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MacPros with WindowsXP only installed!

Z

zoran

macrumors 601
Original poster
Jun 30, 2005
4,881
136
Ive heard of clients getting a MacPro with WindowsXP only preinstalled (they asked for it this way from the reseler), and not OSX. I recon they must be PC users that dont want to switch to OSX but also cant affort getting the dual dualcore Xeons in the HP or Dell workstations that are available and prefer to get the cheaper MacPro.
But is the MacPro really cheaper and best buy compared to the equivalent workstations?
 
why the hell u wanna do that try boot camp method just google for it....
 
BootCamp is free (beta) from Apple. It allows you to setup a dual-boot system, and provides all the hardware drivers needed (actually burns a CD of them). You will need XP SP2.

The BootCamp Setup Assistant will create a Windows partition on-the-fly (w/o affecting the OS-X partition). If you want to delete the partition and regain the space for the OS-X partition, it will do that on-the-fly also.
 
I know about boot camp but whats that go to do with my topic? :)
 
zoran said:
:confused:
Click to expand...

zoran said:
I know about boot camp but whats that go to do with my topic? :)
Click to expand...

I guess the :confused: indicated you didn't understand about boot camp?

I any event I don't believe Apple sells any systems without OS-X installed. I have heard some vendors pre-intalling Windows, but it would be using BootCamp.

I guess the Windows ONLY was why the responses about BootCamp came along.

The pricing is real: a MacPro is considerably less expensive than a comparably equipped Dell.
 
the confused icon was due to the first comment on my thread. Point is that many prefer to purchase the MacPro cause it seems cheeper than the HP and Del equivalents so many pc users get an apple and still run windows from it and not OSX!.Thats what im asking to be commented and not boot camp! ;)
 
Anandtech's review said something to that effect, or that at was as pricey as other machines with similar specs. Mind you, prices for non-Apple hardware must've dropped since then.

Reminds me of a story I read a while back about a lab that bought a whole lot of pocket calculators because it was cheaper than buying the main chip directly from the manufacturer.
 
zoran said:
Ive heard of clients getting a MacPro with WindowsXP only preinstalled (they asked for it this way from the reseler), and not OSX.
Click to expand...

Folks have been trying to clarify the statement regarding "WindowsXP ONLY preinstalled". Sorry it did get past that, but that statement is in error.

Go to Dell's site and try and build something similar (you can only get close, as there are I/O not available on Dell that are on a Mac). Prices may have fallen somewhat, but the price difference wasn't slim. The last time I did it (soon after the keynote), it was many, many, hundreds of $$ more for a Dell.

And, as you know, once booted to Windows, you are only running windows. Can't even see the Mac partition.
 
why isnt it possible to have only windows installed on a MacPro? I mean without OSX?
 
zoran said:
why isnt it possible to have only windows installed on a MacPro? I mean without OSX?
Click to expand...

It is possible, in fact, with the first vista-on-macs, the only way to put Vista on was deleting OSX, and people struggled with these problems on onmac.net, the website that started the whole boot camp malarkey.
 
It should be possible. But, I don't believe the seller is doing much more than adding WIndows as a 2nd OS. As far as I know, they can't be sold without OS-X.

edit: this reasoning is more of a marketing thing, than technical.

You have to run BootCamp Setup Assistant to get the driver CD, and to create the Windows partition. Once you're booted to Windows, you're on your own. You could remove OS-X and it's partition (using something that does it on-the-fly).

But WHY not have both available? Most people find they migrate further and further from Windows naturally, leaving on those apps that have no counterpart in Mac OS.

I see we're back on the BootCamp related topic... ;)
 
If you're going to need a machine in the class of the Pro / Precision 690 / xw6400 etc, it's a mistake to invest in the Mac Pro if your main use for it is Windows - it's a compromised machine for that purpose. I can't understand the logic of doing what's in the first post beyond a very expensive bragging right. No PCI slots for a start and the Mac Pro is more fragile as it were and more suited for domestic use, certainly when compared to the Dell Precision 690, and perhaps the HP xw series as well. It's the little things - like the separate cooling for more subcomponents, better motherboard, enhanced storage support, better support that you get with the competing products (and now at lower prices for some categories of buyer) over the Pro.

