After having left the computer hardware topic apart for a long time, lately - thanks to the brand new used PC - I found that there is still some interest in me about this... so, I want to share some of my thoughts, mainly focused on using the PC to restore movies - of course, this could also apply to other uses like surf the web, watch movies, make simple audio editing etc. but not playing games; that is another world I don't want to put my nose in... 

CPU
In 2017 still many software don't make use of multicore CPUs and, the ones which do that, usually stops at two or four cores; so, IMHO, better to stay with the fastest (in GHz) CPUs - for example, a 4.0GHz as the old Intel i7 4790K or newer i7 7700K at 4.2GHz, even if "only" four cores, are almost always faster than 3.5GHz exa/octa/deca cores; plus, the K versions are overclockable, and a 4.8/5GHz with liquid cooling for daily usage is not that unusual.
I still prefer CPUs without integrated graphics, though. The new Ryzen 1800X seems very interesting, as the Intel X series.

Motherboard
Mine is TUF, and that's great; I expect it to last for a long time; also, with dust covers and forced air circulation over it, it's my preferred version. I'd go with similar features, with the most possible ports and max RAM, according to the chosen CPU.

SSD
Solid state drives still cost 8/10 times the old mechanical drives for the same size; for "mere mortals" like us, I think that 2TB SSDs at around 1000 bucks are not the best option; waiting for their prices to be similar, or better lower than actual HDDs, for the moment the best solution would be a small SSD (120/240GB) for the OS, and one or more big HDDs (1TB and more) for data. Also, they are prone to lose data when not used for a long time - someone wrote that, if put in a fridge, they will retain data for a looong time!

HDD
Still my preferred cost-for-gigabyte storage system, great to retain data for a long time - at a normal room temperature... the speed is way higher than even the most simple encoding task, so no need for SSD speed. Also, I should add that it's possible to get nearly SSD speed (sequential read/write) using multiple HDDs in RAID0; risky, but could be possible to get 10x size and similar speed at the same cost of a single SSD - or same size at 1/10th of the price... perfect for temporary files, I think I would give it a try using three old 250GB HDDs!

Video card
I'm no expert here, but again it seems no many softwares (apart games, of course) would benefit from an high end video card... for "normal" usage, a cheap new one - or an used, older generation but higher quality - that is capable of 4K would do.

Audio card
It seems that this hardware is not that important nowadays; but I think it is for us, in particular for capture, where many integrated audio chips, albeit quite good, do not have digital inputs - needed for laserdisc audio, and not only - and the ADC sometimes is not that good... still better to go with a good quality internal card - I do not like external ones, but maybe it's just a problem of mine - preferably with digital, and RCA analog inputs and outputs.

Video capture card
Old state of the art capture cards, that used to cost several hundred, if not thousand, bucks, now could be found for a tiny fraction of their original price, so I can't see any reason to not buy one; even if you have your faithful DVD recorder, remember that capture lossless and encoding later is always better than capture lossy, even without further conversions...

Monitor
Still don't get it the fact I should pay thousand bucks for a relatively small monitor - albeit capable of high fps and perfect color space representation - when I could get a bigger HDTV with the same color quality, at a lower price; at the end, films are still at 24fps (rounded) and almost none at 48fps... so, I should not need a 144fps monitor.

Fianl speed/price ratio considerations
Take in account I'm still using avisynth for all my projects - even if I must admit I'm open to try new software, now that I have a powerful computer; but this considerations should apply also to other softwares.

The PC I'm using now got a fairly good CPU, a non-overclockable Intel i7 4770 at 3.4GHz/3.9GHz turbo. Not bad. The best compatible CPU with my mobo is the i7 4790K that is 4.0GHz stock, 4.4GHz turbo, and could go up to 4.8GHz and more with overclock. That is a minimum of 11% speed increase, up to more than 20%. That's for about 300 quids, but I would probably get back around 200 selling my actual CPU.

An i7 7700K stays at 4.2GHz/4.5GHz (overclockable at around 5GHz); price is almost the same of the 4790K, but I should also buy a new mobo, so add another 150/200 quids - still, could try to sell mine for half that price. Speed increase would likely be around 25%.

