Neither is a good option for me. I just thought his video was the opposite from actual reality.
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MP 7,1 Does it make sense to purchase a 7,1 Mac Pro today?
- Thread starter ghostwind
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Puget systems are more than fine. I’m not interested in overpriced systems from HP or Dell with Xeon processors, as I’m not in need of a server or doing ML or AI. I can figure things out if something goes sour - I’m tech savvy enough, so I also don’t need to pay for Fortune 500 tech-type support like those companies do. I’m not running a bank with a bad IT department
Yes, Windows 10 is a big improvement over older versions, but still junky. Sorry. Look at the code. Same with Resolve. But that’s another story.
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I think that the main question you should ask yourself is how urgent is it for you to upgrade. It's still unknown exactly when the next Macs will be released and how they are going to perform and look like. Only that it will be by the end of 2022 (based on the 2 year transition announced in latest WWDC).
You could be waiting for just a few months and you could be waiting for a year or more to get the machine you feel comfortable with.
The next thing you should probably consider is how much of a regret will you feel if you find out that the next MBP 16 is performing on par (or better) with your Mac Pro.
In my opinion, if it's going to improve your current professional work in terms of performance and even the process itself (the joy and overall experience) then it would be a good idea to get it.
Also, you could probably sell your Mac Pro later (might be a tough sell though) and compensate for some of that loss but you get best of both worlds - enjoy the benefits of the Mac Pro now and upgrade to a stronger machine later.
I had the same debate recently, even before the ASi were announced and I ordered the Mac Pro (still waiting at the time of writing this). When I "pulled the trigger" I wanted to experience the capabilities of this machine and enjoy its benefits (performant, quiet, expandable and beautiful) and I was aware that a more performant machine is in the works.
It might not have been the best decision but at the time, I decided that it's worth the money for me.
You could be waiting for just a few months and you could be waiting for a year or more to get the machine you feel comfortable with.
The next thing you should probably consider is how much of a regret will you feel if you find out that the next MBP 16 is performing on par (or better) with your Mac Pro.
In my opinion, if it's going to improve your current professional work in terms of performance and even the process itself (the joy and overall experience) then it would be a good idea to get it.
Also, you could probably sell your Mac Pro later (might be a tough sell though) and compensate for some of that loss but you get best of both worlds - enjoy the benefits of the Mac Pro now and upgrade to a stronger machine later.
I had the same debate recently, even before the ASi were announced and I ordered the Mac Pro (still waiting at the time of writing this). When I "pulled the trigger" I wanted to experience the capabilities of this machine and enjoy its benefits (performant, quiet, expandable and beautiful) and I was aware that a more performant machine is in the works.
It might not have been the best decision but at the time, I decided that it's worth the money for me.
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I understand this reservation, but last time I checked my MacBook Pro 16" has no slot for my DeckLink Mini Monitor 4K. I doubt the next one will have improved in this area.
Once the consumer Macs blow past our Pro machines, that itch really will start begging to be scratched though. It's hard to say how long the transition to the Mac Pro will take.
I feel I got lucky and found a Mac Pro at the right price for me. While I think we're starting to move away from the technology it's built upon, it will be many years until a max upgraded 7.1 will start to under perform. And IF interest moves away from it quickly, I guess those of us who stick to it might be able to find interesting components like Vega Pro II Duo modules showing up for reasonable prices.
Once it's in your hands, the sting of paying for it will wear off quickly. It's such a beautiful machine. It's as much a statement as it is a computer. Sure, the pragmatics of the world will just scoff at that, but once I have it installed in my little studio room (not under the desk), the joy of entering that room will be real.
Time to update the sig.
It might sound funny but a completely silent PC was the reason I went for a Mac Pro... I used to build PCs since 1998 and trust me no matter what you do, AIO cooler, adjusting the fan curves or sound dampening PC case.. the PC will get loud under stress. Even the best water pump noise is loud enough to drive me nuts.
I do most of my work at night and ramping up and down fans are annoying as hell.
