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Review: Lenovo’s P360 Ultra Workstation

June 12, 2023

By Brady Betzel

In a world where pros are embracing ultrasmall and ultraportable workstations, Lenovo has met that need with the P360 Ultra — at under 10 pounds, it’s a RAID-0/1-capable, Nvidia-backed workstation with high-level performance.

Much like the Apple with the Mac Studio or HP with the Z2 Mini G9, Lenovo has seen the need for a small form-factor workstation with the power of a full-size tower. The Lenovo P360 Ultra has modern exterior styling and is small enough to travel with you between home and the office, but it’s packed with power close to that of a full-size desktop workstation.

Here are the specs and costs of the Lenovo P360 Ultra I received for review:

Base system: $1,969
Processor: 12th Gen Intel Core i9-12900 vPro (E-cores up to 3.8GHz, P-cores up to 5GHz) (+$859)
Memory: 32GB DDR5-4000MHz (+$230)
GPU: Nvidia RTX A5000 mobile 16GB GDDR6 (+$4,349)
2 SSD: 1TB SSD M.2 2280 PCIe Gen4 (+$70)
Ethernet: Intel i350-T2 Dual Port (+$89)
Wi-Fi Adapter: Intel Wi-Fi 6E AX211 2×2 AC vPro (+$25)
Power Adapter: 300W (+$59)
Warranty: 3-year parts and labor. Repairs are done at your location.
Total price: $7,650 with about 90-day lead time for delivery.

Putting It to Use
So how is the P360 Ultra in a modern editing or color correction environment? It holds its own. On the surface, I was able to edit and color-correct 4K, 6K and 8K footage coming from multiple codecs in Adobe Premiere Pro 23.2 and Blackmagic DaVinci Resolve 18.1.4.

Was the P360 Ultra always able to play in real time? No, but it did hold its own and was in the realm of acceptable. However, if you use proxies in either app, you will be working fluidly. The Lenovo P360 Ultra is a great assistant editor or assistant colorist workstation that takes up minimal real estate, is somewhat portable, can connect to up to eight monitors and would line up well with the Lenovo P620 Gen 2.

Lenovo (and other companies, for that matter) are able to fit so much power and performance in such a small form factor by using laptop-style components, such as the Nvidia RTX A5000 mobile GPU and SODIMM memory. This doesn’t mean they are “bad,” per se, but they are thermally throttled, so when it gets too hot in the chassis, the speed and power decrease. Heat is the enemy of power and speed, and with such a compact form factor, Lenovo is leveraging the best of both worlds.

Intel’s E- and P-cores are another advancement that helps fit so much power into a small form factor. E-cores, aka efficiency cores, focus on background tasks that run constantly but with low energy usage. P-cores, aka performance cores, focus on heavier tasks, like multimedia rendering in apps like Resolve.

Testing
Up first are the tests I run in typical Windows-based nonlinear editing applications: Premiere Pro 23.2 and DaVinci Resolve 18.1.4. Using the same clips I always use for my reviews, I apply a basic color correction in a 3840×2160 timeline. The clips include:

ARRI RAW: 3840×2160 24fps – 7 seconds, 12 frames
ARRI RAW: 4448×1856 24fps – 7 seconds, 12 frames
BMD RAW: 6144×3456 24fps – 15 seconds
Red RAW: 6144×3072 23.976fps – 7 seconds, 12 frames
Red RAW: 6144×3160 23.976fps – 7 seconds, 12 frames
Sony a7siii: 3840×2160 23.976fps – 15 seconds

\I then add Blackmagic’s noise reduction, sharpening and grain. Finally, I replace the built-in noise reduction with Neat Video’s noise reduction to really ride the system hard. From there I export multiple versions: DNxHR 444 10-bit OP1a MXF, a DNxHR 444 10-bit Mov, H.264 MP4, H.265 MP4, and an IMF package using the default settings.

Resolve 18 Exports	DNxHR 444 10-bit .mxf	DNxHR 444 10-bit .mov	H.264 .mp4	H.265 .mp4	IMF
Color Correction Only	00:54	01:04	00:42	00:41	01:41
CC + Resolve Noise Reduction	01:47	01:48	01:44	01:43	02:00
CC, Resolve NR, Sharpening, Grain	02:01	02:02	01:57	01:57	02:14
CC + Neat Video Noise Reduction	04:32	04:36	04:25	04:23	04:43

In comparison to the Lenovo P620 Gen 2, straight exports with only color-correcting take about double the amount of export time with the P360 Ultra. Adding in Resolve-based noise reduction and then sharpening and grain is surprisingly faster, for the most part. Finally, adding Neat Video noise reduction is about one minute slower.

I ran a similar test inside of Premiere 23.2, except for Neat Video noise reduction. In this version of Premiere Pro and Media Encoder, I was able to get much more accurate export times than I have in the past, so these numbers are reliable:

Adobe Premiere Pro 2023 (Simultaneous Exports)	DNxHR 444 10-bit .mxf	DNxHR 444 10-bit .mov	H.264 .mp4	H.265 .mp4
Color Correction Only	1:58	03:42	01:37	01:37
CC + NR, Sharpening, Grain	17:48	36:04	14:03	14:03

Adobe Premiere Pro 2023 (Individual Exports)	DNxHR 444 10-bit .mxf	DNxHR 444 10-bit .mov	H.264 .mp4	H.265 .mp4
Color Correction Only	00:54	02:26	00:50	00:52
CC + NR, Sharpening, Grain	10:07	28:15	08:04	07:56

Benchmarks

Blackmagic RAW Speed Test:
- 8K CPU – 52fps
- 8K CUDA – 75fps
Blender – Gooseberry: 08:24.46
Cinebench R23:
- CPU (multi-core) – 20840pts
- CPU (single-core) – 1975pts
- MP Ratio – 10.55x
Corona 1.3 Benchmark:
- Render Time: 00:01:17
- Rays/sec: 6,258,630
Neat Video – Neat Bench:
- Best combination: GPU-only 11.2fps
OctaneBench 2020.1.5:
- Score: 386.52
PugetBench:
- PugetBench for After Effects (0.95.7 – After Effects: 23.2.1×3)
  - Overall score: 864
  - Multi-score: 144.5
  - GPU score: 62
  - RAM preview score: 87.3
  - Render score: 79
  - Tracking score: 99.4
- PugetBench for Premiere Pro (0.95.7 – Premiere Pro 23.2.0)
  - Extended overall score: 732
  - Standard overall score: 840
  - Extended export score: 73.5
  - Extended live playback score: 81
  - Standard export score: 77.1
  - Standard live playback score: 109.9
  - Effects score: 65
  - GPU score: 70.5
- PugetBench for DaVinci Resolve (0.93.1 – Resolve Studio 18.1.4)
  - Extended overall score: 1598
  - Standard overall score: 1803
  - 4K media score: 118
  - 8K media score: 98
  - GPU effects score: 93
  - Fusion score: 330
- RealBench 2.56:
  - Image editing: 119,995
    - Time: 44.4018
  - Encoding: 278,760
    - Time: 19.1132
  - OpenCL: 276,627
    - KSamples/sec: 50916
  - Heavy multitasking: 154,708
    - Time: 49.3316
  - System score: 207,522
- V-Ray:
  - V-Ray vsamples: 13539
  - V-Ray GPU CUDA vpaths: 1257
  - V-Ray GPU RTX vrays: 1657

These benchmarks all have different purposes and mean much more if you head over to their result postings. Puget Systems has a great benchmark and results page where you can compare systems like the Lenovo P360 Ultra.

