Upgrading From PowerPC G5

[evilcat]

This is really quite the dilemma. I've had recommendations from a mini to the Mac Pro. My current inclination is to go with an i5 or i7 27" iMac and sell my 30" NEC monitor. Though I don't really know for sure, but I think I can sell my monitor for about $1000. I can buy the iMac for about $2000. Thus, for about $1000 I have a new computer. This seems better than spending a grand for a less powerful mini or $2000 for an older Mac Pro. However, I'm still undecided.

Sounds to me like the iMac would be fine, so long as you have good control over the lighting where your Mac will sit... Having used both glossy laptops and an iPad in an average home, I know it would be an issue for me.

I think a Quad core iMac for $1,000 with a small external FW800 SSD and a 16Gb RAM upgrade for a further $500 or $600 would make a really nice systen!

 

[wacomme]

Current status:

I'm really itching to my a new Mac.

I decided against the iMac. While it may be the biggest bang for the buck, I just cannot push the "buy" button for a computer with a glossy monitor. The monitor may work for me just fine, but I just cannot do it.

Then I thought of just buying another Mac Pro, probably a current refurb. This is still a possibility.

Now I'm reconsidering a Mini. Apple has the 2009 2.53GHz refurbs for $589. But I have a few questions.

1) How well would this Mini run my 30" monitor?
2) How much RAM can I add?
3) Will the Mini handle running Aperture, Photoshop, MS Word programs, and a couple of web browsers simultaneously?
4) What's the best way to transfer my current external eSATA drives and drive enclosures to work with the Mini?
5) It seems that people often upgrade the HD. Suggestions?

Thanks for the help.

 

[NeverhadaPC]

Sounds like money is a big portion of your decision making process.

You went from Mac Pro -> iMac -> Mac Mini

If money is not the issue, go (relatively speaking) all out. Get the Mac Pro and you will be set for a long time. Buy 3rd party RAM and cheapest Graphics available (can always update later for much less than now).

If money is a serious issue get an iMac or Mac Mini (but you might have performance issues in near future). Since photography is a passion of yours I would be wary of iMac's "funny" screen issues and use your high-end display with the Mini --- I am sure the Mini supports your screen... if not, seriously consider spending big on Mac Pro...

Good luck... I will be in your boat soon when I upgrade my wife's iMac G5 to Mac Pro...

 

[chrismacguy]

Sounds like money is a big portion of your decision making process.

You went from Mac Pro -> iMac -> Mac Mini

If money is not the issue, go (relatively speaking) all out. Get the Mac Pro and you will be set for a long time. Buy 3rd party RAM and cheapest Graphics available (can always update later for much less than now).

If money is a serious issue get an iMac or Mac Mini (but you might have performance issues in near future). Since photography is a passion of yours I would be wary of iMac's "funny" screen issues and use your high-end display with the Mini --- I am sure the Mini supports your screen... if not, seriously consider spending big on Mac Pro...

Good luck... I will be in your boat soon when I upgrade my wife's iMac G5 to Mac Pro...

Also it should be pointed out that a Mac Pro would last him probably 6-9 years (I know plenty of film/photo students (and ex-students who still hang around the building, who have gone Pro) who have base MPs from '06 and their not planning on upgrading until 2014 or beyond.

 

[wacomme]

Money is always an issue, but it's not my main criteria. I've had my G5 for 5-6 years. I don't want to buy another computer in a year or two. So, perhaps the Mac Pro is my better option.

Is it better to buy a 2010 model where I could easily drop in a hex CPU at a future date, or is a 2008-2009 model the better bargain?

 

[chrismacguy]

Money is always an issue, but it's not my main criteria. I've had my G5 for 5-6 years. I don't want to buy another computer in a year or two. So, perhaps the Mac Pro is my better option.

Is it better to buy a 2010 model where I could easily drop in a hex CPU at a future date, or is a 2008-2009 model the better bargain?

If you can find a 2009 model cheaply within warranty Id go for that and get AppleCare - the only reason I got a 2010 was because I got a really good deal via my University , otherwise I probably wouldve got a 2009 or a refurb. Unless you can see a Hex upgrade being necessary in the future, which if you can get by on a G5 now, you are likely not to need, as it is just so much faster (3x the benchmarks of a G5 Quad or there abouts)

 

[Lord Blackadder]

The options as I see it now:

1) iMac 27" (top end) - about $2200 minus what can get by selling my 30" monitor.

