Have you look at the price of a ram upgrade on the Apple site? Beside the "Apple tax" how could you justify such ridiculous high price given the Apple use the same brand and model that everybody else uses.
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Mac Pro is not overpriced.
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Have you look at the price of a ram upgrade on the Apple site? Beside the "Apple tax" how could you justify such ridiculous high price given the Apple use the same brand and model that everybody else uses.
Have you looked at some of the ram in a cheap Dell system? It is either from some random company that nobody has ever heard from, or has very high latency in order to be cheap.
Is it a fact that 100% of the time everybody's ram are the same as Apples? No. I have seen high latency ram in pre-built systems, and low latency ram I have seen lower speed ram (lower speed as in lower than what the motherboard can handle) vs higher speed ram. The company does not matter. It can be Crucial ram in both systems, but high latency vs low latency.
That is like saying a $400 dell is the same as a $3,000 Mac Pro because the processor manufacture is the same.
There's going to be plenty of times you're going to need to go on the internet even on a "work only" machine. I've spent many hours trying to troubleshoot the PCs in our studio when Creative Cloud won't update or uninstall properly, the machine randomly shuts off during long render times, fonts don't get recognized, we lose connection to the NAS, artifacts appear in the final renders, et al. That requires digging through forums, looking for driver updates plenty of chances to get some malware through a bad third-party ad, no Facebook or porn-surfing required
While admittedly I'd be more proficient at PC troubleshooting if I spent all my time with them, even factoring that in I spend far more time trying to make the PCs my boss insists are going to be so much faster just *work* as opposed to the work I'm getting done on the Mac when he's not around to argue about the workflow.
We're going to be getting a new Z810 to pair with a Titan Z Black, and from a monetary standpoint no Mac is going to be able to beat a 50% discount on the tower and a $3000 graphics card for free; but I'm already dreading the work I'm going to have to do keeping the damn thing running.
You can buy the exact same ram module that apple puts in their machine for a fraction of the price. Look it up yourself if you don't believe me. Apple isn't using some magical super duper special ram module. They use the same Micron, Kingston, Crucial or any other ram manufacturer that fit the bill and that can provide a big enough inventory to Apple.
BTW Dell don't sell $400 workstation, but for the same $3000 you can get a nice Dell system with more ram and better gpu than the nMP, but without the magical unicorn dust that comes with the nMP.
There's going to be plenty of times you're going to need to go on the internet even on a "work only" machine. I've spent many hours trying to troubleshoot the PCs in our studio when Creative Cloud won't update or uninstall properly, the machine randomly shuts off during long render times, fonts don't get recognized, we lose connection to the NAS, artifacts appear in the final renders, et al. That requires digging through forums, looking for driver updates plenty of chances to get some malware through a bad third-party ad, no Facebook or porn-surfing required
While admittedly I'd be more proficient at PC troubleshooting if I spent all my time with them, even factoring that in I spend far more time trying to make the PCs my boss insists are going to be so much faster just *work* as opposed to the work I'm getting done on the Mac when he's not around to argue about the workflow.
We're going to be getting a new Z810 to pair with a Titan Z Black, and from a monetary standpoint no Mac is going to be able to beat a 50% discount on the tower and a $3000 graphics card for free; but I'm already dreading the work I'm going to have to do keeping the damn thing running.
1- Creative cloud not updating is not because of windows or the pc but because CC is crap and Adobe is responsible for it. The same thing can and does happens on Mac.
2- Machine randomly shutting down: Either an overheating issue or hardware failure. Mac aren't immune from those either.
3- Font not being recognize: Really? Well if the font isn't installed it won't be recognized certainly. But this can happen on Mac too!
4- Nas not being recognized: Too many thing can be the culprit with this. But again, Mac aren't immune from this either. Plenty of people around here have trouble setting up and accessing their NAS with their Mac.
5- Artifact: Can be related to #2 and again, not really exclusive to PC. Plenty of people over the years have reported such problems with Mac also.
6- Malware: Mac aren't immune to malware. It is more resilient to viruses but malware is something else. Since most mac user don't install any malware or virus scanner they don't even know if the piece of software they downloaded and run is really the real thing. For exemple, you're looking for a piece of software to do X. You search on google and end up on a site that looks legit and offer such a product. You download it and install it. Of course as always OSX ask for your password. But since you think this is the real thing you enter your password and run it. From that point, that piece of software can do as much damage as it want and you'll never know since you don't have anything to scan or warn you.
Beside, starting with Windows Vista, MS offer a great malware and virus scanner and plenty more are available and every IT dept worthy of the name know how to set it up and keep it up to date. And if they are really really competent then they also use a services to block dangerous website and they keep their network behind a lock down firewall.
