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Mac Hardware and Software |OT| - All things Macintosh
- Thread starter 3N16MA
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The Real Abed
Perma-Junior
Yosemite has the same requirements as Mavericks. And El Capitan has the same too. There won't be a reason to keep them since they don't need to support different system sets.
I've upgraded to Microsoft Office 2016. Goodness, the performance of Word on my 2.6 Ghz quad core i7 MacBook Pro is ridiculous. Mere scrolling and typing performance is sloppy and eats up to 70% of a single CPU core, making the keyboard relatively hot.
Anyone else having the same experience?
Anyone else having the same experience?
Edit: I also think Force Push can become an amazing thing once there is software that takes advantage of it as haptic feedback for things rather than the extra button aspect. Example being like in Xcode when you're aligning things on the storyboard, you get feedback when something is aligned. If i were to drag a label to a view controller and align it in the middle, the trackpad makes the click/vibrate to let me know I can let go of the object. I imagine in Photoshop, Illustrator, Sketch something like that would be really good in conjunction with a less aggressive auto snap.
Have not, but your post doesn't inspire me with confidence. Guess I'm sticking with Apple's built in stuff. Thankfully it's enough for what I do, I can't imagine the pains people who use Office for a living are going through if it's as bad as you say.
Have not, but your post doesn't inspire me with confidence. Guess I'm sticking with Apple's built in stuff. Thankfully it's enough for what I do, I can't imagine the pains people who use Office for a living are going through if it's as bad as you say.
Ended up with an 11" MBA w/the base configuration. I wanted something very portable and sufficient at the essentials (Office/Photoshop). Really enjoying it so far. I thought I'd hate the screen after messing with my phone screen and my iPad Air for so long, but nope.
Junior Mint
Member
That bad, huh?
Any other comments? I was thinking of finally re-installing Office on my Mac but if it's still shit tier software, I'll pass. Shame cause I really enjoy using the Windows version of Office 2013 on my work laptop too.
Don't know if it had to do with the document that I was working on. It was a >100 page document, but it contained nothing fancy. Just text, a few graphics, and standard fonts and formatting. Don't have any issues with that document on my office Windows 8 laptop and Office 2013.
Especially the sloppy typing was extremely annoying. I type fast and with my eyes on the text. It's really distracting when the text doesn't catch up to my typing.
OrangeGrayBlue
Member
Hi mac-gaf. I've started looking into getting a mac for videography purposes. I would need something that will sufficiently handle the workload of editing film at resolutions up to 4k. It looks like the overall best value would be a 27" retina iMac, but I don't know exactly what kind of specs I should have to adequately handle the task. I'm looking at one on ebay at a pretty good price point with intel i7 4.0GHz and 8GB memory, but again I'm clueless on a lot of this. Is that not enough? More than enough? Would a macbook pro handle the job just fine? My only hesitation against a macbook pro is that the highest screen option is 15" which is a bit small for editing and color grading HD video comfortably. I could certainly make it work, but I think I'd prefer to go straight to an iMac now than feel the need to upgrade later.
Anyway, any suggestions as to what would be ideal are welcome
Anyway, any suggestions as to what would be ideal are welcome
Hi mac-gaf. I've started looking into getting a mac for videography purposes. I would need something that will sufficiently handle the workload of editing film at resolutions up to 4k. It looks like the overall best value would be a 27" retina iMac, but I don't know exactly what kind of specs I should have to adequately handle the task. I'm looking at one on ebay at a pretty good price point with intel i7 4.0GHz and 8GB memory, but again I'm clueless on a lot of this. Is that not enough? More than enough? Would a macbook pro handle the job just fine? My only hesitation against a macbook pro is that the highest screen option is 15" which is a bit small for editing and color grading HD video comfortably. I could certainly make it work, but I think I'd prefer to go straight to an iMac now than feel the need to upgrade later.
Anyway, any suggestions as to what would be ideal are welcome
Our 2012 iMacs at work handle 4K footage decently, so you would probably be fine with a riMac. The memory is a little low for video editing but you can always bump that up later.
Thought you couldn't update Retina iMac memory.
Retina iMacs are 27" - these have always had a user accessible port with 4 ram slots.
NinjaCatfish
Member
Some of them are neat. I see some around my uni that are a bit naff, but there are some cool ones.
I have one that makes the Apple look like a cup of coffee. So there's that.
It shutdown after that, yes.
I've shut it down since then and not noticed it, which in some ways makes me more concerned.
Hopefully it's not an issue.
