Wow, thanks Katarn. That's essentially what I was thinking of doing, I'll do something similar with iPhoto if I can when transferring to Picasa. Haven't researched this too much.

roguelazer, if I COULD use ubuntu or Fedora or any linux, I would. I read that Adobe was doing some linux work back in 2005 or something, but I never saw any products get released.

I essentially can't do my work without Photoshop, Illustrator and InDesign. I'm a slave to Adobe, just like the rest of the creative design industry. A high-powered machine that runs Linux is, at this point, only something that I can play Vendetta on and surf the web.

My only option to stay Mac at this point is to buy a used Dual G5 MacPro from work or from eBay. The ones we have at work are 3 years old already, essentially the same mfg age as my 1st-gen iMac G5. AND the PowerMac7,2 G5 goes for about $1,400 now. That gets me thinking...

Does the nVidia 7950GT AGP card work on Macs?
How about the ATI x1950XT AGP card?

Either one of those cards might be enough, but the PowerMacs at work are slooow compared to the new Intel ones...

Gah! This is hard. I have the order all ready to go on newegg, but I have yet to push the "buy" button...

this is an email excerpt i sent to colleagues when i got my core 2 duo imac at home:

Compile time of iMac vs G5 with same source tree:

Power MacG5: 2 x 2ghz 2g RAM total: 14m 06s
iMac Core 2 Duo : 2 x 2.16ghz 2g RAM total: 6m 48s


if you're going to buy a used g5 tower, just get a new imac instead.

Hey Leber, you do a lot of design work at home correct? Have you considered your fonts? Good font control is much more difficult on a pc. Sure you can put Suitcase Fusion on a pc, but Suitcase works a hell of a lot better on the Mac. Take it from someone who works at a printer. If you design, you want a Mac. Your source files will always be accepted at the vendor, and your pdf files will work better down the line at the RIP. At my work, we always cringe when receiving pc files. Mostly due to pc users usually don't know how to set up their files for print. There are other issues with Windows and postscript that cause problems. Sometimes the Fiery print drivers will screw with the base line of every other character with some fonts from the pc. HP print drivers add strokes to Asian fonts on the pc. Plus countless other small issues. None of these things happen when postscripting from the Mac.

Open type just plain works on the Mac, and postscript fonts files are neater. No afm, pfm and pfb files with unrecognizable names to deal with. Granted you might not ever run into problems with fonts and font management on a pc. But it's less likely a printer will have issues with your fonts if you use a Mac. Then again, you also might not ever send anything to a printer, so maybe there's no worries.

P.S. My work just bought a new Mac Pro dual 2.66ghz Dual Core Xeon, with dual 22" LCD monitors loaded with the latest and greatest software. It kicks ass! It'll run Illustrator, Quark 7, InDesign, Acrobat and Photoshop all at the same time without it breaking a sweat. Pitstop 7/Acrobat 8 can preflight a 526 page pdf, and fix the problems in under 2 minutes. Our 1.8ghz G5 would take about 10-15 minutes to do the same task. Unfortunately, our dept has to share. I still have a Sawtooth in my personal work station. :(

Why do you need such a top of the line machine?

Hell, I do tons of stuff with my machine, such as photoshop, 3D meshes, word processing and VO all with a 600MHz (thats right, MHz) iMac G3 (if I remember correctly they stopped making G3's for personal computers four years ago) with 384MB of RAM I found abandoned on an office floor. Hell, this thing is at least 6, if not 7 years old by now, and still gets the job done. It may take awhile, and it certainly doesn't have that "whiz-bang" speed to it, but it works.

Why not get a Mac Mini or a base MacBook? Sure it's not top of the line: they don't have the best graphics cards or the fastest processors money and luxury can afford. Then again, do you need the speed, or just want it for convenience?

Or another option. Why not just run Boot Camp on a new Mac? You'll have best of both worlds running on one great machine.

Anyway, like upper case said, it's your life, and if you have the money (I wish I did, :P ) go for it. Anyway, best of luck in your future Windows endevour.

You guys are NOT making this easier!

A - No more all-in-one machines for me, any computer I buy for the rest of my life will be a tower-style machine where I can swap out replacement parts and switch components as I see fit.

I don't need an absolute top-of-the line machine, but I DO need something that will be able to handle video capture, video conversions, manipulation of up to 1 GB Photoshop images, etc. I can get a top-of-the-line PC for $1700 if I build it myself. A top-of-the-line Mac will be like twice that.

