Serious Photographers - How would you budget your upgrade?

[hoya87eagle91]

HI - I am looking to change from a 2005 Power MAc dual 2.0 w/ an average 20" Dell monitor to a new photo processing / Printing set up. I am avoiding the iMac becuase the glossy screen and lack of adjustment controls is a total bust for me. I want accurate prints - WYSIWYG. In adition to shooting RAW , JPEGS, I have a growing Medium format negative / Slide library to scan / tweak.

In addition, I have a rapidly growing HD video library to processs into 5-15 minute shorts.

So If you had 2k to Spend, would you spend $1k On a high quality monitor and $700 on a new Mini, with possible $ left over for maybe Max RAM and some other things? What would you do???

[jessica.]

The Dell displays are easily calibrated. I would spend the money on a quad MacPro and a Dell display. That would be more than enough power for you, gives you space to increase storage over time, and as I said ... the Dell display is easily calibrated.

[compuwar]

Quote out the high-end Dell LCD with the same screen as the Apple Cinema Display, then go from there.

[peskaa]

I'd actually do some research first. You can calibrate the iMacs properly, just as much you can with an external display, and get matching prints. Of course, you need hardware to do this, for both screen and print.

As such, I'd buy a 27" iMac and a Pantone ColorMunki or similar.

[Badger^2]

I'd actually do some research first. You can calibrate the iMacs properly, just as much you can with an external display, and get matching prints. Of course, you need hardware to do this, for both screen and print.

As such, I'd buy a 27" iMac and a Pantone ColorMunki or similar.

I agree. Not sure where you heard that iMacs cant be done properly.

You just need the right calibrator -- and my vote would be for a Spyder 3 right now.

Several good threads over a DPreview. Everyone loves their 27".

http://forums.dpreview.com/forums/read.asp?forum=1017&message=33945286

http://forums.dpreview.com/forums/read.asp?forum=1017&message=33962659

[compuwar]

I second the Mac Pro recommendation- internal drives are going to be faster and capacity is higher without going to externals.

[peskaa]

I second the Mac Pro recommendation- internal drives are going to be faster and capacity is higher without going to externals.

For under $2k though? Not happening! You can easily blow that budget on a single Eizo screen, and the Mac Pro alone will also cost more than the budget.

[CrackedButter]

HI - I am looking to change from a 2005 Power MAc dual 2.0 w/ an average 20" Dell monitor to a new photo processing / Printing set up. I am avoiding the iMac becuase the glossy screen and lack of adjustment controls is a total bust for me. I want accurate prints - WYSIWYG.

So If you had 2k to Spend, would you spend $1k On a high quality monitor monitor and $700 on a new Mini, with posible $ left over for maybe Max RAM and some other things?What would you do???

Dude, as long as the screen is calibrated and the prints come out it won't matter. At Uni we use Mac Mini's with the Glossy Apple Displays for printing out work.

[compuwar]

For under $2k though? Not happening! You can easily blow that budget on a single Eizo screen, and the Mac Pro alone will also cost more than the budget.

Only by $150-250 if they go refurb or are a student or developer. If they go with the 20" Dell instead of a 30, it's really not a huge delta in price, but it will be in performance if they go off the internal HD.

[NathanCH]

Mac Mini would probably not perform well enough

[Badger^2]

Only by $150-250 if they go refurb or are a student or developer. If they go with the 20" Dell instead of a 30, it's really not a huge delta in price, but it will be in performance if they go off the internal HD.

Have you been reading the iMac i7 benchmarks?

As fast as the low end MP for many things...

http://www.barefeats.com/imi7.html

The only 20" Dell IPS panel is the 2007 @ 1600 X 1200, a lot smaller than the 27" iMac, and they are $369. And never go on sale.

[hoya87eagle91]

Thanks for the input so far everyone.

My Dell isn't fuly adjutable for contrast, just brightness. I calibrate it every few weeks with inconsistent output results. Annoying

I read reviews in Shutterbug mag and other places that after calibration, the mac monitors are measurably inferior to many third party ones ike NEC, Ezio, even Lacie. Can anyone confirm or deny that? No way can I work on a glossy screen of an imac ever. Who's idea were those any way?! the reflection is a deal breaker. Kepp the input coming. Thanks!

