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asking for suggestion for Mac Pro

L

loyallion

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Aug 6, 2007
6
0
I'm a 3D animator and video editor.
I use 3D Max, photoshop, illustrator, After effects, premiere, Final Cut Pro.
I'm looking into buying a Mac Pro that I can use those tools daily bases.

I'm thinking:
Two 2.66GHz Dual-Core Intel Xeon
2GB (4 x 512MB)
ATI Radeon X1900 XT 512MB (2 x dual-link DVI)
250GB 7200-rpm Serial ATA 3Gb/s

Do you think this set up will do fine for my work?
This is my home machine that I want to do freelance work.
Also, I'm going to run windows 64bit primarily because I'm a PC guy, but looking into get a mac for the speed and power.
I also heard it's better to have second hard drive, so I can dedicate windows OS which I'm not sure about.
May I have some suggestions on this?
Thanks a lot.
 
Are you happy to buy a refurb machine? If so, wait until tomorrow and see if anything happens, then jump on a refurb 4 or 8 Core machine.
 
loyallion said:
I'm a 3D animator and video editor.
I use 3D Max, photoshop, illustrator, After effects, premiere, Final Cut Pro.
I'm looking into buying a Mac Pro that I can use those tools daily bases.

I'm thinking:
Two 2.66GHz Dual-Core Intel Xeon
2GB (4 x 512MB)
ATI Radeon X1900 XT 512MB (2 x dual-link DVI)
250GB 7200-rpm Serial ATA 3Gb/s

Do you think this set up will do fine for my work?
This is my home machine that I want to do freelance work.
Also, I'm going to run windows 64bit primarily because I'm a PC guy, but looking into get a mac for the speed and power.
I also heard it's better to have second hard drive, so I can dedicate windows OS which I'm not sure about.
May I have some suggestions on this?
Thanks a lot.
Click to expand...

After Effects CS3 and 3d Max (And other multithreaded 3d apps) will undoubtly gain performance if you go with an 8Core...plus it's future proof.
 
wait

as MM stated; wait at least until tomorrow...

Also, for heavy editing and 3d work; I'd at least get 4GB of ram -->

DZL
 
ok, I think I'll consider getting 4g insted of 2g ram.
however, I'll still have to stick with just 4 core due to the budget.
I'm trying really hard to stay under $4 G.

Even the 4 core will still be pretty fast, right?

Also, what's the disadventage of getting refurb? could anyone share some insights?

Thanks.
 
No Disadvantage With Refurbished At All

loyallion said:
ok, I think I'll consider getting 4g insted of 2g ram.
however, I'll still have to stick with just 4 core due to the budget.
I'm trying really hard to stay under $4 G.

Even the 4 core will still be pretty fast, right?

Also, what's the disadventage of getting refurb? could anyone share some insights?
Click to expand...
NONE. Plus you often get 2GB of RAM with one. Yes the 4 core 2.66GHz for $2,199 will do fine. But watch out if Kentsfield is in the new iMacs tomorrow.
 
does anyone know or have experience with refurb?

This is my first time buying mac, so I'm actually not sure what their policy about the refurb and what exactly is the refurb in terms of warranty or apply care?

If it costs less and do the same performance, then I'd go with refurb though.

Any thought on that for a first-time buyer like me?
 
Additionally,
I need some help understanding on what Boot Camp, Parallels does.

Also, when you install the Windows, do you suggest to have one hard drive dedicated for the Window?

I'm thinking of getting 250 and 500 as a second.
Any suggestions?
 
loyallion said:
I'm a 3D animator and video editor.
I use 3D Max, photoshop, illustrator, After effects, premiere, Final Cut Pro.
I'm looking into buying a Mac Pro that I can use those tools daily bases.

I'm thinking:
Two 2.66GHz Dual-Core Intel Xeon
2GB (4 x 512MB)
ATI Radeon X1900 XT 512MB (2 x dual-link DVI)
250GB 7200-rpm Serial ATA 3Gb/s

Do you think this set up will do fine for my work?
This is my home machine that I want to do freelance work.
Also, I'm going to run windows 64bit primarily because I'm a PC guy, but looking into get a mac for the speed and power.
I also heard it's better to have second hard drive, so I can dedicate windows OS which I'm not sure about.
May I have some suggestions on this?
Thanks a lot.
Click to expand...

I do not know anything about running 3D stuff, so I'll only answer video editing stuff.

First off, I run Final Cut Pro on my Mac Pro. As you can see in my signature, I do have 5GB RAM (2 X 2GB RAM + 2 default 512MB RAM). 4GB RAM is good too. But if you have read a lot of threads related with memory topics, most member suggest that you choose just 1GB from Apple and then add more through your favorite choice of third-party vendor. Because it's way cheaper that way, which I did too.

If you're planning to increase the amount of RAM down the road (because using FCP, After Effects and Photoshop simultaneously will consume your RAM pretty quickly as you already know... although I do not use AE at this moment), adding 2GB each would give you freedom to go up to 16GB (if you throw out the default... you know 8 slots...), instead of 2GB (4 x 512MB) or 4GB (8 x 512MB).

loyallion said:
does anyone know or have experience with refurb?

This is my first time buying mac, so I'm actually not sure what their policy about the refurb and what exactly is the refurb in terms of warranty or apply care?

If it costs less and do the same performance, then I'd go with refurb though.

Any thought on that for a first-time buyer like me?
Click to expand...

You better check out this thread if you haven't yet. This is an excellent example of a refurbished Mac Pro acquired by one of us. :)

https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/334688/

loyallion said:
Additionally,
I need some help understanding on what Boot Camp, Parallels does.

Also, when you install the Windows, do you suggest to have one hard drive dedicated for the Window?

I'm thinking of getting 250 and 500 as a second.
Any suggestions?
Click to expand...

I do not know the answer, because I do not run Windows on my Mac Pro, but under this thread (https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/338554/), Suneohair answered to another OP about the difference between Boot Camp and Parallel. So, check it out.

Cheers. :apple:
 
thanks so much for your insight "MacTo"

BTW, where can I buy refurb?
sorry, I'm just a first-time buyer and don't know what and where to look for.
 
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