G4 800 or Mini, RAM, and other contingencies, i really need the help so sorry :) Options

[pinnocio]

hello mates, i'm so very new to mac.
i want to leave PC (hopefully for good) and move into mac.
now i don't have much money and i'm concidering 2 machines -
used Power G4 800mhz with 512mb
or the Mac mini 1.42mhz with 256mb
now here the story doesn't end...
i plan on buying (for both so it doesn't matter regarding the money cost)
a FIREWIRE HDD 160GB 7200, M-AUDIO FIREWIRE AUDIOPHILE and a 1GB Ram stick (not apples so again, it doesn't regard the money cost).
I use my current P4 2.4 with 1GB ram and EMU 1212m mainly for MIDI projects, classical and film scoring using only samples through kontakt (nothing external) and VST plugins (some VSTis but nothing heavy).
My dilema is very simple i guess but for me it's a mess, getting the Power G4 means i can have up to 2GB RAM but a slower Processor and an older version. Getting the Mac Mini means i'll have a brandnew hardware but only a 1GB limit.
As i said i plan on loading alot of samples but as i've calculated the amout that i load into kontakt, it turns out to 750-800 MB, so a 1GB plus Virtual memory can handle it... i guess.. but still i havn't god a clue if it's worth it... any suggestions? thanks alot, Yoav

[lepetitmartien]

Forget the Mini, even if it's a good little computer, 1GB of RAM is definitely not enough to run virtual instrument and especially samplers. OS X needs at least 512 MB to feel at home. add 512 MB to 1 GB for heavy current MIDI/audio jobs, then you stack for virtual instruments and especially the sampler. Grow to the maximum 1,5 GB first thing.

The G4 800 can work but it'll be stressed easily now it can be later upgraded to something more powerful (accelerator card, 2 processors, up to 1,42 each) and you can fill it up with RAM. You can also put in up to 2 more hard drives (and keep FW for backups), say one SATA drive with a SATA PCI card.

As I'm helping a friend who has a G4 800 right now, running DP, I can tell you it'll bring you fast anyway to bounce tracks fast to save CPU. But processor upgrades are in the $500-800 range now. To give you an idea, my G5 mono 1,8 is about a double G4 1,42 on benches.

My 2 cents