The 2009 (Gainestown) Mac Pro: Everything We Know

[Tallest Skil]

New 2009 vs 2008 mac pros... bah!

What we ALL want to know is Tallest Skil Mac Pro 2009 configuration. What is he going to and what part of his body he's going to sell to finance it. My bets are on the 2.93 and a kidney.

Well, yes, the 2.93. No kidneys, though.

Okay, I was reading the environmental PDF thing and saw that the PSU now has 86% efficiency for 115V and 88% efficiency for 240V.

So, that's good, at least; we got a BIG step up from the Penryn PSU's abilities.

Actually, I just want to know how long it'll be until someone gets a GTX260+ running in EFI32.

Do you mean 32 or 64?

A couple of prerequisite questions:

Does the GT 130 work in the 2006 Mac Pro, and therefore is this what you are basing this on?

Because if it doesn't, then there aren't any EFI32 drivers for anything in the GTX series at all.

Personally, I am curious if a Radeon 4870x2 works in OS X.

Because if it DOES, I might just go with the GT 120 and get a standalone 4870x2 from Newegg and just have BOTH.

Maybe. We'll see what happens. I'm ordering today, so I'll probably just go with my original idea.

 

[kevink2]

The 4 core Mac Pro is probably the reason we don't have a 4 core iMac yet.

Going by the assumption that each core in the 4 core system is faster than the fastest core available in the older 2008 line, it is still probably faster for many people. Unless you are working with balanced multithreaded programs, or many programs running at once all using the CPU heavy, the rise of multicore CPUs haven't helped many programs at all, since they are single thread.

If you run > 4 threads that use a lot of CPU power, then the 4 core system will probably hurt you. Or if you run a lot of virtualization. For instance, on my 8 core system it is feasible to put XP Pro on it, dedicate 2 cores on it to VMWare, and do heavy CPU work in Windows while still leaving 6 cores to OSX. And it is probably not noticable unless there is a lot of disk access. On a 4 core system, not quite as low impact.

 

[agile]

I have this strrrooong irk that in a few months we'll see a minor bump in the new mac pros, lower pricing or a bit better specs.. I dont know.. I'm going to wait it out some more.

I think it will just be incremental jumps until Westmere. This was part of the reason I hopped on a Harpertown and jettisoned waiting for Nehalem. Maybe then Apple will scale down the Mac Pro case due to better thermals, energy management, etc.

It would be great to have a smaller but similar case to the current Mac Pro with more hard drive slots. If they mad it more of a mid-tower, then they could conceivably lower their margin, and hence their price, increase demand. I can dream...

 

[More]

Well, yes, the 2.93. No kidneys, though.

Just curious but I was just wondering where you're getting the money from for the 2.93. You're a student and seem pretty young. I'm getting on a bit and have a v-well paid job as a design director but I'd be struggling to find the cash for this between the mortgage and other bills. Not impossible but overkill. I assume you've simply been saving? It's your business of course but I'm just curious

 

[Salavat23]

Okay, I was reading the environmental PDF thing and saw that the PSU now has 86% efficiency for 115V and 88% efficiency for 240V.

Those numbers mean nothing unless we know what loads they were tested on. Were those at 20% load? 50%? 80%? 100%?

 

[Infrared]

Yea this is the reason why Apple raised prices.. you have to in a bad economy for businesses.

I hope you're not running a business. Other players in the market
are cutting prices. If it's hard to sell stuff, raising prices isn't the
greatest plan ever.

 

[Tallest Skil]

Just curious but I was just wondering where you're getting the money from for the 2.93. You're a student and seem pretty young. I'm getting on a bit and have a v-well paid job as a design director but I'd be struggling to find the cash for this between the mortgage and other bills. Not impossible but overkill. I assume you've simply been saving? It's your business of course but I'm just curious

Oh, yes. In high school, I worked summers and weekends at the retirement community in my town. The pay was far above minimum wage, and the residents/employees were great people, so the job was wonderfully fun.

