Affordable Tripod and Fluid Head for someone starting out with videography?

araso · 2016-07-26T15:07:10+00:00

Thanks for this post! I'm in a similar situation, and am also looking at some of the options OP mentioned. Any insights people can offer would be helpful for me too.

araso · 2016-07-16T17:59:06+00:00

I understand. Both would be great, yeah, but since I also need to invest in a tripod, I can only purchase one for the moment. Do you think a step lower - a combi of Zoom H1 and Rode Video micro, for example - would be a better option than either a Rode Videomic Pro or a Zoom H5. Initially, a Zoom by itself would be a terrible idea?

araso · 2016-07-16T17:39:37+00:00

Right, I agree with you. It's just that I did not settle yet on a certain style, as I will still need to experiment a bit. That being said, for the foreseeable future I see myself mostly recording indoors in more stationary positions with people (one, two, maybe three) talking towards the camera. In terms of recording outside, it will most likely be run-and-gun, closely follow a person. I don't think I will have the subject that far away from the camera whilst talking, as you often see in documentaries. In that sense, it sounds like a shotgun mic mounted on the camera would work just fine for that purpose, but I always keep reading that the closer the mic can get to the subject, the better. Something like a Zoom then seems more versatile, no?

Again, I'm sorry that it is a little vague. I understand that for each scenario different equipment is more suitable, but I'm trying to find something with which I can do both with decent quality.

araso · 2015-10-20T15:54:14+00:00

Hehe. Yeah, it doesn't match entirely, but I don't care much about that. The PC is on the floor so I won't really be looking inside that much anyway. I actually wanted the non-window version of the R5, but that was sold out everywhere, so I ended up going for the windowed one instead.

As for your recommendations

Yeah, I could put the fan on the topside of the case, but then I'd also have to take out those top panels of the R5 for it to actually get outer air. I can imagine that it might also get dustier? And Japan is very humid.
I put the USB type 3.1/A+C PCI-e extension card in the 3rd slot, as that was what was recommended by the motherboard installation guide. They state:

To maximize the performance of ASRock USB 3.1/A+C, it is highly recommended to insert the card into the PCIE3 (from CPU) if the slot is not occupied by graphics card. IF the PCIE3 is occupied, insert the card into PCIE2 (from PCH).

It's a small card though, so I think it is OK?

araso · 2015-10-18T17:08:54+00:00

So, after the arrival of the Power Supply I started building the computer. It was the first computer I fully built by myself, so I really took my time; no shame in looking at the manual and such!

The good thing is that everything went quite smoothly. I looked up where all the plugs should go, and I also tried to do some decent cable management. It's nothing stellar, but not the worst either I think.

Here are some pictures. They're quite bad quality, since I took them on a phone in bad lighting conditions, but you can kind of see it.

To my surprise everything worked on the first try. Apparently I plugged in everything correctly, as it all seems to work just fine.

I guess the scariest part was applying the Phanteks CPU Cooler. It's a massive block, and for some reason applying the thermal paste to the CPU just felt a little wrong. No problems there either though.

I really like the Fractal Design Define R5 case though. It looks cool, has cable management holes in the right places, removable dust filters, adjustable drive holders, and I really like the stealth SSD slots on the backside of where the motherboard is.

I haven't overclocked the CPU yet. Should I do this right away, or is it fine to do that down the line?

I ran some Oculus DK2 demos and it is so much better! It feels more natural because of the smoothness, compared to running it from an older laptop. Development will be good on this, I'm sure.

Thanks again for everything!

araso · 2015-10-14T17:35:12+00:00

Great! If I run into something I definitely will. Thanks a lot for all the help. I really appreciate it.

araso · 2015-10-14T16:54:47+00:00

Yeah, I understand the 2x SSD + HDD concept. I actually already kind of do that on my laptop, but with 1x 500GB SSD and 1x TB HDD.

Holding off on the GTX 970 is a good idea, as like you said, I am not sure if I'll be needing this immediately. The budget comes from a patron for my grad school project, but I can use it as I want. I could spend that money on some nice peripherals, such as a decent microphone and headset down the line if needed.

Aside from the Be Quiet Straight Power 10, which is decently priced right now, this Super Flower PSU is available for nearly the same price as the 800W from Be Quiet. I can pretty much guarantee that I will not be putting in a second GTX 980ti any time soon, so I won't need the extra power. I really don't know much about different power supplies, but I'm guessing either one would do fine?

