I'm looking to take the plunge and buy a Mac, specifically for DVD Studio Pro.

By far the most cost effective approach for me is to buy a base Mac Mini with DVD burner, swap out the CPU for a 2.16GHz Core Duo I have lying about and upgrade the RAM.

A couple of questions then:

1. Does DVD Studio Pro run on the Mac Mini? The specs for the full FCP package say that a dedicated PCIe card is required, but I'd guess that's for editing?
2. Has there been any news on Blu-Ray support for DVD Studio Pro?

Thanks for your time.

you need a super drive. also i dont think DVD Pro studios runs on intel macs at the moment. i think if you can afford it i think you should get a power mac. that comes with a superdrive a duo 2.0, 2.3 or even a quad 2.5 processer

Blu ray is still a very new format. no software i think has been completed to right to blu ray beacuse sony havent finaliesed there blu ray drives. thats why the PS3 has been delayed. also the blu ray dvd players are very new and extrmely expensive starting from £1000 , about $1300. one last thing i think we might have another dvd war on our hands because there apperntly two types of dvd formats. one made by sony the other made by i think hitachi. i think its going to be one of those VHS verses the Betamax tapes

you need a super drive. also i dont think DVD Pro studios runs on intel macs at the moment. i think if you can afford it i think you should get a power mac. that comes with a superdrive a duo 2.0, 2.3 or even a quad 2.5 processer

Hi there,

DVD Studio Pro definitely runs on Intel Macs as part of the Universal Final Cut Studio package, and the Mac Mini base spec can be bought with a 'superdrive' (aka DVD-RW) for an extra £30.

The specs talk about a PCI express graphics requirement though which the Mini doesn't have. However, I'm 90% sure it'll work any way, with PCIe required only for dual monitor configurations.

Blu ray is still a very new format. no software i think has been completed to right to blu ray beacuse sony havent finaliesed there blu ray drives. thats why the PS3 has been delayed.

Blu-Ray came out in US stores a week ago. Scenarist BD will produce Blu-Ray disks. But it costs £34,000. And by all accounts it's a bit rubbish.

oh its out the cross grade version now.

oh its out the cross grade version now.

A few months ago, actually. Around the end of March.

Hi,

I don't have a mini but I do have a G5 tower. With DVDSP4.0 you can render and burn a HD-DVD file on a std DVD (DVD-R or a DVD+R DL) using the mpeg2 encoding. That has been discussed previously in another thread, that the disc will play back on the Toshiba HD-DVD players. DVDSP4.0 can also create a HD-DVD using H.264, but can only be played back on Macs. This was demonstrated at our FCP user group in Dallas at the Willow Bends Mall Apple store. So in other words you can shoot footage on a HD cam use FCP to edit it, DVDSP4.0 to create the DVD and play back on your mac. Or you could use a new 20" imac and send the signal out the DVI to a monitor or a projector.

regards,

Paul