Interesting options for HDX cards? Sonnet's RackMac mini Xserver? Thoughts?

[Endless Pain]

Waiting on the HDX upgrades like many others, personally don't care when as everything is running fine atm with our 9 and 10 setups.

Meantime I was working a bit on a macbook air learning to live in an iCloud, and while looking for a simple thunderbolt to firewire adapter for it to make life even easier, I found this by accident:

http://www.sonnettech.com/product/ra...nixserver.html

Too tired for more than a quick glance, my question is why this won't work? Not if it will.

My first guess is nothing is that easy... any input or ideas from you guys so in the future I know what to look or wait for to get back any mac pro's we give up to meet the requirements for any HDX cards.

Something like this, seems like a sane alternative for an application requiring only one HDX card?

[albee1952]

Interesting for sure. I also just saw an ad for a new Magma chassis that runs thunderbolt and has 3 slots of PCIe. But don't hold your breath on the HDX cards as I think they are not quite ready for delivery.

[Ragged Edge]

Originally Posted by Endless Pain

my question is why this won't work?

Looks like it supports half length cards, HDX may be a tad too long.

[John_Toolbox]

The RackMac mini Xserver supports one half-length, x16 (x4 mode), PCIe 2.0 card

Might work with an HD native card, but I'm guessing the HDX cards won't fit. That's not to say there aren't other options. If it's not already out, Magma has a single Thunderbolt to PCIe chassis coming soon, in both half length and full length card sizes.

[Endless Pain]

Cool, my guess is after the cards are released and we can see how they perform, & what problems or lack there of with any chasis used some pretty cool options might become available. My above post was mostly aimed at the idea of just creating an entirely portable system (fairly cheap) in one rack size solution.

Very much appreciate the responses, as I forgot about the card length and this is my first post to the duc. I've been using PT for as far back as can remember since I stopped using drugs, I was still using PT during that time I just have oddly named backups from that era :)

Knock on wood I have never needed to ask a question, as I have always found solutions here!

So thanks guys!

[jacko]

Originally Posted by John_Toolbox

Might work with an HD native card, but I'm guessing the HDX cards won't fit. That's not to say there aren't other options. If it's not already out, Magma has a single Thunderbolt to PCIe chassis coming soon, in both half length and full length card sizes.

HDX fits and works! Take a look:

http://youtu.be/IZCYqvMSJvU

[Drew Mazurek]

So on the fence!!

If I did the Mac Mini, I'd need an Ethernet hub (ICON and internet-Source Live needs hardwired and I do A LOT of work with European clients) Probably a FW800 hub.

Seems like a lot of extras when a used Mac Pro from 2010 or 2012 would be plug and play and last me 4-6 years.

[MIKEROPHONICS]

exactly my dilemma....

upgrading HD3 192 & Mojo & Procontrol/fader pack to Pt11 HDX (probably) Omni lots of £....

Considering i7 mini, Pro Tools Pc (as a hack) or 2nd hand mac pro.

About to get a Pro Tools PC for a magazine review which will be interesting.

Scared of Magma Chasis due to noise, scared of longevity of 2nd hand mac and being left out of the thunderbolt game, scared of hacks...

Many questions but no answers....

cheers

[jacko]

I am interested to find out how noisy Sonnet products are compared to Magma. Portability is a big factor for me and I would happily switch to HDX/Mini if I knew that it would be as quiet as my 6*3.33 Mac Pro.

[quantise]

I have a Sonnet single PCI/Thunderbolt box that I used for a UAD card and it is really noisy. So much so that I disconnected it until I can get a quieter fan installed, which you can do. So don't rule it out yet.