The Online Photographer: Computerese

The Online Photographer: Computerese:

I know a lot of readers of this blog are a lot more computer-savvy than I. With CS3 hull-down on the horizon and my hard drive full, it’s becoming obvious that my sturdy old eMac is getting due for an update. Any expert opinions on what Mac a photo-stylin’ cheapskate should buy at this point in time? Used or new? Mini or iMac? G5 or Macintel? Two-piece or all-in-one? One Gig or two? I’d sure appreciate input from wiser brains.

UPDATE: THANK YOU for all the great replies. The strongest consensus recommendations seem to be:

a) Wait until after the MacWorld Expo;

b) Get a Core Duo iMac (with 20″ being the main recommendation, 17″ to save money and 24″ for a “dream machine”);

c) Go for 2GB of RAM minimum.

With weaker but still prevalent recommendations being:

1) Choose the Core 2 Duo (I’m not quite sure what this refers to, but I’ll find out);

2) Seek out a refurb, or an educational or employee discount to save money.

Bruce McL points out, “Since you have an eMac, you’ll be pleased with the performance no matter what you get.” I agree, although have to admit that the eMac has been the best computer I’ve ever owned—the monitor is beautiful, with very accurate color (albeit with the benefit of frequent calibration) and the box has been largely trouble-free.

I’m coming into this late (sorry), but I felt I could still be useful in commenting on some of this.

First, I think it makes sense to understand what your needs and priorities are, adn that will help you understand where to spend your money. For a photographer using either Aperture/Photoshop or Bridge/Photoshop as their workflow, it seems to me that the priorities are:

1) Monitor size and quality — and perhaps 2 monitor capability

2) Video card speed and memory

3) RAM — the more the better

4) Disk Space — and expandability.

5) CPU speed

6) Expandability and enhanceability.

So first I’d try to define how much and what kind of monitor I want, and make sure I have a good, fast video card. Then I want as much RAM as I can get.

Because of this, much as I like the Mac Mini, I wouldn’t build a hard-core photo system around it. You can only put 2 gig of RAM in it, and it steals RAM for the onboard video system instead of having a separate video card — and you can only have one monitor. It’s a great little box for some things; not a great box for video/memory intensive things.

I’m going to ignore the Mac tower — not because I dislike the machine, but because it’s the high-end one. If money is no object, then buy one and fit it out. It’ll kick butt, but I don’t think building around it is very interesting in the context of this discussion (but a rational configuration with 4G ram, 500G disk, 7300GT video card and a 23″ flat panel lists for 4800 or so. consider this the baseline we’re trying to beat).

The next question to answer: do you want to work both in a studio and in the field (or on the road?) — if the former, then you want to look at how best to build a box for the office; if the latter, then we should see if we can build a laptop that solves the problem and can be “docked” into an office to improve its capabilities.

I’m of the latter type; I bet many photographers are. It’s a good way to leverage your computer dollars and take it along with you, rather than possibly buying two computers, one for the office, one for the field.

If you want an office machine, though, given we don’t want a Mini and we aren’t spending for a tower — then you want an iMac. Since screen real estate is so critical, look at the 24″ iMac. I left the CPU at 2.16GHz Core 2 Duo, added 3Gig of Ram, 500Gig of Disk, and upgraded the video to the GT7600 with 256M RAM. That’ll cost you $3000 (now you know why I’m not speccing out a tower. Unless you need REALLY HIGH END processing requirements, you don’t need one — leave the tower to the video geeks, photography doesn’t require them any more).

Now, think laptops:

The macbook only has a 13″ screen, and only can go to 2gig of RAM. For me, that’s enough to disqualify it. If your budget is really limited, look at it as a way to compromise if you want.

But look at the MacBook pro. 15″ or 17″ widescreen. Surprisingly, I’m going to suggest the 15″. Why? Because I find the 17″ to be more “luggable” than “portable” in the field — I recommend it to people who need to carry a portable office, not someone who needs to carry a laptop in the field. Instead, go for the 15″, which gives you a decent screen size in the field, and buy the 23″ flat panel to attach it to.

The price difference between the 2.16GHz and 2.33 GHz CPUs is $300. If you need to economize, this is one place to do so, but I went with the faster one in this case because that’s a small number to me. a 15″ 2.33GHz with 3 gigs of RAM, 200G drive, 23″ display will cost you about $4200; not trivial, but still less than that tower, and you can unhook it and take it with you. It uses the ATI Mobility Radeon X1600 wih 256M of ram, which is pretty good (the 2.16G CPU box has only 128M, another reason to spend the $300).

To me, the Laptop+Monitor combination is persuasive; you can avoid spending on a 2nd CPU (or in my case, buy a mini for administrative stuff like backups and file storage), so you can afford to splurge on other things (like the monitor). The only real problems with the iMac is that you can’t incrementally upgrade it — I’d rather not have to upgrade the monitor to get a faster CPU in 2 years, so I’ll spend a little bit more on a top-end monitor and a CPU to attach it to over an all-in-one, knowing that the next round of upgrades can be spread out over time and I have more flexibility. On the other hand, the iMac is dirt simple and would work fine.

So all things being equal, I recommend buying a Macbook Pro and add a 23″ monitor to it. It’s a powerful AND flexible combination that works well in the office and the field. All of my prices are based on similar configurations and Apple list (3Gig ram, 500G disk, keyboard, mouse, bluetooth and wifi) and a 23″ Apple cinema monitor. If you want to economize, you can do so in various ways — 3rd party ram from a good vendor is a no-brainer and will save a couple of hundred dollars. A smaller internal disk and adding a firewire drive (I like Other World computing’s drives — www.macsales.com) is another way. Go with a 20″ cinema display, or a good 3rd party. (for instance, instead of $4200, the 2.16 Macbook pro with 1Gig, 120G disk, 20″ Cinema is $2700. The 2Gig RAM module 3rd party is about $625, saving you $125 over Apple; an external firewire 500G drive is $249, for a final price of about $3800, or $400 less).

that is, FWIW, the configuration I live with. My computing world:

Laptop (2.16 Intel Core duo, 2Gig RAM, 100Gig disk). I have a 20″ Sony (non widescreen, that’s next on the upgrade list) monitor.

My desktop computer is a Mini, with the addition of a 500Gig drive that stores my iTunes and my RAW originals that get accessed over the net, and handles backup to a 2nd 500G drive that’s RAID mirrored using SuperDuper. that means that any file on a system here at the house is on three physical drives; the original and each of the mirrors in that drive (OWC sells a housing that you can RAID 0 or RAID 1 with one power supply and two internal drives. very nice for this; I use another 500G drive for offsite storage by bringing it in and adding it to the mirror to update, then removing it again….)

The mini also drives the printers, so they’re available to anyone on the wifi even if my laptop’s in the field. That and backups are good reasons to keep a desktop unit even if you live on a laptop. that, and in case of failure, you can cobble together a workable system until it’s repaired…. the desktop just doesn’t have to be an EXPENSIVE box).

I use the Belkin flip KVM, which works pretty well.

So, hope this helps. To me, having a unit I can carry anywhere, and dock into a bigger monitor and a keyboard/mouse is the best possible configurartion, and a good compromise of price and functionality and convenience. If you really want an office-only unit, you may STILL want a laptop, depending on your decisions on the monitor, or the iMac is a great little unit. the mini is a good secondary unit — but not one I’d make my primary processing unit for photos (I’ve tried it with Aperture, and I moved back to the laptop…..).

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