I have a MacBook Pro. 2009, OS X 10.5..8. I have just increased RAM from 4 to 8.

Both

Agree with Deggie. The upgrade to Snow Leopard is thoroughly worthwhile even though it is now only partially supported at the security level. Best OS you could have, but if you go that way, don't forget the Combo update to 10.6.8.

No need to worry about the combo update, if they buy Snow Leopard it will be 10.6.8

😀

4GB memory is quite enough for Snow Leopard, though if finance allows an extra 2GB would never go amiss. Do this first before you buy and apply 10.6.8.

Video apps are very memory intensive. Put in as much RAM as you can afford, and the Mac can access. Rendering and encoding in particular will benefit from all the RAM it can use.

To add hard drive memory (6GB left)

Are you referring to hard drive space or the RAM you just increased? If you are talking about the hard drive, it is space > 6 GB of empty space is not enough. You will need to delete or move files to an external because your hard drive needs an absolute minimum of 10 - 15 GB of emtpy space at all times to operate properly. Do not download anything further until you've cleared enough space (you also need to add whatever you want to download while deleting things).

And, if you want to use Final Cut or any video editing software, you will need as much empty space on your hard drive as your project files in order to be able to render and encode. So, if your project contains 50 GB of files (easy to do with HD footage), you would need an extra 50 GB of empty space on your hard drive or you will not be happy with the performance using it.

Not having enough hard drive space would be a main culprit while rendering video (aside from needing RAM). No way should it take 2 hours for a 15 min. clip.

How large is your hard drive? 250 GB? You'd want at least half of that empty while working on videos. If larger, you need to clear at least 150 GB or so to have empty.

And...... even if you are not editing video: 6 GB free is not enough. Without working on video, you need a very minimum of 15 GB free at all times. That means, in reality, you need much more, because the space will decrease as soon as you download something or add more videos.

You have to remember that a hard drive is like a DVD: whenever you do anything at all, that action will write data to the hard drive. That data will stay there until you delete it, so with everything you do, your space decreases.

If your using FCP 5, 6 or 7, it will only used up to 4 gigs of ram and no more. The same with all of the other Final Cut Studio apps. The new FCP X/Motion 5 will use all the ram you can throw at it.

You best bet with FCP is to get an external Firewire (USB drives won't work.) drive and put your video footage on that drive it edit from. You need to keep the video media off of the System drive because it slows down the system having the media there.

You can move all of the media files that comes with Final Cut Studio (FCP, Motion, Color, DVD Studio Pro and Soundtrack Pro,) This will save over 90 gigs on the system drive. This will free up space on the System drive and this will make the Final Cut Sudio App run faster. Just go to each apps preference menu to re-link all of the apps libraries.

If you have (using) iTunes and iPhoto. You can move those libraries over to the external drive to save space on the system drive. You move these library within the app.

Here is what I have on my external dive to save space on my system drive:

I save over 150 gigs on my system drive which is a 250 SSD Flash drive. (I forgot the Color folder.) If you have LiveType you can move that library over too.

It's late... hope you understand what I wrote.

Leave the apps on the system drive, just move the libraries. For example....

LiveType:

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DVD Studio Pro:

___________________________

Motion:

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Soundtrack Pro:

Hit the indexing button to complete.

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FCP: These files will link up automatically when you set Motion up.

_________________________________

When you open the the above preference windows note the path to find them. Try one first... do them one at a time so you don't get messed up. Quit the app and reopen it to make sure the path is correct. You can place all of these files in one folder on the external drive.

If your missing some files for one reason or another. You can reinstall from the media discs. Use the media disc to install the missing files. Don't use the FCS install disc.... (I found out you could do this after reinstalling the whole thing again, dumb me!)

Forgot this...

Move the FCP scratch/rendering over to the external drive:

Purge these files ever once in a while. They can grow enormously over time

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I know this may seems a lot to do, but isn't. Once done you will save a lot of space on the system drive. Don't forget to move the libraries for iPhoto and iTunes.

Aside from all the excellent suggestions from David, you should also check for other space hogging files to see if you can either delete some or move them to an external permanently to gain enough space.