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Wish to build Mac Pro myself, best place to hunt for parts?

L

ListedFirst.com

macrumors newbie
Dec 28, 2009
20
0
philipma1957 said:
I would buy this


http://store.apple.com/us/product/G0LG1LL/A?mco=MTk3NjkyMjE

pull the cpus sell them on ebay after you put in your 3.4 cpus got to be the easiest way. kind of what i did with my quad 2.8 to hex 3.2 mod.
Click to expand...

I second this. Back in the 2006 days, I bought 2.4GHz CPUs and BSEL OC'd them to 3.0GHZ 8-core.

My 2009 2.66 now has the W3580 3.33GHz, and 24GB (3x8GB) ram. Neither of which were purchased form Apple. I then use the Areca 1880ix-12 RAID card, and it blows the Apple raid card out of the water with my SSDs. Just found a great price on a gently used '09 Pro and went to town.

I've built a few from scratch, and aside from the experience, the cost/effort wasn't feasible.
 
A

Another1

macrumors newbie
Apr 4, 2011
16
3
Germany
J

JollyJoeJoe

macrumors regular
Original poster
Apr 3, 2011
114
0
Another1 said:
I would take this one:

http://store.apple.com/us/product/FC561LL/A?mco=MTkyMTM1ODQ

it's a lot cheaper than the 12-core and you can replace the 2x4 cores by 2x6 cores as well.
Click to expand...

Yes, that looks like what I need as long as it has the correct firmware to support Westmere hex core, B1 stepping chips.

Considering it supports westmere B1 quad core it should support the X5690 hex core I would think. Can anyone here confirm this to be accurate ?
 
G

goMac

Contributor
Apr 15, 2004
7,662
1,694
What? Why? This is like building a Honda Civic from scratch from parts.

It's just cheaper to get the base configuration and then upgrade it yourself. Yes, you get to skip the part where you put a logic board and a power supply in a case. But you have a warranty, and it's cheaper.

Edit: Ah, I see we've already reached that point.
 
J

JollyJoeJoe

macrumors regular
Original poster
Apr 3, 2011
114
0
goMac said:
What? Why? This is like building a Honda Civic from scratch from parts.

It's just cheaper to get the base configuration and then upgrade it yourself. Yes, you get to skip the part where you put a logic board and a power supply in a case. But you have a warranty, and it's cheaper.

Edit: Ah, I see we've already reached that point.
Click to expand...

Wouldn't you void the warranty anywhere by upgrading the processors though?
 
G

goMac

Contributor
Apr 15, 2004
7,662
1,694
JollyJoeJoe said:
Wouldn't you void the warranty anywhere by upgrading the processors though?
Click to expand...

I know people who have done CPU swaps who have not lost AppleCare. The new CPUs aren't covered, and if you damage the board, that's not covered.

OWC also says that upgrading the CPU does not void your warranty.
 
philipma1957

philipma1957

macrumors 603
Apr 13, 2010
6,367
251
Howell, New Jersey
JollyJoeJoe said:
Wouldn't you void the warranty anywhere by upgrading the processors though?
Click to expand...

gray area


https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/1122551/


this is my upgrade.. if you look at the photos of the old and new cpu and the old and new heat sink paste. it is plain to see that if i put the machine back to the oem cpu who is to say an upgrade was ever done.

Now if I bring the machine in with the new cpu they will tell me the cpu swap broke it.

not that i advocate cheating or deception of any business nor do i say that any business deceives or cheats their customers.

but lets be real
 
A

Another1

macrumors newbie
Apr 4, 2011
16
3
Germany
T

tpavur

macrumors regular
Sep 8, 2010
196
0
I noticed in that screen shot it said 0% 24 months? how did you get that to pop up?

EDIT: NM I found it...
 
Last edited:
seveej

seveej

macrumors 6502a
Dec 14, 2009
827
51
Helsinki, Finland
kemperman said:
... to avoid a potential lawsuit for loading OSX on to an unauthorised hackintosh.
Click to expand...