Trust me you did the right thing. The Mac Pro is still fast enough for most tasks even the most demanding. It's expandable, you can throw an Nvidia card and Boot Windows10 and TBH no PC will be the fastest for more than couple of weeks. Technology is moving so fast that we're struggling to keep up.
For me it was checklist... Get the fastest Threadripper CPU and build everything from scratch or get a Mac pro and get :
- Dual OS - Mac / Windows
- 4 PCIE - X16 slots
- Virtually silent machine
- Can handle everything you need with a respectable speed
- Can drive the XDR display ( I didn't need it but why not enjoy the best prosumer display available)
- Has excellent resale value compared to other custom built PCs.
- Premium feel and quality along with a modern design
Of course I went for a Mac pro...
Regarding a MBP, I doubt it will even come close to the MP in terms of overall performance. You still need a powerful GPU, plenty of RAM and a processor that won't throttle under heavy usage.
My two cents...
If looking through this thread doesn't quicken the heart beat of OP, nothing will.
forums.macrumors.com
Show off your setups :)
I remember we used to have a thread like this back in '13 so I thought why not have one again. Just curious how people are setting up their new machine, how it looks with different displays etc. I've got one XDR on order for end of January, and am a bit worried about how it's gonna look next to...
forums.macrumors.com
I bought HP Pro notebooks, with next day on site support, for three years. Option to up to 5 years (at huge cost mind you for those extra two years). That service package was bundled.
However, the support did not help our issues. We bought notebooks with cellular sims - and they clashed with Windows. The end game was one could not switch between wi-fi and the sim without de-installing. Support was hopeless. So we pulled the sims and used phone hotspots, which at least, worked. Apple never incorporated a sim into their notebooks, but if they had of, they'd have worked. Without any need to go to a genius bar.
I bought a 4k 31.5" monitor from HP only maybe 5 months ago. The need was to be able to run two notebooks at the same time, when desired, and to have the screen split for both notebooks. Also for type-c to make one of the connections.
After two weeks and around 12 hours of testing, hours and hours of support - it turned out, the monitor just did not work. The advertising was false. I spoke to support before buying the monitor - they confirmed it would work. It did not. So I returned it inside the 14 day return window. Then, HP would not re-pay the money (it was an $US800 monitor). I had to seek legal redress. It took almost two months to get the money back. HP have formulated various divisions of may hem, so that when people return something, you cannot go to the people you know, to activate the funds return. It's another area, and there are no linkages to whats happened before. It's designed to have people give up. If it had of been a $200 monitor, I might have given up. Appalling - and that would never, ever happen with Apple. So I bought a Dell monitor, another 31.5" 4K UPS monitor with this time two USB-C ports and other ones as well. Which cost a bit more. it's much better built than the HP monitor. But more importantly - it worked straight away, as claimed. Perfect.
I would never buy HP again. Maybe it's better where you live. Not in Australia though. And I really like their notebooks - especially their solid chassis, good feel keyboard and coffee proof keyboards (Apple! put in a coffee proof keyboard). It's HP's support that stinks, because they take forever, and they cannot fix the problem. Their financial returns policy and strategy is illegal IMO. That Windows conflicted with HP's notebooks archictecture cost me lots of money, as the non cellular notebooks were cheaper. But that is just another part of being in the Windows world. I can accept that, but it can be really painful and very lonely being a customer stuck in-between Microsoft and the manufacturer.
I have a home built PC. Now if it fails, it's up to me to fix it. That is a good way for a small operation to go IMO. Save the money and keep it simple. And support depends on where you operate I reckon.
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Based on what we've seen so far with the M1 chips I wouldn't be too surprised if the MBP 16 will be near the Mac Pro in terms of Multi Core performance and very likely to surpass the Mac Pro in terms of Single Core performance.
Of course there's also a question of throttling (though it runs cooler generally). The main difference is, as you mentioned, the expandability and modularity you get with a machine like the Mac Pro. MBP 16 or any closed system like that won't give you the same perks.
The machine really is the most beautiful computer I have ever seen in my life. The engineering is also very impressive to me. When my father, who used to build PCs for about 20 years saw this machine was absolutely blown away and is actually more excited to see it in person than I am.
