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any recommended upgrades for a mac pro?

sparkie1984

sparkie1984

macrumors 68030
Original poster
Dec 20, 2009
2,909
2,227
a small village near London
hi guys,

due to issues ive been having with imacs, ive been in touch with apple and im switching to a mac pro.

now im getting the standard quad core, but can anyone recommend an upgrade thats worth doing? is there much difference between the standard 2.6ghz is this the same as the i5 imac? processor or the upgraded 2.93ghz? apart from a £324 upgrade cost!!! is it worth this? also could i do it at a later date myself?

also is it worth upgrading the graphics through apple? or could i pick up the 4870 card for cheaper than apple offer it?

i really appreciated the help on my last thread so anyone who may know if its worth the cost to jump up to that processor, or maybe its a total rip! i dont need tons and tons of power from it.

oh and also i know it has 3gb ram standard, presumably i could buy an upgrade for cheaper? and any kits recommended, im in the uk if it matters.

thanks for any inputs people :)





ALL DONE AND ORDERED NOW THANKS
 
well i got offered a deal so wasnt too bothered about the refurb in the end, if there was one available at the time though, id of got one.

but i got a standard quad, 6gb ram, ati 4870, wireless card (looks a pain to do it on your own,so thought let someone else deal with it) and the wireless keyboard and mouse.

ive got a 300gb sata disk to use for windows 7, the standard disk for osx and am going to add a 1tb disk to use for all my movies and music etc etc etc...

i couldnt justify the extra cost on the processor to jump up to a 2.93, rather than the 2.66.

also ordered the 24" display and found a display port extension lead from amazon!

now ive got a wait of 7 days!!! which feels like it may as well be a year :eek:
 
I've got a an 09 quad as well, and it's great.

My mods:
-ati + nvidea (4 monitors)
-2x 80 gig intel ssd's (one for mac boot, one for win7 boot), stock hd for storage
-8 gigs ram
-airport, etc...

it's good.

r.
 
whyrichard said:
I've got a an 09 quad as well, and it's great.

My mods:
-ati + nvidea (4 monitors)
-2x 80 gig intel ssd's (one for mac boot, one for win7 boot), stock hd for storage
-8 gigs ram
-airport, etc...

it's good.

r.
Click to expand...

good to know :)

My display has shipped today so may get that today, then the pro is due to ship 27 jan = long time
 
My mods (bought a used 2008 model):

- 2x Intel G2 SSD 80GB in Raid 0 mounted in the optical bay, using the additional SATA ports as Mac OSX bootdisk
- HDD WD Velociraptor as Win7 bootdisk
- another 3.5TB of storage&backup HDD`s
- 16GB RAM
- passive gpu cooler for Geforce 8800GT

Well I think that was it...and all that for the exact same money I was going to spend on a new 2009 MP. I think that will do it for years since I`m not a heavy gamer...the only thing you would want to replace is the graphics card anyway.
 
Wooo

they've shipped my macpro!

Are they built in Ireland? As it says cork,IE?

Also I'm only in the uk but it's still quoting a Friday delivery! Maybe I could go pick it up myself :)

can anyone recommend a good Internal 2tb hard disk as I want to use one for my music/movies and photos! I've heard the western digital caviar blacks I think their called are good??
 
alphaod said:
All are built in China; sometimes they have them in stock in the configuration you ordered in a warehouse nearby.
Click to expand...

oh i see!! was hoping it isnt rolling out of the same factory as the imacs!!! god knows how itll arrive if so



got my serial number, so does that mean its a week 4 of this year? and not a system thats sat on a shelf all year: CK00401L4PD
 
Transporteur said:
They are build in China, but BTO in Cork.

BTW: Delivery from Cork to the UK took exactly one day when I ordered my Pro.
You might be lucky and receive it tomorrow.
Click to expand...

i doubt they do saturday deliveries though :( id never ever be lucky enough to get it tomorrow!

although maybe i will get it sooner than their quoted times? on the apple page it says it may take 5 days to get off the plane, but im guessing thats a standard message to anybody anywhere. as obviously ireland is not a million miles away form us in the uk!

do you think my system is reasonably new anyway then? (just dont like the idea of a system being sat around forever)
 
Of course your system will be new. It's custom build. That's why the order process takes so long.

