were any "serious" problems I might run into.

The PC listed in my signature, is not the one I performed the tests on, that is why I had to be as specific about the hardware as I could for everyone that might read this thread. I split my time between the two, depending on what I want to do. The listed one definitely is my gaming rig, so it has both Vegas Movie Studio Suites 13 & 14; 13 is the downloaded "Magix" version build 981, along with the updated build 122 for MS 14. I am actually on the "test" rig from the testing that has both Vegas Pro 14 from the upgrade path (had VP 12, did the VP 13 with free upgrade), and also have Movie Studio Suite 13 build 955, the last "Sony" version. Reason for this is that this "test" rig was originally down in my basement, so I would spend a lot of time down there after work, with limited time on the one in my signature, as it used to be more of a HTPC in the living room. It may seem a pain, but at least I do have a few versions of Vegas, either Pro or Movie Studio, for use of any type of project, or just tinkering/testing! Worst case scenario, still got Vegas Pro 12 in the wings!

Again, thanks for pointing out "the error of my ways"! I'll just chock it up to the Army trying to up the Navy again, Heh, Heh!

Mike "The Chief" O'Sullivan

mmcswnavy24 wrote: Again, thanks for pointing out "the error of my ways"! I'll just chock it up to the Army trying to up the Navy again, Heh, Heh!

Neither could I, or would I try to up the Navy, your naval gun fire saved my butt more than once, Thank You for Your Service Sir.