It is time to upgrade my G5 Quad. Not because it was too slow for my work, but because it's giving signs that it won't last too mush longer. It is been a great asset and I want my next one to do as good.
I had to take one of my two monitor off because the graphic card 256 MBs can no longer render motion imported simple titles mush less MB looks.
I always like to buy the best machine for what I do, but I don't want the most expensive tool money can buy, but the best tool money can buy for my kind of work.
I mostly use FC, Motion, Soundtrack and will be using color on the new Mac. I have a BM HD Extreme video capture card and a sonnet eSata card that I would be using in the new Mac. Other wise I would be getting an iMac 27" i7.
I think that a new 8 core with 8 GB Ram from Apple (add 8 GB more off brand) dual 1GB graphic card should give me the best return on my investment.
What do you gurus think? or, should I go for the 12 core?

God Bless,

Douglas Villalba
director/cinematographer/editor
Miami, Florida

[www.DouglasVillalba.info]
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What format will you be working on?



www.strypesinpost.com

I recently replaced my G5 quad, and faced the same questions. When I build machines for my corporate clients I tend to spec the biggest, baddest machine I can, based on the assumption that a 5 year purchase cycle will have the machine I build be an antique before it is retired.

For my personal systems, tho I can replace them whenever I want. Rather than pay a premium for the latest and greatest, I prefer to use that money for upgraded graphics, RAM and drives. Two months ago I bought a referb Quadcore Nehalem machine at a very reasonable price. I then bought a better video card, went to OWC and loaded up on RAM and drives.

[store.apple.com]

For general FCP editorial work I see no difference in speed or feel from the 8 core machines I use for clients. Motion loves all the RAM and the 4870 graphics card. Color and Soundtrack are equally happy. The one significant place I DO see the machine bog down is when compressing files. Some multi processor aware codecs like .264 would compress faster if I had more cores.

As for the iMac solution. OWC offers a modification to the newest generation of iMacs that gives you an external eSata port for a hard drive array. If you then bought the AJA IOHD box you would have a pretty nice edit system. I do a lot of remote work, and when I next upgrade my shipping system I think I may go that route.
[eshop.macsales.com]
[www.aja.com]
-Vance