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From Mac Pro 1,1 (2006) to MacBook Pro (Oct 2011)

A

atarigraffx

macrumors member
Original poster
Nov 27, 2006
45
0
I'm going mobile and retiring my Mac Pro 1,1 to dedicated render farmer.

What kind of increase in speed can I expect? Every thing from opening apps to rendering 3D animations should see significant boosts right?

My Mac Pro 1,1 had 2 x 2.66 Ghz Dual Core Intel Xeon
and 12 GB 667 MHz DDR2 FB DIMM, NVIDIA GeForce 7300 GT 256 MB

I'm probably going to go with the 15-inch:

2.4GHz quad-core
Intel Core i7
4GB 1333MHz
750GB 5400-rpm1
Intel HD Graphics 3000
AMD Radeon HD 6770M with 1GB GDDR5

I use programs like Maya, Cinema 4D, and After Effects on a daily basis.
 
The only thing you will miss is probably the quietness of your machine when doing CPU intensive stuff (as far as the 2006 Mac Pro is quiet, that is). Other than that, you'll experience an incredible speed increase.
 
motoracer1486 said:
The difference between a Ferrari Scaglietti and a Ford Pinto.
Click to expand...


Really? That's crazy, I always thought my set up was pretty robust. I have rendered out some pretty large scenes in Maya with no problems. My only issue now is portability, I started more freelance work and it's easier to work in co-opt spaces or coffee shops, etc.

I'm really excited then if I can expect the kind of jump you guys are stating. I was also considering buying third party ram from Crucial for 8 GB total. And I haven't researched this much but also possibly removing the Disk Drive and adding a SSD just for running my programs.
 
atarigraffx said:
Really? That's crazy, I always thought my set up was pretty robust. I have rendered out some pretty large scenes in Maya with no problems. My only issue now is portability, I started more freelance work and it's easier to work in co-opt spaces or coffee shops, etc.

I'm really excited then if I can expect the kind of jump you guys are stating. I was also considering buying third party ram from Crucial for 8 GB total. And I haven't researched this much but also possibly removing the Disk Drive and adding a SSD just for running my programs.
Click to expand...

2011 MBP with 8GB + SSD = programs open almost instantly, <10 second restarts, etc. I love this thing. :apple:
 
atarigraffx said:
I'm really excited then if I can expect the kind of jump you guys are stating. I was also considering buying third party ram from Crucial for 8 GB total. And I haven't researched this much but also possibly removing the Disk Drive and adding a SSD just for running my programs.
Click to expand...

Definitely upgrade to 8GB from Crucial...dirt cheap and a nice boost. I'm still not convinced though that the current SSD offerings are worth the money. I just had a 13" Air and I of course loved the speed of the SSD but now that I just switched back to a 15" MBP with the 7,200RPM 750GB drive I haven't noticed it much at all.

I of course plan to upgrade to an SSD but I will be waiting for the next-gen to come around so there are far less compatibility, reliability and cost concerns. Over the next 6-9 months I fully expect the market to have much better choices at a measurable cost reduction. Cost is not my primary concern though, it's the seemingly random problems. I know *some* people don't have any issues so don't flame me over that, but you cannot deny that many do.

Go for a 7200k rpm drive for a few months and upgrade to SSD sometime in 2012. Also if you haven't decided, go for a high-res screen (anti-glare is super nice too).

----------

All that said, if you need a small SSD it's prob not a bad investment. For me I'm looking for at least 500GB + and this is where I expect to see a big price drop over the next few months.
 
@ckeck

You base your SSD speed concern on your experience with Apple branded SSD's, which isn't a good comparison. Apple SSD's are simply quite slow (my 11" MBA's SSD was even slower than a 7200RPM HDD). Seriously, try an M4 or a Vertex 3, you'll come around. I know there's issues with some brands, but this is in most cases not any different with HDD's (just look at the number of complaints on newegg for any random HDD).

Generally speaking, you can't go wrong with the Crucial M4 on FW0009 since Crucial's ironed out the bugs, but I'm biased since I own one. :p Still, I think it is more than worth the money. Opposed to an HDD the speed increase is simply amazing, it generates no heat, it produces no noise, it causes no vibrations, it isn't vulnerable to shocks, and it substantially improves your battery life. The only downside then, is the relatively high price but I think the advantages are obvious and very much make up for it.

If you need more storage, you can always use an optibay. :)
 
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