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specs for Mac media machine

jacksonpt

jacksonpt

Turbo Monkey
Jul 22, 2002
6,791
59
Vestal, NY
My office is considering buying a Mac to do some of our media work on (primarily video editing, some photo/graphics work too).

I've spec'd a ton of PCs, but always for more general office work. As such, I generally buy as much RAM as I can afford, and bump down processor speed, hard drive space, etc. to make multitasking a bit easier.

Should I do the opposite for the mac - buy as much processor video card memory as I can at the expense of RAM?

Thanks.
 
binary visions

binary visions

The voice of reason
Jun 13, 2002
22,162
1,261
NC
A spectacular video card will do virtually nothing for video editing and photo work. It'll be mostly 3d processing juice. If you're doing CAD, that's fine, but otherwise it'll be mostly wasted money.

Apple overcharges for RAM, BTW. Buy little RAM direct and upgrade it afterwards.
 
Transcend

Transcend

My Nuts Are Flat
Apr 18, 2002
18,040
3
Towing the party line.
binary visions said:
A spectacular video card will do virtually nothing for video editing and photo work. It'll be mostly 3d processing juice. If you're doing CAD, that's fine, but otherwise it'll be mostly wasted money.

Apple overcharges for RAM, BTW. Buy little RAM direct and upgrade it afterwards.
Click to expand...
That's not super accurate anymore with macs. Core Image offloads many processor intensive tasks to the GPU now for some applications (mostly the pro apps like Aperture, Final cut, Photoshop etc). A fast video card actually makes a pretty big difference in aperture.

Also, ya, Apple rapes for ram. I bought all mine for my mac pro from crucial for about 1/4 the price Apple wanted.
 
binary visions

binary visions

The voice of reason
Jun 13, 2002
22,162
1,261
NC
I know that a lot of apps are loading the video card to improve speed but I wasn't aware that most of them did so to the extent that a 700+ mb powerhouse actually made much of a difference. Does a ton of video RAM and an ultra high end card make much difference over just a very decent, 256mb card?
 
Transcend

Transcend

My Nuts Are Flat
Apr 18, 2002
18,040
3
Towing the party line.
binary visions said:
I know that a lot of apps are loading the video card to improve speed but I wasn't aware that most of them did so to the extent that a 700+ mb powerhouse actually made much of a difference. Does a ton of video RAM and an ultra high end card make much difference over just a very decent, 256mb card?
Click to expand...
The 2 different cards when i ordered my mac pro were a 256mb nvidia 7300 and a 512mb att version x1900 I think.

I have used both, and the x1900 is noticeable faster for aperture and final cut. I'm not sure about other cards/applications. In this case it was quite noticeable.
 
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My Nuts Are Flat
Apr 18, 2002
18,040
3
Towing the party line.
Lightroom does not use core image. Photoshop and the entire CS3 suite do indeed use it. It is mostly used for filters but layer effects as well as large scale conversions also tap into it.

There is even an indesign/PSD/Ill plugin that leverages core image for the CI specific effects that are part of the OS, mostly for particle effects (smoke, fire, explosions etc).
 
Silver

Silver

find me a tampon
Jul 20, 2002
10,840
1
Orange County, CA
Transcend said:
. Photoshop and the entire CS3 suite do indeed use it. It is mostly used for filters but layer effects as well as large scale conversions also tap into it.

There is even an indesign/PSD/Ill plugin that leverages core image for the CI specific effects that are part of the OS, mostly for particle effects (smoke, fire, explosions etc).
Click to expand...
That's cool, I didn't know that.

Just out of curiosity, is that something you'd notice with regular photo usage on a Macbook compared to a MBP?
 
Transcend

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My Nuts Are Flat
Apr 18, 2002
18,040
3
Towing the party line.
Silver said:
That's cool, I didn't know that.

Just out of curiosity, is that something you'd notice with regular photo usage on a Macbook compared to a MBP?
Click to expand...
Honestly, not too sure. I think the macbook uses an integrated vid chip. Like I said, i only really noticed the difference myself in aperture, which was pretty obvious as I had the 2 cards to try.
 
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