Dual Screen Mac options

[robodude666]

Hey guys,

I have a slight problem that I am having trouble resolving by myself. When I think I got it I end up doubting myself afterwards.

Back in late February I bought a MacBook. Why? No idea, to be honest. It was white, pretty, and I wanted a notebook for college use. Since then I started to love Mac OS X. A few months later, a friend of mine/classmate gave me a PowerMac G5 Dual 2.0GHz system for free and I've been using it for my main desktop since then. I absolutely love it except for two things. The PowerMac G5 doesn't support a secondary monitor without a $99 ADC to DVI adapter and it cannot virtualize windows.

As a web developer I am required to use Windows for Internet Explorer to make sure the website renders properly so I've been finding myself in Windows majority of the time over the last three weeks while working on websites for clients.

So, I've been thinking lately of getting a Mac desktop to use for my website development work. I need one that supports dual displays (they make life far easier for what I do). I also want a new Intel one so I can run VMWare Fusion to access Windows, as well as the iPhone SDK. I am a co-owner of a hardware review website so I am required to have a somewhat up-to-date PC around for reviewing products so I can’t really phase PCs out of my life even if I wanted to.

I have a few options I am considering for my work Apple:

1) Mac Mini - Although the Mac Mini does not support dual monitors, you can get a USB to DVI adapter which will give secondary monitor support. Though the Mac Minis are very cheap for an Apple, they aren't very cost effective. They haven't been revised for a while now and are running rather slow/old hardware so they are actually pretty expensive for what you get. In addition, the onboard video card is rather poor and won't really allow me to play games while in boot camp which might not be a problem as I'll have a good PC anyway.

2) iMac - An iMac has a built in large monitor and a mini-DVI port for a secondary display which is perfect. The 24" model also has an 8800GS which is slightly slower than my HD 3870 so FPS loss wouldn't be too great. The only real downside with the iMac for me is it is almost 100% not upgradable. All you can upgrade is to 4GB of ram and everything else isn't worth the effort to upgrade.

3) Mac Pro - Probably the most ideal solution as it’s pretty much fully upgradable, has an extremely long life span, and supports dual DVI monitors out of the box. The only down side is the $3,000 price tag making it way out of my budget.

There are of course these, less preferable, options:

1) ADC to DVI - I could get the $99 ADC to DVI adapter for my PowerMac G5 and enjoy dual screen glory, but it really isn't a path I'd like to go in. Although it will solve the dual screen problem, it won't solve the switching between to machines every two seconds problem. It is simply easier to stay in Vista and develop from there and deal with the slowness and crashing than to switch between the PowerMac and PC every few seconds.

2) MacBook - I could use my MacBook but I'm not too sure about it. The MacBook natively supports a secondary monitor via mini-DVI which is great; except I don't find it very comfortable to use a laptop for extended periods of time (I am on a computer 10-16hr/day). I could also run a monitor off of mini-DVI and one off of USB to DVI. Then attach a USB mouse/keyboard and use the MacBook in clamshell mode.

3) MacBook Pro - Similarly to the above, I could sell my MacBook (most likely would give to my sister who is currently using an extremely old/slow dell laptop) and get a MacBook Pro 15". It really wouldn't offer anything more over the MacBook except more ports, express card (maybe one day that Express Card external GPU might be released!) and a native DVI port. It would also provide a little more power but otherwise it would be identical to the MacBook option.


The last few weeks I've been thinking of getting the iMac 24" (low-end w/ 8800GS + 500GB HDD and OWC 4GB ram) because it is in the middle of the Mac Mini and Mac Pro. All Macs under the Mac Pro are limiting in upgrades really, but the iMac has fair specs. The 2.8GHz C2D, 4GB ram, 8800GS and 500GB HDD would be enough for me. I would be able to do my work on the machine and switch to Boot camp if I want to play a game or two if I wanted to take a break, or if I needed to do work in windows specifically. I would also be able to run VMWare to access IE7 and Virtual PC for IE6.

