I want to eventually have a good FCP system, but to do that I need work. To get work I need equipment to do work. I realize that I can do FCP on a iMac G5, and do it well, but in the end, would it be better to just go ahead, wait a while, and get the real editing system that is more expandable?

I know 'ol Greg Boston has a iMac G5 and spends all of his money on the cams. I love that plan, but will I be able to effectively mount external hard drives, monitors, and things I would really need to edit a real project? Also, if I get stuck with an SD project, I'm pretty much hosed when I need a real viddy card, right?

Also, this would be an editing suite. Not necessarily a "blammo graphics" suite. I'm a shooter by trade, not a graphics dude, although I will learn it eventually. So I don't need a huge card, but I might need a AJA someday for the I/O capabilities.

Get the 20' iMac G5 now, work, and then sell the rig if need be to upgrade?
-or wait and get a tower?

To me it's a no brainer. Stay with something cheaper that can get you by till you really need the horsepower of the bigger system. I'm editing wedding videos, documentaries as well as batch processing thousands of pictures a month on my imac G5...could it be done quicker? Yes.

But is it economically responsible to upgrade everytime something is announced? IMO...NO. Is it responsible to buy the first gen of any product? Again...NO. Right now you're paying a premium if you go mac pro because it just came out. Why do that? I bought the iMac G5 because it was right around 1K refurbed and I knew it would last me through all the growing pains of the intel switch (though I didn't heed my own advice and picked up a macbook). This way I'll also be getting the mac pro after they announce and release 10.5 and all the sweet new apps.

Let things settle both in the computer industry and in your own business. You don't need the latest and greatest to edit...particularly so if you're not doing edits that require super fast rendering and turnarounds. That's 2K that could go into a lot of other areas that can make you a much better video than slightly improved render speeds...

Paul

You must be considering getting a used iMac G5? Or a refurbished one from Apple? The current iMacs are intel powered, actually the entire Apple Computer line is now intel powered.

If you're shooting DV or HDV all you need is Firewire for capture and any of the Macs will edit either right out of the box. All of them work well with external drives also. I have 2 drives, a DVD burner and DV camera all on the FW bus of my Mac Mini G4 and it works fine.

The towers are available now and if you can afford it, get it. The iMac still kicks ass though and the hard drives, memory, and processors are upgradeable as well.

Better than a new iMac and more reliable I think is going with an older G5, before the intel switch. Try getting a hold of an older dual 1.8 with the larger number of RAM slots or a dual 2 ghz. You'll be saving tons of money, get far better performance than an iMAC, and wait out the intel growing pains in style.