Apple Updates Mac Pro With Up to 12 CPU Cores

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[citation][nom]wotan31[/nom]Because you can't buy an equivalent Windows system for less cash. This isn't a peecee with consumer grade cpu's and memory. This is a real workstation with Xeon server chips, and registered ECC memory. Equivalent workstation offerings from HP, Sun, IBM, and SGI cost the same or more. Heck, go to Newegg and check it out yourself - the six core Xeon chip is more than $1700.00 just for one chip, and this Mac Pro has two of them.[/citation]
I just went to Dells online store
http://configure.euro.dell.com/dellstore/config.aspx?b=&c=uk&cs=ukbsdt1&kc=D4XT7503&l=en&oc=W05T7503&rbc=W05T7503&s=bsd
and got the following, let's see if I can compare the one i made earlier.
[citation][nom]back_by_demand[/nom]Two 2.93GHz Quad-Core Intel Xeon
12GB (6x2GB) (not greedy, just being realistic)
2TB 7200-rpm Serial ATA 3Gb/s (just 1 HDD, and no SSD)
ATI Radeon HD 4870 512MB (a 2 year old card)
One 18x SuperDrive
Ordinary mouse & keyboard
No software, no care plan, no raid card, NO MONITOR!!!! Grand total? £5373 ($7500)[/citation]

So what does Dell give me for as close to the same spec?

Two Intel® Xeon® X5670(2.93GHz,6.4GT/s,12MB,6C) - Same
12GB DDR3 1333MHz ECC-RDIMM (6x2GB) - Same
2 x 1TB (7200RPM) SATA 3.0Gb/s Hard Drive - Same
NVIDIA Quadro FX 1800 768Mb Workstation Graphics - More
16X DVD-ROM Drive and 16X DVD+/-RW Drive with Roxio and PowerDVD - More
Win7 64 Ultimate - Same
MS Office Starter - More
20" monitor - More
Ordinary keyboard & mouse - Same
£5359 ($7502)
So for the same money(ish) they give you better graphics, second optical drive, free software and a 20" monitor.

Dell are not the cheapest OEM by any means and the config was arbitrary, so in this case I will agree with Wotan that the big OEMs can't compete much on price, the extras are just for show and not really worth much. But it is still disgusting that and end user can build it for less than half that.
 
And we'd buy this rather than making a similar Windows-running computer for 3/4 the price because..?

If Apple is really so confident that their products are so superior, they should release their OS independently. People would still buy their computer because they're "cool" to have, but that'd give logical, rational people a chance to use their OS if they for some reason want to.
 


Name one program that doesn't have an equal or better counter-part for Windows? Logic can be used on both windows and macs. 99% of any professional software will also work on windows. Lets even the playing field for a moment though. Final Cut. It is a Mac only program. And? With windows there is pinnacle, there is premier pro/encore/after affects. And if you REALLY want to get down to it, why pay for a fancy GUI for Unix (aka..OS X) when you can get the same damn thing for free, and put your own GUI on it?
 
can Tom maybe do a benchmark price comparison?
$2500 Mac Pro vs $2500 Windows based system
anyone dare to post the results on Apple forums?
Click to expand...

I can tell you exactly what you would be told.
"But these Apple Mac Pros have been optimized for this type of load and can get it done more effectively than a PC can."
I'm going to start keeping a tally of how many times I'm told that every month. Being put in a $1000 Mac Pro case makes NO difference in what the hardware is capable of, and OSX, the 'productivity oriented' operating system, absolutely fails in comparison to many of the Linux distributions out there, and even Windows in most cases. I guess what I'm trying to say to the Apple fanboy crowd is this - NO, your Mac is NOT better at computing than a comparable PC. I don't know who told you this(Actually, I do...), but you're wrong. Just suck up to have been ripped off and go on with your lives.
 