I'd actually do some research first. You can calibrate the iMacs properly, just as much you can with an external display, and get matching prints. Of course, you need hardware to do this, for both screen and print.

As such, I'd buy a 27" iMac and a Pantone ColorMunki or similar.

So what extra hardware do I need to do this?

I'd actually do some research first. You can calibrate the iMacs properly, just as much you can with an external display, and get matching prints. Of course, you need hardware to do this, for both screen and print.

As such, I'd buy a 27" iMac and a Pantone ColorMunki or similar.

I will duplicate the post correctly ...- so what extra hardware will help calibrate the imacs properly? Thanks

Mac Mini would probably not perform well enough

Is this because of the slow internal drive? Thanks

[CrackedButter]

Mac Mini would probably not perform well enough

To post process one image and print it? The Mac Mini is more than capable. It depends on your work flow doesn't it. If you're going to be playing itunes, on the internet watching video's and flicking through aperture for the next image then probably yes, it would not perform well.

But for the Uni setup they have, no.

It goes back to what you're going to do with the machine in the end.

[stagi]

I would put more of your budget towards a better tower vs a mini. And do agree with others some of the dell monitors perform pretty well, although I have a 24" that even when calibrated isn't perfect compared to my 30" ACD which is spot on.

[mep42]

I would get a 27 inch imac and you can easily calibrate those with software, they have IPS panels in them and can deliver excellent performance

[peskaa]

I will duplicate the post correctly ...- so what extra hardware will help calibrate the imacs properly? Thanks

You need a calibration device, such as the ones listed here: http://shop.colourconfidence.com/section.php?xSec=10210&jssCart=7231230625c74d39e1ffd7182e588fa5

They are worth spending a decent chunk of change on, and if you're looking for perfect print matching you will need to get your printer profiled as well as your screen.

My personal recommendation is the Pantone ColorMunki Photo, which will do your monitor and printer. The Spyder3 is also great, and can also be purchased in a kit that can profile printers.


I used to have a 2008 Mac Pro with a 30 and 23" displays. Loved it, but when the Quad iMacs came out I moved to the 27" i7 iMac. I'm not really noticing any difference either - Aperture is behaving in exactly the same fashion, and the system is about just as fast as the Mac Pro was. The bonus is that they're a hell of a lot cheaper - you *could* get a second hand or refurb Mac Pro for your entire budget, but then your monitor would be small/bad for colour accuracy and you wouldn't be able to get a calibrator either.

[compuwar]

Have you been reading the iMac i7 benchmarks?

As fast as the low end MP for many things...

http://www.barefeats.com/imi7.html

The only 20" Dell IPS panel is the 2007 @ 1600 X 1200, a lot smaller than the 27" iMac, and they are $369. And never go on sale.

No, I'm going on the speed differences I get between USB2, Firewire and SATA drives on my Mac Pro and Macbook Pro. Yes, 20" is smaller than 27", I think we all knew that- however 20" is just fine for photo editing- the biggest issue for me is disk space, and I save more time with internal drives on a Mac Pro than anything else in my workflow. As the benchmark you point to says, if they added an eSATA port, the i7 would be competitive, but they didn't- and that's where I bottleneck when working with panoramas, batch settings, HDRs and even batch resizing- heck even full-rez raw conversions suffer once they leave the memory card.

I'd skimp on monitor size with an eye to future screen updates before I'd skimp on the Mac Pro vs iMac because even the low-end Mac Pro will house 4 internal SATA drives, and that has the most day-to-day impact performance-wise for my photo work.

[Badger^2]

Im sure everyones workflow is different, and I understand the advantage of the extra internals on the MP, but you are talking a whole different price category.

A great budget system for our OP would be a 21" 3.06 base iMac for $1000 + extra 4 gigs ram $100 + whatever 24" matte screen he wanted next to it $600 and up (Dell U2410?) + 2 TB external FW800 drive $200 + a good color calibrator (say, Spyder 3) $300 = less than the price of a stock/base model macpro and 5X as fast as his G5 (faster than a $700 mini too) add another $400 for the ATI 21" iMac for the larger drive and faster video (important for Lightroom/Aperture)

The 1 TB internal is plenty large enough to store several big shoots on, even if there were 100 gigs of images for one shoot.

Plenty of direct SATA connection with the internal drive.