My current iMac has been to the genius bar twice but VO still overheats it, and Photoshop/Illustrator is beginning to push the temp towards overheating more than it did when I first bought the machine in Nov 2004. As I type this my temp is at 164 F, I'm only running OS X and Firefox. (well, and Temp Monitor) The computer needs replacing. Plain and simple.

I'd love to get a new Intel MacPro... but I'd need about $1,000 more... I have the money right now, but the Mortgage needs to be paid May 1... you know how it is...

MB - Yeah I know about the fonts. Remind me to tell you the story of me doing a 16-language installation manual on the PC with InDesign 1.5 (the chinese and korean fonts worked pretty well, the problem was the turkish, vietnamese, and arabic fonts.) Let's just say that I have a "solution" that involves Adobe Font Folio. I've used Suitcase since it was invented, and the current version of Suitcase X well, sucks ass. I have been using Linotype's FREE FontExplorer (http://www.linotype.com/2006/tools.html) for the last year and a half and it is much more stable and functional than Suitcase.

It would be great to run BootCamp. I would love it. Maybe if I just... maybe I could... get a baseline MacPro? GAH... CDW has a sale on MacPro 2.66 GHz models bundled with the Adobe upgrade I need...

leebs, normally i wouldn't put so much efforts into this, as i've mentioned before. but i consider you a friend and as such, i wish you to make the right decision.

from my point of view, as a graphics designer, moving to windows is a serious mistake. i corroborate mb's assessment of the printing industry, dealing with pc files.

before i worked for what is not an oracle division, i worked 10 years as a software developer in the printing industry. i've worked on major software, some less known and some in-house stuff you've never even heard of.

in the past, i've worked on lottery ticket generation software (babn, a contractor of loto-quebec) on font compositing and security algorithms; i've workes on pre-press imposition software used in the print shop and printing presses (and i'm talking those frickin huge web printers) software (ultimate impostrip, and the easy impostrip, aka yellow project, for used in complete automated production software for esher grad's xicon film plotters); i've worked on quark xpress xtentions (punch xt being one that sold a few thousand copies in it's time); i've worked on workflow project and something dk&a (a major xpress xtension developer) was ready to shelf 245,000usd on it (before the then stupid vp of the shop i worked on refused), wich was a complete database-to-print automation thing that build flyers from the ground up); my ex wife's step father owns a print shop down st-laurence (st-pascal) and he too can (*can*, not *want*) only work on macs for the job, with the sole exception of his lazer engraver machine whose controler, unlike traditional rip (raster image processors; you sure know about, on linotype, esher grad or agfa gaevert film recorders), uses a custom pc software.

i'm going to say this clearly: in all these years, not one system, print shop or graphics design firm i've seen could effectively do their complete workflow on anything but macs.

but maybe you found a way. i dont know.

I think he wants help and advice on the PC, not a platform war.

If you need to convert files to Mac friendly formats that badly, buy a refurb mac mini on the side just for that purpose alone. Hell, your iMac could do that now!

[EDIT] On the other hand http://store.apple.com/1-800-780-5009/WebObjects/EducationIndividual.woa/6304004/wa/PSLID?nplm=FA356LL/A&wosid=4k6nQtVUog8P3gbcGo32ZRcJI7P . If you can shelf out $500 more, plus taxes/shipping. Refurbs disappear quick, though.

It's a major shame the OSX Fan controllers only work for Intel hardware. 164F is damn hot.

Heh. Processor temp gets to 180F to 185F in no time with Vendetta on bad days, upon reaching 185F the computer is forced into sleep mode (Which is probably a good thing). However, sometimes it spikes temp and sometimes it doesn't. I can't seem to determine why it overheats some days and on other days it doesn't.

For example, last night processor temp sat happily at around 150 F throughout Vendetta. However, when I quit TeamSpeak and went into fullscreen mode for Vendetta, I could only play for about 30 minutes until it got too hot again. If it was just Vendetta doing this it would be less of an issue, but it's starting to happen with other bread & butter graphics programs that I use, and that's the alarming part.

GAH...

What have I done? I pushed the "buy" button...

