FOCUS PRO

- Full-res 4K H.264 and HEVC playback, effects on
- Hardware encode for H.264 and HEVC delivery
- Separate NVMe for cache, scratch and previews
- VRAM for a working Resolve node tree
Your original camera media playing at full resolution. A grade that responds while you move the wheel. Exports measured in minutes. Tell us what you cut in and we’ll show you the machine built for it — FOCUS PRO for 4K without proxies, FOCUS MAX for 8K, RAW and heavy grades.
Four machines on one ladder. FOCUS PRO handles the everyday professional 4K load. FOCUS MAX steps up to 8K, RAW and heavy grading. CREATOR MAX is that same top-end performance in a machine quiet enough to mix beside. CREATOR COMPACT puts Pro-level editing into fourteen litres. All four can be configured before we build them.




Every editing app is held up by something different, so the same money buys a different machine depending on which one you open first. Here is where each puts the load, what it looks like when a machine is short of it, and which model we would start you on.
| Program | What it depends on | How it shows up | Start with |
|---|---|---|---|
CPU decode and single-core speed, then hardware encode — Quick Sync on Intel, NVENC on the card — for delivery. | Scrubbing backwards through long-GOP H.264 or HEVC, and the length of a Media Encoder queue at the end of the day. | Focus Pro4K multicam without proxies | |
GPU compute, and VRAM before anything else. Resolve runs out of video memory long before it runs out of speed. | A node tree that holds real time until noise reduction, Magic Mask or an optical flow retime goes on, then drops. | Focus Max8K, RAW and heavy grades | |
One fast core, then memory. Much of After Effects is still single-threaded, so clock speed counts for more than core count. | A RAM preview that takes longer to build than the shot runs, and an application that appears to freeze when memory runs short. | Creator MaxTop single-thread speed | |
Steady I/O and network bandwidth rather than peak clocks — plus certified, stable graphics drivers. | Full-resolution DNxHR playback off shared storage, large bins, and relinking across a facility. | Focus ProPlus a 10GbE card for the SAN | |
| Topaz Video AI | Sustained GPU load — heavier and longer-running than any grade asks for. | Upscales and frame interpolation that run for hours, on a card that has to hold its clocks the whole way. | Focus Max Or move the card up a step |
| Sapphire · Continuum · Red Giant | GPU, and more VRAM as the stack deepens. These are graphics work, not processor work. | An effects-heavy sequence that slows once several plugins stack on the same clip. | List them when you configure They change the card, not the CPU |
Where your recent jobs sit matters as much as which program you open. At the light end — 1080p to modest 4K, a handful of tracks, a look rather than a grade — camera H.264 plays without proxies on a mid-range Focus, and the rest of the budget is usually better spent on lenses. We will say so.
The daily professional load is long-GOP 4K from several cameras, a full Resolve grade with noise reduction on a node or two, and After Effects comps coming back into the cut. Above that — full-debayer RAW, heavy NR, optical flow, projects that stay open for months — proxies come back unless the machine is specified for it.
Five things decide how fast an edit feels. Here they are in the order that matters for post — what each one does, and what you notice when there is not enough of it.
Every scrub through long-GOP H.264 or HEVC is a decode job, and it lands here. The CPU also carries After Effects, which is still largely single-thread — so how fast one core runs matters as much as how many there are. Higher core counts shorten the export.
Resolve relies on the GPU far more heavily than Premiere does. Grading, noise reduction, optical flow and Magic Mask are all GPU work, and they run out of VRAM before they run out of speed. The card's encoder block is also what turns a long export into a short one.
Media belongs on one NVMe, cache and scratch on another, with the operating system on its own drive. That split is the least expensive effective upgrade in an edit suite, and it prevents the intermittent timeline hitches that are otherwise difficult to trace.
Memory covers streams, layers and RAM preview. Four angles of multicam with a couple of adjustment layers uses a large amount of it, and After Effects uses more again. Running short doesn't show up as slowness; it shows up as the application appearing to freeze.
An export is twenty minutes at full load, not a benchmark burst. Cooling determines whether the machine holds its clocks the whole way or begins throttling ten minutes in, and how much noise it makes over the full run.