I use mine purely as a regular OS X desktop because I decided the 24" iMac was a bad idea. If a headless iMac was available I would definitely have gone for that instead of the Pro - and I suspect many people here also made the same decision. Apple by upselling simply got you to consider a class of machine you would probably have never considered if you were a Windows user - little wonder so many Macheads are happy with the performance of it, what you're buying is nearly a proper workstation.
 
Sesshi said:
If you're going to need a machine in the class of the Pro / Precision 690 / xw6400 etc, it's a mistake to invest in the Mac Pro if your main use for it is Windows - it's a compromised machine for that purpose. I can't understand the logic of doing what's in the first post beyond a very expensive bragging right. No PCI slots for a start and the Mac Pro is more fragile as it were and more suited for domestic use, certainly when compared to the Dell Precision 690, and perhaps the HP xw series as well. It's the little things - like the separate cooling for more subcomponents, better motherboard, enhanced storage support, better support that you get with the competing products (and now at lower prices for some categories of buyer) over the Pro.

I use mine purely as a regular OS X desktop because I decided the 24" iMac was a bad idea. If a headless iMac was available I would definitely have gone for that instead of the Pro - and I suspect many people here also made the same decision. Apple by upselling simply got you to consider a class of machine you would probably have never considered if you were a Windows user - little wonder so many Macheads are happy with the performance of it, what you're buying is nearly a proper workstation.
Click to expand...

I think you're wrong about this.... in fact I know you are wrong about this.

A bit of history - we are a mixed Mac/PC shop with the PC side being far more heavy duty. Up till now we have always had top end workstations from Dell (650, 670, 690 etc.) or Boxxtech, maxed out with RAM etc.
We now have 4 Mac Pros all with 9GB RAM running 24/7 as fulltime Windows (x64) workstations. They are cooler, quieter, & cheaper than the same spec Dell & obviously as fast (er, it's the same components). It really makes me laugh all this talk of "compromise" etc. The Mac pro is a PC pure & simple. Just because it is sold by Apple doesn't make it any different to a Dell or a HP. The only thing different with an Apple machine is the OS.
If you want to only have Windows on your mac Pro, no problem. Remove the OSX HD, replace it with a new one & just install whatever flavour of Windows you want. Boot Camp is only needed to install Windows on the OSX HD. All of our Mac Pros have 2 HD with both OSX and x64 bootable without using Boot Camp.
 
Not cooler when the system is being run at reasonable capacity: The 690's run cooler in such situations because it has more direct cooling to more key subsystems. No PCI slots. No SAS support. And on the matter of support... well, NBD onsite against 'we might come and pick it up tomorrow'. Do you actually have both or are you just guessing?
 
Sesshi,
Doesnt the MacPro have PCI slots?
Whats SAS?
Whats NBD?
 
Sesshi said:
Not cooler when the system is being run at reasonable capacity: The 690's run cooler in such situations because it has more direct cooling to more key subsystems. No PCI slots. No SAS support. And on the matter of support... well, NBD onsite against 'we might come and pick it up tomorrow'. Do you actually have both or are you just guessing?
Click to expand...

Ok, I just checked the temps of the Mac Pro against a Dell 650 & the Mac is running approx 5°C higher than the Dell... so you are correct. They do have completely different internals though & a much better test would be a Dell with exactly the same CPUs etc.

What do you mean by no PCI slots? Of course standard PC hardware will not (currently) work under OSX but there is no reason why they should cause problems under Windows.

Don't need SAS & in 6 years of having Dells have never once used the NBD support. In fact when coniguring any new Dell I always turn it off first to get a better picture of the true price. I know that Apple support sucks surely that's the same for any Mac so why buy one at all?

You are wrong about price though! Just configure a Dell & you will see!
 
Apple doesn't ship any machines with XP installed, let alone installed as a primary OS.

If you want to get rid of OS X and just do XP on your machine, you'll probably need 2 hard drives for the installation process (one for windows, one for OS X, which you would remove or format later but would need to install bootcamp in the meantime).