I think it will compliment my setup quite a bit and will look great in my home office
That's very similar to my "checklist", while I don't do graphics intensive work as most folks around here do - I did care about most of the things you listed.
I wanted a silent powerful machine than can drive the Pro Display XDR with the possibility to expand. I recently switched from a 2017 5k iMac to Pro Display XDR + MBP 16. While it's a nice setup, the MBP 16 gets loud when I compile code and throttles the cpu.
P.S. I followed a discussion here regarding putting an RTX 3090 in the Mac Pro for gaming with Windows and I am really tempted to try that. Seems that it might even be able to run games at 6k@60 fps which is really exciting.
IMO, gaming on 6K is a bit meaningless; of course it depends on the game but if you're playing FPS games where refresh rate is more important that resolution, even on 60Hz monitor staying above 120FPS is a night and day difference than playing 60hz@60FPS.
Don't forget that by going from 4K to 6K you're almost halving the FPS so a game 100FPS game @4K will approximately run at 50FPS on 6K even with DLSS.
I mentioned gaming from my perspective - which is just casual gaming so high refresh rate doesn't really matter to me. I use the Pro Display XDR which runs at 6k resolution and if I prefer to use it for gaming too if I can, instead of getting another 4k display.
Those XDR monitors sure look nice, and I would pay the price, but the issues they have - too bad...If looking through this thread doesn't quicken the heart beat of OP, nothing will.
Show off your setups :)
I remember we used to have a thread like this back in '13 so I thought why not have one again. Just curious how people are setting up their new machine, how it looks with different displays etc. I've got one XDR on order for end of January, and am a bit worried about how it's gonna look next to...
Yeah, dunno what you are trying to link to, but for some reason there's a permission setting that's not letting me see it. Try it logged out - you'll get the same message.
Sure, but in the case of Adobe, it's confusing. Especially when I saw this video, where he's claiming Premiere is prioritized for the macOS platform, not Windows. So which is it?
I just got a base model with an upgraded 1TB SSD, 32GB, 580X yesterday.
Pro Display & Stand on the way Tuesday.
This machine is absolutely overkill for me. I do onsite consulting and IT services. Been living on Powerbooks>MacBook Pro's and of course still will when I am on the road every day.
Added the OWC Accelsior 4M2 with 2 1TB Samsung 970's and room for more!
Being able to have a boot drive, work scratch drive for client projects and then a 1TB for personal use are amazing from the work flow perspective.
Adding more PCI-E flavor cards of who knows what later is a future proof move.
Add more ram will probably happen as I typically have 1-3 virtual machines open at any given time, but also tend to copy virtual machines from one SSD to another is crucial. So having this thing copy 80GB worth of VM images in a minute or less is other worldly.
Graphics are not something I do heavily so the fact that the graphics card has 8GB of ram which is what my 3'rd string retina MacBook has for total system ram is the reality that low end isn't that low.
I would say that this machine has a special audience, but that the consumer side is so much faster and publicized, but these are special machines.
Pro Display & Stand on the way Tuesday.
This machine is absolutely overkill for me. I do onsite consulting and IT services. Been living on Powerbooks>MacBook Pro's and of course still will when I am on the road every day.
Added the OWC Accelsior 4M2 with 2 1TB Samsung 970's and room for more!
Being able to have a boot drive, work scratch drive for client projects and then a 1TB for personal use are amazing from the work flow perspective.
Adding more PCI-E flavor cards of who knows what later is a future proof move.
Add more ram will probably happen as I typically have 1-3 virtual machines open at any given time, but also tend to copy virtual machines from one SSD to another is crucial. So having this thing copy 80GB worth of VM images in a minute or less is other worldly.
Graphics are not something I do heavily so the fact that the graphics card has 8GB of ram which is what my 3'rd string retina MacBook has for total system ram is the reality that low end isn't that low.
I would say that this machine has a special audience, but that the consumer side is so much faster and publicized, but these are special machines.
Viewing angles, blooming, shimmering issues with nano-texture, and the inability to calibrate it (especially with a 3D LUT), make it for me a beautifully designed playback monitor (or a general use monitor), but not something to be used for color correcting and grading or photo editing, where color accuracy is important. I wish this wasn't the case, because it is beautiful, but it unfortunately is the case. Which is why I'm getting the Eizo CG319X.
