HD Native and UAD2 cards in TB chassis.

[Drew Mazurek]

I need at least 3 slots, one for HD Native, one for Octo, and one for Quad.

Who's doing it?

What are you using?

Any issues?

This new Mac Pro has me wondering what to do next.

Hackintosh, used Mac Pro, or Mac Mini and TB chassis.

Thanks for any info you can share.

[powerjoe]

You could buy an older Mac Pro and upgrade the CPU (kind of a pita) and upgrade the drive(s) to SSD? I did this on a 2008 MP, and whoa.... What a difference.

Hackintoshes seem to be the ticket for many pro audio folks nowadays, and with the funky new MP dropping later this year - the feature set and "some" obstacles in upgrading internal components have lots of people now pointing their feet in the hack direction. I love the hacks I've built and have had zero complaints from the people who've used them (so far) - they can be tricky to set up and you can't just add PC (specific) components after the system is running correctly (on OSX) and expect those components to work otb. That said, connecting any OSX / Mac hardware has never proved challenging for the systems I've built.
Ymmv.

[DetroitT]

Magma's TB3 with blower (TBv1) seems the only solution at this time (I imagine you knew this). ($1300.00 or so)

Sonnet Echo Express Pro TB 2 full length PCIe for $800.00
Wait:
The Echo Express III rack looks interesting..http://www.sonnettech.com/product/ec...iii.html?tab=3

If the cost for new MP-bic is low it may take hold.

[Darryl Ramm]

Nice thing is that UAD cards don't consume much bandwidth, I think they are all just single PCIe lane even the Octal.

UAD don't officially certify using Thunderbolt with 3rd party PCIe cards in the same chassis, it would be nice if they did test this with HD Native.

(nothing about this new Mac Pro looks low-cost. I'd prepare for some pretty significant sticker shock. It will be interesting if they do a reduced cost/fewer cores/one GPU model).

Darryl

[Drew Mazurek]

Yeah, the Sonnet is the one I have my eye on.

Actually, right now I'm leaning towards buying either a 6 core or more likely just a 5,1 single 3.2 Mac Pro. I can get one for $1700 and buy myself another 3-4 years.


The video cards alone in the new Mac Pro cost approx $500 each and there are two of them. It's NOT going to be a cheap machine. Some say STARTING at $4k.

[nst7]

If you want to go gradual, you can get the OWC Helios chassis for $329.

Three of those will be about as much as one 3 slot Magma.

[Philthy]

You could stop running Mac OS and switch to Windows. I started using Mac OS on a Power PC clone so I don't say it flippantly. Since 2005 I've been running self-built PC's alongside my Macs and have been pretty pleased with the overall Windows experience. I got so tired of getting hand-me-down programs on the Mac... it's ironic that one of the few Mac originals (ProTools) is supposedly running just as great on Windows these days... A computer is a tool. Get the right tool for the job. 2x $500 video cards in a new Mac Pro? Maybe something is telling you it's not the right tool.