[Jenn Lindsay]

Dear Robin,

Can you please tell me what RED is?

Thank you!
Jenn

[Jenn Lindsay]

Okay. Awesome. I do work in Motion but not 3-D stuff. I don’t really see that happening in this lifetime at least. So I think investing in GPU and then souping up the RAM with a cheaper input purchased outside Apple-land is my best bet.

While I have your helpfulness on the line, can you recommend how/where I can get this 2×8 RAM when the time comes? Is there a certain brand or spec I should be looking out for?

Your input is very helpful, thank you! I believe you know approximately a thousand times more than the sales guy who tried to help me at the Apple Store in Boston a few months ago.

[Jenn Lindsay]

Robin, thank you again.

Let me clarify since I’m not yet as savvy as I want to be.

So if I go for the 27″ 3.4GHz, you recommend that I:
* upgrade the graphics to NVIDIA GeForce GTX 780M 4GB GDDR5 (only $150, which is doable in the scheme of things)
* leave the storage to the in-built 1TB Serial ATA Drive @ 7200 rpm and then work with external drives.
* Figure out the RAM upgrade to 2x8GB or 4x8GB on my own in a cheaper place.

I want also to ask you your opinion on the processor. There is the stock 3.4GHz Quad-core Intel Core i5, Turbo Boost up to 3.8GHz, or the upgrade option to a 3.5GHz Quad-core Intel Core i7 with Turbo Boost up to 3.9GHz. Can you please tell me what you think of this upgrade option, given my present intermediate abilities and desire to improve/grow/make solid docs, but probably not be a professional editor or feature filmmaker?

🙂 I appreciate it!
Jenn

[Jenn Lindsay]

Thank you kindly to all for your feedback!

It makes me nervous to spend so much money on a machine that is maxed out in any way (ie, the 21.5″ Mac that only hits 16GB of RAM). And come to think of it I had eventually partitioned the hard drive on my 2005 MacPro and added 3TB of drive space and 32GB of RAM. I was working with FCP 6 in OS10.5 but could go over to the OS10.7 partition for other tasks.

So if I start to look at the 27″ iMac as a machine I can grow with and possibly push my graphics skillz further….which of the two options (between 3.2 and 3.4GHz) makes the most sense? With which enhancements exactly? –I assume just the 1TB Fusion drive if I can add 32GB of cheaper RAM myself?

It makes me nervous to think of adding RAM to the 27″ myself, but is it really truly easy? I understand that non-Mac RAM is way cheaper.

All who reply are really truly helping me and I really appreciate it. This is an important and costly investment and I want to be smart about it being a machine that meets my present needs but also has room to work with my future needs. And yet I am anxious about not being wasteful and overambitious, because Mac is so costly, especially overseas. My next documentary film will be science-related so I am already envisioning all the cool graphics I can teach myself! Like, transparent rotating brains!

Thank you!
Jenn

[Jenn Lindsay]

Thank you Shane! Please bear with me here because I am not super technical.

I only have FCP to work with today. So at what point should I convert the clips? If I have already cut mov files into a sequence, can I still convert them all within the sequence? The ideal, since I have already produced my rough cut sequence, would be if I can (in my fantasy dreams it works like this) select the whole clip and click on “convert to…..”

I imagine it is not that easy. So…what am I converting it to, how do I do it, and can I do it out of a cut sequence?

Thank you!