Think again and reconsider this decision please. Take it Not from me but this really amazing colorist. He comes to the XDR after a bit of comparing the other screens and I couldn’t agree more. It’s an amazing screen actually for color correction. The blooming is really the only issue but in 99% of cases also a non issue..
With Excel, and Word, ie Office, its clear that many more users are in the Win arena. And when Microsoft slowed down Excel, they were at war with both Apple, and also for that matter, they were eliminating competition from Windows word processing competitors.
With Adobe, I am guessing that there are a few factors going on:
Maybe the Adobe sales (revenue) is larger for the MacOS arena.
Perhaps too, it is easier to develop for the narrow gamut of Mac hardware compared to Windows.
Perhaps too, Final Cut Pro keeps Adobe on its toes - if Adobe favour Windows, then Apple might then reply with competitive software of their own. I thought that some sort of deal might have been going on with Apple and Adobe when Apple dropped Aperture, which made no sense to me at that time. But with Adobe renting a whole suite of software, maybe it did from Apples future perspective.
When I bought a monitor to enable accurate colour printing, I bought an Eizo, a top model there's too. The distributor in Australia of Eizo said that Eizo worked better and sold many more into the Windows arena than they did into Apple users. An example - Windows would sleep the monitor properly, which Apple did not - you have to remember to turn the monitor off with Apple. Hence I concluded that Windows market share must be several years ago, much stronger in Windows than in Mac. But perhaps too, Apple photo users were simply relying on Apple monitor hardware rather than 3rd party monitors, personified I guess by the iMac form factor.
The funny thing about all this, is that I reckon PC users are the more fanatical now. It's the PC users who are seem more defensive about their hardware and are the ones bemused about why anyone would buy an Apple computer or even an overpriced iPhone. While I reckon now, Apple people are almost apologetic, and they simply admit with a shrug of their shoulders that they are prepared to pay more for a known quality level and an interface they prefer. With pc people, they seem more likely to know about their hardware and the latest speeds available. I think Apple users are more likely to shrug their shoulders about the relative performance and say their hardware is still getting their job done.
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I am awaiting the picture of his new 7,1 box under the Christmas Tree ~Think again and reconsider this decision please. Take it Not from me but this really amazing colorist. He comes to the XDR after a bit of comparing the other screens and I couldn’t agree more. It’s an amazing screen actually for color correction. The blooming is really the only issue but in 99% of cases also a non issue..
So I actually listened to the entire podcast while driving back home tonight. He knows his stuff, but as much as he talks about the importance of calibration, as he should, he doesn't mention the fact that you can't calibrate the XDR. He seems most impressed with its contrast ratio compared to his Eizo, but he's overlooking color accuracy, which is quite strange. He talks about CalMAN and calibrating his LG OLED, and you can (and should) do the same 3D LUT calibration on the Eizos (I prefer LightSpace/ColourSpace myself over CalMAN, but same principle). You can't do any of that on the XDR. I don't see where the XDR would even fit in his workflow TBH. You have your main monitor, your waveform, and the larger monitor with a direct SDI/HDMI feed. If I was purely a colorist, using Resolve, I would have an Eizo as the main monitor calibrated with 3D LUT, a cheaper LCD for waveform, and a 48" LG CX OLED calibrated with 3D LUT. Unfortunately, the XDR falls short in this very important area. I know Apple has hinted of "upcoming" calibration abilities, but seems tied macOS/software, no idea really TBH.Think again and reconsider this decision please. Take it Not from me but this really amazing colorist. He comes to the XDR after a bit of comparing the other screens and I couldn’t agree more. It’s an amazing screen actually for color correction. The blooming is really the only issue but in 99% of cases also a non issue..
Read some comments from other pro colorists, and you'll see why the Eizo is preferred by them over the XDR.
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I just looked him up, and here's his workspace. He's using the XDR has his main working/editing monitor and the Eizo for his color critical work
LG up high for OLED/client check, scopes, waveforms, etc.
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