HI THERE - Mac G4 for newbie?

[frozenright]

I can afford a used G4 no problem. what do I want it to have and what will I definitely have to upgrade - if anything. Not newbie to recording, just not computer based yet. video/film too. Thanks anyone.

[brandondrury]

what will I definitely have to upgrade - if anything

All the Mac dudes were using G4s for years in my earlier days of recording. You should be able to do some things just fine. I'm not sure how hard you plan on pushing your G4.

I'm not a Mac guy, so I really can't help much.

Sorry,
Brandon

[richiebee]

I run Final Cut Pro on a G4 Powerbook sometimes. It's as slow as molasses compared to my G5 but it is functional. If you're planning on relatively big mixes, you might find the G4 a bit weak. Mine failed to keep 18 tracks going smoothly in Cubase and ProTools without any plugins at all on an external hard drive.

How much more is it for a G5? The difference in performance is significant, and G5's are old stock now, so they should be quite affordable.

R.

[brandondrury]

Mine failed to keep 18 tracks going smoothly in Cubase and ProTools without any plugins at all on an external hard drive.

Wow! That's it! Was this because it was a laptop? I always figured the G4 was around the XP 2000 in AMD CPU talk, but it sounds like it may have been dramatically slower.

Brandon

[frozenright]

Originally Posted by brandondrury

All the Mac dudes were using G4s for years in my earlier days of recording. You should be able to do some things just fine. I'm not sure how hard you plan on pushing your G4.

I'm not a Mac guy, so I really can't help much.

Sorry,
Brandon

Thanks for the reply - and any sway to go PC is appreciated. Thanks again

[frozenright]

Originally Posted by richiebee

I run Final Cut Pro on a G4 Powerbook sometimes. It's as slow as molasses compared to my G5 but it is functional. If you're planning on relatively big mixes, you might find the G4 a bit weak. Mine failed to keep 18 tracks going smoothly in Cubase and ProTools without any plugins at all on an external hard drive.

How much more is it for a G5? The difference in performance is significant, and G5's are old stock now, so they should be quite affordable.

R.

Thanks, I'll go for a G5.

[brandondrury]

any sway to go PC is appreciated.

Okay. Well here goes.

With all other things being equal, I can think of absolutely no reason to go Mac. (By "all things being equal" I mean that the gear you may already own or the software you want to use works equally well with both).

The biggest reason: Macs cost more. Why?

I consider a good Mac and a good PC to be equal in every regard. I say this because in a well setup system, the operating system should be transparent. Right now I'm not typing in Window, Mac, or any of that. I'm typing in Maxthon (it's like Internet Explorer). When I record, I don't necessarily use Windows, I use Cubase. When I do my weak attempts at graphics, I use Photoshop. When I write php code, I use Dreamweaver.

So, if you have an option go to either way, I'd make my decision on hardware and software first and then figure out which computer platform bests supports that.

Brandon

[richiebee]

One thing is for certain with video editing, Final Cut Pro (Mac only), beats the pants off Adobe Premiere (Windows only). Not quality - there, I'm guessing they're pretty much the same. It's the work flow that is just much smoother on FCP.

[frozenright]

Thanks for putting it so succicntly - Dom DeLuise - That makes the sense I had not heard. When I have a question about anything what is the procedure? Thanks again.

[brandondrury]

Final Cut Pro (Mac only), beats the pants off Adobe Premiere (Windows only).

I could see that. Logic may be way easier to use than X software. If a person really wanted Logic, they'd have to go Mac. In this case, I could see the Mac preference.

Richiebee, you've said that Cubase SX3 runs way smoother on a PC. In this case, it would be silly to go with a Mac.

Of course, the hard part wit ha ll of this is figuring out which software you want to commit to beforehand.

Brandon