Mac Pro Christmas present — exchange for iMac?

First World Problems - ah goddammit, I got a crappy 6k$ 12core Mac Pro for Chirstmas :/


No, exchanging it should be no problem...

Most people here are going to say MP for obvious reasons, but you clearly have no need for it.

Nice problem to have....
As a fellow MP 1,1 owner, I can see where you're coming from with the lack of support in Mountain Lion- to my mind though, it's six years old, Apple was going to draw the line somewhere, and for the vast majority of the use I give it it still is more than up to the job (the Radeon 4870 helps in that regard). That said, as always, there are some jobs that you can never have enough power for, which is why I (like more than a few here) would have bought a '12 MP had it been the proper update it could and should have been, and are still waiting on what Tim Cook may or may not launch next year. A 27" iMac would do pretty much everything I'd want...but at the same time I'd rather wait for a new MP, and I'd probably go down the Hackintosh route if the MP gets canned. The last three desktop Macs I've owned have all had upgrades that just weren't possible for any iMac (video on all three, USB cards on two, extra drives on two). And no iMac will have the same potential longevity.
If it were me, I'd be saying 'thanks', selling the 1,1 & banking the proceeds, enjoying the '12 for the time being...and being ready to buy the 2013, if it was enough of an upgrade in my mind. Win/win.

StuAff said:

Nice problem to have....
As a fellow MP 1,1 owner, I can see where you're coming from with the lack of support in Mountain Lion- to my mind though, it's six years old, Apple was going to draw the line somewhere, and for the vast majority of the use I give it it still is more than up to the job (the Radeon 4870 helps in that regard). That said, as always, there are some jobs that you can never have enough power for, which is why I (like more than a few here) would have bought a '12 MP had it been the proper update it could and should have been, and are still waiting on what Tim Cook may or may not launch next year. A 27" iMac would do pretty much everything I'd want...but at the same time I'd rather wait for a new MP, and I'd probably go down the Hackintosh route if the MP gets canned. The last three desktop Macs I've owned have all had upgrades that just weren't possible for any iMac (video on all three, USB cards on two, extra drives on two). And no iMac will have the same potential longevity.
If it were me, I'd be saying 'thanks', selling the 1,1 & banking the proceeds, enjoying the '12 for the time being...and being ready to buy the 2013, if it was enough of an upgrade in my mind. Win/win.

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it is amazing how much life i got out of my 1,1. Totally stable with 10.7.5, and an upgrade to mountain lion is not out of the question. Processors, video cards, ram, hard drives, and pci sata usb3 have all been upgraded. This is impossible with an imac - mac pro is a very flexible machine and it will last you a long time

I would stick to the MP. First reason would be, that I would not want to exchange any present, especially one from my parents. Second reason is that you never know what tasks future would bring. For example, when I got my 09 MP, it was certainly overkill for my tasks (graphic design). But then, as a designer I had to test my apps in emulated environment, and the power of my machine became handy. Then I made several videos for my music band, and my machine worked awesome for this goals, very fast work with video and audio, compressor working very fast, final cut also running smooth. Now I am learning Maya, for my personal purposes, and everything is easy, fast, just as it should be and as I like it. So now I can say, that this machine is not overkill at all, it is perfect, absolutely perfect for my needs.

So what I am saying - even if a machine looks overkill now, you never know what tasks it would be able to perform for you in future. Life is unpredictable =)

Plus, having some resources that you are not using is very pushing and motivating. It was a partial reason for me to start learning 3D.

So I vote for keeping a MP. Good luck with any decision that you make.

As much as many (including me) would love to own your new beast, unless you need the expandability of the Pro (which will, IMHO, trump any Thunderbolt options for many years) having two nice 27" displays sounds like the winner for you. Plus the top-end iMac would probably be faster for single-threaded tasks.

I vote to keep it. From your description the 'Pro' will handle your demands and then some. Plus, your parents took the time to have a discussion with a tech to ensure they got you a gift that meets your needs and then some. I'm sure your parents also wanted to surprise you with the best computer you could get so there's that to consider as we'll.

I don't want to sound rude but it seems to me that you just want 'more' stuff. I say keep the 'Pro', and use your own money to add peripherals. After all, it's the thought that counts more then how much stuff you can get.

Merry Christmas and enjoy that kick ass computer!!!!!'

Id say it comes down to desk space. The mac pro is "better" but you have to find somewhere to put it. If space is a premium than it would be worth getting it exchanged for an imac.

