I have both Mac and PC so that I can be everybody's pal. I use the Mac for video editing and I enjoy using Premier 5.1c which i find works well with my DV camera etc.
However my core business in recent months is PC based. As such I'm considering taking my editing antics over to the PC. However this is uncharted territory for me. I also have a posh new Sony Vaio (FX301) which has Firewire as one of its many inputs plus it outputs to two screens simultaneously.
So the question is "who'd win in a fight between Mac and PC over editing?"
Anybody have experience editing on both platforms and/or strong views either way?
My view is you will get the best final output from whichever system allows your editing skills to best emerge. This usually reflects your own personal familiarity with a system, which of course grows with usage.
Technically, flexibility, and - dare I say it - in cost terms, they're about equal, all things considered. More support, wider choice of software/hardware on a PC, but as a result, more configuration hassles.
At the end of the day, it's what's what moves the mouse that makes the biggest difference to the final result.
For what it is worth I will add my take on this subject. First I'd better say that although I started editing on a PC (after months of trying to get the system to recognise my PAL camera at all), I moved to the Mac platform and have never acquired, for example, any Canopus capture/editing products which by all accounts are stable and very superior kit.
I got a Mac because Apple invented firewire and Altivec/OSX promised superior speed and stability. A company which has as one central object the development of the DV technology we all rely on deserves support, quite apart from the Emmy Steve Jobs was due to collect not for his speeches but for firewire development. The promise of stability has not, in my experience, been fulfilled, but the Mac does pro-level tasks faster and easier than the PC systems I've tried, and this includes editing and DVD authoring.
Also, although I did not realise this at the time I first began to use a Mac, the fact that it is the platform of choice for most graphics professionals and, I think, a large proportion of 'prosumers', means that when you need to research a process or problem not covered in user manuals or the manufacturer's website, you can almost always get help through the discussion sites (including this one) which the Mac community actively support.
That said, if you are creating output destined primarily for ordinary PC users I think you probably won't get complete coverage if your product is created on a Mac. Occasionally I have to output video recordings where the target playback devices include sub-400 Mhz PII PCs which may or may not have DVD-ROM drives. I keep a small PC editing system for this purpose. It makes a change to use it rather than a Mac, but not one that I really look forward to.
In short, I am happy with my choice but I will keep a fallback PC handy.
What exactly do you mean by your core business being PC based?
I have developed cross-platfrom multimedia for years on a Mac. So long as you are aware of PC idiosyncrasies (mainly because of the lack of knowledge of the PC end-user) you can work around those and deliver usable products. Those idiosyncrasies exist wether you develop on the Mac or on a PC. So I choose what makes my life easier and frees me to develop creatively. Of course, its always helpful to have a PC around to check stuff on - but there is no way I would switch to a PC fulltime for developing.
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regards
Steven Hood
MotionForge