are these sufficient to run on mac mini??

[krappamc]

I currently have external fw harddrive that i use for school.. so hard drive is not really a problem when i'm getting a mini..
however, i am not a real tech guy, so just wanted to make sure before i go purchase Mac mini.

I am looking to buy
Mac mini 1.25ghz 40gig and all that regular spec for $499.
However, I will put in a gig or 512 mb of memory myself.

I am looking to run...
Final cut pro 4 (or HD)
Photoshop cs
and after effects..

Would mac mini sufficient enough to run these even with 512? or would I need a gig of ram? or would this not work at all for what I am looking forward to use?

Thanks guys...

oh.. and one more..
if i load up the programs (FCP, PShop, and AE) on to my external FW (7200rpm), would it load up faster than i would from the harddrive in the system itself?

Thanks.. once again.

 

[mrgreen4242]

Just as a thought, if you end up going for 512mb of RAM you'd probably be better off just ordering it that way. With the edu discount the extra RAM will be like $70, and you won't have to go through the headache of opening the mini case, etc. It'd only be slightly more than buying it yourself.

To asnwer your question: probably. People do all these things on laptops that are slower or similarly equipped to the mini. I'm not sure how well you will do with HD video, however, without at LEAST a gig of RAM. For regualt miniDV and such tho, I am sure it will be just fine.

Rob

 

[Duff-Man]

Duff-Man says...if it were me, and I wanted to run PS and Final Cut I would definitely want that GB of RAM.....oh yeah!

 

[krappamc]

thanks guys.

but.. would 512 work??? or would it be wayyyy to slow for what i want to do?
and would 1gig of ram be fast enough???

and... about loading the program straight from the external HD.. would it be faster than from 4200rpm(or whatever..) hd that mac mini comes with??

thanks guys so much..

 

[Duff-Man]

Duff-Man says....it will definitely work with 512 but I think it will run a lot better with 1gb, especially if you are ever running the programs at the same time. I still say that if your budget allows for it, go for the 1gb.

As for running from the external drive...I am not a total expert, but I would guess that you will see a bit of an increase in launch times but not that much. Where you might see a difference, especially if you are sticking with the 512mb ram, is with the OS X swap file, which is by default on your system drive of course. with less ram it will be paging more frequently and on a slower disk there will naturally be a difference.....oh yeah!

 

[Abstract]

but.. would 512 work??? or would it be wayyyy to slow for what i want to do?
and would 1gig of ram be fast enough???

and... about loading the program straight from the external HD.. would it be faster than from 4200rpm(or whatever..) hd that mac mini comes with??

thanks guys so much..

It'll work with 512MB of total RAM, but trust me, it won't be great. I used my 12" PB with a total of 512MB of RAM until 2 months ago, and if you don't know much about Macs, let me just say that your computer will be tapping that Virtual Memory like mad if you only have 512MB of RAM. In a typical week, I'd get over 100,000 pageouts from my harddrive.

Now, after 17 days of computer uptime, I have only had 3500 pageouts because I now have 1.25GB of RAM.

I'd definitely get 1GB. If you only get 512MB now, you WILL eventually realize that you need more RAM, and then spend the money on 1GB of RAM. I bought a 256MB stick because of money issues. And I thought that upgrading to a 1GB stick later on would be okay at first, since RAM prices are bound to drop in the future, right? Well, my 1GB stick of RAM was the same price after 1 year, so I didn't save a dime. Weird, but true.

 

[maya]

I currently have external fw harddrive that i use for school.. so hard drive is not really a problem when i'm getting a mini..
however, i am not a real tech guy, so just wanted to make sure before i go purchase Mac mini.

I am looking to buy
Mac mini 1.25ghz 40gig and all that regular spec for $499.
However, I will put in a gig or 512 mb of memory myself.

I am looking to run...
Final cut pro 4 (or HD)
Photoshop cs
and after effects..

Would mac mini sufficient enough to run these even with 512? or would I need a gig of ram? or would this not work at all for what I am looking forward to use?

Thanks guys...

oh.. and one more..
if i load up the programs (FCP, PShop, and AE) on to my external FW (7200rpm), would it load up faster than i would from the harddrive in the system itself?

Thanks.. once again.

As others have mentioned working with Video Content, go with the 1Gig ram. Having less, you will pull your hair out waiting for content to render, etc... 🙂

 

[Mechcozmo]

1. It won't work with a built in 4200 rpm drive. Just won't. Use your FW drive.

2. The 1GB of RAM will save you from a premature death while watching the spinny beach ball of doom telling you "Rendering your rendering box"