When I got my Pro it was about 5 days old.
Check coconutIdentityCard when you got your Pro.
 
edit: its now arrived in: KOELN (COLOGNE), DE

it seems to have flown over my house and gone on a trip! why on earth would they fly it around? :eek:

im sure theres logic to :apple: reasoning somewhere
 
What the heck is it doing in Germany?
Germany has neither a shipping central like the Netherlands, nor is there an assembly location, such like Cork.

Weird...
 
sparkie1984 said:
edit: its now arrived in: KOELN (COLOGNE), DE

it seems to have flown over my house and gone on a trip! why on earth would they fly it around? :eek:

im sure theres logic to :apple: reasoning somewhere
Click to expand...
My Mac Pro (2006) had a nice trip as well. It went from Ireland to Gemany, and then on to Luxembourg before arriving in England. I think it may have taken a trip to France as well though I can't remember.
 
sparkie1984 said:
its crazy!!! what a waste of fuel though.....

stupid apple...... and im purely worried about the environmental impact, absolutely nothing to do with wanting my mac :apple:
Click to expand...

The computers are shipped in large pallets, so many orders are fulfilled at once; it might be nice to send each on individually, but from a business standpoint, it's cheaper to send things in large batches, so makes sense to send it from one point to another and taking a longer waypoint to a final destination simply because of other orders.
 
alphaod said:
The computers are shipped in large pallets, so many orders are fulfilled at once; it might be nice to send each on individually, but from a business standpoint, it's cheaper to send things in large batches, so makes sense to send it from one point to another and taking a longer waypoint to a final destination simply because of other orders.
Click to expand...

Is that an assumption, or do you really know Apple does that with end customers?
I doubt that every Mac Pro buyer has to wait till so many people ordered that a pallet is full again.
You may be absolutely right for shipping the products from China to large warehouses like the Netherlands, Cork, US or large Apple vendors, but I from there, every package leaves separately. No waiting for full palettes, or did you ever see the UPS guy bringing your Pro on a palette with 20 others?
That's highly unlikely.
They are definitely delivered individually.
 
Transporteur said:
You may be absolutely right for shipping the products from China to large warehouses like the Netherlands, Cork, US or large Apple vendors, but I from there, every package leaves separately.
Click to expand...
It's likely that the warehouse (distribution points, such as Netherlands, US,...) get the units in pallets, take them off to label them, and add upgrades as needed, put them back on the pallet, and send that to the carriers closest distribution hub, likely on rail car if there's enough pallets shipped per schedule, otherwise by truck. There'd likely be too many systems out daily to be picked up by step van drivers. But its the carrier's location where they'd be removed from the pallets and separated to be sent to their final destinations.

At least that's how it was done when I worked for UPS during college. ;)
 
which country nanofrog??

surely if it was built in ireland as my serial number says they wouldnt forward it on to yet another country before me receiving it??

id of thought it would get flown to uk, along with any other uk orders, then to your central hub, then onto local depot, then out for collection?
 
sparkie1984 said:
which country nanofrog??
Click to expand...
US.

But UPS does operate internationally, as does FedEx, and DHL. I'd assume their operations/methodologies would be similar, as it's done to ship at the lowest cost. It would depend on location and transportation infrastructure, but it usually started on rail, went through a sorting facility (aka Hub), then to truck or air, depending on how it was contracted (i.e. ground, next day,...).

The freight portion relied on rail for most, if not all of it's journey, given the weight and/or size may be too big/heavy for any other means.

sparkie1984 said:
surely if it was built in ireland as my serial number says they wouldnt forward it on to yet another country before me receiving it??
Click to expand...
It depends on how the routes go. Sometimes it does.

Ground may include multiple truck runs and sort facilities before it hits the last stop (local sort), on to a van, and taken to the owners front door.

sparkie1984 said:
id of thought it would get flown to uk, along with any other uk orders, then to your central hub, then onto local depot, then out for collection?
Click to expand...
Air can be similar to ground as well. Multiple flights and sorts before it makes it to the final facility, where it gets loaded to a van, and dropped off to the recipient.

It can get a bit confusing, as it may not take a direct path. But it is designed to keep the avg. shipping cost down by sharing the loads with as much as possible, rather than running partially full trucks or flights. If they're not loaded, then it's costing them more fuel per unit weight, and more man power and equipemnt costs as well, given there's likely to be more unfull loads being moved.

Ground for example, they'll even hold trucks to fill them before sending them on their way (allow the driver to leave), or they don't move daily. It just depends on the location.
 
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