OWC's ThunderBay Flex 8 Storage and Expansion Tower for Macs Now Available

[Taz Mangus]

Apple was referring to the FIRST ARM Mac's, not ALL Mac's. ARM architecture is no where near ready to compete with an Intel Xeon 28-Core system let alone the current base model Xeon processors in Mac Pro's and iMac Pro's. That's ways off. MacBook's, iMac's, Mac mini's will have no problem transitioning. Intel architecture will be supported for a while longer. I also stated 3-4 years, which is puzzling as your quoted reply is essentially in agreement.

I bet everyone will be surprised by what Apple has ready to go for ARM CPUs for their Mac computers. They have had over a decade designing their ARM CPUs. I suspect they already have prototypes running for most of their Mac lineup in their lab that go well beyond a A13 CPU.

Ampere Altra 80-core ARM CPU:

Ampere Altra is the first 80-core ARM-based server processor

Ampere has unveiled the industry's first 80-core ARM-based 64-bit server processor today in a bid to outdo Intel and AMD in datacenter chips.

venturebeat.com

Amazon Graviton2 64-core ARM CPU:

ARM News, Reviews and Insights | Tom's Hardware

Discover the Tom's Hardware take on the ARM product range, with news, reviews and benchmarking for the hardcore PC enthusiast.

www.anandtech.com

 

[minifridge1138]

lol "Dude", no. Not even close. Power Mac G5's started at $1999, then Intel Mac Pro's started at $2499. This may be before your time. I had owned over 7 Mac Pro's in the 2000's through 2014 ranging from $2799 to $4000 fully decked out.

Not quite, it depends on the year.

I agree the base model was cheaper.

I wouldn’t agree that you could get a fully decked out system for $4,000.

In 2009 I bought a brand new 4,1 and I remember the pricing because I spent a lot of time figuring out what I could afford.

The cheapest Mac Pro was $2,499 for a single 2.66 ghz CPU model. That was with the stock HDD (650 GB), RAM (3 GB), and video card (GT 120).

For $3,699 you could get that same system but with a 3.33 ghz processor.

The cheapest dual processor was $3,299 for two 2.26 ghz processors. That was with the stock HDD (650 GB), RAM (6 GB), and video card (GT 120).

For $5,899 you could get the same system, but with two 2.93 ghz processors.

The 2019 base model is only $100 more than a fully decked out Mac Pro was in 2009 (excluding RAM and HDD and GPU upgrades).
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Apple was referring to the FIRST ARM Mac's, not ALL Mac's. ARM architecture is no where near ready to compete with an Intel Xeon 28-Core system let alone the current base model Xeon processors in Mac Pro's and iMac Pro's. That's ways off. MacBook's, iMac's, Mac mini's will have no problem transitioning. Intel architecture will be supported for a while longer. I also stated 3-4 years, which is puzzling as your quoted reply is essentially in agreement.

Incorrect. In the Keynote, Tim Cook said they expect the first Apple Silicon system to ship to consumers by the end of this year (2020) and the transition to Apple silicon should be complete in approximately 2 years.

Here’s the keynote:

Jump to 1 Hour 46 Minutes for the part about shipping and transition timelines.

 

[CJ Dorschel]

I bet everyone will be surprised by what Apple has ready to go for ARM CPUs for their Mac computers. They have had over a decade designing their ARM CPUs. I suspect they already have prototypes running for most of their Mac lineup in their lab that go well beyond a A13 CPU.

Ampere Altra 80-core ARM CPU:

Ampere Altra is the first 80-core ARM-based server processor

Ampere has unveiled the industry's first 80-core ARM-based 64-bit server processor today in a bid to outdo Intel and AMD in datacenter chips.

venturebeat.com

Amazon Graviton2 64-core ARM CPU:

ARM News, Reviews and Insights | Tom's Hardware

Discover the Tom's Hardware take on the ARM product range, with news, reviews and benchmarking for the hardcore PC enthusiast.

www.anandtech.com

very interesting. Thank you for the information!
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Not quite, it depends on the year.

I agree the base model was cheaper.

I wouldn’t agree that you could get a fully decked out system for $4,000.

In 2009 I bought a brand new 4,1 and I remember the pricing because I spent a lot of time figuring out what I could afford.

The cheapest Mac Pro was $2,499 for a single 2.66 ghz CPU model. That was with the stock HDD (650 GB), RAM (3 GB), and video card (GT 120).

For $3,699 you could get that same system but with a 3.33 ghz processor.

The cheapest dual processor was $3,299 for two 2.26 ghz processors. That was with the stock HDD (650 GB), RAM (6 GB), and video card (GT 120).

For $5,899 you could get the same system, but with two 2.93 ghz processors.

