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OT – is the “new” Mac Pro a failure
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[John Rofrano] “Any more than we already have?”
If you need PCI then yes, more than you already have.
[John Rofrano] ” You just can’t upgrade the GPU.”
I love it when people use the word “just”, it generally signifies that the author trying to fudge the most significant point in an argument. Yes, you cannot only not upgrade the GPU, you are locked out of Invidia GPUs or the ability to add more than 2GPUs.
[John Rofrano] “. Adobe CC should run just fine”
By all accounts Ppro does not run nearly as well as FCPX on the nMP – possibly because of the lack of Nvidia cards, possibly because Adobe can’t afford to spend the time to optimize Ppro for just this one machine the way Apple has with FCPX.
[John Rofrano] “Late last year I bought a 5 year old 2010 Mac Pro 12-Core for $2,275 from eBay because it was 1/2 the price of a new Mac Pro 8-core.”
Name one other computer where you would actually consider buying something built in 2010 to buying a newer model because you can get near equivalent performance for less price. Would you consider buying a 2012 Imac or MBP to save some money – I think not. And the reason you wouldn’t is that the technological advances of the past 3 years make that type of saving pointless compared to the disadvantages. But with the 2010 MacPro vs the 2013 nMP it really is something to consider – and this fact alone is proof of what a wasted opportunity the nMP is.
Herb Sevush
Zebra Productions
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nothin’ attached to nothin’
“Deciding the spine is the process of editing” F. Bieberkopf -
[Don Scioli] “Give me those days of an ARRi BL, a Steenbeck and 5247!”
You were definitely living large – for me it was the days of the Eclair ACL, a Moviola flatbed, and 7247.
Herb Sevush
Zebra Productions
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nothin’ attached to nothin’
“Deciding the spine is the process of editing” F. Bieberkopf -
[John Rofrano] “That has nothing to do with the hardware and everything to do with how efficient Mac OS X is and how tuned it is to using the hardware.”
I think that may have had more to do with how VMWARE was written for Windows. I can recount many cross platform applications that ran great on one platform but not very well on another; ZBrush, Cinem4D, Maxwell, Realflow, etc.
[John Rofrano] “That’s really the problem with Windows. It’s bloated with drivers to support an infinite combination of parts where no two PC’s are exactly alike which reduces the chances that everything will work”
That’s kind of an odd statement. You make it sound as if Windows installs a bunch of drivers for hardware that isn’t on the system…
some companies write great drivers, some don’t. I don’t think that’s a platform specific issue.[John Rofrano] “When the new Mac Pro came out, there were no SSD’s for PC’s that could come close to the performance of the ones Apple was using in the Mac Pro.”
Are you talking about PCIeFlash drives? FusionIO and OZC had been been shipping those for some time before the nMP…
[John Rofrano] “Same is true for Thunderbolt. It simply didn’t exist on PC’s until they caught up.”
That’s because Apple bought exclusivity rights to Thunderbolt… the “catching up” was other vendors gaining access to Intel’s technology after the agreement expired.
[John Rofrano] “I’m reminded of the Extreme Tech article: Apple’s new ‘overpriced’ $10,000 Mac Pro is $2,000 cheaper than the e… where if you bought the same quality parts that Apple uses, PC’s really aren’t cheaper. This is especially true for the new Mac Pro where the equivalent GPU’s are very expensive if you were to buy them as external cards instead of built in.”
I didn’t say anything about cost…
Shawn
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[Herb Sevush] “I love it when people use the word “just”, it generally signifies that the author trying to fudge the most significant point in an argument.”
Let me tell you why I use the word “just”. Because the 2010 Mac Pro tower is limited as well which makes it not that big an advantage. This was my biggest disappointment. The most powerful GPU made for the 2010 Mac Pro is the AMD Radeon HD 7950 Mac Edition. That’s the equivalent of an AMD Radeon R9 280 which is no where near as powerful as the R9 290, 295 and 295X.
The limitation comes from the fact that 300w is the maximum limitation on all PCIe slots combined for the 2010 Mac Pro, and the newer graphics cards need more power than the Mac Pro’s PSU can put out. (they need 2x 8 wire connectors and the Mac Pro only has 2x 6 wire connectors). So in order to add a more powerful GPU to a 2010 Mac Pro you need to add an addition power supply. You see you can only take these older technologies so far.
I’ll give you another example from my PC days. I had an older Intel Core 2 Quad PC and I bought an NVIDIA Quadro for it. No where was this requirement listed except on the box when I got it home, it said: Requires Intel Core i7. I put it in my Core 2 Quad PC anyway and it worked pretty well. Eventually I upgraded to an Intel Core i7 Quad and used the same Quadro card. Boy was I shocked when the Quadro card performed remarkably better. The old Core 2 Quad couldn’t hand off work to the Quadro fast enough so it never reached it’s full potential. Once I got the Core i7 it was like getting a new GPU as well.
