Mac Pro 2008 Buyers - I'd like to hear from you!
Hello all!
I've got my mind made up. I'll be ordering a CTO (Configure to Order) Mac Pro 2.8 GHz 8 core Mac Pro soon but I need your help as a few things are driving me crazy!
I have read at various sources that the 320 GB Seagate stock HDD is crap! Further, it can, relative to say, a Western Digital same-sized drive, take a 31% performance hit with the stock 320 GB Seagate drive according to things I've read! This 320 GB has been universally panned as a lousy HDD and an Achilles' heal for the otherwise great new Mac Pros.
I called Apple yesterday and asked what drive I would get if I upgraded my order to two 500 GB drives. They said they do not divulge this info to the public. I understand that as they may substitute one drive for another if supply issues are raised however this is frustrating not knowing what one will get! I suggested to them that this was rather like a CrackerJack surprise inside but you don't know if you'll like what you got or not.
"Forrest Gump: My momma always said, 'Life was like a box of chocolates. You never know what you're gonna get.'
Mrs. Gump: 'You have to do the best with what God gave you'."
Well, with Apple being "God" here, I wish my beloved Apple would allow for some human input in the way of choices.
Question one: Have any of you purchased a new Mac Pro in January 2008 with 500 GB drive or drives? I'd like to know a) what make and model HDD you got b) what you think if its performance / would you recommend?
Question two: If I bought the Mac Pro with the stock 320 GB drive and then added two more 500 GB HDDs what would be two stellar HDDs to get for performance, reliability, price, etc. I'm taking Serial ATA (SATA) drives BTW not RAID or other setups/devices. If you added your own HDD 500 GB what did you chose and why?
Question three: I've read that for best performance one should a) use four sticks of RAM (versus two sticks) so choose 4 - 1GB of RAM vs. 2 - 2GBs of RAM for example. True that this will help performance - getting the 4 sticks? But they MUST be of the exact type.
Question four: I have read that if one uses 4 sticks of RAM they should be identical. This would mean that if I get 2 - 1 GB sticks from Apple and try to save money on another 2 - 1 GB sticks from a cheaper source like Crucial or OW, etc. I may take a performance hit. True? Should I just buy the overpriced Apple RAM and take my lumps? I don't want memory incompatibilities now or down the road.
I'm chompin' at the bit to buy that new Mac Pro but these issues give me pause. And researching "the best" HDDs is insane as everyone has such different opinions. I've always done fine with Seagate drives, for example, but I hear some of their recent stuff, like the stock 320 GB HDD is junk and unreliable. Help!
Thanks all,
SNazz123
I've got my mind made up. I'll be ordering a CTO (Configure to Order) Mac Pro 2.8 GHz 8 core Mac Pro soon but I need your help as a few things are driving me crazy!
I have read at various sources that the 320 GB Seagate stock HDD is crap! Further, it can, relative to say, a Western Digital same-sized drive, take a 31% performance hit with the stock 320 GB Seagate drive according to things I've read! This 320 GB has been universally panned as a lousy HDD and an Achilles' heal for the otherwise great new Mac Pros.
I called Apple yesterday and asked what drive I would get if I upgraded my order to two 500 GB drives. They said they do not divulge this info to the public. I understand that as they may substitute one drive for another if supply issues are raised however this is frustrating not knowing what one will get! I suggested to them that this was rather like a CrackerJack surprise inside but you don't know if you'll like what you got or not.
"Forrest Gump: My momma always said, 'Life was like a box of chocolates. You never know what you're gonna get.'
Mrs. Gump: 'You have to do the best with what God gave you'."
Well, with Apple being "God" here, I wish my beloved Apple would allow for some human input in the way of choices.
Question one: Have any of you purchased a new Mac Pro in January 2008 with 500 GB drive or drives? I'd like to know a) what make and model HDD you got b) what you think if its performance / would you recommend?
Question two: If I bought the Mac Pro with the stock 320 GB drive and then added two more 500 GB HDDs what would be two stellar HDDs to get for performance, reliability, price, etc. I'm taking Serial ATA (SATA) drives BTW not RAID or other setups/devices. If you added your own HDD 500 GB what did you chose and why?
Question three: I've read that for best performance one should a) use four sticks of RAM (versus two sticks) so choose 4 - 1GB of RAM vs. 2 - 2GBs of RAM for example. True that this will help performance - getting the 4 sticks? But they MUST be of the exact type.