For the last test, I ran media through the Blackmagic Proxy Generator:

Sony a7iii UHD (3840×2160) MP4 master files

Proxies: H.265/10-bit 1080p – 46 files
- 125fps

Red RAW – various resolutions

Proxies: H.265/10-bit 1080p – 2 files
- 17fps

These speeds are pretty good considering how compact the Lenovo P360 Ultra workstation is. For comparison, a desktop system using an Nvidia RTX 4070ti was processing the Sony files at 166fps and the Red RAW files at 28fps

Improvements?
What would I like to see improved? Once I get going in Resolve with transcoding, rendering or even just playing back effects, the fans start to hum. If you like to keep your workstation close by, you will definitely notice the fans kick into high gear. Not a deal-breaker, but it is something to be aware of.

One way to get around a bulky internal power supply is to use a laptop-style power brick. The P360 Ultra has a rather large power brick — it measures 9.3 inches by 5.6 inches by 2.1 inches and weighs about 1.3lbs. I would love to see that shrink down to a more manageable size somehow.

Summing Up
In the end, the Lenovo P360 Ultra is a compact-size powerhouse. With the Nvidia RTX A5000 mobile GPU, which supports up to eight independent displays to the 12th Gen Intel i9-12900 vPro processor, the Lenovo P360 Ultra has the power to handle most midlevel requests from a video editor or colorist. It makes a great assistant editor station that can double as a backup in case your main system goes down.

And I mention this in all my workstation reviews: The term “workstation” is not just an adjective to describe a highly powered system. Lenovo-powered workstations are military-grade-tested (MIL-STD-810H) computer systems, with each component tested against industry-leading software like Adobe’s Premiere Pro and After Effects and Avid’s Media Composer to ensure rock-solid driver compatibility.

In addition, Lenovo’s included Commercial Vantage software helps keep your workstation’s drivers and hardware up to date with the latest versions that ensure little downtime.

And you can check out my other recent Lenovo review here: Previously, I have reviewed their monster workstations, the Lenovo P620 Gen 2.

Brady Betzel is an Emmy-nominated online editor at Margarita Mix in Hollywood, working on shows like Life Below Zero and Uninterrupted: The Shop . He is also a member of the Producers Guild of America. You can email Brady at bradybetzel@gmail.com. Follow him on Twitter @allbetzroff.

Lenovo Adds Tower and Mobile Workstations for Hybrid Work

May 9, 2023

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Lenovo has introduced its latest ThinkStation and ThinkPad workstations. Users can configure systems that include the latest components, such as 13th Generation Intel Core processors and professional Nvidia RTX GPUs. They support the latest operating systems, including Windows 11 and several distributions of Linux.

An all-new tower form factor targets designers and engineers. The ThinkStation P3 Tower, with its expanded chassis, supports larger power supplies up to 1100W to handle more demanding configurations and multiple storage options up to 26TB for data-heavy applications. ThinkStation P3 Ultra offers power and performance in a space-saving chassis that is less than 4 liters in volume. The compact P3 Ultra is designed to handle demanding workflows and easily adapt to changing hybrid workspaces. ThinkStation P3 Tiny is engineered to go where other workstations can’t.

The latest ThinkPad P Series mobile workstation models are designed for hybrid work and feature high levels of power and performance, allowing users to do more from any location. ThinkPad P14s i Gen 4 and P16s i Gen 2 target mobile pros who need a mix of performance and power at an affordable price.

According to Lenovo, ThinkPad P16v i is designed to close the gap between entry-level and high-end workstations. Made for content creators who require more power to handle large workloads and multitask easily, it includes Intel Core H-Series processors, advanced graphics and the latest security features to protect data and identity.

Lenovo offers high-end mobile workstation performance in the ThinkPad P16 Gen 2 and ThinkPad P1 Gen 6 workstations, allowing users to do complex workflows such as high-definition rendering and high-end VR on the go. The P16 Gen 2’s performance approaches that of some desktop workstations, with the highest class mobile CPUs, pro Nvidia RTX GPUs and Lenovo’s highest ever memory capacity in a mobile workstation (as much as 192GB). ThinkPad P1, now in its sixth generation, focuses on producing top performance in a thin and light form factor.

Review: Lenovo P620 Gen 2 Workstation

December 13, 2022

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By Brady Betzel

If you are an enterprise-level multimedia user and are looking to purchase a workstation that is not only powerful but easily upgradeable in the future, then the Lenovo P620 Gen 2 workstation might be what you are looking for. From the 64-core, 128-thread AMD Ryzen Threadripper Pro CPU to the Nvidia A6000 GPU, the Lenovo P620 Gen 2 has many standout features that will fit into your editing, visual effects and color workflows.

First up are the main Lenovo P620 Gen 2 specs:

CPU	AMD Ryzen Threadripper Pro 5995WX 64-cores
Memory	8 x 16GB (128GB) DDR4 3200MHz RDIMM ECC
GPU	Nvidia RTX A6000 (48GB)
Storage	2TB SSD M.2 2280 PCIe Gen4 TLC Opal
Network	Marvell FastLinQ Edge 10Gbit
OS	Windows 11 Pro

Digging In
Just glancing at the CPU, memory and GPU will give you butterflies in your stomach if you haven’t already priced high-level components like these, but the power this machine possesses is truly high-level. And Lenovo doesn’t just rely on these high-level components; it takes the title of “workstation” seriously.

When we talk about enterprise-level computers, they are referred to as workstations, and to earn that workstation title, the manufacturer will run its systems through multiple tests. For laptops, that usually includes crazy things like putting them through a sandstorm. For desktops, that means running them at full force for days on end to see how long it takes to break them.

In addition, Lenovo certifies its hardware through Independent Software Vendor (ISV) collaboration testing. For those of us in the media and entertainment industry, that means matching the hardware against software applications from companies such as Adobe, Avid, Blackmagic and more. You can search for yourself here. Lenovo’s organization of this information is a little odd, but you can find the ISV-certified GPU drivers and whether or not a certain model is certified. Over the years I have wished that companies would improve ISV search, but they haven’t yet. Maybe giving them a call will yield easier-to-decipher ISV results. I would love to see benchmarks and other live data that could help inform decision-making, especially when looking at purchasing workstations over $15,000. But I guess that’s what I’m here for!

Benchmarks
The 64-core/128-thread AMD Ryzen Threadripper Pro is a monster of a processor. And when combined with an eye-popping 128GB of RAM and the Nvidia RTX A6000 GPU with 48GB of RAM, it’s fair to say that the Lenovo P620 Gen 2 should chew through almost any multimedia project you can throw at it. I ran a bunch of the usual benchmarks, and here are some of the results:

PugetBench Premiere Pro: Overall Score 1413
PugetBench DaVinci Resolve: Extended Overall Score 1763, Standard Overall Score 1920

PugetBench After Effects: Overall Score 1208

Blender Benchmark CPU – Monster: 558.374238 – Junk Shop: 344.847187 – Classroom: 259.954453

GPU – Monster: 2636.877761 – Junk Shop: 1483.947413 – Classroom: 1284.764265

Blender BMW Render: CPU – 00:32.55 / GPU: 00:34.08

Blender Pavilion Barcelona Render

Blender Barcelona Pavilion Render — CPU: 01:28.88/GPU: 01:29.70

Blender Gooseberry Render (CPU) — 02:24.54

Cinebench R23 – CPU (multicore) — 65836 pts/CPU (single-core): 1461 pts / MP Ratio 45.07

OctaneBench 2020.1.5 – Total Score: 629.64

Cinebench V-Ray GPU CUDA: 1945 vpaths

Cinebench V-Ray GPU RTX: 2549 vrays

NeatBench Best Combination: CPU only (31 cores): 50.8fps

To really put the Lenovo P620 Gen 2 workstation through its multimedia paces, inside of Blackmagic’s DaVinci Resolve 18, I took clips from different cameras and did a basic color correction in a 3840×2160 timeline. The clips include:

ARRIRAW: 3840×2160 24fps – 7 seconds, 12 frames
ARRIRAW: 4448×1856 24fps – 7 seconds, 12 frames
BMD RAW: 6144×3456 24fps – 15 seconds
Red RAW: 6144×3072 23.976fps – 7 seconds, 12 frames
Red RAW: 6144×3160 23.976fps – 7 seconds, 12 frames
Sony a7siii: 3840×2160 23.976fps – 15 seconds

I then added Blackmagic’s Noise Reduction, then added sharpening and grain, and then finally replaced the noise reduction with Neat Video’s noise reduction. From there I exported multiple versions: DNxHR 444 10-bit OP1a .mxf file, DNxHR 444 10-bit .mov, H.264 MP4, H.265 MP4, and then an IMF package using the default settings.