Then when all of your post processing is done, transfer the files to your external FW800 drive. FW800 isnt SATA, but its plenty fast enough for opening large files and transferring gigs and gigs of data around.

Again, we all have different needs, and Im thinking the OPs arent as demanding as yours...

[peskaa]

No, I'm going on the speed differences I get between USB2, Firewire and SATA drives on my Mac Pro and Macbook Pro. Yes, 20" is smaller than 27", I think we all knew that- however 20" is just fine for photo editing- the biggest issue for me is disk space, and I save more time with internal drives on a Mac Pro than anything else in my workflow. As the benchmark you point to says, if they added an eSATA port, the i7 would be competitive, but they didn't- and that's where I bottleneck when working with panoramas, batch settings, HDRs and even batch resizing- heck even full-rez raw conversions suffer once they leave the memory card.

I'd skimp on monitor size with an eye to future screen updates before I'd skimp on the Mac Pro vs iMac because even the low-end Mac Pro will house 4 internal SATA drives, and that has the most day-to-day impact performance-wise for my photo work.

See, I don't get why you're doing a comparison with a MacBook Pro, which uses laptop drives, rather than the iMac that everybody else is talking about which uses standard desktop SATA drives.

The Mac Pro is going to ship with a single 640GB drive, which is going to be exactly the same speed (give or take, depending upon exact model) as the 1TB drive that the iMac would ship with. Same interface, the lot. The difference is that the Mac Pro offers 4 bays - but I would argue that the 2TB BTO on the iMac is plenty of space, with FW800 being there for external/backup.


Quite simply the 27" iMacs offer incredible bang for buck. Performance-wise, they're faster than the base Quad Mac Pros, but their downer is the lack of expansion. However, if you spec the iMac up right (ie: big internal drive) you won't overly miss that.

[compuwar]

See, I don't get why you're doing a comparison with a MacBook Pro, which uses laptop drives, rather than the iMac that everybody else is talking about which uses standard desktop SATA drives.


See, I'm saying external drives in general, laptop or desktop are slow enough that it makes a difference. I thought that would be obvious given the context.


The Mac Pro is going to ship with a single 640GB drive, which is going to be exactly the same speed (give or take, depending upon exact model) as the 1TB drive that the iMac would ship with. Same interface, the lot. The difference is that the Mac Pro offers 4 bays - but I would argue that the 2TB BTO on the iMac is plenty of space, with FW800 being there for external/backup.


See, you can get about 30% faster by going with 10k RPM drives on the Mac Pro and you don't have to worry about anything other than plugging in new drives. You might find 2TB "plenty of space" but not everyone does- take out the OS and all the other data and I have my photos spread over two 1TB drives of their own there's no way I won't be upgrading at least one internal drive in 2010, and most likely all 3 non-OS drives. More importantly, moving everything off a single drive is the largest performance gain you can get.


Quite simply the 27" iMacs offer incredible bang for buck. Performance-wise, they're faster than the base Quad Mac Pros, but their downer is the lack of expansion. However, if you spec the iMac up right (ie: big internal drive) you won't overly miss that.

Nobody said the iMacs aren't incredible bang for the buck, but performance isn't just about CPU- having your OS on a different drive than Photoshop's scratch area or your images or library all come into play- and you're going to spend more time waiting on a single drive, especially if you're working with large files, panos or HDR. The first thing anyone says to do to improve PS performance is to move the scratch files to a different drive-

I'd also be wary of putting a 2TB drive into an iMac, as the cooling paths aren't all that great- I have a friend who uses one as the main computer in his studio, and it's in for it's PSU dying, and it's killed three or four drives- most likely all due to heat issues.

You can also use eSATA on the Mac Pro, giving you external drive performance that's better than twice as fast as FW800. You can expect ~120M/s write and ~140M/s read on eSATA- FW800 is going to give what 55M/s write and ~65M/s read? I'll take your word that you wouldn't "overly miss that," but I sure as heck would- every single time I processed an image!

Paul

[TheReef]

I upgraded from a G5 Single 1.8Ghz to a mini early this year.

Aperture runs great with 16MB RAW / 40MB tiff images, it won't be as smooth as a Mac Pro but max out the ram and you have a pretty capable system for the money.

