Mac Pro for Graphics Design - Questions!

I am a graphics designer and have been recently looking into buying a Mac Pro for my freelance work. I am a long time user of the PC platform but have grown fond of the mac pro after using it at school for the last year. I still have a few issues I'm trying to figure out before my purchase and any help would be much appreciated. Here are my questions:

1. the mac pro is great but I'm not a fan of their monitors, the color caliberation never looks right. Any suggestions on compatible LCD monitors with a closer color accuracy to that of the CRT moniter?

2. Any suggestions for must have custom specs for a graphics designer?

3. anyone use .mac for their portfolio? How is the ease of use, cost, etc.?

4. any complaints about the warranty?

again, I appreciate any feedback regarding any of the questions as this is a bit overwhelming switching from the pc to mac.

Thanks, Medeine

Hi

The Mac Pro doesn't come with any monitor and it's hard to even get hold of a CRT monitor nowadays. The iMac comes with an integral TFT screen which is superb for colour calibration, as are all Apple monitors.
But if you want to get a Mac Pro and a TFT monitor, have a look at LaCie and Formac for decent graphics screens.

1 gig of RAM is a minimum for Photoshop etc., 2 gig would be useful but it's not worth getting any more than that.

.mac is an overpriced product, lacking in features. It's going to be overhauled eventually, but if you need web space look elsewhere.

Macs are reliable and I've no qualms with the warranty.

Well done in deciding on a Mac. It's the industry standard in design and you need to work on it if you want to do it commercially.

I might also reccomend the iMac - (this month, or next, the iMac will be upgraded.) and gettting the 2GB in RAM, or even 3, just so that the for the next 4-5 years your machine will perform amongst the top. The iMac will suit a print design workload just fine.

Just my advice.