MP 7,1 Configuring a new Mac Pro for Adobe Creative Cloud?

[choreo]

I am still deciding what I will need to configure a new Mac Pro primarily for Photoshop, Illustrator, InDesign, After Effects and some FCP work. I realize that Adobe software is crippled especially on Macs now, but would hopefully see some speed improvement over my current 2012 Mac Pro?

This is what I am considering for the Mac Pro:

12 Core
32 GB RAM (will upgrade to 96 GB on my own)
1 TB internal SSD
Either base 580x or W5600x Video Card (still trying to find out how to connect my 3 NEC Monitors with the least pain - if even possible!)

1) Would it make sense to purchase something like the OWC Accelsior 4M2 internal SSD as a dedicated scratch disc for Photoshop?
2) Any thoughts on something like a Promise Pegasus32 R4 for External Storage/Client Data Files
3) What would be a good choice for Time Machine?
4) Anything else I should be considering?

 

[ignatius345]

I can't speak to a lot of this, but as far as Time Machine, just get a nice big drive from a reputable manufacturer and leave it at that. You don't need the fastest drive in the world as Time Machine will just be doing its thing in the background anyway.

 

[xtol121]

I can’t comment on much besides Photoshop as I’m purely a photographer, but those specs are the same as my 7,1 (12 core, 96GB RAM, 1TB SSD, and the 580x). I have no issue with Photoshop on this machine and have never in my career needed a separate scratch disk for Photoshop for high volume e-commerce and beauty retouching. Not saying someone somewhere doesn’t, but I’ve never experienced the need. That said I rarely have PSD’s above 1-2GB, YMMV.

I primarily shoot tethered to Capture One, making around 2500 Canon 5DIV images per day, 3-4 days per week, and I am looking forward to upgrading to the W5700X. The 580X has been mostly ok, but I do notice a performance hit when I am shooting and processing out images at the same time, compared to shooting without processing. C1 relies heavily on the GPU for processing, and only mildly to create previews. Hoping the W5700X will give me that extra boost, and the extra TB3 ports will be nice.

I have the Promise J2i with 2x 8TB hard drives. I use one as a time machine, and the second as a local archive for the current years work, which is backed up to my Drobo and Backblaze B2 storage. It’s great to have the time machine going at the same time as my other backups, and it’s really nice to have all of my recent work available without doing the hard drive shuffle

I’d say the Mac Pro is a bit overkill for photography if you don’t shoot tethered frequently with same day turn arounds. My 2017 15” MacBook Pro feels comparable for Photoshop work, but the 7,1 really shines when I have 2 monitors, 3 backups, tethered capture, and exports happening at the same time.

Hope this helps!

 

[SayCheese]

I have the base spec 7,1 (8 core/32gb ram/580x/256gb Apple SSD). I've added an extra 1tb NVME and the J2i with included 8tb plus a 2tb I had in my old 5,1 Mac Pro.

I'm a photographer and use Photoshop and lightroom on a daily basis.

My workflow is...
Import 5DIII files via card reader onto the 1TB NVME. Lightroom is used for cataloguing. Then culling of images using bridge. Once culled, images are exported from lightroom to Photoshop, edited and then reimported to lightroom.
Finished projects are then moved inside lightroom from the 1tb NVME to the 2tb on the J2i. They stay there until the clients have collected their signed artwork.
Once the job is finished the images are moved to my Drobo for archiving.

The 8tb in the J2i is used for time machine backup of the 1Tb and the 2tb. The system also backs up to backblaze. The Drobo to backblaze B2.

The Apple 256gb is used for the OS and software only. No client or admin files are stored on there and I've still got 170gb free.

I used to edit in lightroom and Photoshop on my 5,1 and the 7,1 is significantly faster even in it's stock config. I don't see a need for a dedicated scratch disk.

I edit off the 1tb as it's the fastest drive for reading and writing files.

 

[darthaddie]

I am a photographer and videographer. We primarily use Lightroom/Photoshop and FCP X. Almost everyday.

My 2 cents:

1. Get a scratch disk. I suggest getting something like https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B01N78XZCH/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o09_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1
I simply added a Samsung 960EVO NVME lying around. 250GB.

I have seen a performance boost with a separate scratch disk. Mainly while working on large files and switching between photos. This is really cheap for the gains it offers.

2. Don't get the 580X. FCP, Lightroom go upto approx 50% GPU usage with most edits and consume almost 100% VRAM on my Vega II. Anything better than the 580x should be a great investment.

3. Time Machine as big as possible and either a great NAS or a simple USB RAID drive. No matter what you choose, do consider investing in Backblaze. Its $5 a month and unlimited backup. I have my data Time Machine'd and Backblazed.

4. Please consider never adding a spinning drive inside the Mac Pro. The sound of the drives... Argh!!!!

5. I use a 4TB NVME Thunderbolt3 Raid for Video edits I created using https://eshop.macsales.com/shop/express-4m2
AND 4 x Intel 660 1TB drives. Works flawlessly.

6. For Photos - I have a 2TB SSD setup using https://www.akitio.com/desktop-storage/thunder3-raid-station and 2 standard 2.5" SSD's. Works great. I use this to import photos/videos from my SD Card. Real good speeds on that.


I have a few WD 8tB Mybooks, which store delivered projects which are then backed up to Backblaze. So at any point I have a local backup and a cloud backup.

And another 8TB Mybook for time machine which backs up only the 4TB and 2TB edit drives.

 

[SayCheese]

1. Get a scratch disk.

I have seen a performance boost with a separate scratch disk. Mainly while working on large files and switching between photos. This is really cheap for the gains it offers.