2) Used older Mac Pro (how old, model???). I'd like to stay under $1500.

3) Macbook Pro. Hooked to 30" monitor when at home.

I'm so confused.

I recommend getting either a refurbished Mac Pro from the Apple Store (probably around $2,000), or buying a secondhand Mac Pro, the newest you can find for under $2,000. That will give you a modern system that can handle eSata right out of the box plus make use of your existing 30" display. You should be able to get at least four more years out of that, probably more.

Based on what you are doing with it, I don't think you need to worry about the hexa-core models.

 

[NeverhadaPC]

I recommend getting either a refurbished Mac Pro from the Apple Store (probably around $2,000), or buying a secondhand Mac Pro, the newest you can find for under $2,000. That will give you a modern system that can handle eSata right out of the box plus make use of your existing 30" display. You should be able to get at least four more years out of that, probably more.

Based on what you are doing with it, I don't think you need to worry about the hexa-core models.

Listen to this guy, he is the Black Adder after all --- what can go wrong
"So, what you're telling me, Percy, is that something you have never seen is slightly less blue than something else you have never seen."

 

[Lord Blackadder]

Listen to this guy, he is the Black Adder after all --- what can go wrong
"So, what you're telling me, Percy, is that something you have never seen is slightly less blue than something else you have never seen."

I'm just providing the OP with a cunning plan to replace his desktop....

 

[NeverhadaPC]

I'm just providing the OP with a cunning plan to replace his desktop....

It's so cunning I can brush my teeth with it

 

[MattA]

It all depends on what you're going to do with it. Having hardware like eSATA and extreme video cards is nice if you're doing things that require the power, but really, any new Macintosh is going to run circles around your G5.

If I were you, I'd keep the 30" and get a Mac Mini with a dual-link DVI adapter. Upgrade the memory to at least 4GB and get a decent Hard Disk for it, and you'll be well on your way. I bought my mini as a 'fill in' machine when my G5 was getting too slow, and it's been super excellent. It is so much faster than the G5, I'm not sure how I survived before.

Why spend the extra cash on an iMac when you already have an excellent monitor?

 

[rezatayebi]

That's a good choice.
I have a 17" MacBook Pro 2010, 27" iMac and had an early 2007 Mac Pro which I sold recently. Out of these three, iMac is the fastest because of it's processor. Plus it's got a great 27" display.

 

[chrismacguy]

a Mac mini would be a poor choice for the OP as he wants it to last - the Mac Pro is the definition of upgradeability - mac mini and iMac: definitely not upgradeable, and hed need to replace them after 2-3 years instead of 6-8 years with a Pro.

 

[MattA]

a Mac mini would be a poor choice for the OP as he wants it to last - the Mac Pro is the definition of upgradeability - mac mini and iMac: definitely not upgradeable, and hed need to replace them after 2-3 years instead of 6-8 years with a Pro.

That's true to a degree. A Mac Pro costs about 3 times more than a Mac Mini. In essence you can buy THREE Mac Mini's for the cost of one mac pro.

The Mac Mini can have the Hard Disk and memory upgraded. What are you really going to upgrade in a Mac Pro that you absolutely have to have? Most people don't use their machines to the fullest anyway. That's why I stated 'what are you going to do with it?'

I've had my Mac Mini for 2 years. It is still a rock solid fast machine. Upgrading to the newest one would buy me better video. Do I need it? No. Does the OP need it? Well, that's up to them to decide.

Unless the OP is doing major number crunching/graphics editing that requires eight or twelve cores and umpteen jigabytes of memory, it just isn't necessary to blow the cash on a Mac Pro.

 

[chrismacguy]

That's true to a degree. A Mac Pro costs about 3 times more than a Mac Mini. In essence you can buy THREE Mac Mini's for the cost of one mac pro.

The Mac Mini can have the Hard Disk and memory upgraded. What are you really going to upgrade in a Mac Pro that you absolutely have to have? Most people don't use their machines to the fullest anyway. That's why I stated 'what are you going to do with it?'

I've had my Mac Mini for 2 years. It is still a rock solid fast machine. Upgrading to the newest one would buy me better video. Do I need it? No. Does the OP need it? Well, that's up to them to decide.

Unless the OP is doing major number crunching/graphics editing that requires eight or twelve cores and umpteen jigabytes of memory, it just isn't necessary to blow the cash on a Mac Pro.