Gimme a break!
Have you heard of even a single case, where Apple had sued a single person for breaking the EULA? Besides, in any true justice state an EULA can,t hold up in court if it's in conflict with the law (as this patently is).

Pekka
 
J

JollyJoeJoe

macrumors regular
Original poster
Apr 3, 2011
114
0
ListedFirst.com said:
I second this. Back in the 2006 days, I bought 2.4GHz CPUs and BSEL OC'd them to 3.0GHZ 8-core.

My 2009 2.66 now has the W3580 3.33GHz, and 24GB (3x8GB) ram. Neither of which were purchased form Apple. I then use the Areca 1880ix-12 RAID card, and it blows the Apple raid card out of the water with my SSDs. Just found a great price on a gently used '09 Pro and went to town.

I've built a few from scratch, and aside from the experience, the cost/effort wasn't feasible.
Click to expand...

The Areca 1880ix-12 RAID card comes with EFi drivers right ? So I don't need to install any drivers etc. Do I use the standard disk utility to set up the raid when using the Areca or does it have its own setup I can boot into etc. Is there a mac edition of this card, or just one and it works fine with mac pro.

It's SAS, so I would need adapter to SATA too. Where did you get yours ?
 
T

Transporteur

macrumors 68030
Nov 30, 2008
2,729
3
UK
SAS and SATA use the same connector, so no, you don't need an adapter for that.

IIRC the Areca cards have EFI support, use BIOS by default, though, so you have to flash the card to EFI first.
 
J

JollyJoeJoe

macrumors regular
Original poster
Apr 3, 2011
114
0
Transporteur said:
SAS and SATA use the same connector, so no, you don't need an adapter for that.

IIRC the Areca cards have EFI support, use BIOS by default, though, so you have to flash the card to EFI first.
Click to expand...

So what I gotta shove it into a PC and flash it with EFI ? The manufacturer I presume provides this firmware on their site.
 
J

JollyJoeJoe

macrumors regular
Original poster
Apr 3, 2011
114
0
Anyone here use the:

CalDigit RAID Card - PCI Express x8 with RAID 0, 1, 5, 6, 50, 60 and JBOD, Two x4 internal Mini-SAS (SFF-8087) connectors and Three x4 External Mini-SAS (SFF-8088) connectors ?

Seems sweet as takes advantage of the internal drive channel for the 4x drives in the mac pro as well as offering external ports. So no need to run SAS expanders on the inside.

Would the performance be a lot worse when used with 4x internal Hitachi ultrastar 72000rpm drives than say if using an Areca card w/ 6GB/sec ports and Intel Dual Core 1200 MHz IOP348 I/O processor ?

Basically I need to know the most kick arse RAID card (under $1000) that has EFI firmware, hassle free setup and top compatibility with the mac pro to handle a 4-disk RAID5 array.
 
Last edited:
1

100Years

macrumors regular
Mar 8, 2011
125
0
JollyJoeJoe said:
Yes, that looks like what I need as long as it has the correct firmware to support Westmere hex core, B1 stepping chips.

Considering it supports westmere B1 quad core it should support the X5690 hex core I would think. Can anyone here confirm this to be accurate ?
Click to expand...

I replaced my 2.4 chips with x5680 chips, and can confirm that those work great. I would expect that the x5690 chips would work too, but I cannot personally confirm it.
 
J

JollyJoeJoe

macrumors regular
Original poster
Apr 3, 2011
114
0
100Years said:
I replaced my 2.4 chips with x5680 chips, and can confirm that those work great. I would expect that the x5690 chips would work too, but I cannot personally confirm it.
Click to expand...

Yes, by all reasoning the X5690 should work. There must be someone who has tried this already ? Albeit google returns nothing in this respect.

X5690

Core stepping B1 (Q4F1, SLBVX)
Manufacturing process 0.032 micron High-K metal gate process


X5680

Core stepping B1 (SLBV5)
Manufacturing process 0.032 micron High-K metal gate process
1170 million transistors
 
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