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Production Suite with 12 pb?

A

amoildani

macrumors member
Original poster
I have a a 12 inch powebook (867mgz, 256mb ram), had for almost a year now. Ive been doing video editing and graphics on my pc desktop but im slowly wanting to use final cut and soundtrack on my mac.
Here's my problem, isn the production suite a good move consideing the powerbook I have? im kind of weary on how final cut pro 4 will run on it, and i know motion will kill the system, I could get it for 499 with the edu discount, but would it be best to save up a little more, get a d2.0 g5 desktop, and use it with that.

Its mostly if my powerbook cant handle it, i already have a 200gb harddrive to use as storage.
Thanks
 
I run FCP on my 1.25 PB with 768 ram. Runs fine but rendering any filter on it is a pain. Well, may be it is relative; I work on a dual 2 at work. So, I think my PB takes forever. Short clips and no filters is okay. Anything other than that, I would strongly recommend a powermac.
 
alright, I have been planning on maxing out my ram (adding 512mb) to the pb. However it seems that wont be enough...Im struggling on whether forking out 2500 bucks on a powermac, its making me uneasy
 
amoildani said:
alright, I have been planning on maxing out my ram (adding 512mb) to the pb. However it seems that wont be enough...Im struggling on whether forking out 2500 bucks on a powermac, its making me uneasy
Click to expand...

I just forked...it ended up being more.

Do you have a suitable monitor? The Cinema Displays are great. Add $1300 for a 20" or $2000 for a 23". With edu its more like 1100 and 1700.

You need as a bare minimum 1GB of RAM. I'd recommend around 4.5, but it might be a stretch for you at this point.

Yes, I know you can run FCP w/ 768 or even 512, but if (s)he's doing the type of editing that merits this system, I suspect it needs more RAM.

If you have a monitor, you could get a Dual 1.8 with 2.5GB of RAM (buy from Kingston or Crucial- apple is expensive) for $2500...less w/ edu.

I'd do it. I just bought a 2.0 (only 1.5GB of RAM tho... 🙁) and it runs FCP fine. Motion too. Rendering is a lil' slow...but more RAM and it would run like a charm
 
Minimum system requirements to run entire suite:

Macintosh computer with 867 MHz or faster PowerPC G4 or any G5 processor, 867MB of RAM, and 4x AGP graphics slot or faster.
Use of DVCPRO HD content in Final Cut Pro HD requires a 1GHz or faster PowerPC G4 or any G5 and 1GB of RAM
Motion recommends 2GB of RAM or more for real-time interactivity.
Motion requires one of the following graphics cards: ATI Radeon 9800 XT, TI Radeon 9800 Pro, ATI Radeon 9700 Pro, ATI Radeon 9600 XT, ATI Radeon 9600 Pro, ATI Mobility Radeon 9700, ATI Mobility Radeon 9600, NVIDIA GeForce 6800 Ultra, NVIDIA GeForceFX Go 5200, NVIDIA GeForceFX 5200 Ultra
Mac OS X version 10.3.5
QuickTime 6.5.1
9GB available disk space required for applications installation.
21GB available disk space for required for Motion, Soundtrack and LiveType content.
DVD drive required for installation.
 
a few months later and im still in this problem. im thinking of just maxing out my ram on my powerbook and using it with production suite ($500 edu discount).

then when the new line of G5's come out (whenever that is, within the year i hope) I get the powermac.

Im just worried that final cut pro and motion will run like ass on my laptop
 
amoildani said:
a few months later and im still in this problem. im thinking of just maxing out my ram on my powerbook and using it with production suite ($500 edu discount).

then when the new line of G5's come out (whenever that is, within the year i hope) I get the powermac.

Im just worried that final cut pro and motion will run like ass on my laptop
Click to expand...

Motion WILL run like ass on your laptop...actually come to think about it, it won't run at all. You're video card doesn't meet the specs. It almost runs acceptably on my maxed out 1.5Ghz Powerbook (which I am selling btw), but runs a world better on my Dual 2.5 G5. Anything more than 3 or 4 actions in Motion on a Powerbook and it chokes to death. As for FCP, it will run fine, I used to edit with FCP 1.0 on a 400Mhz G3 iMac...so you're good with Final Cut.
 
i run FCPHD, Shake, Motion, DVD Studio Pro, and a few more big apps on my PowerBook with NO TROUBLE whatsoever. ok rendering takes a while sometimes but it's fine compared with friends who are trying to do iMovie type effects on a PC. meanwhile i'm sitting there on Motion designing graphics on a frickin laptop.


and the spec of said powerbook? 1.25ghz G4, 2gb ram, 80gb hdd, superdrive.

sweeeeet.
 
hmm, i suppose it would be ok to get the production suite, max out the ram on my powerbook (to 1.2 gb), and handle final cut, and dvd studio. then once i get my powermac (i suppose in a few months) I'll be able to smoothly transition completely to mac...


hmmm, there isnt any sort of hack to get a higher resolution on monitors using my powerbook? the 1024 res when connected to a monitor isnt very nice
 
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