Sure the Mac Pro is ideal, but the price... I was able to sell the G5 for such a good price and almost swap it for the mini.

[Razeus]

lol, the Mac Pro is OVERKILL for photo editing.

[compuwar]

lol, the Mac Pro is OVERKILL for photo editing.

Depends on how much editing you do, how much batch photo processing, how large your photos are, and if you do multiple-image projects like panoramas and HDR or if you routinely work on multiple layers in Photoshop.

I actually wish I'd gone with dual quad cores rather than a single quad core for my editing- so it's definitely not overkill for me. I also had to go to 8G of memory to even get panoramas to stitch with my new camera and the extra processor would save me a *lot* of time.

If all you're doing is bumping an adjustment in small files, then yes- but if you're doing any real work the Mac Pro is the right platform.

[peskaa]

Speaking personally, and this is after all, what this is all about, I'm noticing not much slow down on my iMac from the Mac Pro.

To qualify, my usage is Aperture for cataloguing RAW files from a 5D Mark II, 1D Mark III, 1000D, and then some miscellaneous other cameras and negative scans. I very rarely export to Photoshop CS4, and when I do it is normally for clone stamping and other such 'basic' adjustments. I do not do HDR, nor deal with any files with lots of layers. I expect that there's a lot of people doing similar work levels to their shots as well - not everybody is stitching a 50gigapixel panorama...

For the above, the iMac is great. Aperture is smooth and responsive, and the fast CPU means that any exporting etc. is rapid. I find your statement about batch processing interesting, as damnit, that's a CPU task at which the iMac excels. I've got 8GB of RAM installed, so I don't have any problems there either.


No, the iMac can't have a pair of internal drives, but PS does quite well with an external scratch disk over FW800. It may not be *quite* as fast, but it certainly doesn't turn the system into a piece of slow junk.


As for the 2TB hard disk limit? Meh. If I fill the internal drive, I'll archive older work onto externals for access when needed. Easy enough.



The main point is that for the OP, the iMac is within budget (and not massively over like a Mac Pro...) and will most certainly do the job. Perhaps not quite to the point of a spec'd out Mac Pro at twice the cost, but certainly at a very competent level. The iMac is perfectly capable of "real work" - we've just installed three at the office and are working perfectly.

[Razeus]

Depends on how much editing you do, how much batch photo processing, how large your photos are, and if you do multiple-image projects like panoramas and HDR or if you routinely work on multiple layers in Photoshop.

I actually wish I'd gone with dual quad cores rather than a single quad core for my editing- so it's definitely not overkill for me. I also had to go to 8G of memory to even get panoramas to stitch with my new camera and the extra processor would save me a *lot* of time.

If all you're doing is bumping an adjustment in small files, then yes- but if you're doing any real work the Mac Pro is the right platform.

Understandable. This is why I do my photo RAW processing in Lightroom/Photoshop CS4 on my i7 Windows rig. I leave my MBP to the light weight/iPhoto/Facebook stuff. Nevertheless, the iMac is very sufficient to processing what you describe.

[Macshroomer]

iMac or MacPro? It depends, are you doing this for an income or a pass time? I am often dumbfounded in how amateurs spend incredible amounts of money on gear....and time spent in gear mode rather than photographer mode.

I had a 24" iMac in the main office area, it ripped, I could get lots done on that because I don't really juice up my work like many do, I am a photographer, not a graphic artist. But the Mac Pro I have in the lab handles an Imacon Flextight that I use if I am not printing in the darkroom. So I appreciate those twin raptors and 4 TB of internal storage for big jobs in which I have to use digital or those big 200-800MB scans.

And I don't at all have near the problem with reflections on the screens as much as I did with hazed over low contrast / low specularity of the non-gloss screens, so that is not an issue either, but we are all different...

I'd say don't sell this guy more hardware than he needs unless it is for work and is a tax write off.

[Macshroomer]

Understandable. This is why I do my photo RAW processing in Lightroom/Photoshop CS4 on my i7 Windows rig. I leave my MBP to the light weight/iPhoto/Facebook stuff. Nevertheless, the iMac is very sufficient to processing what you describe.

I just built up and use a 13" MBP for travel work which I do a lot of. It is the 2.53 with an Intel 160 SSD for boot and apps and a 320 GB WD Black in the optical bay for files, it has 8GB of ram.