So do we expect the new fall mac line up to be all Skylake?
http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showthread.php?t=1090722
http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showthread.php?t=1090722
It's fine, but unnecessary; you can do almost all of the same system tasks without additional software and/or for free.
I installed and ran it once.
It flagged my Doom installs as trash, so I got rid of that shit.
i've been solely using an air for 2yrs now and have started to look for a desktop solution. at the moment i'm tossing up between a mini (highest specs available) w/ a generic LG or something 27" monitor vs a 21.5" imac (highest specs again).
which would be a better option? primary uses would be photoshop (nothing serious), watching movies and fucking around online. playing some basic games (LoL) would be a bonus but not a deal breaker. for some reason i have concerns about the imac being an 'all-in-one' kinda thing even though i'm sure my concerns are unwarranted.
would a new iteration of either be released within the next 3-6 months?
i live in australia so pricing is absurdly high either way...
which would be a better option? primary uses would be photoshop (nothing serious), watching movies and fucking around online. playing some basic games (LoL) would be a bonus but not a deal breaker. for some reason i have concerns about the imac being an 'all-in-one' kinda thing even though i'm sure my concerns are unwarranted.
would a new iteration of either be released within the next 3-6 months?
i live in australia so pricing is absurdly high either way...
i thought it would be presumed that i want to use OSX, i have no interest in windows.
edit: i don't mind 'holding off' to an extent, but the issue is that there is always something new around the corner in regards to this stuff. if it's more than 4 months away i'll just buy now.
Well other than the rumors, more desktop Skylake CPUs and Thunderbolt 3 are just around the corner, so it wouldn't be surprising if the iMac got updated in the next four months.
Mac minis are a bigger question mark just cause their updates usually lag other products, sometimes really unpredictably (and occasionally just doesn't get updated). I'm hoping it gets a redesign to be quieter and/or get more thermal headroom (like the AirPort tower!), it's the oldest design left in the lineup now (well other than the MBA, but presumably the MB is its eventual replacement).
An announcement for new iMacs is expected around October. After that it will be a year until another refresh.
I think the "holding off" thing has been a bigger issue recently just because everyone knew Intel was throwing out stopgaps and the delay for Skylake has been so long. It made total sense to wait for Skylake... but then you'd have been waiting a long time.
At some point the "if I buy now I'll be upset when the next shiny thing comes" is psyching yourself out, in other ways it's prudence. The line between them is often subjective.
In this case, yeah, I'd suggest waiting until the usual time for new hardware this fall. You can always get the old Macs for cheaper or via refurbs at that point if the new stuff doesn't interest you.
At some point the "if I buy now I'll be upset when the next shiny thing comes" is psyching yourself out, in other ways it's prudence. The line between them is often subjective.
In this case, yeah, I'd suggest waiting until the usual time for new hardware this fall. You can always get the old Macs for cheaper or via refurbs at that point if the new stuff doesn't interest you.
Apparently the Skylake processors suitable for MBA will be out soon, and the Skylake processors suitable for the MBP won't be out until 2016.
http://www.macrumors.com/2015/08/11/skylake-processors-for-macbook-air/
http://www.macrumors.com/2015/08/11/skylake-processors-for-macbook-air/
Lil'DigiOp
Member
Posted this in PC GAF, but I guess this would be the best place
I just need someone to guide me if going with older hardware will hurt me when it comes to modern PCI components
I just need someone to guide me if going with older hardware will hurt me when it comes to modern PCI components
A big question is what you're going to do with this computer. Because any modern i7 is going to curb stomp the Xeons in the Mac Pros, except in a few situations (like where the i7 is going to throttle from heat sooner than the Mac Pro.) Case in point: Geekbench has the retina iMac run scores of around 3500 for an i5. A 2013 Mac Pro with a 6-core 3.7GHz processor runs scores of around 3200.
With that said, you're still getting 4-6 internal drive bays, PCIe slots (where you can put even faster storage), rock-solid processors and gobs of ECC memory. PCIe 2.0 hasn't yet proven to be a severe (or noticeable) bottleneck in gaming or graphics work for me; hell running games at PCI 1.1 on the older Pros, and you're likely to find the processor is the bottleneck. You stick a 980 in your rig, and you'll be getting better performance than the 680 before it and the X1900T before it, or whatever cards you had.
If you're interested in a little tinkering, you can get cheap 2009 or 2010 Mac Pros for <$500 and can upgrade them yourself; I took a 4-core 2.4GHz 2010 Mac Pro to a 6-core 3.33GHz. It was a fairly trivial upgrade, and aside from dual-processor 2009 models it's trivial in all of the latter models.