Here is where I started to doubt myself. The iMac with all of the upgrades I want would run in at around $2,000 with tax which is a tad expensive I think. A Mac Mini is far cheaper, even though it doesn't have good specs. I also haven't seen many people with a dual display iMac setup. Most people either have a Mac Pro or a MacBook Pro which worries me a little bit.

So I came to you guys for your opinion. What do you think I should do, or what would you do?

Cheers,
-robodude666

 

[valve1138]

The Matrox DualHead and TripleHead 2go dealies might be a good option as well.

 

[robodude666]

Hey valve1138,

Thanks for the reply! I thought about getting the digital edition. Price aside, they are great gadgets but they make the computer think there is one mega wide display attached which means the entire apple desktop, dock, and windows when maximized will be split between the two monitors. The 1-2" of space between both monitors will make reading and doing things really annoying. If Matrox has a way of using a dualhead2go as two separate monitors then please let me know. I never read anything about it being able to though.

-robodude666

 

[blankwire]

If you can afford it, what about a refurbished / outdated Mac Pro? You'll get more than enough power, and you can even try to sell your extra machines.

 

[robodude666]

If you can afford it, what about a refurbished / outdated Mac Pro? You'll get more than enough power, and you can even try to sell your extra machines.

Only reason I could afford the $2k iMac is because it comes with a very nice 24" LCD. $2k for a system by itself is a little much I think. I can get a brand new current Mac Pro for $2,600 with the $200 educational discount. I also don't really have any extra machines. The PowerMac G5 I have now I will give back to my friend when I get my own desktop. Since he gave it to me for free, I have no right to sell it really. My PC I won't be able to sell because I need it for hardware review. I am trying to sell my old P4 laptop, but no one seems to be interested in it.

Thanks for the tip though. I'll keep a refurbished Mac Pro in mind. Once in a while you can find a 2.66 Mac Pro w/ 20 or 23" Cinema for $2k on craigslist.

Out of the options I have listed in my first post which do you think is best?

Cheers,
-robodude666

 

[Cyant]

Well you could always buy a MacPro with only 1 of the 2 Quad core CPU installed and save 500$ right there. Making it a Quad Core Mac Pro instead of an Octo Core.

Total 2299$ for the basic 2.8Ghz machine minus 1 CPU.

A lot of people would not use the full potential of the Mac Pro 8 Cores, so unless you are into heavy HD video editing or 3d rendering id say that's another alternative for you. Oh and don't buy RAM from Apple, buy it from newegg / NCIX or another online store.

 

[robodude666]

Well you could always buy a MacPro with only 1 of the 2 Quad core CPU installed and save 500$ right there. Making it a Quad Core Mac Pro instead of an Octo Core.

Total 2299$ for the basic 2.8Ghz machine minus 1 CPU.

A lot of people would not use the full potential of the Mac Pro 8 Cores, so unless you are into heavy HD video editing or 3d rendering id say that's another alternative for you. Oh and don't buy RAM from Apple, buy it from newegg / NCIX or another online store.

Brilliant!

A Mac Prro with single 2.8GHz quad-core and 8800GT is about $2290 after educational discount. Something to think about.

Oh, I know not to buy HDDs/RAM from apple. Its too bloody expensive. I was planning on using Other World Computing (macsales.com) or Fast Mac (fastmac.com) for my mac part needs. Or should I spend some extra money and get branded ram from newegg?

One other thing, if I buy a 2.8GHz single quad-core Mac Pro would I be able to buy a second processor later, or do they use a different motherboard for the single-core ones?

-robodude666

 

[Cyant]

I am prety sure it's the same motherboard with only one CPU socket filled. Maybe someone can confirm.

You can buy another CPU later but be aware the current Mac Pro's use socket LGA771 Intel CPU's (Xeon) opposed to the more common LGA 775 Core 2 Duo/Quad.