I was able to save enough to buy it on my own because I don't really buy anything more than I absolutely need (gas, etc.).

Actually, for the past year and a half or thereabouts, the only things that I have bought were addons/upgrades for my Mac Pro, besides the odd Wii/computer game.

I was going to say something else... I don't remember what...

I'll think of it and edit this post when I do.

I really need some wetware ECC RAM...

 

[More]

Oh, yes. In high school, I worked summers and weekends at the retirement community in my town. The pay was far above minimum wage, and the residents/employees were great people, so the job was wonderfully fun. I was able to save enough to buy it on my own because I don't really buy anything more than I absolutely need (gas, etc.).

Well done and good on you for being one of the very few people in this day and age who actually save for anything. Best of luck with your new beast

 

[Tesselator]

Hi Tesselator, thanks for you answer. Do you got a Mac Pro 8 Core or Quad Core? I don't think at all, that a Mac Mini CPU has enough power.my MacBook Pro 2.4 Ghz 4GB is exploding at 96 KHZ with 4-5 Synths and Audio Files at the same time runnning. Also the mac mini only gots max. 2.26 Ghz Core2 Duo and has only one display output aswell. I got a Apogee Ensemble Interface:

Yeah with Reason i didn't have problems at all with synthisizers etc.. But Logic 8 with Sculpture and other Plug-In's needs much CPU Power. So my MBP at 96 KHZ doesnt fit that at all. I need Power ! Do you have Logic Pro? I also use many native instruments plug-ins like absynth, massive, battery,...

regards

According to this the new mini has dual video ports now.
http://www.pcworld.com/article/1606...ow_about_apples_new_desktops.html?tk=rel_news

 

[Tallest Skil]

Okay, here's what I'm thinking:

Processor: 2.93 Gainestown
RAM: either standard 6GB or the 8GB upgrade. With the stock I get it sooner, but with the 8GB, I get more RAM and more open DIMM slots. I don't really care about getting it sooner, and I believe that it is worth it to have more open DIMM slots while getting MORE RAM, but I'll see what you guys think.
GPU: Radeon 4870
HDD: Standard. I'm going to add a 1TB drive third-party for a Time Machine backup and a 2TB drive once we establish their... security (cough1.5TBSeagatecough) as drives for extra storage. I'll just back up the 640GB boot disk.

All in all, at this point I believe it will be:

2.93GHz eight-core
8GB RAM
Radeon 4870
640GB HDD
18x SuperDrive & BD-RE DL/HD DVD-ROM drive
AirPort
And my dual 24" monitors. I'm adding the Mini DisplayPort-single link DVI adapter so that I can even USE both of them.

Whaddya think? Some things might be subject to a little change, but I don't see it deviating much from this. Any more suggestions would be cool.

 

[grue]

Just curious but I was just wondering where you're getting the money from for the 2.93. You're a student and seem pretty young. I'm getting on a bit and have a v-well paid job as a design director but I'd be struggling to find the cash for this between the mortgage and other bills. Not impossible but overkill. I assume you've simply been saving? It's your business of course but I'm just curious

Life's easy when you have no expenses. I managed to come up with $6,000 for a PowerBook 3400c/240 when I was in high school. I look back at that and I still can't figure out how I pulled that off.

Of course, back then I was a naïve little Apple fanboy who thought they could do no wrong. Now I loathe Apple but still buy a new workstation every 2-3 years…

 

[Setmose]

!! Stock Radeon 4850 Up and Running in Leopard 10.5.7 beta

http://netkas.org/?p=84
http://www.ditii.com/2009/03/01/mac...date-may-have-nehalem-radeon-hd-4000-support/

I'm getting a little bit excited. Is the Radeon 4870 X2 supported in Leopard 10.5.7, and of course Snow Leopard? Heh.

 

[Setmose]

Life's easy when you have no expenses. I managed to come up with $6,000 for a PowerBook 3400c/240 when I was in high school. I look back at that and I still can't figure out how I pulled that off.

