Official Mac Pro Appreciation Thread

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Comments

  • Reply 101 of 112
    tombtomb Posts: 29member
    Well, I really appreciate these new Mac Pros. This is just what the doctor ordered for Video encoding. I will be ordering one just as soon as the people who buy the first ones confirm that there aren't any lurking bugs anywhere. A new Quad for around $700 less than the old Quad? This is freakin' great.



    My biggest question is about the Video cards, it appears that you can use any PC card. One person says that Apple has confirmed this, but I'm waiting for a second opinion. The fact that you can boot Windows and use the onboard card seems to suggest compatibility. Plus the upgrade cost of the ATI 1900 is pretty close to the cost of the card for regular PCs. Much better than it use to be. And, the fact that the MacPro and Quad G5 Video cards are not interchangeable also sounds encouraging. The EFI/BIOS thing is the big question, but surely, the card makers will eventually release EFI cards, right?
  • Reply 102 of 112
    benroethigbenroethig Posts: 2,782member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by a_greer


    In the keynote they compared a Macpro stock to a Dell, call me crazy but wasnt it unfair because the MP had a ~$70(retail) geforce 7300 card and the Dell had a Quatro...isnt that like compring a stock Viper to a vet with NOS, turbo and racing slicks?



    Quatro is the professional line, not a single high end card. The FX 550 is pretty much the bottom of the line of Quadro. There is maybe a $50 difference. between the two.
  • Reply 103 of 112
    splinemodelsplinemodel Posts: 7,311member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by onlooker


    Actually Zach that's a pretty silly assumption. I'd say about 45% of 3D pro's are using 3D to make games. Most gaming machines originated from a pro graphics machine. There is hardly a difference. If you look at the BOXX, or alienware workstation you will see that there isn't a gaming option left out of their BTO options.



    No way. 5% at the highest. There are a lot of CAD users out there, and there are far more buildings, cars, and other products than there are games. Pretty much any sort of product requires a fair amount of 3D CAD in the design phase.



    Of course, most of the CAD apps are Windows-only, so it doesn't really matter unless you want to run Windows on your Mac Pro. . . . now that I think of it, though, that wouldn't be a bad idea if "Parallels" worked well.
  • Reply 104 of 112
    lcsedslcseds Posts: 14member
    I am a recent switcher. I bought a Mac Mini for use at work. I was salivating waiting for this new machine. However, Apple missed *my* marlk. I am not going to buy that beast of a Mac Pro. I am not going to buy an iMac becauser *I* will pick my screen. My needs are simple, give me a decent mid range video card option. Same for the Macbooks. Not going to buy one of those because no video card is available. Don't want a Macbook Pro because I prefer the smaller screen and size of the Macbook.

    I want to run Aperture. Apple wants me to run Aperture rather than Adobe right? So why can't I run this nice piece of software on any machine other than a $2000 notebook or a $2500 desktop????

    I am trying Soooooooo hard to completely switch to Mac, and there are NO machines in my price range ($1k -$1500) that have a simple 128 or 256 mb video card. And no option to get one either. Incredible.
  • Reply 105 of 112
    dfilerdfiler Posts: 3,420member
    Wah effing wah.



    Personally, I'm glad Apple doesn't cater to gamers. Instead they're building computers for everything _but_ gaming. It is a concious decision and one that I believe is best at this time. It allows them to pour resources into making their products great in other ways.
  • Reply 106 of 112
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by backtomac


    You won't get anywhere. I posted a link showing how a 2.9 ghz Conroe was beating Quad core opteron systems yet Joe is convinced that when AMD goes Quad Cre they'll start killing Intel's Quad core cpus. Good luck, neither Murch nor I could make much progress.



    that test was not even the Conroe system had a much better hard disk system and maybe a better video card.

    Also AMD goes Quad-cord are K8L chips at 65 nm also 4x4 is useing ddr2 based chips.
  • Reply 107 of 112
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by TomB


    Well, I really appreciate these new Mac Pros. This is just what the doctor ordered for Video encoding. I will be ordering one just as soon as the people who buy the first ones confirm that there aren't any lurking bugs anywhere. A new Quad for around $700 less than the old Quad? This is freakin' great.