Right now the 2.8Ghz Xeon E5440 are 700$ and up at most places. And be aware that the Intel stock heatsink MIGHT not fit in a Mac Pro. You can probably order the heatsink alone at an Apple Service Center but I have no idea of the cost of that. Probably 100$+

 

[revo2001]

I'm a graphic and web designer and I love my 24" iMac. It's the best computer I've ever had and today I received my new gift to myself: A Samsung 24" monitor. So now I am packing 48" of workspace and I'm having trouble not getting a boner.

Me personally, I love taking advantage of recertified/refurbished deals and if I were you this looks like one hell of a deal. You could grab another 24" monitor like me and be rocking.

I grabbed the Samsung I just bought from ecost.com for $300. It's recertified but as I said, I love taking advantage of those deals. To me it just means the product was worked on and verified to work by an actual human or two rather than a machine. That's an actual bonus to me.

Personally I don't see the need for a Mac Pro, it's more than I really need. I'd think that'd be the same for any web or graphic designer (for the most part). I'd definitely throw the Mac Mini option out the window. Those things are pretty much strictly for leisure/non-business applications.

 

[robodude666]

I'm a graphic and web designer and I love my 24" iMac. It's the best computer I've ever had and today I received my new gift to myself: A Samsung 24" monitor. So now I am packing 48" of workspace and I'm having trouble not getting a boner.

Me personally, I love taking advantage of recertified/refurbished deals and if I were you this looks like one hell of a deal. You could grab another 24" monitor like me and be rocking.

I grabbed the Samsung I just bought from ecost.com for $300. It's recertified but as I said, I love taking advantage of those deals. To me it just means the product was worked on and verified to work by an actual human or two rather than a machine. That's an actual bonus to me.

Personally I don't see the need for a Mac Pro, it's more than I really need. I'd think that'd be the same for any web or graphic designer (for the most part). I'd definitely throw the Mac Mini option out the window. Those things are pretty much strictly for leisure/non-business applications.

Hey revo2001,

I love you. Thanks for the reply. Yea, an hour after looking at the Mac Pro with single processor I also threw it out as an option. The iMac provides identical specs with less cache + 24" IPS panel for a lower price.

Could you please take some (high-resolution) photos of your setup? I am concerned that an iMac 24" + a 24" (Dell 2408WFP) secondary might be simply too large. I have a fairly large desk (65 x 30 x 30") but I also plan on having some other stuff on it.

Cheers,
-robodude666

 

[Cyant]

Well I would not say identical, it's a dual core but yeah the iMac's are great if you don't need the extra cores or insane amount of ram/expansion.

 

[robodude666]

Well I would not say identical, it's a dual core but yeah the iMac's are great if you don't need the extra cores or insane amount of ram/expansion.

True, I did forget for a second that the Mac Pro is a quad-core. Expandability is always nice. I can't fit onto a single HDD, but I'll be getting an external 1TB which will solve my storage problems (Currently using 2x 500GB and have 200 left on my PC). The Mac Pro has more expansion slots, but I don't need fiber or fancy A/V equipment to plug in.

More ram is important, but the iMac supports 4GB of ram. 2GB for Mac OS X and 2GB for VMWare Fusion. I've been using my PowerMac G5 with 1GB ram with minimal lag. And two extra cores would be great, but on an Intel Core 2 Duo + Mac you won't really need that much extra power. I don't do video editing so I won't need extra power for encoding files.

I'll still be keeping it in mind for the future though. I will want a Mac Pro some day.

-robodude666

 

[revo2001]

One sec.. I'll take a photo and edit this post.

Here ya go:

I wasn't in the mood to calibrate my camera correctly to get what was actually on the screen but as you can see, my desk is pretty small too.

I'm not worried about it though. When I move into my new place in a few months I'll be grabbing a better desk. Actually, if the wall wasn't there on the right, the iMac obviously wouldn't be hanging off to the left as much and it wouldn't look too bad.

Seriously though, the iMac is a great purchase as long as you grab the 24". I can't believe how good that deal I linked you to is.