Of course, back then I was a naïve little Apple fanboy who thought they could do no wrong. Now I loathe Apple but still buy a new workstation every 2-3 years…

Jeez, with a little help you could start to look on the bright side of life, to quote Monty Python. Maybe change your username to "bleen"!

 

[More]

Okay, here's what I'm thinking:

Processor: 2.93 Gainestown
RAM: either standard 6GB or the 8GB upgrade. With the stock I get it sooner, but with the 8GB, I get more RAM and more open DIMM slots. I don't really care about getting it sooner, and I believe that it is worth it to have more open DIMM slots while getting MORE RAM, but I'll see what you guys think.
GPU: Radeon 4870
HDD: Standard. I'm going to add a 1TB drive third-party for a Time Machine backup and a 2TB drive once we establish their... security (cough1.5TBSeagatecough) as drives for extra storage. I'll just back up the 640GB boot disk.

All in all, at this point I believe it will be:

2.93GHz eight-core
8GB RAM
Radeon 4870
640GB HDD
18x SuperDrive & BD-RE DL/HD DVD-ROM drive
AirPort
And my dual 24" monitors. I'm adding the Mini DisplayPort-single link DVI adapter so that I can even USE both of them.

Whaddya think? Some things might be subject to a little change, but I don't see it deviating much from this. Any more suggestions would be cool.

Jeezus! Your config there is coming in at £6,089.00 in the UK apple store:

Two 2.93GHz Quad-Core Intel Xeon
8GB (4x2GB)
640GB 7200-rpm Serial ATA 3Gb/s
ATI Radeon HD 4870 512MB
One 18x SuperDrive
Apple LED Cinema Display (24" flat panel)
Apple LED Cinema Display (24" flat panel)
Apple Mighty Mouse
Apple Keyboard with Numeric Keypad (British) and User's Guide (English)

That works out at approx $8560! Bloody ell!

 

[grue]

Jeez, with a little help you could start to look on the bright side of life, to quote Monty Python. Maybe change your username to "bleen"!

Nah. Bitterness is more fun, it's impossible to be disappointed, only proven prescient.

Ten points for the bleen reference though.

 

[KBS756]

Okay, here's what I'm thinking:

Processor: 2.93 Gainestown
RAM: either standard 6GB or the 8GB upgrade. With the stock I get it sooner, but with the 8GB, I get more RAM and more open DIMM slots. I don't really care about getting it sooner, and I believe that it is worth it to have more open DIMM slots while getting MORE RAM, but I'll see what you guys think.
GPU: Radeon 4870
HDD: Standard. I'm going to add a 1TB drive third-party for a Time Machine backup and a 2TB drive once we establish their... security (cough1.5TBSeagatecough) as drives for extra storage. I'll just back up the 640GB boot disk.

All in all, at this point I believe it will be:

2.93GHz eight-core
8GB RAM
Radeon 4870
640GB HDD
18x SuperDrive & BD-RE DL/HD DVD-ROM drive
AirPort
And my dual 24" monitors. I'm adding the Mini DisplayPort-single link DVI adapter so that I can even USE both of them.

Whaddya think? Some things might be subject to a little change, but I don't see it deviating much from this. Any more suggestions would be cool.

couldnt u order stock 6 gb then get like 16 gb for 290 from macsales and sell the 6 gb ram stick?

btw are u ordering with education discount + shipping to a state with no sales tax? (Alaska, Delaware, Oregon, New Hampshire I think?) thats the most money u can save on a mac pro right now ... I am gonna do that once i ask my parents if they know anyone trustworthy in any of those states who'd then send it to me.

Jeezus! Your config there is coming in at £6,089.00 in the UK apple store:

Two 2.93GHz Quad-Core Intel Xeon
8GB (4x2GB)
640GB 7200-rpm Serial ATA 3Gb/s
ATI Radeon HD 4870 512MB
One 18x SuperDrive
Apple LED Cinema Display (24" flat panel)
Apple LED Cinema Display (24" flat panel)
Apple Mighty Mouse
Apple Keyboard with Numeric Keypad (British) and User's Guide (English)

That works out at approx $8560! Bloody ell!

think he said hes gonna use his own 24 in monitors because hes buyin mini display > dvi

 

[seisend]

K, I just loaded my heaviest Logic Pro 8 project. 16 VSTU plug-in synth tracks and 2 live GuitarRig3 strum tracks and the CPUs don't go over 7% to 10% and averaged maybe more like 4% or 5%.

