I've been a PC user all my life and last year for my laptop I got a macbook pro for christmas and fell in love but still held on to a desktop PC which oddly enough I also bought last year during the summer. It was a custom built system.

Well in October of 07 the power supply blew out. The custom builders told me that even though the PC was under warrenty that the PSU wasn't covered because it was an electrical failure in my home (how they knew this I have no idea as it wasn't an electrical failure) and charged me for a new PSU. Fast forward to this past month and the PC now has so many problems it's not even funny. Luckily I got an extended warrenty but turns out it doesn't apply because they're now blaming all these problems on the PSU blowing out last year and using an electrical failure as the excuse. In other words I have to pay for repairs and worse they're telling me I basically have to replace everything in order to fix the errors, in essence buying a brand new computer off them. Needless to say something is a bit fishy.

However I need a computer and after having nothing but a great experience with my macbook pro I thought it wouldn't hurt to make a full switch and get a mac as my desktop. I do video editing (not professional), image work, website design/work and ofcourse play the occasional game (not much anymore as consoles fill the gaming needs but World of Warcraft and Real time strategy games aren't too friendly with consoles) and so I am looking between getting the high end iMac (24" 3.06 GHz 4 GB Ram Geforce 8800gs) or the Mac Pro (the default Mac Pro with 4 GB Ram and probably buying a video card to change out the one it comes with) but am torn between the two.

For my needs is it really worth the jump in cost to going to a Mac Pro? On top of that my monitor is showing signs of its age and needs to be replaced so if I did buy the Mac Pro a new monitor will be purchased with it but it to me seems the Mac Pro might be a bit overkill for what I need. It's only advantage from what I see is I can upgrade it. Would the iMac be ok for my needs? Or should I really look at the Mac Pro and spend the extra money? I'm hoping to purchase it by the end of this month (when i get paid) or should I wait till like the next refresh of either? (if my current PC can survive that long.....which isn't looking good)

Thank you for taking the time to read this and providing your opinions.

What I would do is produce a table with all the major points that will change your mind, such as...

      Mac Pro      iMac

Price   $2000      $1000
RAM      4GB         2GB
HDD      120GB      160GB

Then you can quickly glance through and compare the differences and may help you with your decision.

Hey George,
For what it's worth, I had the same question.. moving from a Laptop PC (lil Dell powerhouse) and an OC'd Desktop PC combo to a Mac platform was a hard decision, but I'm happy I did!

I was running a fairly heavily outfitted Desktop PC with Dual 22" screens and tons of RAM, HD space, etc. to run all my CS3 products, etc. and would use the laptop on the road to edit files, put together comps, etc.

It worked fine, but I was always plagued by virus alerts, etc.

So,.. on to Mac. Deciding between the MacPro and iMac was hard, but these questions helped me decide:
1) Do I need a the features that I would pay for in the Mac Pro?
2) Is it worth paying for that premium on the MacPro to then have to turn around and buy another monitor?
3) Would one 24" screen of the iMac 24" be sufficient?
4) What has the best value for money in terms of processing power, etc.?

So, what did I do?

I purchased an iMac 24" and upgraded the RAM and HD space.. I LOVE IT!! I should've made the move A LOT sooner in life.
Bare in mind, the MacPro is a true powerhouse. So, if you do A LOT of video rendering, etc. that would be the best bet.

I have only used the Mac Pro for a test run, and have heard great things about it, but in my opinion, it makes more sense for me to stick with the iMac 24"..

The processor is fast, RAM more than sufficient and the screen is perfect. I can always add another if I NEEDED,.. but the screen is better then I thought it would be. The iMac runs flawlessly, has enough power for me to run multiple instances of FireFox, FTP, Fireworks CS3, Dreamweaver CS3, TextWrangler, 2 IM programs, etc. etc... I love it!

You can easily upgrade the RAM in the iMac as well as the HD drive. It's just not as simple as opening the case of a large computer. Also, one important thing for me was real estate. I was pretty tired of giving up nearly all of my desk or foot space to house the processing power I needed. The iMac solved that, perfectly.

Best of luck on your decision, I'm sure either way, you'l be happy.

You mean the new 24" LED displays Apple released? I really wonder how that would look ... Dual imac look.... very interesting!!!