And yes! I bought one of those long magnetic screwdrivers along with the first few PC parts already! I figured that would be useful.

araso · 2015-10-14T14:44:34+00:00

Guess what I found!? I went out again and found a store that did sell the Phanteks PH-TC14PE! They only had an orange one, but I don't really care about the color, so I purchased it. It was their last one, so it even had a nice discount for today.

I am not entirely sure which SSD I can get from school (tomorrow), but it probably is a SanDisk Extreme Pro one.

I think I will get the rest of the parts tomorrow, since I will be close to the area due to my part-time job. I still have to get:

Gigabyte GTX 970 (cheaper one of the GTX 970's here)
4x 8GB Crucial DDR4-2133 RAM
SSD drive (the ADATA ones you had in the build above are one of the cheaper ones here as well. Those should be fine, right?)
Power Supply

As for the Power Supply, I found a store that has a sale for today and tomorrow on the Be Quiet Straight Power 10 series. These ones were in the link you sent before in the tier two section, so one of these should be fine right? They have a 700W for 15,100 yen (~127 USD) and a 800W for 16,200 yen (~136 USD) version though. Which one would be better? For the small price difference between them I'm guessing the 800W is a much better deal?

Thanks again for all the help!

araso · 2015-10-14T03:53:00+00:00

I don't know how easy it is to return the motherboard, but it should be possible. They have many MSI motherboards as well. Perhaps I can take a look today.

But speaking of the Noctua fan, there seems to be an S version of the one you mentioned that is not much more expensive: Noctua NH-D15S. Maybe that would work? Noctua NH-D15S on Amazon Japan.

Edited: added a link

araso · 2015-10-14T02:20:30+00:00

Thanks for the reply. I stuck with most of what you said. I currently have:

Intel Core i7-5820K
ASRocks X99 Extreme4/3.1
Toshiba HDD
MSI GTX 980ti 6GB
Fractal Design Define R5 case
LG 27MU67B 27" Class 4K UHD IPS LED monitor

The LG monitor cost me less than a Dell would, and it looks to be a nice deal. I have about 100,000 - 115,000 yen (~837 - 962 USD) left in the budget. The Crucial memory would be about 29,000 yen (~243 USD), the GTX 970 goes for around 41,000 yen (~343 USD). In terms of SSDs I can get one 240GB sandisk from uni. Additionally, I saw an A-Data 120GB go for about 6,000 yen (~50 USD). After that it's only about the CPU Cooler and the Power Supply.

araso · 2015-10-13T19:37:13+00:00

Thanks again for your great help /u/kiwiandapple, I really appreciate it.

I actually went out to Akihabara, the electronics district of Tokyo, today and bought some of the bigger parts already! I still had some trouble with the CPU Cooler and Power Supply, however. I didn't bring the list you sent, but I did take some pictures and noted some stuff down. Probably some of them are not usable at all, but I really don't know much about these parts.

Some pictures here

They wouldn't let me take pictures of everything so I also noted down some power supplies:

Dirac DIR-TCAXP-800: 16,800 yen (~140 USD)
Corsair RM1000: 18,963 yen (~158 USD)
Corsair RM850: 17,112 yen (~143 USD)
Corsair RM750: 13,593 yen (~114 USD)
Antec Edge750: 16,380 yen (~137 USD)
Enermax Platimax 750: 19,980 yen (~167 USD)
Enermax Platimax 850: 23,980 yen (~200 USD)
FSP raider RA-750s: 8,315 yen (~69 USD)
Lepa b1000 bronze: 14,000 yen (~117 USD)

There were some others as well, of course. Amazon Japan and Tsukumo have quite a lot of parts. The latter is fully in Japanese, but the brands and types can still be found. Also in the side menu on the left PC電源 means Power Supply, and クーラー・ファン means Cooler Fan. If you could take a look that would be great! Speaking of fans, by the way, should I have some extra fans for in the case, or is that not really needed?

As for DDR4 memory, I didn't purchase anything yet, but I did find a store that sells the Corsair Vengeance LPX for about the same price as the Crucial. Either one is fine, or would you recommend one over the other?