Question four: I have read that if one uses 4 sticks of RAM they should be identical. This would mean that if I get 2 - 1 GB sticks from Apple and try to save money on another 2 - 1 GB sticks from a cheaper source like Crucial or OW, etc. I may take a performance hit. True? Should I just buy the overpriced Apple RAM and take my lumps? I don't want memory incompatibilities now or down the road.
I'm chompin' at the bit to buy that new Mac Pro but these issues give me pause. And researching "the best" HDDs is insane as everyone has such different opinions. I've always done fine with Seagate drives, for example, but I hear some of their recent stuff, like the stock 320 GB HDD is junk and unreliable. Help!
Thanks all,
SNazz123
Comments
OK, so every drive manufacturer has had drives that go down. I've had all kinds, and lost one or more of each. For my new Mac Pro internal drives I bought 4 500GB WD Caviar SE16 SATA II hard drives 7500 RPM 16 MB cache regular edition drives. They were each $10.00 more than the raid edition, but I went with them anyway. I've had a few WD's go down, and I've had a few that I've had for 8 years. I have one in one now. With RAM your talking about Cache latency. The lower the latency the faster the data retrieval. I'm really not worried about milliseconds when it comes to performance so I went with 4x 2GB sticks of OCZ Platinum. I'll probably try to OC them as they are made for it, but I don't know if it's possible from within the Mac OS. That's all I have to say about that.
Hello all!
I've got my mind made up. I'll be ordering a CTO (Configure to Order) Mac Pro 2.8 GHz 8 core Mac Pro soon but I need your help as a few things are driving me crazy!
I have read at various sources that the 320 GB Seagate stock HDD is crap! Further, it can, relative to say, a Western Digital same-sized drive, take a 31% performance hit with the stock 320 GB Seagate drive according to things I've read! This 320 GB has been universally panned as a lousy HDD and an Achilles' heal for the otherwise great new Mac Pros.
I called Apple yesterday and asked what drive I would get if I upgraded my order to two 500 GB drives. They said they do not divulge this info to the public. I understand that as they may substitute one drive for another if supply issues are raised however this is frustrating not knowing what one will get! I suggested to them that this was rather like a CrackerJack surprise inside but you don't know if you'll like what you got or not.
"Forrest Gump: My momma always said, 'Life was like a box of chocolates. You never know what you're gonna get.'
Mrs. Gump: 'You have to do the best with what God gave you'."
Well, with Apple being "God" here, I wish my beloved Apple would allow for some human input in the way of choices.
Question one: Have any of you purchased a new Mac Pro in January 2008 with 500 GB drive or drives? I'd like to know a) what make and model HDD you got b) what you think if its performance / would you recommend?
Question two: If I bought the Mac Pro with the stock 320 GB drive and then added two more 500 GB HDDs what would be two stellar HDDs to get for performance, reliability, price, etc. I'm taking Serial ATA (SATA) drives BTW not RAID or other setups/devices. If you added your own HDD 500 GB what did you chose and why?
Question three: I've read that for best performance one should a) use four sticks of RAM (versus two sticks) so choose 4 - 1GB of RAM vs. 2 - 2GBs of RAM for example. True that this will help performance - getting the 4 sticks? But they MUST be of the exact type.
Question four: I have read that if one uses 4 sticks of RAM they should be identical. This would mean that if I get 2 - 1 GB sticks from Apple and try to save money on another 2 - 1 GB sticks from a cheaper source like Crucial or OW, etc. I may take a performance hit. True? Should I just buy the overpriced Apple RAM and take my lumps? I don't want memory incompatibilities now or down the road.
I'm chompin' at the bit to buy that new Mac Pro but these issues give me pause. And researching "the best" HDDs is insane as everyone has such different opinions. I've always done fine with Seagate drives, for example, but I hear some of their recent stuff, like the stock 320 GB HDD is junk and unreliable. Help!
Thanks all,
SNazz123
DO NOT ORDER A 2008 MAC PRO!
Why?
http://forums.macrumors.com/showthre...=1#post4883979
They all have an intermittent video issue that results in pixelation and strange video artificats throughout normal usage. This is most likely the Ati HD 2600XT cards fault. Hopefully Apple wll fix this soon. Even replacements that were sent out have this issue. Unfortuntely my new Mac Pro has this issue as well.