Resolve 18 Exports	DNxHR 444 10-bit .mxf	DNxHR 444 10-bit .mov	H.264 .MP4	H.265 .MP4	IMF
Color Correction Only	00:26	00:26	00:23	00:25	00:31
CC + Resolve Noise Reduction	01:57	01:58	01:49	01:49	01:57
CC, Resolve NR, Sharpening, Grain	02:26	02:26	02:18	02:18	02:26
CC + Neat Video Noise Reduction	03:40	03:32	03:47	03:31	03:39

For comparison, you can check out my review of the Dell XPS 17 Creator’s Edition laptop, where I ran similar tests in Resolve 17. While the P620 Gen 2 speeds should blow the XPS 17 out of the water, the most interesting results are the Neat Video export times because they are more than 50% shorter on the P620 Gen 2.

Resolve
The overall takeaway for me while using DaVinci Resolve 18 on the Lenovo P620 Gen 2 is that working in high-resolution media 4K/UHD resolution or above is much more fluid and can allow an editor or colorist to get closer to a true flow state of creativity. In my testing, I turned off any proxy generation or caching to really break the P620 Gen 2. The only time it would start to stutter is when using Red R3D-type files that require debayering to be done in the computer with noise reduction applied. The timeline would run at around 14fps.

My Resolve temporal noise reduction settings were:

Frames – 2
Estimation Type – Faster
Motion Range – Medium
Luma – 25
Chroma – 25
Motion – 50
Blend – 0

At the same time, I added spatial noise reduction to really try to break the sequences:

Spatial noise reduction:

Mode – Better
Radius – Medium
Spatial Threshold – 25
Chroma – 25
Blend – 0

It wasn’t unusable, but obviously you would want to cache the sequence if playing down for a client live. Even when adding sharpening and grain on top of the Resolve noise reduction, I was able to play back at between 12fps and 15fps, depending on what codec the clip was.

Premiere
Inside of Premiere Pro 2023, I ran similar tests using Adobe’s built-in noise reduction, sharpening and grain. During playback it’s a little more difficult to quantify dropped frames, but Premiere Pro played back in real time all the way up until I added sharpening and grain. And while Premiere’s noise reduction isn’t as intensive or effective as Resolve’s or Neat Video’s noise reduction, it still does some work, so playing back in real time on higher-than-UHD-resolution clips is an achievement.

For the export tests, I ran them in Adobe Media Encoder 2023 with similar export settings except for the IMF:

Adobe Premiere Pro 2023 (Simultan-eous Exports)	DNxHR 444 10-bit .mxf	DNxHR 444 10-bit .mov	H.264 MP4	H.265 MP4
Color Correction Only	03:20	03:32	03:32	03:44
CC + NR, Sharpen-ing, Grain	19:42	34:07	34:07	53:48

The most impressive feature I noticed was how Adobe Media Encoder 2023 used as much of the Nvidia RTX A6000 power as possible by simultaneously encoding all four exports. Funnily enough, the .mov file was the only one that had double the encoding time. This really shows why .mov files are being required less and less, while .mxf files and H.264/H.265 files are becoming the focus of manufacturers. But I am always a little skeptical about combining encodes, so I ran them individually as well.

Here are those results:

Adobe Premiere Pro 2023 (Individual Exports)	DNxHR 444 10-bit .Mxf	DNxHR 444 10-bit .mov	H.264 MP4	H.265 MP4
Color Correction Only	01:45	01:32	01:04	01:06
CC + NR, Sharpen-ing, Grain	18:57

Cost of Build
So what does this specific Lenovo P620 Gen 2 build cost? I was able to build what I think is a matching P620 Gen 2 workstation on lenovo.com for $16,654.68, including a three-year, next business day, on-site repairs package. This includes free shipping, and Lenovo says it will ship within eight to 10 days. Is that expensive? Yes and no.

If you built a somewhat similar Mac Pro tower, you’d be looking at over $18,799 without the Afterburner card. If you went with the highest end Mac Studio with M1 Ultra chip and 128GB of unified memory, you are looking at $6,199. In my opinion, the Mac Studio isn’t really comparable, even though I know some will compare the two. They both serve somewhat different purposes and have different future upgradability.

The real comparison would be between Lenovo, HP and Dell. A similar HP Z8 G4 system, but with an Intel Xeon Gold 28 core processor, added up to $14,133.60. The core count difference between the Threadripper Pro and Intel Xeon Gold is significant, and, depending on how your apps work with multiple cores, might be the difference you are looking for. The only downside was that HP’s expected shipping date was over 45 days away.

Dell, on the other hand, has the Precision 7865 with almost identical specifications priced at $15,836.42, but it ships in approximately 52 days. So depending on which way the wind blows or which brand you prefer to deal with, Lenovo and Dell have similar offerings, complete with the monster 64-core Threadripper and Nvidia RTX A6000.

Summing Up
The Lenovo P620 Gen 2 has been a flawless machine during my testing. To really push systems like this to the max, I run crypto-mining benchmarks for hours to see if the systems will overheat and shut down while the CPU and GPU run at almost 100% power. The Lenovo P620 Gen 2 stayed up and running without hesitation. Just be careful when putting your hand behind the exhaust fan because it blows out heat when running the system so high.

If you’re looking for an insanely powerful workstation with the backing of a major brand name like Lenovo, then you should head over to Lenovo’s website and find out what version is right for you.

Brady Betzel is an Emmy-nominated online editor at Margarita Mix in Hollywood, working on shows like Life Below Zero and Uninterrupted: The Shop. He is also a member of the PGA. You can email Brady at bradybetzel@gmail.com. Follow him on Twitter @allbetzroff.

Lenovo ThinkStation P620 Offers Next-Gen AMD Ryzen Threadripper Pro

March 8, 2022

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Lenovo has introduced the next-generation of its ThinkStation P620 desktop workstation. This tier 1 professional workstation is powered by the latest AMD Ryzen Threadripper Pro processor, the Pro 5000WX series, and offers up to 25% performance improvement over the previous generation. Additionally, the tower workstation is available with a new 24-core CPU option, allowing for greater expansion and configurability for professional users. The next-generation ThinkStation P620 will be available starting later this month.

The new P620 targets users who need to get more done in less time so that shots can render faster, and 3D visualizations and simulations can run seamlessly in real time. According to Lenovo, the ThinkStation P620 is designed to be versatile and allows performance to scale and user productivity to increase while running a variety of applications for multi-threaded workflows. This includes support for up to two Nvidia RTX A6000 graphics cards, up to 1TB of memory and 20TB of storage.

The latest version of the P620 also offers:

PCIe Gen 4 for increased speed across storage, memory and graphics
Two times the L3 cache directly accessible per core compared to the previous generation CPU for reduced latency
Increased clock speeds up to 4.5GHz
Up to 64 core processor
10GB of built-in Ethernet
Windows 11 support

In addition to enhanced performance and support of the latest professional graphics technology from Nvidia, the P620 comes with professional manageability and enterprise-class support.