Focus Pro · Focus Max · Creator Max · Creator Compact
Video editing and compositing performance for creators at every level. Whether you cut in Adobe Premiere Pro, After Effects, DaVinci Resolve or Avid Media Composer, there is a model built for it: FOCUS PRO for professional 4K, FOCUS MAX for 8K and RAW, CREATOR MAX when you want that performance to look and sound the part. Curated components, tested and benchmarked, so you can take on the heaviest projects with confidence.
Resolution gets the attention, but codec is what decides whether a timeline plays. 10-bit 4:2:2 H.265 from a mirrorless camera is compressed across long groups of frames, so every scrub backwards makes the machine rebuild frames it just threw away. ProRes, DNxHR, BRAW and R3D all behave differently on the same hardware. If playback falls over the moment you add a dissolve, the problem is decode — not raw power.
That is why we build around the media you actually shoot. A Sony A7S on HEVC needs a different machine to a Komodo on R3D, and both differ again from an Avid house pulling DNxHR off shared storage. Tell us the camera and the codec, and the answer stops being a guess.
Proxies exist because the hardware can't decode the camera media in real time. They cost you an ingest wait, a relink, and a grade you can't fully trust until you switch back to the original media. A configuration specified for the codec removes the need for them.
Hardware encode is what shortens exports. NVENC on the graphics card and Quick Sync on Intel chips do H.264 and HEVC in dedicated silicon instead of on general-purpose cores.
Cache and scratch on their own NVMe is the least expensive effective upgrade in an edit suite, and one that's often skipped.
Anyone can order the same parts. What you are really choosing is who builds the machine, who tests it before it ships, and who answers the phone when something goes wrong two years from now. That is where we are different.
4.9 on Google from over 4,200 customer reviews
Best Custom Desktop PC Brand 2020–2023
8 years of workstation builds — universities, studios and practices
Every system is checked as it is built, then stress-tested and fully updated before it leaves us — so problems are found here, not at your desk. It arrives ready to work, hand-foamed for safe transit anywhere in Australia. Four years of national awards say we get that right.
Full-system cover for three years, extendable to four — the whole machine, not a chain of separate component warranties you have to chase. If something happens in transit or years later, a dedicated team gets you running again. Support carries on for as long as you own it.
Add on-site servicing and we come to you. No packing it up, no courier, no waiting while it travels both ways — a technician diagnoses and repairs it where it sits. It is the difference between days of downtime and hours of it.
A dedicated workstation team — not a call centre — with eight years of these builds behind it, trusted by universities, studios and practices. Call or email and an Australian expert helps you match the right tool to the job — before you buy, and long after.
What we actually check before a machine is packed, how we specify one in the first place, what happens in year three, and an honest comparison against buying off the shelf or building it yourself.
Virtual production volumes, arena lighting shows and Epic’s own Unreal showcase. When a room full of screens has to stay in sync and nothing is allowed to drop a frame, this is the hardware behind it.

Our Hyperfocus workstation powers Dreamscreen’s 12 × 4.5m LED virtual production stage at their 950m² Epping studio — one of Australia’s most advanced filmmaking environments. Rendering immersive virtual sets in real time demands hardware that never drops a frame.

Systems for one of the largest lighting installations ever staged at PICA — the John Summit tour. Our hardware let the visual lighting crew simulate the full light show in pre-production, then drive the entire live installation on the night.

Invited as the official technology partner for Unreal Fest, supporting Epic Games’ showcase of Unreal Engine across virtual production, game development and real-time experiences.
Some of these relationships now run to several years and multiple deployments. Others began with a single machine.










Curated configurations held in stock and dispatched fast. Professionally built, tested and backed by Aftershock PC — no configuration required.
Start with the machine built for your software, then change what you like. We build, test and optimise it before it leaves us.
Tell us the camera, the codec and how many seats. We'll come back with a spec and a price — written enquiries answered within one business day.