A 2006 Mac Pro uses SATA-1, however the SAS drives will run at Sata-2 speed 3Gb/sec. Buy a SAS PCI-Express Raid card and put it in slot 1 or 4 and configure 16 lanes. Then buy a SAS-Sata cable. Remove the old Sata cable from the logic board. Connect the new SAS-Sata cable to the logic board. If you don't have SATA-2 or 3 hard drives buy four. Now you are running SATA-2 or 3 at 3Gb/sec through the backplane. I configured mine for RAID-10. Next connect two SSD's to the hidden Sata Ports on the logic board behind the fan. Install Lion on either one of the SSD's or run the two striped. Congratulations, you now have your OS on an SSD, and you are running your four SATA-2 or3 drives at full speed, 3Gb/sec. You just took your 2006 Mac Pro up about four years. Check out my attachments.
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Why it's worth buying a 2006 Mac Pro
- Thread starter dbaps
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So you pushed a 2006 MP to "2010" levels.... making a hefty investment I'm sure and still leaving you more than 3 yrs behind times, with no more room to move forward. You mentioned LION.... (3 OS behind)... and while the 2006 MP can run SnowLeopard.. it cannot "offically" run "Mt.Lion" or "Mavericks" or any other future version of OS.
So all you ended up with is a 7yr computer with faster storage.
(For what its worth... I too have a 2006 MP.. and was disappointed that SL was the end of the line for it. It now sits in the corner, running Win7 for those rare times I need to evaluate a Win product. Its previous position in my workstation has been taken by a 27" iMac)
So all you ended up with is a 7yr computer with faster storage.
(For what its worth... I too have a 2006 MP.. and was disappointed that SL was the end of the line for it. It now sits in the corner, running Win7 for those rare times I need to evaluate a Win product. Its previous position in my workstation has been taken by a 27" iMac)
That's a bit negative, don't you think?
The money the guy spent to do this upgrade was primarily the cost of the new SSD drives, which would obviously be usable again in the next computer he buys -- so not money stuck permanently in his 2006 Mac Pro.
And while the 2006 Mac Pro can't officially run OS X newer than Lion, there are ways to get it to boot Mountain Lion by going through a few extra steps during the initial installation. Can't say if that will remain so for Mavericks, but it will certainly let you get some more mileage out of an existing machine, if you can run the OS that's only one version behind the latest.
(It does officially still work with Lion, BTW ... not just Snow Leopard.)
I owned one of these until last year, and still use a 2008 model every day. The difference between the two in "real world" daily use was fairly minor, so I'd still recommend a 2006 Mac Pro tower to anyone trying to get a very capable Mac that can hold multiple internal drives at a budget price.
As long as you're not too hung up on everything being officially "Apple sanctioned" that goes in one, people are supposedly getting even the ATI Radeon 5870 graphics cards to work in the 2006 Mac Pro.
The money the guy spent to do this upgrade was primarily the cost of the new SSD drives, which would obviously be usable again in the next computer he buys -- so not money stuck permanently in his 2006 Mac Pro.
And while the 2006 Mac Pro can't officially run OS X newer than Lion, there are ways to get it to boot Mountain Lion by going through a few extra steps during the initial installation. Can't say if that will remain so for Mavericks, but it will certainly let you get some more mileage out of an existing machine, if you can run the OS that's only one version behind the latest.
(It does officially still work with Lion, BTW ... not just Snow Leopard.)
I owned one of these until last year, and still use a 2008 model every day. The difference between the two in "real world" daily use was fairly minor, so I'd still recommend a 2006 Mac Pro tower to anyone trying to get a very capable Mac that can hold multiple internal drives at a budget price.
As long as you're not too hung up on everything being officially "Apple sanctioned" that goes in one, people are supposedly getting even the ATI Radeon 5870 graphics cards to work in the 2006 Mac Pro.
I found.....
this post interesting, informative and innovative (some sort). If you can live with an outdated OS and be productive on it, getting more from the hardware you have sounds like something positive.
I have a lot of old hardware. Because good and no so good reasons. Some of that inclusive have afforded me tackle out of the blue gigs. But still, I feel difficult to digest to work with something 7 years old. And sure thing becoming OS-obsolete.
But you have managed to do something. And works for you and that is the bottom line, at least for me.....By the way, kudos.....
this post interesting, informative and innovative (some sort). If you can live with an outdated OS and be productive on it, getting more from the hardware you have sounds like something positive.
I have a lot of old hardware. Because good and no so good reasons. Some of that inclusive have afforded me tackle out of the blue gigs. But still, I feel difficult to digest to work with something 7 years old. And sure thing becoming OS-obsolete.
But you have managed to do something. And works for you and that is the bottom line, at least for me.....By the way, kudos.....
