What is the MAX to pay for a 2008 Mac Pro?

[MentalVizion]

I hadn't seen your location before, sorry. You might have to consider looking around various European eBays and Amazons or even find a seller who will ship from the US. Not the best solution, but maybe overall the cheapest.

Already checked german, austrian, british, and US ebay. Prices seem to be quite random there. Probably am best buying a 2nd hand one on some marketplace or something. Sucks to be only able to enter the marketplace on here after a certain amount of posts, and atleast 6 months of being registered. But this way it's better and safer I guess.

 

[Giuly]

Since I have quite a few HDD's I need to storage somewhere, the Pro is my only consideration. I also don't want to eliminate the fact, that I may once upgrade the GPU.

Are there some site's I can get 2nd hand macs "quite cheap" that I should be aware of? Not sure if it's allowed to post links in here.

I am from Austria, and here we have pretty much nothing but overpriced **** (for example: 2nd hand Mac Pro 1.1 with 4 gigs of ram for around
600€ = probably around 900$)

That actually equals $600 in the RDF.

Even though you don't want an rMBP:

The bottom-of-the-line 15" rMBP has nearly twice the single-core performance of an 8-core MacPro3,1.

It even beats it for 64-bit multithreaded workloads.

You can attach hard drives and displays via Thunderbolt so that they aren't throttled, and there're tons of audio hardware that attach either via Thunderbolt or USB 3.0, too (and if you really need it, Thunderbolt enclosures for PCIe cards).

As far as the graphics card upgrade is concerned: A modern one like the Sapphire Radeon HD 7950 Mac Edition won't work in a 2008 Mac Pro, and the benchmarks for Apple's HD5770 are on par with the graphics performance of the 750M in the rMBP.

 

[MentalVizion]

That actually equals $600 in the RDF.

Even though you don't want an rMBP:
Image
Image

The bottom-of-the-line 15" rMBP has nearly twice the single-core performance of an 8-core MacPro3,1.
Image
Image
It even beats it for 64-bit multithreaded workloads.

You can attach hard drives and displays via Thunderbolt so that they aren't throttled, and there're tons of audio hardware that attach either via Thunderbolt or USB 3.0, too (and if you really need it, Thunderbolt enclosures for PCIe cards).

As far as the graphics card upgrade is concerned: A modern one like the Sapphire Radeon HD 7950 Mac Edition won't work in a 2008 Mac Pro, and the benchmarks for Apple's HD5770 are on par with the graphics performance of the 750M in the rMBP.

Thanks for your answer.
I already had a Laptop as my Audio-Workstation for quite a few years, and it was a nightmare. Sure, the Macbook probably is twice, or maybe even 3 times as powerful, but I think it wasn't power thats was missing.

A desktop just seems way more stable and more made for such work to me.
I definately will also get a Macbook Pro in the future, just for the portability (not only for music production though), but the desktop has priority to me.

Also, by the time, I start to prefer the 4,1 model over the 3,1. But again, I dont really get why everyone prefers it over the 2008 model.

Just to sum things up here a bit:

As far as I got it, the 4,1 uses i7 technology, while the 3,1 is using Core 2 Duo, right? Which instantly means a big + for the 2009 model, I get that.

The RAM is WAY cheaper on the 2009 Model, also fine.

The graphicscard I'm planning to get (either a 5770, or a 6870) are working fine in both o them I guess?

Now to the part I don't really get:

I read quite a few times already, that people are flashing the EFI from the 4,1 to 5,1, which basically MAKES it a 5,1 as far as I understand. Does this bring any performance boosts with it, or do people just do it to be able to tell they have a 5,1?

I also don't quite get the 2009 model CPU wise. I read that people are using 6-core Xeons with it, while at wikipedia there are only 4 and 8 core CPU's listed. Do these 6 core units only work if you flash the EFI?

