Anybody switched to a Macbook Pro Thunderbolt Native from Mac Pro Native?

[petesteen]

I'm thinking of downsizing my 8 core Mac Pro 2.26 24GB RAM HD Native Omni setup for a Macbook based setup with an external thunderbolt chassis or an Avid Thunderbolt interface if they'll ever allow purchasing by itself. Has anybody switched to this kind of setup? My main concern is not having enough RAM and the 8 Cores that my Mac Pro has. I would be using a Macbook Pro Core i7 2.4. I think the RAM maxes out at 8GB. Is this enough? I generally don't use more than 24 tracks.

[CHD]

Recently transferred my 95 minute TV drama stereo mix from HD3 Accel MacPro2.1 8 core 3GHz 12 GB RAM to a 2011 MacBookPro quadcore (8 cores seen in ProTools) 2.3 GHz 8GB RAM Metric Halo ULN-8. HD had 166 voices occupied, Sonnox or DMG audio EQ and compression in every track, 6 stereo Altiverbs, de-essers and so on, quicktime video. Everything runs smoothly on the MacBookPro, but the fan noise is unbearable for serious mixing, which disappointed me very much.

[SmokinBaldMonkey]

I cant speak to your RAM but this isnt a good idea yet. I made that jump to a 16GB Retina MBP, only to find my TDM cards wont work in a thunderbolt chassis (FU Avid), and so then today I bought a Native card, and While PT launches and plays, you dont get more than 2 minutes in before getting a 9171 error.

I was running 88.2, 8 tracks, no effects, no plugs. I am so sick of the fail coming out of this place lately.

[KMcK]

I swapped my second rig from a 2008 8-core Mac Pro w/Native Card to a 2012 MBP (non retina) with the Helios thunderbolt chassis and it works great.

Only 2 issues: 1) The Helios cooling fan is a bit loud, it wouldn't be good if you wanted to do tracking anywhere near it. I do editing so not an issue for me. 2) Since it's a laptop rig I unplug it from the Thunderbolt chain ever night to take the laptop home. Sometimes the next morning I have to restart the system to get it to see the Helios after plugging it all back in. Always works fine again after a restart though.

As far as performance it's at least on par with what it replaced, possibly even a little more power on hand with the laptop. The 15" MBP can hold 16gb of RAM which is what I have in there.

[acstctws]

KMcK, what OS and version of PT are you running? I have a 2012 retina MBP and my two year old Hackintosh with 002 and PTLE seems to out-power it at low buffer settings. Even with fairly light sessions with a moderate amount of plugins where my CPU is sitting at <50%, I'll get frequent spikes (I can see them in PT's system usage window) that cause errors, mostly 9171. It's solid with higher buffer settings, but I'm trying to eliminate variables and hash out what's causing these spikes. Seems some people are having the same issues with HDX, I really think it might be an issue with PT on ML, so any info about your system would be much appreciated.

Thanks!

-Evan

[KMcK]

I'm running PTHD 10.3.2 with 10.8.2 OS. My MBP is non-retina though, and I'm using an HD OMNI, but other than that everything seems pretty similar. I never really had any issues with any versions to prior to this current setup though, other than the automation-follows-edit bug.

[Jazzbass56]

I'm using a MBP 2011 quad core ,16 gig ram,with thunderbolt OWC hellios , Avid HD native card with 192 I/O sync I/O
And the system rocks
I also use my MBP with a Apollo Quad with thunderbolt which also kicks ass
I use the HD Native card in my editing room, and use the Apollo for my record mixing rig

[Jazzbass56]

Forgot to mention I'm using PT HD 10.3.2 and Lion OS 10.7.4,I also use a sonnet tempo sata pro express card34
for my hard drives. I now have a free FireWire 800 port to use as I need.
Also I use DVI adaptor running threw the second thunderbolt port to run a 23" monitor as my 2nd monitor and EVERY thing runs smoothly,thunderbolt is amazing technology :)