I need a new Mac

[Barry_Green]

EDIT: realized now that the thread title is "I need a new Mac" -- so, never mind, scratch everything I said in here.

[berlinfool]

Thanks for your advice.

I think I'll buy the Mac Pro - looks like it will last a while.

I'm also dissappointed about the workflow with the Mac - it's just that Windows drives me crazy.

Any last thoughts?

[cheezweezl]

keep in mind the imac is basically a laptop built into a monitor. the imac and macbook pro will always be slower than a mac pro of the same speed. yes you can edit hvx footage on any of these. i do simple hvx cuts on my macbook (not pro) and it works fine. however once you start adding plugins, color correcting, jumping into motion or after effects the lower end macs will lose steam a lot quicker than the mac pro. so you can decide what you need your mac to do and how much power you really need.

barry, you know you can copy hvx footage into final cut directly from p2 cards without raylight or anything else. it does rewrap the clips as quicktime but all of the image data is preserved. i have used premiere, vegas, etc. and i think fcp blows them away in general. just my opinion.

berlinfool: if you want to use fcp and work with native p2 format, just get raylight. personally i don't see the big deal about ingesting into fcp. doesn't take that much time, but if you must, get raylight.

[NeverColdCall]

I have an iMac and a MacBook Pro and definitely want to get a Mac Pro as soon as the budget allows.

Having said that, neither of these computers does a BAD job in FCP, I'd just like for things to go a bit quicker.

The statement that an iMac is a laptop built into a monitor isn't completely untrue - the iMac actually uses a laptop processor to save space!!

[Barry_Green]

barry, you know you can copy hvx footage into final cut directly from p2 cards without raylight or anything else. it does rewrap the clips as quicktime but all of the image data is preserved.

Yes, of course. But doing so takes time, doubles the storage space, throws away the metadata, and makes files that are incompatible with Windows systems. No other editor asks you to make those compromises, I don't think FCP should either. Fortunately Mac users can select from a few options to get around this; Premiere Pro CS3 gives proper integrated MXF support, and both Raylight and HD Log provide instantaneous Quicktime proxy editing. Doesn't really solve the metadata issue, but at least it gives you instant editing without any of the other compromises.

Also, with the release of the Mac formatting tool, one of the major pains of using MacOS has been eliminated so it's becoming a friendlier-to-P2 platform.

berlinfool: if you want to use fcp and work with native p2 format, just get raylight. personally i don't see the big deal about ingesting into fcp. doesn't take that much time, but if you must, get raylight.

Everyone's workflow is different. When 64GB and 128GB cards come out, spending two hours to ingest footage instead of just editing off the cards immediately may be cumbersome or even prohibitive to some. Fortunately, Raylight (and also HD Log) have the ability to avoid this process entirely for FCP users.

[cheezweezl]

jeez. 128gb, i can't even imagine. that will be cool though. would you really edit from the cards? i guess you could if it is a quick edit but it seems like you would want to get the footage off the cards and make backups anyway. otherwise, you keep your cards tied up and have no backup. well maybe panny will start selling 128gb cards for like $20 and we can just shelf them like tapes and buy new ones for each project. THAT would be cool!!!

[Barry_Green]

I already do edit from the cards, for small stuff. For quick-turnaround shoots like news it's perfect for that.

As for cheap cards, if prices keep going the way they have we should have pretty affordable per-gig cards in a few years. We're at $50/gig now, which means we should be at $1/gig in about five years.

[miloca]

Not the Pro, just Macbook?

Thanks,

CCC

[Barry_Green]

No slot for P2 offloading.