Hi,

I know this subject is well torn, but anyway...
I have until now mostly used PC, but now I have this opportunity to buy a used 2x2 GHz MAc G5 with two 250G hard discs from a friend I know have good hand with his hardware. He says it is good for HDV. And I happened to just get the whole Adobe Suite CS3 for Mac for a good price (I got the wrong package!).

Give me reasons to switch to Mac or if I should stay with PC. Reasons for PC is you save money, and I also teach PC stuff at my current school. I also already have a lot of earlier Premiere PC projects that I want to be able to reedit if needed. Is it possible to reedit PC-made Premiere timelines on Premiere for Mac? Aren't the avi:s different (Win/QT)?

I have used Mac quite a lot as video teacher also, and I think it was good except when you wanted to create Windows Media, but then we used Flip for Mac, a conversion program and solved it.

Some Mac evangelists here? Or are they all on the Mac forums?

I shoot and edit small documentaries, commercials and short films and want to pursue furhter into fiction films.
I know you have to do the decisionmaking yourself, but advice is never bad.

Get the Mac, then load Bootcamp or Parallels to run Windows on it. Then you can have all your Windows applications running on your Mac. It's like having 2 computers in one!

Urban is quite right. "Platform" is quite weather-worn here and it won't take much platform bashing or evangelizing to just get the whole thread pulled out of public view.

If you have some specific, factual comparisons or contrasts that might help Urban and others to choose a platform such as the file support he asked about, please share them as if you are a scholarly scientist -- even if you aren't.

Of course, TRY BEFORE YOU BUY is the best advice.

I agree with Pete. Flame-baiting rants don't help and just pollute an otherwise excellent forum.

Urban, I would suggest that it depends on the price. If it is cheaper than anything else you could buy then it's a no-brainer. After all, you can use Bootcamp to allow you to run Windows as well as OS X. So, you can take advantage of the strengths of both (and avoid the weaknesses of both).

I After all, you can use Bootcamp to allow you to run Windows as well as OS X. So, you can take advantage of the strengths of both (and avoid the weaknesses of both).

Just a clarification here. The system Urban mentions is a dual processor G5 and therefore can not utilize Bootcamp to run Windows. Only the Intel based Macs can do that.

Urban just has to determine what software he wants to edit with. That may ultimately make the decision for him.

I have in my home...

One Mac machine running OSX
Two Windows machines running XP
One Windows machine running Vista Business

In all honesty, the Mac gets better than 90 percent of my computer usage. When I'm online, which is a lot, I feel more secure from the Mac OSX side whether it's real or perceived.

-gb-

Just a clarification here. The system Urban mentions is a dual processor G5 and therefore can not utilize Bootcamp to run Windows. Only the Intel based Macs can do that.

Oh. I assumed Intel because Urban mentions having Adobe Suite CS3 for Mac (it only supports MacIntel, right?).

If that is the case, then Urban may want to rethink the strategy....

My Mac Pro is the best PC I've ever owned.
And it's a Mac too!

If you want a reason... sure. I love my Macs. (G5 powerpc tower, and Macbook pro-- intel)

If you do have everything setup already on a PC, and you're just kinda casually switching, seems a bit... expensive.

I don't know anyone who has bought a mac and regretted it. Macs are nice. They're just expensive.

Some people prefer PCs, of course. Personal preference.

However, without even debating the two formats-- since you already have a PC setup (correct?) and you have the chance to have a Mac as well (not a huge financial burden?), then that's great. Having both is good, and you can be familiar with both for any possible jobs you might get and have access to more software (for example, Shake [compositing] is only now available on Macs).
Adobe CS3 suite will be nice as well. I'd suggest looking at FCS, but you already bought that. Should be fine.

If you have any questions ABOUT Macs, feel free to ask too. It's hard to say which someone would just like better in general.

I own both platforms. I prefer doing visual work on my Mac. It's just easier (for me) since somewhere along the line I learned many shortcuts.

I just purchased a Mac Pro and it's by far the easiest computer to tinker with. Adding drives, cards and RAM is straightforward: open the side, slide it in, done.

All my jacks and ports work. My PCs have what I'd term fake firewire that requires adapters or external power....maybe that's my fault for not investigating before I purchased. But everything I own plugs and plays with my Mac. I can't say that about my PCs.

Bob

Owning and having worked on both Macs and PCs, I enjoy both. The Mac you have WAS a monster, but with the advent of the IntelCore Duo chips, it's a bit long in the tooth now. And Apple is porting over to the intel processors.

I grew up on Premiere and have used FCP 5 quite a bit recently. So far, I still like the Adobe suite better, but who knows, the FCP suite does some nice things...

