Mac Pro 1,1s are officially screwed

[sperry1988]

I take it your Mac is supported then

imacs not, macbook is. so im selling the imac and getting a new one.. after 6 years i cant complain, the same models are going for $450 on ebay right now.. $1200 - $450 = $750/6 = 125 per year or $10.42 per month. not bad

 

[cryingrobot]

I definitely feel emotionally invested in my 1,1 since I have had it so long....not to mention my 2 yr hunt for 5535 upgrade CPUs. However, the thing has become a real power hog with the 2 5535s and the 4870 GPU. I think a new Mac Pro would probably pay for itself in a couple of years simply in utility bills.

The real question for me is Mac Pro or Macbook Pro + xbox. Any mac other than a Mac Pro will be a dead end for gaming in a year. I really cant say more due to NDA.

 

[Yebubbleman]

I definitely feel emotionally invested in my 1,1 since I have had it so long....not to mention my 2 yr hunt for 5535 upgrade CPUs. However, the thing has become a real power hog with the 2 5535s and the 4870 GPU. I think a new Mac Pro would probably pay for itself in a couple of years simply in utility bills.

The real question for me is Mac Pro or Macbook Pro + xbox. Any mac other than a Mac Pro will be a dead end for gaming in a year. I really cant say more due to NDA.

Any current 15" or 17" MacBook Pro will kick the crap out of your current Mac Pro for gaming. It might even come close to the current Mac Pro in terms of graphics cards and CPU muscle, just not exandability and upgradability. Still though, I'd go Xbox + MacBook Pro, or MacBook Pro + PC tower. Actually if gaming is that important, definitely MacBook Pro + PC tower. Unless you're getting some serious 3D/video/graphic design work done, what more would you need than a 15" MacBook Pro on the Mac end anyway? Plus the Mac Pro, even with its Xeons, pales in comparison in terms of upgrade flexibility to a similarly configured custom-built PC tower.

 

[Lesser Evets]

Am I the only one here who's going to use the 2006 Mac Pro until it physically breaks down, or when Adobe stops releasing software for Snow Leopard?

In which case, I would stop upgrading software as the old ones are working perfectly fine for me and will still do so.

Sure, compared to new machines, the 2006 is slow. But it's a slow fast machine if you know what I mean. It's still way faster than my office's recently PC upgrade to quadcore. Pretty amazing.

I have a low-end 2006 MacPro and it works great. Got Lion installed and everything is snappy aside from some stutter in video as drives start or heavy processing occurs. It was purchased with a 6-year lifespan expect. I'll get beyond that, and expect it to work for me until around 2014/5. That's only 2 or 3 years. By that time I will have definitely gotten money's worth from it.

When I get a new computer, I will continue to use this one as an external FW drive. With 4 SATA drives, it becomes a brilliant FW800 external, if a little bulky.

 

[derbothaus]

Any current 15" or 17" MacBook Pro will kick the crap out of your current Mac Pro for gaming. It might even come close to the current Mac Pro in terms of graphics cards and CPU muscle, just not exandability and upgradability. Still though, I'd go Xbox + MacBook Pro, or MacBook Pro + PC tower. Actually if gaming is that important, definitely MacBook Pro + PC tower. Unless you're getting some serious 3D/video/graphic design work done, what more would you need than a 15" MacBook Pro on the Mac end anyway? Plus the Mac Pro, even with its Xeons, pales in comparison in terms of upgrade flexibility to a similarly configured custom-built PC tower.

You are incorrect on the Macbook Pro angle. Your 6850 is just slightly faster than the stock 5770 desktop replacement. And more than 2x's slower than the 5870 that 2010 Mac Pro's had available. 5870 is 2x's faster than the current top of the line 6970m in iMac. No way is a MBP even close to the 2010 Pro in gaming anything. My 5870 and 6-core 3.33GHz gets over 22,300 in 3DMark Vantage and around 4800 in 3DMark11. MBP or iMac can't touch that. Not close even.

 

[Yebubbleman]

You are incorrect on the Macbook Pro angle. Your 6850 is just slightly faster than the stock 5770 desktop replacement. And more than 2x's slower than the 5870 that 2010 Mac Pro's had available. 5870 is 2x's faster than the current top of the line 6970m in iMac. No way is a MBP even close to the 2010 Pro in gaming anything. My 5870 and 6-core 3.33GHz gets over 22,300 in 3DMark Vantage and around 4800 in 3DMark11. MBP or iMac can't touch that. Not close even.

Fair enough. He could still, for the cost of a Mac Pro with a 5870, get a lower-end 15" MacBook Pro and a PC with a graphics card that makes the 5870 look incredibly stupid.

