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Need hardware advice based on my proposed workflow
Hello. I am excited to have discovered this forum. I have recently been placed in charge of purchasing a camera, NLE software, and computer hardware platform for my company to begin shooting and editing video. We are planning to produce educational training video composed of lectures and experiments, as well as some material for advertising. Through an extended amount of research, I have narrowed my field of view to the following:
Panasonic HMC-150 camera
Final Cut Pro software
iMac or Mac Pro platform for editingIt seems that the “what hardware should I use” question gets asked frequently on this board, so rather than a generic repeat and rehash, I would like to try to get some advice based on my specific workflow. I envision us shooting videos of around 30 min to 1 hour in length. Since the camera is AVCHD, I am told that I will need to transcode the video to the Apple ProRes format before editing. We will be doing basic edits, such as transitions, titling, adding canned commercials, and bringing in graphics and possibly animations at some point. The final product will be set for use on DVD or posted on a website.
My hardware budget will limit me to either the Mac Pro 2.8 GHz quad core Xeon Nehalem with the ATI 5770 or 5870 GPU, or the iMac 2.93 GHz quad core i7 with the ATI 5750 GPU. I plan to put 6-8 GB of RAM in either system.
Now my questions:
1. – Is either system a clear winner?
2. – Can FCP even take advantage of the Mac Pro quad core processors and better GPUs, or is it more important to just have a large amount of memory?
3. – Since I will be doing some transcoding, will I notice a siginificant speed difference if I go with the Mac Pro?
4. – Any other thoughts?Thank you so much for your help. I have learned already from all the posts I have read, and I am sure I have much more to learn.
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5 Replies
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There are a ton of threads that talk about the iMac and its limitations. If you never plan to go outside the box, external monitor, faster/redundant hard drive RAIDs. You can do fine with an iMac but the default answer for most people is to get a MacPro because of all the flexibility it offers.
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Well, the Mac Pro with 8GB of ram (to be comprable to the iMac) and a 24″ ACD (add another $200 for the upcoming 27″ screen) will run you $3700 while the iMac is $2400 so not exactly an apples to apples comparison (no pun intended). Boss’s money I’d go Mac Pro. My money, a lot tougher call, for what you say you want to do the iMac should be fine, but if things change (when don’t they?) you will be locked in with the iMac whereas greener pasteurs always await you with the Mac Pro. Just my 2 cents.
Jeff Mueller
http://www.ApertureVideos.com
Santa Barbara, CA -
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Thank you all for your input. I certainly appreciate the time it takes out of your schedules to reply. I think we are leaning towards the iMac, but I wonder about the idea of adding e-sata port for storage. Seems like there is a company that will modify your iMac in this way. Good idea or not, what do you think?
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[Ben Seyller] “but I wonder about the idea of adding e-sata port for storage”
that modification will void the warrantee by Apple, but I think that company will warranty the entire system if they do the work. Which is okay but it would most likely mean longer turn times if something goes wrong. Just something to think about.
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