For HDV, the older Mac dual will do ok, though not with Adobe, cause it's not an intel machine, which, I believe, is a requirement for CS3. And with HDV, as much CPU power as possible is a good thing. The newer intel chips (as opposed to the ones in the Mac you have, which I believe, are called 'power pc' chips), are cheaper and faster. A "quad core" i.e. 2 x intel duo core 2 chips, gateway costs $1,300, (with a monitor, I think). Much faster than your dual proc mac. So part of this, to me, is really a hardware issue, rather than a platform one.

So I wouldn't switch platforms based on the acquisition of an older Mac with non-intel chips. OTOH, if you can get an older version of FCP, or some other programs you work with, and explore using the Mac, it would be a great way to find out if you like the platform and its software.

Very good point.

I have a G5 Tower PowerPC and now a Macbook pro (intel).

I don't really like working with the tower because it's slipping more and more behind every day not being able to run windows or the newer/better programs.

I think paying more for a Mac with intel is worth it.

Thanks for all your reflections.
I'm being sucked into the Apple spiral.
It seems clear I need an Intel-based Mac.
I would like to hear your reflections about the portable versus the stationary Macs. Big benefit of portable: it's portable. But what's on the negative side? I would like to be able to edit and burn HDV soon.

Macbooks are fine, but the graphics cards don't fully support a few features in FCP and Motion/Color are not supported.

Macbook pros have better graphics cards and fully support FCS.

I have a 2.33ghz core 2 duo 15.4" 2GB RAM macbook pro, and it's great.

For the same price you can get a tower that is more powerful. Quite true. But you also do need to purchase a monitor. ...and it's not portable.

The macbook is a very solid computer.

I really dislike the 5400 rpm hard drive. This stalls out with some files. (I'm not currently editing HD, so I can only tell you about SD performance.) DV SD is fine and plays without trouble. Only about 3 seconds of uncompressed SD will run without it stalling out. The drive just can't keep up.

That's my only complaint, though.


As is, the prices for Macbook pros and Mac pros (the towers) are about the same. Mac pros, for the same, are more/faster, though.


Personally, I really like having a strong mobile computer. I can go somewhere and record right to the hard drive, or edit on a trip, edit on set, etc.

Having a desktop workstation does have one advantage-- concentration. It's convenient to be able to sit on your couch with a laptop, but not very productive. Having a desktop station for editing and sitting at the desk will help you concentrate, perhaps.

I've used my macbook "as a desktop", by connecting a second monitor, hard drives, networking, etc. It works well. But it doesn't completely fit the illusion, I must say. Still does feel like a laptop, if that matters to you.
(Perhaps better if you set it up with a mouse and keyboard.)

Thanks, Daniel. I suppose you can spread out the desktop on the two monitors with the macbook pro?
Do the Macbook Pro's support raid?
Is the GPU in the Macbook Pro as powerful as in the Mac Pro standard version?

You can just check the numbers. No, macbook pros are somewhat less powerful than mac pros but they're plenty capable.
Sure. Using an extra monitor can spread out well.

I'm not sure about RAID, but I don't see any reason it wouldn't. It's not anything special/limited. Just a computer.

while there are no reasons not to switch to mac, there are a lot of reasons to stay with PC.
Then you should look at the problem this way and just make sure that after the switch you still can acces the huge quantities of free utilities that the PC offers. hardware and software on PC are moving/upgrading a lot faster than on Mac.
The community on products is bigger, so usually answers are easier to find.
Tons of codecs are easily manageable on PC, while Macs are pretty limited on this side.

I did actually switch to Mac and I'm more than satisfied. :)

I don't know why HDV renders much faster in my Mac with Final Cut Pro than with my similarly configured PC with Adobe Premiere Elements. (It was by a factor of 10)

I bought my macbook and the only thing I don't like is the fact that I can't upgrade it to a quad-core.

If I had it to do over again, I -probably- would have gone with Sony Vegas but even then I'm not sure of the speed difference; FCP can take advantage of 64-bit processing, Sony Vegas (on Windows XP) can't (and I professionally reviewed Windows Vista and declared it "unfit for any user.") There's also a bit of bad blood between me and Sony - I don't want to use any Sony products at all if I can help it.

I don't know why HDV renders much faster in my Mac with Final Cut Pro than with my similarly configured PC with Adobe Premiere Elements. (It was by a factor of 10).

Not really a fair comparison - Elements is a consumer level product. It might not support multiple cores and the HDV codec may be less optimized than those from other vendors etc. A more relevant comparison would be with iMovie. Or CS3 on both platforms.

you really need to choose your NLE of choice and let that determine your computing needs. For example, I ended up switching to a Mac during my second to last year of my undergrad program when I decided I wanted to get ahead and fell in love with editing- since we had FCS and G5's in the labs, I went ahead and purchased a 1st rev MBP and FCS. The towers were great at the time, but my MBP was actually faster! Thats completely different these days- with 8 core MacPro's leaving all the laptops in the dust. But I do have to say- I find I do my best work in coffee shops. I have no clue why, but sitting down with my Americano, my little g-drive mini and a macbook or macbook pro just can't be beat. When its closing time I pack up and quickly move to a new location to continue. When its time to color grade, I go home, turn off all the lights and connect to a calibrated cinema display. Final Cut is my favorite, but thats probably because I've only tinkered with Vegas, Avid and Premiere. But I know so many people who use them, and LOVE them, and most importantly, do their best work on them.