You should defiantly keep the pro.

apple_iBoy said:

I get by fine with my laptop and, like I said, the major disk storage space is the only real reason I have a desktop to begin with. That computer sits in an unused office in my house and I rarely go in there to use it directly. It kind of acts like a server for me.

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It sounds to me that if the expansion is of no value to you, you'd be better off having something else that's more efficient and less power hungry to serve up files. An iMac and a Mac Mini with some external drives attached would use a lot less power than the Pro.
Receiving a brand new 3 year old computer as a gift sure is a mixed blessing.

Man, the OP comes in here, is very respectful, and then gets accused of being a troll and being spoiled. He's done nothing but be thankful and respectful!

To the OP: You are asking the Mac Pro crowd what to do, and you will get a majority of people who say "keep the Mac Pro" because that's what they like and want. You'd probably get a different mix of answers in the iMac section.

Since you use both an iMac and a Mac Pro, you are probably in a good position to answer the question yourself.

I thoroughly agree that by exchanging (or not!) you will be doing the best with the investment that your parents made for you. Do it, be happy, and let them know how you exchanged it if you do so. They'll understand.

Enjoy it!

apple_iBoy said:

Your sense of smell's off buddy. Thanks for the useful feedback.

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Dominated

Your computer most likely cost $3799.00. Add in tax, applecare if you got it, shipping or w.e.... Thats almost a 4000 DOLLAR COMPUTER.

And yea, that mac pro is a complete waste of money. The only reason to use it is if you work for a company that requires a licensed copy of OS X, and an extremely powerful computer.

A PC build with the same specs can cost up to 1000 dollars less if not more, you can hackintosh if you want.. etc.

The only reason i can think of a person needing that is if they just must have OS X, but also want to bootcamp and use a top end GPU.

92jlee said:

Sweet mother of christ a 12core mac pro for christmas?! Wow! You lucky so and so.

Personally I'd keep the Pro. My personal reason which wouldn't suit everyone;

- 12 cores of power! Always like to boast about having 8 cores, let alone 12.
- More ram than an iMac (96 top end vs 32?)
- will last longer than an iMac (i'm on a 1,1 which is 5/6 years old - todays Apple stuff seems to be alot more consumer based when it breaks it breaks)
-continue to upgrade the Pro vs iMac, more disks, graphics card and even processor.
- I like real desktops, plus you have a 1,1 so I assume you have all the monitors, keyboard blah blah.. Might as well just replace the 1,1.

Vote with your wallet (or mothers wallet in this case) if you take it back and swap it for an iMac you are basically telling Apple you don't want a real desktop computer, you want an anorexic laptop on a stand..

Yeah you wont have thunderbolt.. but so? You don't with the 1,1 and you didnt expect this pro, its a gift. Plus do you really need thunderbolt?...

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What? Are you serious? Vote with your wallet?

If he keeps the Pro he is telling apple he wants to get slammed with overpriced hardware. And my god, from the sound of the OP there is no way he will ever, and i mean EVER, use all 12 cores.


@OP: you do what you think is best, but know that the Macrumors official site stance on the 2012 mac pro is that its "outdated" and it recommends waiting for 2013. Just ask yourself this, do you really need a 4000 dollar computer, and how much computer do you think you would get from a PC that you build that cost 4000 dollars. Do you do high end graphic rendering? Do you play video games? Do you word process and cruise facebook?

as far as i'm concerned, unless you work for lucas arts or something, that 4k Mac pro is not worth it.

Although not quite as lush as a 12-core, I got a quad core 3.2 for xmas and there is no way in hell it's been traded for a stinky skinny ugly iMac...

I've put two SSD's Intel 520s' 120GB in raid 0 as boot, 2 WD Black 1TB as raid 0 for data, a 250GB drive as TM for boot drive, a 160GB drive as clone for boot drive, and the original 1TB drive is TM back for data, I've also put the 2 SSD on a Velocity x2 PCIe card, caldigit usb3 PCIe card, LG BD M-Disk RW and stuck in 24GB of RAM.

Its purring along nicely for me, when it's out of warranty I'll put the HEX processor in it.

Thunderbolt....heard enough of it, don't like it done need it, got two GIG Ethernets I can use to hook up any external storage I need, got USB3, got FW 800...

only thing that is missing is the ML upgrade I'm still waiting on

iMac is .... not for me even more so now i have this baby running

I can relate to the OP (except I paid for mine ). I am a Doctoral student and an Engineer. I have a very similar set-up to his new present (see photo), I have 12-cores, 32 GB of RAM, the 5870 Video card, and 8TB of HD space. I do all of my research and school work on the Mac side, and run Parallels with Windows 7 Pro OS for Autodesk, MS Visio, and MS Project. Each OS has its own 27" monitor and workspace. It is truly the best of both worlds . I could not be happier. OBTW I have had mine for about a week, moving up from a loaded 2011 IMac. And OP, I have a MacBookPro 15" Retina with a 27" Thunderbolt monitor sitting right next to the MacPro, the monitors are identical in resolution, color space and brightness, if you did not know which was which you could not tell which was TB and which was MiniDP.

http://i1279.photobucket.com/albums/y538/mark_wentling/photo1_zps84579976.jpg

I'm going to approach this from a different angle.

