[LiLCurry04]

Hello,
I was just wondering if anyone has used the mac mini and tried to run Motion on it? I am thinking about buying one but id really like to run Motion. If anyone has please give me some feedback. And if you prehaps have any video capture software to capture the screen while using it that would be greatly appreciated.

[MichiganRich]

I think that Motion will run like lightning on a single processor G4 with a notebook hard drive and 167mhz system bus with 32 megs of video memory. I'm sure that when Apple says a 'Pro Application' like Motion is optimized for the dual G5, they also mean the mini.

BWAAAA-HAAAAA-HAAAAA are you guys INSANE?????

[gatep5]

Can we grow up a little here? The orginal poster asked a legitimate question but instead of an answer that was helpful he got your back-talk. The good thing about the Mac community is that the people are respectful and helpful to other people and their questions. Try to show a little class next time or don't post a reply at all. We want to gain more people into the mac community, not drive them away if they think the only support they are going to get is sarcasm.

[MichiganRich]

Well gatep5, just so you know, I'll post what I feel like, when I feel like it, within the guidelines of this forum. As for 'growing up', or only using whatever words or tone you consider proper in your little world, you can shove it. You're not the prime minister of behavior or taste.

If the original poster had done even the most cursory investigation on the Apple site he would have seen that the recommended system to run an application as demanding as Motion is a dual 2 G5 with 2GB or more of RAM and a Radeon 9800XT. This bears no resemblance at all to a Mac mini.

[mikerally]

Hi there,

Motion requires a G4 or G5 based Mac with one of the following graphics cards:

nVidia GeForce 6800 Ultra DDL,
nVidia GeForce 6800 GT DDL,
nVidia GeForce FX 5200 Ultra (or nVidia GeForce Go5200 on a laptop),

ATI Radeon X800
ATI Radeon 9800 XT,
ATI Radeon 9800 Pro,
ATI Radeon 9700 Pro (or ATI Mobility Radeon 9700 on a laptop),
ATI Radeon 9600 XT (or ATI Mobility Radeon 9600 on a laptop),

(quick edit: all these cards ship with a minimum of 64MB VRAM on any Mac)

Currently shipping Macs that are eligable candidates to run motion:-

- Any PowerMac G5
- All new Aluminum Powerbook G4s that shipped after September 2003 (sorry this excludes the original 12inch and 17inch Powerbook G4s that shipped from January to September 2003 and any Titanium Powerbook G4)
- Any iMac G5

Currenlty shipping Macs that can *never* run motion (cannot even be upgraded to run motion):-

- Any iBook G4
- Any eMac
- Any Mac mini <--- take note

(quick edit: these Macs don't support Motion because they have an ATI Radeon 9200 (or Mobility 9200) with 32MB of VRAM. Apple should condsider fixing this by putting in something ever so slightly more powerful and doubling the VRAM on these machines, just to boost Core Image/Video in Tiger if more than anything).

The cheapest brand new Mac you can buy just to try out Motion is the iMac G5 at $1299.

Macs that are no longer made that can run motion (or be upgraded to run motion):-

- Any PowerMac G4 with AGP graphics
- Select models of the iMac G4, namely the 17 and 20 inch models introduced in fall of 2004.

You may want to try your luck at buying a used PowerMac G4 (with AGP slot) and upgrading it with a supported graphics card, it could work out cheaper than a brand new iMac G5 (or maybe buy a used PowerMac G5 1.6Ghz model).

Definately lean towards the G5, Apple's demonstrators say Motion is really designed around that processor more than anything, and that's what you should be targeting to really get a good experience with Motion.