Still not as good as the deal I got on mine thanks to a rich foolish friend... Intel C2D 2.4GHz, 4GB RAM, 320GB HD... $900. Virtually new in box. I wet my pants when he offered it to me... haha.

I'm sure we'd all like to have a Mac Pro... and if I'm ever close to making 6 figures and have some money to waste, I'll probably get one. But an iMac with a NAS for storage of a gigabit network or even a firewire external HD is straight up g-funk (old slang ftw).

BTW, as far as memory usage goes. Right now I have Adium, Entourage, Firefox, Illustrator, Photoshop, Dreamweaver, Cyberduck, Last.fm, iPhoto, and a few other small apps open. I still have a gig of RAM free.

What kind of web design do you do? Have a web site?

I'm currently working on http://www.myaquatica.com. It runs the SocialEngine platform. Very cool. I'd like it if it were cheaper but it works and the source code is commented all over the place which helps me since I'm still learning PHP.

 

[robodude666]

Hey!

One sec.. I'll take a photo and edit this post.

Here ya go:
[img here]
I wasn't in the mood to calibrate my camera correctly to get what was actually on the screen but as you can see, my desk is pretty small too.

You are awesome, thank you very much .

How wide is your desk? About 3ft I'd say? Looks pretty good. I was scared it would be a lot worse. Should give me enough room to hold a Receiver and a printer on my desk.

I'm not worried about it though. When I move into my new place in a few months I'll be grabbing a better desk. Actually, if the wall wasn't there on the right, the iMac obviously wouldn't be hanging off to the left as much and it wouldn't look too bad.

Make sure you check out the Bester and Bush line at Staples and the JONAS series from Ikea. $200 with the JONAS buys you an amazingly large beautiful desk with a filing drawer unit. If I didn't get my big ass desk + shelf + drawers from Staples a few years ago, I would of picked up the JONAS from Ikea.

Seriously though, the iMac is a great purchase as long as you grab the 24". I can't believe how good that deal I linked you to is.

Still not as good as the deal I got on mine thanks to a rich foolish friend... Intel C2D 2.4GHz, 4GB RAM, 320GB HD... $900. Virtually new in box. I wet my pants when he offered it to me... haha.

Wow, that is an amazing deal you got. Think you can get him to buy a new one and sell it to me on the le uber cheap?

The deal you linked me to is amazing but for $100 more I can get the cheapest 24" iMac brand new using my educational discounts. I'll probably spend $45 more to upgrade from 320GB to 500GB because it isn't much compared to ripping the iMac apart and upgrading myself.

I'm sure we'd all like to have a Mac Pro... and if I'm ever close to making 6 figures and have some money to waste, I'll probably get one. But an iMac with a NAS for storage of a gigabit network or even a firewire external HD is straight up g-funk (old slang ftw).

f'shizzle (new slang). I have been planning on getting a Synology NAS for a while now. Mostly for a small scale web server for testing. Its also of course good for storage. Sadly its not wireless which kind of sucks. I may pick up a 500GB Time Capsule, replace HDD with a 1TB, format to two partitions and use as external storage + time machine backup.

Yea.. I'd like to make the six figures, but oh well. A couple of clients is enough to buy a goodie toy or two though, so I can't complain. Especially since the amount of "labor" / "work" is no where near the amount of a "real job" but it still takes a lot of mental energy.

BTW, as far as memory usage goes. Right now I have Adium, Entourage, Firefox, Illustrator, Photoshop, Dreamweaver, Cyberduck, Last.fm, iPhoto, and a few other small apps open. I still have a gig of RAM free.

Thats not bad. On my PowerMac G5 I had Adium, Skype, Mail, FireFox, Safari, iTunes, Cyperduck, Text Mate, Twitterrific and some other stuff running. I was hovering around the 100-200MB free mark. If I had quicktime playing in FireFox then it was down to 11MB free.

What kind of web design do you do? Have a web site?

