Possible Sawtooth replacement - mini or iMac?

[Sam3]

Now that I have my refurb mini, I have placed myself in a bit of a quandary. I had originally intended the mini to be turned into a pseudo-AppleTV, but now with iMovie '08 requiring a G5 or Intel, I am wondering if it's time to find the Sawtooth a new home. My Sawtooth is upgraded to a 1.2 ghz processor, USB2 card, GeForceMX video card, SATA card, 120 gig boot drive, 160 gig SATA drive, a 500 gig SATA drive and 1.25 gig of RAM. The display is a 21 CRT who's picture is usable for my needs.

Speaking of needs, besides surfing and Macresource foruming, I'm using/learning Photoshop for personal needs, learning In Design while putting together a calendar for publication, I may switch a newsletter I work on to In Design or Pages. I will want to get into Dreamweaver eventually, I also am anticipating learning Final Cut Express. For now I'm using some of the iLife suite and want to possibly use iWork. In other words I'm not using the Mac for any money-making and don't need a professional-level machine.

As I said, seeing that iMovie '08, which I do want to use occasionally, requires an Intel, the mini looks like it would be a good fit. However, given that the mini uses the embedded Intel GMA 950 video chip, would that be sufficient for my uses or would an iMac, with it's own video card, be a better idea?

While I've been perfectly happy with my Sawtooth, I'm thinking that iMovie '08 is the beginning of the end of G4 support, and now may be the best time to get rid of any G4 machines while they still have any value. Does that sound reasonable, or does the Sawtooth still have life?

[edgarbc1]

imovie 6 hd is a good application.
why incur more expense if you are still running fine
with your other apps?

if you have money to burn... burn it and get a new mac
(my preference would be a refurb iMac 20" C2D 2.16 ghz)
if not, then hang on and make due with what you have.

best of luck with your decision!
EBC

[sekker]

I'd turn the sawtooth into a media server, buy an iMac, and add that 21" monitor as a second screen for extra real estate when you are doing video editing.

[rz]

your questions are a little confusing... you intended to use your G4 mini as an AppleTV, but because iMovie 08 requires G5+, you want to ditch a Sawtooth? Not sure how the dots connect there. Are you still thinking of using the G4 mini as a pseudo-AppleTV?

The Sawtooth is/was a great machine, but it's getting "long in the tooth" (laugh, dammit! It was a good pun!). Ditch it now while it still has a little bit of value. I'd yank the 500GB SATA and get a decent USB or Firewire enclosure for it. Since you're used to a 21" CRT (which you'll really want to get rid of), I'd say go for the 20" iMac.

[Jem]

[quote rz]your questions are a little confusing... you intended to use your G4 mini as an AppleTV, but because iMovie 08 requires G5+, you want to ditch a Sawtooth? Not sure how the dots connect there. Are you still thinking of using the G4 mini as a pseudo-AppleTV?
I think his Mini is an Intel mini. Hard to tell from the original post, but he did mention it uses the GMA video processor, which would be an Intel Mini.

[Chupa Chupa]

Clearly G4 support, particularly at the mid an lower Mhz end is coming to an end as Leopard will only support a 800Mhz or greater G4. BUT if you are happy w/ what you have I would not upgrade JUST for iMovie '08. It's not that great of an app, and I vastly prefer iMovie '06 because it allows for more editing creativity. iMovie '08 is mostly a slice and dice and put it online app.

I can't see Sawtooths losing much more value since they are pretty inexpensive right now. It's almost worth it just to keep it around as a legacy OS 9 machine if you have any odd ball stuff that never got upgraded to PPC or Intel.

If you are on the hot road to upgrade at least wait until Leopard. Given how long you seem to keep your machines I'd go for the iMac just b/c I'm not sure how useful the minis integrated video is going to be in a few years. Best thing would be to bit the bullet for a MP. It's incredibly upgradable...even the processor to some extent.

[macnut]

You do realize that the new iMovie is not an upgrade but an entirely new application that is pretty much different from previous releases of iMovie.

http://pogue.blogs.nytimes.com/2007/08/1...imovie-08/

[Sam3]

Sorry for the confusion. That may stem from a previous post where I was thinking of using a G4 mini as an Apple TV clone. But I couldn't pass up the refurbished Intel 1.83 mini for $479, so I got that instead to do the Apple TV clone. Now I'm revisiting that idea and am considering making the Intel mini my main machine, hence the posting looking for your thoughts and suggestions. This posting refers to the Intel mini, which, by the way, was just delivered!

The reason I emphasize iMovie '08 is two fold. One is that i would use it for crash and burn editing, for instance, taking a TV show and editing the commercials out of it; while the other is that it's the first Mac app to require at least a G5, and I have a feeling the next round of software upgrades will make G5's as a minimum mandatory.

[Dick Moore]

I would go iMac -- in fact, I did. Sawtooth went to the grandson. Both happy.