iMac i7 for 3d art... or PC I need advice very quickly!!!

[akilone]

Hi guys,
I have great issue in chosing between iMac and PC for 3d modeling and animating. So far, I decided to buy iMac, but after reading one post about GPU rendering I'm confuse again. There are plenty of reasons to buy PC instead of Mac for rendering. But... This year I'm gonna start college for 3d art (modeling and animating). The computer that I'll buy soon I'm going to use for learning in first place. First 2-3 years I won't build some complex scenes for rendering, because I need to learn everything.
I have heard that ATI radeon is pretty weak in GPU rendering. As you know iMac come with ati radeon graphic card built in. But, GPU rendering is very limit in it's possibilities. CPU is still main choice for rendering. Is PC with same configuration as iMac i7, but with geforce 580 for instance faster in rendering than iMac? Is there any big difference in render speed?
If I finally decide to buy Mac, should I order one with 2gb ddr5 on hd6970m instead of 1gb? If ati radeon is not use for GPU rendering, will that 1gb more make some difference? This decision is pretty urgent, I will pay and order my Mac/PC on Monday.
sorry for my english, I hope you understand

 

[gforce91]

Pc

I'm going into my second year for Game design and i work with Maya and Z Brush regularly. A mac as whole does not have quite the support that a pc would have to easily handle the load. also, the Maya 2011 toolbar in a mac is a pain. I would stick with a pc for that. either one should work tho. hope this helps.

 

[Texran]

Why not wait until class starts, that way you find out the Professors preferred system, as well as the software you'll be utilizing.

 

[akilone]

I know that we'll use brush, 3dsmax, adobe illustrator, photoshop... It's not a problem to install windows via bootcamp and use both OS. I will use windows on iMac (if I get it) for sure (3dsmax).

 

[toxic]

Windows would make everything easier. if you must have a Mac, get a Mac Pro (2008 or newer). assuming they haven't run out, eVGA has refurb Mac NVidia GTX 285's for $130, and then there's the Quadro 4000 for $1200 . going Windows would make life easier since you get more choices.