Spring for iMac vs. Hackintosh vs. Something Else

Hey All,

I've been mulling over an upgrade situation, and I'd like some community input here—just wondering what you lads/lasses might do in my shoes.

I bought a new MacBook Pro 13" with Dual Core 2.9 GHZ in January of this year. It's my work horse, as I'm a graphic designer and web developer. It's been nice to take it with me when I have a coffee shop work day (I do this a lot) or at meetings. However, I'd like a bit more graphics performance than I'm getting, largely for gaming. My creative firm is also getting heavily into motion graphics and video editing, so a beefier setup would be fantastic.

I've been thinking about buying a new desktop/office-only computer. My requirements are thus:

• Needs to have better than Intel HD 4000 graphics, preferrably as much juice as is available
• Needs to run both Mac & Windows safely (thinking about Hackintosh stability, here). I use OS X 8 hours a day to work, but like to game in Windows 7.
• It might as well have more processor power. That'd mean a quad core system.
• Upgrade potential is a boon, but not necessarily requried. I'll load whatever I get with as much RAM as possible out of the chute. Changing out hardware in the future would save some headaches, though.
• I've already spent the money on the new MacBook earlier this year, so cost-effective would be good. Price isn't necessarily an object, but hey . . . it doesn't grow on trees.

So there ya have it! To summarize: Desktop, beefy, good with video, plays (very) well with two OS's. Is Hackintosh a good (cheap) way to go, that's stable enough to work with professionally? iMac a better deal, here? Or some other option you can think of? Would buying an old Mac Pro to upgrade be a rational plan? Should I sell the laptop I have now in the process?

Thanks, and sorry for such a long post! Any thoughts (seriously, dream in my direction, here) appreciated.

 

Solid advice! If I were to spring for an iMac, I would certainly get the latest release. However, I would like to be upgrade in the future, I think. I've been a Mac user since Mac II, and I'd like to keep a Mac computer the ten years it can stay alive.

Thanks for the thoughts on Hackintosh! I'm scared of going for it for the reasons you mentioned. It may be a fun project in the future. I'll stay away for now, though!

For a Mac Pro, this is something I'm unfamiliar with: How far back in architectures can I go and still be able to upgrade it to latest generation gear? Obviously I'd want an Intel release, but is there a cut-off point? What years are good for upgrades? How long could I continue to upgrade in the future? Also, any price estimates on that?

Thanks again!