Recommended Hardware

The grid above will have provided a PC Build code. Use that code by scrolling down to see the full spec that includes processer types, processor quantity, memory, and disks. It is important that you don’t compromise on details unless we have discussed this with you first as small changes may have unexpectedly large performance impacts.

Important Notes:

Please take care with memory. The internal architecture of a PC or server means you will typically get better performance by using multiple smaller sticks of memory than a single larger one. The more demanding the application, the more important this is. You’ll see our guidance for each of the builds below. All our builds, with the exception of the Management server, expect a minimum of 16GB.

Please take care with PCIe lanes. Each GPU or Video card expects to have a certain amount of PCIe bandwidth. If you put a 16 lane PCIe card into an 8 lane slot you will not get the best performance. Always check what your card expects and what the PC can provide.

Sometimes you may not require a video board, for example an offline Swift CG editor, in which case you do not need to include this in your build. But you would always require the specified GPU.

To support Record to Disk on Tactic Pro, you should add an additional SSD for each channel you wish to record. Indicative storage hours are shown in the Tactic Pro section above.

Our preferred supplier is HP. There is a cost and support advantage to buying the PC with the graphics card installed at the HP factory. It means support will be handled by HP, and you should get a lower cost than purchasing separately. When RT Software provides the PCs we include the HP 5 year, next business day warranty.

As described earlier, we offer different PC form factors. If you require SDI you may prefer the cost advantage of using a desktop machine. For uncompressed IP video you will require the rack mounted type which will likely be too noisy if placed in an operational area. Rack mounted machines can be used for SDI aswell of course. Please double check you are looking at the correct build in the list below.

Desktop / Tower Builds. 

Scroll down for rack mounted options.

PC Build – Z2

HP – Z2 G9 / Dell – Precision 3660

Processor #1 – i5 13600k (14 cores, 3.5GHz)
Processor #2 – N/A
Memory – 32GB DDR5 4800

• Memory DIMMS must be installed as 2 x 16GB sticks

HP Z Turbo Drive M.2 1TB TLC SSD
Plus… the correct GPU as defined in the list above.

PC Build – Z4
HP Z4 G5 / Dell Precision 5820
Processor #1 – W5-2445 (10 cores, 4.4GHz)
Processor #2 – N/A
RAM Memory – 32GB DDR5 4800

• Memory DIMMS must be installed as 2x 16GB (Dell – 4x 8GB)

HP Z Turbo Drive M.2 1TB TLC SSD
Plus… the correct GPU as defined in the list above.

PC Build – Z8 HD
HP Z8 G5 / Dell Precision 7960
HP – Processor #1 – Xeon 5415+ (8 cores, 4.1GHz)
HP – Processor #2 – Xeon 5415+ (8 cores, 4.1GHz)

Dell – Processor (single) – Xeon W5-3433

RAM Memory – 64GB DDR5 4800

• Memory DIMMS must be installed as 4x 16GB

HP Z Turbo Drive M.2 1TB TLC SSD
Plus… the correct GPU as defined in the list above.

PC Build – Z8 UHD
HP Z8 G5 / Dell Precision 7960
HP – Processor #1 – Xeon 6434 (8 cores, 4.1GHz)
HP – Processor #2 – Xeon 6434 (8 cores, 4.1GHz)

Dell – Processor (single) – Xeon W7-3455

RAM Memory – 128GB DDR5 4800

• Memory DIMMS must be installed as 8x 16GB

HP Z Turbo Drive M.2 2TB TLC SSD
Plus… the correct GPU as defined in the list above.

…………………………………………………………………………………….

Rack Mounted Builds. Required for uncompressed IP (ST2110)

Can also be used for SDI if rack mounted is the preferred form factor.

PC Build – ZC4R-Entry
HP ZCentral 4R
Processor #1 – Xeon W-2255 (10 cores, 3.7GHz)
Processor #2 – N/A
Memory – 32GB DDR4 2933MHz

• Memory DIMMS must be installed as 4 x 8GB sticks

HP Z Turbo Drive M.2 1TB TLC SSD
Plus… the correct GPU as defined in the list above.

PC Build – ZC4R-Single
HP ZCentral 4R
Processor #1 – Xeon W-2275 (14 cores, 3.3GHz)
Processor #2 – N/A
Memory – 32GB DDR4 2933MHz

• Memory DIMMS must be installed as 4 x 8GB sticks

HP Z Turbo Drive M.2 1TB TLC SSD

Plus… the correct GPU as defined in the list above.

PC Build – ZC4R-Dual
HP ZCentral 4R
Processor #1 – Xeon W-2295 (18 cores, 3.0GHz)
Processor #2 – N/A
RAM Memory – 64GB DDR4 2933MHz

• Memory DIMMS must be installed as 4x 16GB

HP Z Turbo Drive M.2 2TB TLC SSD
Plus… the correct GPU as defined in the list above.

Laptops are sometimes a viable alternative to full PCs, but may not be suitable for every application due to their slim dimensions. The suggested builds here would be suitable for Tactic telestration, or Swift CG / CG+ editing.

