Mac-mini w/intel good for video editing?

I'm looking for an affordable Mac to run Final Cut Pro Studio. Has anyone used the Mac Mini with the Intel chip to run FCP studio successfully? I need it to handle several layers of video and possibly HD content. THANKS.

Short Answer: No

Long Answer: Reply if you really want it, some one (or myself) I'm sure will fill you in.

only option at the moment

well, unfortunately its the only Mac within my price range at the moment. I was thinking of the 1.66Ghz with 1.5Gb RAM. The way I rationalized it was that a friend is running FCP 4 on a G4 with 1Ghz and 1.5Gb RAM with no problem. Seeing that the new mini matches these specs pretty closely and is equipped with the new Intel chip I was hoping it would run smoothly. I'm hoping to get a response from someone out there who's already attempted to use FCP studio on the mini. anyone......anyone.....

The Dual Core will probably handle it.

I don't see any reason why it wouldn't be fine. Sure, it won't run as fast or as efficiently as it would on a G5 or larger desktop model, but it will be able to do the job.

In theory it should run, but you would have to max out the memory and it would still be painfully slow compared to a G5 or an iMac.

i run it on 1.25 G4 mini. unless you do lots of keyframe animation and rendering mini will do just fine

MAC-simus said:

i run it on 1.25 G4 mini. unless you do lots of keyframe animation and rendering mini will do just fine

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If you don't do rendering then that kind of defeats the purpose of FCP, iMovie or FCE would be better (and faster).

I don't think you can run Motion 2 with the GPU in the mini, everything else should be fine since they aren't terribly GPU dependent(I think).

Something about running a $1300 application on an $800 system just doesn't sound right though.

Benjamindaines said:

If you don't do rendering then that kind of defeats the purpose of FCP, iMovie or FCE would be better (and faster).

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iMovie?... come on...
on mini FCP and FCE run same way (you loose all FCP special real time features on low end hardware). and by the way I don't make living making movies or TV shows, its just a hobby of mine, and of course I could do all my little home videos in iMovie, but its more fun to go after a fly with a bazooka .

This Apple thread has two experiences of installed FCP on a Mac mini Intel box.
http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?messageID=2043534&#2043534

Motion ran like crap but did render the result. FCP it self seems to run OK. What I'd be concern about is not getting the real-time rendering of some effects.

As I was considering a mini too, the above link has turned be off of the idea for now because I'd like to learn Motion.

This Apple technote says you can install FCPS but that the mini does not meet the minimum requirements. I interpret it to mean that Motion will be useless, and you won't get a great experience if your looking forward to the real-time effects playback.

http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=303470

I don't understand. The Processor in the iMac Intel Core Duo is not signifigantly faster than the one in the Mac Mini Intel Core Duo. How is it that the iMac performs so much faster than the Mac Mini?

I guess I could always keep my iMac to run FCS, but then I lose the resell value and there is almost no point in buying a new mini and LCD...

djlee12 said:

I don't understand. The Processor in the iMac Intel Core Duo is not signifigantly faster than the one in the Mac Mini Intel Core Duo. How is it that the iMac performs so much faster than the Mac Mini?

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The iMac has much better graphics and a faster hard drive.