[citation][nom]wotan31[/nom]Well, you got the part about the idiots right. Here's the part you Microsoft nuthuggers don't seem to comprehend: This is a complete integrated workstation solution, from a single vendor, with full warranty and support. It's not some cobbled together frankenstein rig that you have to assemble yourself, deal with 12 different companies for warranty work, 12 different companies for drivers and compatibility problems, and have zero support.If you want to make a fair comparison, you need to compare a complete workstation, like from Dell, IBM, HP, etc. Not some cobbled together discount parts from the internet.[/citation]
Man are you ever delusional! This is exactly what they have been doing. They compared OEM workstations to the Mac Pro and the Mac Pro lost on EVERY comparison.
 
[citation][nom]tokenz[/nom]Your high. Theirs two problems. 1 those processors are add ons, So they get charged more when you configure the system. 2 Apple doesn't refresh their lines often enough. So as of right now they are 5 to 10 percent higher. Three years from now right before they refresh the line, they will still want the same amount of money for these systems.[/citation]

I did not realize we were shopping for systems in the future....I live in the present...as do businesses and institutions who buy these

[citation][nom]smlong426[/nom]You're almost right, jerk. First, there is no x5570 mentioned anywhere in this article. So, I assume you are referring to the X5670. I was referring to the W3680 in my price comparison since it had the highest clock speed. But I guess you have to get the slower X5670 for SMP.At any rate, I see the X5670 for $1350 eWiz for quantity of >ONE[/citation]

Clearly you have limited vision....IMMEDIATELY after posting that I corrected myself saying I meant x5670 lol. Secondly, I only chose x5670 to compare to what Mac is offering - personally I would go X5680's if it was my choice....Oh, and you can only use 1 W3680 in a machine as it does not have the 2nd QPI link that the X5670 has needed to put 2 cpus on one motherboard....so fail again!
 
And the very funny thing....I do not own a Mac, never have, and most likely never will. I am just fed up with all the immature bashing people do lol
 
And smlong426, you also completely glossed over the 95W vs 130W point I made in the post you quoted...this matters a lot to people who have to both keep the CPU's cool and pay for the power bill on them
 
A Actually, smlong426, I appreciate the time you've taken to work out those calculations. I would, however, like to make a couple comments on the proper way of purchasing Apple kit in a cost-efficient manner.

First, a small disclaimer: I'm a FCP editor as well as Motion Graphics/Animation specialist. I need two things: Power and Reliability. It doesn't do me any good to purchase a super fast machine today that doesn't last the 5-7 years of projected lifespan. I need two good workstations at any given time, so I upgrade every 3-4 years.

Over the years, I’ve learned this very important secret... Whatever you do, DON’T purchase a fully kitted Mac Pro through the online store. THAT is the real source of the “Apple Tax” everyone is talking about. Take a moment to consider basic purchasing strategy and you’ll find that Apple gear isn’t as pricey as people believe it to be.

Upgrade ONLY that which cannot be sourced via online retailers, configure your RAM choices so they take up as few slots as possible, then purchase only the cheapest components Apple has to offer. Then go shopping at NewEgg (or wherever) to pick up the rest of the gear.

Using that basic purchasing advice, let’s go back and look at your example:

Note: We won’t know until August what the full pricing for this dual 6-core and upgrades will be. However, historically Apple holds price points within a few hundred dollars of the previous configuration levels. Please indulge me as I make a few assumptions based on what is known from the press release and current pricing levels.