Anyway, regarding the HDD's The stock 320GB HDD is a Western Digital. It's an 8mb cache drive, the cheapest available. It's OEM what do you expect? The 500gb drive has 16mb of cache, the 1tb hdd has 32mb cache. Both the 500gb and 1tb HDD's are overpriced. Order Samsung Spinpoint F1 drives from Newegg - much better performance, good price, and low heat/power usage.
Ram - this is controversial. But according to Larry from OWC (other world computing) having 2 x 2gb in addition to the 2 x 1gb Apple sticks causes no performance decrease. I have this in my Mac Pro and Xbench numbers were the same before and after the upgrade. I can confirm there is no noticable performance decrease in normal usage and in bench marks. The claim is mostly newb's who just like to spread rumors.
see my HDD thread:
http://forums.macrumors.com/showthread.php?t=422186
Hope this helps!
DO NOT ORDER A 2008 MAC PRO!
Why?
http://forums.macrumors.com/showthre...=1#post4883979
They all have an intermittent video issue that results in pixelation and strange video artificats throughout normal usage. This is most likely the Ati HD 2600XT cards fault. Hopefully Apple wll fix this soon. Even replacements that were sent out have this issue. Unfortuntely my new Mac Pro has this issue as well.
Anyway, regarding the HDD's The stock 320GB HDD is a Western Digital. It's an 8mb cache drive, the cheapest available. It's OEM what do you expect? The 500gb drive has 16mb of cache, the 1tb hdd has 32mb cache. Both the 500gb and 1tb HDD's are overpriced. Order Samsung Spinpoint F1 drives from Newegg - much better performance, good price, and low heat/power usage.
Ram - this is controversial. But according to Larry from OWC (other world computing) having 2 x 2gb in addition to the 2 x 1gb Apple sticks causes no performance decrease. I have this in my Mac Pro and Xbench numbers were the same before and after the upgrade. I can confirm there is no noticable performance decrease in normal usage and in bench marks. The claim is mostly newb's who just like to spread rumors.
see my HDD thread:
http://forums.macrumors.com/showthread.php?t=422186
Hope this helps!
And people wonder why I think ATI sucks. Now I have two reasons. Apparently their shit is always going down, and their cards are slower. They always say they are going to be faster than Nvidia, They even say their tests are showing how much faster they are the day they come out, but then they come out, and reviewers do the same tests and guess what. Nvidia's old card is running circles around it.
Samsung Spinpoint F1 drives from Newegg
Samsung drives? If samsung is making drives they are fairly new to the drive game, and I wouldn't recommend one. I thought I have had every kind of drive in the past, and I've never even heard of a samsung drive until now. There is a chance they are just re-branding a drive from another manufacturer. I'd look into it before buying one.
People are talking about DOA fails far more frequently than I would like.
Additionally, read the Samsung drive reviews at NewEgg.
People are talking about DOA fails far more frequently than I would like.
Any drive can fail. I've had Segate, WD, Maxtor, IBM, Fujitsu, Hitachi, Quantum, Toshiba all fail on me. Maxtor more than any, but that is the case of one individual user. They can all fail. It's not uncommon for a drive to fail. It's just as common as a bad stick of RAM, Faulty Optical Drive, or a bad video card. I usually just get the warranty and try not to worry about it. I've had stock computers last years without problems. It's more common for your equipment to be fine than it is for it to fail. I just deal with it as it happens.
DO NOT ORDER A 2008 MAC PRO!
Why?
http://forums.macrumors.com/showthre...=1#post4883979
They all have an intermittent video issue that results in pixelation and strange video artificats throughout normal usage. This is most likely the Ati HD 2600XT cards fault. Hopefully Apple wll fix this soon. Even replacements that were sent out have this issue. Unfortuntely my new Mac Pro has this issue as well.
Anyway, regarding the HDD's The stock 320GB HDD is a Western Digital. It's an 8mb cache drive, the cheapest available. It's OEM what do you expect? The 500gb drive has 16mb of cache, the 1tb hdd has 32mb cache. Both the 500gb and 1tb HDD's are overpriced. Order Samsung Spinpoint F1 drives from Newegg - much better performance, good price, and low heat/power usage.
Ram - this is controversial. But according to Larry from OWC (other world computing) having 2 x 2gb in addition to the 2 x 1gb Apple sticks causes no performance decrease. I have this in my Mac Pro and Xbench numbers were the same before and after the upgrade. I can confirm there is no noticable performance decrease in normal usage and in bench marks. The claim is mostly newb's who just like to spread rumors.
see my HDD thread:
http://forums.macrumors.com/showthread.php?t=422186
Hope this helps!
