Af-100 post production on an imac?

[GRENCH]

Would this setup do the job for 4:2:2 footage via the AJA Ki Mini or NanoFlash? Looking to minimize rendering as much as possible while staying within a budget.

This package will run me around $2600.00.

1. Software:

• FCP 7
• AE CF5

2. Hardware:

• Apple IMAC
• 3.60GHz Intel Core i5
• 16GB 1333MHz DDR3 SDRAM - 4x4GB
• 1TB Serial ATA Drive
• ATI Radeon HD 5750 1GB GDDR5 SDRAM

[life4eva]

That's not a quad core processor. If you have the money to splurge I suggest getting the top of the line iMac which are quad core i5/i7 processors which can also have an external eSata mod done to them. If you are not looking to buy the top of the line iMac, then just get the base model for $1K which is a better value.

Personally if I had 2K to spend on a Computer no question it would be a Mac Pro, then a Top Of the line iMac

[xenogears]

The best you can do is invest in a MacPro, you will need hard drive space, and more memory, even a used MacPro is prefer to a Imac, for serious hard work a All in One computer is not the way.

My two cents
Cheers.

[GRENCH]

The best you can do is invest in a MacPro, you will need hard drive space, and more memory, even a used MacPro is prefer to a Imac, for serious hard work a All in One computer is not the way.

My two cents
Cheers.

Thanks guys. So a Quad core i5 processor with 16gb of memory wouldn't cut it? If I pay $2000.00 on a Mac Pro then I would still need a keyboard, mouse, additional monitor, and more memory. I would be well over $2500.00 easy. Unfortunately I don't have the money nore time to hold out based on current project demands. Right now I'm using a McBook Pro 2.16 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo with 4gb ram. Would the top shelf IMAC blow my current setup out of the water. I just want faster memory and processing. I have to wait for ever for footage to render my DSLR footage with this current setup (FYI-I convert my footage 1st using MPEG Stream Clip). I would think with a Quad core i5 processor and 16gb of ram the IMAC would be lightening fast and would work well with my current 7D footage as well as my future AF-100 footage.

[David Saraceno]

Any way you look at it, you will need to edit pro res.

An iMac provides one Firewire bus, and that's it.

It's your call, but a MacPro used or refurbished makes much more sense.

[life4eva]

Thanks guys. So a Quad core i5 processor with 16gb of memory wouldn't cut it? If I pay $2000.00 on a Mac Pro then I would still need a keyboard, mouse, additional monitor, and more memory. I would be well over $2500.00 easy. Unfortunately I don't have the money nore time to hold out based on current project demands. Right now I'm using a McBook Pro 2.16 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo with 4gb ram. Would the top shelf IMAC blow my current setup out of the water. I just want faster memory and processing. I have to wait for ever for footage to render my DSLR footage with this current setup (FYI-I convert my footage 1st using MPEG Stream Clip). I would think with a Quad core i5 processor and 16gb of ram the IMAC would be lightening fast and would work well with my current 7D footage as well as my future AF-100 footage.

16gbs of ram is not going to increase the speed of your iMac and also will cost you a lot of money
( close to $700-800 ). Personally I believe 8gbs of ram if only working in FCP will be very good so you can save some money.

Also you can look into buying a refurbished iMac
http://store.apple.com/us/browse/hom...co=MTkyMTQ5NDQ

Some really nice deals on there. Finally yes these iMac computers will fly through your dslr footage. I currently am using a 3.06ghz iMac i3 with 8gbs of ram with an external firewire 800 and everything is butter smooth.

I only payed $1K for it though, so when you think about price/performance it was a no brainer. In the future when things get better I will pick up a Mac pro, but for now and as a small person doing a couple projects ( like 4 ) a month it works fine.

[GRENCH]

Thanks Life4eva! I missed your post before posting the following. I'm checking the site now. For that price I can put off buying a bigger computer for a little while. That AF-100 is making things a little tight by money standards. So to get my hands on something for about $1000-1400 would be great.

Any way you look at it, you will need to edit pro res.

An iMac provides one Firewire bus, and that's it.

