iMac Core i7 test drive: Quicktime X screen recording

Received the iMac yesterday (20th). Spent all day installing all the new software I bought to go with it along with moving over files from the older MacBook (13.3" Core Duo -- first intel Mac laptop -- still running Tiger.) Installing FCP studio and logic studio is time consuming.

Aside: my old Front Row remote for the MacBook works with the new iMac (cool!)

Quicktime X -- new with Snow Leopard... will record from iSight AND will record the screen -- with sound.

The original screen recording is the full 2560x1440 resolution of the iMac and the frame rate turned out to be an average of about 15fps. I resized to 1280x720 and in order to coerce youTube to convert to HD I upped the fps to 24 and added a separate soundtrack.

Anyway -- I've been taking the iMac out for a test drive today... Running a bunch of heavy duty apps, plus EyeTV with a 1080i game on with de-interlace set to always (it seems to burn the most cpu). I had to render a RAM Preview in Motion, and you'll see that -- but the rendering and the playing while the tv was on and the screen recorder running -- the results are pretty awesome.

Although you'll see fairly heavy use of all 8 cores (4 actual x 4 "virtual" hyper-threaded), they aren't "slammed".

... and the magic mouse is so-o-o-o-o-o-o sweet!

Category:

Film & Animation

Tags:

• iMac (2009) Core i7
• Quicktime X

[fxmah]

Yes it does. The frame rate was 15 fps, max, and watching the Quicktime Info window while the movie was playing back revealed the fps was actually variable (down to 12 or so at times.) Final Cut wouldn't open the original recording with an error of something like: Final Cut does not recognize this format. So, I used Quicktime 7 Pro to downsample the 2560x1440 video to 1280x720 and upconvert the frame rate to a 24fps. I can't say it's a great way to make a screen recording... but it *is* free.

[BMOCroc]

doesnt Quicktime X record at like some weird FPS?? i did a test of it and it seemed a bit choppy when playing back fast motion...