GTC Conference: Advances in Virtual Production

October 9, 2020

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By Mike McCarthy

I usually attend GTC in San Jose each the spring, but that was interrupted this year due to COVID-19. Instead, I watched a couple of sessions online. This fall, Nvidia normally would have held its GTC Europe, but instead made it a global online event. As a global event, the sessions are scheduled at all hours, depending on where in the world the presenters or target audience are — hence the tagline, “Innovation never sleeps.” Fortunately, the sessions that were scheduled at 2am or 3am were recorded, so I could watch them at more convenient times. The only downside was not being able to ask questions.

Nvidia is building a supercomputer for UK’s healthcare research using artificial intelligence.

While the “G” in GTC stands for GPU, much of the conference is focused on AI and supercomputing, with a strong emphasis on health care applications. Raytracing — the primary new feature of Nvidia’s hardware architecture — is graphics-focused, but that is limited to true 3D rendering applications and can’t be easily applied to other forms of image processing. Since I don’t do much 3D animation work, those topics are less relevant to

In-Camera VFX
The one graphics technology development that I am most interested in at the moment —the focus of most of the sessions I attended — is virtual production. Or more precisely, in-camera VFX. This first caught my attention previously at GTC, in sessions about the workflow in use on the show The Mandalorian. I was intrigued by it at the time, and my exploration of those workflow possibilities only increased when one of my primary employers expressed an interest in moving toward that type of production.

Filmmaker Hasraf “HaZ” Dulull using his iPad on a virtual production.

There were a number of sessions at this GTC that touched on virtual production and related topics. I learned about developments in Epic’s Unreal Engine, which seems to be the most popular starting point due to its image quality and performance. There were sessions that touched on applications that build on that foundation — to add the functionality that various productions need — and on the software-composable infrastructure that you can run those applications on.

I saw a session with Hasraf “Haz” Dulull, a director who has made some shorter films in Unreal Engine. He is just getting started on a full-length feature film adaptation of the video game Mutant Year Zero, and it’s being created entirely in Unreal Engine as final pixel renders. While it is entirely animated, Haz uses his iPad for both facial performance capture and virtual camera work.

One of my favorite sessions was a well-designed presentation by Matt Workman, a DP who was demonstrating his previz application Cine Tracer, that runs on Unreal Engine. He basically went through the main steps for an entire virtual production workflow.

There are a number of different complex components that have to come together seamlessly for in-camera VFX, each presenting its own challenges. First you have to have a 3D world to operate in, possibly with pre-animated actions occurring in the background. Then you have to have a camera tracking system to sync your view with the 3D world, which is the basis for simpler virtual production workflows.

To incorporate real-world elements, your virtual camera has to be synced with a physical camera in order to record real objects or people, and you have to composite in the virtual background. Or, for true in-camera VFX, you have to display the background on an LED wall in the background. This requires powerful graphics systems to drive imagery on those displays, compensating for their locations and angles. Then you have to be able to render the 3D world onto those displays from the tracked camera’s perspective. Lastly, you have to be able to view and record the camera output, presumably, as well as a clean background plate to further refine the output in post.

Each of these steps has a learning curve, leading to a very complex operation before all said and done. My big take away from all of my sessions at the conference is that I need to start familiarizing myself with Unreal Engine. Matt Workman’s Cine Tracer application on Steam might be a good way to start learning the fundamentals of those first few steps, if you aren’t familiar with working in 3D.

Lenovo P620

Lenovo P620 & GPUs
Separately, a number of sessions touched on Lenovo’s upcoming P620 workstation based on AMD’s Threadripper Pro architecture. That made sense, as that will be the only way in the immediate future to take advantage of Ampere GPU’s PCIe 4.0 bus speeds for higher bandwidth communication with the host system. I am hoping to be able to do a full review on one of those systems in the near future.

I also attended a session that focused on using GPUs to accelerate various graphics tasks for sports broadcasting, including stitching 360 video at 8K and creating live volumetric renders of athletes with camera arrays. As someone who rarely watches broadcast television, I have been surprised to see how far live graphics have come with various XR effects and AI-assisted on-screen notations and labels to cue viewers to certain details on the fly. The GPU power is certainly available; it has just taken a while for the software to be streamlined enough to use it effectively.

Mike McCarthy is an online editor/workflow consultant with over 10 years of experience on feature films and commercials. He has been involved in pioneering new solutions for tapeless workflows, DSLR filmmaking and multi-screen and surround video experiences. Check out his site.

Mo-Sys intros scalable virtual studio production package based on Unreal

July 21, 2020

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Mo-Sys, a provider of camera tracking solutions for virtual studios and augmented reality, has introduced a pre-assembled virtual studio package called StarTracker Studio. The system is scalable to any size production, and can support 4K Ultra HD.

A big part of virtual studio and augmented reality production is the ability to track the position of each camera in 3D space across all six axes of movement. StarTracker offers a precise and reliable camera tracking package using dots on the studio ceiling (“stars”) that are placed at random and tracked to plot camera positions with extraordinary accuracy.

StarTracker Studio bundles the tracking with cameras and mounts and a high-performance virtual graphics system based on the latest version of the Unreal Engine and the Ultimatte keyer. Mo-Sys’s plug-in interfaces directly between the camera tracking and the Unreal Engine, for extreme precision with virtually no latency.  All the hardware — including Lenovo PCs with Titan RTX GPUs — is mounted in a rolling rack cabinet and pre-wired, and all the software is loaded and configured. All the user has to do is design their unique virtual environment, power up the StarTracker Studio rack and start shooting.

According to Michael Geissler, CEO of Mo-Sys, equipment in the package includes offerings from Blackmagic, Ultimatte, Lenovo, Canon and Cartoni. “That hardware works with the incredible virtual graphics power from the Unreal Engine, tied with perfect precision to real objects thanks to Mo-Sys tracking. It gives the user access to top-end effects like hyper-realistic reflections, soft shadows to emulate real-world lighting, continual depth of field processing to emulate lens performance and occlusion handling so talent can walk around virtual objects.”

  The standard package is supplied with three Blackmagic Ursa Mini 4.6K cameras with Canon 18–80 zoom lenses and paired with Mo-Sys StarTracker tracking units. The kit also includes a camera jib, a rolling tripod and a camera rail set. An 8-channel Atem production switcher provides the live output for broadcast or streaming, and three video recorders are included for separate program, key and graphics recording. Smart switching means that only one Ultimatte keyer is required for the system, rather than the more conventional one keyer per camera.

The package also includes the Mo-Sys Beam-In kit to bring remote guests into the virtual studio. Every element can be used in HD or 4K Ultra HD. Three radio microphones and an eight-channel audio mixer are also part of the solution.

The system is scalable up to the largest size of virtual production. Rack kits are available to support either eight or 16 cameras. The complete system is pre-configured by Mo-Sys before shipping, and Mo-Sys will also provide all support, including training in technical and creative aspects where required.

Lenovo intros next-gen ThinkPad mobile workstations

June 17, 2020

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Lenovo has launched the next generation of its ThinkPad P Series: the ThinkPad P15, ThinkPad P17 and ThinkPad P1 Gen 3; the new ThinkPad P15v; and the ThinkPad X1 Extreme Gen 3. Equipped with high-performance 10th Gen Intel H series mobile processors, these new ThinkPads are available in a variety of configurations.

