[weed_]

Just upgraded from my 1 GHz 15" Tibook (on which I'm typing right now) to a new Power Mac G5. While reading the posts in this forum I came to a very good decision on what I ordered and what not. I'd like to share my information sources and want to give a first feedback on how the machine/screen feels.

What I got last Thursday:
Dual 2.5GHz PowerPC G5
1536MB DDR400 SDRAM (PC3200) - 2x256MB + 2x512MB
74 GB Serial ATA Western Digital Raptor (System + Apps)
160GB Serial ATA (original)
DVD/CD-RW Combo (downgrade, saved 100 EUR)
ATI Radeon 9600 XT 128MB, ADC/DVI
Modem downgrade (saved 30 EUR)
AirPort Extreme Card (as Option)

1 Apple Cinema HD Display 23" 1900x1280

1 Apple Care Protection Plan (gut a 100 EUR rebate :-)

Why the largest machine? It's even 25% over a dual 2GHZ referring to this thread. So I decided to downgrade all other features (saved 130 EUR) and get less RAM than I'd like to.

Because of my wish for a good starup disk performance I got a 74 GB Raptor from a third party dealer (and the 2x512 MB RAM). These sources did help me to do so:

When I started this review, I thought the Raptor wouldn’t be my cup of
tea. I like my disks as big as they come, and 74 GB of which 69 remain
after initialisation, is not big with today’s 250 Gigabyters offered
everywhere in mind. Nevertheless, the Raptor has proven to be so much
faster that I have no problems with its somewhat limited size factor. (it-enquirer.com,
http://www.macgurus.com )

I fully agree with the conclusio of arstechnica.

My first impression after 6 days of usage and working: very stable (had one kernel panic while my w2k notebook tried to acces the Mac via network ;-) very very fast (the first time I feel OS X has the power it likes) and very silent. But frontmost (I remeber the poll recently) it was a brillant decision to get the 23" Cinema Display -- it's unbelievable bright and much nicer than the two display setup I had before.

There's only one or two questions left: If I decide to get a second display for palettes etc., which size would you choose? And, what about the brackets offered for the G5 tower, mentioned here and here? Is this a stable option to add up to three 3,5" drives in the desktop?

Thanks for all your patience and maybe some answers.

[TiDual]

I have a rev Dual 2.0 with the 23" display, and am currently installing the 74GB Raptor as well ... this will then move to my dual 2.5 which should arrive in the next 1-2 weeks :-)

As for a 2nd display, I used a Formac for a while (1600x1200 20") but got rid of it ... frankly, I found two displays was giving me a headache. The most important thing, though is to make sure that the 2nd display has the same (1200) vertical resolution. It just makes moving windows + cursors around work more smoothly.

If you can't afford a second 23" Apple CD, look at the Dells: price performance on there 20" monitors (1600x1200) look hard to beat, and people say they're good. Nice thin bezel too :-)

Dunno about the drive brackets ... but our experience with the external LaCie FW800 drives is pretty positive.

[bossep]

Originally posted by TiDual:
I have a rev Dual 2.0 with the 23" display, and am currently installing the 74GB Raptor as well ... this will then move to my dual 2.5 which should arrive in the next 1-2 weeks :-)

As for a 2nd display, I used a Formac for a while (1600x1200 20") but got rid of it ... frankly, I found two displays was giving me a headache. The most important thing, though is to make sure that the 2nd display has the same (1200) vertical resolution. It just makes moving windows + cursors around work more smoothly.

If you can't afford a second 23" Apple CD, look at the Dells: price performance on there 20" monitors (1600x1200) look hard to beat, and people say they're good. Nice thin bezel too :-)

Dunno about the drive brackets ... but our experience with the external LaCie FW800 drives is pretty positive.

Congrat to your G5's!
My reply is about the hdd. I have currently a 80GB WD with 2MB cache. I have been looking at Seagate Barracuda 700.7 with 8MB cache. I believe the Seagate to be quicker and produce less noice. Any comments?

[Cadaver]

I have a Raptor, and while it is indeed a fast drive, I've found that the new 7200 RPM Maxtor 300GB (16MB cache) w/ NCQ is just as fast in normal use (boots just as fast, and small file writes are actually faster). Plus, 300GB > 74GB

The Maxtor is now my OS/Apps drive, and the Raptor is my scratch drive now.

[TiDual]

Originally posted by Cadaver:
I have a Raptor, and while it is indeed a fast drive, I've found that the new 7200 RPM Maxtor 300GB (16MB cache) w/ NCQ is just as fast in normal use (boots just as fast, and small file writes are actually faster). Plus, 300GB > 74GB

The Maxtor is now my OS/Apps drive, and the Raptor is my scratch drive now.

Interesting and impressive. Having installed the Raptor, my feeling was that is was the best 150 Euro I'd spent on upgrading (apart from getting up to 2GB Ram) ... reviews of the Maxtor have been mixed, but good to hear! The reputed reliability of the Raptor was also important for me (my experience with Maxtor has been less favourable, but the MaxLine III's are supposed to be pretty good).

But more generally, people should really consider upgrading the HD (to these faster models), before worrying about other upgrades. Really an amazing improvement in the response of the system.

As for the 7200.7 Barracuda, well, I've still got the 160GB as the second drive (was primary). Seems like a good drive, but the Raptor really is really so much better.

[weed_]

Thanks for all your answers and info! I'm still very happy with my decision. I like the "small" Raptor 69 GB because it's enough space for all that needs the power (os, important apps, scratch, working doc's) and it's easy to backup using CCC on an external 80 GB disk.

Today, I doubt that I need a second display -- I was working with the 1280x854 of the Tibook plus 1280x960 on a 17" Dell CRT, which was quite blurry at such a high resolution -- but it was good enough for palettes and stuff.

My main problem is myself ;-) I'm not used to profit of Exposé which could help much at a 23" display. Trying to teach me to leave my "old ways" ;-)

[osxisfun]

I'd just like to say i added a 200 gig SATA drive to my dual 2 g5 and it was just sinfully easy...