I've been running on G4s for quite awhile now, and I'm hoping to upgrade my system by the end of the year. I just figured that a G5 tower would be the ticket, but I'm wondering how many of you opted for the 24" iMac and if you've been happy with it? It's a pretty impressive machine.

G5s are done, man! It's Intel Mac Pros now!

If you're truly looking to upgrade you should get the mid-level Mac Pro -- whichever model is mid at the time you choose to buy -- and hook it up with RAM. Then pick up a refurbished monitor and enjoy a system that should last as long as your G4s!

The iMacs just don't have the expansion capability of the Mac Pro -- especially when it comes to graphics, hard drive space, and SATA & RAID cards...

Good luck!

Quad intel chips should be coming to the macs soon. I'm not fully educated on when they will be released. But, if it is not a pressing need, I would wait until the quad processors hit the market. They will be faster and the prices of the dual core processors should go down considerably. I believe the change will happen ... within the next 6 months ... but ... I'm really not up-to-date on the exact date they will hit. Anyone else know?

It'd be awful to buy a dual core when 30 days later a quad core comes out at the same price.

Oh, and we went with the 20" iMac and couldn't be happier. Perfect for receptions (not too heavy or too hard to carry around) and works well with editing as well.

G5s are not done. My quad 2.5ghz G5 runs better than any system I've ever had, and will probably last me for another two years... easily. I run 5 gigs of RAM and a 23" Apple and 17" Dell monitor and this computer handles CS3 as well as a Mac Pro or 24" Intel iMac.... and it cost me a sh*tload less than a Mac Pro would have in this configuration. I love my G5... there's no reason to get a Mac Pro if you're just doing image and short film editing... I can understand a Mac Pro if you want the latest greatest insane processor power for rendering an HD-quality feature film while watching four movies and editing a few 2gb images at the same time!

Check out the refurbished section on store.apple.com... i bought my G5 there for $2700 and spent about $500 on RAM and an extra hard drive. No way can you get a Mac Pro that cheap.

As far as G5 vs. iMac.... you can't upgrade an iMac to the extent of which you can upgrade a G5. They won't hold much RAM, you can't put two hard drives in them (you can get upgrades for G5s to hold 4 more drives... thats 6 total!) amd you just can't beat that damn cool tower!

Okay, enough from me... I'll probably get yelled at enough as it is....

I dunno bout' that. One thing you've got to consider about a Mac - you buy it for a longer lifespan than a PC. I used to upgrade my PC every year. A good Mac needs to last 3 years to justify the expense. The Mac Pro's have wider channels to pump all the data around, faster busses, etc. You can't upgrade any of that stuff after the purchase (you can, but you won't, in actual application...) You'll add more Ram and more drive space, that's it.

Going through the right channels you can get a Mac Pro nicely loaded for well under $3k. I know, I just got one this week. Compare to the cost of a used G5? You'll probably pay at least 2k for one as they hold their value. If you came up on a nicely loaded G5 for $1200, sure, be tempted, but that's not likely.

Spending an extra few hudred on a machine may make a big difference in 2 to 3 years when it's nearly it's life end. That could mean the difference between "I can still use this for another 8 months" and "It's just too slow, must upgrade now".

You don't need to go crazy overboard, but I think $2500 for a standard retail Mac Pro is a darn good value, and will continue to be so into the forseeable future.



a bit of an overstatement? doing heavy work of any kind will still push any current computer to it's limits. I've been spinning my Mac Pro for the past 2 days putting it through the works and it's super crazy fast - but there's still some lag when doing heavy PS work. It's way fast, but not quite butter smooth under heavy work. I wouldn't want to flop down multiple thousands of dollars and get anything less.



Good call there! They do some sweeeeet deals there. Sometimes the retail stores have refurbs also, and a friend of mine recently got a MBP that way and got 15% off for the refurb PLUS got his 10% student discount. They had a $3800 machine last week posted for about $3100 if I remember right.



Consider yourself yelled at.





... seriously, anything you get above a G4 should feel screaming fast, but a little more investment now really can add a year of life later, which means the following upgrade is better/less expensive and so on, so it may make a lot of $$ sense over the long run to just buy the current offering and consider yourself setup.

its all good man. i did purposely make a few overstatements for the sake of theatrics lol, and i honestly do see the point of getting a mac pro due to all of those things you mentioned. however, if one were to be on a tight budget but still be able to afford a G5 which would still last them 2 more years, i think its totally worth it.

no harm done... the most important part here is that we all love our macs ;-)

Thanks for the replies. In the original post, I actually meant "Mac Pro" but got side-tracked and typed in G5. If I'm not mistaken, the 3 GHz quad-core is already available. I agree with the post about investing for long term. It's too much money to spend on a computer for 1 to 2 years of use. My G4s have gone beyond their call of duty. What's a 'PC'?

The Quad Core are out now, but personally I'd stick to the Dual core (it's still two of them, so you have four cores...the quad cores have 8 cores...again, cause it's doule...I know, it's confusing). The software (even CS3) just isn't written at the moment to max out all those cores even when you're running them pretty heavy.

We've got the 3.0 ghz Quad Core machine and it's great. Just like Kevin said, it's fast, but it still hangs up a little bit under heavy PS work. I just don't think (at this point) more cores will do you any better.

Christopher-

I'll be writing a review later this week of my Mac Pro compared to my MacBook Pro. I'm doing some hardcore editing this weekend to really get a feel for it.

For what it's worth - students get a 10% discount from the retail stores - if you've got a student ID or know someone who does - it's worth calling in a favor. If not, you can call Apple's business direct line and get a 5% discount for being a business, which is still a nice chunk on a purchase this large.

Business direct line: 800-409-5381
My rep is Joseph Anderson, x2435 - he was great and very helpful. Used him to buy my MBP last year, as well as the MP last week. I think they get a comission, so maybe hook him up. Just tell them you're a business, you give some basic info, and get a discount. No faxing licenses or anything, they just trust you.

For memory, I've heard great advice to NOT buy Apple's memory as it's the same stuff available other places and more than double the cost. I ordered my MP with the stock 1GB ram, then added a 4GB (2x2GB) upgrade from another retailer for $360, plus very reasonable shipping. www.18004memory.com - they were recommended by some friends and also a few people gave positive feedback on the apple forum about them. They shipped the same day, fedex 3 day was only $8. Memory installed clean, works great, includes heat spreaders. I got the Micron manufacture stuff. Here's the direct link:
http://www.18004memory.com/focus.asp?sku=502783

Grand total with tax, shipping, memory, everything, my 2.66 Quad, 250 GB HD, 5GB ram was $2930.

My testing so far - "crazy insane fast" a magnatude faster than my MBP.

This is what's so great about this forum. Fellow photographers willing to share information with their peers. Occasionally, I get turned off by the drama queens (male and female) here and their petty bickering, then I'm reminded that there's plenty of cool people still posting to OSP and it keeps me coming back.
Thanks, guys!

With the octo core, you really have to pay attention as to how you install your ram. ou have to match the sticks to each core. so 4g of ram may be stronger in a quad core over 4g (8 x .5) in an oct. it can get pretty confusing. Like Chris said, most software wont run faster on an 8. Yet.

I was just offering advice for someone buying new. We have a brand spanking new MacPro (5GB Ram) sitting next to an original dual processor (2x2.5, also 5GB RAM) G5 that is still fast!

I just hope the radiator/cooling system on the G5 doesn't pop any time soon!