Which Mac for Processing M9 files?

[philipotto]

Advertisement (gone after registration)

I recently got a 27" i5 iMac to replace my dual 2.5ghz G5 whose logic board failed. If you want another tower I would wait for updates as the current Mac Pro is due for a refresh:

Mac Buyer's Guide: Know When to Buy Your Mac, iPod or iPhone

[Advertisement]

The Leica Q3 is available for pre-order at B&H Photo Video and Adorama

[Elmo]

It's a question of budget.

 

The more horsepower [CPU speed] and memory the faster you will be able to process.

 

Disk space is a function of how many photos you need to store.

 

I just got a G_SAFE 1TB raid 1 dual disk [basically auto backup] that I devote to my LR catalog and pics. I keep catalog backups on my iMac 21 [vintage 2006-7]

 

I could wish for a more current mac with it's cpu speed and better monitor. All for the price of a single Leica M9 lens

[!Nomad64]

I currently have a relatively ancient but capable PowerMac G5, with the most basic, original 1.6gHz single processor together with an NEC 2690 LCD monitor. My G5 has 2.5GB of RAM.

 

It's all good with one exception--the processing speed of the G5 on files from the M9. Yesterday, I brought 101-18MB files into Adobe Lightroom v1.4 (I haven't downloaded 2.6 yet). My G5 uses Motorola processors, not the current Intel processors. Bottom line--to upload and do simple processing of the 101 M9 shots took at least 45 minutes. With my M8, it would have been half as long, of course. I was downloading files from the Sandisk Extreme III 8GB disk via a card reader plugged into a USB 2.0 port.

 

Having just expended a boat load of money on the M9, what would be a good Mac-based solution to explore--new, refurbished, or used are all options in my mind? I'd consider a laptop as long as I can plug my 26" NEC monitor and external hard drives into it.

 

Any thoughts on this?

 

Slightly OT as it drops the Mac upgrade, but why not a DIY PC with Linux inside and a handful of non-free commercial softwares (Lightzone, Rawtherapee)?

A bit more of a hassle, but way more things to learn and final satisfaction.

Plus, it's cheaper and loosely Mac relevant being a "Think different" solution :-)

 

Cheers,

Bruno

[nryn]

You'll definitely want to move to an Intel processor. That will make a world of difference. I agree with others that the mini does not have the graphics processing power necessary to work with RAW files efficiently.

 

I'm blessed with a full stable of Macs: a Mac Pro, a MacBook Pro (latest, loaded), and a Mini. My next upgrade will be to a 27" iMac. I'm a designer by trade and though the Mac Pro is very nice, it's hard to justify the space, noise, and cost against the iMac (particularly because slot expansion has become less and less important through the years).

 

I do love that screen on the iMac.

[sanyasi]

I just took a look at my iMac purchased earlier this year. It has 4 gigabytes of RAM and a 3.06 GHZ Intel Core 2 Duo processor. I find it more than adequate to run Lightroom 2. I am not doing professional work, but I can work on 300 photos in a collection without being annoyed by "slow" processing. I also have experimented with HDR and find using Photometrix (?) software, it takes less than a minute to process three photos into a finished one. I recognize that adding 12 GB more of RAM would really speed things up, but I'd rather put the money elsewhere given my needs. One thing I would be curious about--I don't do live/tethered capture. I imagine more RAM might make a big difference there.

 

 

 

Jack Siegel

[KM-25]

Just an FYI, Lightroom 3 Beta and the upcoming CS5 suite are 64 bit, something to consider as you move forward into new hardware and look at ram specs.

 

At home I use a MacPro quad with 16GB of ram, twin Velociraptors and two 1TB storage disks. On the road I use a 13" MacBook Pro with 8 GB of ram, an Intel XM-25 160 GB SSD boot drive and a 500 GB 7,200 storage drive in the optical bay. When not using the storage drive, I unmount it and get a solid 6-7 hours of battery life.

[photolandscape]

Advertisement (gone after registration)

Wow everybody, this is great. Thanks for all the ideas and options. Since I have a great monitor and money is tight, I might even try a Mac Mini w/4GB of RAM. It's relatively inexpensive and theoretically could run about 3.5X faster than my current machine. I appreciate the input.