The 2019 base model is only $100 more than a fully decked out Mac Pro was in 2009 (excluding RAM and HDD and GPU upgrades).
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Incorrect. In the Keynote, Tim Cook said they expect the first Apple Silicon system to ship to consumers by the end of this year (2020) and the transition to Apple silicon should be complete in approximately 2 years.

Here’s the keynote:

Jump to 1 Hour 46 Minutes for the part about shipping and transition timelines.

Honestly, you’re so far off topic at this point and missing the point it’s not even worth discussing any further.

 

[minifridge1138]

very interesting. Thank you for the information!
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Honestly, you’re so far off topic at this point and missing the point it’s not even worth discussing any further.

Which point?
The original post was about OWC’s new storage enclosure. I think it looks awesome.

 

[martyjmclean]

I’d be interested to see how this stacks against an Avid Nexis.
It won’t have their filesystem so it won’t be a fair competition, but still.

 

[SurferPup]

I am drooling. That would make for one h3ll of a media server plugged into a Mac Pro.

 

[justperry]

Intel owns the standard, not Apple. Apple worked with them but they don't own it. Source: https://appleinsider.com/articles/1..._will_be_transferred_from_apple_to_intel.html

However, it looks like The Verge got some news from Apple that Apple Silicon Macs will support TB (USB-C): https://forums.macrumors.com/thread...licon-chips-will-support-thunderbolt.2244967/

But it is not clear if it is USB-C or TB4.

TB3 will be a part of USB4 standard, so Apple could support USB4 without supporting TB4.

They said they will support it so I'm pretty sure TB will be on arm silicon.

"Over a decade ago, Apple partnered with Intel to design and develop Thunderbolt, and today our customers enjoy the speed and flexibility it brings to every Mac. We remain committed to the future of Thunderbolt and will support it in Macs with Apple silicon."

 

[subi257]

lol "Dude", no. Not even close. Power Mac G5's started at $1999, then Intel Mac Pro's started at $2499. This may be before your time. I had owned over 7 Mac Pro's in the 2000's through 2014 ranging from $2799 to $4000 fully decked out. Most did not purchase Apple RAM as it was - and is - overpriced. Third party RAM and HDD's were simply swapped into the 4 SATA II bays. You're using extreme examples of CURRENT Mac Pro and iMac Pro systems and, frankly, they aren't applicable as updating Mac Pro's before the 2013 revision weren't expensive after selling the previous model and simply putting in your internal storage, RAM, and any PCIe cards from one to the other. Many of us bought GPU's and replaced the base GPU - this was especially true when Apple supported nVidia cards.

Lastly, as I clearly stated, this is regarding PROSUMER market use. Apple used to design and sell the Mac Pro with a myriad of BTO's that allowed anyone from prosumers to professionals/editing houses/studios/etc the ability to fully configure reasonably priced workstations. Additionally, Apple had a dedicated CCFL LCD line - 20", 23", 30" ACD's that were top of the line displays. I still have 2 30" models running in one of my home offices.

This isn't about "oh my god, get over it, you can make that money back with work, bro" discussions. My comment you intentionally misrepresented for some odd personal agenda and point stands: Apple used to make reasonably priced Pro systems. They don't anymore. Period.

It's not before my time, My first Mac was a $5000.00 ish Mac 512K when it first came out, then later a USED IICX for $3795.00 for a CPU and monitor. I understand that they used to support the prosumer better before and I won't debate that. However a lot has changes since the time of the G5, both computer technology and what computers are being used for. I understand about the 1999.00 base G5, but what is that in today's dollars ? I am not sure, but I would have to take a guess and say 4-5K ? I see a lot of that with the freelance video editors and motion graphic designers that we hire at work, as they complain that they are too expensive, but the lower priced models don't function well with high data rate 4K and 3D motion graphics....Flame, Maya, etc.

Everything has changed so much, that you can no longer swap RAM to newer models as the old models RAM is now too slow or older version of DDR type. I am not trying to be an ******* about this stuff, but I see so many people constantly bitch about "Apple is ignoring the pros" then the model comes out that then it becomes "Apple is crazy, what is this, it's too high end"

I still have for some stupid reason, almost every Mac from SE, IICX, 6100, 7100, 8100 G4, G5 assorted laptops in the closet. all were my running machines at some point.

 

[BillyBurke]

Tired design, super lazy.

Disagree. Classic. Looks good. I want one !!!
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I'm seeing a lot of Thunderbolt peripherals out lately, but ARM Macs are coming which probably won't support Thunderbolt since it's an Intel chipset technology.

Does this stuff fall back to USB 3.1 if Thunderbolt isn't available? I'm just thinking and it would really suck if people invested a lot of $$ into equipment that became obsolete as soon as they upgrade to an ARM-based Mac.