ThinkPad P1 Gen 3

The ThinkPad P Series and the ThinkPad X1 Extreme Gen 3 feature the new Ultra Performance Mode, exclusive to these systems, which allows users to take full control of their performance settings. Users can now dial up the system, ensuring peak performance when they need to complete a render as fast as possible or demo high-fidelity VR content while maintaining a stable frame rate.

Enabled by default as a setting in BIOS, Ultra Performance Mode relaxes restrictions on acoustics and temperature, allowing users to tap into the GPU and CPU and leverage an improved thermal design to maintain the integrity of the machine and deliver increased performance.

A complete reengineering of the thermal design optimizes performance on the ThinkPad P15 and P17 over their predecessors, resulting in what Lenovo says is an added 13% more air flow, a 30% larger CPU heat sink, larger vents and a new thermal mesh to dissipate heat faster.

Lenovo has also moved to a new daughter card design instead of relying on a soldered solution. The ThinkPad P15 and P17 will feature this modular design, offering four times the number of GPU and CPU configurations than previous generations. With Nvidia Quadro RTX GPUs on board, the ThinkPad P15 and P17 support higher-GPU-wattage graphics than their predecessors, increasing from 80 watts to 90 watts and 90 watts to 110 watts, respectively. This increase allows users to select the right configuration for their needs — optimizing performance for their workflow directly out of the box and enabling more complex graphics on a mobile workstation.

ThinkPad P15 and P17

The ThinkPad P15 and P17 boast additional shared features – including a new 94WHr battery and up to 4TB of storage, along with up to 128GB DDR4 of memory and UHD Dolby Vision HDR displays.

The ThinkPad P15 and P17 will be available in July starting at $1,979 and $2119, respectively.

Lenovo’s thinnest and lightest 15-inch mobile workstation – the ThinkPad P1 Gen 3 – has been updated with additional usability features including a new anti-smudge coating, upgraded speakers and a new UHD LCD display option with a 600-nit panel. For mobile workstation users in areas without expansive Wi-Fi access, the ThinkPad P1 Gen 3 also offers optional LTE WWAN – the fastest internet option for remote workers – for increased mobility and performance.

The ThinkPad P1 Gen 3 will be available in July starting at $2,019.

ThinkPad X1 Extreme Gen 3

The latest ThinkPad X1 Extreme Gen 3 is designed for advanced users seeking a high-performance Windows 10 laptop with 10th Gen Intel H series vPro mobile processors up to Core i9 and optional Nvidia GeForce 1650Ti graphics. This combination of processing power and high-performance graphics, along with a 15.6-inch display with up to 600-nits brightness, offer users advanced productivity and collaboration capabilities.

New Wi-Fi 6 and optional Cat 16 LTE-A wireless WAN provide reliable high-speed data transfers for a highly efficient remote working experience. Modern Standby helps ensure emails, messages and updates are received, even when the lid is closed, and allows rapid resume.
The ThinkPad X1 Extreme Gen 3 will be available in July. Price to be announced.

Rounding out the mobile workstation portfolio is the new ThinkPad P15v. Powered by 10th Gen Intel H series mobile processors, the 15-inch P15v offers a UHD 600-nit LCD display and the Nvidia Quadro P620 GPU.
The ThinkPad P15v will be available in July starting at $1,349.

Choosing the right workstation set-up for the job

July 12, 2017

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By Lance Holte

Like virtually everything in the world of filmmaking, the number of available options for a perfect editorial workstation are almost infinite. The vast majority of systems can be greatly customized and expanded, whether by custom order, upgraded internal hardware or with expansion chassis and I/O boxes. In a time when many workstations are purchased, leased or upgraded for a specific project, the workstation buying process is largely determined by the project’s workflow and budget.

One of Harbor Picture Company’s online rooms.

In my experience, no two projects have identical workflows. Even if two projects are very similar, there are usually some slight differences — a different editor, a new camera, a shorter schedule, bigger storage requirements… the list goes on and on. The first step for choosing the optimal workstation(s) for a project is to ask a handful of broad questions that are good starters for workflow design. I generally start by requesting the delivery requirements, since they are a good indicator of the size and scope of the project.

Then I move on to questions like:

What are the camera/footage formats?
How long is the post production schedule?
Who is the editorial staff?

Often there aren’t concrete answers to these questions at the beginning of a project, but even rough answers point the way to follow-up questions. For instance, Q: What are the video delivery requirements? A: It’s a commercial campaign — HD and SD ProRes 4444 QTs.

Simple enough. Next question.

Christopher Lam from SF’s Double Fine Productions/ Courtesy of Wacom.

Q: What is the camera format? A: Red Weapon 6K, because the director wants to be able to do optical effects and stabilize most of the shots. This answer makes it very clear that we’re going to be editing offline, since the commercial budget doesn’t allow for the purchase of a blazing system with a huge, fast storage array.

Q: What is the post schedule? A: Eight weeks. Great. This should allow enough time to transcode ProRes proxies for all the media, followed by offline and online editorial.

At this point, it’s looking like there’s no need for an insanely powerful workstation, and the schedule looks like we’ll only need one editor and an assistant. Q: Who is the editorial staff? A: The editor is an Adobe Premiere guy, and the ad agency wants to spend a ton of time in the bay with him. Now, we know that agency folks really hate technical slowdowns that can sometimes occur with equipment that is pushing the envelope, so this workstation just needs to be something that’s simple and reliable. Macs make agency guys comfortable, so let’s go with a Mac Pro for the editor. If possible, I prefer to connect the client monitor directly via HDMI, since there are no delay issues that can sometimes be caused by HDMI to SDI converters. Of course, since that will use up the Mac Pro’s single HDMI port, the desktop monitors and the audio I/O box will use up two or three Thunderbolt ports. If the assistant editor doesn’t need such a powerful system, a high-end iMac could suffice.

(And for those who don’t mind waiting until the new iMac Pro ships in December, Apple’s latest release of the all-in-one workstation seems to signal a committed return for the company to the professional creative world – and is an encouraging sign for the Mac Pro overhaul in 2018. The iMac Pro addresses its non-upgradability by futureproofing itself as the most powerful all-in-one machine ever released. The base model starts at a hefty $4,999, but boasts options for up to a 5K display, 18-core Xeon processor, 128GB of RAM, and AMD Radeon Vega GPU. As more and more applications add OpenCL acceleration (AMD GPUs), the iMac Pro should stay relevant for a number of years.)

Trollbäck & Company

Now, our workflow would be very different if the answer to the first question had instead been A: It’s a feature film. Technicolor will handle the final delivery, but we still want to be able to make in-house 4K DCPs for screenings, EXR and DPX sequences for the VFX vendors, Blu-ray screeners, as well as review files and create all the high-res deliverables for mastering.

Since this project is a feature film, likely with a much larger editorial staff, the workflow might be better suited to editorial in Avid (to use project sharing/bin locking/collaborative editing). And since it turns out that Technicolor is grading the film in Blackmagic Resolve, it makes sense to online the film in Resolve and then pass the project over to Technicolor. Resolve will also cover any in-house temp grading and DCP creation and can handle virtually any video file.

PCs
For the sake of comparison, let’s build out some workstations on the PC side that will cover our editors, assistants, online editors, VFX editors and artists, and temp colorist. PC vs. Mac will likely be a hotly debated topic in this industry for some time, but there is no denying that a PC will return more cost-effective power at the expense of increased complexity (and potential for increased technical issues) than a Mac with similar specs. I also appreciate the longer lifespan of machines with easy upgradability and expandability without requiring expansion chassis or external GPU enclosures.

I’ve had excellent success with the HP Z line — using z840s for serious finishing machines and z440s and z640s for offline editorial workstations. There are almost unlimited options for desktop PCs, but only certain workstations and components are certified for various post applications, so it pays to do certification research when building a workstation from the ground up.

