Because of the new OS coming out and it only working on Intel based Macs (mine is not ) I may wait until after the holidays when the new Leopard is due out. (Mac Rumors says its not a good time to buy, since its at the end of its cycle, so this gives me some time to save & ponder)

In the meantime I was hoping to get your thoughts on imac vs: mac pro debate.

I use my computer primarily for large amounts of Photo Storage/editing, Music (itunes), and internet usage (including lots of videos and music. I have a LARGE amount of files (both photo and music) so a large hard drive is a concern.

Something doesn't sit right with me about an "all in one" machine (like imac) but I do love the simplicity and small amount of space it takes. Also the price is better.

I'm looking at one of the 24" (can't decide between the 24-inch: 2.8GHz
and 24-inch: 3.06GHz
http://store.apple.com/us/browse/home/s ... co=MTE3MDM

or Should I spring for this:
http://store.apple.com/us/browse/home/s ... o=MjI5MDE1

I've had a G5 Powermac for 5 years and have grown to love it, but I'm not sure I need all the oomph of the pro for what I do with it.

i think you'll be siked with an imac. i'd go with the 2.8 GHz, they both have 2 gigs of ram.

You could get the Mac Mini and an external hard-drive for storage. That way you don't have the all-in-one issue, but still have a very small foot print. And I'm sure you already have a keyboard/mouse/monitor, so you wouldn't need to buy the peripherals.

i'd do an external HD either way

don't get a tower. do an imac or mini and an external drive.

I'd say go with the iMac. It supports up to 4 Gigs of RAM, and has firewire 400/800 if you want to hook up an external drive. It sounds like HDD space is more of a concern for you than having a beast of a processor.

Thanks guys. I already have a 500 external drive, but will probably get a larger one for backing up the entire machine (via time machine).

Are you guys running things like Photos and Mp3s from your external drive into iphoto or itunes?

This is when I began to have problems with my current setup. When i pointed the directory at the external drive, all sorts of issues came up that I never had before.

I use two external drives with my iMac (one of which hosts ripped DVDs) and have no problems at all accessing the drives or content on them.

is it connected through firewire or USB?

we are completely locked out of our towers (admin rights) at work and my whole music library is on an external. i have had zero problems with it.

I have an external hard drive with my entire music collection on it connected via firewire 400...and no hitches whatsoever..

I too have had an external music collection w/ itunes. Never had any problems out of it. It would take a massive music collection to cause any sort of hiccup as Firewire 400 is more than enough to move an on average 5 MB file.

Now movies and tv shows, that might lead to some issues, depending on the resolution. Otherwise if it's just standard definition content I dont think it would be too bad, maybe if you were using a FW 400 daisy chained with several other FW peripherals you would run into some problems.

I agree with what everyone else has said, the Mac Pro is more or less for video/3D modeling applications at this point.

If your getting the iMac, get Applecare for sure. I'd upgrade the RAM to 4GB for CS3. Personally, I would also get the 512MB graphics card upgrade too. I can't remember if the iMac has a FW800 port, if it did that would rule. The one thing about the iMac that sucks is the glossy display. I don't think you can choose a matte display nowadays.

@ Legoomba... I actually run a 1TB external HDD through USB to my MacBook Pro. I can play 720p video files in VLC, which then is displayed full screen on a second display to 2560x1600, all the while having my bit torrent client running to it (downloading and seeding). Never had a problem.

I can view HD content from an external drive via USB with no hiccups or other response time problems at all.

That's why i said might

I didnt figure that even video would be a problem, but it would be closer to being a problem than music would. I myself have run 1080p video off of firewire drives in the past and had no problem. Bandwidth is an issue with external drives and firewire/usb both sit on the southbridge with a bunch of other stuff. If one were to do multiple high bandwidth operations at the same time it COULD lead to some performance issues. Bit torrent is incredibly slow speed wise compared to firewire, so i wouldnt expect any slowdown there. But I have seen issues when copying an HD movie to another external drive, while a different drive is playing an HD movie at the same time.

Either way, i'd still expect this to be a minimal problem if ever with an iMac. It's more than capable of handling these sorts of tasks.

On a different note entirely, I wish they would improve the Mac Mini... That 64MB graphics card and Max 2GB of RAM leaves a lot to be desired. It's a shame because I can think of some cool applications with it, but the specs are just too low.

One thing to remember is that it's pretty easy to upgrade the disk drive in an iMac to a larger one when you decide down the like that you really need that 2 TB drive.

I think the reasons to get a Mac Pro, currently, are

1) you need more cores -- doing heavy-duty computing tasks or development (compilation flies on an 8-core machine!)

or

2) you want two monitors

However, the latest MacBooks have eliminated Firewire, which kind of sucks, so that might also happen with the iMacs