If someone could clarify this for me a tiny bit, I would be thankful

thanks

 

[Giuly]

I fail to see the difference between display, keyboard and mouse hooked up to a MacBook Pro vs. a display, keyboard and mouse hooked up to an old Mac Pro from a usability perspective. An external storage device that holds four hard drives is also physically smaller than those Mac Pros.

Except that you can just unplug two cables, take the rMBP with you and enjoy the retina display in all its glory.

 

[G4DP]

That actually equals $600 in the RDF.

Even though you don't want an rMBP:
Image
Image

The bottom-of-the-line 15" rMBP has nearly twice the single-core performance of an 8-core MacPro3,1.
Image
Image
It even beats it for 64-bit multithreaded workloads.

You can attach hard drives and displays via Thunderbolt so that they aren't throttled, and there're tons of audio hardware that attach either via Thunderbolt or USB 3.0, too (and if you really need it, Thunderbolt enclosures for PCIe cards).

As far as the graphics card upgrade is concerned: A modern one like the Sapphire Radeon HD 7950 Mac Edition won't work in a 2008 Mac Pro, and the benchmarks for Apple's HD5770 are on par with the graphics performance of the 750M in the rMBP.

The sapphire 7950 works fine in a 2008 Mac Pro. The 2010 mark is purely an artificial lie by Apple and ATi.

 

[Giuly]

Wasn't it so fast that it melted the traces on the logic board?

 

[MentalVizion]

I am not planing to get more then either a 5770 or 6870 in there, so it doesn't really matter that much.

 

[wesk702]

Hey I have a 3,1 2008. It's a quad core with 3gb ram. Still in mint condition. Would be willing to do $700, since I'm getting a new computer as soon as the new MP rolls out. Let me know if you're interested.

 

[push/pull]

I would get the next model of Mac Pro(4,1).

I have an the 2008 3,1 and it still runs great. However I got it with 4 GB of ram. The ram for this particular model is very expensive. If you can find one with 8Gb minimum I'd go for it. I'd shoot for even more ram than that.

to answer your question: 3,1 with 8gb ram for between $800 and $1000 USD

 

[MentalVizion]

As by now I would have two sellers, one with a 3,1, one with a 4,1.

The 3,1 is the 8 core 2.8ghz model upgraded quite alot. SSD, 8 gigs of RAM, BlueRay drive, 6870.
The case looks like the owner took good care of it also.

8 GB's of RAM proably are even to less. Which leads to quide expensive upgrade costs.

the 4,1 is the 2.66ghz Quad-core model. It also has a SSD installed and offers 24GB's RAM. Should be more then enough RAM for my work, but even IF I have to upgrade it, it's fairly cheap compared to the 2008 models.

The nice thing about the 4,1 would be that I can upgrade the EFI and basically make a 5,1 out of it, which allows me to install the 6-core CPU everybody is recommending.

both of them would cost me 1000$ + the shipping costs which sadly are way to high

 

[Yebubbleman]

Hey,

After reading through the forums here quite often, I thought it's finally time to register, so hey all!

I am planing to get a Mac Pro, preferably a 3.1, in the near future.
Since this is my first "real, big mac" (lol), I really don't have to much of a plan what to pay for it.

I had in mind to probably get a 8-core one, with atleast 8 gigs of RAM (preferably 16GB).
HDD and Graphics don't really matter (btw, are the only compatible 5770's the one's that Apple sell, or are the ones that Sapphire or XFX, for example, manufacture also working inside of it? Quite curious about this!)

I saw some @ ebay, but the prices there are quite random I think.

So what would one be worth nowadays?

Thanks!

Regarding graphics cards, there are several threads about graphics cards and compatibility that will tell you much more than I could. I'd say you should check them out.

Otherwise, I'd say don't bother with a 2008 Mac Pro; they are irritating when they are not in tip-top shape and the RAM is way pricier than it ought to be. I'd go with a 2009 model at minimum; that's probably your best bang-for-buck for any Mac Pro that isn't based on one or two 6-core processors. And for those you can find decently for $1200.