The Molecule‘s artist row in NYC.

It’s also important to keep the workstation components balanced. A system is only as strong as its weakest link, so a workstation with an insanely powerful GPU, but only a handful of CPU cores will be outperformed by a workstation with 16-20 cores and a moderately high-end GPU. Make sure the CPU, GPU, and RAM are similarly matched to get the best bang for your buck and a more stable workstation.

Relationships!
Finally, in terms of getting the best bang for your buck, there’s one trick that reigns supreme: build great relationships with hardware companies and vendors. Hardware companies are always looking for quality input, advice and real-world testing. They are often willing to lend (or give) new equipment in exchange for case studies, reviews, workflow demonstrations and press. Creating relationships is not only a great way to stay up to date with cutting edge equipment, it expands support options, your technical network and is the best opportunity to be directly involved with development. So go to trade shows, be active on forums, teach, write and generally be as involved as possible and your equipment will thank you.

Our Main Image Courtesy of editor/compositor Fred Ruckel.

Lance Holte is an LA-based post production supervisor and producer. He has spoken and taught at such events as NAB, SMPTE, SIGGRAPH and Createasphere. You can email him at lance@lanceholte.com.

Lenovo’s ‘Transform’ event: IT subscriptions and AR

June 28, 2017

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By Claudio Santos

Last week I had the opportunity to attend Lenovo’s “Transform” event, in which the company unveiled its newest releases as well as its plans for the near future. I must say they had quite the lineup ready.

The whole event was divided into two tracks “Datacenters” and “PC and Smart Devices.” Each focused on its own products and markets, but a single idea permeated all announcements in the day. It’s what Lenovo calls the “Fourth Revolution.” That’s what the company calls the next step in integration between devices and the cloud. Their vision is that soon 5G mobile Internet will be available, allowing for devices to seamlessly connect to the cloud on the go and more importantly, always stay connected.

While there were many interesting announcements throughout the day, I will focus on two that seem more closely relatable to most post facilities.

The first is what Lenovo is calling “PC as a service.” They want to sell the bulk of the IT hardware and support needs for companies as subscription-based deals, and that would be awesome! Why? Well, it’s simply a fact of life now that post production happens almost exclusively with the aid of computer software (sorry, if you’re still one of the few cutting film by hand, this article won’t be that interesting for you).

Having to choose, buy and maintain computers for our daily work takes a lot of research and, most notably, time. Between software updates, managing different licenses, subscriptions and hunting down weird quirks of the system, a lot of time is taken away from more important tasks such as editing or client relationship. When you throw a server and a local network in the mix it becomes a hefty job that takes a lot of maintenance.

That’s why bigger facilities employ IT specialists to deal with all that. But many post facilities aren’t big enough to employ a full-time IT person, nor are their needs complex enough to warrant the investment.

Lenovo sees this as an opportunity to simplify the role of the IT department by selling subscriptions that include the hardware, the software and all the necessary support (including a help desk) to keep the systems running without having to invest in a large IT department. More importantly, the subscription would be flexible. So, during periods in which you have need for more stations/support you can increase the scope of the subscription and then shrink it once again when the demands lower, freeing you from absorbing the cost of unused machines/software that would just sit around unused.

I see one big problem in this vision: Lenovo plans to start the service with a minimum of 1,000 seats for a deal. That is far, far more staff than most post facilities have, and at that point it would probably just be worth hiring a specialist that can also help you automate your workflow and develop customized tools for your projects. It is nonetheless an interesting approach, and I hope to see it trickle down to smaller clients as it solidifies as a feasible model.

AR
The other announcement that should interest post facilities is Lenovo’s interest in the AR market. As many of you might know, augmented reality is projected to be an even bigger market than it’s more popular cousin virtual reality, largely due to its more professional application possibilities.

Lenovo has been investing in AR and has partnered up with Metavision to experiment and start working towards real work-environment offerings of the technology. Besides the hand gestures that are always emphasized in AR promo videos, one very simple use-case seems to be in Lenovo’s sights, and that’s one I hope to see being marketable very soon: workspace expansion. Instead of needing three or four different monitors to accommodate our ever-growing number of windows and displays while working, with AR we will be able to place windows anywhere around us, essentially giving us a giant spherical display. A very simple problem with a very simple solution, but one that I believe would increase the productivity of editors by a considerable amount.

We should definitely keep an eye on Lenovo as they embark one this new quest for high-efficiency solutions for businesses, because that’s exactly what the post production industry finds itself in need of right now.

Claudio Santos is a sound editor and spatial audio mixer at Silver Sound. Slightly too interested in technology and workflow hacks, he spends most of his waking hours tweaking, fiddling and tinkering away on his computer.

Review: Lenovo ThinkStation P410

January 5, 2017

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By Brady Betzel

With the lukewarm reaction of the professional community to the new Apple MacBook Pro, there are many creative professionals who are seriously — for the first time in their careers — considering whether or not to jump into a Windows-based world.

I grew up using an Apple II GS from 1986 (I was born in 1983, if you’re wondering), but I always worked on both Windows and Apple computers. I guess my father really instilled the idea of being independent and not relying on one thing or one way of doing something — he wanted me to rely on my own knowledge and not on others.

Not to get too philosophical, but when he purchased all the parts I needed to build my own Windows system, it was incredibly gratifying. I would have loved to have built my own Apple system, but obviously never could. That is why I am so open to computer systems of any operating system software.

If you are deciding whether or not to upgrade your workstation and have never considered solutions other than HP, Dell or Apple, you will want to read what I have to say about Lenovo‘s latest workstation, the P410.

When I set out on this review, I didn’t have any Display Port-compatible monitors and Lenovo was nice enough to send their beautiful Think Vision Pro 2840m — another great piece of hardware.

Digging In
I want to jump right into the specs of the ThinkStation P410. Under the hood is an Intel Xeon E5-1650 v4, which in plain terms is a 6-core 3.6GHz 15MB CPU that can reach all the way up to 4.0GHz if needed using Intel’s Turbo Boost technology. The graphics card is a medium-sized monster — the Nvidia Quadro M4000 with 8GB of GDDR5 memory and 1664 CUDA cores. It has 4 DisplayPort 1.2 ports to power those four 30-bit 4096×2160 @60Hz displays you will run when editing and color correcting.

If you need more CUDA power you could step up to the Nvidia M5000, which runs 2048 CUDA cores or the M6000, which runs 3072 CUDA cores, but that power isn’t cheap (and as of this review they are not even an option from Lenovo in the P410 customization — you will probably have to step up to a higher model number).

There is 16GB of DD4-2400 ECC memory, 1TB 2.5-inch SATA 6Gb/s SSD (made by Macron), plus a few things like a DVD writer, media card reader, keyboard and mouse. At the time I was writing this review, you could configure this system for a grand total of $2,794, but if you purchase it online at shop.lenovo.com it will cost a little under $2,515 with some online discounts. As I priced this system out over a few weeks I noticed the prices changed, so keep in mind it could be higher. I configured a similar style HP z440 workstation for around $3,600 and a Dell Precision Tower 5000 for around $3,780, so Lenovo’s prices are on the low end for major-brand workstations.

For expansion (which Windows-based PCs seem to lead the pack in), you have a total of four DIMM slots for memory (two are taken up already by two 8GB sticks), four PCIe slots and four hard drive bays. Two of the hard drive bays are considered Flex Bays, which can be used for hard drives, hard drive + slim optical drive or something like front USB 3.0 ports.

On the back there are your favorite PS/2 keyboard port and mouse port, two USB 2.0 ports, four USB 3.0 ports, audio in/out/mic and four DisplayPorts.

