Blackmagic Forum

Out of the 5900X and i7 11700 and i9 11900, I need to know the one best for 4K, H.264 4:2:0. The reason for my concentration on H.264 4:2:0 is that my Fujifilm X-T2 only records 4K in this format.

I refer to this chart from Puget Systems:



Source of the chart:
https://www.pugetsystems.com/labs/articles/What-H-264-H-265-Hardware-Decoding-is-Supported-in-DaVinci-Resolve-Studio-2122/

Am I correct that the chart says the AMD 5000 series CPUs -- namely the 5900X and 5950X -- do not have in-built H.264 encoding/decoding?

I have Davinci Studio version. I read somewhere that the Studio version has its own inbuilt H.264 encoding/decoding. If so, does that mean I can ignore the H.264 hardware coding features of the Intel chips?

Overall, the following article from Puget indicates that the 5900X is best for 4K - but I wonder if my specific focus on 4K, H.264 4:2:0 might suggest a different CPU? How much should I take into consideration the H.264 hardware-coding ability of the Intel chips?

https://www.pugetsystems.com/labs/articles/DaVinci-Resolve-Studio-11th-Gen-Intel-Core-vs-AMD-Ryzen-5000-Series-2104/

Is it true that for H.264, the decoding is during editing where the compressed files are "decoded" - and that encoding is used during rendering?

Get an Nvidia card with the latest NVENC/NVDEC revision. Wikipedia has list of Nvidia architectures and nvenc version. The cheapest card with the latest revision is IIRC the GTX 1650. CPU decoding is IMHO pointless.

The chart you posted refers to AMD CPUs with build in GPUs. The 5900x and 5950x do not have that.

Only chips with onboard IGPUs have decoding/encoding.

For 4.2.0 you're likely okay relying on your discrete GPU which most likely handles 4.2.0

The important part of the new Intel chips is they're the only ones that currently support 4.2.2. Nothing from Nvidia does no matter how expensive the GPU is.

Apple's M1 supports 4:2:2 too.