MacPro / should I

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well i came across a mac pro for $1300.00, has everything you could think of, 20" apple cinema display, keyboard, mouse, speaker system with subwoofer and more. tell you id love to have it but im trying to talk myself into getting it. ive owned a powermac g4 digital for many years now without any problems at all. all and all what kind of improvements am i going to see over my old g4 with this pro ?
 

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well i came across a mac pro for $1300.00, has everything you could think of, 20" apple cinema display, keyboard, mouse, speaker system with subwoofer and more. tell you id love to have it but im trying to talk myself into getting it. ive owned a powermac g4 digital for many years now without any problems at all. all and all what kind of improvements am i going to see over my old g4 with this pro ?

Would need specifics on the MacPro to go into details, but two things you should gain.

1) Speed - slowest benchmark I've seen for early MacPros in is the 4000 range, about 3 to 4 times your G4
2) Ability to run the latest OS (including Lion)
 
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well after thinking about the $1300.00 im leaning more towards a g5. i know it will be a upgrade from my g4 and i can buy one of these for $200.00 to my door.
 

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Only you know your budget and usage, but $1300 for a complete system (providing it's in good shape) seems reasonable to me, though honestly I don't stay up on the price of used equipment like some of the guys here.

EDIT: may be worth going to Mac2Sell and entering the specifics on the system you are looking at.
 
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i think im going with this g5. looks good. im sure it will be a improvement over my old g4 digital audio.

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well after thinking about the $1300.00 im leaning more towards a g5. i know it will be a upgrade from my g4 and i can buy one of these for $200.00 to my door.

A G5 is better than your current G4...but a Macintosh G5 based computer is no Mac Pro.

If you have $1300 to spend (and you don't mind spending it)...I would recommend getting an iMac (anything listed in the link below):

iMac 21.5" - Apple Store (U.S.)

HTH,

- Nick
 
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went with the G5. now i need to find out which firewire cable to get, 6 - 9, or 4 - 9 pin.
 

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went with the G5. now i need to find out which firewire cable to get, 6 - 9, or 4 - 9 pin.

Sounds like what should be asked is...whether you need firewire 400 or 800.

I think that you'll find the G5 to be faster than your old G4...but a G5 still has a fair number of limitations vs. an Intel based Mac.

- Nick

Edit: Just looked up the specs on Powermac G5's (2.0ghz). There are 3 different models...and all 3 have at least one firewire 400, and at least one firewire 800 port...so either cable you get will fit one of the ports on the Powermac G5. So you would need to find out what what sort of port you have on other device(s) this cable will be plugged into (400 or 800)...to know which cable to get.
 
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would of loved of been able to of justified buying the intel mac but just couldnt. these are the specs i found on the unit im getting. id like to have the cable here before i get the g5. i have a 4 pin to 4 pin now that ive used in the past for going from my old g3 to my g4.

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would of loved of been able to of justified buying the intel mac but just couldnt. these are the specs i found on the unit im getting. id like to have the cable here before i get the g5. i have a 4 pin to 4 pin now that ive used in the past for going from my old g3 to my g4.

Your Powermac G5 has 2 firewire 400 ports, and 1 firewire 800 port. So either cable will work with the Powermac G5. If you're going to run this firewire cable from your Powermac G5 to another device...you need to determine what sort of port the "other device" has before purchasing the cable.

- Nick
 
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they both have the 400 ports. i talked to apple about going to leopard on the g5 and he told me to make sure i got a 10.5.4 version so it would update to 10.5.8 or .9, cant really remember now but did write down the 10.5.4. i can buy 10.5 for a lot less than the 10.5.4. if i bought the 10.5 wouldnt it update to 10.5.8 also ?
 

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i talked to apple about going to leopard on the g5 and he told me to make sure i got a 10.5.4 version so it would update to 10.5.8 or .9, cant really remember now but did write down the 10.5.4. i can buy 10.5 for a lot less than the 10.5.4. if i bought the 10.5 wouldnt it update to 10.5.8 also ?

You're absolutely correct. ANY 10.5 install disk (as long as it's a retail/black disk) will install just fine on any Powermac G5 with a 2.0ghz cpu. And yes...ANY black/retail 10.5 install disc will update to OS 10.5.8.

Good luck,:)

- Nick
 
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went ahead and also bought the macpro. dont know if i made a good choice or not. dont really know anything about these macpros, which models are better, or worse.

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Sweet, that one benchmarked at 4833 according to MacTracker. You can pump the RAM up to 32Gb if you wish.
 
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think i got a good macpro then ? also comes with = now i did pay $950.00 for it. not sure if thats a fair price or not.

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RavingMac

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think i got a good macpro then ? also comes with = now i did pay $950.00 for it. not sure if thats a fair price or not.

If everything works then looks like a great deal to me. I love my Magic Trackpad and paid $69 for it alone.
 
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i did some searching on all items that come with it. figured the extras alone added up to a couple hundred dollars. plus everything is intel now. prices have really come down on these machines, and i mean a lot. did a little reading on the trackpad and looks like its pretty cool. all i need to do now is some more searching on how to transfer my files from my old g4 to my new macpro. i see where migration assistant is good and where carbon copy cloner is good. a apple tech said to use migration assistant.
 

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i did some searching on all items that come with it. figured the extras alone added up to a couple hundred dollars. plus everything is intel now. prices have really come down on these machines, and i mean a lot. did a little reading on the trackpad and looks like its pretty cool. all i need to do now is some more searching on how to transfer my files from my old g4 to my new macpro. i see where migration assistant is good and where carbon copy cloner is good. a apple tech said to use migration assistant.

Never used CCC so I can't comment on it. Migration assistant using FireWire cable and booting in Target mode works great (as does migrating from a TM backup).
Does your new beast come with OS disks? If not, may want to pop $29 for the Snow Leopard set from Apple. It is a full OS and will come in handy.
 
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no disc included but already has lion installed. so then i should be on my g4 monitor and transfer from there rather than being on my macpro. monitor.

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