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Monitor and upgrades for new Mac Pro

post #1 of 4
11/27/10 at 11:34am
Thread Starter 
Hi all,

I finally managed to justify the cost of a Mac Pro and ordered the base 8 core model (it will get here Tuesday). I only have about 400-500 dollars left to complete the system, so I was wondering if anyone could make some suggestions on which monitor to get (and are there any essential upgrades that I need)?

Thanks!
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post #2 of 4
11/27/10 at 1:52pm
I'd say any of the following:

Dell U2211H 21.5" 1920 x 1080 $250 IPS
http://accessories.dell.com/sna/prod...4&sku=320-9271

You can get two of the above, although I'd say that 1080p on a 21.5" just makes the UI elements small. I'd personally go with the following:

HP ZR24w 24" 1920 x 1080 $399 IPS
http://www.amazon.com/HP-ZR24w-24-in...0893277&sr=8-2

The good thing about having two of them though is you can keep one of them in portrait mode.

I would have ordered the Radeon 5870 upgrade with the machine to get double precision support and it's also 70-100% faster for just $200. But if you don't plan to use it for computation or gaming, the 5770 will be fine.

Another upgrade to consider in the near future would be an SSD drive, even if it's just as a boot drive. You can get a fairly inexpensive 32-64GB SSD to keep apps and the OS on and then use a standard HDD for your files. An 80GB Intel x25M is $170:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...-031-_-Product

The 60GB Vertex 2 is $119:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...-550-_-Product

The cost for SSD drives should drop dramatically in January or February though so this can wait.
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post #3 of 4
12/3/10 at 10:41pm
Thread Starter 
Thanks for the advice. If I had gotten it from Apple I would have gone with the 5870, but I got it off Amazon, so I had to go with the stock model. I will probably upgrade the card in a couple of months.
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The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing
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post #4 of 4
12/3/10 at 11:46pm
SSDs are great, but probably not a wise use of such a limited budget. Better to buy a nice monitor and an external drive for backups, if you don't have one.
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