How Big Does It Really Have To Be?, what constitutes a 'powerful' Mac? Options

[ofried]

i've been in PC land forever. now, i'd like to try Apple! in terms of buying a system, what do i really need? i've heard everything across the board... can anyone (and everyone!) help me figure out what to configure before i purchase the monster!? i have Digi001 LE. i will be buying a dual processor G4. now, while knowing a week after i buy it it's going to be 'old', what exactly should i get to not have to worry about anything for a while? how much Memory, Hard Drive, and anything else you recommend... and do i need external drives... (i don't even know what firewire is... but do i need it!?!?!) thanks very, very much. sincerely, an excellent musician and an awful technician.

[manexmachina]

Well, no matter what you'll be complaining in six months when your computers speed has been left in the dust. some people use this as an excuse to buy the fastest/latest. Some people buy the next to best as policy and then sell it on ebay every six months when the new ones come out, taking a six month hit of about $500, but always having the new technology. around six months from now, the 970 should be "out" or at least on the platform. This will be the single most important change in mac cpu's since moving to g3 from PPC (bigger than g3 to g4). So - me, personally, I don't know if I'd boost a TON of cash for an extra .2 ghz.

LCD's - i'm in a different opinion that tripping because I feel tha the monitor is the thing you hold onto through about 3 generations of computers if not more... so get the thing you want and, trust me, you want LCD. if the apple ACD prices kill you, consider Dell's LCD's which some mac enthusiasts still prefer.

Firewire - it's just a harddrive with a different sort of connector... hot swapable, incredibly convenient (i own 1.2 terrabytes of firewire). Not quite as fast traditionally as an internal drive or a raid, but the new firewire800 is pretty darned speedy.

a dual 1.25 would make you feel pretty speedy and might not make you take the "luxury hit" when the 970's come out.... (if the do and if you're worried about that).

software based systems are going to be more demanding of that processing. not all software is dual system aware.