 

[derbothaus]

Fair enough. He could still, for the cost of a Mac Pro with a 5870, get a lower-end 15" MacBook Pro and a PC with a graphics card that makes the 5870 look incredibly stupid.

Yup. I did this throughout 2006-2010. But I needed major tracking power for Logic Pro so the upgrade in 2010 to Mac Pro was worth it. It ended up solving both gaming and OS X power issues. One box ruling it all. I will need a GPU upgrade in the next year though to keep it game current. Or back to PC land. Still have my p180 case just waiting. If Apple releases 7950 or higher I may bite and stay with what I have cause I can still play everything all maxed out.

 

[Yebubbleman]

Yup. I did this throughout 2006-2010. But I needed major tracking power for Logic Pro so the upgrade in 2010 to Mac Pro was worth it. It ended up solving both gaming and OS X power issues. One box ruling it all. I will need a GPU upgrade in the next year though to keep it game current. Or back to PC land. Still have my p180 case just waiting. If Apple releases 7950 or higher I may bite and stay with what I have cause I can still play everything all maxed out.

If the MacBook Pro provides insufficient power, then I can see the reasoning behind Mac Pro all the way. Otherwise, as far as gaming goes, the Mac Pro really suffers by being limited to a maximum of four different video cards that it can run, the two that it could've been shipped with, and the two that are shipped with the model thereafter. I can upgrade my 6850 on my PC tower to any 7 series card or any 8 series card thereafter. I could also (but won't because I don't think it's worth the extra premium) have my choice of NVIDIA card. For gamers, this is terrible; hence my going MacBook Pro (because it's not like laptops are meant to be upgraded beyond hard drive and RAM, whether they be PCs or Macs) and PC.

 

[Lesser Evets]

Appears to say that all Mac Pros are supported and I also noticed no i3 support

1. February 16, 2012 11:13PM UTC

OS X Mountain Lion Seed
Server Release Notes


Minimum System Requirements

You can install this version of Server on any Macintosh server or desktop computer with:
• An Intel Core 2 Duo, i5, i7 or Xeon processor
• At least 2GB of RAM
• At least 20GB of available disk space

I have snooped around the net and found the earliest days of Mountain Lion's release had a panic about incompatibility with those early MacPros. Later posts show that there are people with MacPro 1,1 that CAN run Mountain Lion's preview and those that can't.

Those that can't might be using the original or inadequate video cards, according to other critics on the net. Good news, though: if people with MacPro 1,1s are running Mountain Lion successfully, it means all MacPros can run it and there is something causing inadequacy or incompatibility.

However, we have to be aware that our machines are definitely closing in on antiquation, in terms of OSX support. Once we get to the last OSX, we have maybe 2 or 3 years and nothing more will be made by Apple to help us adjust to blossoming technology and formats.

If Mt. Lion supports us, the next one probably won't. So our Mac Pros will probably be best replaced by 2015. That's 9 years! A brilliant life span, I think, for such tech. Who today can still use a 2003 PowerMac without trouble? My old 2003 PowerMac was already a clunker when I sold it years back.

 

[Jst0rm]

I have a low-end 2006 MacPro and it works great. Got Lion installed and everything is snappy aside from some stutter in video as drives start or heavy processing occurs. It was purchased with a 6-year lifespan expect. I'll get beyond that, and expect it to work for me until around 2014/5. That's only 2 or 3 years. By that time I will have definitely gotten money's worth from it.

When I get a new computer, I will continue to use this one as an external FW drive. With 4 SATA drives, it becomes a brilliant FW800 external, if a little bulky.

as long as you arent paying for electricity its brilliant.

 

[karsten]

I have snooped around the net and found the earliest days of Mountain Lion's release had a panic about incompatibility with those early MacPros. Later posts show that there are people with MacPro 1,1 that CAN run Mountain Lion's preview and those that can't.

Those that can't might be using the original or inadequate video cards, according to other critics on the net. Good news, though: if people with MacPro 1,1s are running Mountain Lion successfully, it means all MacPros can run it and there is something causing inadequacy or incompatibility.

However, we have to be aware that our machines are definitely closing in on antiquation, in terms of OSX support. Once we get to the last OSX, we have maybe 2 or 3 years and nothing more will be made by Apple to help us adjust to blossoming technology and formats.

