@emmrecs

Hi Jeff.

It was me who talked about Steve's graphics card and mentioned that MEP suggests a 4GB card for 4K editing but his card also only can handle Direct X9 so may not fully function with Direct X 12.1.

I also pointed out about the Intel GPU and did state its purpose.

Ray.

@Steve-McClelland

Hi

. . . . My question is now I want to upgrade my video card but obviously want to make sure I get correct one that will defo work properly with Magix edit 2021 . . . . I am looking at a MSI geforce 1660 ti Ventus or Super xs  oc 6gb gddr6.. . . .

If you are working with 2.7K or higher resolution video then before getting a Nvidia or AMD graphics card, you need to a new computer that has an Intel processor that is UHD 630 iGPU. MEP currently relies on the Intel integrated GPU for hardware acceleration (HWA) of export to MP4 (h.264/AVC), HEVC (h.265) and AVCHD,

If you are working with Full HD (1920x1080) or lower resolution you can use the HD4600 for HWA on export.

If you have only one monitor ensure this is plugged into the motherboard video output, or if the monitor has 2 video inputs connect the other to the motherboard - it only has to be detected. Windows display settings should be set to Duplicate so you do not lose the mouse going off one end of the screen.

If you work with 2 monitors plug one of them into the motherboard output - you may need to tell set which is the primary display in Windows .

Ensure the HD4600 is set as the default GPU for MEP in the Windows Graphics settings as shown below

yours should be the HD4600 under Power saving option

In MEP the HD 4600 is set as shown below

and turn on both hardware acceleration options on the Import/Export tab.

HTH

John EB
Forum Moderator

Hi Thanks for all replys-Update. I use two monitors and both are plugged into graphics card. So let me try and say what I do and what I think you guys are saying is possible.

I do Drone footage with Mavic air 2 which I mainly film in 4k 60fps, However, when I export I always export in 1920 x 1080 as otherwise the files are too big anyway to post on youtube or facebook etc...For example in 4k just one file can be 2gb. I did notice though there was a problem viewing 4k and just thought was my monitors not coping with 4k, however is this because CPU is not up to it.

So, in regards to John Baker comments about CPU capability -My i5-4670k CPU is basically the issue and also my graphics card needs upgrading, however pointless upgrading graphics card alone until upgrade CPU???

Also in regards to making the setting changes HD4600 and turning on both harware acceleration this should all work as long as I only export 1920 x 1080. It does not make a difference if the intial recording of footage is 4k, only the fact when exporting. Also, just for information incase it makes a difference, the initial problem I had was the intros/outros etc..sections would not preview play, and when made the changes to windows compatability mode and turning off hardware acceleration did it solve that issue. Sooo, if I make these changes as you suggest by setting HD4600 etc... and turning on hardware acceleration again, it wont effect the intial problem I had with intro/outros etc.. section.

Phew...Sorry for long reply but I am just not as tech savvy as you guys.

@Steve-McClelland

So, in regards to John Baker comments about CPU capability -My i5-4670k CPU is basically the issue and also my graphics card needs upgrading, however pointless upgrading graphics card alone until upgrade CPU???

Yes,precisely.

You do not need a 4K monitor to edit or export 4K video. YouTube has a 128GB limit for uploads on verified accounts.

Ray.

OK thanks, going back to initial issue then I first had of preview play options in intro/outro sections not playing and then turning off HDW and putting in windows compatability mode cured that problem, Which solved the problem windows compatible mode or the hardware acceleration being turned off. Or are they separate issues and the HDW is just for exporting and perhaps windows compatability mode solved the main issue I had.

@Steve-McClelland

Hi

. . . . My i5-4670k CPU is basically the issue and also my graphics card needs upgrading . . . .

I should have made this more clear:

The important part is the CPU upgrade, in your case this means a new computer, you cannot upgrade just the CPU as the CPU sockets are different, this means a new motherboard and new memory (RAM) as the old RAM will not be compatible with the new motherboard.

A 3rd party (AMD or Nvidia) graphics card is an optional extra - not necessary however can be useful for another program that requires one.

. . . . It does not make a difference if the intial recording of footage is 4k, only the fact when exporting . . .

Previewing the timeline with 4K on the Intel i5-4670k /HD4600 is at best going to be liveable, art worst almost impossible to watch, this depends on what effects, transitions etc are applied, whether you are using proxy files and the preview monitor performance option - blue lightning symbol bottom right - is turned (blue).

