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all the quad core penryn people...

fluidedge said:
and of course you'll have forgotten to de-intelace it so you'd have to do it again! :p
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haha! been there.
as for 4 or 8 core. of course 8. doesn't owning a 4 core mac pro make it sound less "pro"? it's like going to a restaurant and only ordering the side dishes. incomplete in a way.
 
yeh but inflation has gone up too, as has the cost of new technology and disposible income - i'd be surprised if apple hadn't increased prices wouldn't you?

Prices of cars and groceries have gone up too, fuel too. Everything goes up.
 
fluidedge said:
yeh but inflation has gone up too, as has the cost of new technology and disposible income - i'd be surprised if apple hadn't increased prices wouldn't you?

Prices of cars and groceries have gone up too, fuel too. Everything goes up.
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the wife's demands also goes up. :(
 
Hi people !

I was asking myself the same question, but I went the single quad way.
Using my adc student discount, the difference between the single and the dual quad was only 380 euros, so it was tempting to go 8 cores.
But since the single quad will be enough for my needs (I was initially falling for the dark side of the force - overclocked q6600 hack1nt0sh...), I finally listened to reason an ordered the single 2.8 with a 8800gt (well, as much as someone is listening to reason making an Apple purchase :) )

The only thing that could have made me order the 8 core is the idea that my system would have been more future-proof, with more and more apps takind advantage of the 8 cores. But I think that in my case the benefit of the 4 additional cores would have been limited by hard disk and memory bandwidth (since I rarely do CPU intensive tasks that don't need lots of memory access). So I decided to save those 380 euros.

And BTW, expected to ship by Feb 19. and delivered by Feb 21.
 
9Charms said:
100% agree.

Save the $500 and put it towards the new 32-core machine in 4 years time.

Remember, your computer is a depreciating asset. It will not hold it's value overtime, nor will it get faster over time. Don't buy more than what you actually need right now. You can't accurately predict your own future, so don't try to buy a computer with more horse power "just in case."

New, more powerful machines come out at cheaper prices all the time.
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That's exactly how I felt about it also. I just got my quad Mac Pro, and I know that I won't even touch its abilities with most things that I do. Encoding, of course, is extremely processor intensive, but aside from that my photo editing doesn't take up much.

It's a brilliant machine. And I also plan on holding onto that extra 500$ for a future computer.
 
fluidedge said:
yeh but inflation has gone up too, as has the cost of new technology and disposible income - i'd be surprised if apple hadn't increased prices wouldn't you?

Prices of cars and groceries have gone up too, fuel too. Everything goes up.
Click to expand...

Umm, no. The price of computer technology goes down...

Price of a 19" LCD 4 years ago - $600+. Today you can get a 24" LCD for $499.
Price of a iPod 4 years ago $399, for 20gb. Today $249 for 80GB.
Price for an entry level Sun Server about 4 years ago $5K. Price today $1200.

Except as I said for Apple:

Price for the entry level Apple tower 4 years ago $1499. Price today $2799

I'm just stating the trend...

BTW: I'm trying to make up my own mind on whether to go for a single Quad Core or dual Quad Core.
 
is the real choice between the standard dual quad with the 2600 or the single quad with the 8800 - knowing that the single is still a few hundred cheaper.

What is the better solution of the 2? In my head should be easier and more likely to upgrade the video card vs the processor.
 
ziwi said:
is the real choice between the standard dual quad with the 2600 or the single quad with the 8800 - knowing that the single is still a few hundred cheaper.

What is the better solution of the 2? In my head should be easier and more likely to upgrade the video card vs the processor.
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It would have to be 1 x Quad and 8800GT for me I'm afraid.
 
I have a quad with 6gb of ram and 2 x 750gb spinpoints in raid 0. I don't game, I don't encode video, and I don't do any sound work. I'm a marketing guy so it's email, browser, tons of terminal windows, and occasional photoshop. This thing is lightning. I have not come close to utilizing both cores. The extra ram and hdd's have made 10x the difference a second 4 core processor would have made.
 
fluidedge said:
yeh but inflation has gone up too, as has the cost of new technology and disposible income - i'd be surprised if apple hadn't increased prices wouldn't you?