[elvis2000]

Originally posted by mikerally:
Hi there,

Motion requires a G4 or G5 based Mac with one of the following graphics cards:

nVidia GeForce 6800 Ultra DDL,
nVidia GeForce 6800 GT DDL,
nVidia GeForce FX 5200 Ultra (or nVidia GeForce Go5200 on a laptop),

ATI Radeon X800
ATI Radeon 9800 XT,
ATI Radeon 9800 Pro,
ATI Radeon 9700 Pro (or ATI Mobility Radeon 9700 on a laptop),
ATI Radeon 9600 XT (or ATI Mobility Radeon 9600 on a laptop),

Are you adding these "or" statements yourself? There is a gulf of difference between, for example, the GeForce FX 5200 Ultra and the GeForce Go5200. As well, the Radeon 9600XT and 9600 Mobile are entirely different GPUs. Don't be fooled by the numbering schemes. For example, the 5200go is a weaker GPU than the Radeon 9200 in the Mini. Neither are likely to run Motion well.

[mikerally]

elvis 2000 wrote:
Are you adding these "or" statements yourself? There is a gulf of difference between, for example, the GeForce FX 5200 Ultra and the GeForce Go5200. As well, the Radeon 9600XT and 9600 Mobile are entirely different GPUs. Don't be fooled by the numbering schemes. For example, the 5200go is a weaker GPU than the Radeon 9200 in the Mini. Neither are likely to run Motion well.

I'm very well aware of the fact that they are entirely different GPUs. My statements were merely to point out what their laptop equilvilent was (e.g. what to check against if you had a Powerbook G4) and not to compare their power.

Regardless of how powerful those GPUs are, those are the GPUs listed on Apple's website as supported by motion:
http://www.apple.com/motion/specs.html

And this guy is not planning to become a Pro in Motion just yet, he looks like he was interested in the Mac platform because of it, and maybe just wanted to play around with it (granted this is speculation on my part).

But I may aswell inevitably point out (just like others will have before this post, and after too I imagine) that to get the full benefits of Motion you are going to want to run it on a Dual Processor PowerMac G5 with a significantly more powerful GPU with plenty of VRAM, e.g. a Radeon 9800, Geforce 6800, or a Radeon X800.

But as much as this is going to upset people by me mentioning it, I know many people who have been drawn to the Mac because of particular pieces of software that they were attracted to and made them curious about the platform as a whole.

E.g. I know people who have bought an old G3 and put on a pirated copy (yes pirated!) of Final Cut Pro just to see if they like the way it all worked - only later to be convinced to buy a much more powerful Mac and a legit copy of Final Cut Pro.

[ChrisB]

Even if you could run Motion on a G4, the experience would not be nearly as pleasant as if you used G5. If you want to run Motion, sincerely get a G5.

[gatep5]

Well gatep5, just so you know, I'll post what I feel like, when I feel like it, within the guidelines of this forum. As for 'growing up', or only using whatever words or tone you consider proper in your little world, you can shove it. You're not the prime minister of behavior or taste.

I can see that you just don't get it...

[turtle777]

Wow, nice n00b fights here

-t

[Goldfinger]

Originally posted by turtle777:
Wow, nice n00b fights here

-t

I was thinking the same

[gatep5]

Hehe

[historylme]

Originally posted by Goldfinger:
I was thinking the same

Yeah it made me laugh.

[tooki]

On my 1.25GHz PowerBook, which has a Radeon Mobility 9600 w/64MB of RAM, Motion can barely render in real-time. Even if the mini's graphics card had all the functions it needed, it would be basically unusable.

Motion really, really needs a fast GPU, so it really wants a Power Mac with a high-end card.

tooki

[andreas_g4]

Originally posted by MichiganRich:
Well gatep5, just so you know, I'll post what I feel like, when I feel like it, within the guidelines of this forum. As for 'growing up', or only using whatever words or tone you consider proper in your little world, you can shove it. You're not the prime minister of behavior or taste.

If the original poster had done even the most cursory investigation on the Apple site he would have seen that the recommended system to run an application as demanding as Motion is a dual 2 G5 with 2GB or more of RAM and a Radeon 9800XT. This bears no resemblance at all to a Mac mini.

We are all so happy that you know the forum's guidelines