The 2 builds are similar but UHD processing and editing requires increased memory and a large screen size.

To add video I/O, you would need to add an external device connected via Thunderbolt 2 or 3. The 2 options we would suggest are:

1 – AJA Io 4k Plus.

• An all in one solution for video I/O

2 – Sonnet. An external chassis that supports PCIe cards.

• Available for low profile cards
  • AJA Corvid 44LP
• Available for full height cards
  • AJA Corvid 24
  • AJA Kona 1

Laptop Build – 1

HD ‘Entry Level’

HP ZBook Fury 16 G10

Processor #1 – i9-13900H (14 cores, 5.4GHz)

Memory – 32GB DDR5-5600

1TB PCIe NVMe Solid State Drive

GPU – NVidia 2000 ADA

Screen – minimum 15″

Laptop Build – 2

HD

HP ZBook Fury 16 G10

Processor #1 – i9-13900H (14 cores, 5.4GHz)

Memory – 32GB DDR5-5600

• Memory DIMMS must be installed as 2 x 16GB sticks

1TB PCIe NVMe Solid State Drive

GPU – NVidia RTX 4070

Screen- minimum 15″

Laptop Build – 3

UHD

HP ZBook Fury 16 G10

Processor #1 – i9-13950HX (24 cores, 5.5GHz)

Memory – 64GB DDR5-5600

• Memory DIMMS must be installed as 2 x 32GB sticks

2TB PCIe NVMe Solid State Drive

GPU – NVidia RTX 4080

Screen- minimum 16″

Virtualisation

If you are considering converged IT solutions, RT Software has experience of Cisco’s UCS and HP’s DL380 with VMware vSphere.

Please refer to the separate virtualisation page for more details.

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AWS

AWS Instance Types:

• Tactic Pro : g4dn.2xlarge / g5dn.2xlarge
• Tactic Lite : g4dn.xlarge / g5dn.xlarge

• Swift CG+ (3D) : g4dn.2xlarge / g5dn.2xlarge
• Swift CG (2D) : g4dn.xlarge / g5dn.xlarge

All types should be provisioned with

• 256Gb Disk
• 16Gb Memory
• Video files should be stored locally
• Video stream should be NDI

We support SDI, NDI and uncompressed IP video – ST2110.

For SDI we use AJA boards. For uncompressed video over IP we use NVIDIA/Mellanox boards. Details for both of these are found below.

For NDI, a dedicated network with high bandwidth and availability is ideal. Further information is available on the NDI website.

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AJA SDI Video I/O Boards

AJA has a long history of building high quality, reliable video devices for the video industry. With capabilities starting from single channel I/O to multiple, simultaneous I/O streams there is an AJA video card for every RT Software application.

AJA’s product line is constantly improving and evolving. Let us know if you would like to use a card not listed here.

The specs listed are an abbreviated set. For full information please refer to the AJA website.

You can also use AJA video devices on a Thunderbolt-enabled laptop:

Note, we do not recommend the Io-XT.

NVIDIA Bluefield-2 DPU / Mellanox IP Video I/O Boards for ST 2110 Workflows

NVIDIA acquired Mellanox in 2020 and RT Software supports certain Nvidia high performance, high bandwidth IP cards for ST 2110 workflows.

Note that the Nvidia Rivermax software is required for ST2110 support.

RT Software qualified the following boards, please call us to discuss if you wish to discuss the suitability of other cards (eg. half-height variants)

• These cards are full height and have been tested with the HP ZCentral 4R family.
• These cards require forced air cooling which is not available as standard in certain workstations including the HP Z series workstation family (Z2, Z4, Z6, Z8). RT Software recommends the HP ZCentral 4R family (1U rack) for use with NVIDA Bluefield cards for ST 2110 uncompressed IP video.
• There is also a Support item required for Rivermax to ensure correct spaced IP packets. Please contact us so we can advise on the correct part for you.

When considering the amount of bandwidth required for a project, these notes may give some basic pointers. Note – this is not intended to cover all the technical aspects of an installation and a proper analysis should be done by a customer’s projects team that is qualified in uncompressed IP workflows.

• PTP timing must be provided – typically by a grandmaster or boundary clock using SMPTE 2059-2
• If using ST2110, the video stream only is likely to be ST2110-20 and 1080i would consume approximately 1.1Gb/s of bandwidth.
• Audio – ST2110-30 (AES67) and Ancillary data (ST2110-40) consume additional bandwidth, so for the purposes of a basic evaluation it may help to assume 1.5Gb/s per stream when including all the component streams together. Currently ancillary data is not supported, so please check with us about this.
• Approximate bandwidth per stream for 1080p would be roughly double that of 1080i.
• The amount of available bandwidth on a card is bi-directional, so a 25GbE card can provide that simultaneously as both input and output streams.
• A 25GbE card should be capable of supporting 2 UHD streams in and 2 UHD streams out simultaneously.
• If considering redundancy using 2022-7, this would consume 50% of the available bandwidth.
  The 16GB on board memory provides the necessary buffering to ensure even paced video streams.

