FCP Xpress and Imac G5

[Jeff Carpenter]

Should work great! Here’s a few thoughts for best performance:

* Get an external firewire hard drive. 120 or 160 GB should be just fine. Set that drive as the media scratch disc for Final Cut and don’t store ANYTHING else on it.

* Make sure you’re getting one of the new iMac models. It should haev 128 MB of Video-card RAM. Processor speed is not that imporant, they’re all pretty similar.

* Make sure you get one with a Superdrive for burning DVDs.

* Buy the iMac with the smallest amount of RAM possible. Then go to http://www.crucial.com and buy two 1-GB chips for it. That should cost about $230 but it’s the BEST investment you’ll make for that computer. Keep the RAM that comes out of the computer as backup, or sell it on E-Bay.

* I’m assuming you have a DV camera with firewire? You’ll hook that up to the computer with the firewire, but also go to Best Buy (or something like it) and get whatever TV you can buy for under $150. Hook that up to the camera while he edits. For learning purposes it will make a fine external monitor.

[Darrin]

…thanks Jeff.

[Kevin Monahan]

I don’t like the idea of using FireWire drives on the same bus as your DV Deck, it’s a recipe for dropped frames when you daisy chain. You are forced to work this way with an iMac.

I recommend a lower end Mac Tower over an iMac. With a tower, you can add a FireWire PCI card if you want to use FireWire drives. That way the drives and the deck will be on separate buses.

I would also suggest some good external speakers and a video monitor. That way, he can monitor video properly.

Kevin Monahan
Author – Motion Graphics and Effects in Final Cut Pro
fcpworld.com

[Jeff Carpenter]

You have a point, Kevin, about the same firewire bus, but I don’t think it’s a big enough deal to change his plans. My thinking is that if it’s for a student, the price they’re willing to spend is probably fixed, and the money it would take to go from an iMac to a tower would probably cut into other items, like the RAM. Although having seperate buses would be nice, I don’t think it’s worth the cost in either money or other items lost.

I edited on a G4 Powermac with a hard drive and a deck plugged into the same bus for years and I only had minimal problems. I know people who edit with Powerbooks, daisy chaining the deck through the drive. Will there be dropped frames? Yes, sometimes, I’m sure. But it’s probably not worth the extra cost for them to worry about that. I do think there’s only so much money you can spend on a hobby before it gets to be a bit much.

But I don’t know you, Darrin, or what you want to spend. Kevin’s advice IS good advice, I’m just letting you know that you don’t have to make the system fool-proof if it’s just for learning. However, if you DO want to go the tower-route, I just want to let you know that my video RAM and system RAM advice stays the same. You could skip the firewire drive, however, and get a second internal drive and use THAT as the media scratch disc.

[Kevin Monahan]

Hey Jeff,
We agree to disagree then. To me, a stable system config is a big deal.

As former student of digital video (hey, we’ve all been there), I would say that having a stable system that always works without dropped frames is probably the most important thing you can do for the lad. Sure, an iMac is cool lookin’ and utilitarian for most stuff–but for video editing, I have a more conservative approach regarding system configuration.

I’m glad you had no issues daisy chaining, but many, many people DO have trouble. I have a powerbook and daisy chaining w/o a PCMCIA card WILL drop frames every time.

[Jeff Carpenter] “I’m just letting you know that you don’t have to make the system fool-proof if it’s just for learning.”

Disagree. A used car with a leaky radiator will work, but it’ll let you down in the long run as well.

[Jeff Carpenter] “You could skip the firewire drive, however, and get a second internal drive and use THAT as the media scratch disc.”

Now THAT’S good advice! 😉

Kevin Monahan
Author – Motion Graphics and Effects in Final Cut Pro
fcpworld.com

[Jeff Carpenter]

[Jeff Carpenter] “I’m just letting you know that you don’t have to make the system fool-proof if it’s just for learning.”

Disagree. A used car with a leaky radiator will work, but it’ll let you down in the long run as well.
============

I just want to make it clear that my experience was about 1 dropped frame for every 4 or 5 hours of video captured. I would export my finished projust as a self-contained movie before laying back to tape so I didn’t have problems there.

I absolutely agree that you need to learn on a system that works. I just apparently had a much luckier experience with my computer than most people. I do agree with you, I think I just have much different level of expectation for an iMac than you do. I’ve never owned an iMac so I can’t say that I’m right.

Sorry, Darrin, I don’t think we made this easy for you! 😉 Hopefully you can see the points we’ve made and you can decide what to do with that information.

[Darrin]

all is well my friends. Thanks for your time.

[Seawild]

Q: But can you cut a New Reality Show on the new photo IPOD?
A: Yes and its better cause you don’t have to watch it either!