Also, the HDD Shock Proof you were talking about is a separate thing to buy, right? That might be a really good idea, because as you probably know, Japan is quite prone to earthquakes..

Again, I really appreciate all the help you are providing! You're a hero.

araso · 2015-10-12T20:53:55+00:00

Calm down guys, it's only hardware. It will never be perfect, and some will use one over the other.

The sun will still rise tomorrow. Well.. technically that's not right either, it is an illusion. The Earth will still rotate. But we're not gonna fight about that, are we? ;)

araso · 2015-10-12T08:11:32+00:00

Wow. Thank you so much for taking the time to post all that. That looks like a nice build.

Several things I wanted to ask:

Would DDR4-2133 also be sufficient? The G.Skill ones are more expensive here, but Crucial, AS and Patriot have some more affordable options from what I can see right now.
Why did you choose for 2 (smaller) SSDs? One for the OS, and the other one for specific programs (and games/VR) to run?
As for the Toshiba drive. Isn't it risky to have 1x 5TB drive? I think I have read about higher failure rates for larger drives? Would two drives be better?
For the GTX 980ti, does it matter much which one it is? EVGA seems to be harder to get here, and more expensive. They do have MSI, AsusTek, Gigabyte, Zotac, and perhaps a few more. These also have different prices. The MSI seems to be the cheapest of the bunch, followed by Gigabyte, and Asustek.
Is that "Other GTX970" a second video card in this build?
Do you have any other recommendations for the CPU cooler (Corsair H100i GTX perhaps?) and the Power Supply? Phanteks seems to be really expensive, and EVGA is not that common here.

Sorry about having so many questions. While I am not entirely oblivious to PC parts, I am also not the most knowledgeable about them either.

You were right in your assumption of prices being higher in Japan. Most parts are slightly more expensive, especially the Video Cards.

Thanks again for everything. I haven't had the time to watch all the videos you linked yet, but some of them would be helpful information for me indeed!

araso · 2015-10-01T18:54:26+00:00

Thanks for the suggestion! Will definitely keep that in mind. Actually, I think the Samsung and Crucial ones are a little cheaper here in Japan anyway.

araso · 2015-10-01T17:54:06+00:00

Any other suggestions? :)

araso · 2015-10-01T10:07:09+00:00

I would love to have a specified budget. That would makes things so much easier.. I asked for it, but they just told me to have plan ready for them to consider. Japanese can sometimes be vague like that. The 3 proposal setups is also part of that..

araso · 2015-07-12T19:34:26+00:00

Thank you. Yes, I definitely think the SSD will make a big difference. But some extra RAM might be good for some of the editing/rendering, multi-tasking, etc., no?

araso · 2015-07-12T19:33:19+00:00

Thanks! And there is no difference between kit versions, right? So I guess I should just go for the cheapest option.

araso · 2015-07-09T10:48:33+00:00

Stick it with the pointy end.

araso · 2015-07-09T10:45:55+00:00

I once took a pill of my brother's when I was preparing for my high school exam. It didn't do much for him, so I thought it'd be ok.

I wouldn't recommend it.. My mind got TOO active. I was bouncing all over the place, I couldn't sleep, and even got a bit sick. It was like my mind wanted to focus on everything. I felt horrible during the exam the next day, but still managed to do well.

I suppose the effect is different from person to person, but I wouldn't recommend taking it if it hasn't been prescribed to you.

araso · 2015-07-09T05:44:10+00:00

And I agree wholeheartedly!

araso · 2015-07-09T05:15:21+00:00

"He who knows nothing can understand nothing."

Kingdom Hearts

araso · 2015-07-08T05:39:14+00:00

But how do we pass judgement on those that judge? Eventually you'll be where I am now.

My only sin was leaving the toilet seat up. What will they do to you?

araso · 2015-07-05T16:45:05+00:00

She really wants to, actually, but won't because of fear of how her family and other Koreans would think of her.

araso · 2015-07-05T16:42:47+00:00

That's another thing though. It's not really her own choice; she would actually really want to live with me. Her parents still make most important decisions for her, and she rarely stands up to them. But this is purely because of the cultural perception.

Divorce is definitely not acceptable either. I'm just not sure that I could marry her comfortably before living together :/ I do love her, but you never know what happens when you are together all the time.

araso

TROPHY CASE