Imac Or Powermac?, do i need the power? Options

[kjartan]

Hi there!

I'll be starting an electronica group with a friend in the near future, and plan on getting a Mac with Apple's Logic Pro. We'll be programing drums, synths, virtual instruments and using the guitar modeling and synths in real time. This sounds like a huge load to process all at once, and was wondering if an iMac would give Logic enough juice. The portability and lower price is making me lean towards the iMac, but if we REALLY REALLY need the power of the dual 2GHz G5s, then so be it.

Any input you guys could give would be most appreciated.

Thanks!
--kjartan

[kjartan]

I'll be honest here, and say I've been a PC user all my life. I'm just not sure how Intel's and AMD's GHz translate into the whole G5/PowerPC thing. Like I don't know how to begin to compare a 3.4 GHz Pentium 4 to a dual 2 HGz PPC G5.

My assumption of what we'd be using in any given situation:

a) 1-2 drum tracks (Ultrabeat)
b) 3-4 Synth Tracks (Sculpture and others)
c) 1-2 Synth tracks *in real time* (playing along with pre-composed music live on stage)
d) 1 Guitar Amp Pro modeler *in real time* (again, playing along with pre-composed music live on stage)
e) Probably a few misc pre-recorded audio tracks (percussion, basses, keyboards, guitars, etc.)

That just seems like A LOT of "stuff" for a computer to handle all at once. Whichever system I get, I'll have *at least* two gigs of RAM. I know virtual instruments gobble it up like crazy, I'm just not too sure how much *processing* power I'll need.

--kjartan