Avid Pro Audio Community

Avid Pro Audio Community

How to Join & Post  •  Community Terms of Use  •  Help Us Help You

Knowledge Base Search  •  Community Search  •  Learn & Support


Avid Home Page

Go Back   Avid Pro Audio Community > Pro Tools Hardware > Pro Tools HDX & HD Native Systems (Mac)

Reply
 
Thread Tools Search this Thread Display Modes
  #11  
Old 11-12-2013, 02:14 PM
propower propower is offline
Member
 
Join Date: Mar 2002
Location: Redmond, WA
Posts: 2,202
Default Re: Conumdrum: New Mac Pro?

Going forward from here though, once one bites the "Thunder-bullet" transitioning from machine to machine in the future should leave all of your infrastructure in place

But its gonna cost ya if you want to do it today!
__________________
2017 27" iMac 3.8GHz i5, 1TB SSD
Logic ProX, Studio One V4, PT current version, Apogee Ensemble TB
Musician: http://www.ivanlee.net/
Design Engineer: http://www.propowerinc.com/resume.html
Reply With Quote
  #12  
Old 11-13-2013, 04:39 AM
hitp hitp is offline
Member
 
Join Date: Mar 2002
Location: Manila, Philippines
Posts: 307
Default Re: Conumdrum: New Mac Pro?

Why not just get a new maxed out iMac? Slightly lower specs and same price as the entry level MacPro. Get 32GB of RAM and the fastest i7 option, which many say rivals or outdoes the current 12core tower. You get a beautiful 27" screen to boot. I feel the new Mac Pro will be a killer video workstation, but the new iMac is pretty powerful for audio. Lots of Thunderbolt peripherals finally coming out. Currently running PT11 on my 1st gen MacBook Retina with Thunderbolt Native and LaCie Thunderbolt drives. Runs circles around my old 8 core 2010 Pro on PT10. While waiting for my plug-ins to update to AAX, I got used to the stock Avid plugins and Channel Strip and hardly missed my original plugs.

Just my two cents.
__________________
Dennis Cham
HIT PRODUCTIONS
music | sound design | post
www.hitproductions.net
Reply With Quote
  #13  
Old 11-13-2013, 05:56 AM
Bookerv12 Bookerv12 is offline
Member
 
Join Date: Jun 2000
Location: No fixed address
Posts: 897
Default Re: Conumdrum: New Mac Pro?

Hi,

I was going to wait another year before updating my ancient G series HD 4 Accel system. (Which worked great)
Of course, my 4th G series computer decided to accelerate the process for me by dying.
I was really counting on seeing what would happen all through next summer. (My arbitrary time line)
I depend on this stuff for my living so I had to do something fast.
I assumed Tbolt would be further along.
I thought long and hard about a current Mac Pro.
For whatever reason, I convinced myself that Tbolt was a show stopper.
We ended up experimentally putting together a Hack to "temporarily" bridge the gap running HDN.
All I can say is Wow!
I'm thinking, unless something crazy happens over the next few years, I am staying on this machine.
There are a few quirks with HDN, but I do mostly mastering and mixing, so they aren't too much of an issue.
The Hack chews up and spits out huge track count, lots o plug sessions without a dent in the processor usage.

In retrospect, a loaded Mini would probably be almost as good, minus the peripheral expansion issues.
The Mini would probably be Plug and play. The Hack was not. It took a while.

In the end, I am only using one of the Tbolt ports to a Firewire 800 adapter.

If I were doing tracking again, I would most certainly need an HDX card.
We do light tracking occasionally (16 tracks or less at the same time), and it works well.

It would be really cool if Avid sold a Tbolt HDX card box.
I'll bet they do in the next year.
__________________
bookerv12
Reply With Quote
  #14  
Old 11-14-2013, 06:39 PM
lampmusic lampmusic is offline
Member
 
Join Date: Jan 2004
Location: Coastal GA
Posts: 377
Default Re: Conumdrum: New Mac Pro?

It definitely is a hard choice to wrap your mind around after coming from decade and a half of desktop / pci combos.

I was faced with this same situation this past summer. I did some installs at a couple facilities and was pleasantly surprised at the robustness of the MBP compared to our (2) 2010 MP systems. I decided to replace one of our 2010 6-core MP desktops with a MBPr.

The laptop system with OWC thunderbolt breakout absolutely flies on HDN.

We also have another HDN sytstem in a 2010 4-core MP.

Bottom line the MBPr system is twice as fast plus it connects to the Thunderbolt display - turning it into a dual display system

Another factor was that I was able to sell the mac pro's for about $1500 this past summer. I think the values may have dropped slightly since then.

