iMac or MacPro??????

[Yebubbleman]

Had no choice really. As well as Alzheimers my current MacPro has also developed Aspergers (could have caught it from me) Frequently when I turn it on, the pointer moves but I can't click on anything (have to share screen from my Snow Leopard Mini to get it working), Photoshop keeps freezing and this morning so did Mail and all sorts of other odd things which may be software, but I doubt it as I haven't changed anything and run virus software frequently too.
So I'm waiting for my built to order MacPro which might be here by the end of the week or Monday next.
If the MacPro is killed off with no replacement (which I seriously doubt) I will end up with a very fast powerful machine and if they do replace it, I will still have a very fast powerful machine. I'm sure Thunderbolt is brilliant, but I've got a ton of stuff that is FW800/Esata etc which I'm not about to replace.
Of course if the 'new pro machine' is incredible, then I'll wait a respectable time (being defined by the time I can buy a new machine without my wife totally freaking out after what I've just sent on my new MacPro) and then buy that too.

If you have a 2011 MacBook Pro as an earlier comment of yours suggested, you already have Thunderbolt where you really need it. The fact that you won't have it on your Mac Pro won't be all that much of a drag.

 

[colinet]

If you have a 2011 MacBook Pro as an earlier comment of yours suggested, you already have Thunderbolt where you really need it. The fact that you won't have it on your Mac Pro won't be all that much of a drag.

That's true. I've got a nice Apple LCD monitor which I bought the week before Apple released the Thunderbolt one. Obviously Apple will release an incredible all new MacPro the week after next!

I think the biggest speed increases you can get is to go SSD - as shown by my late 2011 MacBook Pro which has no hard drive, just a 512Gig SSD - starts up in 9 seconds and shuts down in 2!

And I imagine someone will bring out a Thunderbolt card for the existing MacPros - not sure if that would work - maybe there's a bottleneck somewhere that would slow it right down, but I bet someone's working on it.

 

[Zwhaler]

Wow that computer is going to be amazing. I have a similar setup with 7,200 RPM drives in there I can only imagine what it's going to be like with an SSD and that much RAM!!! Congrats!! Remember there is such thing as an opportunity cost for waiting, that's why I bought mine last year and have no regrets!

 

[colinet]

AND in the exact same minute I got an email saying you'd posted, I also got an email from Apple saying my machine is on its way !!!!!!

This is good month!

Sony Vita arriving around the 23rd and maybe even my Sony NEX-7 body!

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Wow that computer is going to be amazing. I have a similar setup with 7,200 RPM drives in there I can only imagine what it's going to be like with an SSD and that much RAM!!! Congrats!! Remember there is such thing as an opportunity cost for waiting, that's why I bought mine last year and have no regrets!

You could always get a small SSD and sit it in the second optical drive bay - connectors are there and it doesn't need screwing down.

As well as Apple's 512Gig SSD as my OS and App drive, I've got a OWC 120 gig SSD coming to use exclusively as a Photoshop scratch disc and that's going to sit in the 2nd optical drive bay.

 

[Yebubbleman]

That's true. I've got a nice Apple LCD monitor which I bought the week before Apple released the Thunderbolt one. Obviously Apple will release an incredible all new MacPro the week after next!

I think the biggest speed increases you can get is to go SSD - as shown by my late 2011 MacBook Pro which has no hard drive, just a 512Gig SSD - starts up in 9 seconds and shuts down in 2!

And I imagine someone will bring out a Thunderbolt card for the existing MacPros - not sure if that would work - maybe there's a bottleneck somewhere that would slow it right down, but I bet someone's working on it.

Given that Thunderbolt is just PCIe + miniDP, I have a feeling that if Apple puts the Thunderbolt ports on the video cards of its future Mac Pros, they will release a version of the same video cards for the Mac Pro that you got, at which point, go for it! If they do it on the backplane (MLB), then you might not see something out for what you have. That said, I don't think there's any technological bus-based limitation preventing Thunderbolt from being retrofitted onto your Mac in a form like that, though someone please feel free to correct me if I'm wrong.

 

[Zwhaler]

You could always get a small SSD and sit it in the second optical drive bay - connectors are there and it doesn't need screwing down.

As well as Apple's 512Gig SSD as my OS and App drive, I've got a OWC 120 gig SSD coming to use exclusively as a Photoshop scratch disc and that's going to sit in the 2nd optical drive bay.

I could consider this when prices for 512GB SSDs come down. I'm currently using 2x superdrive but have one more hard drive bay left using a 2 + 2 + 3TB at the moment. Would I have to reinstall the Mac OS on the SSD or just drag application files onto it?

 

[thekev]

I had no lag with painting or most adjusting on my 8 core. Other things that used the scratch disc a lot took time and loading and saving could take a really long time.

The point is that my machine became unstable and is obviously dying. I expect some improvement in performance with a new machine, but the most useful time saving will be using 2 SSD drives - one will hold my Photoshop files and a smaller one will be used exclusively as a scratch disc.

A number of things could cause that, but yeah SSDs make amazing scratch disks. I wish we had them before all of the 64 bit applications took over. They would have been an immense help in a 32 bit workflow where it was much easier to hit a wall on ram.

If the MacPro is killed off with no replacement (which I seriously doubt) I will end up with a very fast powerful machine and if they do replace it, I will still have a very fast powerful machine. I'm sure Thunderbolt is brilliant, but I've got a ton of stuff that is FW800/Esata etc which I'm not about to replace.
Of course if the 'new pro machine' is incredible, then I'll wait a respectable time (being defined by the time I can buy a new machine without my wife totally freaking out after what I've just spent on my new MacPro) and then buy that too.

Yeah.. especially considering that you Australians get brutal markups on electronics even factoring out GST. Somehow I think the high markups came from a historic lack of stability in the currency relative to the dollar and euro, but I could be way off here. I'll admit I'm a bit jealous of your new machine. The one thing I'd watch for is if OpenGL performance under OSX improves on a new card. It's more of an OSX or driver issue here, but improvements don't always translate to older cards. Photoshop and Illustrator really aren't hard on graphics cards at all. It's just Apple has been having issues there.

 

[szolr]

A maxed out iMac should suit you just fine. And you never know... You may even like it so much you don't return to Mac Pro until you next need a new computer.

 

[colinet]

A maxed out iMac should suit you just fine. And you never know... You may even like it so much you don't return to Mac Pro until you next need a new computer.

Unlikely - my built to order maxed out MacPro is on its way from Apple right now. I came to the conclusion that no matter how much maxing out an iMac got, it would not still be able to handle my workload.

My wife has an iMac - her third one. They're OK, but my December 2011 MacBook Pro is much faster.