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Feeling pretty good about my Early 2008 Mac Pro.

TheStrudel

TheStrudel

macrumors 65816
Original poster
Jan 5, 2008
1,134
1
Well, the upgrades came, and they were more interesting than earth shattering. The switch to all FW800 ports is certainly different, but nothing else has changed, ports-wise. I guess we'd have to wait for benchmarking before hearing the answer to this question, but I don't know if we'd be able to get the same performance out of the new machines for the same amount of money we paid for the octocore Penryn machines.

The answer is probably yes, given that the memory architecture, for example, is fundamentally faster, but I'm increasingly convinced these days that upgrades to top hardware will be more incrementally faster and software aimed at multicore processing will make the difference less clear.

We can buy Radeon 4870s. Pleasant news. Probably super expensive, but the option is nice. Anybody else find it quite interesting that all the new cards come with a DVI port and a Mini Displayport? Also interesting that the base card is now the Nvidia and upgrade the Radeon, again. It seems like they're determined to switch it each generational upgrade. Also, the model number is meaningless to me, but I expect somebody has already figured out which PC card it's analogous to. Still, they've defied expectations with that card, which is in itself amusing.

PCIe slots appear to be the same configuration, only they're now all 2.0. Not a huge difference there, either.

Also interesting: RAM upgrades are less prohibitively expensive, apparently. Makes me wonder how much cheaper OWC's upgrades will be when they start selling them.
 
TheStrudel said:
Well, the upgrades came, and they were more interesting than earth shattering. The switch to all FW800 ports is certainly different, but nothing else has changed, ports-wise. I guess we'd have to wait for benchmarking before hearing the answer to this question, but I don't know if we'd be able to get the same performance out of the new machines for the same amount of money we paid for the octocore Penryn machines.

The answer is probably yes, given that the memory architecture, for example, is fundamentally faster, but I'm increasingly convinced these days that upgrades to top hardware will be more incrementally faster and software aimed at multicore processing will make the difference less clear.

We can buy Radeon 4870s. Pleasant news. Probably super expensive, but the option is nice. Anybody else find it quite interesting that all the new cards come with a DVI port and a Mini Displayport? Also interesting that the base card is now the Nvidia and upgrade the Radeon, again. It seems like they're determined to switch it each generational upgrade. Also, the model number is meaningless to me, but I expect somebody has already figured out which PC card it's analogous to. Still, they've defied expectations with that card, which is in itself amusing.

PCIe slots appear to be the same configuration, only they're now all 2.0. Not a huge difference there, either.

Also interesting: RAM upgrades are less prohibitively expensive, apparently. Makes me wonder how much cheaper OWC's upgrades will be when they start selling them.
Click to expand...


No complaints with my purchase. I still love my little guy........... I don't need to upgrade yet........
 
Feeling pretty shafted by my December 2007 8x3.0 Mac Pro, since Apple is apparently going to continue to crap on EFI32 users when it comes to video cards.

I should make a t-shirt: "I gave Apple $10,000 and all I got was an assload of fail"
 
Feeling good about my 8 core early 2008 pro too. I thought I would regret the refresh after buying it late last year.

I'm hoping that we'll be able to flash PC 4870's into EFI 4870's. That would really make my day (I have two at my disposal).

*wink wink* ;)
 
mackmack said:
Feeling good about my 8 core early 2008 pro too. I thought I would regret the refresh after buying it late last year.

I'm hoping that we'll be able to flash PC 4870's into EFI 4870's. That would really make my day (I have two at my disposal).

*wink wink* ;)
Click to expand...

That sounds very appealing. I wonder if Bruinmacs will be doing it and selling them as before on eBay? It'd be nice to complete the upgrade for ~$100-$150 as opposed to ~$200-$350. Though I have to wonder if the Apple 4870s using a Mini Displayport will make that feat tougher.
 
And I still haven't out grown my Mac Pro 1.1 2.66GHz quad. :)

But I am surprised to see that these new machines aren't any less expensive. I know the new Xeon processors aren't cheap, but I'd be interested to learn what Apple's profit margin on these new desktops are.