    My biggest question is about the Video cards, it appears that you can use any PC card. One person says that Apple has confirmed this, but I'm waiting for a second opinion. The fact that you can boot Windows and use the onboard card seems to suggest compatibility. Plus the upgrade cost of the ATI 1900 is pretty close to the cost of the card for regular PCs. Much better than it use to be. And, the fact that the MacPro and Quad G5 Video cards are not interchangeable also sounds encouraging. The EFI/BIOS thing is the big question, but surely, the card makers will eventually release EFI cards, right?



    Windows vista will not have support for efi at first so it may be a long time they come out.
  • Reply 108 of 112
    benroethigbenroethig Posts: 2,782member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by dfiler


    Wah effing wah.



    Personally, I'm glad Apple doesn't cater to gamers. Instead they're building computers for everything _but_ gaming..



    And business and basically everything else that isn't artsy.
  • Reply 109 of 112
    cindercinder Posts: 381member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by Placebo


    SWEET, where'd you see it?



    RE: ZIF Sockets



    My friend saw it on the Apple Tech website in the documentation there.
  • Reply 110 of 112
    placeboplacebo Posts: 5,767member
    Wow, that is a great piece of news.



    If the mobo auto-configures, this also means that I could potentially remove one of the procs and sell it if I needed to feed my heroin habit, right?
  • Reply 111 of 112
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by ZachPruckowski


    Ok. The next person who mentions gaming is going to have an ACD dropped on their head.



    Mac Pros are not for gaming. They are for PROs.



    Apple would rather dominate the Pro market than deal with gamers.



    Why?



    1) Pros will be more inclined to buy Apple Pro software when they're getting the Mac $500-750 cheaper than the Dell. Sales of Final Cut Studio, Shake, whatever the sound one is, etc., will add a lot.



    2) Pros are much more interested in processor power. Except for limited circumstances (some 3D rendering) all the final work is done on the CPU (hence having 4 of them).



    3) Gamers are a smaller market with more competition. Gamers have XPSes, Alienware, Falcon NW, and Build-Your-Own boxes. Apple can't make much margin on gamers and be competitive. Also, gamers gain less from OS X, because they'll be booting in to Windows all the time.



    If you want a gaming box, get a Windows box. If you want a nice workstation, a Mac Pro is your best bet. Yes, it'll play games decently, but that's not the point of the machine.



    A Mac Pro is a Hummer, and a gaming machine is a dragster. Each are powerful in their own way. Apple doesn't care about 4x4, because most pros don't need Quad FireGLs/Quadros, and 2 Xeons will kill 2 FXs.



    This is such a shortsighted post. Gamers are a computer company's dream consumer: They upgrade constantly, they want the very very high end, and they defend their rigs with religious fervor.



    The Mac Pro is almost there. If it were demonstrated that Mac Pros got the highest FPS in some popular game, Apple would be in the money. You say gamers are a small market? How about Mac towers? What does Apple sell - a few hundred thousand a year? It would take only a small fraction of the gaming market to double Apple's Mac Pro sales.



    Anyways, based on the price and configuration of the Mac Pro, I suspect a new MiniTower is in the works. Might be wishful thinking on my part, but there's just too huge a gap between the iMac and Mac Pro. Add the cost of a display to the low end Mac Pro, and we're talking ~$2500, a full $800 over the high end iMac. That is some hole in Apple's lineup. Also, check out the naming scheme: Mac Mini, Mac Pro...iMac? The iMac name is totally out of place. Something has got to give.



    On the other hand, the Mac Pro prices will come down by next year. Apple's pro tower sales have been running on fumes, so now that they've got a tower that's actually drool-worthy, they're going to milk the initial mad rush, and then either adjust the price, or introduce a midrange tower/mac.
  • Reply 112 of 112
    placeboplacebo Posts: 5,767member
    The other thing about the Mac Pro that appeals to gamers is just how slick the case and insides look, and also the ability to brag about having four cores even if they mean NOTHING to game performance.





    A few Mac Pro questions I thought might be able to be answered:



    -Are any of them liquid-cooled? Which ones?

    -Do I have to buy Apple RAM because of the heatsinks, or do most 3rd party RAM manufacturers have that anyways because it's part of the DD2 667 ECC spec?

    -Does it run the 64-bit version of Windows for Boot Camp?
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