The moral of the story is that when you upgrade your systems you must keep them in balance. You can’t put too powerful a GPU with a weak CPU or a Powerful CPU with a weak GPU. So expandability, IMHO, is highly overrated. At some point you need to buy a new system to get the benefits of the latest technology. So to me, “just” not being able to upgrade the GPU is not a deal breaker.
[Herb Sevush] “But with the 2010 MacPro vs the 2013 nMP it really is something to consider – and this fact alone is proof of what a wasted opportunity the nMP is.”
Wasted in what way? What could they have done different?
There is no doubt that the radical shift in design left some people wanting for more. But Apple is not in the “upgrade” business… they are in the “technology is disposable” business which is why Android phones have slots for memory cards and iPhone must be thrown away or traded up when you need more memory. This is Apple’s entire business model.
I think another part of it is that Moore’s Law is no longer in effect. CPU speed has plateaued. Nothing seems to be able to break the 4Ghz barrier. So now manufacturers are going multi-core but software can’t always take advantage of multi-core because not all problems can be parallelized (like AVC/H.264 encoding) so there is very little room for improvement. A 12-Core Mac Pro from 5 years ago is still a formidable beast. I don’t think I would want to use a Quad Core PC from 5 years ago In fact, I sold my 6-Core 2012 PC to buy my 12-Core 2010 Mac Pro. That more a testament to what an incredible machine the 2010 Mac Pro is.
Would I have liked to see a new Mac Pro that was more expandable. I’d have to say yes. Having options is always a good thing. But as I pointed out expansion needs to be balanced and at some point it’s better to buy a new system. People tell me they would never buy an iMac because if the display goes bad you have to send the whole system in for repair. Then I ask them if they have a laptop. Usually they say yes. Then I say, “so if the screen on you laptop goes bad don’t you have to send the whole system in for repair?”. It’s funny how people have double-standards like that. People get use to things being a certain way.
~jr
http://www.johnrofrano.com
http://www.vasst.com -
Well, they were the good clients. Many times it was an ARRI 2C or Eclair, 7247 at 30 Frames a sec and a Moviola or a KEM. Later it went to a Rank converter and a CMX.
It’s too easy now, HD right into a MAC and online, no cutting neg, no prints, no FEDEX deadlines to ship spots back East, too easy.
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[John Rofrano] “Let me tell you why I use the word “just”. Because the 2010 Mac Pro tower is limited as well which makes it not that big an advantage. This was my biggest disappointment. The most powerful GPU made for the 2010 Mac Pro is the AMD Radeon HD 7950 Mac Edition. That’s the equivalent of an AMD Radeon R9 280 which is no where near as powerful as the R9 290, 295 and 295X.
The limitation comes from the fact that 300w is the maximum limitation on all PCIe slots combined for the 2010 Mac Pro, and the newer graphics cards need more power than the Mac Pro’s PSU can put out. (they need 2x 8 wire connectors and the Mac Pro only has 2x 6 wire connectors). So in order to add a more powerful GPU to a 2010 Mac Pro you need to add an addition power supply. You see you can only take these older technologies so far.”
Well…..yes and no. Yes the most powerful GPU ‘made’ for the 2010 Mac Pro may be the AMD Radeon HD 7950 Mac Edition. And
yes, you are limited in how much power you can draw from the older Mac Pros. However, Nvidia has made available web drivers
so that you can install newer and much more powerful GPU’s in your old Mac Pro’s. How powerful? How about a GTX 980 Ti(6GB)?
Or a Titan X (12GB)? Two of the most powerful single cards available. And they work just fine with the available power from the old
Mac Pro’s. I have a 2009 single quad core Mac Pro myself. I flashed the firmware and installed a six core 3.46ghz CPU ($235) and
a GTX 980 Ti GPU in mine myself. Fairly cheap (much cheaper than even buying a low end iMac) and my system is faster than a mid
range ‘new’ Mac Pro.Gabe Strong
G-Force Productions
http://www.gforcevideo.com -
I wouldn’t call the nMP a failure. It’s a nice little machine with that challenged the market on what should come standard in a workstation.
I would call the nMP overrated. It’s a limited little machine with outdated components that cannot be upgraded.
In other words, I think the nMP is another high-floor, low-ceiling design from Apple.
Walter Soyka
Designer & Mad Scientist at Keen Live [link]
Motion Graphics, Widescreen Events, Presentation Design, and Consulting
@keenlive | RenderBreak [blog] | Profile [LinkedIn] -
I think it’s hard to separate the software from the hardware when considering FCPX, since it’s not cross-platform. You have to look at the system as a whole, which makes side-by-side comparison difficult. I also think that Moore’s Law has put video editorial on the desktop and off of the workstation, so there comes a point when you don’t need more than fast enough.
I like the nMP. It’s enormously powerful for its size. But it’s not slam-dunk better than other options, including the now five-year-old cMP.
[Tom Sefton] “Not for us it isn’t. Fast and v. reliable. The GPU and RAM performance when dealing with 4K+ resolution is fantastic.”
We have a different experience — but we have different requirements, too.
I’d suggest that the nMP, limited to a single CPU socket, is a half-fast workstation. (Rimshot.) That matters for compositing and 3D.