The new iMacs are clearly a much better value, though they really should be running a quad core as an option.
 
mackmack said:
Feeling good about my 8 core early 2008 pro too. I thought I would regret the refresh after buying it late last year.

I'm hoping that we'll be able to flash PC 4870's into EFI 4870's. That would really make my day (I have two at my disposal).

*wink wink* ;)
Click to expand...

More importantly, hopefully they can be flashed to EFI32. I'll buy from Apple if they make one for EFI32 within a reasonable amount of time, but I'd rather have a pair of dual-link DVI ports than one of those and one of their little failports.
 
Still loving my 2008 too. Bought mine a month ago and not regretting at all. Just wish I could use it with the 24" LED
 
Makes me feel less jealous with my year old pro. Still have plenty of headroom on my system for MY usage. But for me an 8gb quad core iMac would still suffice for year or 2 more.
 
paulg1979 said:
Is that for definite?
Click to expand...
Well that is why they added the displayport for right? Don't see too many other monitors out there that use them.

I hope it also isn't what kills hope for flashing 4870's into MAC versions. The rest of the card seems to be a standard reference layout 4870.
 
Just some initial gut reactions in here

Still taking-in the new Mac Pro specs but my initial reaction is that I'm SOOOO glad I bought the top of the line 2008 Mac Pro just over a month and a half ago. The new specs look nice but my god... those prices are absolutely breathtaking. A new top of the line Mac Pro that doesn't even break the 3GHz specs costs nearly £4500. Bee jeeezus!

I'm sure the new machine crunches some serious data but come on. Those prices are knock out stuff. Ahh... I love my 2008 Mac Pro and 30" cinema display with the Intel X25-Ms. Yum :D

No external design changes either. Ahh... and relax.
 
1 yr later and 1 yr of awesome computing, I'm still feeling good about my purchase.

I just ordered the ATI HD 4870 from the Hong Kong Apple Store which listed HK$2,700 or US$348. Shipping in 5 - 7 weeks.

Will be selling the 8800 GT (I know some buyers).
 
xraydoc said:
And I still haven't out grown my Mac Pro 1.1 2.66GHz quad. :)

But I am surprised to see that these new machines aren't any less expensive. I know the new Xeon processors aren't cheap, but I'd be interested to learn what Apple's profit margin on these new desktops are.

The new iMacs are clearly a much better value, though they really should be running a quad core as an option.
Click to expand...

The components in the $2,499 Mac Pro can be bought retail (including OSX) for under $1,300.
 
Some other tidbits:

The port situation seems to assure that Apple is most definitely NOT deprecating Firewire, as some "analysts" seemed to think - just phasing out old ports, as Apple routinely does. It seems probable that the next revision of Mac Pro won't use DVI ports at all for precisely that reason. It also seems like this move to only 800 ports is in advance of a move to Firewire 3200, or so I hope.

It now uses SATA instead of PATA for optical drives. About time. Now, installing a Blu-Ray drive via SATA won't be a completely unauthorized hardware jury-rig-cable-sling, and instead a simple in and out procedure. Again, something we should have had ages ago, but a nice fix in the here and now.

I wouldn't put it past Apple to implement Blu-ray support in a software update or bundled with Snow Leopard. It seems more likely now with the recent break in licensing arrangements. Or maybe Apple never was planning to do it short of the upgrade to OS 10.6 and the "bag of hurt" was their way of justifying delays. That said, it IS cheaper to do it now, so both facts could be true.

Idle curiosity note: Should the firmware flash be possible, would it then be possible to flash a PC 1 GB 4870? Or a 4870x2? I'm guessing no on the x2, but possibly on the 1 GB card. Either way, the option of having a more silent or more powerful card (or even both?) tickles my fancy. Now for another question: would it be possible to run my existing 8800 GT and the 4870 simultaneously, or am I hitting the window of PCIe power draw? I don't know what the draw is on the new card. Though again, if a PC card had less draw...
 
Oh and it gets even better. The new 4870 card for the 2009 Mac Pro is available as an upgrade kit for the 2008 Mac Pro.

Bliss! :D
 
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