Upgrade for mild audio recording

[DDorian]

Hello All,


Last summer I purchased a Sawtooth G4 400 mhz machine to learn the ways of the mac on. This coming spring I will be auditioning for various colleges to major in Percussion and would like a modest setup to record myself on. I have looked at old Powermac G4's and G5's on eBay. I basically just want a machine to use Sibelius, Garageband, and maybe digital performer on so that I can record myself. While it would be nice to have a webcam like the one built into iMacs, I can buy a USB one I would rather have a headless mac to carefully stow away.

My main issue here is cost and I would rather not have to spend more than 500 dollars for the whole package, including a minidisc microphone and iMic. I will be going to college next fall and am planning to buy a brand new Macbook or Macbook Pro so I would like to not splurge as much on a machine that I will leave here for most of the year.

So far I have looked at Powermac G5's and they seem to run around the 400 USD mark for single core machines. Would a single CPU G5 be a better investment than a dual cpu newer G4?

While it would be possible to use my pc for recording, my pc's are VERY loud and I do not have pc software for sibelius or other software. Which set up should I choose?

 

[lostngone]

I would sink the money into a Macbook pro now, it is going to give you better performance then any G4 or any G5 for that matter. It can to tucked away to deaden any sound, it can run windows and it even has a webcam built in.

If you want a old system, I would recommend a single G5 over dual cpu G4.
If you are looking at upgrading that sawtooth double check your model the early units do not support the dual CPU upgrade cards.

 

[rockinrocker]

a G4 mini would be quieter then a G5.

you'd have to check the minimum specs on DP, but as long as you've got that covered a G4 would work for what you're talking about.

 

[netdog]

I don't know what they cost, but a Cube has no fan so the only noise is the drive. Great for recording if you must keep the computer in the same room as the microphone.

 

[DDorian]

Would a faster eMac be suitable? 1 ghz models and above could handle the applications, theoretically.