The GPU performance on the nMP leaves a lot to be desired for us. We wanted to use nMPs to drive our Oculus Rift VR project because they are so compact, but we are getting a lot more quality at higher framerates out of newer, significantly less expensive, only slightly larger Windows systems with modern GPUs. (Even accounting for the noticeable performance improvement running Windows via Boot Camp on the nMP hardware!)
Regarding RAM, a 64 GB ceiling is low for 4K/stereo/beyond. I understand OWC supplies a 128 GB kit — that’s cool, but it’s also an unsupported configuration. Apple should qualify it.
Regarding reliability, I have trust issues. Of the four nMP units we own, two had to be shipped off for repairs.
Walter Soyka
Designer & Mad Scientist at Keen Live [link]
Motion Graphics, Widescreen Events, Presentation Design, and Consulting
@keenlive | RenderBreak [blog] | Profile [LinkedIn] -
[John Rofrano] “Wasted in what way? What could they have done different?”
multiple PCIe lanes and internal storage options. They could have done what HP has done, made it a no brainer for anyone with needs beyond an Imac. In the PC world, does a serious buyer consider a 2010 HP? I don’t think so.
[John Rofrano] ” But Apple is not in the “upgrade” business… they are in the “technology is disposable” business”
Which works for consumer items but does not work when your investing 6-8K for a workstation. In fact your statement is the problem – Apple is applying consumer based marketing and design for business users and sometimes it’s a bad fit.
[John Rofrano] “Would I have liked to see a new Mac Pro that was more expandable. I’d have to say yes. Having options is always a good thing. But as I pointed out expansion needs to be balanced and at some point it’s better to buy a new system.”
I absolutely agree, which is why the nMP was/is such a disappointment – I would rather have bought a new system, but when faced with my options, I ended up with a 2010 because it would give me a longer life than a 2013 – and that statement is unique to the nMP.
Herb Sevush
Zebra Productions
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nothin’ attached to nothin’
“Deciding the spine is the process of editing” F. Bieberkopf -
Indulge me for a second:
[Herb Sevush] “multiple PCIe lanes”
What PCIe cards would you have put in those slots? That’s what I’m really trying to get at. My 2010 Mac Pro came with 4 PCIe slots. One contained the graphics card and that’s built into the nMP. One contained a Apple RAID card. The other two were empty.
The new Mac Pro has 4 x USB-3 ports, 6 x Thunderbolt-2 ports, 2 x Gigabit Ethernet ports, and an HDMI 1.4 UltraHD port. It can support 3 x 5K displays and up to 6 x Thunderbolt displays.
What’s missing?
PCIe cards with break-out boxes don’t count because most of those break-out boxes are now available as Thunderbolt boxes so an external box is an external box. If the nMP was designed like the old MP, two of the 4 slots would have had graphics cards in them so you still would have only had 2 slots free anyway.
If the nMP had PCIe slots what would you populate them with? Or is it just the comfort of knowing that you could add something if you wanted to later? (because you can add anything you want via Thunderbolt)
[Herb Sevush] “…and internal storage options.”
Why does it matter where the storage is? if you don’t have ANY external storage then I can see your point. It’s nice to have everything in one box. But most video editors have an external RAID enclosure that all of their work is on. Once you have an external enclosure, why do you care how much storage can fit in the box? It’s irrelevant at that point where the storage is.
This is an important point because in the days of FW800 and USB 2.0 it mattered where the storage was because external storage was slower unless you had Fibre Channel. Today, Thunderbolt connected storage is just as fast as internal storage. In fact, a USB 3.0 connected 7200 RPM G-Drive is faster than the internal 5200 RPM drive on my MacBook Pro. It’s important not to let “rules of thumb” that were true in the past cloud our judgment of new technology where those rules no longer apply.
I’m trying to understand the essence of the objection to the new form factor. Is it a real technical limitation or is it a personal preference. That is not to dilute the importance of personal preference but it changes the debate from “the nMP is a failure because of technical limitations” to “the nMP is a failure because it didn’t satisfy my personal preferences”.
[Herb Sevush] “In the PC world, does a serious buyer consider a 2010 HP? I don’t think so.”
I agree. So in my mind that is a testament to how good the 2010 Mac Pro was but in your mind you are saying that it is a statement about how undesirable the new Mac Pro is. I guess I can see your point. I hadn’t thought of it that way before.
I guess what I’m poking at here is that there really are two questions:
- Is the “new” Mac Pro a technical failure? (i.e., it doesn’t allow me to conduct my business)
- Is the “new” Mac Pro a cultural failure? (i.e., it’s too radical a change)
Of course there is always the question of whether it is a marketing failure but that would require sales figures to debate. The fact that some of us upgraded our 2008 Mac Pros to 2010 Mac Pros instead of 2013 Mac Pros is certainly something Apple should be concerned about if they cared (but I don’t think they care about the Pro market at all but that’s another debate). 😉
~jr
http://www.johnrofrano.com
http://www.vasst.com
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