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2009 Mac Pro purchase satisfaction poll
- Thread starter Boneoh
- Start date
- Sort by reaction score
I suspect the people who purchased an 09 MP did so because they are satisfied or at least neutral on the value. It would be unusual to buy something if you didn't see the value in it... so for those that purchased one and aren't satisfied with the value, I'm very curious why you purchased it? We're you disappointed with the value before you pulled the trigger but did so anyway or did your disappointment follow after you purchased?
I think we should discuss whether or not the Mac Pro is overpriced.
The poll question was phrased as price/value, so that is the basic goal. We are getting a significant percentage of dissatisfied votes. I'm not a statistician, but the numbers tend to speak for themselves. If I was an Apple exec, I would Not want to hear that 15% of my customers were not satisfied. Let's see how the numbers change as more buyers enter their votes.
I want to hear from the dissatisfied voters... When you buy something, you are effectively saying you find sufficient value in it for you to make the purchase. No sane person buys something if there's insufficient value in it.
To have purchased something and not be satisfied with the value implies one of two things:
1. It's not performing to expectations. Which is an indication that it's either got a problem that should be corrected or not enough research was done prior to purchase.
2. It's more than you wanted to pay but you had no choice. I'm not sure how you could be forced to buy a Mac Pro.
Merely wishing it cost less, is not a legitimate reason to be dissatisfied with the value.
I'm going to have to go ahead and disagree with you on number one there....
I've come across products in my life that have not preformed to expected levels. Especially with a product in this price range what you end up using for research is a lot of other peoples opinions. Maybe you're lucky enough to try one out, but just like a car, you can't drive every road on a test drive. I would suggest that people dissatisfied with the purchase due to misrepresented performance probably shouldn't have been in the workstation market anyways.
I'm going to have to go ahead and disagree with you on number one there....
I've come across products in my life that have not preformed to expected levels. Especially with a product in this price range what you end up using for research is a lot of other peoples opinions. Maybe you're lucky enough to try one out, but just like a car, you can't drive every road on a test drive. I would suggest that people dissatisfied with the purchase due to misrepresented performance probably shouldn't have been in the workstation market anyways.
If someone is dissatisfied with the performance, good luck finding satisfaction with something else.
I think if "value" wasnt considered in this poll I think that everyone would vote satisfied with their octo/quad mac pros.
BUT value does matter to some people so its not a great buy as to how much the previous gen was offering with its performance.
I'm just still surprised that a 2.8GHz 8 core 2008 model (you can buy one for $2499 right now from places like b&h photos) is just about the same in speed as the 2.66GHz 8 core Nehalem model ($4699). (Not much difference in speed wise but a big difference pricing).
And the people who bought the Nehalem over the 2008 model and paid the huge extra premium was chose the Nehalem just because its architecture is new and different but both machines get the job done in about the same amount of time.
And many people argue that SL is not going to make much of a difference in the Nehalem machines as to the Harpertown machines so to conclude from that argument, I think there is no real future proofing justification when purchasing a Nehalem over the 2008 models.
BUT value does matter to some people so its not a great buy as to how much the previous gen was offering with its performance.
I'm just still surprised that a 2.8GHz 8 core 2008 model (you can buy one for $2499 right now from places like b&h photos) is just about the same in speed as the 2.66GHz 8 core Nehalem model ($4699). (Not much difference in speed wise but a big difference pricing).
And the people who bought the Nehalem over the 2008 model and paid the huge extra premium was chose the Nehalem just because its architecture is new and different but both machines get the job done in about the same amount of time.
And many people argue that SL is not going to make much of a difference in the Nehalem machines as to the Harpertown machines so to conclude from that argument, I think there is no real future proofing justification when purchasing a Nehalem over the 2008 models.
Wow! Currently 1/4 of all Octad buyers are dissatisfied. I sure can understand it! When you charge that much there are expectations formed. When you charge "that much more" over last years model people expect the performance to follow suit. When it doesn't (which it obviously doesn't!) it causes dissatisfaction.
But man, that's bad. So even the people who usually con themselves into thinking (by justification) that their box is what it was knocked up to be are having to be honest. I didn't expect that one.
But man, that's bad. So even the people who usually con themselves into thinking (by justification) that their box is what it was knocked up to be are having to be honest. I didn't expect that one.
I agree it's bad but also bizarre... I don't know how anyone could have been mislead about the performance of the Octo or the price... and therefore the value. The first day of launch, there were tons of benchmarks indicating exactly what the performance was with a variety of different workloads.
Again, I'm confused as to how someone could buy an Octo Mac Pro and later become dissatisfied with the value
. The alternative that they were dissatisfied with the value but made the purchase anyway is even more perplexing. It is an eye-opener. Also a head-scratcher. There is a significant percentage of dissatisfied users. And almost as many that are in the middle, neither ... nor ...
From my personal experience, I went from a 3 year old MacBook Pro to the 09 MP. Things that used to take 10 minutes take 2 or 3. But I suppose if I had an 08 MP, I would be very disappointed...
From my personal experience, I went from a 3 year old MacBook Pro to the 09 MP. Things that used to take 10 minutes take 2 or 3. But I suppose if I had an 08 MP, I would be very disappointed...
Really guys? I more than half expected it. Here there are a few truth-tellers but on most other sites I've skimmed "the Nehalem is a billion trillion times faster and super-advanced space-age technology". Even here, poster after poster advises to buy the 2.26 quad over (or as equal to) the 2008 2.8 and if no one steps in the guy (about 40% of the time) posts back with "OK I just ordered it". I usually feel like: Let the Buyer Beware & They get what they deserve. Even the 2.66 Octad is not a 100% (in all areas) improvement over the 2.8. Add to that hype the fact that for very light work the Gx models felt just as fast and that at many things an iMac could actually feel faster and it's a recipe for dissatisfaction.