Testing
I first wanted to test the P410’s encoding speed when using Adobe Media Encoder. I took a eight-minute, 30 second 1920×1080 23.98fps ProRes HQ QuickTime that I had filmed using a Blackmagic Pocket Cinema Camera, did a quick color balance in Adobe Premiere Pro CC 2017 using the Lumetri Color Correction tools and exported a Single Pass, variable bit rate 25Mb/s H.264 using Media Encoder. Typically, CUDA cores kick in when you use GPU-accelerated tools like transitions, scaling in Premiere and when you export files with GPU effects such as Lumetri Color tools. Typically, when exporting from tools, like Adobe Premiere Pro CC or Adobe Media Encoder, the GPU acceleration kicks in only if you’ve applied GPU-accelerated effects, color correction with something like Lumetri (which is GPU accelerated) or a resize effect. Otherwise if you are just transcoding from one codec to another the CPU will handle the task.

In this test, it took Media Encoder about six minutes to encode the H.264 when Mercury Playback Engine GPU Acceleration (CUDA) was enabled. Without the GPU acceleration enabled it took 14 minutes. So by using the GPU, I got about a 40 percent speed increase thanks to the power of the Nvidia Quadro M4000 with 8GB of GDDR5 RAM.

For comparison, I did the same test on a newly released MacBook Pro with Touch Bar i7 2.9Ghz Quad Core, 16GB of 2133 MHz LPDDR3 memory and AMD Radeon Pro 460 4GB of RAM (uses OpenCL as opposed to CUDA); it took Media Encoder about nine minutes using the GPU.

Another test I love to run uses Maxon’s Cinebench, which simply runs real-world scenarios like photorealistic rendering and a 3D car chase. This taxes your system with almost one million polygons and textures. Basically, it makes your system do a bunch of math, which helps in separating immature workstations from the professional ones. This system came in around 165 frames per second. In comparison to other systems, with similar configurations to the P410, it placed first or second. So it’s fast.

Lenovo Performance Tuner
While the low price is what really sets the P410 apart from the rest of the pack, Lenovo has recently released a hardware tuning software program called Lenovo Performance Tuner. Performance Tuner is a free app that helps to focus your Lenovo workstation on the app you are using. For instance, I use Adobe CC a lot at home, so when I am working in Premiere I want all of my power focused there with minimal power focused on background apps that I may not have turned off — sometimes I let Chrome run in the background or I want to jump between Premiere, Resolve and Photoshop. You can simply launch Performance Tuner and click the app you want to launch in Lenovo’s “optimized” state. You can go further by jumping into the Settings tab and customize things like Power Management Mode to always be on Max Performance. It’s a pretty handy tool when you want to quickly funnel all of your computing resources to one app.

The Think Vision Pro Monitor
Lastly, I wanted to quickly touch on the Think Vision Pro 2840m LED backlit LCD monitor Lenovo let me borrow for this review. The color fidelity is awesome and can work at a resolution up to 3840×2160 (UHD, not full 4K). It will tilt and rotate almost any way you need it to, and it will even go full vertical at 90 degrees.

When working with P410 I had some problems with DisplayPort not always kicking in with the monitor, or any monitor for that matter. Sometimes I would have to unplug and plug the DisplayPort cable back in while the system was on for the monitor to recognize and turn on. Nonetheless, the monitor is awesome at 28 inches. Keep in mind it has a glossy finish so it might not be for you if you are near a lot of light or windows — while the color and brightness punch through, there is a some glare with other light sources in the room.

Summing Up
In the end, the Lenovo ThinkStation P410 workstation is a workhorse. Even though it’s at the entry level of Lenovo’s workstations, it has a lot of power and a great price. When I priced out a similar system using PC Partpicker, it ran about $2,600 — you can check out the DIY build I put together on PCPartpicker.com: https://pcpartpicker.com/list/r9H4Ps.

A drawback of DIY custom builds though is that they don’t include powerful support, a complete warranty from a single company or ISV certifications (ISV = Independent Software Vendors). Simply, ISVs are the way major workstation builders like HP, Dell and Lenovo test their workstations against commonly used software like Premiere Pro or Avid Media Composer in workstation-focused industries like editing or motion graphics.

One of the most misunderstood benefits of a workstation is that it’s meant to run day and night. So not only do you get enterprise-level components like Nvidia Quadro graphics cards and Intel Xeon CPUs, the components are made for durability as well as performance. This way there is little downtime, especially in mission-critical environments. I didn’t get to run this system for months constantly, but I didn’t see any sign of problems in my testing.

When you buy a Lenovo workstation it comes with a three-year on-site warranty, which covers anything that goes wrong with the hardware itself, including faulty workmanship. But it won’t cover things like spills, drops or electrical surges.

I liked the Lenovo ThinkStation P410. It’s fast, does the job and has quality components. I felt that it lacked a few of today’s necessary I/O ports like USB-C/Thunderbolt 3.

The biggest pro for this workstation is the overwhelmingly low price point for a major brand workstation like the ThinkStation P410. Check out the Lenovo website for the P410 and maybe even wander into the P910 aisle, which showcases some of the most powerful workstations they make.

Check out this video I made that gives you a closer look at (and inside) the workstation.

Brady Betzel is an Emmy-nominated online editor at Margarita Mix in Hollywood, working on Life Below Zero and Cutthroat Kitchen. You can email Brady at bradybetzel@gmail.com. Follow him on Twitter @allbetzroff.

Lenovo’s ThinkPad P50, P70: possible DIT powerhouses

August 11, 2015

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By Boon Shin Ng

When I was asked by postPerspective if I’d like to get a hands-on preview of some of Lenovo’s upcoming embargoed products over lunch, my answer was, “Of course!” Technology and food — a match made in heaven!

Both lunch and tech did not fail that day. It was an intimate setting of five at an upstairs private balcony of a nice restaurant here in New York City. During lunch, we were presented with Lenovo’s latest laptops — the ThinkPad P Series, which includes the P50 (15 inches) and the P70 (17 inches). The company pitched them as workstations in a laptop size, which feature new Intel Xeon processors.

While Lenovo went over the details of the products, I began wondering if they could be used as part of my DIT setup in order to reduce my footprint. In my mind I kept checking boxes:

– Number pad on a 15-inch laptop — check
– USB 3.1/Thunderbolt 3, offering transfer speeds of 40Gbps — check
– 4K UHD IPS display and FHD touchscreen options — check
– Integrated X-Rite Pantone color calibration — check
– Two dims (oh wait, no, it has four DIMMS!) – check
– RAID-capable drive setup — check (M.2 PCIe is an option)
– Solid and rugged feel – check

For those who remember the ThinkPad when it belonged to IBM — before Lenovo bought the technology — the little red knob tracker is there. Double check!

The machines also feature Nvidia Quadro graphics and up to 64GB DDR4 ECC memory.

The beauty of the machine comes in its innards. While we were presented with three different kinds of antipasti, the different parts of the machine were handed over to us to get hands-on. The roll cage was surprisingly light and sturdy. When I held it up, it looked like a piece of steam-punk art. The cooling design continued along this theme, with its two fans on each end — brass-like tubes extended toward each other and melded together as one piece. I didn’t know a laptop could be sexy on the inside.

While I mulled over how lucky I was to be able to get to see the insides of a laptop (Yes, I’m that geeky!), our steak entrée came and we all started chatting about the weather, our first computers and what other things we would like to see in a laptop. It was informal, casual and relaxing, which is exactly how I like my tech to be presented.

When the preview of the tech ended, and as I walked the streets of New York on the way to my next meeting, I thought about using this laptop as my next DIT setup. The many I/O ports are always a plus, and integrated color calibration is nice to have, although it will not replace a reference monitor on the set. I’m the kind of person who will need to test the laptop out thoroughly before drawing a conclusion on its value, but it’s looking very promising for a start. Look to this space in the future for a full review.

