Bugs in Mac Pro?

[I'mAMac]

If I get the Mac Pro I want to be sure it is not a victim of early market bugs. Has anyone heard of any? and if you get yours before me (which you probably will) could you plz post it? even though i'll probably order it in 2 days cause i NEED a computer

 

[macgeek2005]

The one and only "Rev A. Bug" that was found in the Mac Pro, was one in which you needed to reseat the ram cards to be able to boot up the machine.

It happened to the guys over at some reviewers website or something. When they got the machine, it wouldn't start up, and they reseated the ram cards, and haven't had a problem since.

Other than that, no. There are no problems with it.

 

[I'mAMac]

ok good thanks

 

[danny_w]

Not a bug exactly, but something to be aware of: I believe there is a SATA driver problem if you plan to use it with XP and Bootcamp. There is a big thread about it on this forum. There are now workarounds but I believe they are rather involved.

 

[kered22]

You'll also want to avoid using the migration assistant if moving over from a PowerPC Mac. A user on the Apple forums had all manner of problems with his 3rd drive bay, moved the hard drives around, it still stuck in bay 3, but then started affecting other drive bays. Turns out the migration was about 5 machines old, all of them before that PPC.

Like MacGeek said though, the Pros been very bug free which is great to hear. There was one DOA MacPro reported on Macintouch, they tried re-seating the RAM riser cards (which worked for Macintouch' DOA MacPro) and that was a no go. So he had to send it back to Apple.

 

[MacsAttack]

So far I have seen very few issues - which is why I have ordered a Mac Pro myself.

1. I've seen one report of a DoA

2. A handful of people have had to re-seat the memory risers after delivery.

3. One report of an overheating 7300 video card - probably a manufacturing defect.

4. Some reports of instability that can be resolved by reinstalling the OS from the DVD supplied - apparently the build on some shipping machines is earlier then that on the DVD.

5. Some reports of software instability caused by migrating software from other Macs.

6. One or two people reporting excess noise from one of the fans - replacment required.

7. Some people finding the system slower than they expected - usually due to a combination of running software under rosseta with only 1 GB of memory. Possibly made worse by Spotlight indexing at the same time on out-of-the-box systems.

Just a few issolated issues. Vast majority of people sound happy.

Two points to note...

1. Some issues getting SATA drivers to install for Windows XP. A work around has now been found to this. By the time the final version of Bootcamp is released as part of Leopard I expect this will have been resolved.

2. Late in development of the Woodcrest Xeon CPUs Intel (or more exactly the manufacturers who had been given samples of the chips) found some problems with using the CPUs in conjunction with hardware RAID support build into the support chipsets. Possibly as a result, Apple does not make use of the hardware RAID option in this version of the Mac Pro. Later revisions may use this feature once it it working - but I doubt the revision A will be able to "activate" the feature. That is of course pure speculation and I don't see it as a reason not to get what otherwise looks like an excelent machine.

Of course it is too early to say what kind of long-term problems may exist. However given the relativly untroubled history of the Intel-powered iMac and Mac Mini it looks like Apple have done a good job on their desktop systems.

 

[macgeek2005]

So far I have seen very few issues - which is why I have ordered a Mac Pro myself.

1. I've seen one report of a DoA

2. A handful of people have had to re-seat the memory risers after delivery.

3. One report of an overheating 7300 video card - probably a manufacturing defect.

4. Some reports of instability that can be resolved by reinstalling the OS from the DVD supplied - apparently the build on some shipping machines is earlier then that on the DVD.

5. Some reports of software instability caused by migrating software from other Macs.

6. One or two people reporting excess noise from one of the fans - replacment required.

7. Some people finding the system slower than they expected - usually due to a combination of running software under rosseta with only 1 GB of memory. Possibly made worse by Spotlight indexing at the same time on out-of-the-box systems.

Just a few issolated issues. Vast majority of people sound happy.

Two points to note...

1. Some issues getting SATA drivers to install for Windows XP. A work around has now been found to this. By the time the final version of Bootcamp is released as part of Leopard I expect this will have been resolved.

