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Mac Pro - upgrade or get an iMac
- Thread starter stimpycat
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I would try bumping up the RAM (4GB is rather paltry for a MP these days) and also maybe upgrade to a faster HD.
As for (entry level) MP vs iMac, I had to dance that through my head a few months ago. I like the iMac concept as I don't have any need for PCI slots and can live with a couple ext. drives for storage. But the deal killer for me is that user upgrades are a PITA.
The glass is tricky to take off, and especially to put back unless you are in a clean room which I don't have access too. Also the HDs seem to be customized these days based on my research. If you want to put your own HD in forget about it. I can't live with that. If my drive dies I can't spend time shipping it back to Apple when I could just drop a new on in a MP in 5 min.
So I wait patiently for the next MP revision w/ TB. It's too bad Apple doesn't have a real headless solution -- something more than the mini but less than the MP.
As for (entry level) MP vs iMac, I had to dance that through my head a few months ago. I like the iMac concept as I don't have any need for PCI slots and can live with a couple ext. drives for storage. But the deal killer for me is that user upgrades are a PITA.
The glass is tricky to take off, and especially to put back unless you are in a clean room which I don't have access too. Also the HDs seem to be customized these days based on my research. If you want to put your own HD in forget about it. I can't live with that. If my drive dies I can't spend time shipping it back to Apple when I could just drop a new on in a MP in 5 min.
So I wait patiently for the next MP revision w/ TB. It's too bad Apple doesn't have a real headless solution -- something more than the mini but less than the MP.
Well, how about THAT. Probably not an "authorized" response, since as far as I've been able to tell, the panel in the 27" iMac is the same display as the 27" Apple Cinema... oh wait... Thunderbolt Display. But seems a "have the bloody cake and eat it too" scenario, as Apple seems to be positioning the 27" iMac as a prosumer video editing workstation with FCP X.
Does anyone out there know if they are the same panel? For lots of non-trival reasons, it would make serious manufacturing sense for Apple if they were. You might think of the 27" iMac as a 27" Display with a computer attached especially considering the price points.
But considering that both screens are glossy, for that ever-so-important "ooohhh shiny" sales experience, many of us Graphics Pros would not consider them "professional grade" anyway. So your best option might be a Mac Pro with a third party display.
Your mileage may of course vary.
It would be a cracking editing station if the screen was reliable. I liked the form factor, not the lack of upgrade. The noisy hard drive was a pain too.
I did mention that the 27" cinema display which led to silence from the Genius.
I already have an external display, I had to buy it as I couldn't trust the iMac panel! The only question is, do I wait or buy now.But considering that both screens are glossy, for that ever-so-important "ooohhh shiny" sales experience, many of us Graphics Pros would not consider them "professional grade" anyway. So your best option might be a Mac Pro with a third party display.
Your mileage may of course vary.
That's a pretty fair question. Since there's a decent number of us who need to update our kit to stay plugged into Apple's ecosystem. Leaving aside the Mac Pro vs iMac question, there was a brief rumor pulse that there would be a Mac Pro update with the Lion drop. But that actually turned out to be a MacBook Air / ThunderBolt Display release.
Apparently Thunderbolt capable next-gen chips are not available from Intel yet. So we should probably not get our boxers in an uproar till at least Q42011, but on Apple's MP timeline, that might even be sometime in 2012. The last upgrade cycle was 511 days - a year and a half. The one before was 420 days.
Patience, Grasshopper.
What concerns me that on the current arc, we perhaps should check our expectations. The last update was kind of "meh"... We'll certainly get Thunderbolt, and of course a CPU bump, they'll be SSD's and maybe a nudge up on graphics cards. They'll probably still have optical drives.. maybe. But they're days are absolutely numbered. Don't hold your breath for USB 3, eSATA, or gods forbid, Blu-Ray... Apple's just not interested. But at least with discrete graphics cards, you can still plug in third party displays. Not so with the thunderbolt equipped MBA.
But otherwise, I am expecting essentially the same machine in most respects. And still a costly beastie.
If you NEED it, go ahead and buy, you'll get Lion too, now. But if you can wait it out, you can wait for the new model.