Keeping up with the Joneses (how much of a hit)

[Chaos123x]

Does anybody here always stay up to date with each Mac Pro / Powermac refresh?


I sold my Dual 2.7ghz G5 at the beginning of this year, and bought the base line Octo-Core Mac Pro with the money.


But after reading about Nehalem, I think I would like to upgrade early this time and sell my current Mac Pro on the day the new Nehalem ones come out.

About how much of a hit do you take selling a last gen model to get the newest refresh?


Anybody else do this with the last couple Mac Pros? How did it work out?



I get a corporate discount with Apple so that should reduce the hit of upgrading for me a bit. (since I paid less in the first place for my old one and the new one I should be able to get a little cheaper too).

What do you guys think? Should I keep it? or will Nehalem be worth taking a hit in the wallet?

 

[ntrigue]

Easier qualified in the mobile market. There is a 0.000001% chance you will use the additional power if you already own an Octo.

 

[applefan1997]

Selling yours on the day a newer one is released might get lower values since it's better. Most don't realize it though for a few days or near.

 

[nanofrog]

Not sure what the financial hit would be, but do you really use all of it ATM?

I ask, as due to the lack of software written to take advantage of the multiple cores, it's kind of hard to max it out.

 

[zer0tails]

If you're constantly pushing your current mac pro to the limit, and are often hitting bumps because of the lack of power, then by all means I would suggest you upgrade to Nehalem.

Depending on condition, how much Apple warranty is left, what you have inside, upgrades etc. it's hard to say what the hit will be like.

Definitely, no one is going to pay the same price or higher for what they can get in the refurb store. So use that as a measure when deciding how much to sell.

 

[Chaos123x]

Well of course I don't use all 8 processors all the time, the only app I use that does that is Compressor and the quick clusters are buggy.

Just heard that the Nehalem will be 20 to 50% better performance per chip.

Which would help allot with FCP rendering.


Since I bought the machine I have put in some more Ram, another hard drive, and upgraded the video card to a Ati 3870.

If I decide not to wait for Nehalem, I would like to set up a software raid with some extra internal drives, add a boat load of more ram, and also add a PCI express Firewire card so my clients external firewire drives don't run on the same bus as my HDV camera.

 

[nanofrog]

Well of course I don't use all 8 processors all the time, the only app I use that does that is Compressor and the quick clusters are buggy.

Just heard that the Nehalem will be 20 to 50% better performance per chip.

Which would help allot with FCP rendering.


Since I bought the machine I have put in some more Ram, another hard drive, and upgraded the video card to a Ati 3870.

If I decide not to wait for Nehalem, I would like to set up a software raid with some extra internal drives, add a boat load of more ram, and also add a PCI express Firewire card so my clients external firewire drives don't run on the same bus as my HDV camera.

Given what you're doing, hardware RAID may be the better way to go. It would free up the cores to run your software, rather than having to operate the RAID as well.

 

[Chaos123x]

Given what you're doing, hardware RAID may be the better way to go. It would free up the cores to run your software, rather than having to operate the RAID as well.

Yeah but hardware raid for the Mac Pro costs way to much, I'm poor.

Plus I found that they cause allot of headaches.

 

[nanofrog]

Yeah but hardware raid for the Mac Pro costs way to much, I'm poor.

Plus I found that they cause allot of headaches.

Depends.

4 port internal solutions exist, that can even work in Boot Camp for $269.99. As per headaches, I've had far more with software RAID. Very few with hardware solutions, provided proper planning/selection.

Example.