Still sitting on the fence
 

I am intrigued by moving to the Mini-MAC as an editing platform in relation to my current XP x64 Beige box I have on my desktop.

My main NLE is Premiere Pro 1.5 and after having played a little with FCE, the interface is quite similar - so what does the MAC platform bring to the table that I don't already have on the Windows platform???

Not trying to start a flame fest - just wanting to get my facts before making a purchasing decision.

TIA,

Nothing
 

You gain nothing going to the MAC. It's only software, afterall.
However, you should be using Premiere Pro 2.

good luck

I was in the same boat you were about a year or so ago, I was using PPro 1.5 on Win XP. Bought a Mac, FCP 5.1, never looked back.

They're both great systems, but the Mac will cost you more. I personally like FCP over PPro any day, but there were some little nitpicky features that PPro had that I liked, but now that I switched I haven't missed them.

All in all, I'll never switch back, but take that with a grain of salt, spend money where you need it most because what you have will produce great videos as-is.

EDIT - I didn't buy the mini mac, it was too slow and limited, and got a G5 instead... so the "it will cost you more" above might be misleading. If you get a G5 (or now Intel Pro or whatever it's called) it will cost you more.

I'm in the same boat. Looking on Craigslist, you'd think there is a law that you must use FCP in Los Angeles. Software may be software but if you're looking to fit in at an organization, you gotta be able to 'speak the language.'

I have tested PPro 2.0 and more or less, since I'm shooting MiniDV Standard Def footage, I can't see a compelling reason to upgrade to PPro 2.0 - maybe I'm wrong on this assumption.

With the type of work I shoot (Video Journalism subjects - straight cuts/Dissolves are 99% of my editing), Final Cut Express has a VERY nice price point and the form factor of the MAC-Mini as well as lowered power consumption is important enough for me to consider.