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Film Student lost between MacBook Pro or Mac Pro.

J

joefa88

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Jan 11, 2007
3
0
currently own a 1.33G4 12" iBook and need to get a new Mac. I use a lot of Final Cut, and am going to start moving into some photoshop and music apps as well. I do not know whether I should get a 15" MacBook Pro or a MacPro and just keep my iBook for lugging around. I have a 19" widescreen monitor that I use with my iBook, so a monitor is not a problem. Basically I would like to hear what people think I should buy. Money is not a huge issue, I can not afford either system and would have to take out a loan. I am concerned about having to buy another mac a few years down, I want to be able to keep this next mac for a long time. So what do you guys think?? Any help/suggestions welcome. Oh, and some may suggest getting a used G5, which I was considering, but I want an intel chip so I can use parallels.
UPDATE
I just got back from macworld and did a lot of thinking, am now leaning more towards the MacBook Pro. I am not a power Final Cut user and have access to video editing labs. I still would like input, as far as what configuration works best, I dont want the 17" though.
 
If you were using FC often on an iBook, either of these systems will blaze.

I think you should get a Mac Pro if you're going to be doing even more of this sort of work. However, I love laptops and bringing my main computer with me.
 
If you have lab access and want portability, get the MBP. You can use the power in the MBP, and if you don't have enough, move the project to the lab.

Otherwise, getting a Mac Pro and more power never hurts in video editing.
 
same, mac pro - more power, more expandability, etc - you can use external drives if u need portable using FW800

edit - maybe even a quad g5 - you can save $$ and when you are done and graduated, the mac pro will be more powerful when you start your own production company and make millions :p
 
I dont know much about the system wants of FC, but if it doesn't lean heavily on the GPU, you might want to look at a 2.0GHz MacBook. They are a few hundred cheaper than the MBP, and you have that 19" monitor to put to use, so screen estate isn't a worry. What do you think?
 
Since you're a student, definitely get the Macbook Pro. I'm in college and a laptop is definitely the better choice. Also you would probably want to get an external 7200rpm firewire 800 hard drive to use as capture scratch and ****.
 
What year are you in school? and are you going to grad school?...as long as you have the lab access, stay on a portable machine and use the labs...but make sure you have enough money saved up to buy a MacPro right before you leave school.
 
iW00t said:
Mac Pro.

You know you want that RAID array to blaze through your video editing, an option that is not possible with any other Mac ;)
Click to expand...

Don't be silly, you can get a 2 drive RAID external FW800 for 2.5in portable drives, right now for the MBP C2D only, and if that is not enough speed (for someone who is not now a 'power user' but might be in the future), you can attach as many 3.5in drives as you like to the Express Card port for RAID, from a MBP, which does not exist on the MB; that will do all but the highest bandwidth HD uncompressed video capture and editing.

*edit: my appologies, EC/34 chipset on the current MBP's are limited to just over 100MB/s STR, which is not enough for uncompressed HD content, but will work easily as will FW800 for Panasonic's proprietary Pro100HD format as used on their HD camcorders from the 'film student' level $5k HGX-200 all the way up to the $100k professional Varicam fully decked out.

See quick takes Dec. 26th, 2006 @barefeats: http://www.barefeats.com/quick.html

"December 23rd, 2006 (Corrected) -- ExpressCard SATA bandwidth woes -- A reader wrote me about his frustration when connecting a four drive Port-Multiplication (PM) enclosure to an ExpressCard/34 SATA adapter installed on his MacBook Pro. Four drive RAID 0 benchmarked at 120MB/s. That was only slightly faster than two drives (90MB/s).

Though the theoretical bandwidth of an ExpressCard is 256MB/s, the current speed limit of all ExpressCards is about HALF of that when used with a RAID set no matter how many drives are connected. This is due to the fact that all current ExpressCard products use the Silicon Image 3132 chip set "

17in is always nice to have in a MBP, even if you have a desktop monitor. but if portability is a concern in a smaller size, then the higher res, MBP C2D (it will have better resale value than the slower and more problem prone 15in CD MBP, should you ever decide you need more power) is the best choice. When looking at all the space the tool bars take up in various apps, you'll appreciate that higher res. screen on the MBP 15 v 13 in the MB.

For a non power user consider how big of a drive you might need, and how STR's drop when the drive gets full. Buy with a 5.4k 160GB drive if you can afford it, and then swap that out for a 200 or 250GB 5.4k drive when they become available later this year.

Read this link: http://www.barefeats.com/mbcd7.html

If you're going from a pokey G4 iBook to any new Intel laptop, you'll notice a dramatic speed boost.


and these too:

http://www.barefeats.com/mbcd6.html

http://www.barefeats.com/mbcd3.html

Yep, even a higher end used G5, with a faster FSB RAM, faster and much larger 7.2k desktop hard drive, is going to be faster in some instances (faster, way too hot for a laptop, GPU helps in the desktop) than the newest laptops, but do you really need that much more speed, if not a 'power user'?

http://www.barefeats.com/mbcd4.html
 
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