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Old 01-24-2019, 10:17 PM
RedEyeJedi RedEyeJedi is offline
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Join Date: Nov 2011
Location: Pretoria
Posts: 61
Default New Computer time! - Mac Pro 2009 vs Mac Mini pros and cons..

Hi guys

Its new system time.. I have been having some unpleasant experiences with my current MBP 2017 - it doesnt have enough RAM. Im getting these weird CPU spikes all over the place to the point where my machine just shuts down - I ahve a seperate thread about that under VirtualInstruments

Anyway I decided to sell my MBP2017 and get a new machine. Im faced with 2 big options:

1) A used "souped up" Mac Pro 2009 with 12 cores - 2x6Core Xeon 3,46ghz Processor and 32GB 1666 DDR3 plus a Gforce GTX760 2047MB GPU
for around $1100 . - would add another 32GB ram making it 64
Its quite a serious system with 12 working cores

2) New Mac Mini 2018
- with i7 6 core 3,2 ghz processor
- 32GB ram
- 512GB SSD
will cost around $1500 (through Hong Kong istore)

The price difference is not a hug factor for me.
I want stability and longevity. I want to have a machine that will be good for decent audio post and music composing sessions for for the next 6+ years

What concerns me about option 1 - is that the machine is already 10 years old. I wonder if new macOS's will even support the hardware in a few years time. Not keen to buy something that will be redundant. Also wonder about new technology, Thunderbolt 3 etc and being limited in that regard.

What concerns me about Option 2 is the New Mac Mini having the T2 chipset in which people have reported weird audio things with USB interfaces and general CPU spikes and bad perfomance with macOS Mojave.
I dont like the fact that the unit ships with Mojave and you can not downgrade.
I dont trust Pro Tools and other software on new macOS's and I have a lot of work on the go at the moment - cant deal with stability issues!

Another option would be building a hackintosh - but interms of my priority of Stability and Longevity - i think that might rule that out?

Hope y'all can chime your 2cents on the matter
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