Having said that, if I were you I'd save a few more pennies and try to get an intel machine simply because it allows you to run OSX and Windows side by side, and ultimately this could allow you some important flexibility should you have an employer that is looking for someone who knows Avid (a lot of the world is Avid based it seems). I've used a macbook (non pro) for months before switching to the new MBP's, and using Nattress plugins and tricks, have managed to turn it into a solid workstation. I agree with Daniel- the 5400rpm hard drive and the firewire 400 can be slow, so be prepared to render a lot. If you are working in SD (not uncompressed) you wont even notice the difference till you start adding alot of layers.

Hi,

I know this subject is well torn, but anyway...
I have until now mostly used PC, but now I have this opportunity to buy a used 2x2 GHz MAc G5 with two 250G hard discs from a friend I know have good hand with his hardware. He says it is good for HDV. And I happened to just get the whole Adobe Suite CS3 for Mac for a good price (I got the wrong package!).

Give me reasons to switch to Mac or if I should stay with PC. Reasons for PC is you save money, and I also teach PC stuff at my current school. I also already have a lot of earlier Premiere PC projects that I want to be able to reedit if needed. Is it possible to reedit PC-made Premiere timelines on Premiere for Mac? Aren't the avi:s different (Win/QT)?

I have used Mac quite a lot as video teacher also, and I think it was good except when you wanted to create Windows Media, but then we used Flip for Mac, a conversion program and solved it.

Some Mac evangelists here? Or are they all on the Mac forums?

I shoot and edit small documentaries, commercials and short films and want to pursue furhter into fiction films.
I know you have to do the decisionmaking yourself, but advice is never bad.

You don't necessarily have to choose between owning one or the other. It sounds like you could benefit from owning both, especially since you teach for both platforms.

Not really a fair comparison - Elements is a consumer level product. It might not support multiple cores and the HDV codec may be less optimized than those from other vendors etc. A more relevant comparison would be with iMovie. Or CS3 on both platforms.

I've used CS3, but only on a dual core AMD system, not a dual-core Intel system.

I'm pretty much a mac fanboi, with untold macs in the house and most of my family and friends have drunk the koolaid as well. To me its like a hotrod vs. luxury car comparison. If you want to drag race and enjoy tinkering under the hood on saturdays, then pcs make more sense. If you want a really comfortable seat, automatic transmission and (so far) bulletproof security system, then I say macs are the better option. In the past one platform over the other could do things the other couldnt. At this point, its more of a comparison of how comfortable you are as they do it.

If your ultimate question is "should i stick with pcs or buy a used g5" then absolutely I vote stick with pcs. You'll be far more likely to run into limitations with the g5, and frustrations that a newer machine wouldnt cause. If you already know and love macs, having a g5 around can be great, but in computer terms the g5 is an old jalopy now. A new core2 mac can boot into windows, or run windows virtualized at full speed... and its really fast with fcp and cs3. More and more intel only apps are coming out too.

For the price difference between a core2 mac and equivalent pc, , even a home built one, I think the versatility of having both platforms is worth every penny (if there is a price difference at all).. ) You might have a lot of money tied up in older software that makes you reluctant to change, but having parallels can eliminate that problem too, if you dont mind the weirdness of having two OS runningg.

It really comes down to preferences. Some people like easy and cheap engine upgrades and lots of 3rd party options like skull shaped side mirrors and neon rim lights. Those people look at mac users and feel superior because they saved money or are smart enough to work on their own machine. Some people like heated seats and that feeling of superiority over the uncivilized miscreants either too poor to afford the price of a mac, or so savage that they like to change their own oil on a carpet in their back yard. hehe.

Now... there is a totally different category if you have an IT guy on staff. Thats kinda like having a personal mechanic. If somebody else is driving you around and checking the fuel for viruses and searching down hand rubbed custom walnut knobs... then by all means buy whatever they want you to. The guys driving around in bentleys? They dont care about ANY of the above stuff. hehe.

cheers!
-a

It sounds like you could benefit from owning both, especially since you teach for both platforms.
Now I do, and I really benefit from both*. Your'e totally right. And I'm privileged.

*Although I enjoy the Mac experience more...

Chixxx dig Macs.

ok, i should really check the dates on posts. doh!

So, who you gonna vote for in the upcoming nixon/ford election?

I hate to admit it, but I'm old enough to remember that Nixon never ran against Ford.