I disagree. I bought a Quad Core Mac Pro over any other machine as I 1) Like being able to have more than 1 Internal HD (I currently have 3 in my Mac Pro), 2) I like being able to give my machine USB3/LightPeak/Blu-ray/Whatever else Apple says it cant take. And a Mac Pro will last a lot longer than 3 Minis in some respects - I know of a few Classic Mac users I support locally who are still using PM9600 machines for certain applications - theve lasted more than the same money buying 8 years of consumer machines (Approaching 1.5x the life)

 

[cluthz]

I disagree. I bought a Quad Core Mac Pro over any other machine as I 1) Like being able to have more than 1 Internal HD (I currently have 3 in my Mac Pro), 2) I like being able to give my machine USB3/LightPeak/Blu-ray/Whatever else Apple says it cant take. And a Mac Pro will last a lot longer than 3 Minis in some respects - I know of a few Classic Mac users I support locally who are still using PM9600 machines for certain applications - theve lasted more than the same money buying 8 years of consumer machines (Approaching 1.5x the life)

PM 9600
They got replaced in 1997 by the Beige G3!
The 604e's are still blazing fast running OS9

 

[chrismacguy]

PM 9600
They got replaced in 1997 by the Beige G3!
The 604e's are still blazing fast running OS9

Yep, especially the 350 - Many people keep them as they use all 6 PCI slots in that mac for expansion, and nothing yet has convinced them to upgrade, they all have MacBooks for the Internet, but for Video Editing or Music Production, they swear by OS9 tools.

 

[wacomme]

The decision is between a Mini and a Mac Pro. I can really see both sides of the issue, but I'm leaning towards the Mac Pro for these reasons:

1) I've had my G5 for 5-6 years. Frankly, the only reason I'm replacing it is because it doesn't have the Intel chip. My phone, ipads, Kindles, etc. will come and go, being replaced as needed. I like having one solid desktop machine.
2) While most of my upgrades will be memory and drives, the Mac Pro has internal drive space (I currently have 2 internal and 3 external drives - photo storage and backup) that I can utilize. I have also replaced the graphic card on my G5 and added an eSATA card. I also replaced a broken optical drive. While I don't tweak my computer a lot, it's nice to have that option.
3) I don't know how well the Mini will handle graphics on my 30" monitor. I'm downsizing my photography business a lot, but I will still dabble in it from time to time; it'll be a side business. I want a computer that will handle big raw files, many Photoshop layers and Aperture.
4) I often have many programs open and running simultaneously. I want a computer that will handle this (perhaps the Mini can do this just fine).

I like the Mini for these reasons:

1) Cost
2) Small form factor
3) Electrical use (I run my desktop 24/7).
4) Heat (my current Mac Pro and 30" monitor generates quite a bit of heat).
5) I think that if I'm considering a Mini, then why not an Air (I have a work PC laptop, so I really don't need another laptop, but . . .)? Then again, for portability, I'll probably buy an iPad2.

 

[Paulius]

Dear wacomme,

I'm not sure why I'm replying to this thread. I usually browse MacRumors for news, but I always see the forum full of threads with misinformation and recommendations which are not justified. However, I just itching to reply to this thread.

First off, let me just say that, if you’re coming from a PowerMac G5 and going to a Mac Mini, you will be very much disappointed. The Mac Mini uses a much slower and lower power processor than the other Apple desktops and also uses a laptop hard drive. The Mac Mini is a great little machine for web browsing and casual work, but you’ll find yourself wanting more performance if you’re going to do anything intensive or run any creativity apps. If you can’t afford any other machine, the Mac Mini is certainly better than nothing, but I would highly recommend you to see if you could invest an iMac.

Let me start by answering some of your questions:

1) How well would this Mini run my 30" monitor?

Passably. The Mac Mini has the capability to support a monitor of this size, but you shouldn’t expect the interface to be too smooth. It uses a rather low performance graphics card.

2) How much RAM can I add?

Up to 8GB. The Mac Mini takes laptop-style memory. You will need two DDR3 DIMMs (bars) of 4GB each to get to that size. DDR3 memory has come down in price a lot recently, so I would highly recommend you to cram as much memory as you can. The trick is to also never buy memory from Apple as it's much more expensive.

4) What's the best way to transfer my current external eSATA drives and drive enclosures to work with the Mini?

Unfortunately, the Mac Mini nor the iMac have an eSATA port. The fastest performance interface for hard drives that is available on this machine is the Firewire 800 port. You’ll need to get yourself a compatible enclosure to use it.