I can blast through D3X raw files or 800 MB large format scans near instantly it would seem, so I would not be so quick to dismiss a portable for professional level photo work. I have a lifestyle shoot in a couple weeks, the job will be in the hand of the creative before I even leave the hotel.

[compuwar]

I find your statement about batch processing interesting, as damnit, that's a CPU task at which the iMac excels.


It's also a disk task, and that's where the difference is for me- I often convert all my shots to a different file format depending on usage, and in my experience Photoshop likes the extra drive. I can tell the difference if I just use the system drive versus moving the images and scratch area off to a different one. If I shoot all day, I can tell the difference between USB2 and Firewire 800 card readers, let alone adding internal and external drives after download. Plus, all the iMacs in the OP's range are dual core, so if your batch task is multi-threaded you still lose out. For me, I often work on images while I have batch conversions (either Photoshop, RPP or Capture NX) going on- so the extra cores are in use. If you go with the quad-core iMac, then you may as well just pony up and get the extra disk spindles, as they'll do more for you in terms of performance than anything- you have actually looked at the difference in data transfer rates haven't you? The Quad-core iMac isn't that much less than a Mac Pro if you don't mind going with a 22" Dell UltraSharp monitor.


As for the 2TB hard disk limit? Meh. If I fill the internal drive, I'll archive older work onto externals for access when needed. Easy enough.


Once you've got more than four externals laying around, you may see how well that plays out- because I've got probably fifteen+ external drives from when my Powerbook and then MacBook Pro were my only options, and it works pretty poorly for me. I've got eight years or so of digital files and I'm still trying to locate one original image from 2003 when my backup scheme wasn't worked out well (which is probably on one of the externals that was going bad which was replaced with another external that's also going bad...)

But once again, if you really want external performance, eSATA is going to be well over twice as fast as FW800- both read and write speed- my files are getting larger, not smaller so I find it to be more of an issue today than even a year ago. I also tend to go from raw to TIFF as masters with JPEGs as working and printing copies- if you're just moving JPEGs around, then that may change how important fast disk is to you. If you're saving PSD layers to re-work or re-version, then it becomes critical. TIFFs from my new camera are ~145M each, 2TB isn't nearly as big as it once was.


The main point is that for the OP, the iMac is within budget (and not massively over like a Mac Pro...) and will most certainly do the job.

A Mac Mini will "do the job," the real question is how much processing the OP does and what their time is worth to them. If you're not de-wrinkling faces from portraits, doing panos, working with HDR or doing anything in Photoshop that requires a Scott Kelby book, then you're probably about as well off with a Mini and doing either an external SATA or eSATA hack if the price factor is that much of an issue:

http://www.erebos.net/34/
http://katastrophos.net/andre/blog/2006/11/02/the-mac-mini-external-sata-hack/

Since the Mini will boot from eSATA, you could even go with 10K RPM drives, or you could remove the DVD drive and do RAID-0 with one of these:

http://www.ifixit.com/Apple-Parts/12-7-mm-Optical-Bay-SATA-Hard-Drive-Enclosure/IF107-079

Performance comes in many flavors, but spreading the load out over multiple drives is one of the easiest and best all-around throughput changes you can make to a system, and that's simply not easy to do on an iMac. Only the OP knows if their workload warrants rebudgeting, hacking hardware or simply compromising.

[compuwar]

I can blast through D3X raw files or 800 MB large format scans near instantly it would seem

What's your workflow, because my D3x NEFs don't seem to be able to do anything instantly! Maybe I should look at RAM Disking my scratch areas...

(Maybe I should just shoot skinny folks with no wrinkles.)

Paul

[Razeus]

I just built up and use a 13" MBP for travel work which I do a lot of. It is the 2.53 with an Intel 160 SSD for boot and apps and a 320 GB WD Black in the optical bay for files, it has 8GB of ram.

I can blast through D3X raw files or 800 MB large format scans near instantly it would seem, so I would not be so quick to dismiss a portable for professional level photo work. I have a lifestyle shoot in a couple weeks, the job will be in the hand of the creative before I even leave the hotel.

Point to where I said I dismiss using a laptop for the pro level work? Or did you mistake my personal preferences as such?

