A newbie has some questions

Hello!, I've been a pc guy all of my life and have got more certies in that world than you could shake a stick at. However, with the forecoming release of Windows Vista, I'm wondering if I could switch without too much pain since I'm going to have relearn a lot of things any way.

With that being said, I've recently purchased a Imac With OS x. It's 333mhz (Not exactly new I know) with 160mb of ram 8mbs vram and 6gb hd. And I have a myriad of questions.

Apple iMac G3 M5521

1. Will this Imac take a standard 3.5in hard drive (In other words: could I upgrade the internal hard drive?)

2. Will my Imac recognize a usb dvd burner?

3. Will this machine's specs support burning dvd's?

4. Does OS X have built in software for burning dvd's?

5. If OS X does not have built in cd/dvd buring software, what should I use? (If the software is built in: is there better software than what is built in?)

6. Could I edit video on this machine?

7. If so, what software should i use?

I have more, but this is a good starter. My apologies to the webbies for this mess of a post!

Just to be sure, is the CDROM a Tray or a Slot? The 333Mhz should be a Tray loading CD Drive.

http://www.lowendmac.com/imacs/imac-d.shtml

That URL will tell you a lot on specs and hard drives. If you install a drive larger than 8GB, you have to partition it and the OS has to be on no more than a 8GB Partition at the beginning of the drive. Read that URL carefully and it will tell you a lot. If you want to run OSX, Up the RAM as far as it will go. Most of the 333Mhz iMacs would take 512Megs RAM but read that url and it will tell you more.

Sure the iMac will recognize a DVD or CD Burner on USB but do remember, like all computers from that era, the ports are USB 1.1 so it will not burn fast. For basic burning OSX will burn from the Finder. For anything else I would Highly recommend Roxio Toast.

Editing video would be a bit touchy as with anything of that CPU speed. I have never tried it on my old 333, but you could probably do some light video stuff in iMovie.

Since that 333 iMac has no Firewire, Tiger will not work as an OS. I would recommend Panther 10.3.

Hope some of this helps you. Since I own the machine, ask away!

...Dennis

deleted post...dtravis beat me to it

It is a tray loading drive. And its already loaded with OS x. I'm not sure what its name is (panther, or otherwise) could some one explain the differant animals? I've always wondered what those were indicitive of.

Is iMovie the best software for editing movies? Can you split video files add transitions and make photo slide shows and the like?

Thank you for all your info! :black:

Enterra said:

It is a tray loading drive. And its already loaded with OS x. I'm not sure what its name is (panther, or otherwise) could some one explain the differant animals? I've always wondered what those were indicitive of.

Is iMovie the best software for editing movies? Can you split video files add transitions and make photo slide shows and the like?

Thank you for all your info! :black:

Click to expand...

Click on the Apple in the very top left of the screen and click on about this mac. It will tell you the OS Version. 10.2 is Jaguar, 10.3 is Panther and 10.4 is Tiger. Each major version change is like going from say windows 2k to XP if you get my drift.

It's not that iMovie is the BEST editor out there, but probably the best for that slower iMac. I am sure it will do what you need. Someone else can tell you more as I normally use Final Cut, but that requires a pretty fast system.

What kind of system do you need to run final cut?

For decent performance?

I'd say anything around the 1,5Ghz mark and up, with at least a Gig of Ram...

assuming that I am able to acclimate to mac OS and the accompaniment of software, I was looking at purchasing a mac desktop. The quad core systems are quite interesting to me. Are there four sockets in those systems, or is there two sockets with dual core processors? I know it probably is the later, but I still have to ask. :yinyang:

Aptmunich said:

For decent performance?

I'd say anything around the 1,5Ghz mark and up, with at least a Gig of Ram...

Click to expand...

Not unless you're running express...

Enterra said:

assuming that I am able to acclimate to mac OS and the accompaniment of software, I was looking at purchasing a mac desktop. The quad core systems are quite interesting to me. Are there four sockets in those systems, or is there two sockets with dual core processors? I know it probably is the later, but I still have to ask. :yinyang:

Click to expand...

its a dual, dual-core... so two sockets

makwanad said:

Not unless you're running express...

Click to expand...

what is express?

I hope I'm not annoying your guys with all these questions!

ahh final cut questions... my favorite ones to answer lol

So there are 3 different final cuts you can go out to the store an buy. 1 is final cut express - it is the lowest priced version, and is missing a few features. The next one up is final cut pro, this is very expensive but it is one of the best editors out there.. the next one up, the most expensive, and the one I use is the best video editing software suite in my opinion ( i know people like avid, I just don't really like it that much, don't get me wrong its good, but I prefer final cut) this version is known as final cut studio. It is 1 box, with final cut pro 5, motion, dvd studio pro, and soundtrack pro.

As for the computer you would like to run it on. I have ran it on my powerbook g4 1.5ghz with 2 gigs of ram. I only use that if I have to edit something quick and can't go home to do so. My main editing system, is a quad core, with 4 gigs of ram, a good video card, and 2 cinema displays. I also recommend getting a good final cut pro keyboard if you are going to take editing seriously in the future.

I hope all your questions about final cut are now answered, but use your current system to play with imovie and get the basic concept of editing before you put a large investment down as an editing system when you might realize you might not enjoy it, or you don't do anything fancier then what imovie can do, as investing in a computer and final cut can be very expensive.

PowerBookG4 said:

I hope all your questions about final cut are now answered, but use your current system to play with imovie and get the basic concept of editing before you put a large investment down as an editing system when you might realize you might not enjoy it, or you don't do anything fancier then what imovie can do, as investing in a computer and final cut can be very expensive.

Click to expand...

LOL I'm already knee deep in adobe editing software for pc, thousands of dollars for software that crashes on a dime when you challenge the OS just a little too much.

Actually thats my next question, is there a pc software that Final Cut is similar to? Sony Vegas, Pinnacle Studio, Adobe premeir?