I see. With your build, you get:
1. Non ECC RAM.
2. A gaming graphics card. There is a difference in professional applications.
3. A vague CPU.
4. A much slower SATA SSD.
Dude, that is not a comparable system, it lacks thunderbolt which many professionals need for RAID thunderbolt arrays, etc. etc. etc.
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Even with the RAM tax, try to build an equivalent machine and you will quickly realize that it is very fairly priced.
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And these days, these "scanners" tend to fail more often than they work. Antivirus is basically useless these days, even the maker of Norton antivirus has said "antivirus is dead" recently because it generally fails to provide any protection it just slows down the system.
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The Titans aren't gaming cards... They are CUDA workhorse and they are used in many many render farm setup.
As for ECC ram, it doesn't really matter except in the extremelly limited market of scientific application. It is not needed in rendering or video/image/sound processing at all.
Well the CPUs are probably e5 2643, so ECC RAM is certainly a possibility. And the P3500 is PCIe just like the Mac Pro. And I think you're severely overestimating the "need" for thunderbolt. Workstations generally have many other options for high speed data transfer.
I wouldn't necessarily call the Titan a gaming card, but yeah, if you're working in Windows then you want the workstation GPU for may pro apps.
You're really missing the point. Of course the capability is for any hardware running any OS to have these issues; I'm not saying Apple can't have CC update failures or font problems or you can't install malware. But for me, they're all happening on the Windows PC. I can count the number of hardware failures or serious software failures I've had on my Macintosh desktops in 22 years: zero. I can count the number of hardware/software failures I've had on the PC desktops in my office in less than two years of working there: seven, including one of them just today throwing up a graphics driver error and BSOD right in the middle of exports.
I'm not speaking for everyone, but I'm speaking from a pretty extensive personal experience, and Apple's worth is far more than just its dollar price or its design, or its ease of use; all those things matter to people in different ratios, and for some putting up with headaches is worth getting something for cheaper, sometimes much cheaper. Some people just plain don't have the money to even consider other options. Some people get a $400 or $4000 Wintel workstation and are completely happy. It's a spectrum, not an absolute.
Small businesses like the one I work at don't have tech staff on hand. We don't have an IT department. There are many more businesses like mine than there are that do have those things. So again: the point is that for me there is almost no scenario where a Mac is overpriced for my needs, because the alternative is plain abysmal.
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To disentagle this from Windows for a second: I did a high school job one summer writing curriculum for a tech course. Because this was run by big CS nerds (our high school teachers) we used Ubuntu Linux, and since I was testing out some NLE I was given a distro of Ubuntu Studio.
My entire first day was spent working with people smarter than me to figure out how to get a resolution higher than 1024x768 out of the 1200p monitor. It was a complete waste of time, and the distro never really worked well, and the NLE was so bad I ended up just doing ActionScript demos. But I don't think it mattered much to my peers; these guys happily beta-test software and like jumping in, getting dirty, rolling their own packages and such. For them they have an entirely different concept of value than I, and I can't say it's "wrong". I can say I don't prefer it, and many don't.
They're all hapening (to you or tothers) on windows PC because they are a lot more windows PC out there in many more hardware configurations! If the ratio was reversed you would here way more about Mac problem then windows...
Hardware problem happens just as often on Mac. If not then no one would need Applecare. This is especially true since beside the case and motherboard, Apple uses the same parts that Dell, HP or your corner store clone. You hear less about them because there are less Mac users than PC users and since this is a Mac forum there is also a pinch of partisanship going on.
The fact that you've never had any problem with your mac mean as much as someone else on a forum posting that he never had any problem with is Dell or HP. Nothing more, nothing less.
Apple being restrictive in its hardware configuration may save you some drivers updates problem, but at the same time this also restrict your choice of hardware and software to use on your mac. Beside, since OSX 10.9.2 we do know that Macs aren't immune to drivers issue either.
If you look at the total cost of ownership, the so called "Apple Tax" disappears when you upgrade and sell the machine in 3 to 5 years.
You will probably recoup 50% or more of your purchase price when you sell a Mac. Even a broken, non working Mac will sell for a surprising price on eBay. Plus you can transfer all the software with the Mac since it was part of the original purchase.
You will get very little for a 3 year old PC from Dell, HP, etc. It is too easy to get a new one for 0% down, no payments for a year at retailers on mainstream PCs, and deals abound for corporate purchase. And you can't easily/legally transfer ownership of the software to the new user.
And you pretty much have to almost give away a home-built PC since very few people will chance the unknown. You are probably better off parting it out to sell which is a lot of work for less than current parts. Same issues with the core software.
