Mac or not to Mac that is the question

Ok, here's my run down, being a 12+ year PC user and software engineer (Symantec Ghost) who switched to Macs solely about 4 months ago after trialling a Mac Mini for about 8 months. And no, this isn't a PC bashing affair, and I'll cover more than just editing. NOTE: There is a lot of subjectivity here.

One impetus for switching to Macs was that I was bored with PC's. I was sick of the ugly interface and non responsiveness compared to some Macs I'd been seeing lately which had piqued my interest. Being a games developer in the past I always had a thing for smooth, graphical UI's. Windows loses here bigtime compared to a Mac. I also considered a Mac for other reasons of course, including, learning to program a new platform, and learning FCP. The NLE I use had to be one that I could use for my own projects primarily but offered some secondary advantage for outside work. Also, FC Studio attracted me, with DVD studio being miles ahead of DVDA, and Livetype was sexy. Throw in Soundtrack and Motion too and you have some very nice software. Of course it's more expensive than Vegas.

In short I'm getting grumpier the older I get and the more I use PC's. Aint got time to dick around with flaky software, non responsive OS's, and troubleshooting my computer every month (As someone said, it's love hate with PC's). I have jobs to do, and want to do them smoothly.

Here's my summary:

MAC PROS

Integrated software is nice. iLife is funky if you want to easily manage photos, webpages and all that stuff. I don't have time to fiddle with complicated pieces of software nowadays, I just want to get stuff done. iLife is good at that. And it comes with the machine, Windows lacks all that Out Of The Box power.

USB keyrings and external drives, when connected show up fast and silently. Cameras etc are generally handled better IMO.

Software on the whole (Apart from XCode which is awful) has a nice UI, intuitive, smooth. I think developers try and pride themselves on good UI's on the Mac. Not so on the PC (Apart from the Picasa people)

NO REGISTRY! Lots of apps don't require installation as they just have 1 file housing everything. So you can delete or move them by dragging a single Icon. I really do think this is a good thing; for users and developers.

It's *nix based so you can do a lot more at the lower levels if you desire.

Spotlight - It's pretty fast and does the trick.

FCP Keyframe editing while bad, is better than Vegas' lame attempt.

FCP project level media management is ahead of Vegas'

Once you're used to FCP, editing in it is fast. 3 point edits, shifting events by numbers quickly and other really nice things.


MAC CONS

The Finder is nothing to write home about. You can navigate around and do the usual things but it's functionality is lacking and it's a little awkward. For instance, there is no "cut" file...Seriously.

Finder is delicate. I've had my Mac freeze on me when I inserted a USB keyring, that I assume it had trouble recognising or somesuch. Likewise when I put a bad DVD in the drive, couldn't eject it and Finder froze. Had to remove the drive.

FCP's interface is slow. I have a Dual Core 2.0Ghz Powermac. Try opening the effects window and highlighting an effect. The lag is horrid.

Startup is slow takes a couple minutes to boot.

Vegas is LIGHTNING fast and I still think it's realtime performance is un beaten short of hardware cards - I REALLY MISS IT for some things.

Vegas is format agnostic. FCP can try to be, but really it needs Quicktime files for best performance.

Vegas prviews effects right in the effect window. FCP can't

There is (AFAIK) no 'curves' feature as standard in FCP. (If someone knows where it's hiding, let me know!)



So in summary, I'd say if you want more of a smoother user experience, are interested in something a little more standard and powerful as far as NLE's go, or are just sick of PC's and want something 'sexy' then try a Mac.

I think they're much of a muchness really, and after being a Mac owner solely for 4 months, I'm 50/50 about the decision I made, and to be honest, I was hoping I wouldn't be and would have got more value from my Mac than I have so far. Especially when I take price into consideration. Could have got myself an upgrade to a DVX100b, 35mm adapter and some speakers for the cost of the Mac.

If you can borrow someone's for about 2 weeks, I think you'll get a feel for whether you like it or not. Also, right now, I think I'd consider a 20 inch iMac over almost any PowerMac once FCP dual binaries come out. You'd have to research but I don't think there's much the PowerMac can do that the iMac can't now that the iMac can do dual displays.

Aaron
 
Get a Mac.

Get a Mac.

Why? Final Cut Studio.
Final Cut Pro, Motion, Live Type, Soundtrack Pro, Motion 2, DVD Studio Pro, Cinema Tools
it's a killer suite. And ideal for the HVX.

And if you can get your hands on a Soundtrack Pro, or Motion 2, or DVD Studio Pro 4 (on eBay perhaps...) you can take advantage of the Apple upgrade program, and trade in your disc to get the new universal Final Cut Studio suite for $199. Did I say $199.? Yes. (it retails for $1300.) Details here.

Damn, just a few years back Cinema Tools alone was $1,000!!!
 
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Here is one compelling reason to use Macs: In our studio we like to have the latest, fasted workstations. To help afford to do this, we sell the macs on ebay when they get to be months old. We have consistently seem to recoup about a 66% of the original price...and when there is a price drop...at least 50%. Try that with PCs.

The simply amazing & elegant FCP is a bonus.
 
Hi:

Some very good points, both good and bad for the Mac and PC raised here. For me, I just find all computers picky and strange, at times they seem to almost animate. FCP is great and I think will come to basically take over the video editing industry in time. AVID has a good foothold (I work at an AVID based prodco with 9 Xpress DV Pros and a Symphony Nitris) and will for a while but when my $8,000.00 FCP system does 90% of what a $90,000.00 AVID does, the writing is on the wall.

Best,

Dan
 
Aza said:
FCP's interface is slow. I have a Dual Core 2.0Ghz Powermac. Try opening the effects window and highlighting an effect. The lag is horrid.