Well, Mr. PS, not buying a new Mac Pro is not an option for me but I truly appreciate your alerting me to the ATI card problems. In fact, I had decided from the release date of the new Mac Pros to upgrade to the 8800GT anyway. If I had any doubt, your experience and those of others that you pointed me to would have solidified my going with the 8800GT even if I have to wait longer.
I should check out OWC since Crucial is charging a whopping $300+ for a 2GB kit (2 - 1GB). Did your OWC memory come with the "heat spreaders"? I've heard mixed things about OWC. Does anyone else want to weigh in on them? Thanks Mr. PS for your feedback on the XBench test. Although that doesn't tell the whole story on performance it is reassuring to know that it did not degrade performance as you measured it.
I'm hoping to pull the trigger on an order this week and still have to decide on the HDD and memory issues. Western Digital vs. Seagate. My Seagates have always been reliable but I read about how coolly, quietly and reliably the WD's run. Then I read just the opposite the next day. ARGHHHHHHHH!
SNazz123
After a little research I found out samsung drives are actually Western Digital. I'd just go directly with the WD, and not pay samsungs markup.
Do you have a link for this?
AFAIK, Samsung has been making their own drives since 1996 at a manufacturing facility Gumi, Korea.
From this link:
All Samsung hard disks are manufactured on a plant in Gumi, Korea ? it was opened in 1996, and now it has 5 fully automated and 7 semi-automated process lines, clean room class 10, and it already manufactures about 15 million devices a year.
I've been buying Samsung SpinPoint drives for years and have never had a failure.
Great quality and very quiet drives.
Any drive can fail. I've had Segate, WD, Maxtor, IBM, Fujitsu, Hitachi, Quantum, Toshiba all fail on me. Maxtor more than any, but that is the case of one individual user. They can all fail. It's not uncommon for a drive to fail. It's just as common as a bad stick of RAM, Faulty Optical Drive, or a bad video card. I usually just get the warranty and try not to worry about it. I've had stock computers last years without problems. It's more common for your equipment to be fine than it is for it to fail. I just deal with it as it happens.
Yeah... but you missed my point.
I dislike the frequency of reported failures.
Not the fact that failures exist.
Yeah... but you missed my point.
I dislike the frequency of reported failures.
Not the fact that failures exist.
And you missed my point. That Maxtor failed more than any other, but that is just one user incident. It's not reflective on quality from the manufacturer as a whole.
Do you have a link for this?
AFAIK, Samsung has been making their own drives since 1996 at a manufacturing facility Gumi, Korea.
From this link:
I've been buying Samsung SpinPoint drives for years and have never had a failure.
Great quality and very quiet drives.
Not hard to find this statement, but here is an example. I don't know if that Korea plant is owned by Samsung, or if they are just re-branding them there in Korea and it belongs to someone else. When I was looking for this I also found some Samsung drives were by Hitachi.
Description:
Western Digital presents the Samsung HM060II 60GB Internal SATA Notebook 2.5 Hard Drive, a superior STORAGE product. Today, PC users are on the go. So a PCs drive better be reliable. No problem, if it is got a Samsung 2.5-inch hard drive. And with a 5400rpm spin speed and 8MB buffer, this drive also delivers truly impressive throughput performance. Like all our drives, And leading-edge technology that increases noise suppression and lowers power consumption
http://www.compuplus.com/i-Samsung-H...82q84c7k18pih3
And you missed my point. That Maxtor failed more than any other, but that is just one user incident. It's not reflective on quality from the manufacturer as a whole.
Ah, I see the misunderstanding.
You thought I was commenting on the manufacturer when I was, in fact, commenting on the product.
Ah, I see the misunderstanding.
You thought I was commenting on the manufacturer when I was, in fact, commenting on the product.
My real point is in the end no matter what drive you buy it's going to be hit and miss. You just never know. Segate is supposedly the most dependable drives made. I've lost a few, but I can't say that I think segate is a bad drive to buy. I do know they cost a bit more, spec vs. equal spec, than most drives, but there will always be that chance that it's going to go down. I would tend to buy whatever looks like a good buy at the time, and run with it. If you have a preference, go with your preference. I've had good luck with WD for a while now so I tend to stick with them. If you like Fujitsu, get a Fujitsu. One thing I do know is these manufacturers are competitive. If you, and a lot of other people had problems with a manufacturers dives 2/3/4 years ago. The chances are that problem has now been eradicated for the most part.