HTH

John EB

No it was clear thanks, I was aware cant just upgrade CPU and need new PC. Interesting to know though that you saying dont need external graphics card as nearly spent £300 on getting one. So on an updated pc I can get 4 to 6gb VRAM on motherboard and not need the extra graphics card, just for my information as may look for new pc now.

I always use proxy’s and always use blue lightening and is ok to be fair. Problem I have at moment is program randomly crashes/freezes and have to go to task manager and end task then restart. Fortunately I have set auto save to 5 minutes so dont lose to much work when it does. I was presuming it was graphics card not coping but now is bit more clear that it’s probably CPU.

Thanks.

@Steve-McClelland

Hi Steve.

So on an updated pc I can get 4 to 6gb VRAM

No, not quite. Motherboards use ram not vram and for 4K I would suggest at least 16GB or 32GB. Make sure you get two sticks to use dual channel in the memory slots. so either 2 x 8GB or 2 x16GB. I'm sure John will say that 16GB is enough.

Also think about getting a current or last gen i5 or i7 CPU with graphics chip.

Ray.

Yes thanks. I know about ram and vram but this is where i am becoming a little confused. In first instance it says i need at least 4gb Vram but i only have 3gb vram. Now you saying I need 16-32gb Ram but dont need Vram?

@Steve-McClelland

Hi Steve.

Vram is associated with graphics cards only. If you want to add an additional nvidia card then 2GB is recommended for up to 1080p (HD) and 4GB for 4K. Some third party effects will use this such as the noise reduction program De-noise, and some 3D titling plugins as well as a few others. Without one most 3D intensive processing will instead be done by the CPU while the Intel GPU gets on with other tasks that frees up and is faster than using the CPU.

The higher the CPU clock speed is and the newer the Intel GPU embedded in it the better the processing becomes if the motherboard has sufficient ram. Although a video card is not used to full capacity on the rendering side of things its Vram is often used over normal ram because it is normally faster. Even on small project I often find the amount of Vram being used is often at the limit of my 4GB card when editing 4K material. Also when using 3D graphics the amount of motherboard ram used can get as high as 28GB on my system but I may be unusual in my processing needs.

The amounts of what resources are used and when varies with each project depending on the effects used.

Above is from one of my typical 4K projects of around ten minutes worth of video. Below is a typical export example while above was during playback.

Ray.

@Steve-McClelland

Hi

. . . . Interesting to know though that you saying dont need external graphics card as nearly spent £300 on getting one. . . . .

The RTX 2060, as I have mentioned in some of my other posts where hardware acceleration is an issue, was added nearly a year after building my PC for use with Blender.

Although Blender can use the Intel GPU is much better with a Nvidia card by a factor of about 10x to 20x faster when rendering out animation as video.

. . . . I'm sure John will say that 16GB is enough. . . . .

John does. MEP only loads video into memory when it is needed and even then it is not much as the cache size is 35 MB by default which can hold up to ~ 1 - 2 seconds of video.

John EB

Cheers all. Much appreciated. Got a headache now. Decided to put all back to normal for and start saving :( .And then what happens aaaahhhhh. Because I been messing with settings my codec H265 needs re-activating and now getting that '0' activation key again. Just bit the bullet and purchased again £3.99. This should not happen, once paid should be for life. Very frustrating. Anyway thanks for all your input, been very helpful.

@Steve-McClelland

Hi Steve.

If you had emailed Magix using the email address they used when sending you the code you could have requested a new one from them. I asked and received a new code three times before they said I'd used up my quota. The key to all of this (if there is one) is to have a complete second backup up system drive then when a drive fails you still have an active copy ready to use. Doesn't help to keep reinstalling the program. It seldom cures anything.

I think you will find that Magix has to pay for a license that allows only so many copies of the encoding codec to be activated on their products and as not everyone needs it they had it as an extra rather than add it to the price, as if lost it costs to reactivate it.

Ray.

So after exporting it is very poor quality, noticed that codec activated is MPEG-Full Codec and then had to change in settings to main concept, However when I had done months ago it was HEVC Codec upgrade (H265 Intel). Is there something different here. When I now goto Download extra content too see, there is now no box to tick to let me see what is installed.

@Steve-McClelland

Hi Steve.

Export quality has little to do with the codec type used but the amount and efficiency of the compression used in each type. On average, the older the codec the larger the file has to be for a given perceived quality of the final encode. The downside to that is, the more efficient the codec is at reducing file size the greater the need for a more powerful CPU or graphics card is to get a smooth playback. I find the Magix MP4 export to be better than the main concept one and more desirable than H265. I only use H265 if trying to keep within an upload limit to a hosting site that requires files to be under a certain size. If the program can not use hardware acceleration on a codec on export then MP4 (H264) files often take less time to export than HEVC (H265).