I have a MacPro v1.1 which was originally 2 dual core x5150 but now is modified to x5355 dual quad cores at 2.66ghz. And 4gb RAM. (I want another 4gb tho. )

Does that help?

Ok thank you Tesselator.

hmm , I think I'll go with the QuadCore Mac Pro . I am going to buy the mac in 1-2 Months. my father has a iMac 2008. I've seen how fast the iMac was loading programms and stuff and I've seen how fast a Mac Pro (in a store) can load programms and other things. From there I decided to buy a Mac Pro... But I am happy with my MacBook Pro too. It's cool to take it away and make music with other people in good quality. But are you recording at 96 KHZ? With my MacBook Pro it is no problem to record with 44.1 or 48 khz with synths etc. . But 96 KHZ is two times more than 48khz and doube the workload for the CPU , don't underestimate this my friend.


thank you ! =)

regards

 

[Tallest Skil]

couldnt u order stock 6 gb then get like 16 gb for 290 from macsales and sell the 6 gb ram stick?

btw are u ordering with education discount + shipping to a state with no sales tax? (Alaska, Delaware, Oregon, New Hampshire I think?) thats the most money u can save on a mac pro right now ... I am gonna do that once i ask my parents if they know anyone trustworthy in any of those states who'd then send it to me.

Maybe... WHY is their only 4GB DIMM option EIGHT of them?!

Seriously, maybe I just want TWO of them for now!

Does their RAM buyback apply to the newest Mac Pro RAM? How does that work; can I just send my RAM to them in the box in which their RAM came?

Developer discount. I worked it out; the price difference between the regular store and the developer store for my configuration is about 25%.

Twenty. Five. Percent.

So that rocks.

 

[Fomaphone]

Okay, here's what I'm thinking:

All in all, at this point I believe it will be:

2.93GHz eight-core
8GB RAM
Radeon 4870
640GB HDD
18x SuperDrive & BD-RE DL/HD DVD-ROM drive
AirPort
And my dual 24" monitors. I'm adding the Mini DisplayPort-single link DVI adapter so that I can even USE both of them.

Whaddya think? Some things might be subject to a little change, but I don't see it deviating much from this. Any more suggestions would be cool.

you've probably already read what i think about the 2.93 octo vs the 2.66... still not sure why it's worth the extra thousand bucks.

go with the 8gb from apple and then either get 8gb from OWC (right now only $20/gb for 2GB sticks)... 16gb will take you quite a bit of time to max out.

the 640 with a 1TB time machine makes sense.

 

[Setmose]

Okay, here's what I'm thinking:

Processor: 2.93 Gainestown
RAM: either standard 6GB or the 8GB upgrade. With the stock I get it sooner, but with the 8GB, I get more RAM and more open DIMM slots. I don't really care about getting it sooner, and I believe that it is worth it to have more open DIMM slots while getting MORE RAM, but I'll see what you guys think.
GPU: Radeon 4870
HDD: Standard. I'm going to add a 1TB drive third-party for a Time Machine backup and a 2TB drive once we establish their... security (cough1.5TBSeagatecough) as drives for extra storage. I'll just back up the 640GB boot disk.

All in all, at this point I believe it will be:

2.93GHz eight-core
8GB RAM
Radeon 4870
640GB HDD
18x SuperDrive & BD-RE DL/HD DVD-ROM drive
AirPort
And my dual 24" monitors. I'm adding the Mini DisplayPort-single link DVI adapter so that I can even USE both of them.

Whaddya think? Some things might be subject to a little change, but I don't see it deviating much from this. Any more suggestions would be cool.

