"recommend some activities this beast can hande?
Well, really, you have to admit it was kind of a dumb question.
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Things to do with a new Mac Pro?
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"recommend some activities this beast can hande?
Well, really, you have to admit it was kind of a dumb question.
I think he was just looking for things he could tinker with when he had a little free time.
I used to tinker around in fruity loops and some other audio programs on my older computers just for the hell of it, just to see what I could do. Never made anything worthwhile, but it was fun to tinker and play around.
Any computer is going to have it's main uses, and, to me anyway, especially when it's new, I like to see what else is out there that I may be interested in playing with. Usually the first thing I reach for is a FPS game just to try out (I'm terrible at FPS games.. beyond terrible really), then I just play it by ear.
After awhile you settle in to just doing what you normally would, but you never know.
student_trap makes some outstanding points. For me, I am (mostly) happily cutting away 1080i TV shows for air in my local television market (top 30). I have a 20" iMac (late 2006) and it does the job. The new iMacs are even bigger and faster and can crank out the work and I can't wait to get my hands on one.
But the bottom line is glossy screens suck. Other than adding more RAM, I can't upgrade the iMac. And the highest end iMac is "about" the same as the entry level Mac Pro. All these give the more expensive Mac Pro a longer useful life than the iMac giving owners a (much?) longer time to recoop and exceed their initial expense.
For me, I can't afford the added upfront expense or the decision would be clear. I love my iMac and I can't wait to get an i7. But, in reality, I really want a properly speced out Mac Pro.
Oh, and Nade...sorry, but that really was a stupid question. You set fire in a forum, no matter how cool we are, there's going to be flames. We're just having fun. Don't take it personal. We're just jealous 'cause the bulk of us don't have the student discount anymore.
But the bottom line is glossy screens suck. Other than adding more RAM, I can't upgrade the iMac. And the highest end iMac is "about" the same as the entry level Mac Pro. All these give the more expensive Mac Pro a longer useful life than the iMac giving owners a (much?) longer time to recoop and exceed their initial expense.
For me, I can't afford the added upfront expense or the decision would be clear. I love my iMac and I can't wait to get an i7. But, in reality, I really want a properly speced out Mac Pro.
Oh, and Nade...sorry, but that really was a stupid question. You set fire in a forum, no matter how cool we are, there's going to be flames. We're just having fun. Don't take it personal. We're just jealous 'cause the bulk of us don't have the student discount anymore.
For my part, I'll be glad to help you any way I can with any specific questions you might have about your Mac Pro. I've had this one since 2006 (it's a 1,1) and can't muster up enough rationalization to replace it with a newer one.
The only negative I can think to apply is that this thing does put out the heat, especially when used with a couple of 30" ACD's.
That might apply for the older Pro's, but in fact the current generation produces almost no heat and consume comparatively little power.
I've got an octad version with the biggest graphics card, additional SATA card and 7 hard drives and it uses not more than 160W in idle.
That's just 10W more than the 30" Cinema on full brightness.
That makes 310W in total for screen and computer.
A stock Quad Pro should pull much less power, I reckon about 120W in idle.
That's not too much if you ask me.
The i7 iMac pulls 157W in idle and full brightness, so a stock Pro Quad with a decent LED screen should not pull much more energy than the iMac.