Thank you very much for your replies guys, I really appreciate it!
To give you more background about me:
I am an independent creative, I run tons of apps at the same time, I spent most of my time in Photoshop. Each project takes me around 1-4 months so moving the files from PROJECT DATA PARTITION would occur only a few times per year. I need a snappy system in general and a high performance in Photoshop. In Photoshop, I work with lowres files around 2000x4000px, but with hundreds of really small layers in a single file. My PS history is set to 100 states. My last project file had around 300 layers, but only because my PC was laggish. Not to mention I would like to have more than 1 such files opened at the same time. So if I would have an ideal environment (the one I am trying to create right now), I would go with much more layers. That's the workflow that suits me best personally, I can understand someone can't imagine that, especially the huge number of layers.
The thing is I don't have the Mac Pro yet so I can't do any tests. I've already ordered it 2 weeks ago, should arrive in about 2-4 weeks from now (I am from Europe). I also do 3D in C4D, but that's just a hobby since I am still a total beginner at it.
I work from home and I also play latest games, that's why I need a WINDOWS PARTITION and fast boots to switch between. I also need tons of storage for movies, music, photos, etc -> that's why the external 8TB Qx2 from OWC in RAID5 seamed like a good solution, especially because it's external. That's probably all I could say to help understand what I am trying to achieve with this machine.
Now a bit more technical info:
The OSX boot partition should be around 150-300GB (can't be really sure, it will be my first Mac and the huge WINDOWS games will be on another HDD) - that's why my first thought would be to get more smaller SSDs in RAID0. In terms of price, it seams like it doesn't matter much if it's one big or more with smaller size. Please correct me anytime I say something stupid, I don't have much knowledge/experience in hardware, you guys seam like you know what you are talking about.
Scratch space doesn't have to be big, I "think" 50GB SSD should be more than enough in terms of space.
Same goes for one project folder, 50GB (smallest RE SSD) is more than enough.
I've ordered the Hex MP, 5870, with 3GB of RAM - the question is how much RAM I need right?
Can you recommend some software or methods I should try once the MP arrives? MP arrives with only 3GB of RAM - not sure if that's not a problem for testing. I would love to run some tests to be able to precisely decide what I really need and what not. The shopping list I gave you in my first post was just based on what I've collected from reading some stuff online, definitely not final list. That's why I think I will need to run a few tests that will fit to my workflow.
Since I am not from USA, ordering from OWC or TRANSINTL, a few parts a time can be a little pricey and takes longer, but it shouldn't be a problem either, so if you can suggest what parts to buy first and then do some tests on it, I would love to hear your thoughts. I don't want to overshoot it with power I won't use or be just wasted by some bottlenecks in any part of MP.
they way you say partition ? are you getting 2 discs for working and 2 for scratch meaning 4 total ?
or you saying 2 total and you are going to cut that raid 0 setup into two partitions ? one for scratch one for data ? if so dont do this
I've meant 4x SSD by that. 2x SSD for SCRATCH in RAID0 and 2x SSD for DATA in RAID0.
not sure where these numbers are coming from ?
but 2 should do you just fine and more memory also you want to really check efficiency of your files and know why you are getting what you are ? so even 1 SSD might do the job ?
The 500MB/s max throughput of PS's scratch was told to me by OWC tech staff, they said the guy from macperformanceguide.com tested it. It's not exact number of course, just a rough estimate of what I remember from our online chat few weeks ago.
What you need to be aware of, is that Slots 3 & 4 share the same 4x lanes via a PCIe Switch located on the backplane board (one with the PCIe slots). So you're sharing the bandwidth, and have a loss due to switching as well. Performance may not be what you'd expect at all.
You can get around this by using Slot 2 for one of the cards, but the card linked is only SATA 3.0Gb/s (not the best for SSD's, as current models can already max out the ports), and it will require system resources to do it (not bad with stripe sets, but just so you're aware of it).
Again, I was told by OWC that each lane in a PCIe 2.0 slot handles up to 500MB/s. So if it's 4x, then there shouldn't be a problem of running 4 internal SSDs out of it right? Or am I mistaken? Please correct me.
Why do you think the Sonnet E4i wouldn't be good/fast enough for 4x SSD? This card could be plugged in SLOT2 (16x). I was also told that this card doesn't support booting - not an issue since I can have boot SSDs in MP bays.
The external SATA card has only 2 ports (first for Qx2, second for naked HDD dock station for doing backups). I am really sorry I've noted it wrong (I've said it has 4 ports in my previous post). Here it is:
http://eshop.macsales.com/item/Newer...gy/MXPCIE6GS2/