All numbers above are general and will be affected by many factors including frame rate. A detailed and thorough analysis should be undertaken before any purchase decisions are made.

We have been an NVidia GPU partner since 2001 and have a great deal of experience with their cards. We recommend that you always use a Quadro version of an NVidia board to ensure the performance meets expectations. We only test with Quadro cards and our benchmarks and PC build recommendations are based on these. Our PC Builds are based on the latest available NVidia boards (RTX A4000 – 6000 at the time of writing). If you have older cards you would like to use please contact us.

You should never compromise on GPU performance for an on air system. If however you believe you will only be using a system offline, for example a Swift CG Editor, it may be possible in some cases to use a lower performing card. This should not be done if you want to have a true preview test capability in the editor because the only way to really test what on air performance will be like is to use the same GPU.

Please also refer to our virtualisation page to understand more about vGPUs and NVidia GRID.

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All new systems should be installed on Windows 10 or 11, or Windows Server 2019. Older operating systems may not be supported by Microsoft, so this should be checked before going ahead with your project.

If you are purchasing an operating system for a locally bought PC, please use English language when installing to assist our support and engineering teams when commissioning your systems.

SWIFT

Note: the word ‘tOG’ below is the internal name used for the core code used in all Swift products.

tOG 4.6.5
Windows 10 x64
Windows Server 2016 x64 Standard
Windows Server 2019 x64 Standard

tOG 4.6.4
Windows 7 SP1 x64 Professional/Ultimate
Windows 10 x64
Windows Server 2012 R2 x64 Standard
Windows Server 2016 x64 Standard
Windows Server 2019 x64 Standard

tOG 4.6.3
Windows 7 SP1 x64 Professional/Ultimate
Windows 10 x64
Windows Server 2012 R2 x64 Standard
Windows Server 2016 x64 Standard

tOG 4.6.2
Windows 7 SP1 x64 Professional/Ultimate
Windows 10 x64
RedHat 5.5 64bit

RT Software graphics projects are compatible across operating systems. Driver availability may vary across operating systems. For further information please contact support@rtsw.co.uk

TACTIC

Tactic 5.4.2 and newer
Only supported on Windows 10 x64

Tactic 5.4.1 and older
Windows 7 SP1 x64 Professional/Ultimate
Windows 10 x64

Notes on technology choices

PCs

RT Software has had a long and successful relationship with HP PCs. We have test systems using the builds we recommend in our office and test lab which makes recreating any obscure problems you might find much quicker to identify. We have always found they provide good reliability and support, so for this reason we recommend using them.

We offer HP desktops with single PSUs or rack mounted with dual PSUs. We can also offer Dell servers as often recommended by our OEM partners for their solutions. Provided the models you select can provide the PCIe lanes and memory slots that we recommend there should be no problems. But please contact us so we can discuss before a purchase.

For more custom server builds you may want to consider SuperMicro. This can be useful sometimes if the location you need to install in is constrained in size, such as an OB truck.

Laptops

It is now possible to deliver broadcast graphics from a laptop. This can be useful when needing to travel, for example using Tactic in different sports arenas. However, using a laptop to deliver a complex virtual studio may lead to overheating, depending what your working environment is like. For a laptop to use a video I/O board you will probably be using an external device via Thunderbolt.

Please contact us if you are not sure, but if in doubt a PC is likely to be the better solution.

Tablets

Our telestrator and presentation software supports control by tablet, both Android and Apple. Wifi or cabled connections are supported. If you plan to use in a live show, you may want to give some consideration to avoiding wifi interference, or using a tablet that supports a cabled connection.

Tablets should have a resolution of 1920 x 1080 and run a Chrome browser.

Touchscreens

There’s a huge range of touchscreens available today. Its not possible for RT Software to test these individually, so we recommend using magazine buying guides. Some details to look out for include the distance from touchscreen to PC. This will usually be done via USB for communication, and video is often over HDMI. Both of these support a limited cable distance, so you would likely need cable extenders, especially if this is for a live, in-vision studio setup. Many companies provide these extenders. We have had a good experience when using Adderlink X-DVI PRO.

It has been known for bright studio lights to affect some touchscreens. If possible, arrange for a test in these conditions.

You may prefer to look into stylus controls rather than fingertips if using a tablet touchscreen, especially for a live presenter operation.

One of the technologies used in touchscreens is SAW. This can be more prone to false touches, so may be better avoided depending on your likely use of the tablet.

Controllers

Tactic operator control can be further enhanced by using Contour’s Shuttle Express, Shuttle Pro or Shuttle Pro2. Read more here.

GPIs

GPIs are supported using the Adlink Technology PCIe card. LPCIe-7230.

Possible accessories you may require include

• DIN-50S-01 Break out block
• ACL-10250-1 Cable

Please contact us to discuss how you plan to use GPIs.