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Mac Pro Towers — worth waiting for MacWorld?

eclipse

eclipse

macrumors 6502a
Original poster
Nov 18, 2005
989
14
Sydney
Hi all,
I'm wondering whether to invest in a new MP tower for my wonderful wife the designer. Then I get her G5 :D.

So... should I wait or buy now? There's work I could do now if I got her G5 that I probably would find too annoying on my old G4 (9 years old with a TERRIBLE screen... when I get her G5 a new screen becomes possible). But if there's something REALLY revolutionary coming at Macworld I could possibly wait. What do people think? Part of my professional development (as a design assistant) is being held up because I can't stand my old G4 and it's terrible monitor. I would CELEBRATE having her 5 year old G5 by installing CS3 and all the tutorials! I'd be a new man, working hard on learning Adobe and Quark... I promise! :D

But if there's something really worth waiting for....
 
If you can wait, wait, you will get a faster machine then what is available, that's as simple as I can put it.

If not, you can still get an 8-core beast, it really depends on if you need it now, or are willing to work to with what you have until the next revision comes around.
 
The current Mac Pros (especially 8 core) have way more power than 90% of users can use. I don't know what you're waiting for...
 
the next update will bring substantially more power to the mac pro... but is it power your wife will even notice? As exan said, the current machines are such beasts that almost nobody can fully use them.

Of course, since your post shows that your family keeps computers for a long time, buying at the start of a cycle means having the computer stay viable one more year. But since the mac pro would be a huge upgrade for your wife, and the G5 a huge upgrade for you, I think you should go for it. :D
 
Buy a used G4, save your money for a flight out of the country that is going to produce an economic collapse.

Sorry... On topic:
Go for the current Mac Pro, sell it, buy the new one, it'll lose you $300-500, if you can..
eclipse said:
Hi all,
I'm wondering whether to invest in a new MP tower for my wonderful wife the designer. Then I get her G5 :D.

So... should I wait or buy now? There's work I could do now if I got her G5 that I probably would find too annoying on my old G4 (9 years old with a TERRIBLE screen... when I get her G5 a new screen becomes possible). But if there's something REALLY revolutionary coming at Macworld I could possibly wait. What do people think? Part of my professional development (as a design assistant) is being held up because I can't stand my old G4 and it's terrible monitor. I would CELEBRATE having her 5 year old G5 by installing CS3 and all the tutorials! I'd be a new man, working hard on learning Adobe and Quark... I promise! :D

But if there's something really worth waiting for....
Click to expand...
 
It all depends how serious of a user your wife is - as others have said, the current Mac pros are powerhouses and your wife may not be able to take advantage of their power right now as it is. Faster machines are coming, no doubt, but not until 2009 by my guess.

It's kind of like choosing between a C6 and Z06 Corvette - are you ever realistically going to utilize that extra hp or hit the extra 8 mph that the Z06 has over the C6? ;) :cool:
 
It all sounds sooooo cool I think I'm going to weaken and buy one sooner rather than later. If they have SO much grunt, my wife's productivity might even go up let alone my 'assistant' status going up with some training.

Hmmm, can't wait!

Off-topic...
It's kind of like choosing between a C6 and Z06 Corvette - are you ever realistically going to utilize that extra hp or hit the extra 8 mph that the Z06 has over the C6?
Click to expand...
Check my sig... I'm a peak oiler who believes our oil dependent cars and city plans are 'Satan spawn' causing the next Great Depression (or worse :eek:). But other than that, have a nice day. :cool:;)
 
Yeah buy now! :p

eclipse said:
Check my sig... I'm a peak oiler who believes our oil dependent cars and city plans are 'Satan spawn' causing the next Great Depression (or worse :eek:). But other than that, have a nice day. :cool:;)
Click to expand...

Love oil. <33
 
Question: Do I post a request for machine specs for a Graphic design and web design machine in this thread or the Design thread.
 
Just buy it now. You know you want to :)

In the interest of conservation, I think asking here would be just fine. For standard web and graphic design work, I think that the standard 8-core option would be more than enough horse power for your wife. You could honestly probably save $500 and go for the 4-core, but if you're going for longevity then 8-core is the way to go. If you're not doing any rendering or gaming, the stock graphics card should be fine for your usage. If you are, you'll probably want to shell out at least for the geforce 8800, but again, if you're going for longevity's sake, this might be a good thing to add as well.