CASE: RAIDMAX|ATX-612WB BK RT
MB: ABIT AW9D-MAX 975X 775
CPU: INTEL|C2D E6600 2.4G 775 4M
VIDEO: EVGA 320-P2-N811-AR 8800GTS
PSU: HIPER|HPU-4B580-MS 580W
RAM: 1Gx2|G.SKILL F2-6400PHU2-2GBHZ
HD: 320G|ST 7K 16M SATA2 ST3320620AS
DVD: LITE-ON|LH-20A1L-05 LS
OS: MS WIN XP PRO W/SP2B SINGLE PACK
MONITOR: MNTR VWSNC|LCD 22" 5MS DVI VG2230WM
MOUSE: RAZER|COPPERHEAD CHAOS GREEN
KEYBOARD: LOGITECH|G15 GAMING KEYBOARD
MOUSE PAD: RAZER|EXACTMA T& EXACTREST

/me paces fitfully and will pray extra lots in about 8 hours that this works out for the best...

Just... please use XP. Vista has a lot of potential and will be a good OS when the service packs come out but now... *sigh*

I would direct you to this post, and notice the choice of XP. :)

Just as a point of interest LeberMac, you could install Linux 7.04 and take advantage of the free and open source software out there which can be as good as if not better than the Windows equivalents (which saves you a LOT of cash to begin with) and use something like Crossover Linux or WINE to run the Adobe software you need to use.

If you check out both those applications you will see that they are more than capable of running whatever design apps you need, since they were created for people in pretty much exactly your situation.

Its true that I am a bit of an open source evangelist, but it has to be tempered with realism. As good as gIMP is, it isn't Photoshop yet. As good as Inkscape is, it isn't Illustrator yet. So if you need to, use things like Crossover Office and WINE to get what you need done and support FOSS at the same time. Paying for Crossover Linux is directly supporting the WINE project, so you really are doing some good there if you use it.

My two pence.

I love open source. Im a contributor to such things as the SimpleMachines forums and the Joomla CMS projects, they are awesome open-source endeavors. Keep in mind I already own most of the software that I need for the Mac, and the software cross-grade costs are under $800 for everything esentially.

The GIMP is OK, it works well, just... not as well as Photoshop. I've tried InkScape, and I would equate it with Illustrator 5. Of course, that's awesome for an open-source program. However, like I said before, I'm a slave to Adobe. I use these programs every day, and, well, I'm willing to pay $600 for the upgrade.

I need to find out about WINE & Crossover Linux. Perhaps that will help me. Who knows? I'll leave a partition open for it.

But, I bought XP already so day-to-day production will probably be done there, I'll experiment with linux flavors when I have time.

I have a better idea: How about I rob your house, like I robbed Cunjo's house. That way you'll have no money, and you won't have to make this hard decision. (I know, you already bought it; I can take care of that....) That way, everybody wins!

Absolutely understand being a slave to Adobe. It used to be Adobe and Macromedia with a spattering of discreet (3ds max) for me.

XP as an operating system will fairly happily do what you want it to do with a bit of screwing around and tinkering with security and so on, so using it from a professional perspective does make some kind of sense.

My decision to go with linux was based around the idea that I could finally do what I needed to do with an operating system which espoused ideas that I'm passionate about. Which is a strangely geeky thing to say, but something I'm not ashamed of.

Seriously have a look at WINE and Crossover Linux, not only are they amazing already, but they are getting better and better literally every day. Its starting to get to the point where they are attempting to fix a lot of the more esoteric shit which windows and windows developers throw at people to get stuff done.

Use windows to get what you need done, but for gods sake, do make sure you leave a partition open for linux. I think you will find that your Adobe slavery can still hold you in chains without having your feet nailed to Redmond.

Good luck getting used to XP. It was odd getting used to it coming from Windows 2000, I can't imagine what coming from a Mac might be like.

Like a egg on a brick wall. You'll be scrambled with brick as a texture. But that is looking at someone that never looked or actually did anything on Windows. I strongly suggest reading the guides or you can grab a dev and ask for help. ;)

OK, it's not like I'm a babe in the woods, here. Hell I have to use & abuse XP machines at work where we do video editing. For the most part, they work fine for design tasks and video tasks. Drivers are sometimes a problem. Fonts are a problem. Transferring files back & forth between platforms is always a problem, even though the SW companies LIE and say it's not.

Chaos, if you rob my house, be sure to steal my cars as well. I need the insurance $$.