# Two 2.93GHz x5670 6-Core Intel Xeon
# 8GB (2x4GB) (Note: $100 upgrade that frees up 2 RAM slots)
# REMOVE: Mac Pro RAID Card - Only needed for dedicated External RAID
# REMOVE: 1TB 7200-rpm Serial ATA 3Gb/s
# REMOVE: 1TB 7200-rpm Serial ATA 3Gb/s
# REMOVE: 1TB 7200-rpm Serial ATA 3Gb/s
# ATI Radeon HD 5870 1GB (Note: assuming similar pricing)
# One 18x SuperDrive
# Apple Mouse
# Apple Keyboard with Numeric Keypad (English) and User's Guide

Final Apple price: ~$6000 (+/- $300 assuming historic pricing trends)

From NewEgg, purchase:

# 3x WD RE3 @ $140/each = $420
# 2x Corsair 4GB RAM = $260 (couldn’t find Samsung. Corsair is very good)

Final NewEgg price: $680

Final Mac Pro specs:

# Two 2.93GHz x5670 6-Core Intel Xeon
# 16GB (4x4GB)
# 1TB Serial ATA 3Gb/s hard drive running at 7200 rpm;
# 3x WD RE3 1TB 32MB Cache Hard Disks in RAID 5
# ATI Radeon HD 5870 1GB
# One 18x SuperDrive
# four PCI Express 2.0 slots;
# five USB 2.0 ports and four FireWire 800 ports;
# AirPort Extreme 802.11n;
# Bluetooth 2.1+EDR; and
# Apple Keyboard with numerical keypad and Magic Mouse.

Total estimated Mac Pro price: $6680 (+/- $300)

That’s roughly $1100 cheaper than your $7822 (Est.) Linux workstation. The differences are:

1) Mac Pro has 2x 2.93Ghz Xeon x5670 vs. the Linux x5660 (2x $200 upgrade)
2) Linux Workstation has 8GB more RAM (2x $130 upgrade)
Mac Pro has extra 1TB HDD (1x $140 upgrade)
ATI Radeon HD 5870 and NVIDIA GeForce GTX 480 are roughly the same class of card. Basically a wash.

In other words, to equalize the CPU, RAM and HDD specs, that increases the net difference of the Linux system by another ~$280.

Linux Workstation ($7822) + CPU upgrade ($400) + 1TB HDD ($140) = $8362
Mac Pro Workstation @ 16GB RAM as above ($6680) + 8 GB RAM ($260) = $6940

Total price difference: $1,422

That’s enough for either a MacBook Pro, an iMac, or all of the iToys.


If we take this same purchasing strategy with your MORE INTERESTING configuration, the 2x Quad Mac Pro would actually cost:

Apple Store: $3500 base + $100 for 8GB (2x4GB) RAM + $200 for 5870 upgrade = $3800
New Egg: $420 for 3 WD RE3 HDD + $780 for 6x Corsair 4GB RAM = $1200

Final Mac Pro Dual Quad price w/ 32GB RAM: $5,000 Est. (+/- $300)
That’s STILL some $1100 cheaper than your 32GB Linux Dual Quad workstation.

One final note before I close...
When I talk ‘Workstation Class Graphics Cards’, I’m talking about the $1500 PNY Quadro FX 4800 class of graphics cards. Neither the GeForce GTX 480 nor the Radeon HD 5870 fit that category. So please take that into consideration before (any of) you start taking issue with my assessment that a 5870 more or less equals a 480 by spouting Crysis benchmarks of 5-10 fps one way or the other.
 
[citation][nom]scook9[/nom]you have limited vision....IMMEDIATELY after posting that I corrected myself saying I meant x5670 lol. Secondly, I only chose x5670 to compare to what Mac is offering - personally I would go X5680's if it was my choice....Oh, and you can only use 1 W3680 in a machine as it does not have the 2nd QPI link that the X5670 has needed to put 2 cpus on one motherboard....so fail again![/citation]
Yeah - I saw your 2nd post. I just didn't feel like correcting myself.

I already said that you needed you needed X5670 rather than W3680 for dual CPU usage. Yes, I used the acronym SMP rather than QPI since I couldn't remember at the time what Intel's acronym of the day was. Same premise, though, so I have no idea what you mean by "fail again." Get a grip.

As for the 95W TDP, other than mentioning the W3680 which was a bad comparison, everything else I have mentioned was the 95W TDP part I do believe. I don't recall "glossing over" that aspect. The importance of such is duly noted.
 