5) It seems that people often upgrade the HD. Suggestions?

The Mac Mini uses a laptop hard drive (because of the machine’s small size) so the hard drive is clearly the Achilles’ heel of the Mac Mini. If you can afford it, upgrading to a good quality solid state drive will give you the best performance. I’m also not sure, but upgrading the hard drive might void Apple’s warranty.

I also saw on this thread that you were inquiring about the iMac. I personally have a Core i7 27” iMac and I love it. It has its flaws, but short of a really expensive Mac Pro, it’s the best bang for the buck that you can get with Apple. The main limitation of this machine is that it only supports one hard drive and that it doesn’t have too much room for upgradability. You have no idea how much I’d love to have more than one hard drive in my computer. Fortunately, I’m rather technical so I’m using iSCSI connected to a NAS to expand my storage. My other complain about the iMac is the lack of proper cooling, but that’s just my opinion…

Glossy screens are a somewhat controversial issue, as some people supposedly like them. I personally don’t like the glossy screens or the idea of them, but I got used to them. The glossy screen’s performance will also depend on the placement of the machine in your room. You can forget about having a window behind you, as the screen will look like a mirror. I personally had to re-arrange my desk when I got my new iMac to prevent having issues with the glossy screen. On the upside, however, the screen in the iMac is an IPS panel and uses LED as the backlight. The LED means that this screen won’t take up as much power as your current NEC and won’t generate as much heat either. The IPS panel isn’t the best quality, but it’s passable. I can’t stand TN panels, but I find the IPS panel in the iMac a pleasure to work with.

If the glossy screen is an issue for you, you could consider plugging in your existing NEC screen into the iMac and using the iMac itself as a secondary screen on the side. Meaning, the NEC would be your primary screen.

My conclusion is that I would highly recommend the iMac. It will give you similar performance than a low-end Mac Pro at a much lower price. Check out the glossy screen as an Apple store or another retailer near you to see how shiny it is.

 

[maccompaq]

The low end Mac Pro is so powerful, it will meet your needs for 10 years thus making it a very reasonable cost. It runs so much cooler than the other Macs, and that will lead to a longer life.

The extra cost of the Mac Pro is very much worth it due to the versatility of the machine.

 

[Paulius]

The low end Mac Pro is so powerful, it will meet your needs for 10 years thus making it a very reasonable cost. It runs so much cooler than the other Macs, and that will lead to a longer life.

You can install tools on other Macs to manually control the fans. The Mac Pro still runs much hotter than what I would like Apple's cooling to be.

 

[chrismacguy]

You can install tools on other Macs to manually control the fans. The Mac Pro still runs much hotter than what I would like Apple's cooling to be.

Its still the best desktop around as far as imaging or video applications are concerned (at least in my books).

 

[MattA]

Video on the Mac Mini isn't as bad as most people think. I'm running a mini with the 9400m and a 24" ACD and play World of Warcraft regularly with it. It runs it perfectly adequately, and the 320m is much faster. If you're doing 2D stuff with the Mini, you wouldn't have many complaints with it.

However, HDDs are a problem. If you need extra Hard Disks, then your only choice really is the Mac Pro. Unfortunately, Apple refuses to make a decent mid range headless machine, and until they do, the Mac Pro is the only Mac that'll hold more than 2 Hard Disks.

The largest size that fits in the mini with no trouble is 750GB. I've heard of people getting 1TB drives to fit, but they're 12.5mm where the enclosure in the mini is 9mm.

You can do SSD drives, but again, there's only room for 1 HDD (2 in the server), so you're kinda stuck with one or the other.

Like I said before, purchase what you need. If you need the extra space for Hard Drives, get a Mac Pro. I do know you can get substantial discounts on Mac Pros online compared to what Apple sells them for. Amazon even had them for sale for a bit around Christmas for around $1799.

Good luck with your purchase!

 

[chrismacguy]

Video on the Mac Mini isn't as bad as most people think. I'm running a mini with the 9400m and a 24" ACD and play World of Warcraft regularly with it. It runs it perfectly adequately, and the 320m is much faster. If you're doing 2D stuff with the Mini, you wouldn't have many complaints with it.

However, if your comparing the video between a Mini and a Pro, the Pro beats the mini like a human beats a fly...

 

[wacomme]

I'll be buying a Mac Pro. I might have a connection for a discount on a new Mac Pro. If not, I'll consider a 2009 model. Thank you for all of your help.