My cart is the same, except:

1 24" LED ACD
2 Superdrives (for duplicating & redundancy)
2 640GB HDD (for mirror backup)
0 Airport (I use cross-over Ethernet cable to dock the MacBook Pro)
1 XP (for Boot Camp - not purchased through Apple)

Enjoy!

 

[Tesselator]

Ok thank you Tesselator.

hmm , I think I'll go with the QuadCore Mac Pro . I am going to buy the mac in 1-2 Months. my father has a iMac 2008. I've seen how fast the iMac was loading programms and stuff and I've seen how fast a Mac Pro (in a store) can load programms and other things. From there I decided to buy a Mac Pro... But I am happy with my MacBook Pro too. It's cool to take it away and make music with other people in good quality. But are you recording at 96 KHZ? With my MacBook Pro it is no problem to record with 44.1 or 48 khz with synths etc. . But 96 KHZ is two times more than 48khz and doube the workload for the CPU , don't underestimate this my friend.


thank you ! =)

regards

Yeah, I didn't test that just now. But I don't remember it being heavy at all. After you start a thread about it (before you buy) if no one answers you with knowing specifics PM/Mail me and I test that extensively for you.

I think the Quad would certainly be enough off hand but it's kind of a rip. You're getting a machine based on the 3500 series chip in a system which is very close to identical to an i7 system costing a good $1000 less. (more actually). The quad Mac Pro maxes out at 8 Gig memory and cannot add a second processor. 4 drive bays, 2 CD bays, One W3520 $284 2.66 xeon, and a bitchen case. This looks just like an i7 without the ECC feature but costs over $1,000 more.

I'm not so sure that's such a good idea. <shrug>

 

[rylin]

I'm adding the Mini DisplayPort-single link DVI adapter so that I can even USE both of them.

Whaddya think? Some things might be subject to a little change, but I don't see it deviating much from this. Any more suggestions would be cool.

I'd consider getting a GT 120 instead of the adapter, as it's yet more cores Snow Leopard might be able to use.

 

[KBS756]

Maybe... WHY is their only 4GB DIMM option EIGHT of them?!

Seriously, maybe I just want TWO of them for now!

Does their RAM buyback apply to the newest Mac Pro RAM? How does that work; can I just send my RAM to them in the box in which their RAM came?

Developer discount. I worked it out; the price difference between the regular store and the developer store for my configuration is about 25%.

Twenty. Five. Percent.

So that rocks.

hey this is just buying that $99 student developer discount? drops 25% off the price? do you need anythin special to qualify or u just drop 99 bucks for it.? and does the cut work on displays as well? Thanks in advance

 

[rylin]

hey this is just buying that $99 student developer discount? drops 25% off the price? do you need anythin special to qualify or u just drop 99 bucks for it.? and does the cut work on displays as well? Thanks in advance

Yes, it's the ADC student membership.
It lets you buy one "system" at a reduced price.

System can be an iMac, a Mac Pro with or without display etc.

On the old MP the discount was roughly $500 IIRC, but customizing (i.e., padding Apples' margins) naturally means you can chop off more.
The requirements are:

If you are 18 years of age or older and enrolled in a college or university, the ADC Student Membership provides the tools and resources you need to take your development skills to the next level.

See http://developer.apple.com/products/membership.html for more info.

 

[iMacmatician]

The 4 core Mac Pro is probably the reason we don't have a 4 core iMac yet.

Yeah. Even though there would still be a significant performance difference.

Hopefully that means 6-core Westmere allows Apple to release a 4-core iMac. That is, if Apple doesn't do an addition like with Clovertown.

Going by the assumption that each core in the 4 core system is faster than the fastest core available in the older 2008 line, it is still probably faster for many people. Unless you are working with balanced multithreaded programs, or many programs running at once all using the CPU heavy, the rise of multicore CPUs haven't helped many programs at all, since they are single thread.

True. Extrapolated benchmarks have put the 2.27 GHz 8-core Gainestown at something similar to the 3.2 GHz 8-core Harpertown. Also multiple cores would help with multi-tasking.