You will probably recoup 50% or more of your purchase price when you sell a Mac. Even a broken, non working Mac will sell for a surprising price on eBay. Plus you can transfer all the software with the Mac since it was part of the original purchase.
You will get very little for a 3 year old PC from Dell, HP, etc. It is too easy to get a new one for 0% down, no payments for a year at retailers on mainstream PCs, and deals abound for corporate purchase. And you can't easily/legally transfer ownership of the software to the new user.
And you pretty much have to almost give away a home-built PC since very few people will chance the unknown. You are probably better off parting it out to sell which is a lot of work for less than current parts. Same issues with the core software.
You're being deliberately obtuse now or just bad at reading and comprehending my point. And your argument about the number of Macs vs PCs sold is statistical garbage; if they're the same hardware numbers sold is meaningless to failure rates.
To failure rate yes, to failure reported on forums no they're not meaningless.
5% of mac vs 5% of pcs means a lot more pcs...
The Mac Pro is super expensive but I rather change field of business before working on a PC.
4 years ago I bough an Alien Ware 15" full aspects and I was running some 3D software. It had 1GB of Video Ram.
Well, my 2008 17" Mac Book Pro with 256GB of VRam (I still have it running just fine) was able to out perform the same software running Bootcamp!
the Alienware had dropped frames while the MBP ran the graphics just fine.
I sold the Alienware 4 months later on eBay. Again, I still have the 17" Mac Book Pro, now with SSD drive and 6GB of Ram.
I gave a good chance to the best PC manufacturer and nothing.
4 years ago I bough an Alien Ware 15" full aspects and I was running some 3D software. It had 1GB of Video Ram.
Well, my 2008 17" Mac Book Pro with 256GB of VRam (I still have it running just fine) was able to out perform the same software running Bootcamp!
the Alienware had dropped frames while the MBP ran the graphics just fine.
I sold the Alienware 4 months later on eBay. Again, I still have the 17" Mac Book Pro, now with SSD drive and 6GB of Ram.
I gave a good chance to the best PC manufacturer and nothing.
The Mac Pro is grossly overpriced. I need a workstation, not a render farm. $7000 worth of GPU's sitting idle (as they would be for me) is pure idiocy. I can build a better machine for less than half the price (with a single much cheaper graphics card), and I would never see the difference in performance.
And say all you want about mac OS (I'm currently using Mountain Lion), but that iOS Desktop Yosemite Edition they're about the dump on the market makes windows 7 look fantastic by comparison as a workstation OS.
And say all you want about mac OS (I'm currently using Mountain Lion), but that iOS Desktop Yosemite Edition they're about the dump on the market makes windows 7 look fantastic by comparison as a workstation OS.
Amazing that even on a forum you assume has technology-aware and literate people you still get ignorant statements like this.
well guess you're right about that, system looks more awful with every "upgrade" they give us
especially the professional apps have transgressed the rubicon by a long shot by now IMHO
as for the system, i think right now what they do is charge for that extra "cool" design, i don't think its very functional
somehow i still love the machine
I think nMP isn't going to retain value the way cMP did.
Which Mac from 2006 can still run latest OS? Only the Mac Pro. (Using Tiamo Boot EFI and newer GPU)
What is a 2006 iMac worth? Very little, it is stuck in 10.7.
The nMP is going to be in same boat as rest of 2013 crop, stuck in 2013. It will have a shorter useful life. Some new feature will come out that Dx00 can't support and people will be dumping them like day old sushi.
To those who say "why would I care, I replace machines every 3 years" keep in mind that resale value on 2009 has remained high precisely because it can avoid premature aging and has remained relevant. How popular would 2009 be if they all had GT120 or AMD4870 and there were no options to change that?
You will get less in 3 years and have less to apply to your 3 year upgrade. Not to mention you paid $500 extra to start with.
Which Mac from 2006 can still run latest OS? Only the Mac Pro. (Using Tiamo Boot EFI and newer GPU)
What is a 2006 iMac worth? Very little, it is stuck in 10.7.
The nMP is going to be in same boat as rest of 2013 crop, stuck in 2013. It will have a shorter useful life. Some new feature will come out that Dx00 can't support and people will be dumping them like day old sushi.
To those who say "why would I care, I replace machines every 3 years" keep in mind that resale value on 2009 has remained high precisely because it can avoid premature aging and has remained relevant. How popular would 2009 be if they all had GT120 or AMD4870 and there were no options to change that?
You will get less in 3 years and have less to apply to your 3 year upgrade. Not to mention you paid $500 extra to start with.
