Buying first Mac Pro

[MikeFightNight]

OK so I am in the market for a Mac Pro because I am going to be getting a very nice pro HDV camera. I live in Canada first of all and have been on the apple.ca website looking at the offers they have. For a brand new Quad Core Mac i'm looking at $3,983.00 (Candian of course). add Final Cut Pro to that and it comes to a grand total of $5,182.00. Here are the specs if your wondering

One 2.66GHz Quad-Core Intel Xeon
8GB (4x2GB)
640GB 7200-rpm Serial ATA 3Gb/s
640GB 7200-rpm Serial ATA 3Gb/s
640GB 7200-rpm Serial ATA 3Gb/s
ATI Radeon HD 4870 512MB
One 18x SuperDrive
Apple Mighty Mouse
Apple Wireless Keyboard (English) and User's Guide
Apple Mini DisplayPort to VGA Adapter

OK so now I have been looking at other sites to see how much I could get an older refurbed Mac Pro for. I found this deal on Ebay offfered by Macworks
http://cgi.ebay.ca/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=290328374804&ssPageName=STRK:MEWAX:IT
and it seems like a pretty good deal, of course I am no expert that is why I am here. Also since it comes with Final Cut Studio 2 can I upgrade it to the new final cut pro for cheaper?

Than you all for your time and if you have somewhere better I should be looking or any ideas then please tell me

 

[GoCubsGo]

Be weary of eBay for items of this size. They can come damaged for one, a MP is not something you ship without proper care. If the seller is not providing the install discs for the listed software then that is a red flag.
It also doesn't have bluetooth. You may or may not care.

To me, the deal with the software is too good to be true frankly.

 

[miniConvert]

If you're buying brand new, don't get your HDDs from Apple. I mean yes, you need to get the primary, but buy the rest of the drives online. They will be cheaper and/or you'll be able to buy better quality.

RAM, well, it's only 8 gigs, probably easier to just get that BTO.

 

[Umbongo]

It's not a terrible price for such a system, but it ranges from slower to a lot slower than the quad core 2.66GHz system you were looking at (depends on application). Installed software without disks is nearly always piracy. It's also a 3 year old system.

I see the Apple canadian refurb section has the 2008 3.2GHz 8 core for CA$3,399 link. They are great machines and you'd get a better overall system for your money. If you take a look at somewhere like www.canadaram.com you can get 8GB of memory for $250 and 750GB drives for under $100 each. Even if you go with a 2009 quad get memory and storage 3rd party if you want to save a few hundred dollars.

 

[MikeFightNight]

Thanks for the adivce and links. I'll definatley be getting my RAM and hard drives seperatley.