Any Heavy Duty Aperture Owners?

[ToddBPhoto]

I'm not much of a computer guy, so I'm sorry for the clearly dumb questions, but I'm an Apple convert from the PC world and absolutely love my Apple products. Between my wife and I, we have a MacBook, a MacBook Pro, an iPhone 3gs, and an iPhone 4. Love them all!

(And yes, I have actually spent about the last month reading these forums, but a lot of the computer speak goes right over my head.)

So, here's the deal. I have a photography business and am currently running Aperture on my MacBook with 4GB Ram, a 500GB HD, 2 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo, and 256MB graphics. I'm need to upgrade to an iMac, but want to make sure that what I buy will work for my needs. Besides Aperture, I'm starting to use iMovie more and more. Other than that, I use my computer for basic word processing, Keynote, and web surfing.

I saw a 21" in the refurb store (27" is too big for my work space) with the i5 processor and 512MB graphics. Should that be plenty for my Aperture work and future video editing? Or should I wait for the refresh in a few months to see if the iMacs will have better graphic options for the 21"? And if maybe the i7 will be an option for the 21"? I'm not in a big rush, so I can wait to see what changes the iMac will have.

Any advice and opinions are welcome. Thanks!

 

[gdeputy]

aperture will see the most gain from processor bumps, with that said, i3 and the 21" i5 are both dual cores, a quad core would be significantly faster with that app.

You won't see an i7 21", rather an upgraded i3/i5.

 

[rrdiaz30]

If photography is your business, I would suggest going the Mac Pro route due to the iMacs limited upgrade potential. Check out this website for suggestions. Also, ask your CPA or tax consultant about whether section 179 of the US Internal Revenue Code will be extended into 2011. My wife purchased a new Mac Pro system in December and with section 179, we will be able to write-off 100% of the system on our taxes. See this link.

Rick

 

[scottdot]

Sounds like you might want to do what I did -- I detached the hutch on my desk to make room for a 27" iMac quad core. I'll buy it as soon as Apple revs. the whole lineup. I'm also looking at running Aperture for my photography hobby.

 

[John T]

For serious photographic work with Aperture, I personally find the 21.5" screen is plenty large enough. The i3 processor is fine too. However, if you plan to do a lot of video work, you may find the i5 to be that much faster. You can always add extra RAM to the supplied 4MB if needs be.

 

[ToddBPhoto]

aperture will see the most gain from processor bumps, with that said, i3 and the 21" i5 are both dual cores, a quad core would be significantly faster with that app.

You won't see an i7 21", rather an upgraded i3/i5.

So, would it be a logical guess to think that the refresh might have quad core i5? Or is the dual core i5 strong enough for Apertures needs? Seems it needs a graphic card boost as well.

If photography is your business, I would suggest going the Mac Pro route due to the iMacs limited upgrade potential. Check out this website for suggestions. Also, ask your CPA or tax consultant about whether section 179 of the US Internal Revenue Code will be extended into 2011. My wife purchased a new Mac Pro system in December and with section 179, we will be able to write-off 100% of the system on our taxes. See this link.

Rick

I checked that out and we'll see what happens for 2011 in terms of write offs. I know that I can't spring for the Mac Pro right now, so the 21" iMac is where I'm headed. Thanks for the links. Very helpful.

Sounds like you might want to do what I did -- I detached the hutch on my desk to make room for a 27" iMac quad core. I'll buy it as soon as Apple revs. the whole lineup. I'm also looking at running Aperture for my photography hobby.

I've played with the 27" and it's nice, but for my workspace, it's the 21" all the way/ I know I'll be more than thrilled with it.

For serious photographic work with Aperture, I personally find the 21.5" screen is plenty large enough. The i3 processor is fine too. However, if you plan to do a lot of video work, you may find the i5 to be that much faster. You can always add extra RAM to the supplied 4MB if needs be.

So again, for Aperture and programs like CS5, I know extra ram is good, but is the quad core processor really significantly better than the dual core? And what about the graphics cards? Are they currently strong enough to run Aperture for some time, or will they be outdated sooner rather than later?

Thanks again!

 

[John T]

So again, for Aperture and programs like CS5, I know extra ram is good, but is the quad core processor really significantly better than the dual core? And what about the graphics cards? Are they currently strong enough to run Aperture for some time, or will they be outdated sooner rather than later?

Extra RAM is not always good - your need extra memory is solely dependent on the load imposed by the software on your system.

With regard to quad/dual cores, I suppose it all depends on what you are doing on your iMac. If you're multitasking at lot, then the quad could show an speed advantage. For normal use, the dual core should be more than adequate (particularly if your budget is limited).

Personally, I'm not a fan of CS5 and so my experience is limited. However, Aperture doesn't put too much of a demand on the system.

As far as being "outdated" is concerned, as soon as one purchases pretty well anything, rest assured it's going to be outdated in the not to distant future! A system running Aperture at the present time is not suddenly going to slow down as systems are updated! I ran Aperture on a pre-Intel G5 iMac up to last September with no problems. The latest iMacs are obviously an update but my original machine was perfectly adequate (while it was working!!).

 

[ramzhh]

Aperture is quite confusing for me, for some reason. A pretty weird UI, I can't really do anything in it, I don't know where to click... This coming from a geek who has never had any problems regarding software UI or anything, in Photoshop or anything...


Weird...