I've got an old 512Gb AHCI laying around. I'll give that a go as a scratch disk. Thanks for the tip.

2. Don't get the 580X. FCP, Lightroom go upto approx 50% GPU usage with most edits and consume almost 100% VRAM on my Vega II. Anything better than the 580x should be a great investment.

The 580X works fine for my needs. I guess it depends on exactly what needs you have and the files you're editing.

4. Please consider never adding a spinning drive inside the Mac Pro. The sound of the drives... Argh!!!!

Have you actually heard spinning drives in the Mac Pro? I'm sat about 18 inches from my machine with the 2 drives in the J2i and I can't hear the drives spin up, ever.

 

[daveedjackson]

I am still deciding what I will need to configure a new Mac Pro primarily for Photoshop, Illustrator, InDesign, After Effects and some FCP work. I realize that Adobe software is crippled especially on Macs now, but would hopefully see some speed improvement over my current 2012 Mac Pro?

This is what I am considering for the Mac Pro:

12 Core
32 GB RAM (will upgrade to 96 GB on my own)
1 TB internal SSD
Either base 580x or W5600x Video Card (still trying to find out how to connect my 3 NEC Monitors with the least pain - if even possible!)

1) Would it make sense to purchase something like the OWC Accelsior 4M2 internal SSD as a dedicated scratch disc for Photoshop?
2) Any thoughts on something like a Promise Pegasus32 R4 for External Storage/Client Data Files
3) What would be a good choice for Time Machine?
4) Anything else I should be considering?

I do motion work, so AE, C4D, Photoshop, illustrator, indesign some premiere but not much. I have the 16 core, but 192gb ram. W5700x It's a bit of an improvement for me over the 2013 - but waiting for some serious adobe updates.

 

[ZoomEnhance]

My recently purchased 7,1: 16c, 48GB RAM (upgraded to 256GB), W5700X, 1TB internal SSD.

My typical workflow is 2D graphics/motion graphics/video (Photoshop, Illustrator, InDesign, AfterEffects, Premiere Pro).

I'll also be working on AI/ML in the near future (ROCm, tensorflow).

1) I chose the OWC Accelsior 4M2 over other NVME M.2 PCIe, because I need a quiet studio. From what I've read, spinning disks/fans inside the MP aren't very noticeable--but I have no desire to test that out.

2) The Promise Pegasus32 R4 seems fine if you need direct-attach storage. You can probably even use TB3<-->10GbE adapters, but I prefer a proper NAS for my archive. That way I can keep those spinning disks in the closet and not have to deal with dongles. I'll be upgrading my old Synology 4-bay NAS for a Synology 6-bay with dual 10GbE PCIe.

3) For Time Machine, any decently sized U.2/M.2 SSD will be fine. HDD will probably also work fine if you RAID it.

4) The internal T2 SSD is not user-serviceable. I live in a city and don't have a car, so taking my MP into the Apple store would be less-than-ideal. Right now, my OWC 4M2 has 3x1TB sticks (JBOD). Stick #1 is a bootable nightly clone of the internal OS drive (Carbon Copy Cloner). Stick #2 is a TM backup of the OS drive. Stick #3 is my scratch disk/temp storage. My active project data is on a 1TB U.2 SSD/PCIe, backed up to my NAS and the cloud. Archived projects on my NAS are backed up to the cloud.

The future NAS upgrade will also host VMs. Once ROCm adds MacOS/official Navi support I'll get a Vega II for more compute.

HTH

 

[MisterAndrew]

I think even a base 7,1 is probably overkill for Adobe apps. Lightroom and Photoshop are working well for me on my 6,1. If I was buying a 7,1 I'd opt for the W5700X GPU, but the 580X should be fine for most things.

 

[darthaddie]

Have you actually heard spinning drives in the Mac Pro? I'm sat about 18 inches from my machine with the 2 drives in the J2i and I can't hear the drives spin up, ever.

I am approx 12" from my Mac Pro. When I put in the J2i I could hear the noises from the drives hence I took them out. This was specially evident and loud during copying data. It could be just the WD Red drives though. The 8TB ones then do get noisy.

 

[SayCheese]

I am approx 12" from my Mac Pro. When I put in the J2i I could hear the noises from the drives hence I took them out. This was specially evident and loud during copying data. It could be just the WD Red drives though. The 8TB ones then do get noisy.

Fair enough. If you can hear them and it bothers you then it's not the right solution for you. Personally I couldn't hear anything so it's a good option for me.
I've also heard others say they can't hear drives in the J2i

 

[daveedjackson]

I think even a base 7,1 is probably overkill for Adobe apps. Lightroom and Photoshop are working well for me on my 6,1. If I was buying a 7,1 I'd opt for the W5700X GPU, but the 580X should be fine for most things.

Not really true. The 580 for me was feeing, stuttering. Just requiring too much for what it could offer. Using after effects it would just come to a halt. The 5700 has thrown me some issues but nothing like what I was experiencing before.

 

[MisterAndrew]

Not really true. The 580 for me was feeing, stuttering. Just requiring too much for what it could offer. Using after effects it would just come to a halt. The 5700 has thrown me some issues but nothing like what I was experiencing before.

That’s not good. I wonder how dual 580Xs would be. There are some on eBay for a little over $200.

 

[choreo]

Not really true. The 580 for me was feeing, stuttering. Just requiring too much for what it could offer. Using after effects it would just come to a halt. The 5700 has thrown me some issues but nothing like what I was experiencing before.

What issues?