Another Switcher. Hopefully I won't be disappointed

Well,
I am new to the whole Mac experience. Having been a Windows Server admin for 5 years, and now a SAN / AIX professional, I am no slouch when it comes to computers. Heck I even have a few IRIX boxes at home.

However, I recently became a father and wanted an easy to capture my childs first moments on film. So, I bought a mini DV recorder and an AIW card for the Athlon64 machine. It proved to be such a pain in the butt that I havent taken very much footage. Not to mention the editing software.

So, I guess I bought into the whole 'it works right out of the box' concept that Apple has been spouting all these years.
I went to Apple's website and purchased a Dual 2.0 PM g5 from their certified stock. Figured that it was the same price as a new Dual 1.8, and came with 512 RAM instead of the stock 256.
So with credit card in tow, went out to newegg, plopped down the money fer another 1024Mb of RAM, and a 250Gb SATA drive, as well as a new 12ms 19" LCD.
So after purchasing all this crud, to "make my life easier" I'm sure I will appear the dumbass for not knowing alot as I ask questions, so please bear with me.
I hope that the promise of video editing and stills will bear fruit. Otherwise, someone is going to get a good deal on a dual 2.0 G5.

So, the first questions I have are..

What 'essential' software do I need?
I would like to do
CD/DVD burning
Family videos to DVD
Picture Management
surf
play a few games
compile GNU type code
email
manage my finances
serial port monitoring of SAN gear...



Second question..
I have a truckload of PC software. Are there any companies, (mainly games) that offer trade-ins or upgrade pricing on their games when switching platforms?



Sorry for the long-windedness

Here's to hoping I did not just fritter away 3K...


Bubba

For:
I would like to do
CD/DVD burning iMovie and iDVD
Family videos to DVD -ditto
Picture Management iPhoto
surf -Safari
play a few games -there are many
compile GNU type code -There is Darwin, the terminal with Vi and Perl
email -Apple mail
manage my finances -iCal is what I use

Bubba said:

What 'essential' software do I need?
I would like to do
CD/DVD burning
Family videos to DVD
Picture Management
surf
play a few games
compile GNU type code
email
manage my finances

Click to expand...

You should have the iLife package, so for basic video editing you are okay.
iTunes for burning music CDs.
iDVD for burning videos to DVDs.
iPhoto for basic picture management.
Safari is the default web browser
OS X have a mail application

You will need to get a finanicial application for your finances.
You will need to install GNU products to work with GNU.

Quicken or Quickbooks for your finances?

gcc comes with the dev tools. Ditto X11.

As for the PC software you've got...some companies do, but I'd wager that most don't. You may get lucky and find that some included the Mac version on the CD.

Sounds like a nice system... if I take too much of a liking to my Mac Mini (still not here yet.. grrr) then down the road I might have to check out the deals on the recertified boxes. I could give a dual G5 a happy home for sure.

Thanks for the info

Thanks for the information. I guess I will be using quicken for my bookkeeping. Why does everyone tout Final express over imovie?

can I compile code like on Linux/IRIX?

Thanks again, amd I am sure I will be asking yall's Sagely advice in the future.


Bubba out...

Bubba said:

Why does everyone tout Final express over imovie?

can I compile code like on Linux/IRIX?

Click to expand...

Final Cut Express is in between iMovie and Final Cut Pro HD. You can do more with Final Cut Express than you can with iMovie.

As for compiling code, all you need is a good compiler installed on your sysrem.