USB3 support is fine; I've got a Inateck card in mine that works fine, and I believe there are several places that sell cards specifically designed for the Mac Pro.
Finally, your friend is frankly an idiot. Clock speed is essentially irrelevant in modern PCs, especially with threading and turbo-boost. For instance, a 2009 Mac Pro is far and away better than a 2008 Mac Pro due to architectural changes, even if the earlier model has a higher clock speed.
With that said, you're still getting 4-6 internal drive bays, PCIe slots (where you can put even faster storage), rock-solid processors and gobs of ECC memory. PCIe 2.0 hasn't yet proven to be a severe (or noticeable) bottleneck in gaming or graphics work for me; hell running games at PCI 1.1 on the older Pros, and you're likely to find the processor is the bottleneck. You stick a 980 in your rig, and you'll be getting better performance than the 680 before it and the X1900T before it, or whatever cards you had.
If you're interested in a little tinkering, you can get cheap 2009 or 2010 Mac Pros for <$500 and can upgrade them yourself; I took a 4-core 2.4GHz 2010 Mac Pro to a 6-core 3.33GHz. It was a fairly trivial upgrade, and aside from dual-processor 2009 models it's trivial in all of the latter models.
USB3 support is fine; I've got a Inateck card in mine that works fine, and I believe there are several places that sell cards specifically designed for the Mac Pro.
Finally, your friend is frankly an idiot. Clock speed is essentially irrelevant in modern PCs, especially with threading and turbo-boost. For instance, a 2009 Mac Pro is far and away better than a 2008 Mac Pro due to architectural changes, even if the earlier model has a higher clock speed.
Lil'DigiOp
Member
Thanks for the fast response.
Yeah, Ill be using this computer to run Pro Tools work and some Premiere / Final Cut work, possible a BootCamp partition for FL Studio.
Interesting how a modern chip would be more powerful than duel Xeons. I guess its not really worth it? Novelty wish.. eh
I was concerned that older architecture would hold me back but it sounds good to be reassured that PCI 2.0 isn't a limiting factor. So it seems older chipsets are a bigger bottle neck than most? I was aiming for a 2010 Mac Pro for the most part, I think those were Sandy or Ivy?
Another thing was that I plan to have this build for a while so I wanted to get the most for my money. I'll probably buy the lowest spec build and throw better hardware on it. How well did your MPro hold up?
I think Apple skipped the Sandy Bridge Xeons (2012?) and went to Ivy for the 2013 (current) models. Core/speed wise kinda varies depending on how those apps take advantage of however many cores, no clue myself on them, so all I can say is get the newest generation that drops in those sockets, looks like Westmere? Newer chips are faster cause...that's pretty damn old now. But they're decently fast themselves, and you can get a lot more cores. If you get a dual socket model you can get to 12 cores.
From what I've seen around it seems the only things holding older models back hardware wise are the slower SATA ports (3Gbps?), but even then though it's slow relative to PCIe storage it's still fast enough in practice, and afaik you can upgrade through one of the PCIe slots. The other stuff is artificial, like if you go too old you'll have to mess with firmware or something cause Apple not supporting the oldest ones.
The main thing I think is that even for the stuff that it's limited on it's still good enough for the most part, and otherwise you can upgrade other important parts to modern standards, primarily thinking of the GPU there.
From what I've seen around it seems the only things holding older models back hardware wise are the slower SATA ports (3Gbps?), but even then though it's slow relative to PCIe storage it's still fast enough in practice, and afaik you can upgrade through one of the PCIe slots. The other stuff is artificial, like if you go too old you'll have to mess with firmware or something cause Apple not supporting the oldest ones.
The main thing I think is that even for the stuff that it's limited on it's still good enough for the most part, and otherwise you can upgrade other important parts to modern standards, primarily thinking of the GPU there.
CrudeDiatribe
Member
I'm still rocking my 2008 Mac Pro. I intend to replace it with a 2010 down the road, but am quite content. Modern-ish nVidia PC video card and SSD via PCIe make it seem plenty fast for what I do.
I don't understand why Apple hasn't updated the Mac Pro since its initial release. Can't be that hard to give your most expensive family of computers the same treatment that you give to your other families.
In any case, I am looking forward to external 5K displays and Thunderbolt 3.0. Somewhat thinking about an upgrade in that direction.
In any case, I am looking forward to external 5K displays and Thunderbolt 3.0. Somewhat thinking about an upgrade in that direction.
It's a low sales volume product. Apple always puts those on update much less frequently back burner status. They are a tiny little percentage of Apples profits. Apple is basically a mobile phone company now.
