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nMP vs Workstation Price Comparisons
- Thread starter fixmdude
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Why start with a dual socket workstation?
It seems crazy (or manipulative) to use a highly expandable dual socket workstation as the base to make something "equivalent" to the Mac Mini Pro - a closed, barely expandable or upgradeable single socket system.
I'd consider the attached config to be pretty close, and it's a dollar less than the trashcan.
You also have a lot of choice for graphics cards with z420, including CUDA cards - you're not forced to get a pair of ATI cards. You may argue that the 3900s are less than the D300s - but unless your important apps can use dual GPUs for OpenCL that's a moot point.
And of course, HP systems are seldom sold at list price - the discounts are usually quite good.
It seems crazy (or manipulative) to use a highly expandable dual socket workstation as the base to make something "equivalent" to the Mac Mini Pro - a closed, barely expandable or upgradeable single socket system.
I'd consider the attached config to be pretty close, and it's a dollar less than the trashcan.
You also have a lot of choice for graphics cards with z420, including CUDA cards - you're not forced to get a pair of ATI cards. You may argue that the 3900s are less than the D300s - but unless your important apps can use dual GPUs for OpenCL that's a moot point.
And of course, HP systems are seldom sold at list price - the discounts are usually quite good.
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That doesn't have PCI-e SSD though. So with slower GPU's and a much slower SSD, it's still the same price as Apple's.
After 20% off, its $2398. Apple might dive $100-200 lower than list occasionally (i.e. a black friday or education discount), but youre still looking at ~$500 less.
And on the plus side that HP has 8 DIMM slots, so you can get to the same memory with modules at half the capacity. Which is especially meaningful for 128GB, since the 32GB sticks you need for the Mac Pro are still quite expensive. And of course even thought he z420 officially supports 64GB, you could go to 256GB with 32GB sticks. Something the nMP wont be able to do until we see 64GB RAM sticks.
Also, the z420 has room for 4 HDDs. While the PCIe is of course fast as hell, its also small. So you can easily put in a pretty fast 3 disk RAID0 with standard hard drives and get up 12 TBs in there, plus a boot disk. If you need to match that kind of capacity+performance in the nMP, you need expensive TB expansion arrays.
Then the z420 has room for PCIe-SSDs as an expansion card. So, with that ~$500 bucks you saved, you could just add a PCIe-SSD yourself if you wish. I would also challenge many of the folks arguing that an SSD isnt as good as a PCIe-SSD to actually benchmark their workflow with one vs the other. Many times youre going to be bottleneck by something else before the difference between 700MB/s and 1250MB/s on your disk means anything.
Regardless, I think this comparison points out pretty clearly what others have already said, and that is: The nMP gives you good value if your workflow makes good use of the hardware it provides, but if your workflow does not, then you get more bang for your buck somewhere else.
The PCIe (not "PCI-e") SSD speed difference is unlikely to be noticeable except with odd tasks or synthetic benchmarks. Application launch times would be so close as to be virtually the same speed.
If your apps aren't multi-GPU OpenCL aware, the GPU speed difference won't matter.
If your apps are CUDA-aware, the z420 may cream the Mac Mini Pro.
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And what's the price of the Mac Mini Pro with two additional 4 TB drives in RAID-1? HP wins big time here - without the discounts.
My main point, though, is that you can't discuss "equivalent" systems without putting them in the context of the intended applications. Those dual-ATI cards on the Mac Mini Pro are a complete waste of money for compute-intensive apps that can't (or don't) use OpenCL.
But looking at the fine print it says select workstations. The devils in the details. Do these select workstations compare to the 2013 Mac Pro? But either way not too bad for a cereal box.
That is changing quite quickly. Nvidia does support openCL, but rather slowly. Adobe has given support for openCL in a lot of its Adobe applications. Especially Premiere Pro that does support the nMP and does support multiGPU as well. Even though its for export only at this time.
Also DaVinci Resolve 10 does support the nMP which they say screams.
I would say its not just about just Nvidia anymore.
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Good Grief... as has been stated numerous times in this thread... this thread is not about debating the merits of Apples design (there are at least 100 other threads already discussing that topic ad nauseum), it's merely about trying to price comparable systems.
But you have to understand the differences between whats most comparable and what they might be worth to you.
Never did I question the merits of the new design, I simply pointed out whats different and what value it can have. Its no different than pointing out that the nMP has a PCIe-SSD, but that the z420 doesnt. Then, should we respond anyone saying that, that this isnt about the merits of HPs design? Once you turn your argument around, I think you should understand that you actually have no argument at all, but rather a ridicule.
The simple fact is that there is nothing all that comparable. And if we cant point out the differences between the designs without some sort of ridicule, whats the point of pricing anything out?
I just ran through the exact machine configured above and it worked. $559.40 off and $215.78 CA tax, $45 dollars shipping. When I was shopping for a workstation last Jan. for my job, I obtained several official quotes with the same 20% on a few different configurations and it always worked.