Is that really needed? Spend 300/500 to get a "simple" 25% speed increase, while I could spend around 600 to get a 100% and more? How? Simple, get a second PC with similar features! It's not a crazy idea, after all... I know I can run multiple instances on my actual multicore/multithreading computer - I'm doing it right now - but there is always a limit; having a second PC would double that limit...

Buy an used computer, that has a CPU with six, eight, ten cores, at lower clock, at double the price (if not more) than one similar to mine, because its fancy video card and top-of-the-line SSDs would be not a smart move now.
Buy an used computer with a 4770K/4790K/6700K/7700K, a simple video card, no SSD, would be a better move IMHO.

Just hypothetical at the moment for me, but could be an idea to follow.

I'm fondling the idea of color regrading The Terminator Blu-Ray to theatrical look in the future but I have no idea if there is any kind of 35mm reference around. I have the DVD release, video capture from the Italian laserdisc (thanks to SpoRv), early TV recordings but no idea if the color of any of these are anywhere near its theatrical incarnation.
I remember a color regrade by kk650 from some years ago (and I probably still have it) but I'm not sure if it was based on any kind of visual reference.

Any 35mm frames going around? Are lobby cards a valid source? I think I have a couple of them from 1984.

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2020 UPDATE. This is a 2 years old and very long thread on the topic, so here's a very short summary of what came out of it.
Very short summary of a long thread: it appears that the Blu-Ray of The Terminator features what is possibly the most faithful representation of theatrical colors that could have been seen in cinemas in 1984.

Hey guys.

Though I'm a relatively new user here and I don't know most of the users here, I want to ask if here are some of you who are living in Europe and have the possibility to scan 35mm film material?

I obtained a 35mm trailer from the "Lord of the Rings" trilogy, and I would greatly make it accessible to our community. And because I have no possibility myself to make a digital scan of this material, I would like to send it to someone here who can be trusted.

[Image: jsjgrnc5.png]

I've been trying to preserve some LD tracks with a basic set-up: Pioneer CLD-V850, hooked up to a Toshiba DVD Recorder. Unfortunately, not a bit-perfect workflow, but better than nothing. 

Unfortunately, after transferring only three tracks (two of which turned out to be worse than the Blu-Rays), it seems as if I cannot do any more because all subsequent transfers are plagued by a mysterious buzzing noise.

Moshrom's been trying to help me troubleshoot, but so far we haven't been successful. Under his advice, I tried moving the player and recorder in case it was electrical interference from that particular outlet. Unfortunately, I've moved it twice with no luck.

Is it possible that my player is just finally giving up on me?   

Anyone have any advice?  

EDIT: For context, here is a sample of said buzzing noise: https://mega.nz/#!e0UESL6Q!Xtx4yycCi2Lxt...cgLshsK6ow

With the new PC I discovered that I can speed up a lot of tests, so I tried to put my hands again on The Matrix to see if I can solve the problems of the first version.

To whom it may not know it, long story short: the movie in BD has a modified color grading, while the DVD has the same (or, at least, closer) of the theatrical print. In my first attempt, despite the fact I was able to get many shots very close, if not identical, regraded, in many I get artefacts - sometimes just a frame for one shot, but it rendered the whole project a pain in the... neck, and I was forced to use upscaled DVD parts to replace them... not bad solution if it would be for a couple of shots, but it happened in a lot - too much - of them.

Now, I discovered that the main problem doesn't lie in the software, but in the BD, which has a lot of white clipping; in these parts, the color matching software simply says "Hey, what I'm supposed to regrade here? It's just a white (green/blue/red, choose your color) spot, so I'm going crazy!" and replace these with various random artefacts...

So, the solution is to use the BD contrast somehow, to limit the artefacts to the minimum; it works pretty well, even if sometimes the colors are not so close to the DVD as in the previous version, BUT... I also discovered that the DVD has very flat palette, so for example faces have a lot less tones in the DVD than the BD; so now, even if faces are not of the same exact colors of the DVD, they have more details, thanks to more skin color shades.