LOL was just looking at this but with older yesterday specs and decided against buying dew to major lame Ati4870 video card max available for it mac Pro desktop.
Also looked at getting a just released updated Imac with old pathetic laptop "new parts" but could not find any value an the problems with their OSX 10.6 "Apple's Vista" = no sale.

I am sure they used to build decent Apple's way back with G4 laptops and G5 desktops and that was performance for a price = okay with me.

Will pay any price for performance if it justifies against my money and other options available.

Now that everything is just another Intel and weaker than 6 to 12 months old other manufacturers hardware and still this insane prices for buggy hardware / pain in the bu*t software I see no reasons to even buy anything Apple anymore.

Cursed with a 20" Imac 2.4ghz core 2 duo and lots of data in office 2005 / 2008 and nothing can transfer or communicate with each other / read old data + 8gb of data in my trash that no one knows how this got in there problem.

I wish when Apple hacks my Imac and puts stuff in the trash that they would at least inform me of their hacking and spying on me / ET call home. Latest 10.6 OSX.

I hope they found what they were looking for. Thanks Apple for almost destroying my ISP's routers in the data rape procedure.
"Remote data delete procedure"
 
LMAO
$5000
$200 6gb/s sata 3 640gb hd
$680 Ati 5970
$100 keyboard + mouse combo
$220 Server 6gb ram (3x2gb) pc3 10666
$140 Blue ray burner sata
$3450 2x Intel X5680 3.33ghz 6 cores each
remaining for Case + PSU

Did not take the cheap options or on sale options for this above.

Apple's default with max ATI 4870 as on their store page at this moment $6099 with 2x 2.93GHz Quad-Core Intel Xeon what ever model or part this might be "mystery part" .

Can add to my config above a $1099 for OCZ Z-Drive R2 P84 OCZSSDPX-ZD2P84256G PCI-E 256GB running at a slow "
# Sequential Access - Read: up to 750MB/s
# Sequential Access - Write: up to 500MB/s
For the same $6099 price.

Recap:
256gb SSD + 640gb rotational 10000rpm hd instead of maybe 1x 130mb/s rotational 640gb hd.
Ati5970 instead of Ati4870
2x real xeon 6 core processors at 3.33ghz extremely overpriced by default instead of mystery 2x 2.93ghz quad core.

All for $6099 and I can put a decent less buggy operating system on it.
 
[citation][nom]welshmousepk[/nom]But i can buy a windows system thats more powerful, for less cash, right? how are people still buying these things...[/citation]
Its because your paying for the image above and not the image below

BOXX
[citation][nom]silentq[/nom]can Tom maybe do a benchmark price comparison? $2500 Mac Pro vs $2500 Windows based systemanyone dare to post the results on Apple forums?[/citation]

Its quite doable to test both machines since both can run linux/windows. But to make it fair, u should test apples to apples, that means make sure the PC is XEON, has TOSLINK on the motherboard, wifi/bluetooth built in, ECC RAM, and liquid cooled since people forget that those features are standard on every macpro.


 
Upgrade ONLY that which cannot be sourced via online retailers, configure your RAM choices so they take up as few slots as possible, then purchase only the cheapest components Apple has to offer. Then go shopping at NewEgg (or wherever) to pick up the rest of the gear.
Click to expand...
That is a great idea, i just did that with the Apple and Dell again.
Same everything except instead of 6x1Gb RAM they have 3x2Gb RAM and instead of a single 640Gb HDD they have 2 x 320Gb HDDs.