Prices of cars and groceries have gone up too, fuel too. Everything goes up.
Click to expand...

not electronics components.

my 4,000 dollar TV's next-gen replacement that's better in every way is 1700 dollars.

computers have not been getting more expensive as the price of cars/groceries/gas has gone up.

the competition is too high. competition...hmn
 
azentropy said:
More powerful? You bet..
Cheaper? Well not by Apple, who have raised their entry level Pro machine price each of the last 4 updates :rolleyes:
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I guess that depends on what part of the world you're in. In Canada, where I live, the prices have been going down each of the last 4 years. But that's more a function of the US dollar devaluation than anything else. So I'm sticking with my original reasoning (ie. that Apple releases better cheaper machines in the future, so save your$500; it will buy more machine later).
 
but you're hardly comparing like with like. The price of old technology goes down, as do old cars and 'last years model' - New technology will always be priced above what the old technology came in at when it was new. It has to, to be seen as an improvement, if new tech came in under the price of the old tech when it was new, people would be suspicious - 'are they using cheaper parts/cheaper labour/poor quality standards'?

So Apple could be making their mac pros with old xeon chips and old slow RAM and old slow HDDs and reduce the price as you'd like them too, but would you buy it? Of course you wouldn't.

But they're making them with brand new xeon chips, barely available to the public and newer RAM, again not readily available before Apple used it in the 2008 MP.

So i think Apple is absolutely right to be charging more for each new product that comes out, compared to the last price point. Apple is not a charity that has to help out it's users - if you want to use the highest quality equipment and latest material you'll have to pay them for it. With each new revision comes more advanced tech, more research, more steps of the processes that all adds up to higher production costs. And hence higher end cost to the consumer. Simple Really
 
azentropy said:
Umm, no. The price of computer technology goes down...

Price of a 19" LCD 4 years ago - $600+. Today you can get a 24" LCD for $499.
Price of a iPod 4 years ago $399, for 20gb. Today $249 for 80GB.
Price for an entry level Sun Server about 4 years ago $5K. Price today $1200.

Except as I said for Apple:

Price for the entry level Apple tower 4 years ago $1499. Price today $2799
Click to expand...

you see here you're not making a fair comparison.

When that 19" LCD came out 4 years ago, it was the latest greatest technology, now it's standard. Look at what the latest technologies are today - ultra thin panels etc, you'll be paying a damn site more than $600 for that sort of tech.

The same goes with the iPod $399 for the 20GB was the biggest best ipod there was, now it is the iPhone which went for $599 on entry.

I don't know much about Sun servers, but i can probably bet that they offer something 'entry level' for eay more than 5k.

Anyway this thread has got off topic
 
Anyone who has one of these machines...

Can you please check the build # of 10.5.1 installed on your Mac Pro? To find the build #, go to Apple Menu --> About this Mac --> More Info button --> Software.

When you click on Software (on the left), the build # will show up on the right, next to the "10.5.1".

On my MacBook Pro, for example, the build # is 9B18.

I want to know this to determine if it's safe to boot the Mac Pro from a disk that was originally created for booting a MacBook Pro.
Thanks.
 
I'd only had my Quad 2.66ghz Edu Pro for a few months and felt a little cheated that I could now get an Octo for less than I had paid.

so about 2 hours after macworld I got my machine on ebay, I sold it and bought the new 2.8ghz edu, an extra 4gb of ram from OWC and paid shipping and fees and I still had £70 left over....didn't feel so cheated lol
 
arcsbite said:
I'd only had my Quad 2.66ghz Edu Pro for a few months and felt a little cheated that I could now get an Octo for less than I had paid.

so about 2 hours after macworld I got my machine on ebay, I sold it and bought the new 2.8ghz edu, an extra 4gb of ram from OWC and paid shipping and fees and I still had £70 left over....didn't feel so cheated lol
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Huh? the 2.66 base was $2499 the new base is $2799 for the starter Octo - I do not see how this is a true statement? the Edu prices on both would have been $2299 and $2599 so it is $300 more either way you slice it. Don't feel cheated.
 
ziwi said:
Huh? the 2.66 base was $2499 the new base is $2799 for the starter Octo - I do not see how this is a true statement? the Edu prices on both would have been $2299 and $2599 so it is $300 more either way you slice it. Don't feel cheated.
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£70
​

Just what I was thinking, but he didn't use US dollar amount. So he must not be in the USA and with the falling of the dollar's value in relationship to other currencies then perhaps that the reason the new machines are cheaper.

 
my 2.66ghz cost me 1499 in uk pounds.
My 2.8ghz cost me 1429 in I'm pounds.