You weren't expecting a Pro for christmas am I right?

So.. out of the blue you get a pro given to you, what difference does it make if it doesn't do what you want it to do? It was given to you?

Its like saying I was given a ferrari, but I want to trade it in for a honda and some nice wheels because 1 - I'll never use all that speed and 2 - the ferrari doesn't have 4 seats (aka thunderbolt - handy to have sometimes but most of the time you wont use it, just like 4 seats!)

Or I suppose the other option would be take it back, get the money - if you need it, which I kind of assume you have everything you could possibly need... Keep the money for the 2013 pro? If the parents ask just point at your 1,1 and tell them thats it - you cant tell the difference from the outside!

92jlee said:

I'm going to approach this from a different angle.

You weren't expecting a Pro for christmas am I right?

So.. out of the blue you get a pro given to you, what difference does it make if it doesn't do what you want it to do? It was given to you?

Its like saying I was given a ferrari, but I want to trade it in for a honda and some nice wheels because 1 - I'll never use all that speed and 2 - the ferrari doesn't have 4 seats (aka thunderbolt - handy to have sometimes but most of the time you wont use it, just like 4 seats!)

Or I suppose the other option would be take it back, get the money - if you need it, which I kind of assume you have everything you could possibly need... Keep the money for the 2013 pro? If the parents ask just point at your 1,1 and tell them thats it - you cant tell the difference from the outside!

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Because he loves and cares about his Mother, and her financial well being? Perhaps he feels inclined to be a functioning member of his families financial decision making process?

Its not like he wants to pawn the damn thing for blow.

My opinion is what you paid for it, nothing and yet here I go.

Keep the MP. Take the HDs that have your music out of the 1,1 and put them in the new MP. Did that for my wife and for myself and didn't lose a thing.

Go ahead and trick it out with memory while the memory is still pretty cheap.

Thank your parents for a wonderful gift. Ya, it would be nice if the sales reps at Apple did not talk folks in to more than someone needs but that is also the nature of sales. This is not exclusive to Apple though.

As a side note my wife was going to get me a new computer for my 50th. But I could not let her do that. Instead she got the new computer, I got her 2008 3,1 and she upgraded the drives and memory for me. We both got what we wanted and needed. The 2008 just got a USB 2.0 board today and I'm more than happy with it still.

I've never been a fan of all in one computers and that is what a iMac is.

Merry Christmas,

Just out of curiosity (sorry if already posted) what CPUs did they sell her (GHz)?

seems like you know your own needs quite well... if your parents won't take offense to the exchange, may as well get what you want.

If you only need TBolt for displays, you can always buy the Korean panels which are basically the same panel and then you also have more input options such as DVI or HDMI on those panels. You can also get 2 for the price of one. They don't look as nice as the TBD but will do the same job, if not more.

The ability to upgrade CPU/GPU, which I don't think the CPUs will need to be upgraded for a long time, the GPU should always be upgradable if you ever need to. You can also SLI them if you ever want to game in windows. The ability to add SSDs or HDDs are also cheaper compared to TB alternatives.

Why not, for now, trade it up for a couple of 27 incher displays, and a well dressed quad-core iMac? (16GB RAM, Fusion, etc.) You might want the video processing power but you didn't mention games, etc.

This way, when the refresh occurs (made in America, too maybe) you'll not feel like you own a (new) dinosaur.

Can i just say, how much money do your folks have???? My folks would NEVER give me a present of that expense. Why don't you exchange it for the iMac and give the remaining cash back to your parents?

You're not going to like it but

Unless you have a Fat Birthday or something coming up where you can get the New Mac Pro for 2013: Ask and make sure the Gift Card will last a year, and wait for the Mac Pro 2013, if you get scared you can try MacMall (maybe they'll use the gift card) last minute for a left over MP model, if Apple does something screwy like not make a 2013 Mac Pro.

While you are waiting like some of us, you can buy some Thunderbolt drives or accessories, that you should be able to use with you AIR that should hold you over...

But you want something new NOW don't ya?

EOL