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Activity Forums Apple Final Cut Pro Legacy FCP 5.1.4 in Leopard or return to Tiger

  • FCP 5.1.4 in Leopard or return to Tiger

    Posted by Jill Freidberg on July 16, 2008 at 12:13 am

    I’ve been reading over threads on this topic, but need some specific answers.
    My machine:
    MacBookPro with Leopard
    2.5 GHZ Intel Core 2 Duo
    4 GB 667 MHZ DDR2 SDRAM

    I am coming on to a feature-length documentary project as editor, and everyone else working on the project is working in FCP 5.1.4. I need to edit in 5.1.4. as well. I don’t have FCP on this computer yet, as I just got it a couple of months ago after Powerbook was stolen. So it came with Leopard as the OS.
    I won’t need to use Compressor at any stage of this project. Just straight edits. My understanding is that most of the problems between Leopard and 5.1.4 have been moving between FCP and Compressor.

    So my questions are:
    Are there other concrete reasons that I should not run 5.1.4 over Leopard?
    If so, can I go backwards to Tiger, even though this machine came with Leopard?
    If I do that, what precautions should I take so as not to hose anything else on my machine? And will I have to go back and BUY Leopard later, if I want to come back to Leopard after this project is finished (or maybe it came with the machine…I should check).

    Thanks
    Jill

    Kyle High replied 17 years, 10 months ago 5 Members · 6 Replies
  • 6 Replies
  • Jerry Hofmann

    July 16, 2008 at 12:35 am

    Have them supply you a computer with their software on it? I’d think that would be best. Or buy 5.1 on ebay? Can’t get it legally any other way.

    I’m pretty sure they cannot load their license on computers they don’t own…

    I’d run 5.1.4 in Tiger. It was written for it… However I’d not run Tiger on your machine without calling apple first. post the exact specs… and you should be able to research this in Apple’s online Support.

    Have them upgrade to studio 2? That should be a no brainer I’d think. Unless they own G4’s or something…

    Jerry

    Apple Certified Trainer

    Author: “Jerry Hofmann on Final Cut Pro 4” Click here

    8-Core 3.0 Intel Mac Pro, Dual 2 gig G5, AJA Kona SD, AJA Kona 2, Huge Systems Array UL3D, AJA Io HD, 17″ MBP, Matrox MXO, CD’s

  • Jill Freidberg

    July 16, 2008 at 1:14 am

    I own 5.1.4. I had it on the laptop that was stolen.

    They can’t provide me with a computer. This is a feature-length political documentary… without a budget for extra Macs.

    And they are too far along in the project to risk a version upgrade mid-project. Especially cause they are using footage from multiple formats and sources and were able to manually do time-based correction in 5.1.4., which will create big headaches in FCS 2, which wants to do it automatically.

    I’ll check with Apple about going back to Tiger. But does anyone have any CONCRETE examples of common problems running 5.1.4 over Leopard?

    Jill

  • Joel Peregrine

    July 16, 2008 at 3:03 am

    I don’t have any concrete examples of problems running 5.1.4 on Leopard and I do it all day, every day. I use MacBook Pro’s also and it been one of the most stable set ups I’ve had since I started with FCP 1.0. Besides the occasional difficulty getting older external firewire drives to mount its been perfectly reliable.

  • Zane Barker

    July 16, 2008 at 5:52 am

    [Jill Freidberg] “If so, can I go backwards to Tiger, even though this machine came with Leopard? “

    Your machine contains hardware that will NOT be supported in Tiger. I saw some one who tried doing that and the machine ran all sorts of funny because the old OS did not contain drivers for the newer hardware.

    Stick with leopard or get a machine that was released before Leopard was released.

    There are no “technical solutions” to your “artistic problems”.
    Don’t let technology get in the way of your creativity!

  • Jerry Hofmann

    July 16, 2008 at 12:58 pm

    Nice to hear a report like this… most folks do such a lazy job of upgrading that they report problems… that are really cuased by upgrading the OS without a clean install then upgrading FCP without performing a clean install.

    Joel’s been around here a while so I’d trust his word on this.. I’ve no experience running 5.14 in Leopard but there’s a reliable report right here that it seems to be OK…

    Jerry

    Apple Certified Trainer

    Author: “Jerry Hofmann on Final Cut Pro 4” Click here

    8-Core 3.0 Intel Mac Pro, Dual 2 gig G5, AJA Kona SD, AJA Kona 2, Huge Systems Array UL3D, AJA Io HD, 17″ MBP, Matrox MXO, CD’s

  • Kyle High

    July 16, 2008 at 8:40 pm

    I upgraded two, 2.33GHz Intel Core 2 Duo’s a few months back to Leoppard.
    I installed FCP 5.1.4 but had few a issues with Compressor. I searched the COW and Apple support site to find the solution to those problems. Once I got those straightened out, the machines run smooth.

    I recently wrapped up a 90 minute documentary and I used Compressor and DVD SP4 for final authoring. All worked as expected.

    I’m looking forward to FCS 2.0. Just can’t afford it right now.

    Hope this helps!

    Kyle
    aka, Postman

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