Of course the poll is young and now I guess many will answer just to skew it in one direction or another so it's not final yet either.
Of course the poll is young and now I guess many will answer just to skew it in one direction or another so it's not final yet either.
The only conclusion that I came up for myself with my own contemplations from buying a Nehalem Mac Pro as to the previous generation is that it has a new architecture, which is about it.
Well and the occasional back of my head thinking, hopefully Snow Leopard will draw out the differences in overall speed but then again hope is a really negative word to begin with. Hope is like the same meaning as being wishful.
I voted "Dissatisfied with octo" mainly for it's noise level, not for performance. Comparing to 2008 octo it is much louder and comparable to average PC.
So, in short, 2008 is fast, quiet and expensive, and 2009 is fast, loud and enormously expensive. Therefore 2008 more satisfying than 2009.
So, in short, 2008 is fast, quiet and expensive, and 2009 is fast, loud and enormously expensive. Therefore 2008 more satisfying than 2009.
So the sound of the fans tipped the scales to dissatisfied?
BTW, welcome to the forums... another frog!
(Our other resident frog is small... 10E-9 small! )From what I've seen on several sites, like barefeats, even the 2,26 octo ist faster than the 2,8GHz octo 2008.
Can you please proof your assumption? I'm going to buy a Pro next month but I am still wondering about which model, and if over 1000$ are worth the optional 2,66GHz processors.
Bought the Quad because it was faster at single threaded apps over the base 2.26 octo and voted 'neither'.
Pros:
1. It's not a laptop pretending to be a desktop
2. RAID options
3. 8GB Ram
4. Upgradable GFX card options (looking at you GTX285)
5. Quad Core so if we do get more multi-threaded apps soon it will take advantage of them.
6. More ports. I've got lots of accessories (printer, tablet, keyboard, hard drives etc)
Cons:
1. Overpriced. The Quad 2.66 chip + case + 3GB ram + $30 GFX card don't equal $2,499. Could have been released at $1,899. (and still made profit)
2. Only 4 DDR3 slots. Competitors offer in multiples of THREE (6/12)
3. Came with nvidia gt120 card which is a joke. Has display port -> DVI issues and doesn't even support native resolutions with DVI ->HDMI like my iMac did with a ATI 2600!
4. If I let it sleep on it's own everything freezes when it wakes. I found out this is a common issue.
5. Have to run SMC Fan control otherwise it lets the insides get up to 70C before it ramps them up from the default. (60 is too high IMHO)
So there you go pretty even on the Pro's and Con's side for the most part which is why I gave it the 'neither' vote.
Pros:
1. It's not a laptop pretending to be a desktop
2. RAID options
3. 8GB Ram
4. Upgradable GFX card options (looking at you GTX285)
5. Quad Core so if we do get more multi-threaded apps soon it will take advantage of them.
6. More ports. I've got lots of accessories (printer, tablet, keyboard, hard drives etc)
Cons:
1. Overpriced. The Quad 2.66 chip + case + 3GB ram + $30 GFX card don't equal $2,499. Could have been released at $1,899. (and still made profit)
2. Only 4 DDR3 slots. Competitors offer in multiples of THREE (6/12)
3. Came with nvidia gt120 card which is a joke. Has display port -> DVI issues and doesn't even support native resolutions with DVI ->HDMI like my iMac did with a ATI 2600!
4. If I let it sleep on it's own everything freezes when it wakes. I found out this is a common issue.
5. Have to run SMC Fan control otherwise it lets the insides get up to 70C before it ramps them up from the default. (60 is too high IMHO)
So there you go pretty even on the Pro's and Con's side for the most part which is why I gave it the 'neither' vote.
There's just no way the 2.26 competes in general terms with the 2.8. The 2.66 octad does compete though, with the 2.8. The only time the 2.26 approaches the 2.8 is in either of two cases:
- All cores are saturated to ~100% and the code running is heavily cache dependent.
- A single core is saturated to ~100% and the code running is heavily cache dependent.
The new Nehalem processors have better and faster cacheing and they have a faster RAM throughput via an on-board controller. Intel's own documentation reflects all of these findings. Have a search. I haven't seen much on the Barefeats site that I didn't deem "questionable". Other sites may be worse or better.
Also like RebootD, if faced with a choice between the 2.26 Octad and the 2.66 Quad I would certainly choose the 2.66 Quad - unless I was spending many hours every day rendering 3D or video encoding.
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So as the poll stands right now:
About one third of 09 Octad owners are not satisfied.
About one fifth of 09 Quad owners are not satisfied.
About one fifth of 09 Quad owners are not satisfied.
If there weren't other prices (or the great value of the 08 MP) to be considered, I think we'd see much higher satisfaction. It just felt like such a step back in terms of price/performance...I'm now very interested in seeing what'll happen with the next mac pro, because I expect the hardware to change more in that revision. That said, I do think the performance will be enhanced a good deal by SL, but anything's possible at this point. Be nice if someone with a developer preview of SL weighed in.
Chalk me up as an extremely satisfied 09' octo owner. Super duper, extra satisfied with luscious happy cherries of awesome value on top. I want to put on some Barry White, lay my Mac Pro down by the fireplace and make sweet aluminum love to it till the sun comes up.