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Trying to decide what do get

D

dblester

macrumors member
Original poster
Jan 8, 2008
31
0
Atlanta, GA
Ok so i have been waiting for the new mac pros to come out and now that they are out i will be purchasing one next week. I plan on buying my ram from OWC and getting one or two hard drives from newegg.
my current thoughts on the build is

Two 3.2GHz Quad-Core Intel Xeon (8-core)
2GB (2 x 1GB)
320GB 7200-rpm Serial ATA 3Gb/s
NVIDIA GeForce 8800 GT 512MB (Two dual-link DVI)
Two 16x SuperDrives
AirPort Extreme card (Wi-Fi)

I am a Jr in college doing graphic design work the programs i use most are photoshop, illustrator, after effects, aperture / lightroom. any thoughts? i need something that is going to last for numerous years
 
I think the CPU upgrades are a waste of money for your tasks.

Use that to get RAM and Hard drives. Then put the rest away, or maybe get a new display. I would also recommend looking into the student ADC program.
 
i have actually signed up for the student ADC and faxing in the info tomorrow i was only thinking of going all out on the processor because i figure it will last the longest i have a 23" ACD so i dont really need a new display. will there be a noticeable difference between 3.0 and 3.2ghz a few years down the road?
 
Not too many G5 DP 1.8 owners are lusting after G5 DP 2.0 computers right now. Does that answer your question about how you'll feel about the processor speed a few years down the road?

I'd not BTO a second optical drive. They're about $30 to put one in yourself now.
 
dblester said:
i have actually signed up for the student ADC and faxing in the info tomorrow i was only thinking of going all out on the processor because i figure it will last the longest i have a 23" ACD so i dont really need a new display. will there be a noticeable difference between 3.0 and 3.2ghz a few years down the road?
Click to expand...

My thoughts are this:

1: Applications are only going to become more processor intensive, and better optimized for multiple cores now that Intel and AMD are both doing 4+ cores in a workstation. Memory is easily upgradeable, HDDs are as well. CPUs are touchy. And if Intel decides to release a a 4 GHz CPU, I don't think you'll see that big a difference from where you're at when you have a high number of cores.

2: Down the road, if you find a need for a newer system, an 8 core system will have decent resale possibilities.

3: Don't skimp on the display. It's the only thing you actually have to look at. I use a Samsung 24" LCD and it's wonderful. I will of course feel silly if Apple releases an earth shattering new display next week, but I know enough people in the LCD display industry that I would have heard about something wild coming.

4: If you don't have a need for two optical drives, I personally wouldn't spend the extra money since at some point the high definition media will become standardized, and I'd save the other drive bay for one of those drives.
 
I would agree about the two drives. Originally I was going to go with two myself but it won't be too long and the newer drives will come down in price and you can drop that in the empty slot.
 
trollking said:
I would agree about the two drives. Originally I was going to go with two myself but it won't be too long and the newer drives will come down in price and you can drop that in the empty slot.
Click to expand...

Yeah, I left my second slot open for Blu-Ray. Could be waiting a while, though.
 
yeah i was looking at that and 80$ for a second drive is kinda a waste.. the main thing i am trying to decide now is weather to go with 3.2 or 3.0
 
the 3.2 really seems to be a waste at the moment, its just so expensive, if you upgrade the processor, i'd get the 3.0 (i myself am trying to decide between the 2.8 and 3.0).
 
dblester said:
yeah i was looking at that and 80$ for a second drive is kinda a waste.. the main thing i am trying to decide now is weather to go with 3.2 or 3.0
Click to expand...

The way I look at it, that extra $1600 you pay to go from 2.8 to 3.2 is 57% of the cost of a whole other Mac Pro! If you put that money aside, you could buy a whole new system by the time the 2.8 seems sluggish. So, only buy it if you're positive you can utilize it.
 
Any particular reason why you are dead-set on the 3.0Ghz or 3.2Ghz Mac Pro?

If you are going to be working on fairly large files I recommend getting a RAID system.
 
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