Thunderbolt on iMAC?

[Bret Williams]

I think they will put thunderbolt on everything. Especially since they’re merging it with their monitor connector. It’ll make iMacs great editing machines. But they’ll still sell the mac pros because of the processor power and expandability. It’s not like I’m going to jump ship and get an imac just because it has thunderbolt. I have an investment in sata gear and drives for awhile.

[Mark Petereit]

Apple will change the existing mini Displayport to Thunderbolt on all new iMacs.

[Mark Maness]

Well… I can tell you, Brett.

I just bought an iMac for my home system and also to be used an edit system. IT IS AWESOME!!!! I bought the 27″ 2.9 Quad Core i7 processor with 4 gig on RAM and 1 gig of video. Man it screams faster than my 2007 Octocore with 8 gig of RAM. Motion is AWESOME. It works in realtime with lots of layers. Render times are almost half of what I’m used to seeing at work.

Yeah… I don’t have a true monitoring on it yet but I use the scopes religiously and until I can afford a broadcast monitor and an HDMI to SDI breakout box… I’ll just keep using my HDMI flat panel. It’s pretty darn close to broadcast.

I just wish I had an ExpressCard slot and another firewire 800 port.

_______________________________

Wayne Carey
Schazam Productions
https://web.mac.com/schazamproductions
schazamproductions@mac.com

[Bret Williams]

Oh man I figured. I’m using the old 2007 octocore (dual dual 2ghz) but it still keeps on going. Yes, an i7 would be awesome. But so would a new tower with 12 cores of whatever the heck is the latest processor. It’s nice to wait 3-4 years because anything feels like it screams. My plan was to possibly upgrade in December, but with all the new stuff shaking out, I’ll try and keep going. But AE CS5 is really not too happy with the old machine. Funny, cuz CS4 and CS3 were snappier. Maybe I’ll go post about that in AE forum…

[Thomas Morter-laing]

For sure they will. I reckon the wait for this was a lot of the reason they didn’t implement the express card in the iMacs was because they were waiting for this…
Hopefully it will remove mac pro snobbery which seems to happen as well- the iMac is a perfectly good editing machine as far as specs go. With the ability to connect to hi speed devices, the mac pro only seems to have minor speed advantages. I think there is a strong argument here that apple have even further blurred the line between what is condidered consumer and pro.

😀
Tom Morter-Laing
Freelance Editor
Certified Apple Product Proffessional, 2010
http://www.depictproductions.co.uk

Sony Z5, with Rode NTG2.
iMac 27″ intel i7 2.93GHz, 12GB RAM, ATI HD5750 [1GB GDDR5], 2TB Int. SATA with 2TB External HDD; (FW800), with Elgato Turbo H264HD.

[Bob Zelin]

Mac Pro “snobbery” ? Yea, who needs professionals, and professional equipment. Consumers should be able to do exactly what we do – who needs professionals for anything !

It’s posts like this that make me say “that God for RED, 4K, and a new hi end”, because when “anyone” can do what we do – guess what – we don’t make any money.

Thank God that Thunderbolt can only handle 6 devices (including monitors) – once (and if) they develop hubs and/or switches for Thunderbolt, then Creative Cow may go out of business, as their advertisers will crumble.

Bob Zelin

[Andy Lewis]

There may still be good reasons to buy a mac pro but I don’t think speed counts as one of them. Unless it’s worth your while paying to be at the top end all the time, and upgrading frequently.

If you’re buying a top-end mac pro and replacing it every 5 years you might be doing it wrong. You’d get a faster system on average replacing an imac every 2 years.

Exponential curves, innit.
Not that speed per dollar is everything.

Anyway, thunderbolt means I’ll never buy me the giant silver toaster and I can’t say I’m sad.

[Margus Voll]

Probably there will be 5 k and 9 k cameras and we still need Mac Pros 🙂 with 64 cores.
I know i do.

I see every day how some people use now canon for jobs that use to use film and editing on laptop.
Yes they can do it but outcome is peace of BS.

Professional experience and talent will not come with cheap gear as we have seen with DV.

There will be just more bad stuff coming out.

Real businesses will still hire Pros i bet.

—

Margus

https://iconstudios.eu

[Thomas Morter-laing]

To an extent, I have to say, point proven….
Look folks. Professional tools are just that, a tool, NOT a measure of your worth or talent as a pro. There seems to be too much emphasis here on the latest technology and having the fastest and best. Im sure the film “Meet the Spartans” was edited on top of the line equipment, but it was the most awful pile of crap Ive seen in a while. I also saw a music video edited on a Macbook (not even a pro) which as quoted by a BBC producer) was “pretty much MTV standards”. Didnt the director of “Monsters” shoot everything on an EX3? Certainly not a bad camera, but certainly not as much as one could pay. It getting ridiculous. Dont get me wrong, a mac pro top of the line is certainly going to make your life easier, and sure, people will probably take you more seriously if you have top of the line equipment. But equally, saying you need to have top of the line equipment for editing is essentially the same as saying you can’t be an editor without either lots of money, or (in this country at least) a few contacts, as well as luck (and skill of course) enough to get into a full time editors position. Basically opinions like this seem to suppress creative talent, and actually there is a lot out there. This is the case for TV really, I mean there was a BBC short called “Crack House” which was filmed on a crud camera and not edited amazingly but the story was such that it got onto TV. So equipment isnt everything, talent is. But yes, I DO concur that editing hollywood features and material for cinema requires something a little higher caliber, although I would say that the top range imac (over £2k, NOT a “consumer” standard price for a computer) can handle this stuff.
I would also like to add that a prestigious media company in London has added a top range iMac for editing to its list, as has an award winning TV production company in Somerset. Both get regular, large commissions for big TV projects and large corporate projects.

😀
Tom Morter-Laing
Freelance Editor
Certified Apple Product Proffessional, 2010
http://www.depictproductions.co.uk

Sony Z5, with Rode NTG2.
iMac 27″ intel i7 2.93GHz, 12GB RAM, ATI HD5750 [1GB GDDR5], 2TB Int. SATA with 2TB External HDD; (FW800), with Elgato Turbo H264HD.

[Paul Jay]

Even a Mac Mini Server will get it eventually.

Thunderbolts are go!!