Wow, yet another editing program to read about. Shame a video i saw said the free version doesn't use the GPU to render thus its slow needing to spend $400 to get the Studio version to avoid this issue.
Back with more substantial-ish information! I went ahead and downloaded the free version of Davinci Resolve 15 to confirm and test some things so here are my findings:
ΓÇó I found Resolve easier to use than Premiere Pro yet more time consuming due to understanding how to use its functionality better. I spent more time editing in resolve but also received a far better final image (in my opinion as someone who was originally trained on Final Cut Pro and used it for many years).
ΓÇó Resolve does use GPU acceleration in its free version from what it shows me in the settings; however, it only utilizes a maximum of one GPU. If your like me and have two GPUs your not using your full availability of hardware in Davinci Resolve's free version.
I then decided to perform an export speed test and did my best to keep as many environmental variables as consistent as possible but the grades did differ a bit including giving each program exactly 32.6GB of my system's ram and making sure each program was using CUDA acceleration.
Test Machine specs are AMD's Ryzen Threadripper 2950x, 64gb of ram and x2 EVGA 1080ti FTW3 cards. Programs were reading the media from a 7200 RPM IronWolf Pro drive and writing the export to another 7200 RPM IronWolf Pro drive.
In exporting a 12 minute video file that is color graded using each program's built in color grading tools (Premiere's Lumetri Color vs Davinci's Color Workspace) to a h.264 MP4 File:
-Premiere Pro completed the task in 3:21.16
-Davinci Resolve completed the task in 2:43.72
I like to think I also did a more complex job within Davinci Resolve due to understanding it better and would like to think if I had as much knowledge in Premiere that the gap could possibly be larger than is shown in this test. It is also widely known that Adobe Programs prefer Intel CPUs so that could also be playing a part in results.
Blackmagic literally made me a convert with its free version and I don't think I'm ever going back to Premiere after this. If I do end up purchasing one of their cameras I'll test the full version and see if there is a speed increase but its faster either way so far. I'm a fan!
Sorry for the long write up.... had a lot of time on my hands today