If Mt. Lion supports us, the next one probably won't. So our Mac Pros will probably be best replaced by 2015. That's 9 years! A brilliant life span, I think, for such tech. Who today can still use a 2003 PowerMac without trouble? My old 2003 PowerMac was already a clunker when I sold it years back.

more like 2013 if apple is going to a 1 yr release cycle on OS X even if 32-bit support squeezes in this release I doubt it'd be in the next one

 

[Tyrone Chicken]

Your machine will be 6 years old when Mountain Lion is released. I think it's fair that they drop support for a 6-year old computer.

it benches about the same as the low end mac mini (without any upgrades of course) yet those are getting the upgrade i don't see how that is fair at all

EDIT: whoops! i didn't see the topic date :s

 

[Lesser Evets]

it benches about the same as the low end mac mini (without any upgrades of course) yet those are getting the upgrade i don't see how that is fair at all

You can easily double the benchmarks of the 1,1 with the 5365s in there, and then you BSEL mod and it's probably screaming toward the low-end 2010 MacPro which is one of the top benchmarks of all current Macs. Computing wise, the 1,1 is STILL current and excellent value.

 

[Graeme43]

Even a stock 1,1 with 4GB+ ram and decent video card its still no slouch and totally capable and since Apple is dropping it a lot of them may become windows machines

I got a SSD for mine and it feels faster than it was when it was new

 

[MacinJosh]

...and since Apple is dropping it a lot of them may become windows machines

I highly doubt that. Once ML is launched, Lion doesn't become obsolete. I can't imagine someone going to install Windows just because they can't run ML...

 

[Graeme43]

I certainly hope all the apps don't end up 10.8 only

 

[MacinJosh]

I certainly hope all the apps don't end up 10.8 only

Well, eventually ML will be obsolete as will everything else we currently use. It's safe to say that within a few months of ML launch we will see several apps that require ML just as we see many app that require Lion today.

 

[miniConvert]

I'm replacing my Mac Pro 1,1 server with a Mac mini server + RAID over Thunderbolt. I can appreciate that for some, who have invested a lot of time and money in this machine, it's painful to think that it's nearing EOL. But for me and my needs, the six year old hot and increasingly noisy beast can definitely be respectfully retired at this point.

No idea what I'll do with it.

 

[TacticalDesire]

You are incorrect on the Macbook Pro angle. Your 6850 is just slightly faster than the stock 5770 desktop replacement. And more than 2x's slower than the 5870 that 2010 Mac Pro's had available. 5870 is 2x's faster than the current top of the line 6970m in iMac. No way is a MBP even close to the 2010 Pro in gaming anything. My 5870 and 6-core 3.33GHz gets over 22,300 in 3DMark Vantage and around 4800 in 3DMark11. MBP or iMac can't touch that. Not close even.

The 6850 is far from 2x slower than the 5870.

 

[derbothaus]

The 6850 is far from 2x slower than the 5870.

So it's 3x's slower?

 

[TacticalDesire]

So it's 3x's slower?

Cute.

http://www.anandtech.com/bench/Product/539?vs=511

 

[schalliol]

I have snooped around the net and found the earliest days of Mountain Lion's release had a panic about incompatibility with those early MacPros. Later posts show that there are people with MacPro 1,1 that CAN run Mountain Lion's preview and those that can't.

Does anyone have news on this? I really would enjoy having my Mac Pro I bought when the 8-core first came out (just bought the 4-core which didn't get an update). I upgraded my Mac Pro with an SSD RAID 0 for startup/apps (in the second 5.25" bay using the unused SATA port on the board) and 4x 750GB Seagate Barraduda ES drives, along with 10GB RAM. This is a capable machine for sure. It is true that a new retina MBP would give it a run for its money, but I end up using it less intensively than I originally did and would enjoy running ML on it.

 

[nycaleksey]

Does anyone have news on this? I really would enjoy having my Mac Pro I bought when the 8-core first came out (just bought the 4-core which didn't get an update). I upgraded my Mac Pro with an SSD RAID 0 for startup/apps (in the second 5.25" bay using the unused SATA port on the board) and 4x 750GB Seagate Barraduda ES drives, along with 10GB RAM. This is a capable machine for sure. It is true that a new retina MBP would give it a run for its money, but I end up using it less intensively than I originally did and would enjoy running ML on it.

Nothing new in the last few weeks - MP1,1 is not supported by ML natively. You can use Chameleon boot loader and boot ML that way, but effectively you will be Hackintoshing your machine. I am staying on Lion, the only thing I will be missing is Messages app and the ability to send iMessages from OSX. I hope someone will backport Messages to Lion.

 

[schalliol]

Nothing new in the last few weeks - MP1,1 is not supported by ML natively. You can use Chameleon boot loader and boot ML that way, but effectively you will be Hackintoshing your machine. I am staying on Lion, the only thing I will be missing is Messages app and the ability to send iMessages from OSX. I hope someone will backport Messages to Lion.

Thanks for the update. Do you have a link to a repository of knowledge on this you could link us? Thanks!

 

[Cindori]

Thanks for the update. Do you have a link to a repository of knowledge on this you could link us? Thanks!

http://forum.netkas.org/