Sidebar Sidebar
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.

Final Cut (and Avid) on a MacBook

F

foxdougan

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Jun 9, 2007
25
0
I recently bought a macbook to do some editing on - nothing fancy like graphical effects, just the basics to get to grips with the industry software as part of my media production course at university.

I have a macbook 2.0Ghz C2D, 2GB RAM and I thought this would be fine. However, a friend of mine (who has a PowerPC Mac Mini) installed his version of Final Cut Pro 4 onto my macbook and it wouldn't work. It said my graphics card wasn't suitable but it worked on his Mini perfectly. Is it a case of having to buy Express or is there a fully-featured version of Final Cut that will work on this new mac?

Also, I have concerns that if I buy a new piece of software it won't work. Testing out Avid Free earlier on with professional television footage (massive files, perfect quality) they wouldn't play - just the audio and a still image of what was put in. Then a friend and I made a short mobile phone clip and tried that but had the same problem. Any idea why this is? I wasn't running any big processes at the time, could it be the very same graphics problem as in Final Cut Pro 4?

I was under the impression when I bought my macbook that editing would be fine and I don't want to just resort to iMovie as the point was to buy a macbook to learn the industry standard software.

So, is there any way to get Final Cut Pro to work or, if I have to buy Express, will I just have the same playback problems as in Avid Free?

I know it's long-winded but I greatly appreciate the advice.
 
fcp 4 will not work on intel very well , also how did you get it ? if you bought it i'd send it back.

apple.com/finalcutpro for info on what you will need to run on intel

edit : just re-read that you installed from a copy
 
liketom said:
fcp 4 will not work on intel very well , also how did you get it ? if you bought it i'd send it back.
Click to expand...

I didn't buy Final Cut Pro 4, it's my friend's disk which he bought for his Mac Mini. I don't mind so much not having the pro version, as I hear the Express version will certainly teach me the basics. But are there any other versions of Final Cut that will certainly run on my macbook?

Apparently Express will, but will there be possible lock-up on the video as in Avid Free?
 
foxdougan said:
I didn't buy Final Cut Pro 4, it's my friend's disk which he bought for his Mac Mini. I don't mind so much not having the pro version, as I hear the Express version will certainly teach me the basics. But are there any other versions of Final Cut that will certainly run on my macbook?

Apparently Express will, but will there be possible lock-up on the video as in Avid Free?
Click to expand...

I have Final Cut Pro 6 (part of FCS2) installed and running fine on my MacBook C2D. In fact the whole suite works well, with the exception of Color.
 
As I understand it (from unhappy personal experience) no FCP versions before 5.0 are going to operate on any Intel-based Mac.
And, if you believe Apple's own system requirements for Final Cut Studio, it won't operate on a MacBook. But numerous forum members have reported successfully installing and running FCS1 on MacBooks, with the possible exception of getting Motion to function properly.
It now sounds like the same might be true for FCS2, although us MacBook users might not have the use of Color.:(
 
VideoTour said:
As I understand it (from unhappy personal experience) no FCP versions before 5.0 are going to operate on any Intel-based Mac.
Click to expand...

Is this true for Express as well? I haven't seen any sys reqs stating that it's not macbook compatible.
 
The big TV programme clips were uncompressed 8-bit, so no codec. The phone was a 3GP file. There were no error messages and the audio played fine but the video just froze.
 
foxdougan said:
The big TV programme clips were uncompressed 8-bit, so no codec. The phone was a 3GP file. There were no error messages and the audio played fine but the video just froze.
Click to expand...

I'd be willing to bet neither of those file types are support by Avid free DV.;) Do you have a MiniDV camera you can test capture some footage from? If not, see if you can export those files using Avid's DV codec then re-import them into the program.

Also, AFAIK the program is only designed to run on 10.3.x PPC Macs so it may not run correctly.


Lethal
 
foxdougan said:
Is it a case of having to buy Express or is there a fully-featured version of Final Cut that will work on this new mac?

Also, I have concerns that if I buy a new piece of software it won't work. Testing out Avid Free earlier had the same problem. Any idea why this is?
Click to expand...
'fraid I'm not going to be incredibly useful.... but that's never stopped me posting before.

Like one of the previous posters said, the problem is most likely that Avid Free doesn't support that format and/or the PPC legacy issue. I haven't used Avid Free myself, partly because a fair few Mac users have reported various technical problems (this is a while back mind) and from feedback on various editing forums (e.g. stick to iMovie as it doesn't add anything much; you're better off shelling out for FCE).

As for you FCP problem, I'm pretty sure (but haven't double-checked this) that version 4 ramped up the system requirements and required you to have a graphics card (no idea of the specs - sorry) - and it could be the latter that's causing you problems.

Although Final Cut Studio doesn't offically support MBs - FCP runs well on it and there are one or two people using FCS over here on MBs.. plus there are benchmarks to show this!

FCE would run v v well on your machine and my advice would to be to bite the bullet and buy a copy (there'll be an edu discount, but this might preclude you from a cheaper upgrade cost to newer versions and/or to FCS).
 
Versions of Final Cut Pro from 5.1 onward are Universal, and therefore will run on your Macbook with no problems.

The only problem comes from running other apps in the FCP Studio suite that Final Cut Pro comes in. Motion doesn't supposedly support the integrated graphics on the Macbook, and as others have said, Color would struggle as well.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.
Top Bottom
Back