I'm currently working on http://www.myaquatica.com. It runs the SocialEngine platform. Very cool. I'd like it if it were cheaper but it works and the source code is commented all over the place which helps me since I'm still learning PHP.

Note how I said "web developer" ;P. I am more of a programmer than I am a designer. I can use photoshop and do basic stuff and tweak, but I am not very creative in terms of graphical design. I have a friend of mine do design work that I need.

My current website is pcflip.com. Its about 6 months old so I'm still working on it. I didn't do the design, so don't comment on it please. I know it sucks, but it was the best I can get done at the time. I'm working on getting a v2 design done which will be far better.

Pretty cool. I don't like to use pre-made stuff (except for bb systems and js libraries). Everything I make is 100% coded from scratch. I've been doing PHP for almost 3 years now but slowly moving everything over to Python because I find it a much nicer language.

Cheers,
-robodude666

 

[Serpico]

I have a 24" iMac that I use for Final Cut Studio. It shares an NEC 2490WUXi with my PC. When I'm not using my PC (all for gaming at this point) it gets used in dual screen mode on my iMac.

It works great (Final Cut Studio screams on it) and I didn't have to spend an arm and a leg like I would have with a Mac Pro (I don't need eight Xeon cores, Core 2 Duo will be just fine). Also note that the 24" iMac uses the same H-IPS panel that the NEC 2490WUXi does (IMO the best 24" LCD around), except that the NEC costs about $1100. The NEC looks slightly better (it had better for the price) but the 24" iMac is awfully close in quality.

Keep the LCD in mind when crunching the value of the 24" iMac. All that quality in an all-in-one is a great value. Highly highly recommended.

 

[robodude666]

I have a 24" iMac that I use for Final Cut Studio. It shares an NEC 2490WUXi with my PC for dual screen mode.

[img here]

It works great (Final Cut screams on it) and I didn't have to spend an arm and a leg like I would have with a Mac Pro (I don't need eight Xeon cores, Core 2 Duo will be just fine). Also note that the 24" iMac uses the same H-IPS panel that the NEC 2490WUXi does (IMO the best 24" LCD around), except that the NEC costs about $1100. The NEC looks slightly better (it had better for the price) but the 24" iMac is awfully close in quality.

Highly highly recommended.

Hey Serpico,

Thanks for the reply! Very nice picture, thank you very much for it. Seems like the iMac 24" is the best deal for me.

The Dell 2408WFP uses an PVA panel and goes for $600-700 depending on sale. It seems like an extremely popular monitor, especially in the mac world.

Now I need to figure out how to balance an iMac 24", Dell 2408, and audio system within my upcoming payments.

Cheers,
-robodude666

P.S. Why don't you name your consoles?
P.S.S. You get bonus points for two cool wallpapers and Klipsch speakers.

 

[revo2001]

Hey!
Note how I said "web developer" ;P. I am more of a programmer than I am a designer. I can use photoshop and do basic stuff and tweak, but I am not very creative in terms of graphical design. I have a friend of mine do design work that I need.

My current website is pcflip.com. Its about 6 months old so I'm still working on it. I didn't do the design, so don't comment on it please. I know it sucks, but it was the best I can get done at the time. I'm working on getting a v2 design done which will be far better.

Pretty cool. I don't like to use pre-made stuff (except for bb systems and js libraries). Everything I make is 100% coded from scratch. I've been doing PHP for almost 3 years now but slowly moving everything over to Python because I find it a much nicer language.

Cheers,
-robodude666

Haha, actually I forgot.. at the point of that post I thought I remembered reading designer.

You looking for any PHP work? I could use some help modifying the SocialEngine platform. I need a script for it to do what this site does: http://peoplescourtraw.com/

In short: upload a video, challenge another person to defend that video with another.

I'm definitely a designer that knows a little bit about development. I'm in over my head though with figuring out how to code this in PHP. Throw me a PM if you're interested.

Also, that Synology NAS.. which one would you get? I'd like to get a NAS myself. Right now I'm just sporting a external HD for Time Machine backups.