 

SP

[Bo_Lorentzen]

The Mac mini is great value.!

[sanyasi]

Wow everybody, this is great. Thanks for all the ideas and options. Since I have a great monitor and money is tight, I might even try a Mac Mini w/4GB of RAM. It's relatively inexpensive and theoretically could run about 3.5X faster than my current machine. I appreciate the input.

 

SP

 

I am not suggesting that you do this, but if you take a serious look at the mac mini, you might take a look at the one that comes with server software--$999. I am not sure what the advantages are, but I read that this is considered a great bargain when compared to comparable Windows servers. I don't think the server software makes a difference unless you are sharing software over a network or running your own web site, but there may be some advantage. One disadvantage may be hardware. If I recall, the server doesn't come with the super drive or whatever they call it. Do your research.

 

Jack Siegel

[Bo_Lorentzen]

Jack,

 

I have the mini-server - it have the server os installed, and it have a additional HDD in place of the CD drive, 1TB out the door of storage. I use timemachine to backup the office server.

[brill64]

"A good guide to MacPerformance by Lloyd Chambers who puts in a silly amount of time in researching and measuring these issues so we don't have to."

 

this is a very informative and useful site, thanks for posting!

[wattsy]

The MacBookPro is a fine machine....... However, to convert a M9 16 bits DNG file with Capture One, it takes around 15 sec vs 4 sec on the MacPro.

 

Strange. I also use a unibody MacBook Pro and a 16bit DNG conversion (to TIFF) in C1 takes around 6 seconds.

[haroldp]

How you configure a machine is as important to performance as the components.

 

I am using an 8 core macpro (late 2008) w/ 12GB RAM.

 

I recently converted the boot drive (for OS paging), and a partition on 2 other drives (for PS and Capture scratch) to raid 0 arrays (parallel striped read/writes).

 

Most imaging processes now run about 1/2 of the prior times.

 

Since Raid 0 is not robust, you would need fastidious back ups.

 

Time machine also helps.

 

A prior model macpro with it's 4 internal sata drive bays may be a cost effective alternative.

 

regards ... harold

[magd0328]

I think for most photo editing tasks any computer in their current range would be adequate. I am using a late-2008 2.5Ghz MacBook Pro 15" with 4Gb of RAM. I can happily edit layered, 16 bit colour images from my scanner which weigh in at several hundred Mb.

 

Using the latest version of Photoshop is a big advantage, as it can use the dedicated graphics processors in most modern computers. That is what makes the difference.

[previlo]

Jumping in here, right now I am a heavy Win-user and now thinking about to change for imaging processing etc. towards Mac.

I have a Mac Mini here (older Intel model with 2Ghz Core 2 Duo CPU, 2GB of RAM and the Intel GMA 950), and it is not so bad as I would have expected.

Right now I am trying to get use to Adobe Lightroom 3.0 Beta and again it is not so slow as I might have thought of.

However I am now seriously thinking to get a MacBook Pro 13" 2.26Ghz model, so that I can use it offroad or anywhere in our house, for all kinds of stuff (Email, Office, Web, and of course Photoshop and Co.).

Is there any website which demonstrates the performance differnces between this 2 Macs?

I was thinking about to get the MacBook Pro with 4GB or 8GB of RAM, or would be 8GB "over the top" for this small one?

Or should I stick with 4GB of RAM, but instead pick the 2.53Ghz and not the 2.26Ghz?

What is your advice/ experiences about that?

 

Thanks a lot in advance!

Oliver

[ericperlberg]

Jumping in here, right now I am a heavy Win-user and now thinking about to change for imaging processing etc. towards Mac.

I have a Mac Mini here (older Intel model with 2Ghz Core 2 Duo CPU, 2GB of RAM and the Intel GMA 950), and it is not so bad as I would have expected.

Right now I am trying to get use to Adobe Lightroom 3.0 Beta and again it is not so slow as I might have thought of.

