Mac for Video Editing

pasta-solo

Hello, was looking for some advice on the following if anyone could help me out.

As a hobby, I enjoy editing video but lately have found my laptop is not really up to the task, as it is used for lots of other stuff aside from editing. I was thinking of buying a dedicated desktop, and found a Mac with the following stats:

Apple G5 PowerMac Dual Core 2.3 Ghz
G5 Powermac Dual Core 2.3 Ghz
6 GiG RAM
250 Gig HDD
NVIDIA GeForce 6600 (256Mb)
SuperDrive DVD-R Dual Layer
Model: A1177, M9591LL/A

I capture footage with a Canon HV30 video camera.

My question is, how would this Mac deal with editing video? Should I look for something with a little more oomph? Bear in mind this is just as a hobby so I'm lloking for something with a very low budget.

Thanks!

Liameter

I'd stick with Intel. PowerMacs were OK in their day but I think the G5 fan noise alone would drive you crazy. Also, the power supplies tended to have poor reliability. Look for at least a Core 2 Duo. iMovies is OK for basic editing. Beyond that, you'll have to spend some money.

Freddie59

I'm using Final Cut Express 4.0 (now replaced by FCX Pro) on a quad-core iMac with 8 GB RAM, now using a Canon HV40. Prior to that I used Pinnacle Studio on a PC for six years.

My experience:

http://www.pinnaclesys.com/PublicSite/us/Products/Consumer+Products/Home+Video/Studio+Family/ required a great deal of patience; regular saving of a project; crashed many times (even on a good spec PC); but the finished product was a delight. Huge amount of transitions; a very easy interface; a program that could capture, edit, and burn all in one.

Final Cut Express: never - EVER - crashes; very steep learning curve; extremely limited amount of very basic transitions which could be from the mid-90s; you have to burn the DVD using iDVD (which is very unstable - I ended up burning a Video TS folder to the HD and then using Toast 10 to burn the DVD).

Having said that, Nero 8 (which I had used since buying the Mac) had started to use 100% of system resources on the PC side, which is why I now use Toast.

FCE is a far more stable program - but for that reliability you sacrifice the user-friendliness and all-round dexterity of Pinnacle Studio. Sadly, you cannot get PS for Mac.

Hope that helps.:)

pasta-solo

I did a course last year in Final Cut so I know my way around it enough to suit my needs anyway, I just don't want to be hampered by performance issues that might arise from the Mac not being powerful enough for editing HD video.

SouperComputer

Well the G5 would let you edit for sure, the pain will be when you start rendering. I've edited HD footage on old single core P4 clunkers, but rendering took a LONNNNNG time.
I'd agree with the others, Intel Core2 is a good starting point.
What's your budget?

pasta-solo

Budget would be under €400 if at all possible. maybe its not... The mac was around €360 delivered on ebay

pasta-solo

How about a PC with the following specs:

Motherboard: ASUS M4A78LT-M
Processor Type: AMD Phenom II
CPU CORE: SIX CORE
Processor Speed: 2.5GHz - 2.9GHz
Memory (RAM): 8 GB
Hard Drive: 1TB
Primary Drive: DVD+/-RW

Graphics: SAPPHIRE TECHNOLOGY Radeon HD 5770 - 1 GB GDDR5 - PCI Express 2.0

Atx 450w Power Supply

Could anyone tell me would that be suitable?

SouperComputer

Yeah that would work pretty well, leaps and bounds ahead of the G5 thats for sure. What software are you thinking on using?

pasta-solo

Well I kinda had my heart set on Final Cut, one of the older versions would suit me fine.

SouperComputer

That rules out the phenom box then, unless you want to mess around with OSx86. If you do, this is not the place to discuss it
An intel iMac "might" work out to be better value for you....