Which mac is best for editing

sbricke6

sbricke6

New member
Im just converting to Mac from Windows becasue thats what my school uses and i am planning to buy a mac but im so confused on which one would be the best for editing, theres the powermac G5 and now they got the new iMac intel core duo or something, what is the the newest top of the line equipment i could buy for editing on macs?

-thanx
 
What do you want to edit?
If you're looking for DV editing - then any mac will do.
If you're looking for HD editing - then I would suggest looking at Mike Curtis' HD FAQ on HDforIndies.
He's got a lot of good info on what Mac system is needed for what kind of HD editing.
 
Luis Caffesse said:
True, but you don't always need the 'best' to get the job done.
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I agree with Luis. Take a look at what you need to do, then get the best machine you can reasonably afford. It would be nice to have the biggest, fastest... but if you don't need all the power get something that will do the job then upgrade later when you need it. With the way technology moves, you don't need to trying thinking what you'll need down the road, now, since it'll probably be outdated by the time you need it. One thing, though, get all the RAM you can afford.
 
sbricke6 said:
Im doind DV editing, which new mac would be the fastest
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Any new Mac will be up to the task of editing DV footage.
Getting a faster mac will allow you more realtime effects and layers of video.
A faster system will also allow for faster renders.

If you plan on doing much Motion Graphics work (after effects or motion) then you should look at getting a decent amount of RAM. Those things eat up RAM pretty quickly.

Honestly you should simply look at what you need to accomplish, and what you can afford. Keep in mind any additional expenditures. You may be better off getting a less expensive Mac and outfitting it with more drive space and RAM than getting a stripped down top of the line system.

But for the bare bones of DV editing, you're pretty much okay with any Mac as far as I know.
 
Man get a powerMAC for sure. Try and get the fastest one you can afford. Also get it bare bones to save money. Buy the RAM and hard disk space seperate, you save alot of money that way. I bought a bunch of ram from crucial.com and its great and a HECK of alot cheaper than buying it from Apple. I also buy seperate hard drives that are all linked up. Thats a whole lot cheaper too.
 
K i just didnt know if the New intel stuff was faster than the powermacs. but i guess its not. does anyone know the status of a G6? i knew apple was making model ideas.
 
It may be. But it's a moot question until they get FCP recompiled to run on the new Intel macs.

Right now FCP doesn't run at all on the Intel macs.

We won't know about FCP's relative performance until they release the Intel/Mac version, which should be around a month from now.
 
the imac is the best power to dollar ratio - g5 with a 17" monitor starting at $1299.

http://www.apple.com/imac/

I run FCP 5.0.1 on a 1.67 gHz G4 with 1.5 gigs ram and its pretty smooth. Motion (the application) is slow, but all the stuff that's supposed to render realtime in FCP does so.

As Barry mentioned - you need the old G5 chip - not the new Intel ones right now - but once FCP is configured to run on the intel chips -- well the Imacs will be twice as fast! that plus a monitor for $1299 -- wow!

maybe barry can say if the montor is up to par:

Built-in 17-inch (viewable) widescreen or 20-inch (viewable) widescreen TFT active-matrix liquid crystal display
Millions of colors at all resolutions
Typical viewing angle:
17-inch model
140° horizontal
120° vertical
20-inch model
170° horizontal
170° vertical
Typical brightness: 250 cd/m (17-inch model); 280 cd/m (20-inch model)
Typical contrast ratio: 500:1 (17-inch model); 800:1 (20-inch model)
 
I have a G5 dual 1.8 with 2 gigs of ram and it works quite well with FCP 4.5. You could pick up a decent used one for a resonable price.
 
sbricke6 said:
Im just converting to Mac from Windows becasue thats what my school uses and i am planning to buy a mac but im so confused on which one would be the best for editing, theres the powermac G5 and now they got the new iMac intel core duo or something, what is the the newest top of the line equipment i could buy for editing on macs?

-thanx
Click to expand...

right now the Power Mac Quad and Dual 2.7 dominate by far. If you want something with big balls, get one of those OR wait for the new wave of intel big balls (new Power Mac equivalents) to come out.

In tests they outrun the intel imacs hands down. But that's not surprising. An old Lamborghini can still outrace a brand new Kia....but the new Lamborghini's will beat the old Lambo's. Mac hasn't released the intel Lamborghini yet, but i'm sure it's on it's way.
 
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Buyer beware! I've recently purchased an iMac G5 and can honestly say that I am quite pleased with it with the exception of one thing.

Final Cut Pro 4.0 doesn't run because the iMac doesn't have an AGP graphic card. From my understanding, they've upgraded to PCI-Express.

Apparently (and I did some minor internet research on this), Final Cut Pro 5 recognizes this change and interacts with it well. However, if you're planning on getting an iMac and own Final Cut Pro 4 or below, be warned.

I hope this proves to be helpful for those of you looking into getting an iMac G5. Aside from that issue, it's a great buy!
 
You'll be on the safe side buying second revision model. I have iMac G5 20" with built in iSight which got outdated only three months after it showed up on the market by its flashy Intel based twin.

While my model is second revision of already best machine around, an Intel based Mac, with all due respect, is yet to carve its way through. I have a museum of over 20 Macs but Intel items are not yet qualified for my pick. I'll wait next year myself.

I'd advice you to buy a second hand machine since they are generally pumped up in all performance issues for a price slightly under brand new ones and or in this confusion, get advantage of a generational switch and discounts.

If you're not in a hurry, PowerMacs are supposed to be updated, as well as a complete line of laptops, so you'll be like in a candy store any time now.

I envy you :)
 
boo said:
if you got the money, get the quad. if not, then get a dual processor g5...
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Assuming either a dual or quad G5, where would one best spend money: RAM, CPU, graphics card? Say you begin with a dual G5, 4 GB, standard graphics card. I met a guy who does corporate work with this setup and he was complaining of the rendering times. Which makes me want to find out where the bottlenecks are? During a render with either the dual or quad, are all the CPUs locked up or can you multitask on the machine?
 
Depends what kind of rendering you're doing. RAM will give you the best extra boost of power, but faster hard drives and graphics card will also help.
Motion likes a faster graphics card and more than 2GB RAM. FCP likes a faster hard drive along with it's RAM.

You can still multitask while a render is going on, but I wouldn't recommend it - the render will take longer and whatever else you are doing will be slow.
 
get a good condition used dual processor g5...you'll save hundreds and still have overkill for sd editing...anytime i buy a new mac i get extremely pissed 3 months later when the new version comes out, so i try now to only get used...then you have more cash left to max out ram and maybe buy some other goodies too. i just got a dual 1.8ghz for about $1300, and there's no way you could tell a speed difference between it and the dual 2ghz that runs $1999.
 
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