Apple announced that ARM Macs WILL support TB.

 

[Alan Wynn]

lol "Dude", no. Not even close. Power Mac G5's started at $1999, then Intel Mac Pro's started at $2499. This may be before your time. I had owned over 7 Mac Pro's in the 2000's through 2014 ranging from $2799 to $4000 fully decked out.

Apple’s 2013 Mac Pro 12-core systems cost $6,999 in the base configuration (more for those with the D700). If you did not purchase them used (as the previous poster said), how did you get them for $4,000 fully decked out?

 

[Neberheim]

They missed the mark on not including 96W/100W PD for the MBP16,1 users out there for a single cable solution. Looks like a great array for iMac and those working from home for the next 6-12+ months. A similar but smaller unit just for straight M.2 NVMe and 2.5" SATA SSDs would be the only suggestion for a future alternative design.

This is plenty adequate for the 16 inch MacBook Pro, unless you have a bunch of other bus-powered devices plugged in. The charger is rated to recharge the notebook while powering peripherals.

 

[tiger$tyle]

Remember, this can handle an egpu as well. Presumably you could use that slot for yet more storage expansion.

This can't handle an eGPU. Specifically OWC say that it can't

 

[Alan Wynn]

lol "Dude", no. Not even close. Power Mac G5's started at $1999, then Intel Mac Pro's started at $2499. This may be before your time. I had owned over 7 Mac Pro's in the 2000's through 2014 ranging from $2799 to $4000 fully decked out.

Apple’s 2013 Mac Pro 12-core systems cost $6,999 in the base configuration (more for those with the D700). If you did not purchase them used (as the previous poster said), how did you get them for $4,000 fully decked out?

Still curious how you did this.

 

[chucker23n1]

Still curious how you did this.

Well, it's pretty simple. You get two 2013 Mac Pros, travel in time to the era of Power Mac G5s fully decked out™, replace those with 2012 Mac Pros, and then post your story on MacRumors.

 

[Alan Wynn]

Well, it's pretty simple. You get two 2013 Mac Pros, travel in time to the era of Power Mac G5s fully decked out™, replace those with 2012 Mac Pros, and then post your story on MacRumors.

Ah. That makes sense. Here I thought he was just wrong. Thanks!

 

[underattack]

I received mine last week. So far, I am pretty happy with it. I got a model with 4TB SSD and 36TB (usable) RAID5. (7x6TB disks) for a bit short of $4,000. I am using it with a 2019 13" MacBook Pro (4 TB3 ports, touch bar).

Here are my approx speed measurements using the Blackmagic disk speed test. Don't take them as "authoritative". This is me running the speed test a couple of times, and sort of trying to make sure nothing else was running at the same time.

Internet SSD (for comparison): 2700MB/sec write, 2700MB/sec read
Thunderbay SSD: 1700MB/sec write, 2000MB/sec read (I got a couple "spikes" that got close to 2700MB/sec)
RAID5 spinning disks: 700MB/sec write, 500MB/sec read (a bit suspect that the read speed is slower than write. May have to redo that).

I did play a bit with different disk configurations, but the speed differences were within the error of the speed tests. Also did not make a difference if I plugged it into left/right-hand side TB3 port (I also have an OWC dock for monitors and such plugged in on the left).

So overall, the speed is good IMHO. I will re-run it in a couple of days to see if anything changed.

Another big question I had initially was the noise. There are actually two fans in the chassis. A large one in the back. it is quite, and it spins pretty much all the time. There is also a small fan at the bottom of the unit (not visible in the normal product shots). I have not seen/heard it spin yet. So either it is very quiet, or it only spins if the system has additional PCI cards that cause extra power use.

The "click" from the spinning disks is more annoying than the fan. The unit was too loud for me to put on my desk. But I got a longer (6ft) cable and keeping it on the floor under the desk works well. I do have hardwood floors. With the fan at the bottom, you may want to be careful placing it on the carpet.

The built quality is nice. This is a very heavy unit (another reason to keep it on the floor?). I think the package said 40lbs. The chassis was a bit deeper than I expected.

Misc notes:
- by default, you only get a 2 ft Thunderbolt cable, which is VERY short IMHO. TB3 cables max out at 6ft unless you go for the super expensive fiber cables.
- note that the thunderbolt ports are hidden under a sticker that tells you to read the manual online ;-) (took me a moment to figure out where they are... was looking for the manual... saw the sticker... ;-) ).
- the SoftRaid software license key is on the bottom of the unit (that is something the manual does not tell you).

 

[CJ Dorschel]

Ah. That makes sense. Here I thought he was just wrong. Thanks!

sigh. I hesitated replying to the condescending remarks.

And yup, still won't.

