Apple shopping. Help!

[SchemeTeam]

Greetings...
I've been a Mac user for years now, and have decided to upgrade from my ibook to a G4 and the Digi001 ProTools.

My questions: Can you guys help me with the recommend specs? How much RAM? HD size? Best place to buy-Apple site? MacWarehouse? etc.

I'm looking to spend about $1,800 or so on the computer.

Thanks alot!

[trashy]

I like macmall, but almost everywhere has the same prices. I mean, its mac for chrissakes!

Here's my take:

RAM: plan on doubling whatever the computer comes with. OS X loves to eat RAM, and so do music programs. I would say at least 500.

HD: the size depends on what you're going to do with it, but get a separate one for your music. They're cheap now, so no biggy. Size is not nearly as important as speed: 7200, at least.

Hope that helps! Someone with better knowledge of the Digi001 and PT might want to weigh in...

[No Wave Casio Kitsch]

As far as where to buy, the prices are going to be pretty consistent wherever you go. This may sound silly, but make sure they're an authorized Apple dealer!

Get as much RAM as you can swing. There's no such thing as too much. However, I'm only running 192MB and it's incredibly rare for me to run into problems. The only time it happens is when I'm running mucho plug-ins (that dam'n SansAmp plug-in eats a lot!).

Pick up the largest AND FASTEST hard drive you can afford. Gotta be at least 7,200 RPM. Whether you go internal or external, make sure you put the drive on its own channel. Don't want that audio drive being dragged down by your CD-ROM/RW/whatever. I run a 7,200 RPM firewire drive and the only time I ever had trouble with playback was on a recent project which had tons and tons and tons and tons of 32nd and 64th note snare and kick triplets. Other than that it's been golden. I defrag at least once a week, but I'm not recording that often. Were I recording daily I would probably defrag at the end of every night.

Hope that helps a bit!

-Giahni

[musicjon]

Check out the "Special Deals" link in the Apple Store. You can get refurb stuff with the full warranty from Apple.

Currently you can get a Power Mac G4 1.25GHz DUAL/256MB/80GB/Combo for $1399

[62junior]

O.k., there's one issue you should be aware of and that's the noise created by these machines. I just bought a refurbed MDD 1.25ghz with Superdrive and 512ram for 1699- at Expercom.com

The machine is unbelievably fast and powerful, and LOUD. Check out G4noise.com for more on this matter. Supposedly the new ones being shipped have the new, quieter fans on them but my refurb didn't and I'm now in the process of getting the fans replaced so they're dealable. If you to have the computer in the same room that you track and want to do an acoustic part, forget about it if it has the old power supply and fans. There are silencing kits from Verax but they void the warranty.

Are you using OSX or OS9? The fan speed changes all the time in OS9 and it's annoying at best, it's not as bad as in OSX. If you get a system with the upgrade this may not an issue but I have seen others still unhappy after the
upgrade and I at least want to make you aware of the situation going in.

Oh, I should also mention that there's an issue with the sound in/out jacks on these things too and apparantly there's no real fix for it. I have this problem too, there's a hum on the output jack so if I want to use Sound Manager to listen to anything there's a quite loud humming sound. Pretty unacceptable but Apple isn't fixing this one. It's not too much of an issue as
I use a Motu firewire device but it is annoying if I want to just listen to something via soundmanager without firing up the Motu.

Apple tech support is horrible on this issue by the way, they even tried to tell me that this was not a known problem, even though they had an exchange program a few months ago to replace the power supplies and fans. I got the feeling that I knew way more than the Apple tech about Apple computers. The first guy I talked to couldn't even tell me how to check which firmware version I had!

Good luck, don't mean to scare you off or anything, knowledge is good in these situations though.

peace, K.S.

[friendlybunny]

Also... the digi001 will not work on the new g5 machines, so you might want to consider the digi002 or mbox if you want your hardware to stay current.

I would save up to get a G5 ($2K) if I were you, or a fast G4 imac ($1800) with the digi002.

They make a rack mount version of the digi002 now as well.

good luck...

[ottokbre]

just saw the new G5's over the weekend...andthey are.....shhhh.....really.....really....quiet...shhhh...

[ahmedgarcia]

Found out that Digi is faseing out the Digi001 but NOT the MBox. The 002 is the next step up.

[62junior]

I saw a G5 over the weekend too and it didn't seem much quieter than the last gen. G4 sitting next to it. Also, beware of the quiet computer when it's at rest, sometimes when they're getting taxed they can howl. Of course it's my hope that Apple learned it's lesson after the g4 noise fiasco, but I wouldn't put anything past them after that one.

K.S.

[RinnyTin]

Keep in mind that the G5 currently won't run Pro Tools HD, Mix, or LE. Digidesign says they're working on it, but no definite timing on when they'll issue a software upgrade. Also, the Mix and Digi 001 cards will not fit in the G5 PCI slots. You can get a new, dual 1.25mHz G4 with warranty direct from Apple for $1599. Hope this helps.

[trash180]

I'm looking at the same thing as the origional poster and it seems the way to go is to get the fastest G4 with a minimal amounts of upgrades. Then, order the ram, the superdrive, and the extra HD elsewhere...online or whatever. You'll get more for your money.

You should be able to put together something for $1800 with money to spare for a monitor (at least 17 inches, yo.)

Pretty crazy that they're getting rid of the digi001 though. I guess the digi002 is geared toward the G5.

[foley]

I don't want to hijack this thread, but what the flock does it mean that a G5 *won't* run pro tools le? Shouldn't the operating system be the only thing that matters?

I imagine it has something to do with the sound manager shyte, but this really makes me angry and, frankly, I don't know why.

Just seems like any computer running osX should be able to use software that is compatible with osX. Right?

mf

[xik]

well first off I feel sorry just for the fact that your asking to pay 1800$ on an audio system, and thinking about paying 2K and only getting a digi 01 or 02 -

I'm seriously not trying to get you off mac or anything but if you want to save some money take a look at the maudio gear and get a pc - I've worked both tons on mac, wintel, and linux boxes, and your going to be able to "Get" more system for you money, but that really is only if your have enough courage to learn to build your own computer.

so I'll leave things at rest there because mac makes my favirote laptops. just not my favirote desktops.

ok - system specs -

hd's get at least two - one for system one for song data, (critical data keep a copy on both drives - or get a firewire backup) 7200 rpm min - ram 512 min, get as much drive space as you can afford.

for pro tools compatability -

http://www.digidesign.com/compato/

[Poppatwang]

Check the specs, but I believe the entry level G5 accepts older style PCI slot cards. The 2 other models have a different card architecture.