It's your call, but a MacPro used or refurbished makes much more sense.

Thanks David,

Can't argue with that. OK here is what I'm looking at for around $1850.00 if I go with the Mac Pro.

* Two Intel Quad Core Xeon 2.8ghz E5462 (Harpertown/Penryn) processors
- 12MB of shared L2 cache per processor
- 128-bit SSE4 vector engine
- 64-bit data paths and registers
- Energy efficiency optimization
* 1.6GHz, 64-bit dual independent frontside buses

* 8GB of 800MHz DDR2 ECC fully buffered DIMM (FB-DIMM) memory
* Eight FB-DIMM slots on two memory riser cards (four slots per card) supporting up to 32GB of main memory
* 256-bit-wide memory architecture

* Nvidia Geforce 8800gt card with 512MB of GDDR3 SDRAM, one DVI port (dual-link) and one Mini-DisplayPort, Supports 2 displays simultaneously per card

* PCI Express 2.0
* 64bit EFI

* Two independent 10/100/1000BASE-T Ethernet (RJ-45) interfaces with support for jumbo frames

* 2.3TB drive SATA II 3Gb/s

HD1 - OS drive - 300 GB
HD2 - 500 GB
HD3 - 1.5 TB

Total - 2.3 TB

* 16x SuperDrive with double-layer support (DVD+R DL/DVD±RW/CD-RW). 2nd slot empty. Great to add a Blue Ray burner!

* Ports: One (2) FireWire 800, Two (2) FireWire 400, Six(6) USB 2.0, Optical Digital & Analag IN-Out
* Bluetooth

* Apple Keyboard
* Mighty Mouse

* Power cord

*Software Included:

Adobe CS4 Design Premium (Student Edition)

Final Cut Studio 2 (Student Edition)

Apple ILife 09

OSX 10.5.1 (pre-installed)

Would this get me out of the gate? What should I look to replace or update besides FCP and CS4?

[Jaime Valles]

An iMac provides one Firewire bus, and that's it.

Not if you add an eSATA port: http://eshop.macsales.com/shop/turnkey/iMac_2010_27
The 2.8GHz Quad-core i5 27" iMac with eSATA port mod should run about $2200. That's what I'd go for. That, or a Hackintosh...

[Mike@AF]

I had a 2007 Mac Pro 8-core 3.0GHz and sold it and got a new 17" MacBook Pro with 2.66 i7. I added an eSATA card to it and it works awesome, and in some cases actually better than my old Mac Pro. I even graded a Red project using R3D files in Color with no issues other than long rendering times when I was finished. AF100 footage transcoded to ProRes I don't see as being an issue on an iMac, even with FireWire. You'll get little real-time capability with multiple tracks and effects and your rendering times won't be stellar, but it will work. If I didn't need a portable solution I'd probably have an iMac at this point. I have no regrets about selling my Mac Pro. It's important to evaluate your needs and what you're willing to accept as limitations and go from there.

[life4eva]

I had a 2007 Mac Pro 8-core 3.0GHz and sold it and got a new 17" MacBook Pro with 2.66 i7. I added an eSATA card to it and it works awesome, and in some cases actually better than my old Mac Pro. I even graded a Red project using R3D files in Color with no issues other than long rendering times when I was finished. AF100 footage transcoded to ProRes I don't see as being an issue on an iMac, even with FireWire. You'll get little real-time capability with multiple tracks and effects and your rendering times won't be stellar, but it will work. If I didn't need a portable solution I'd probably have an iMac at this point. I have no regrets about selling my Mac Pro. It's important to evaluate your needs and what you're willing to accept as limitations and go from there.

The Desktop i3 processor inside of the Base Model iMac is Faster than the mobile processor i7 inside of the Macbook Pro. The main advantage of the MBP though ( 17" ) is the express card slot which has all kind of upgrade options.

The iMac 21.5" is also handicapped by only having one firewire 800 connection as well. But if you want to talk about speed and performance the Base Model iMac is a faster computer than ANY Mac Book Pro. Basically the laptops use a different kind of processor than the desktop versions. So an i5/i7 in an imac is different than an i5/i7 in their laptops.