[compuwar]

iMac or MacPro? It depends, are you doing this for an income or a pass time? I am often dumbfounded in how amateurs spend incredible amounts of money on gear....and time spent in gear mode rather than photographer mode.


Leica would hardly still be (barely) in business if it were otherwise. But the gear affects what you do- I know pros who shoot lots and spend two minutes on a print, and I know amateurs who shoot more and spend two weeks on a print- who's to say one is worth more than the other? Adam's printmaking was stellar, but he'd spend a lot more time in the darkroom after the early years than he did before (mostly after VC papers were invented.)


And I don't at all have near the problem with reflections on the screens as much as I did with hazed over low contrast / low specularity of the non-gloss screens, so that is not an issue either, but we are all different...


It comes at the price of shadow detail, I can see the differences between my matte Macbook Pro and my LED-backlit screen on some images more than others- but it's really a matter of "can I proof well enough?" to me.


I'd say don't sell this guy more hardware than he needs unless it is for work and is a tax write off.

It's all dependent on what they need- which isn't clear at all. The last time I shot a golf tournament, I was *very* happy to have the extra spindles, the last time I shot product it didn't matter much at all. but since we don't know what the OP shoots, how much, with what... it's difficult to say what's "more hardware than he needs," as it may be that anything is overkill, or that an 8-core fully-loaded system is the most optimal choice because their bent is focus-stacked HDR panos (and let's face it, we probably all know about three photographers combined making money on panos.)

Paul

[pdxflint]

...(and let's face it, we probably all know about three photographers combined making money on panos.)

Paul

I met one of those guys, David Bergman, a couple of months ago. Some incredible panos...inauguration and world series, who knows what else. The inauguration one he actually used a point and shoot zoomed all the way out, and let 'er rip. I'm not sure how many images were stitched, but over 1000. He said it took all night on his Macbook Pro. Anyway, enough trivia... ;)

[compuwar]

I met one of those guys, David Bergman, a couple of months ago. Some incredible panos...inauguration and world series, who knows what else. The inauguration one he actually used a point and shoot zoomed all the way out, and let 'er rip. I'm not sure how many images were stitched, but over 1000. He said it took all night on his Macbook Pro. Anyway, enough trivia... ;)

The guy I got my D2x off of does about 15% of his income off of one pano- right time, right place, right market. It's definitely not the usual pro forte.

Ok, so I took the last batch I did and redid it several times to see if my assertions on speed were correct. I processed 110 TIFF files (LZW compression) and 2 NEF files (D3x, no compression) to JPEG using the following process: Nuke the target JPEG directory, go into Bridge and select the files, then chose Tools->Photoshop->Image Processor, Photoshop will open up a dialog box, Settings are "Save in Same Location" or save to a different location depending on the test, "Save as JPEG" Quality 12, with some Copyright text (My name and year with a C) and "Include ICC Profile."

This is a fairly routine thing for me, but most of the time I'm dealing with 3x to 5x the number of files. I'm moving my hosting from Imagekind to Zenfolio, so I'm using a smaller batch size than if I were actually processing images for the first time, and I'm not dealing with the raw front-end stuff that would have an even larger effect (reading NEFs and writing to large TIFFs- the write speeds would be the key.)

Here's the "iMac-alike times" Read from, write to OS disk, Photoshop scratch on same disk:

6:13, 6:10, 6:08 average 6:10.3

Here's the Mac Pro different disk times:

5:57, 5:51, 5:51 average 5:53

Now, if you roll off to a USB2 drive (my firewire external is down) you're at over 12:30 (and I didn't have the heart to do that two more times!) If you want to roll from the USB2 to to the internal drive, the transfer time alone is around 7m, so you're still around 12-13m if you have to go the external route.

As I said, these are small numbers for me- and the times with larger items like panos and HDRs are really going to show up more, but the simple fact is that more disks are generally faster. If you do a lot of image processing, you'll see the difference in terms of saving 5-10m per session if you're a heavy user, or just waiting for things to move around, for me that can add up to about 4-5 hours per month if I shoot a lot of images that need processing.

With all this, I just realized I spend way more time on group and fine art images than I do on commercial or most of my portrait work except where I'm de-wrinkling someone.

Paul

[seedster2]

I would wait for a MacPro refurbished deal or a macbook Pro w/ external Dell IPS monitor. Skip the Mini and the iMac.

