Ideal Powermac For Video (final Cut)

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Hey,
I wish i was on a Bill Gates budget. But I have to make the best of my $.

I'm interested in purchasing a PowerMac G5 (And can not commit to anything over $2000. I did find a deal for a refurbished Power Mac G5 Dual 2GHz for $1700.

Of course I will max out the ram and put (2) 500 gig harddrives in there.

My question from experience users, will this machine suffice for basic final cut pro work (music videos) and flash (FLV processing)?

If I had the budget to buy any G5 now, what would you reccomend?
And whats the least G5 to buy if you wanted to work on final cut but had a limited budget.

Hey if its worth waiting and saving some more pennies, then it may be worth it. But waiting for ever as new G5s roll out occassionally, isn't cool.

Anyones feedback is greatly appreciated!
 
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Well there will be no more new G5s produced as they have been discontinued, but they are still good for video editing. If you want the maxed out version the quad G5 is the best G5 you can get, although still very expensive. I would say the least G5 you should get for video editing would be a dual 2.3ghz model, but it really depends on what you are going to be editing, that recommendation is based on you editing music videos with special effects but in standard definition. If you are planning on editing HD any time soon, you may want to look at the faster models.
 
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A friend sent me this reply and I wanted to share it with you all:

What's important more than power is having adequate RAM and big fast disks. That refurb is a bit steep for me. You should factor in adding the cost of more RAM disk space and software, it will be killer. While PowerPC is very fast. Core 2 Duo laptop at 2.16GHz I found is as fast as my Dual 2 GHz G5. But my G5 is 3+ years old and is a desktop. The power of laptops have cought up to the desktops, I would look in that direction, and use external FW800 drives for your movies. I've used an external drive for my HD movie done it iMovieHD, it works just fine.


http://store.apple.com/AppleStore/W...6214008/wo/jM2biaCJc7Ac36LyFJ61iQtsCBN/2.?p=0
 
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He is working in iMovie not Final Cut and there is a difference. Don't spend the extra money on a laptop if you are going to go new. If you are going to go new go for the mac pro and max out the video card, then add after market ram. You said you were on a tight budget then you show a maxed out macbook pro with a 30 inch screen, so are you on a budget or are you looking to spend close to 5 thousand?
 
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lol!
dag shoot me down!
But seriously! Thanks for the feedback. What you said is entirely true.
First, i don't want to edit on a powerbook. Especially since you can't upgrade certain aspects.

I was going to buy this refurbished powermac g5:

http://store.apple.com/1-800-MY-APPLE/WebObjects/AppleStore?cid=AOSA10000007879&cpncode=08-19894747-2&srccode=cii_16079562&productLearnMore=F9590LL%2FA

what do you think?

I am not currently using special effects in my music video but I am heading that way. So getting a 2.3ghz G5 might be worth the wait.

Ram will be the most essential. I will probably have to sell my quicksilver and old powerbook just to get some decent ram in there.

Do you have any recommended vendors that I should check out? Or just stick w/Apple.

Thx!





wh
He is working in iMovie not Final Cut and there is a difference. Don't spend the extra money on a laptop if you are going to go new. If you are going to go new go for the mac pro and max out the video card, then add after market ram. You said you were on a tight budget then you show a maxed out macbook pro with a 30 inch screen, so are you on a budget or are you looking to spend close to 5 thousand?
 
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Yes that computer should suit you fine for now, unless you have the time to wait for a better computer to do more special effects in less time. You can always upgrade the graphics card later if you would like to get the computer you linked me to now, then thats fine. I would suggest putting atleast 2gb of ram in there, but on my video editing machine I have 4gb of ram, but thats mainly because of shake and shake likes alot of ram. You can get ram fromc crucial.com or newegg.com both are good sites for good cheap ram.
 
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" I would suggest putting atleast 2gb of ram in there, but on my video editing machine I have 4gb of ram"

What machine are your using final cut on now?

4gig ram from crucial is $500

I am working on a quicksilver now but I'm patiently waiting and tempting to go with the previous link i sent you (dual core 2 ghz)....should i hold out till Apple's expo?

Dieing to put my sony pd150 and final cut to use without wasting time watching basic transitions render.

By the way, does anyone know if one can use a sony pd150 to record to an external harddrive instead of a mini-divi? Or recommend a website to do this research. If not, i can always check with a vendor in town. But just checking for extra resouces.

Thx all!
 
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look for the dual 2.7. since those are around a year old you can get them if the 1,700 dollar range. The only powermac faster than that is the quad.
 
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Pb,
Do you have samples of your work that I could check out? Stuff you used w/Quake? I'm curious.

best,


Yes that computer should suit you fine for now, unless you have the time to wait for a better computer to do more special effects in less time. You can always upgrade the graphics card later if you would like to get the computer you linked me to now, then thats fine. I would suggest putting atleast 2gb of ram in there, but on my video editing machine I have 4gb of ram, but thats mainly because of shake and shake likes alot of ram. You can get ram fromc crucial.com or newegg.com both are good sites for good cheap ram.
 
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Editing with FCP and Dual G5

I have been editing SD movies on a 2gig dual g5, 4 gigs ram( Jan. 2005 model) with absolutely no problem for several years. I use lots of simple effects, text, transitions, etc and find the system very fast.

However, I am now trying to figure out what system I need to edit HD natively. Lots of options.

Best, Connie
 
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Pb,
Do you have samples of your work that I could check out? Stuff you used w/Quake? I'm curious.

best,

I don't have any samples of shake work on the web.. I currently don't have any samples on my computer for a quick upload either.. all shake intensive work is probably not going to come around again until april/ june.. Around then I might post a link to the work in this this forum and send you a pm letting you know its here. If I get the chance around then.. You should consider getting shake when you get your computer, but I would also recomend getting a black magic decklink card for your computer as well. IT allows you to view your work from shake, after effects, and even photoshop on and external monitor.
 
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I have been editing SD movies on a 2gig dual g5, 4 gigs ram( Jan. 2005 model) with absolutely no problem for several years. I use lots of simple effects, text, transitions, etc and find the system very fast.

However, I am now trying to figure out what system I need to edit HD natively. Lots of options.

Best, Connie

Did you look at the Mac-pro? If you want to keep all your software with out upgrading then look at the quad g5, it supports native HD quite well.

Also look at this hard ware upgrade:
http://www.blackmagic-design.com/products/hd/

they do more then just capture the HD footage. They actually help with performance and real time effects.
 
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Did you look at the Mac-pro? If you want to keep all your software with out upgrading then look at the quad g5, it supports native HD quite well.

Also look at this hard ware upgrade:
http://www.blackmagic-design.com/products/hd/

they do more then just capture the HD footage. They actually help with performance and real time effects.

cool does it have a littloe cpu in it or somthing?
 

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