Startup is slow takes a couple minutes to boot.


Aaron
Click to expand...

What are you talking about? I have a dual 2.5, only a bit faster than yours and FCP blazes on it. Opens in 10-15 sec tops.
 
JesterJJZ said:
What are you talking about? I have a dual 2.5, only a bit faster than yours and FCP blazes on it. Opens in 10-15 sec tops.
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my dual 2.7 boots up in seconds.....acouple minutes doesnt make sense.
whats your ram???
 
I've used Final Cut on everything from 500 Mhz G3 PowerBooks to my current Quad G5 (and many systems in between). It's never been slow. I don't know what kind of "lag" you're refering to, but I've never seen it.

Back to the general point of this thread: the Mac video editing experience isn't just about Final Cut, it's something much broader. From a software standpoint, Apple makes FInal Cut, but also all the other applications you'd need to put finished products together--Motion, Soundtrack Pro, LiveType, DVD Studio Pro, Logic, and even Shake. These are all world-class apps in their categories and price ranges, and they are all more or less designed to work together (and usually succeed in that attempt!). The only company that comes close to this level of multi-app integration is Adobe, and I personally don't think Adobe is as quick in improving its products (other than PhotoShop and After Effects), or innovative. As for Avid, it bundles a bunch of software together, but as a whole, its support apps don't feel like the finely-tuned-and-tightly-integrated system that Apple's media apps are.

But that's just the software side. Apple excels even more because it ALSO makes the hardware, and the end result is that the apps are more stable, and they squeeze more performance out of said hardware. You could point to exceptions, but on the whole, it's been my experience that this is the case.

In the end, it's ARGUBLE that Macs are more expensive than PCs when you factor in hidden costs such as maintenance time and $...but even if the Mac has a higher price tag, it's not by higher by much. And while the PC has more software choices, I tend not to care because the Mac has the cream of the crop. The PC has 5 different video editors? In my mind, that just fragments the market, and creates 4 more opportunities for me to buy a product that may have one particular strength, but can't deliver the whole well-oiled machine that Apple does in Final Cut Studio, and other apps.
 
Sorry Jester, the start up time was referring to the maching, not FCP. FCP is quite responsive when scrubbing, but the general interface is not as responsive. Now I'm talking relative here. Try Vegas, it's instantaneous with almost everything it does.

FCP isn't a dog, (Except for the aformentioned highlighting of effects) but Vegas is better IMO.

That's why I suggest he trial one, simply because opinions are just that, opinions. What might be fine for you, might not for me.


JesterJJZ said:
What are you talking about? I have a dual 2.5, only a bit faster than yours and FCP blazes on it. Opens in 10-15 sec tops.
Click to expand...
 
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I have about 1.5G of RAM. For whatever reason (Maybe my network holds the whole process up for some reasons- can't see why as it's just a basic home one) but it does take a while to boot - a lot longer than my XP box did and I thought that was bad.

esperman said:
my dual 2.7 boots up in seconds.....acouple minutes doesnt make sense.
whats your ram???
Click to expand...
 
Aza said:
I have about 1.5G of RAM. For whatever reason (Maybe my network holds the whole process up for some reasons- can't see why as it's just a basic home one) but it does take a while to boot - a lot longer than my XP box did and I thought that was bad.
Click to expand...
hmmm.....thats odd. There is something not right here.
 
Aza said:
Sorry Jester, the start up time was referring to the maching, not FCP. FCP is quite responsive when scrubbing, but the general interface is not as responsive. Now I'm talking relative here. Try Vegas, it's instantaneous with almost everything it does.

FCP isn't a dog, (Except for the aformentioned highlighting of effects) but Vegas is better IMO.

That's why I suggest he trial one, simply because opinions are just that, opinions. What might be fine for you, might not for me.
Click to expand...

Hmm...Just about every Mac I've used can boot up within about 30 sec. Can't say the same for PCs.
 
OK timed it. This was noticeably faster than what it normally takes to boot, and I got 1 minute 10 seconds to get to the logon screen. Normally it's longer as I said and I think it would hit close to 2 minutes at times. This is strange for sure. Especially getting 2 different times, both much longer than you all get. It seem if I'm booting from a 'warmed' up machine it's faster to boot. i.e. If I turn it off, then straight on again it's faster (still over 1 minutes). If I boot it up after it being off all night, it takes longer.

Now I'm actually getting concerned.
 
Aza said:
OK timed it. This was noticeably faster than what it normally takes to boot, and I got 1 minute 10 seconds to get to the logon screen. Normally it's longer as I said and I think it would hit close to 2 minutes at times. This is strange for sure. Especially getting 2 different times, both much longer than you all get. It seem if I'm booting from a 'warmed' up machine it's faster to boot. i.e. If I turn it off, then straight on again it's faster (still over 1 minutes). If I boot it up after it being off all night, it takes longer.

Now I'm actually getting concerned.
Click to expand...

Run Mac Janitor, epair your permissions and clear your parameter ram. Maybe your Mac just needs a little attention...
 
I ran some repair tool last night and that helped a little but not a HUGE amount. I then ran, looking at the boot process (Command - V) and I notices that immediately after printing the MAC address of my ethernet devices, the hard drive stops and that machine just "sits there" for about 30-40 seconds. This is the killer of the whole operation.

Any ideas about what it's doing and how to stop it doing it?
 
Do try cleaning up your PRAM! (You know, restart, and after the tone press: cmd+opt+P+R hold them pressed until the fourth tone is heard (four including the first tone) and release.

Try restarting your machine unplugged from the network.

Also, check if your system preferences for HD energy saving is off. My Mac used to stop spinning the HDs when they were not in imidiate use. That was very frustrating...

Good Luck!
 
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