Buying a powermac soon, maybe

[it5five]

I looked at the last couple pages, and did a search, and really didn't come up with much, but if I'm wrong, please link me.

I'm a freshman student going into film and media production next year, and was looking at getting the Powermac G5. I was going to get the 2ghz model (as much as I'd like the quad, I don't have that much money). But with the new Mac Pros coming hopefully in August, am I better off just waiting for that? I'm going insane using this windows machine and REALLY want to switch now, but it isn't necessary yet.

Another question, am I getting too much too soon? Would I be okay with an iMac for now, upgrading to the Mac Pro's maybe 2 years down the road? Any suggestions from current or past film students would be greatly appreciated.

 

[Fredou51]

I think the iMac would be pretty good. Maybe you could wait for Core 2 Duo though. The Mac Pro would probably be out by then and you could compare. But I am sure the iMac will run Final Cut pretty nicely.

I am interested myself in going into film school, where are you studying? Is it the New York film academy?

Fred

 

[it5five]

Nah, I wish it were in New York.

It's at the College of Fine Arts at ASU. Would have much rather gone out of state, but the tution at ASU is pretty low for in state students.

 

[SuperSnake2012]

If I'm not mistaken, the iMacs beat the dual G5s in everything but Photoshop since that's being emulated. Unless you really really really need it right this moment, wait two months.

 

[it5five]

So would I be better off getting an iMac now and just getting a mac pro a couple years down the road? Or the mac pro. Would the mac pro be too much for a freshman student?

 

[SuperSnake2012]

Well, the iMac is a very capable machine. If you put two gigs of RAM in it and get the 500GB hard drive, I think you'll be set for a while.

Logic Pro is already universal and Final Cut is too

 

[it5five]

Thanks. I think I'll end up doing the 20" iMac. I'll get 2GB of RAM and upgrade the video and HD. I'll probably end up getting the Mac Pro a couple years down the road.

 

[Keebler]

i would wait

Thanks. I think I'll end up doing the 20" iMac. I'll get 2GB of RAM and upgrade the video and HD. I'll probably end up getting the Mac Pro a couple years down the road.

save your duckets and see what the summer brings for newer powermacs. i'm sure the imacs will be ok, but i disagree that the imacs outperform the current powermacs. i would like to see some stats on tests run. that said, the powermacs will always have one key factor better than the imac: expandability.
more ram, more internal (and external HDs)

i'm not in film school, but i do run video transfers and could not imagine doing my business on an imac.

see what the summer brings. if you don't need it now, don't burn your cash.

if anything, the imacs will most likely have faster cpus than the current models.

either way, you still win...you're getting a mac

 

[Nate4747]

You should wait at least until August to see if the new Mac towers come out. As a film student you will probably find yourself wanting the expandability the PCI express slots in the towers offer. You can add better capture cards and a bunch of other stuff that film school might make you want. Plus the tower will definitely have a longer useful lifetime than the iMac. The video card can be upgraded, the processors will be faster and it will take more memory and hard drives.

If you can wait until August, you should. If not, the iMac probably will suit you fine for a few years.

 

[it5five]

As tempting as the powermac/mac pro's are, do students generally do extensive editing that require a machine like a mac pro their first two years? I'd rather get the mac pro so I don't have to buy a whole new computer later (as the case would be if I got the iMac), but I don't know if I'd be using it to it's fullest capabilities as a new student to justify paying thousands of dollars for it.

I'd definetely be getting the mac pro eventually, but am at a loss for what I should do now.