Developers and the nMP: Worth?

[dyn]

Interesting. Any idea why the MP would be so much more performant (besides the obvious nature of being a 'mac pro')

That's easy: thermal envelope. Small devices such as the Apple notebooks, Mac mini and to some extend even the iMac do not have enough room when it comes to thermal envelope. Basically it means that they get hotter quicker. With modern day processors this means that they will scale back in performance. The Mac Pro has a larger thermal envelope thus cpus do not scale back in performance for quite some time. That's why they have a better performance than the ones in small devices like notebooks even though they are about the same in processing power (on paper). See also the link I provided in my earlier post.

My Mac Pro doesn't go past the 40C line, my MBA and MBP are way past that at 80 to even 90C (and I managed to push my MBA to 100C even whilst doing some compiling and driving a 30" display...cpu and gpu are on the same package so this is to be expected).

The other benefit: because the big machine isn't heating up that much the fans do not need to run fast which means it is quieter. In the end this is better for your hearing and your mental well being. You do not want to sit in an environment with constant background noise. It drives you crazy and can cause hearing damage in the end.

 

[Cubemmal]

Xcode does a few tasks in the background, so it could be related to that.

Yep, and after about five minutes it stopped whatever it was doing and the fans spun down.

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That's easy: thermal envelope. ...

The other benefit: because the big machine isn't heating up that much the fans do not need to run fast which means it is quieter. In the end this is better for your hearing and your mental well being. You do not want to sit in an environment with constant background noise. It drives you crazy and can cause hearing damage in the end.

Yes this is what I was trying to say, except that it won't damage your hearing. It will contribute to general fatigue though. The noise from oMP annoys me, I'm looking forward to the near silence of the new Mac Pro.

 

[slifty]

I just wanted to pop in and say thank you to everyone for the candid feedback.

My current takeaway is that the Mac Pro is not something I would be stupid to buy (i.e. it is reasonable for a professional programmer to buy a mac pro) but that ultimately I should be honest with myself that it is more than I would need, and I should think of it as more of a "somewhat practical luxury" purchase rather than a "necessary purchase."

I do intend to own one of these, and as such I don't plan on buying a mini or an iMac, but for now I have canceled my order since my card won't be charged in 2013 anyway (i.e. I wouldn't be able to deduct) and there are enough risks right now from all angles to hold off.

Would still love to hear additional takes and speculation! I do love thinking about owning one

 

[mrsavage1]

I just wanted to pop in and say thank you to everyone for the candid feedback.

My current takeaway is that the Mac Pro is not something I would be stupid to buy (i.e. it is reasonable for a professional programmer to buy a mac pro) but that ultimately I should be honest with myself that it is more than I would need, and I should think of it as more of a "somewhat practical luxury" purchase rather than a "necessary purchase."

I do intend to own one of these, and as such I don't plan on buying a mini or an iMac, but for now I have canceled my order since my card won't be charged in 2013 anyway (i.e. I wouldn't be able to deduct) and there are enough risks right now from all angles to hold off.

Would still love to hear additional takes and speculation! I do love thinking about owning one

Well a mac mini would do for xcode really. Unless you are planning to get a 4k monitor there's no real reason to get a mac pro. Though xcode is faster with more cores

 

[cnstoll]

iOS Developer not upgrading to nMP

Alright, I'll jump in. I'm an iOS developer and I'm not upgrading to the new Mac Pro.

I use two machines for my work, a 2012 retina MacBook Pro with the lowest spec CPU and 16GB ram, and a 2010 Mac Pro with a mid range CPU, 24GB ram, and a ton of internal storage (more on that later). I should also mention that I have been a Mac tower user for 10 years. I used a Power Mac G5 before I got the Mac Pro.

One thing that I've noticed is that the laptop and desktop are virtually equal in terms of responsiveness. They both "feel" very fast. The Mac Pro has the advantage in processing and RAM. The rMBP has an advantage in storage. Its onboard SSD is far faster than the storage on the Mac Pro. The rMBP routinely hits 400MB/s from its SSD. That isn't even possible on a Mac Pro without going to PCIe based storage, due to the limitation of the Mac Pro's SATA bus. One machine has faster storage, and one has more RAM, and they both feel about the same in normal usage.

The Mac Pro is definitely faster at some things than the rMBP though. Compiling is just a hair quicker, thanks to the 3.2GHz CPU compared to the 2.4GHz CPU. They are both quad core CPUs.

The Mac Pro is also FAR faster at graphics intensive operations, including Aperture performance, and especially gaming. Even with an outdated 5870 that continues to be the case. This is relevant to me because I am also an avid photographer (hence the large amount of internal storage). For things like basic photoshop/pixelmator/acorn use, I can't tell a difference. For Aperture I can, and the Mac Pro is a clear winner.

So why am I not getting a new Mac Pro? Its got incredible graphics, and fast PCIe storage. Shouldn't I be all over it?

The reality though is that I am very happy already with machines that cost far less than the new Mac Pro. My baseline rMBP is 1/3 the price of the Mac Pro I would get. One of the reviews (Macworld) really said it best. Its not that the new Mac Pro is slow, its that all of the other Macs in Apple's lineup are impressively fast! The older Mac Pro and rMBP serve my needs, so I am going to stick with them.

I am going to do something though. I'm going to add PCIe SSD storage from OWC to my existing Mac Pro. That should eliminate the one spot where its weaker than the recent rMBP and new Mac Pro lineup, by giving it insanely fast flash storage. That upgrade is between $500-$1500 depending on how much of it you purchase, but compared to the price of a new Mac Pro, thats a huge bargain.

More information on that upgrade is available here:
http://macperformanceguide.com/blog/2012/20120415_1-OWC-Mercury-Accelsior.html

Will this be the right choice for everyone? Probably not. If you don't already have a 2010-2012 Mac Pro, I don't think I'd recommend picking up a used one now. In the long run, those machines, and their internal components, will become extinct. Eventually I'll have to move away from that machine, and when I do I'll have to get new drive enclosures and other gear to compensate. But hopefully then it will be cheaper and more prolific than it is now. And at least I know I can take the PCIe SSDs with me, using a thunderbolt enclosure, so that investment will not be for nothing.

Hope that helps. I'm one developer and photographer is passing up the new Mac Pro.