A smart-mouthed retort
Honestly, I know this sounds harsh, but cutting for home on a PC is a nightmare, and setting you up for disaster.
In my experiences, it's only been a disaster for people who jump in feet first expecting this box to be the HAL9000 that does everything for them, and then get all bent out of shape when it becomes apparent that there's no magic juju inside. I've been editing on PCs for the past 3 solid years, and sporadically for 6 years before that. I trained on Macs and PCs side by side, and my overall experiences have proven to me that Macs don't "just work". They can and do crash just as often as some of their PC cousins.
You can argue with me, PC people, but I know I'm right on this.
This is the part in Star Wars where the Emperor says something like "Your over-confidence is your weakness!" while he steeples his evil fingers while clicking his evil mouse on his evil Windows computer to bring certain doom to the rebel scum.
I have 3 machines in my office at work. One is a Mac Pro with dual G5 chips running FCS2. The second is an HP running Windows XP and Premiere Pro CS3 on a dual core AMD processor, and the third is my laptop with a Core2 Duo running Vista Ultimate. If given the chance, I would gladly torch the Mac and sell it's stupid "cute" case for scrap and spend the money on After Effects plugins. Frankly, I was surprised to see that my CS3 suite runs much faster and more reliably on my Vista machine. After being skeptical and wary of Vista, it was a great sigh of relief and a surge of confidence knowing that I could reliably work in 3ds Max, After Effects, and Premiere all at the same time without having to worry about crashes. Once again, it comes down to taking the responsibility to do a little research on your machine so you know it's capabilities. I've been building and cannibalizing PCs since 1995, so I've also had my share of burned out motherboards and learning other lessons the hard way.
As far as Macs go, I think they're way overpriced for what you get out of them. It costs much more to upgrade internal components, and since they all have Intel chips these days, all you're paying for are the bragging rights to say "Please pay attention to me because I spent a crapload of money on this Mac! Isn't it so cute?" Oh yeah- need to run things in Windows? You'll have to shell out even MORE for the privilege of running Boot Camp on top of buying a second operating system. Several people I know that are proud Mac owners talk about how great it is that they can now run Windows at the same time. If it's so great to run Windows apps, why not save yourself the cash and just get a Windows machine?? I'm sure there are screen savers for Vista that are just as impressive as OSX.
And Final Cut Studio? I can't stand it. I think many of the problems some folks on this very forum complain about like how people are trying to pass off low quality crap as broadcast quality work are only exacerbated by products like Final Cut Studio. Here's a software suite that for all intents and purposes, sells itself based on the presumptions of:
-it just works. (so you don't have to!)
-it's loaded with templates so impatient types can be "creative"
-it's aimed at people who want to dive in and "create" without having to learn those darn complicated controls and how to really use programs. As for Final Cut being Generation2 software, I don't see how that's relevant. Hasn't Avid been out longer? I know Premiere has been around for at least 10 years, and it's currently on it's 3rd generation of the Premiere Pro variety.
I actually get calls now from clients who have spent their money on these computers and FCS, who now need me to fix the crap they got themselves into. They start off spouting on and on about how they're the greatest music video editor or documentary film maker, but the thing that confuses them is that their project seems lacking in some way- even after using ALL the effects and templates FCP, Motion, and LiveType have to offer. Go figure- you actually need to know a little bit more than the difference between your butt and your elbow to put together a good looking music video or documentary! And it's dealing with people like this on a more frequent basis that makes me realize that Apple is mainly marketing this stuff to clueless people that want to be the cool film maker without having to know anything else.
There's a good reason that Apple totally dominates their entire 5% share of the computer market. And it's not because Microsoft is being a big mean jerk. Apple has it's place. They make a good iPhone, and they make cute looking little notebooks for the kids to write their poetry in while they try to attract other pretentious haiku-writing kids at Starbucks.
So that's my rant. Just keep in mind that all of this is strictly opinion and my own special blend of verbal diarrhea. Plus, the OP is trying to do simple editing at home- it doesn't sound like he's trying to cut the next greatest thing at the Sundance festival. AlexLucas is totally and completely right though- just as much as I'm totally right.