Guess what, there is £4 differance between them.
You are 100% right about the add-ons

Apple will charge to upgrade RAM to 32Gb 1066mhz ECC for £3026
Dell will charge to upgrade RAM to 48Gb 1333mhz ECC for £1746
So Dell gives you faster RAM, 50% more of it and Apple charge 73% more

Apple charge for additional hard drives 1Tb for £245
Dell charge for additional hard drives 1Tb for £180
So Apple charge 36% more for hard drives

Apple charge for 24" monitor £649
Dell charge for 24" monitor £586
So Apple have displays nearly 11% more

So far that's pretty cut and dried, Apple grabs you on the still not cheap hardware but really butt-f**ks you on the upgrades. Goddam!!!!! For the CAD man who wants to max out the RAM as much as possible and have a monitor and a 4 HDD RAID for speed, the savings are a whopping £1600.

For that money you could upgrade both CPU's from 2.93Ghz to 3.33Ghz, and upgrade the graphics to a Dual 2 GB GDDR5 ATI FirePro V7800. That is some serious workstation, is it really worth the Apple tax not to get the extra RAM, CPU and Graphics?
 
[citation][nom]amk09[/nom]Yea while my dated $800 laptop with a core2duo @ 2.26GHz continues to get 180 fps at 1920x1080 resolution.It boggles my mind why people even consider buying apple computers. Such a dumb waste of money.[/citation]

Its a little thing called "Windows Rot" that annoys the heck out of people that when they get their nice shiny new computer and runs all fast but for some reason after 2 years its all slow, bogged down, can't do a thing on it because people haven't kept up with the constant daily maintenance of anti-virus scan/ spyware removal that they get from torrenting and pron sites.
 
[citation][nom]ryphlin[/nom]Actually, smlong426, I appreciate the time you've taken to work out those calculations. I would, however, like to make a couple comments on the proper way of purchasing Apple kit in a cost-efficient manner.[/citation]
Thanks for the post and I appreciate the insight. Your approach definitely works better than buying everything from Apple.

There are some flaws with your analogy, though, and some flaws with your numbers. Also, I can apply the same savings to the OEM Linux system as well.

I just checked this on the Apple store. I cannot remove ALL of the hard-drives. It forces me to choose at least one. Also, the best video card offered was the Radeon 4870 512MB. With this configuration (yes, I removed the RAID card) and 4x2GB DIMMs (they do not offer 2x4GB), my base price is $6,299.00.

If the price premium for the 6-core Xeons only goes up by $300, then my base price is still $6600.

Add in the components you mentioned for $680 and the estimated price is now $7280.

But, according to the Mac forums, the RAID card is needed if you want RAID5. So, to be fair, I'm going to say the base price is $7980 minimum.

I estimate the 24GB (as that would be the max memory) Mac w/ dual X5670, using after market parts, would be in the $9000 ball park. This is definitely cheaper than the $12k+ that Apple would charge, but still significantly more expensive than the OEM Linux system after applying similar cost savings by anywhere from $1000-$1500. Bare in mind, though, that I could continue add additional memory over the already larger 32GB that I would have.
 


So...Here are my specs...

Two 2.93 Ghz x5670 6-Core Intel Xeon
24GB (6x4GB) DDR3 1333 ECC Registered
Four 1TB Western Digital 7200 RPM SATA III Hard Drives (Set to whatever Raid you want)
24X DVD Burner
Radeon HD 5870
Creative Sound Blaster X-Fi Titanium
Two 4 Port (3 ext 1 int) Firewire Cards
1 PCI Express Wireless Adapter for a/b/g/n networks
A few PCI-E 2.0 slots left over (x8 variety)
6 USB 2.0 Ports
No Bluetooth but who the hell cares about that on a desktop anyway
Reg Keyboard and Laser mouse

$5800.00

So..that is roughly $800 cheaper than your build still. Amazing.


 
Silly boys 1st off a Mac Pro is not selling to home brew buyers it is selling as a high end workstation for content creation work, and there OSX and Finalcut etc necessitate a Mac platform.

Also if you reed the news the new Machines are not out until August so what you can configure on apple.com are the old machines. The basic price quoted with the intro info is $4999 for 12 core at 2.66 GHz with 1tb drive and 8gb memory.

