Hello all,

I am a PC editor and have been editing for MANY years on a PC system, never had any problems, but lately I have been asked too many times to do projects with other people who are running final cut, and in the end either have to turn down the gig, or go nuts trying to make things transfer over between the two...

So long story short I have a gig coming up that would require me getting a mac with final cut studio 2. I am on a budget of $1,000 for the mac...

I am looking to buy a used Mac G5 dual 2.0 tower, but I am worried about the power it will have to work with 1080p files, including P2 footage from HPX500 and all other DVCproHD footage...

Can a Mac G5 dual 2.0 have enough power to edit 1080p footage with real time playback/2 or more layers? or am I just kidding myself and would really need something with more power to handle 1080p footage? I will be able to put more ram in as time comes, so please dont worry about the ram side of things... I will most likely put it 4-6gigs, so it comes down to the actual powerpc processors... can the dual 2.0 deal with 1080p footage playing back well, or will I end up with bottle necks in the system?

(by the way, what kind of render times for say 10min 1080p clips be? for instance fully edited sequence with sound (hardly any text) exported to a quicktime mp4 1080p or 720p hd file? will they be outrageously long? thanks for any info.)

This is something I need to find out ASAP as for I have to order the computer within the next 48 hours! (by the way if some of the responses say I cant edit dvcprohd 1080p footage, how about 720p?)

Just on a side note as well... I am currently running a dell Intel quad core pc... how would the G5 dual core powerpc processor equal up to the quad? how much slower in speed will I recognize between the two?

Thanks for any responses this info would really help me sleep at night for the next day, im worried and restless as this is one field I am not at ease with.

You need an Intel machine- PowerPC is old and not supporting of some of the core technologies FCP6 works with - like encoding ProRes for example. You can go with a G5 and a lot of folks still have them but you'll find yourself more and more over time wishing you had something a bit more up to snuff. My advice would be save up for an Intel Machine- you're close to a used one but not quite or go into a little credit card debt.

You'll certainly be up to editing DVCPROHD on a G5 but precisely the things you're asking about are going to be slower- filter rendering, making DVDs etc. Again- not an impossibility but at a certain level it's your time- how much is it worth. Even a new iMac Intel would be better than an older used G5.

Noah

how does the G5 handle editing 1080p footage? when you scrub the time line is it slow/skippy? or does it edit at a decent rate? As long as the timeline moves well and can handle 720p footage fine I would still think the G5 could handle what im looking at doing... again there is not extra money in the budget for this, Its either G5 or bust... So the option of saving up for more isn't there...

Also what about HDV footage? I know the data rate is much slower... how do you think it will handle 1080p HDV footage/720p HDV footage? Will it handle that much faster than the DVCproHD?

anyone else care to chime in... maybe some people who are running on a G5 now? again sorry for all the questions, this is a make or brake decision about taking this gig or not.

Giuseppe,

Just based on your budget for the Mac alone I'd say you should not take the gig; you'll need much more money for computing horsepower to do what you really need, especially if you plan on 1080p footage. The G5 setup properly could handle the job but you'd need a fast external RAID to handle multiple streams of 1080p footage properly. That's way beyond the budget you've set.

Giuseppe,

Just based on your budget for the Mac alone I'd say you should not take the gig; you'll need much more money for computing horsepower to do what you really need, especially if you plan on 1080p footage. The G5 setup properly could handle the job but you'd need a fast external RAID to handle multiple streams of 1080p footage properly. That's way beyond the budget you've set.

The raid 0 setup I already have, as well as the ram and video cards... thats why the budget is low for the G5 itself, all the other parts are being factored into it already... thats why im just asking a straight forward questions, like does the timeline skip around when scrubbing, and so forth... So I can get a feel for what needs to be added to speed up if necessary or if less is needed to be bought than I thought.

The raid 0 setup I already have, as well as the ram and video cards... thats why the budget is low for the G5 itself, all the other parts are being factored into it already... thats why im just asking a straight forward questions, like does the timeline skip around when scrubbing, and so forth... So I can get a feel for what needs to be added to speed up if necessary or if less is needed to be bought than I thought.

That's the set-up I am still using but 1080p is not something that I have ever been asked to use or would be tempted to try on a pay job without some serious testing. ProRes works on the G5 dual with FCP6. 720p HDV works fine on the G5 (so does 1080i HDV) and that takes more processing power than DVCProHD as I've been told. As Robert Lane says, it's the drive set-up that needs to be up to speed for DVCProHD.

The raid 0 setup I already have, as well as the ram and video cards... thats why the budget is low for the G5 itself, all the other parts are being factored into it already... thats why im just asking a straight forward questions, like does the timeline skip around when scrubbing, and so forth... So I can get a feel for what needs to be added to speed up if necessary or if less is needed to be bought than I thought.

If you have the raid already the G5 will cut DVCPRO footage all day long without skipping a bit. We have 5 G5 2.0 and they are used for cutting 1/2 HD TV shows for the past 4 years. HDV is render hell. You can't capture pro res, but DVCPRO HD - all day long and multiple streams if you're raid is up to snuff. In fact they cut 8bit uncompressed without any problems. Jumping to 10bit however was really reaching the limits and wasn't always fun. We're on xraid running throughput of 200meg/s according to the Kona tests. I used to cut DVCPRO HD on a g4 laptop running firewire 800 and it wasn't that bad.

Thank you for all the posts, after much debate and your guys input, I ended up putting up for sale one of my lens adapters to buy a MacPro quad 2.66, I found a graphics editor who was selling his system "pimped out" with 2 terrabites of storage and 5 gigs of ram and clean at that....