(for the record, I did and you have your pricing wrong - a 2013 Mac Pro was originally $6499 "decked out" yet I only got the 12-Core and Dual D700's w/ 256 GB SSD and added my own RAM that year and I stated I receive a 25% off on Mac's as well as selling one of my Mac Pro's which helped as well, which, again, is something many of us did when trading up systems until Apple kept increasing base model pricing from $1999 to now $6000 - and don't try the "you didn't account for inflation" non-sense as that still doesn't account for the price increases from 2004 - now).

Done here.

 

[minifridge1138]

A base 2013 Mac Pro with a Quad Core processor started at $2,999. So yes, the base model was definitely cheaper.

With a 2.7 Ghz 12 Core CPU a 2013 Mac Pro started at $6,499 with the base 16 GB ram, base 256 GB SSD, and dual D500 GPUs. Upgrading to dual D700s was a $600 upgrade. Which would bring the total to $7,099. If you had a 25% discount that brings it to $5,324.25 (not including tax). And that's not "decked out" because you're with the base ram and SSD (or we're working off of different definitions of "decked out").

If you sold your old hardware for $1,324.25, then you're at $4,000; and that's entirely possible but that's not the same as "I got a decked out Mac Pro for $4,000". It's more of "I bought a high end system with some custom options and sold some old hardware and was $4,000 out of pocket". In the same way as "I bought a Ferrari from the dealership for $100" is different from "I bought a Ferrari from the dealership for $100 + the trade in value of my old Ferrari."

All prices US $.
Sources:
Base 2013 Mac Pro Specs - EveryMac.com
12 Core 2013 mac Pro Specs - EveryMac.com
2013 Mac Pro Review with CTO option prices.

 

[moab1]

Any updates here from actual users of this product? The T2 chip issue and SoftRAID are still holding me up from buying this. It seems the only other viable option for a something similar is the Promise Pegasus32 8 bay machine that has hardware raid and raid 6 option. I'm on the Pegasus2 R4 (3 units) but would like to get to an 8 bay.

What are thoughts about running something like a Synology 12 bay NAS DS3617xs or something as a main unit for Video and photo editing over 10Gbe? I've read some people say don't edit live over a NAS and others say it's fine.

My main machine is a 2019 Mac Pro and I need 50-100TB's of accessible storage (20-40TB of active editing storage (Video editing in FCPX, resolve, Premiere and photo editing in LR, Captureone) and the rest would be work that I may want to access on occasion to put up on Stock, Reel work, etc. but won't be as actively used).

I currently have two onsite copies of all footage and one offsite copy (on single drives 3.5" drives by project)

 

[Alan Wynn]

Any updates here from actual users of this product? The T2 chip issue and SoftRAID are still holding me up from buying this. It seems the only other viable option for a something similar is the Promise Pegasus32 8 bay machine that has hardware raid and raid 6 option. I'm on the Pegasus2 R4 (3 units) but would like to get to an 8 bay.

I have played with it, but I am not yet ready to jump on it.

What are thoughts about running something like a Synology 12 bay NAS DS3617xs or something as a main unit for Video and photo editing over 10Gbe? I've read some people say don't edit live over a NAS and others say it's fine.

If you want enough performance for editing, consider a Jellyfish from Lumaforge. I would not consider a Synology. Another option would be to build a small FreeNAS system with 10Gb/S Ethernet and use RAIDZ/3 with big drives for redundancy (with 10TB or greater drives you want to be able to have 3 drives fail before you lose data). If you are editing on a MacPro, you can get a 40Gb/E or even a 100Gb/E card and connect to your server at higher speeds.

My main machine is a 2019 Mac Pro and I need 50-100TB's of accessible storage (20-40TB of active editing storage (Video editing in FCPX, resolve, Premiere and photo editing in LR, Captureone) and the rest would be work that I may want to access on occasion to put up on Stock, Reel work, etc. but won't be as actively used).

Have you considered a Proxy Workflow? Edit with ProRes and then do a conform so you do not need as fast a network/server for your working storage.

I currently have two onsite copies of all footage and one offsite copy (on single drives 3.5" drives by project)

Do you keep those 3.5" spinning all the time? If not, you will discover that you are like to have stiction problems starting after about 6 months, and getting very bad after about 18 months. You might want to consider spending about $700 a year for a set of Dropbox Advanced Business accounts (you need three to qualify for unlimited storage) and use that for off site backup.

What speed is your public net connection? If you are in fiber territory, consider using Wasabi for near line storage of your current working set. I routinely get over 95MB/s (just under a full gigabit) to them and the storage is pretty cheap $6 a terabyte (although there is a minimum of 3 months for anything you store with them, so be careful). They are way faster than Box, Dropbox, Google Drive and One Drive.