 

[robodude666]

Haha, actually I forgot.. at the point of that post I thought I remembered reading designer.

You looking for any PHP work? I could use some help modifying the SocialEngine platform. I need a script for it to do what this site does: http://peoplescourtraw.com/

In short: upload a video, challenge another person to defend that video with another.

I'm definitely a designer that knows a little bit about development. I'm in over my head though with figuring out how to code this in PHP. Throw me a PM if you're interested.

No worries, its all good . I tend to write long posts, I know =/

YGPM. Or will 5 minutes after this is posted.

Also, that Synology NAS.. which one would you get? I'd like to get a NAS myself. Right now I'm just sporting a external HD for Time Machine backups.

I am thinking one of the following:
Synology DS207+
Synology DS108j
Synology DS107

They are all nice. The DS108 is the cheapest of the three but doesn't offer eSATA for connecting an external HDD. It isn't a big deal but it can be helpful. The DS107 has a bit more CPU power than the DS108 but for a much higher price. And the DS207 has support for two drives so you can RAID0 or RAID1 them for performance or protection. All three are good units though. I'd like to get the DS400 series and do RAID5, but its simply too expensive for me. Synology advertises iTunes support but I am not sure how much support they provide. I also am not sure if Synologies can be used for Time Machine either, something to look up.

-robodude666

 

[Serpico]

P.S. Why don't you name your consoles?

Because I can't give them names on my network.

 

[trag]

The ADC (video card side) to DVI (display side) adapter is about $35. Here is one link:

http://www.powermax.com/parts/show/a-drb-0136-addv?src=g

The adapter which is $99 is to go from a DVI connector on the computer to an ADC connector on an Apple display. But if you need to go from ADC on the computer to DVI on the display, the adapters are much simpler and more affordable--although I don't know why they haven't dropped much cheaper by now, seeing as ADC is dead, dead, dead.

Alternatively, you can buy an aftermarket video card which has dual DVI connectors instead of ADC and DVI connectors, but that would cost considerably more.

 

[robodude666]

The ADC (video card side) to DVI (display side) adapter is about $35. Here is one link:

http://www.powermax.com/parts/show/a-drb-0136-addv?src=g

Thanks for the link! That still is one hell of an expensive adapter. This only solves one half of my problem. The PowerMac G5 is still a PowerPC processor and can't virtualize windows with VMWare, so I'd still end up switching between two computers.

 

[illgiveumorality]

Your macbook supports dual displays. Why can't you use that?

 

[robodude666]

Your macbook supports dual displays. Why can't you use that?

It does, but using the tiny 13.3" display for work is very hard. I have yet to find a good USB to DVI adapter which works on Mac. I know the eVGA UV PLUS+ is a good adapter but I don't know about its Mac support.

Also, putting the MacBook into clamshell mode is very annoying when using a bluetooth mouse and keyboard. I need to also have a USB one plugged in to keep it in clamshell mode.

 

[robodude666]

Howdy folks,

Little off topic question, but I was wondering what are the safe temperatures for a MacBook's processor? I've got the Early 2008 revision. I've read 60-70c is common and the max is around 85c, correct? Today I decided to try using the MacBook with an external monitor/mouse/keyboard for some work as my PowerMac was starting to slug down a bit with several photoshop files open. I had VMWare Fusion running Vista and Photoshop CS3 running and getting temps from 65-75c.

And for the bright side of things, DisplayLink, the company who makes the IC inside of the eVGA UV PLUS+ announced Mac OS X Beta drivers back in late march so I'm very excited to pick one of them up. I hope the MacBook would work well for what I need and allow me to save $1,800 .

Cheers,
-robodude666

 

[bryanwii]

maybe I am missing something, but why can't you upgrade the G5 with a better graphics card? a dual dvi card isnt that bad to come by these days. I picked up a used ATI x1900xt for $42 off eBay shipped that does wonders for dual 22" widescreens next to each other at 1680 x 1050.