Thanks to it edu discount by 2.66ghz sold at over 1600.
 
fluidedge said:
you see here you're not making a fair comparison.

When that 19" LCD came out 4 years ago, it was the latest greatest technology, now it's standard. Look at what the latest technologies are today - ultra thin panels etc, you'll be paying a damn site more than $600 for that sort of tech.

The same goes with the iPod $399 for the 20GB was the biggest best ipod there was, now it is the iPhone which went for $599 on entry.

I don't know much about Sun servers, but i can probably bet that they offer something 'entry level' for eay more than 5k.

Anyway this thread has got off topic
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I'm not making a fair comparison? Aren't you the one who earlier compared it to the price of groceries and full??? ;-)

19" were not the latest and greatest 4 years ago. 20", 23" and even larger LCD's were available 4 years ago. The 20GB iPod wasn't the latest and greatest, it was the entry in the full sized iPods. Then you say that Sun has entry level way more $5K? So you first complain that my iPod and 19" were the top end (which they were not), and then you complain that my Sun example was too low end???

I picked a random set of technology items to show my point - that price points in every segment have come down. Except as I said for the Mac towers.

You can dispute that Apple has moved the towers even more upscale (but the G4 and G5 processors WERE the top end then), but you can't dispute that 4 years ago Apple had a tower starting at $1499 (they had a single CPU option the was even less custom order) and today their tower starts at $2799 (again there is an option for single CPU customer order).

So as I stated in my original point -
azentropy said:
More powerful? You bet..
Cheaper? Well not by Apple, who have raised their entry level Pro machine price each of the last 4 updates.
Click to expand...

Apple's trend is to raise the price point of it's tower systems. So don't expect to get more technology for less money in the future. Expect to get more technology for more money! ;-)

But back on topic - I re-uped my Apple Developer Select membership, so now I have a new hardware discount. I'm leaning towards the dual processor (8 cores) now just because the discount brings the price difference down to $400 and don't want to regret getting the single CPU down the line. While I don't have to have 8 cores now, for my primary purpose of running multiple VMs of Windows and Linux distros the 8 cores could be useful now.

I'm waiting on the 8800GT to start shipping first...
 
Im reordering with an 8 core. The Quad was ok, but I dunno, for $500 extra I rather just get it.
 
MacRoom said:
BareFeats Compares Quad 2.8GHz vs. the 3.2GHz OctoCore. These results make the Quad 2.8 look like a really bad idea.
Click to expand...

I don't know if I quite agree with you.

Bare feats: The "early 2008" 4-core 2.8GHz Mac Pro is pretty much the equal of the "2006" 4-core 3.0GHz Mac Pro.
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Remember when the 3.0 4-core was about $3200 USD. Wow! Just last month! And people were ponying up a lot of extra money because of all the power of the 3.0 beast. And now you can get the same power, with less power usage, for about a $1000 USD less, with double the ram and Bluetooth to boot. And all that changed in one day: Jan 7, 2008 to Jan 8, 2008.

Bare feats: However, if you plan to run Compressor, After Effects, Photoshop, Cinema 4D, or any app that uses all available cores, we recommend you get the 8-core version of the Mac Pro "Harpertown," regardless of the core frequencies.
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And how many people, other than professionals, actually use the above programs on an intensive basis or for extended periods of time? If time is money to you, then the 8 core is great, but I think too many people are jumping on the band wagon fearing that in a couple of years they won't even be able to get their email or surf the web unless they have at least an 8 core machine.
 
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