August 9.
August 9.
16? I'm still dogcrap happy with four.
FYI, Apples 12 core machine is now available. Personally I might hold out until next year for the 16 core version with 50 GBPS QPI vs the current 6.4 GBPS.
Stock Mac Pro
CPU Xeon W3530 2.8 Ghz My cost $340
Motherboard not sure typically $200. $300
1 Terra HD Drive $100
DVD burner $35
3 Gig Ram DDR3 $100
ATI Radeon 5770 $180
It's a nice case + PSU $250
So about $1280 and change. They charge you double what it's worth, well what I can buy the same parts for that is.
Hi ho.
Yeah, I couldn't wait tell next year so I'm building a PC. I've got the time and patience to tweak with it to get optimal performance, and I want to avoid the apple premium. I'm sure my decision is influenced by my negative experience with the quad core G5.
I did find out the Xeons are not bad at all. They are the same as the I7's only with an extra QPI except; for the W models, I believe. According to Toms hardware duel 3.3 ghz quad or six Xeons is faster then a six core I7 on photoshop. Of course the Xeons cost more due to the extra QPI link.
I decided to go for a well rounded build with liquid cooling (non conductive), 24 GB of performance ram, PCIe SSD, and generally awesome parts. I was looking at a duel xeon but then I figured an i7 was probably fast enough for now since I will probably swap out the CPU and motherboard in Q3 2011.
Some of the things that I don't like about the mac are:
*1033 mhz limited ram speed (yes I know its ECC, but my ram is 2000mhz cas 8)
*no performance cooling options.
*overpriced and limited SSD stock. No support for PCIe SSD's
*overpriced and limited video card and CPU options (on google shopping you can get the 2.93 GHZ hex core for $300 more then the 2.66, apple charges $600 per CPU)
*Liquid cooling a PC improves over-clocking capacity to the point were you can get a 40% performance increase. Overclocking is not an option on a mac.
Look at this system... $4,800 and it includes 2 3.33 ghz six core xeons (not even available on the mac yet), 16 GB ram and 2 15,000 RPM SAS drives. Much better deal in my opinion then the new apple.
http://cgi.ebay.com/DELL-WORKSTATION...ht_2613wt_1109
Although... this system still uses a server motherboard and ram. For best performance nothing will be a top end custom PC rig with the Classified SR-2 motherboard.
http://www.evga.com/articles/00537/
Also are there only 4 Dimm slots on the new mac? My motherboard has 6 and the SR-2 has 12. More slots is good because you can use a lower capacity and higher speed 2GB sticks or for the 4 GB ones for extreme ram levels. Just stay away from the 8GB sticks, as they don't perform all that well, yet apple uses them for the 32GB configuration... Go figure.
I like how apple talks about all the new technology such as the integrated memory controller on the CPU... As if the same technology hasn't been out on windows computers for a year.
If someone is stuck on buying a mac they should keep an eye on ebay. A lot of movie studios will buy a computer for a project and then sell it for a loss at the end of production. You can still buy applecare for used macs and this would be a good way to save some cash.
Someone on a budget may want to also consider a PC powered by AMD processors. For $300 you can get a six core AMD processor.
Yup killer hardware is pretty cheap these days alright.
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