Sure, but given the system's high price, updating the chipset and CPU/GPU doesn't look like a huge step to me. Best case, they are even pin compatible. It's not like they have to change the basic design of the Mac Pro. That one is good for another decade.
I hear you. I waited for three years for a Mac Mini update and asked the same exact question. And then when it came it was underwhelming and I decided to stick with a laptop in a desktop setup anyway. I have no idea what they are thinking. All I know about is what they do, low sales low margin products get updated less frequently. Apple doesn't just throw in a new chip set without a lot of testing I might guess.
What I particularly don't understand is that Apple always does an expensive custom job when it comes to the core design of cases, cooling, and motherboardespecially with the latest Mac Probut then cheaps out on the much easier incremental updates to the chips, all of which are just standard components.
Well if you want one, can't you buy a new Mac Pro and buy yourself a better chipset and swap them, and then try to sell the old chipset?
I'm not saying it's ideal but I thought that Apple designed the motherboard to make doing this yourself much easier than usual.
Also doesn't the Mac Pro have custom pro graphics cards or something like that?
You can't, the CPU/GPU chips are soldered directly onto one of the motherboard. It's impossible to do for the end customer. But for Apple themselves it should be an easy job.
Ok it sounds like I was wrong about how easy it is... but it can be done. OWC will do it for you, and they even give you a credit for your existing chipset if you don't want them to mail it back to you.
http://eshop.macsales.com/shop/turnkey/MacPro2013/2013_Xeon_Processor/Apple_Mac_Pro_2013
You can even do it yourself: http://eshop.macsales.com/shop/turnkey/MacPro2013/2013_Xeon_Processor/Apple_Mac_Pro_2013
But people do say that you shouldn't do it unless you have extensive experience upgrading computers:
http://www.everymac.com/systems/app...o-upgrade-mac-pro-cylinder-cpu-processor.html
Again I'm not defending apple just pointing out that it's possible to get this if you want it.
I have no complaints with my Mac Pro; this 5,1 is performing like a champ for what I need it to do (After Effects, Photoshop, some Cinema 4D, Final Cut, and Indesign, plus Dota 2, Minecraft, and a few other games.) I upgraded the processor to a W3680 Westmere, bumped the RAM to 24GB, and swapped in the Radeon 7950 I previously had in my 2008 Mac. If I wanted faster performance I could get PCIe storage, but the Samsung 840 running in my SATA II bay is fine for me. I've got a Lacie 16TB RAID attached via USB3 for my long-term storage, and then a scratch HDD in one bay and a hard drive clone in another.
While new computers are certainly faster, it's worth pointing out that chip speed gains in terms of real world speed are not that impressive in the past few years, and multithreaded performance still tilts heavily to the 6,8+ cores you can get these on these machines (AFAIK Pro Tools is very good about using multiple cores, although with the limitation some plugins and VIs you have might be bound to a single thread). So they are still very viable machines for many use cases and will continue to be for a bit longer, especially if you're willing to do upgrades.
Nothing in the new Mac Pro is soldered; it's a bit trickier than the 2009/2010 Pros but if you want to swap the processor yourself you can do it. The downside is that the Ivy Bridge EP were the last of their socket type, so even if the software theoretically could support you swapping in a newer Xeon the physical connections aren't compatible. Upgrading RAM is even easier than the previous Pros.
The downside is the GPUs themselves are easy to upgrade, but there's nothing to actually upgrade them to—Apple hasn't offered any upgrade kits, so basically if you have a D300 the best you can do is upgrade to a D700 by buying them off eBay. It doesn't seem like Apple's interested in such aftermarket upgrade options these days, but we'll see. The GPU is really the biggest knock against the new designs in terms of long-term viability; as much as people gripe about internal storage and expansion slots it's not really that much of an issue for me, but it would be nice to have the option to upgrade later on so I'm not spending as much on the front end. As it is unless I'm going to run games in Windows, the D700s in the new Mac Pro would cost me $1000 but wouldn't be much better than my $250 (when I bought it) 7950. So it makes very little sense to upgrade from my current rig.
And yeah, it does seem odd to me they don't do the very minor updates necessary for new revisions of the product, but then again they're only behind one chip generation (although the GPUs again are based on designs from 2011 and are thus the most aged element of the new machines.)
With Broadwell-EP seeming very iffy and the promise of Thunderbolt 3 and even true external GPU support, it might make more sense for Apple to bite the bullet and wait to release a truly next-gen Mac Pro. But if the wait is gonna' be another 18 months or two years, why not just release a minor update and show consumers that you're interested in the platform?