2. Late in development of the Woodcrest Xeon CPUs Intel (or more exactly the manufacturers who had been given samples of the chips) found some problems with using the CPUs in conjunction with hardware RAID support build into the support chipsets. Possibly as a result, Apple does not make use of the hardware RAID option in this version of the Mac Pro. Later revisions may use this feature once it it working - but I doubt the revision A will be able to "activate" the feature. That is of course pure speculation and I don't see it as a reason not to get what otherwise looks like an excelent machine.

Of course it is too early to say what kind of long-term problems may exist. However given the relativly untroubled history of the Intel-powered iMac and Mac Mini it looks like Apple have done a good job on their desktop systems.

Holy flying spider-monkeys! That post made me cry!!!

 

[amin]

Holy flying spider-monkeys! That post made me cry!!!

I thought the post was rather reassuring.

 

[stevo86]

I thought the post was rather reassuring.

agreed, that post was extremely reassuring !!

 

[I'mAMac]

I thought the post was rather reassuring.

Yea usually there are tons more.
Also, does that SATA thing happen on most mac pros that are also running windows or just a few?

 

[macgeek2005]

Yea usually there are tons more.
Also, does that SATA thing happen on most mac pros that are also running windows or just a few?

It happens on every single one. It's a driver issue, not a luck issue.

 

[stevo86]

Yea usually there are tons more.
Also, does that SATA thing happen on most mac pros that are also running windows or just a few?

i think it's all the mac pro's, but it seems to be a simple work around to get them running at full speed

 

[I'mAMac]

alright just gotta wait for the drivers. any idea when they may be coming out?

 

[stevo86]

with Leopard at the latest

 

[Mr. Mister]

Yeah, at the absolute latest. Right now Apple has said that they're aware of it and working on it, and have likely been pressured from any sort of "let 'em pay for Leopard to get it" evil logic by the release of workarounds.

 

[I'mAMac]

If you do the workaround thing, do you need the drivers? or just get them to be safe?

 

[ender78]

Holy flying spider-monkeys! That post made me cry!!!

Which part? If a Rev B/C? mobo has hardware raid, I would push Apple to replace it under AppleCare.

 

[MacsAttack]

Which part? If a Rev B/C? mobo has hardware raid, I would push Apple to replace it under AppleCare.

Had Apple provided RAID only to find it did not work then you would have a point.

Right now it is only speculation as to whether Apple could (or intended) to include RAID. Circumstances mean that they can't. With the first Mac Pro refresh that may change, but existing owners are not going to get a free upgrade if Apple makes such a move.

 

[macgeek2005]

I personally don't care about RAID. I just use my hard drives seperetaly, like a normal person. If RAID gives me any advantage over the way I do things, than it's not an advantage i'd be able to take advantage of.

 

[Mr. Mister]

How about cutting hard drive access times in half? That doing it for you?

 

[ammon]

How about cutting hard drive access times in half? That doing it for you?

Actually, my favorite part is the redundancy! (raid 5) There is something about knowing that I have to loose 2 drives before I loose any data that keeps me happy...

 

[macgeek2005]

How about cutting hard drive access times in half? That doing it for you?

And I can't RAID the drives in my Mac Pro? I could in my G4.......

 

[iMeowbot]

And I can't RAID the drives in my Mac Pro? I could in my G4.......

Software RAID (the kind you can do on any Mac) wouldn't be affected by that problem.

 

[macgeek2005]

Software RAID (the kind you can do on any Mac) wouldn't be affected by that problem.

Whatever. My hard drives run fast enough for me. I don't need RAID. I'm really not that interested in it.

I don't even know how it works........ It's something about like combining 2 hard drives to appear as one volume, right? Why would that speed things up?

 

[bob5820]

How about cutting hard drive access times in half? That doing it for you?

Doubtfull, HD benchmarks are BS. It's real world performence that matters. I've never seen much of a realworld performance from RAID. I've also seen the argument that a striped RAID array is twice as likely to fail, if one of the drives goes it takes out the entire array. The fact is when it come to performance the math isn't as easy as multiplying by 2, there is overhead that needs to be acounted for. The only situation where I have seen a true benefit from RAID, is on servers. And these have highend hardware raid solutions.