Now I am just waiting for the day when we can have screens flexible enough to be able to open up a laptop like a pop-up book, to have three different screens and a pen tablet. I hope to be among the first to see that, and if it’s over a delicious lunch, all the better.

Boon Shin Ng is a NYC-based post pro working in turnovers, workflow, finishing, online, color and dailies.

Review: Lenovo ThinkPad W550s Ultrabook mobile workstation

July 7, 2015

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By Brady Betzel

Over the last few years, I’ve done a lot of workstation reviews, including ones for HP’s z800 and z840, Dell’s mobile workstations and now the Lenovo ThinkPad W550s mobile workstation.

After each workstation review goes live, I’m always asked the same question: Why would anyone pay the extra money for a professional workstation when you can buy something that performs almost as good if not better for half the price? That’s a great question.

What separates workstations from consumer or DIY systems is primarily ISV (Independent Software Vendor) certifications. Many companies, including Lenovo, work directly with software manufacturers like Autodesk and Adobe to ensure that the product you are receiving will work with the software you use, including drivers, displays, keypads, ports (like the mini display port) and so on. So while you are paying a premium to ensure compatibility, you are really paying for the peace of mind that your system will work with the software you use most. The Lenovo W550s has ISV-certified drivers with Autodesk, Dassault, Nemetscheck Vectorworks, PTC and Siemens, all relating to drivers for the Nvidia Quadro K620M graphics card.

Beyond ISV driver certifications, the Lenovo ThinkPad W550s is a lightweight powerhouse with the longest battery life I have ever seen in a mobile workstation — all for around $2,500.

Out of the box I noticed two batteries charging when I powered on Windows 8.1 — you can choose Windows 7 (64-bit) or 8.1 (64-bit). One of the best features I have seen in a mobile workstation is the ability to swap batteries without powering down (I guess that’s the old man in me coming out), and Lenovo has found a way to do it without charging an arm and a leg and physically only showing one battery. For $50 (included in the $2,500 price), you can have a three-cell (44Whr) battery in the front and a six-cell (72Whr) battery in the back. I was able to work about three days in a row without charging.

This was intermittent work ranging from sending out tweets with 10 tabs up in Chrome to encoding a 4K H.264 for YouTube in Adobe Media Encoder. It was a very welcome surprise, and if I had a second battery I could swap them out without losing power because of the battery in the front (built-in).

Under the Hood
The battery life is the biggest feature in my opinion, but let’s layout the rest of the specs… Processor: Intel Core i7-5600U (4MB Cache, up to 3.20GHz – I got 2.6); OS: Windows 8.1 Pro 64; Display: 15.5-inches 3K (2880×1620), IPS, Multi-touch, with WWAN; Graphics: Nvidia Quadro K620M 2GB; Memory: 16 PC3-12800 DDR3L; Keyboard: backlit with number keypad; Pointing Device: trackpoint (little red joystick looking mouse), Touchpad and Fingerprint Reader; Camera: 720p; Hard Drive: 512GB Serial ATA3, SSD; Battery: three-cell Li-Polymer 44Whr (Front), six-cell Li-ion 72Whr Cyl HC (Rear); Power Cord: 65W AC Adapter; Wireless: Intel 7265 AC/B/G/N dual band wireless plus Bluetooth; Warranty: one-year carry-in (diagnosed by phone first).

The W550s has a bunch of great inputs, like the mini display port, which I got to work instantly with an external monitor; three USB 3.0 ports with one of them always on for charging of devices; a smart card reader, which I used a lot; and even a VGA port.

In terms of power I received a nice Intel i7-5600U Quad Core CPU running at 2.6GHz or higher. Combined with the Nvidia Quadro K620M and 16GB of DDR3L, the Intel i7-5600U delivered enough power to encode my GoPro Hero 3+ Black Edition 4K timelapses quickly using the GoPro software and Adobe Media Encoder.

Encoding and layering effects is what really bogs a video editing system down, so what better way to see what the W550s is made of than by removing the fisheye on my clip with an effect on the image sequence containing about 2,400 stills in Adobe Premiere, speeding up the timelapse by 1,000 percent and sending the sequence to Adobe Media Encoder? In the end, the W550s chewed through the render and spit out a 4K YouTube-compatible H.264 in around 15 minutes. The CUDA cores in the Nvidia Quadro K620M really helped, although this did kick the fans on. I did about six of these timelapses to verify that my tests were conclusive. If you want to see them you can check them out on YouTube.

The Quadro K620M is on the lower end of the mobile Quadro family but boasts 384 CUDA cores that help with the encoding and transcoding of media using the Adobe Creative Suite. In fact, I needed a laptop to use in a presentation I did for the Editors’ Lounge. I wanted to run After Effects CC 2014 along with Video Copilot’s Element 3D V1.6 plug-in, Maxon Cinema 4D Studio R16 and Avid Media Composer 6.5, all while running Camtasia (screen capture software) the entire time. That’s a lot to run at once, and I decided to give the W550s the task.

In terms of processing power the W550s worked great — I even left After Effects running while I was inside of Cinema 4D doing some simple demos of House Builder and MoText work. I have to say I was expecting some lag when switching between the two powerhouse software programs, but I was running Element 3D without a hiccup, even replicating the text particle and adding materials and lighting to them – both a testament to a great plug-in as well as a great machine.

While the power was not a problem for the W550s, I did encounter some interesting problems with the screen resolution. I have to preface this by saying that it is definitely NOT Lenovo’s problem that I am describing, it has to do with Avid Media Composer not being optimized for this high resolution of a screen. Avid Media Composer was almost unusable on the 15.5-inch 3K (2880×1620), IPS, multi-touch screen. The user interface has not been updated for today’s high-resolution screens, including the W550s. It is something to definitely be aware of when purchasing a workstation like this.

I did a few benchmarks for this system using Maxon Cinebench R15 software, which tests the OpenGL and CPU performances as compared to other systems with similar specs. The OpenGL test revealed a score of 35.32fps while the CPU test revealed a score of 265cb. You can download Cinebench R15 here and test your current set-up against my tests of the W550s.

There are a couple of things cosmetically that I am not as fond of on the W550s. When you purchase the larger rear battery, keep in mind that it adds about ¼- to ½-inch lift — it will no longer sit flat. In addition the keyboard is very nice and I found myself really liking the addition of the numeric keypad, especially when typing in exact frames in Premiere, the touchpad has the three buttons on top instead of underneath like I have typically encountered. On one hand I can see how if you retrain yourself to use the three buttons with the left hand while using your right hand on the touch pad it may be more efficient. On the other hand it will get annoying. I like the idea of a touchscreen, in theory — It’s nice to move windows around. But practically speaking, from a video and motion graphics standpoint, it probably isn’t worth the extra money and I would stick to a non-touch screen for a mobile workstation.

The last item to cover is the warranty. Typically, workstations have a pretty good warranty. Lenovo gives you a one-year carry-in warranty with the purchase of the W550s, which to me is short. This really hurts the price of the workstation because to get more than a three-year warranty — one that will actually help you within a business day if a crisis arises – will cost you at least a few hundred dollars more.

Summing Up
In the end, the price and awesome battery life make the Lenovo ThinkPad W550s a lightweight mobile workstation that can crunch through renders quickly. If I was ordering one for myself I would probably max out the memory at 32GB, get rid of the touchscreen (maybe even keep the 1920×1080 resolution version) and keep everything else… oh, I would also upgrade to a better warranty.

Before you leave, take these highlights with you: extreme battery life, lightweight and durable, and powerful enough for multimedia use.