I'm late to this thread and most people have already made up their minds one way or the other, but I thought I'd share some real world information. I work IT at a small-ish 3D studio and we had always used Mac Pros. We just switched to Dell Precision T5610 last month mainly because of the price of the new Mac Pros. The pricing was virtually identical between the configurations we were considering, but in the end the Mac Pro just wasn't a good option. The dual AMD FirePro's are a total waste for us. While we use RT rendering for scene planning and previews, we use a traditional CPU renderer for our production renders. The Dell workstations were able to offer more expansion options, upgradability and much better performance at near the same cost. I understand there's specific reasons you may like the Mac Pro more, but it's a worse value in general.
Here was the choice for us:
Mac Pro - $7250
2.7GHz 12-core with 30MB of L3 cache
32GB (4x8GB) of 1866MHz DDR3 ECC
256GB PCIe-based flash storage
2x AMD FirePro D500 GPUs with 3GB of GDDR5 VRAM each
Dell T5610 - $7300
2x 3.4GHz 8-core with 25MB of L3 cache
32GB (4x8GB) of 1866MHz DDR3 ECC
256GB SATA SSD
1TB Standard Hard Drive
Nvidia Quadro K5000 with 4GB GDDR5 VRAM
Here was the choice for us:
Mac Pro - $7250
2.7GHz 12-core with 30MB of L3 cache
32GB (4x8GB) of 1866MHz DDR3 ECC
256GB PCIe-based flash storage
2x AMD FirePro D500 GPUs with 3GB of GDDR5 VRAM each
Dell T5610 - $7300
2x 3.4GHz 8-core with 25MB of L3 cache
32GB (4x8GB) of 1866MHz DDR3 ECC
256GB SATA SSD
1TB Standard Hard Drive
Nvidia Quadro K5000 with 4GB GDDR5 VRAM
Media processing is only one market segment that Mac Pro's serve. ECC RAM is very important to many Pro users. In fact, it's even important in some media applications as well.
How about this. Go out and build a machine with actual equivalent parts, the same memory, the same PCIe based SSD's, the W9000 which is almost entirely identical, the same processor, etc. and I will forgive the fact that it is 5x larger and most likely lacks thunderbolt. I wish you the best of luck in getting that machine at a lower price than the Mac Pro.
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Oh yeah? A machine, with similar specs will be less than half the price of a similar machine that has $4,000 more video card power behind it?? No way!
Some of you are so clueless. You seem to be applying your very specific needs to the Mac Pro, whining that the Mac Pro falls short of your own very specific situation, and then condemning the entire machine. If you don't find the machine meets your specific situational needs, then don't buy it. But that doesn't mean it isn't a fantastic machine, because in a lot of other users situations it is by far and away the best machine on the market they could purchase.
I am using Yosemite. How on earth do you call it an iOS desktop...? What exactly, in your mind, makes it iOS-like? There may be some minor graphical improvements, but hardly anything that could let you call it an iOS desktop. It is worlds superior to Windows 7, which is a five year old OS. I burst in to laughing at the fact that you pretend the whole "Windows 8" thing never happened, haha!
Dude, why are you even on a Mac website??? I wonder with some of you.
You're right in the sense that a Mac Pro has an adequate price... unless you don't need all of its features. For example, Thunderbolt support is a requirement only in the Mac world. Why would I need Thunderbolt having plenty of PCIe Gen3 x16 slots? A Dell T7610 supports up to 512GB of RAM. If you need handling (way) big data, a PC workstation is the way to have the task done. If you need CUDA support for heavy matrix processing, a Mac Pro isn't adequate...
If I had $10000,00 for investing in a workstation AND wouldn't care with OSX, the PC would give the best performance for the money, unless you need all the features a Mac Pro provides (like exactly dual D700 AMD GPUs). All I want to explain is: when you buy a Mac Pro, chances are that you're paying for stuff you actually don't need. On a PC, you can install just the stuff you need for the moment, being capable of adding expansion cards in the future.
Here is an interesting set of phrases.
The D700 is just like a W9000 except it doesn't include that "very important" ECC RAM.
And it's clocked slower.
And oddly enough it doesn't share the same device id. (Used by drivers to assign identity)
In fact, guess which device id it uses?
AMD7970. (device id 6798)
So, especially in OSX, it performs IDENTICALLY TO A 7970. (Except it has been watered down with much lower clocks, of course)
SO go ahead and chop a "0" off the price. From $3,500 down to $350. Now add the numbers up again.
So, is a D700 "almost entirely identical" or is ECC RAM "very important"?
Can't have both.
I think it's silly to have two mediocre cards instead of one good one, especially if the software you use doesn't support them.
I'm still not sure why they were so eager to include two GPUs without a generous power supply and a commensurately robust cooling system to accommodate them.
Even if they're "cheap" they're not free, can't see paying twice as much for half the performance.