Configure the same basic machine at dell.com and you get a price of $5,455.00 after instant savings!

Of course you can build something yourself for less but thats not what business Apple or Dell or HP are in.

A linux workstation is useless for content creation as it does not have Adobe CS5, or Finalcut or any real software. Great as a server but not a useable configuration for production.
 
Clearly one can argue these issues back & forth forever. 😀

However, one thing that does kinda bug me about the new Macs
is their label, 'workstation'; how exactly is this a fitting
description when there is no option for any proper workstation-
class gfx card? By that I mean a Quadro or FireGL. A 5770?? Gimme
a break... I'd much rather use an FX4500, or even an FX1500.

I've specced out numerous workstation PCs for studios, etc.,
typically with a Quadro FX5800 4GB, but even a middling Quadro
or FireGL will knock the socks off a gamer card for professional
apps like Maya, CATIA, etc. I tested this recently with a simple
comparison of an 8800GT vs. FX1500; for games, the 8800GT was
massively faster, but for pro apps (tested with Viewperf, etc.)
the FX1500 was faster.

As long as Apple fits consumer gfx cards into it systems, to me
they're not workstations. For heaven's sake Apple, at least
offer the option of at least one decent Quadro or FireGL. Funny
part is, searching my emails, it seems I was moaning about this
very same issue to a friend 16 months ago. 😀


One other thing: I can't help but be amused by those who refer
to 'proper' expensive UNIX workstations from SUN, HP and... SGI?
Ahem, looks like some people are rather out of date. 😀 SGI does
not make 'workstations' anymore and hasn't done so for a long
time. The last products they sold which could be called
workstations were just rebadged BOXX systems, while the Octane III
is more like a deskside cluster rather than a workstation (it
can have up to 20 x 6-core i7 XEONs, or 4 x 6-core and 4 x Quadro
cards, but the system is just a collection of separate 2-socket
blades linked together).

Production of SGI's own inhouse MIPS/IRIX workstation designs
stopped many years ago (ie. Fuel, Tezro). And I should know,
I own a fair few of them. 😀 I do have a 4GHz i7 860 8800GT SLI
for gaming and video encoding, but my main desktop is an SGI Fuel
R16K/900 V12, with a Tezro and Octane2 for Flame, O2 for Effect, etc.,
all products from yester-year.

So, please stop comparing to SGI products which simply don't
exist. They're not in the workstation market anymore. SGI does
sell products which can probably be stuffed full of Quadro
cards (eg. Altix UV), but one would hardly call them workstations...

Ian.

PS. One thing I've noticed with many dual-socket XEON X58 mbds:
they often don't support CF or SLI.

 
Silly boys 1st off a Mac Pro is not selling to home brew buyers it is selling as a high end workstation for content creation work, and there OSX and Finalcut etc necessitate a Mac platform.

Also if you reed the news the new Machines are not out until August so what you can configure on apple.com are the old machines. The basic price quoted with the intro info is $4999 for 12 core at 2.66 GHz with 1tb drive and 8gb memory.

Configure the same basic machine at dell.com and you get a price of $5,455.00 after instant savings!

Of course you can build something yourself for less but thats not what business Apple or Dell or HP are in.

A linux workstation is useless for content creation as it does not have Adobe CS5, or Finalcut or any real software. Great as a server but not a useable configuration for production.
Click to expand...

I am an OEM manufacturer. So I can offer everything apple can, for a lower price than dell, HP, and apple. I've been posting my cost. Take my $5800 system I posted. $6500 sale tag on that specific platform. If I wanted to get more aggressive I could, say $6100. Either way, cheaper than the equivalent MAC will EVER be. And lets be perfectly clear. If the base price is $4999 as you say..With those modest upgrades to the 2.93 Ghz system, 4 1TB hard drives, the higher end video card, and 24GB of memory..I guarantee the system will be over $7000. PC FTW!
 
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