What is the situation on the Hard Drive type/internal? 3.5"? 2.5" only? Accessible?

[Tesselator]

Well, USB3.0 will deliver full speed from the fastest single SSD you can buy currently, so why would you use the TB2 ports? What a waste. Save the TB2 ports for monitors and SSD RAID enclosures. USB3.0 is even fast enough to deliver full speed for RAID0 using 3 of the fastest rotational drives in existence - at 4 drives in RAID0 USB3.0 will cap the top throughputs just slightly - and that again, is only if you're using the very fastest rotational drives. If you're using WD Black or Red drives (i.e.. NOT the fastest) then USB3.0 will deliver full speed from even a 4-drive RAID0.

I want to use the ports properly and not waste connections and money so for me the descriptions above will be connected via USB3.0. But it's fine, if you're not going to grow your system and you have hundreds of unneeded dollars to throw away then for sure, use the TB2 ports. These dynamics may change in the future but for now that's where I'm at.

 

[spunkgarLEWII]

Tessalator,

If you decide to buy this you do realize(I know you do) that thunderbolt enclosures are going to be so high in price, but really how much faster is USB 3.0? I do know that eSATA and or SATA III/II is much faster than USB 3.0.. But for someone who wants to get the new cylinder Mac Pro and is watching finances, would USB 3.0 enclosures really be more efficient? I would think not given that they are not even close to the speed of SATA II/III.

The idea of buying enclosure after enclosure is one reason that could possibly kill this idea of a cylinder Mac Pro. Thunderbolt enclosures are not cheap and those could EASILY exceed the price of the Mac Pro itself.. Just something to think about.

Well, USB3.0 will deliver full speed from the fastest single SSD you can buy currently, so why would you use the TB2 ports? What a waste. Save the TB2 ports for monitors and SSD RAID enclosures. USB3.0 is even fast enough to deliver full speed for RAID0 using 3 of the fastest rotational drives in existence - at 4 drives in RAID0 USB3.0 will cap the top throughputs just slightly - and that again, is only if you're using the very fastest rotational drives. If you're using WD Black or Red drives (i.e.. NOT the fastest) then USB3.0 will deliver full speed from even a 4-drive RAID0.

I want to use the ports properly and not waste connections and money so for me the descriptions above will be connected via USB3.0. But it's fine, if you're not going to grow your system and you have hundreds of unneeded dollars to throw away then for sure, use the TB2 ports. These dynamics may change in the future but for now that's where I'm at.

 

[VirtualRain]

I know you're not asking me but.... TB with 1 or 2 GB/s (v1 or v2 respectively) is great for adding SSD storage, and for that, something like the Pegasus J4 is ideal at $387 (although now I need one in black please!). For spinning disks, as Tess says, TB is overkill. USB 3.0 at 500MB/s is more than enough for multi disk RAID arrays and Sans Digitals MobilStor line are great enclosures for this.

 

[Tesselator]

Tessalator,

If you decide to buy this you do realize(I know you do) that thunderbolt enclosures are going to be so high in price, but really how much faster is USB 3.0? I do know that eSATA and or SATA III/II is much faster than USB 3.0..

SATA II = 3Gb/s
USB 3.0 = 5Gb/s
SATA III = 6Gb/s
TBolt 2 = 20Gb/s

A single fast SSD = about 5Gb/s top speed but small file I/O is much much slower.

But for someone who wants to get the new cylinder Mac Pro and is watching finances, would USB 3.0 enclosures really be more efficient? I would think not given that they are not even close to the speed of SATA II/III.

Well, it just depends what you're doing with the drives. For example if you're booting, loading apps, saving application projects, generating tens of thousands of image thumbs, and so forth like that then you could more than likely put a 3-drive RAID0 SSD enclosure on either the TB2 or the USB3.0 port and get really really close to the same performance.

On the other hand if you were loading, saving, or playing 4k video from individual frames located on those same three SSDs in RAID0 then the TB2 connection would trounce the USB3 performance.

In another example if you were reformatting a massive video stream 7GB or so using something like Handbreak you again wouldn't see any difference. So it all just depends...

The idea of buying enclosure after enclosure is one reason that could possibly kill this idea of a cylinder Mac Pro. Thunderbolt enclosures are not cheap and those could EASILY exceed the price of the Mac Pro itself.. Just something to think about.

Yeah, I guess they'll get cheaper when someone sells out their company's schematics to an HK manufacturer. LOL.

I hope we will see an all-encompassing expansion box which can accept all of the TB2 and USB3 connections and offers 4 PCIe slots, 8 drive bays, and a USB2 and 3 hub. With dips or something to select configuration. Maybe sell it for $750 or something - with seasonal sales approaching $475...

 

[d-m-a-x]

old Mac Pro as server

I'm going for the new mp and keeping the old one as a server / storage / backup. The plan is to keep the work in progress on the new mp, and when done transfer them to the old mp and eventually burn them off on the blu ray in the optical bays. 4 hd bays plus the open pci slots, be able to get a lot in there, and it will only be on part of the time saving power