So, I am looking at getting a pimp Mac set up. (I currently own a fairly beefy "cheese grater" Mac Pro.)
It seems that the new iMac Pro is worlds ahead of the current Mac Pro offerings available. (at least, the price point proves that out).
If you were to get a spec-maxed setup, what would you purchase???
Hey from my experience it will weigh heavily on what you are planning to 'do' on the mac. I am about to take an iMac pro (base model) back to apple, as my 10 year old Mac pro 3,1 actually handles some stuff better and not far behind in others. I'm really confused what to wait for now, as i expected the iMac Pro to be such a beast all round, but its just not noticeable against a decent running system if you already have one.
the iMac Pro is fast for render and export, and compared to my cheese grater it's about 2x speed (after effects) i think if you're in final cut you'd add zeros to that, but AE doesn't make use of the iMac Pro power. For me the render is time to make tea, go to the loo, go to sleep etc, so its not much difference to me at that point in the job. You could even get two i7 5k iMacs, and just switch machine when render time hits, this could be my next plan, as also i7 will be better for AE i think ...
So in actual normal day to day use, its hardly noticeable the difference, the timeline updates slightly quicker but not much. and in illustrator the iMac is super laggy dragging around a mid sized document, that is totally fluid to drag around on screen on the 3,1. pretty disappointing for a 10 year wait and £5k
I think these 5k screen just use so much GPU power that the equivalent Gb per Pixel means my 970 4Gb card on a 30 inch (2560x1600 screen) is actually more powerful. thats the only reason i can think that things move more swiftly on my old tank. The problem increases if you use display scaling on the iMac Pro as you're just asking it to work even harder to deliver more content to the screen.
I think my issue is that a) i'm not using Final cut where gains would be made, and b) ive upgraded the 3,1 a fair bit over time so it has PCIE boot drive, couple of SSD drives for current work files + a load of HD for storage, 32Gb ram, and a GTX 970. so it all runs well and those upgrades were not super pricey.
The other thing - and i think this is the main thing for me, the screen seems tiny! I currently have a 30 inch apple display (and a 2nd one plugged into the pc next to it). but the 27 inch imac just seems like i'm penned in, and the scaled resolutions don't help much. the half way setting between 'standard' and 'more space' where it says "looks like 2880x1620 (apples description)" is the closest useable setting to me ACD appearance, in terms of what windows you can fit on screen, but its still physically smaller, so going back to the ACD seems like stretching your legs, its so much nicer, even with the 'fuzz' of non retina. I just have to stop looking at the iMac until it goes back and my ACD seems fine again. despite having thought 30inch were too large for the last 10 years, i now see they are a glorious large desk or workspace, and im so glad i plonked the money down for them when they first arrived. These and the cheese grater are the best money i ever spent!
sorry i think i might have gone a bit off topic...
in conclusion, i'd pimp that mac pro until something suitable comes along for you, unless you are doing lots of final cut rendering...