Of course, you can't update the Mac firmware via XP, and there's a 2GB RAM cap (which is something they don't like to talk about).

So basically, you'll have a somewhat crippled machine if you choose to do XP only on a Mac.

Is it worth the extra scratch for a Dell? Probably not, unless you NEED more than 2 gigs in XP (you can keep an OS X partition around for updates).
 
zoran said:
Sesshi,
Doesnt the MacPro have PCI slots?
Whats SAS?
Whats NBD?
Click to expand...

The Pro has PCI Express Slots. Many (in fact, almost all bar displays and certain controllers now coming onto the market) add-on PC hardware uses PCI or PCI-X, which the Pro does not provide. From the above post I can surmise that EricTheRed71 probably doesn't have access to a 690 as it's not possible for anyone with reasonable knowledge to make such an elementary mistake.

SAS storage is a high-performance storage subsystem (Serial SCSI) that is ideal for true high-performance workstations with high transactional loads which can cover intensive computational use as well as the more normal server-style database uses. This does use a PCI Express controller on the Dells.

NBD - Next Business Day.

EricTheRed71 said:
You are wrong about price though! Just configure a Dell & you will see!
Click to expand...

And with the number of machines you are supposed to be getting through and being such a long-time Dell user, surely you can get better than sticker price and more in my league?
 
slughead said:
Apple doesn't ship any machines with XP installed, let alone installed as a primary OS.
Click to expand...
I didnt say Apple is shipping machines, but resellers do this to make it convenient from some clients, at least that what i heard, i dont know this of first hand!

slughead said:
Of course, you can't update the Mac firmware via XP, and there's a 2GB RAM cap (which is something they don't like to talk about).
Click to expand...
What do u mean by a 2GB RAM cap?

So what are the other "sideffects" created by having Winxp on a MacPro? (apart from the not beeing able to install pci cards, or the cap thing which will be explained)
 
EricTheRed71 said:
If you want to only have Windows on your mac Pro, no problem. Remove the OSX HD, replace it with a new one & just install whatever flavour of Windows you want.
Click to expand...


I have been thinking of that... With the slick SATA drive bays can't you have OSX on one drive and XP on another and simply pull out the drive you don't want to boot to?
Leave in the drive with the OS you want to use? Hell you would have the other two bays for storage drives as well.
No need to mess with Boot Camp at all.

Is there a reason this wouldn't work?
 
madyaks said:
I have been thinking of that... With the slick SATA drive bays can't you have OSX on one drive and XP on another and simply pull out the drive you don't want to boot to?
Leave in the drive with the OS you want to use? Hell you would have the other two bays for storage drives as well.
No need to mess with Boot Camp at all.

Is there a reason this wouldn't work?
Click to expand...

Premature wear. And after a while, a certain degree of hassle if you do this on a regular basis. Any internal drive caddy system is not intended for very frequent swappage.

HP have a good set-up on some desktops which is probably the best engineered for frequent removal without wearing parts - but even then it would be hassle-ish.
 
Sesshi said:
If you're going to need a machine in the class of the Pro / Precision 690 / xw6400 etc, it's a mistake to invest in the Mac Pro if your main use for it is Windows - it's a compromised machine for that purpose. I can't understand the logic of doing what's in the first post beyond a very expensive bragging right. No PCI slots for a start and the Mac Pro is more fragile as it were and more suited for domestic use, certainly when compared to the Dell Precision 690, and perhaps the HP xw series as well. It's the little things - like the separate cooling for more subcomponents, better motherboard, enhanced storage support, better support that you get with the competing products (and now at lower prices for some categories of buyer) over the Pro.

I use mine purely as a regular OS X desktop because I decided the 24" iMac was a bad idea. If a headless iMac was available I would definitely have gone for that instead of the Pro - and I suspect many people here also made the same decision. Apple by upselling simply got you to consider a class of machine you would probably have never considered if you were a Windows user - little wonder so many Macheads are happy with the performance of it, what you're buying is nearly a proper workstation.
Click to expand...

there is a "headless imac" it's called a mac mini...haha
 
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