I think we need this machine to be out for a little while before we really put much faith in any that.
I can't speak for the OP, but I believe the point of this exercise is to determine if Apple's pricing is in line with other systems.
What's annoying is that no thread seems to be able to discuss the nMP without some folks getting on their soapbox about no internal drive bays. That message has been heard... countless times.
Well, the idea was to find something comparable at similar to lower cost, I think. The HP z 420 priced out by Aiden pretty much hits that.
To that we see:
And of course another person doubting the 20% coupon even works....did he think to try it? No....
Here you and iBug are pointing out that the GPUs arent the same and are slightly slower (not mentioning no GPUs from vendors other than Apple will ever be the same) and that the PCIe-SSD is slower than the standard SSD.
All are true enough, but when anyone points out that any differences between the z420 and nMP that favor the HP, we get treated your last two posts basically ridiculing the idea of even bringing up such a thing.....hypocritical much VR?
Basically, its ok to bring up that a single SSD in HP is only capable of 500+MB/s while the nMP PCIe-SSD is unto 1250, but its not ok to bring up that in that $500 price difference between the HP and the nMP, you could have 12TB getting maybe 300MB/s. Or you could do a whole host of other modifications to that HP to suite what ever need you have. The HDD example is only brought up because its the easiest.
Overall, my basic point is that you need to price out a fully computing solution for your needs before you can really compare. Line for line spec matching for no real reason isnt anything but a game with no real world application.
At least that was what was put out by Blackmagic Designs. Looking it up again DaVinci Resolve can now use up to 5 FirePro cards. So I guess it also has multiGPU support. Pretty cool.
While we can't say how well it might work on the nMP until it comes out we can certainly test the newer apps out on openCL based systems now.
But in regards to this thread...I see what virtualrain is saying. We could argue all day on exactly what configuration would be needed for our own uses.
I would have to use hardware that does not come with either Mac or PC natively. But that does not necessarily mean I should add the price on top of either configuration.
The only components you can add internally to the new Mac Pro is an SSD or RAM. Its not about having an PCIe SSD in the HP but rather having to add the additional price of the hardware to support it.
If you think spec for spec matching is a game, try adding all the different hardware combinations possible must be childs play.
Thats not what I said. I meant what select workstations does this discount apply too? Applying it only to one configuration does not mean it would work for all. In your broad definition, based on each persons requirements, it has to be able to be used in all cases. Something I don't have the time to check or want to do....sorry.
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There is a reason... At least for myself and the OP (and a few others who started out in this thread), the new Mac Pro is a perfect fit for our needs, so we are trying to determine how competitively priced it is. That's it. I understand others value internal storage and upgradable GPUs (even though those things may not cost anything) but that's not relevant to this, we're simply trying to figure out if Apple has priced the nMP competitively.
Can't see that in the OP. But if every post that differs from said view gets shot down because of i.e. the fastes SSD known to mankind, this thread loses its original appeal. If you folks fell in love with the nMP why not just say so and close this thread, because there won't be any direct 1:1 comparison possible. Apple made sure of that.
All the people who hate the nMP should just say so and the 200 threads about how it does not meet their needs should be closed.
You are kidding right? Try editing 4k with a SATA3 SSD. Even Apple's offering is not fast enough. Would need around 2GB/sec to be on the safe side.
And if your apps do not use Cuda the same principle applies to HP's offering.
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Yeah. That should be a separate thread. Kind of bored of every single nMP thread being filled up with irrelevant posts. People who will not buy a nMP should open a new thread and start discussing their options. It'd be better for everyone.
Thanks to all of you and others for giving me the inspiration to do what I should have done in the first place, for no system made by anyone other than Apple is comparable to the nMP. It's one of a kind.
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Apple offers an educational discount as well, the 6-core $3,999 Mac Pro is $3,699. People keep posting irrelevant variables on here.
"I want internal slower drives so you probably can't notice how fast the Mac drive is anyway." or "I'll just RAID0 a bunch of slow drives and ignore the fact that SATA 6 has a 750MB/s limit." "You can probably blah blah blah for less even though I haven't tried it and don't have prices to show it."
Some don't want a big bulky loud box so no matter what the price of the PC, the nMP is "better", you can't win when you argue a preference. There are a million other products and choices out there, this thread is discussing the particular choice and configuration of the nMP, however you can buy or build it.
Changing the rules to say you don't care about certain features or you want other features so something else is worth more to you, doesn't apply to this thread.
If you don't like the topic of this thread then don't waste your time whining about not liking the topic of the thread, just pick different thread.
There are 50 million other products and configurations out there that you probably don't care for, go post why they don't meet your needs on every one of those threads too. See you in a million years.
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That's exactly my point. People are arguing about Dell and HP discounts below the retail price. Apple has discounts, MacMall has discounts below Apple, you can avoid the tax on a Mac by ordering from another reseller out of state, but you can't if you order from Dell.
It's all irrelevant. We can only do a general comparison using Retail costs since discounts vary by individual and by location.