It's possible your processor is struggling to decode H265 files efficiently whereas the main concept files should be much easier for you to play back. That may not be the case for the poor looking exports as it is difficult to tell without seeing the system in operation. Depends on what you describe as being poor.

All content within the program should show in their relevant sections and the HEVC export would not show in the 'Export As' option if not installed. It does take a while to get used to where to expect to find things though.

Ray.

@Steve-McClelland

I notice your drone footage is recording at 120 Mbps and can record HEVC in D-Cinelike which could possibly be HDR.

If the files recorded in HEVC are 10 bit files they would be hard to handle even on a higher specified machine. If you have such a file to hand could you use MediaInfo to look at and publish here the text view of the file data to see if it they are 10 or 8 bit recordings?

The file info should look like this.

General
Complete name                            : I:\2019\Santa Fun Run 2019\100MEDIA\DJI_0208.MP4
Format                                   : MPEG-4
Format profile                           : JVT
Codec ID                                 : avc1 (avc1/isom)
File size                                : 415 MiB
Duration                                 : 2 min 19 s
Overall bit rate mode                    : Variable
Overall bit rate                         : 25.0 Mb/s
Encoded date                             : UTC 2019-12-15 10:08:17
Tagged date                              : UTC 2019-12-15 10:08:17
Comment                                  : DE=D-CLike, Type=SlowMotion, HQ=Normal, Mode=P
gpt                                      : +3.80
gyw                                      : -8.50
grl                                      : +0.00

Video
ID                                       : 1
Format                                   : AVC
Format/Info                              : Advanced Video Codec
Format profile                           : High@L5.1
Format settings                          : CABAC / 1 Ref Frames
Format settings, CABAC                   : Yes
Format settings, Reference frames        : 1 frame
Format settings, GOP                     : M=1, N=30
Codec ID                                 : avc1
Codec ID/Info                            : Advanced Video Coding
Duration                                 : 2 min 19 s
Bit rate mode                            : Variable
Bit rate                                 : 25.0 Mb/s
Maximum bit rate                         : 100.0 Mb/s
Width                                    : 1 920 pixels
Height                                   : 1 080 pixels
Display aspect ratio                     : 16:9
Frame rate mode                          : Constant
Frame rate                               : 29.970 (30000/1001) FPS
Original frame rate                      : 119.880 (120000/1001) FPS
Color space                              : YUV
Chroma subsampling                       : 4:2:0
Bit depth                                : 8 bits
Scan type                                : Progressive
Bits/(Pixel*Frame)                       : 0.402
Stream size                              : 415 MiB (100%)
Title                                    : DJI.AVC
Language                                 : English
Encoded date                             : UTC 2019-12-15 10:08:17
Tagged date                              : UTC 2019-12-15 10:08:17
Color range                              : Limited
Color primaries                          : BT.709
Transfer characteristics                 : BT.709
Matrix coefficients                      : BT.709
Codec configuration box                  : avcC

Other
Type                                     : meta
Duration                                 : 4 s 0 ms
Bit rate mode                            : Constant
Default                                  : No

Notice the line I have underlined and put as bold lettering.

Ray.

Hi Cube, see below as requested. Also I would like to do H264 but when in 4k the drone only has option for H265 which is why I added the intel 265 activation. I just did windows system restore this morning back to before I made any changes, however the MPEG Full Codec now shows in Install extra content but not the intel one. Also to note I only export into MP4 at 1920 x 1080. The recent export I have done is from a previosly made movie, I just re exported as test and exported movie is poor in that in stutters and looks like pixels are changing. I never had this prior to the recent codec install. Anyway below is file information you asked for.

Other thing I am thinking about is if this program is just not suitable for my PC, what about different version of Magix edit pro. I really only need to export in 1920 x 1080 but always film in 4k 60 as find is better quality to film in.