I say to skip the mini because nothing is upgradeable without potentially risking your warranty and it's not up to huge file PP. The iMac, although an incredible bang for the buck, has some serious shortcomings with respect to upgradability and QC. Both of these computers require you to plug in externals to expand (and no e-sata) and neither are portable.

The MacPro I picked up last year was under 2k and I am looking for NEC monitor from my 20 inch IPS Dell. Im not rich and work on a budget but by the time you work out the costs of settling for the lesser offerings, you will end up spending much more.

Many will say that the new glossy screens are useable and color calibratable but I have been to various printing shops and PP spots around and while I see new MPs I dont see glossy screen apple monitors. I am sure the 27inch monitors will be offered by dell soon if money is tight.

[hoya87eagle91]

A great budget system for our OP would be a 21" 3.06 base iMac for $1000 + extra 4 gigs ram $100 + whatever 24" matte screen he wanted next to it $600 and up (Dell U2410?) + 2 TB external FW800 drive $200 + a good color calibrator (say, Spyder 3) $300 = less than the price of a stock/base model macpro and 5X as fast as his G5 (faster than a $700 mini too) add another $400 for the ATI 21" iMac for the larger drive and faster video (important for Lightroom/Aperture)

Again, we all have different needs, and Im thinking the OPs arent as demanding as yours...

Thanks for laying out the ways to spread out the budget, Badger. This is very helpful.

I'm definitley a weekend amatur photog here, but what I should have added in my original post is that I've got loads of HD video amassed on mini DV HD tapes that I'd lke to edit into small five to fifteen minute shorts using imovie HD, Imovie 08, and or FCE, and I expect the library will only grow with two young kids around! How would that change a potential set up, given that it might be easier to have multiple drives for editing video?

I also have a growing library of medium format slides and negatives that i may eventually scan (either myself or will outsource) and store digitally.

I would wait for a MacPro refurbished deal or a macbook Pro w/ external Dell IPS monitor. Skip the Mini and the iMac.

I say to skip the mini because nothing is upgradeable without potentially risking your warranty and it's not up to huge file PP. The iMac, although an incredible bang for the buck, has some serious shortcomings with respect to upgradability and QC. Both of these computers require you to plug in externals to expand (and no e-sata) and neither are portable.



Thanks Seedster. I definitely agree that refurbs are they way to go no matter what machine you buy. I tend to agree with your expandability comment ( I'm maxed out at two drives and 4Gigs in my G5), and in the short five years I've been looking at Macs, the latest Pros seem to be far more expandable vs other Mac offerings that ever. Bumping RAM and drives is a draw for me to the pro, but perhaps i won't notice much diference between three drives and 16G? and one drive and 8GB?

[hoya87eagle91]

apologies for consecutive posts. my newbie error

[seedster2]

Thanks Seedster. I definitely agree that refurbs are they way to go no matter what machine you buy. I tend to agree with your expandability comment ( I'm maxed out at two drives and 4Gigs in my G5), and in the short five years I've been looking at Macs, the latest Pros seem to be far more expandable vs other Mac offerings that ever. Bumping RAM and drives is a draw for me to the pro, but perhaps i won't notice much diference between three drives and 16G? and one drive and 8GB?

yeah doing authorized upgrades yourself is a huge plus. I upgraded my ram to 10GB and I use 4 1TB WD in RAID 0 and back up externally.

If you're planning to work on video and/or multitask you will certainly notice the difference with internal RAID drives.

[Macshroomer]

What's your workflow, because my D3x NEFs don't seem to be able to do anything instantly! Maybe I should look at RAM Disking my scratch areas...

(Maybe I should just shoot skinny folks with no wrinkles.)

Paul

I only shoot in raw to cover my rear if something was off in the shoot, which is next to never, so I simply export to tiff or jpeg and get other things done As it is chugging along. It seems to move instantly to me.

But I really only use digital for certain gigs when I can't use film, which thankfully is less and less these days.

Everything else, landscapes, monthly magazine articles and the like are on film Now.

[Jaro65]

I would get a 27 inch imac and you can easily calibrate those with software, they have IPS panels in them and can deliver excellent performance

+1 vote for a 27" iMac. Plus, you can use it to drive another screen with it. Dual screen setup can be quite useful. I love using Lightroom with 2 screens.