Good luck
__________________
Running Pro Tools 2021.12
Main System 2020 M1 Macbook pro 13 inch / 16MB Ram / 1TB SSD / Big Sur


Future System 2021 14inch M1 Pro / 16MB Ram / 512 / Monterrey
Reply With Quote
  #15  
Old 11-14-2013, 07:08 PM
YYR123's Avatar
YYR123 YYR123 is offline
Member
 
Join Date: Dec 2010
Location: Austin TX
Posts: 13,737
Default Re: Conumdrum: New Mac Pro?

Just was checking Fry's yesterday and they have the 2012's on sale!!!!!

12 core is going for $3500 and a quad core was going for $2000.

Get them while they last b/c that's the last of the great Mac Pro desktops !
__________________
Daniel
HDX - PT12.5.1 - HD I/O 16x8x8
Win10-Pro (v1709)- 6 Core i7-6850k - ASUS X99 Deluxe ii
D-Command Main Unit - 'Ole Blue


http://www.sknoteaudio.com/ plugins rock and are affordable.
Reply With Quote
  #16  
Old 11-18-2013, 08:54 AM
jauk jauk is offline
Member
 
Join Date: Jul 2004
Posts: 158
Default Re: Conumdrum: New Mac Pro?

LampMusic- I'm kinda liking what you outlined with the MBPr. Was this with Pro Tools 11?

I was wondering how they performed. So you have seen great performance out of the MBPr's?

Anyone else had issues with or see issues with running a MBPr as the main system?

Thanks again!
Reply With Quote
  #17  
Old 11-18-2013, 09:34 PM
lampmusic lampmusic is offline
Member
 
Join Date: Jan 2004
Location: Coastal GA
Posts: 377
Default Re: Conumdrum: New Mac Pro?

Yes Jauk it was with the co-install of HD10 and HD11.

It is almost twice as fast in the processing, offline bounce etc. when compared to my quad core 2.8 MP (2010) with 16G ram.

I'd love to hear other peoples experience with the MBPr / HDN combo also.
__________________
Running Pro Tools 2021.12
Main System 2020 M1 Macbook pro 13 inch / 16MB Ram / 1TB SSD / Big Sur


Future System 2021 14inch M1 Pro / 16MB Ram / 512 / Monterrey
Reply With Quote
  #18  
Old 11-20-2013, 08:15 AM
jauk jauk is offline
Member
 
Join Date: Jul 2004
Posts: 158
Default Re: Conumdrum: New Mac Pro?

LampMusic- Dang, that's nice!

Just confirming...and you're not finding that you're bumping up against any limitations (within reason, of course) with plugin's track count, etc.?

I like the idea, too, that you can also pick up a MBPr and take it along for basic editing and such while on the fly. Bonus!

Can you tell me how the MBPr's you have are configured? Processor, RAM, etc.

Thanks!

Kind regards-
Reply With Quote
  #19  
Old 11-21-2013, 10:24 AM
lampmusic lampmusic is offline
Member
 
Join Date: Jan 2004
Location: Coastal GA
Posts: 377
Default Re: Conumdrum: New Mac Pro?

the experience I had was with the top of the line mid 2012 15 MBPr with 8G Ram and 512 SSD.

You do have RAM limitation with hard wired memory in the MBPr. Max is 16G but you have to buy it already configured.

The Previous Gen Mac Pro desktops have a max ram capability of 32G.

Another option would be the quad core Imac 27 which benchmarks almost as high as the MBPr and has the same thunderbolt expansion capabilities. Not sure what the max ram is
__________________
Running Pro Tools 2021.12
Main System 2020 M1 Macbook pro 13 inch / 16MB Ram / 1TB SSD / Big Sur


Future System 2021 14inch M1 Pro / 16MB Ram / 512 / Monterrey
Reply With Quote
  #20  
Old 11-21-2013, 10:46 AM
JFreak's Avatar
JFreak JFreak is offline
Moderator
 
Join Date: Jan 2003
Location: Tampere, Finland
Posts: 24,853
Default Re: Conumdrum: New Mac Pro?

Current iMacs go 32GB but I don't know about the older ones.
__________________
Janne
What we do in life, echoes in eternity.
Reply With Quote
Reply

Thread Tools Search this Thread
Search this Thread:

Advanced Search
Display Modes

Posting Rules
You may not post new threads
You may not post replies
You may not post attachments
You may not edit your posts

BB code is On
Smilies are On
[IMG] code is On
HTML code is Off

Forum Jump


All times are GMT -7. The time now is 05:23 PM.


Powered by: vBulletin, Copyright ©2000 - 2008, Jelsoft Enterprises Limited. Forum Hosted By: URLJet.com