Other options, like hard drives and Ram - especially ram - should be purchased ala carte from otherworldcomputing.com, newegg.com -- take your pick.
 
So... much... temptation... to... just... buy... for... self.... can't resist... need 'hit' now...

Other options, like hard drives and Ram - especially ram - should be purchased ala carte from otherworldcomputing.com, newegg.com -- take your pick.
Click to expand...

How many people do this? We run a business from home and wish we could use cheaper stuff, but also value the on-site Mac service. I've heard conflicting things about what adding your own ram can do to warranty... anyone got any definitive links to mac policy on this?
 
eclipse said:
So... much... temptation... to... just... buy... for... self.... can't resist... need 'hit' now...



How many people do this? We run a business from home and wish we could use cheaper stuff, but also value the on-site Mac service. I've heard conflicting things about what adding your own ram can do to warranty... anyone got any definitive links to mac policy on this?
Click to expand...

Adding RAM doesn't void your warranty lol (unless you break something while doing it of course)
 
I'm solidly of the opinion that very, very few people perform tasks that will come even remotely close to using the power of a Mac Pro. These things have at minimum 4 cores.

Did you consider the 24" iMac instead for her?
 
Well can you hold on another 4 months minimum? As others have said there is more power than most people need in the current MP, however alot of software doesn't fully utilize multiple cores so faster processors become more important and the new ones offer a big leap forward. Of course all faster processors will give you is time. It's not like the new ones are going to be able to do tasks that the current one can't 5 years from now.

The bet thing to do at this stage in the products life cycle is to buy a refurb from Apple and get some more memory else where (2x2GB is probably the best option) and another hard drive if you need it. You might even want to consider the quad core 2.8GHz rather than 8 core. They go for $2,000 refurb, but you will have to wait until they are on the store again.
 
Hi,
she's a graphic designer that will have everything open in Adobe and Quark, with quite large files, and so having EVERYTHING open won't push it? (Just joking, of course these 8-brained monsters are good!)

An iMac is tempting just because they are so sexy but it's the glare on the screen. We need the colour correct dull non-reflective studio for our work. If we weren't graphic designers, I'd buy an iMac in a heartbeat!
 
eclipse said:
Hi,
she's a graphic designer that will have everything open in Adobe and Quark, with quite large files, and so having EVERYTHING open won't push it? (Just joking, of course these 8-brained monsters are good!)
Click to expand...

Well this is the common misconception alot of people make. Just having things open doesn't need multiple cores, if you want to do batch image processing, process video, and do graphic design work without waiting for the processor then multiple cores are useful. Memory will surely be more useful to her. 6-10GB on a Quad 2.8GHz will probably be more than enough.
 
eclipse said:
So... much... temptation... to... just... buy... for... self.... can't resist... need 'hit' now...



How many people do this? We run a business from home and wish we could use cheaper stuff, but also value the on-site Mac service. I've heard conflicting things about what adding your own ram can do to warranty... anyone got any definitive links to mac policy on this?
Click to expand...


Installing Ram and Hard Drives (desktops at least, I wouldn't even attempt installing a new hard drive on my iMac) is a very easy procedure, and I think it's a shame that more companies don't already do this for free. Seriously, it's as easy as turning a screwdriver and connecting a few lines or seating a stick. Neither operation will void your warranty, and you'll save a nice chunk of change by doing it yourself. There are plenty of guides floating around the internet that should be able to help you out.
 
If you're not doing any rendering or gaming, the stock graphics card should be fine for your usage. If you are, you'll probably want to shell out at least for the geforce 8800, but again, if you're going for longevity's sake, this might be a good thing to add as well.
Click to expand...

Well... :eek: there... might... be a little bit of... you know.... gaming. :eek::eek:

Anyone tell me more about the graphics cards? I thought the basic could do everything we needed, unless people were into video rendering and stuff?
 
eclipse said:
I thought the basic could do everything we needed, unless people were into video rendering and stuff?
Click to expand...

The 8800 will only increase performance in 3D tasks such as gaming and creative packages such as Motion... although there is evidence that Apple tailor their Pro Applications to ATI cards.

I would suggest you pick up the standard 8 core model (not that you need that power but it's quite cool for bragging rights) and then pick up the RAM and extra HDD space from another supplier. The price Apple charge for RAM and hard drives are quite extortionate.
 
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