I picked up an "anthology" of some shots previously ridden with artefacts - they were all located in the bright parts of the image, like lights, fires, explosions etc. - now they are almost all gone, apart few... want to take a look at the new version? LINK - test clip 5min, 5mbps, 229MB size, English and Italian audio (would expire around mid May 2017) - remember: it's a "patchwork" of short shots, you are warned!

At the end: do we need a revised edition?

Sometime may have not noted, but when I see the following things, I fix them every time; so, if you can follow these guidelines, my work - and the ones of the other mods - will be easier, thanks!

IMAGES

To insert an image, just copy the URL, but DO NOT FORGET to add the s after the http - basically, if you want your image to be showed, you must write your URL as https://yoururl.com - if you forget to use the https, or simply your image hoster can't use it, your image will appear just as a simple link.
Hint: http://postimage.io offers free image hosting since several years, it works well!

MEDIAINFO (and other monospaced fonts data)

If you post mediainfo data, and other formatted text that reads better when using a monospaced fonts, please use the CODE tag; it will be more readable, and avoid to have looong posts!

EMOTICONS

If you want to add emoticons to your text, typing directly them, please do not forget to put a space BEFORE them, to be recognized by the forum software; this is done to avoid confusion, and to let the poster to write something like this

...the movie (released in 1978)...

without having this

...the movie (released in 197...

got the point? want to have some space between the emoticon and your text? Just type two spaces before it and one after... when finally we will have a new set of emoticons, I'll plan to solve this, and add some space to the sides, to avoid double space before (single space would still be used, though) and one after.


Last thing: "preview" is your friend; use it, at least sometimes!

Thanks!

I wanted to pick some brains here. Anyone get banding from avisynth?

I ask because I'm getting some banding in some of my upscale work. I'm wondering what is causing it. Some of the DVD's have it built in already. Problems of the 8-bit world but upscaling seems to make it worse. Could that be a function of working in the 8-bit area or some color space conversions?

I've tried some of the avi plugin de-banding solutions and they all look sub par and destroy picture details.

Is it worth capturing the audio with CX enabled for preservation? My player DVL-909 doesn't support CX (from what I could read on internet), but I have LD-4300V that supports it. I was wondering if it's worth capturing the CX analog audio as well, what's your opinion?

I don't know of any 3D Blu-ray that includes the final trailer for Disney's Frozen, and the only high-quality version I could find has the text in Russian. There is an English-language version, but it appears to be a camrip. Therefore, after much futile searching at various different times, I decided an English-language restoration was in order. But to do that, I'm going to need assets I don't have. I do know, however, that I have the 3D Blu-ray from the UK, so I can source clips from the actual film from there; I think the aforementioned Russian trailer also has some usable clips. But anything with text in it, I'm going to need from somewhere else. In fact, some 3D conversion skills may be in order, if anyone has them. And no, no cheating via automatic stereo conversion software, I know fake 3D when I see it (*coughClashoftheTitanscough*).

Name's Koopa. Koopa Luath. For those of you who don't speak Irish, that's Koopa the Quick. As you can see from the title of this thread alone (I greeted you in a mixture of Japanese and Italian), I'm fairly good with languages apart from my native language, that being English. I graduated from college some years ago with a degree in video editing. For years I've been honing my trade at home. I'd mainly restored old logos to old films and television programs, but at one point I used my 3D Blu-ray of The Wolverine and the Extended Edition that came with it to make a 3D Extended Edition with certain scenes and shots in 2D. Though it didn't come out perfect, at the time I was satisfied enough. I've also done some work on PAL speedup reversal on some stuff, including the old Walt Disney Home Video international logo (which is base don the old Disney anthology intro from the early '80s). As for movie-going tastes, I enjoy 3D and IMAX movies. My favorite TV network is PBS. I collect old VHS cassettes and also DVDs and Blu-rays (mainly Blu-rays and VHS cassettes nowadays), so I have plenty of the films whose fan restorations interest me the most (including The Dark Knight IMAX regrade). I was also hoping to contribute some of my own materials, and also work on a few projects of my own.

In any case, I hope to have a great time here!