However I am now seriously thinking to get a MacBook Pro 13" 2.26Ghz model, so that I can use it offroad or anywhere in our house, for all kinds of stuff (Email, Office, Web, and of course Photoshop and Co.).

Is there any website which demonstrates the performance differnces between this 2 Macs?

I was thinking about to get the MacBook Pro with 4GB or 8GB of RAM, or would be 8GB "over the top" for this small one?

Or should I stick with 4GB of RAM, but instead pick the 2.53Ghz and not the 2.26Ghz?

What is your advice/ experiences about that?

 

Thanks a lot in advance!

Oliver

 

Oliver... realise that different people have different expectations about "speed" and "expectations". Since you said that you don't find your older mac mini too slow I'll take that as a baseline. The MacBook Pro 13" is a very nice computer for portable work. Better laptop screens (like on the MacBook Pro 13) don't have the colour gamut or tonal range of better desktop monitors and they show more banding. This isn't a criticism of this specific computer which has a better than "typical" screen but a criticism of laptops in general. However, if you were unsatisfied (or maybe to phrase it more positively... if you wanted even better fidelity between what you see on your screen and what you print) you can always later add either Apple's latest 24" monitor or an even higher quality monitor for desktop use. The graphics card will support even a large monitor.

 

The extra RAM will definitely speed up the machine if you work with either large files in Photoshop or many simultaneous files in photoshop or many applications open at the same time. But you can usually buy the RAM much cheaper from Kingston or Crucial or OWC and install it yourself.

a video showing the proceedure.

 

You can also either buy one of the larger hard drives or buy the smallest and buy a faster larger hard drive from someone like OWC (which again are relatively easy to replace... see

)

 

Performance of any computer is a combination of many components. How fast the computer boots up is a function of the speed of the hard drive. SSD hard drives are relatively expensive but boot much quicker than normal laptop hard drives. Apple offers both with a big price premium. Again, you can get it cheaper elsewhere and replace the drive yourself. Small hard drives fill up faster (duh) and the more full a hard drive is, the slower it is. So if you want a good responsive hard drive, buy a bigger one.

 

Actual processing in software like Lightroom is a function of the processor speed, the graphics card to some extent and RAM. Processor speed and RAM can be compared by using a software test called Geekbench. Here's a list of geekbench scores for all macs. You can compare your mini to your possible laptop. Remember this is a general score and rule of thumb. Games for example and anything 3d require very fast graphics cards in addition to fast processors. While the faster processor is nice to have, apple include only 4 gig of ram and to bump that up to 8 gig you'd have to replace the entire 4 gig of ram which is a shame as part of the extra cost of the computer with the faster processor is the more memory. But that's the way Apple has set it up.

 

The macbook 13 is a very nice computer though and will perform well as you describe your idea though pound for pound and dollar for dollar desktops like the iMac are a lot cheaper.

 

My 2 cents. Others will likely have a different perspective.

 

Eric

[previlo]

Thanks Eric, that is helpful summary!

As you pointed out, I should have mentioned, that I will use a external Eizo LCD Monitor (already in use) for imaging processing work, so that is addressed.

[ericperlberg]

Thanks Eric, that is helpful summary!

As you pointed out, I should have mentioned, that I will use a external Eizo LCD Monitor (already in use) for imaging processing work, so that is addressed.

 

I just checked the MacRumours site, they're suggesting that a MacBook Pro upgrade is imminent. Rumours of core i5 processor.

[Advertisement]

Hallo,

Look here: Leica M

[previlo]

Well, if that will be true, I assume that would be the right device for me (honestly I was already looking on some of the i5 Win-Based Notebooks the other days, but again, would like to move over to the Mac OS for various reasons...so if i5 is coming to Macland, I think that would be great and give me enough horsepower to continue without to worry if a MacBook would be good enough...)

[ericperlberg]

FWIW a few days ago Intel sent an email to members its retail arm in several countries saying that the January prize for sales success would be a core i5 MacBook Pro which as you know doesn't officially exist. Somehow the rumour sites got hold of the email and it quickly spread across the macosphere. Intel went into public denial mode as Apple are notorious for being rather mean spirited to partners who leak info about upcoming product releases.