J:\Backup\Shropshire Canals\Berwick South Portal\Video\DJI_0014.MP4
Format                                   : MPEG-4
Format profile                           : Base Media
Codec ID                                 : isom (isom/iso2/mp41)
File size                                : 3.50 GiB
Duration                                 : 4 min 6 s
Overall bit rate                         : 122 Mb/s
Encoded date                             : UTC 2021-03-06 09:46:21
Tagged date                              : UTC 2021-03-06 09:46:21
Writing application                      : Lavf56.15.102

Video
ID                                       : 1
Format                                   : HEVC
Format/Info                              : High Efficiency Video Coding
Format profile                           : Main@L5.1@Main
Codec ID                                 : hvc1
Codec ID/Info                            : High Efficiency Video Coding
Duration                                 : 4 min 6 s
Bit rate                                 : 122 Mb/s
Width                                    : 3 840 pixels
Height                                   : 2 160 pixels
Display aspect ratio                     : 16:9
Frame rate mode                          : Constant
Frame rate                               : 59.940 (60000/1001) FPS
Original frame rate                      : 59.000 FPS
Color space                              : YUV
Chroma subsampling                       : 4:2:0
Bit depth                                : 8 bits
Bits/(Pixel*Frame)                       : 0.245
Stream size                              : 3.50 GiB (100%)
Encoded date                             : UTC 2021-03-06 09:46:21
Tagged date                              : UTC 2021-03-06 09:46:21
Codec configuration box                  : hvcC

Hi Steve.

The H265 codec you have from Magix is the encode codec. The Microsoft one is for playback on the system. If you can see a picture thumbnail in your folders of the files then it is already installed. If not you can get it from the Microsoft online store. It is cheaper than the encoding codec. There was a way to get it free legally but I'm not sure that still exists. Maybe someone else can check.

I don't have the drone hence my request for the file info. The good news is the file is 8 bit not 10 bit which would not tax a reasonable new system. The quality I'm guessing is coming from the high bit rate of 122Mb/s. This is somewhat higher than MEPs standard export setting for such a file. What I do in these instances is to select the 4K export option in the 'Export File As' section and then select the HD export size of 1920 x 1080. That gives me more MB/s on export. Then in 'Advanced', I select 'Best' and keep the GOP structure the same or half the number of frames per second for export. Check the audio is set to the highest quality possible and export to MP4.

The exported file will be larger in size than the sum of its parts but I find it necessary to maintain quality in the shadow areas and to help reduce banding and blockiness in large areas or colour such as the sky and allows for smoother graduations of colour.

The size of the file should not in itself produce stutters of any kind in the final file as long as you keep the project frame rate and resolution the same as the files in use. It may however cause your machine to struggle playing the file back. One way to check if this is the case would be to upload the file to YouTube and then play it back once rendered via your web browser. Try playback initially at a lower resolution from YouTube to see if it plays smoothly. If it does then the file itself is fine and it is your machine struggling to play it back in real time on your PC.

If it still stutters when viewed on YouTube then come back with a link so we can see and confirm and take it from there.

Ray.

Hello Cube-So have tried a few and all not good, however best one is the First version which was prior to new Codec which is number 3 on list. I have uploaded to you tube and these are links to them. If you watch after tunnel where goes to alot of trees you can see all a bit fuzzy and changing, however let me know what else we can do.

1. Link to Cube recommended you tube-

2. Link to Version 2 with Geforce on high efficiency-

3. Link to First Version when prior to new codec-

4. Using Arrow top right corner and selecting high quality 2-

Hi Steve.

I actually prefer number four in your list overall but three is a close second.

A couple of questions.

How many separate recordings were used or was it one continuous flight?

If more than one recording can you look at the clips with MediaInfo to check the settings? Are they the same bit rates, frame rates, and resolution?

Did you use the speed changer in MEP? Did you zoom any portions of the video? Cropping in will lose resolution. Speeding up a clip or slowing it down can degrade the image quality a bit but not that much.

I can see what you mean though, even the water from the overhead shots is sometimes losing detail. Blurred areas are very blocky. Times when this happens varies between versions.

Some of the problems arise because when the camera pans as it has nothing to lock on to to focus, so will slightly blur and be slightly out of focus until the pan subsides and the pan re-locks. Tree branches at varying distances in the center may also cause focus shift or a slightly out of focus look but if the original looks fine then it is fine.

Can you do screen shots of each selection of your export settings for the whole video? Also your project settings please. I will try at my end to do the same for comparison.

Ray.

Hi Steve.

These are the settings I would start out with.

First the project settings match the majority of the video clips in use.

Then for the export.

That normally gets me close to the quality of my videos or 100 Mb/s that are recorded slightly below your quality settings of 120Mb/s.

Ray.

They are quite a few separate recordings, however all filmed within 2 hr period and all same settings. Below is an original clip before imported into MEP and all looks fine.

Original Clip-

- As for speed changer I use speed ramps a lot as maybe you noticed. I did also find problems when I set a clip to play in reverse but decided to change as was not working properly.

- No zooms were done, No cropping either. However I have done things like that in past and was no issue, it literally seems to have started this week since codec change or maybe just a coincidence.