Anyone thinking of getting one of the new coffee cans?

[MIDI Life Crisis]

... but for those of us in production studios with tight deadlines and rush projects, etc., there's this from that page...

The new Mac Pro delivers up to 12 processing cores (up to 24 virtual cores) and up to 60GB/s memory bandwidth — twice the bandwidth of the previous-generation model. Now you can work with even more tracks of virtual instruments, plug-ins, and effects than previously possible. And the ultrafast PCIe-based flash storage loads all those instruments, samples, and loops almost instantly.

The gigs HAVE TO justify the investment, IMO, but I can easily see the value in that system.

[mikehalloran]

Pricing has been announced:

Quad-core starting at $2999; Six-core starting at $3999.

http://www.apple.com/mac-pro/specs/

You'll need a monitor and probably want an external SSD or two plus something for Time Machine. Considering my Mac+ system cost me $6,600 in 1986, I'm not far off the mark.

RE Time Machine, I've become a big fan of using Time Capsules of late now that they're available up to 3T. Either old ones via ethernet or the new one now that 802n is available (it really is faster wireless). Older Time Capsules are cheap on eBay and are extremely easy to retrofit with WD "green" drives - because of heat issues, you do not want to install anything else in there. I suppose you could set up a RAID over TB just for Time Machine but that's not an expense even I could justify. Besides, I have one of my TM drives in a hidden location - were my house burglarized, I could restore every system in the family network.

[BKK-OZ]

I have started asking Mr Google about external drive enclosures (Thunderbolt).
Haven't figured out which way to go on the storage front just yet, may let that settle for awhile anyway. Worst case scenario=using my existing drives in my current MP over ethernet. Not as fast as it could be, but it will be fast enough for awhile.

Given that I have a nice big Dell 27" screen already, and apart from external storage, there isn't anything else I would need to get going straight away.

hmmm...

[mikehalloran]

With 6 TB-2 ports, you probably don't need a rack. Any TB multi drive housing should support JBOD so you can take advantage of multi threading. All support RAID - not really useful except as storage since it slows things down a bit.

This 4-drive housing looks like it would do the job nicely. Only thing, it doesn't support TB-2 but nothing does-yet. I expect that to change in December.

http://eshop.macsales.com/item/Promise% ... gy/PRJ4US/

[BKK-OZ]

Only thing, it doesn't support TB-2 but nothing does-yet. I expect that to change in December.

I'm thinking that I should wait until December-January at least before doing the storage thing. I would think that there will be some more choice by then. Thanks for the link.

[mikehalloran]

I would think so. No doubt there will be something out there announced with the release so if you need a drive, you can get just one to start. Six TB Ports plus HDMI 1.4? Unless you need 6-8 monitors, you don't really need a multi drive bay except for RAID. 4 externals is the same as 4 in a bay configured for JBOD (Just a Bunch Of Drives).

There was a recent comparison of TB, eSATA and usb3 externals and the tests all agreed that, above eSATA (barely), if you are using mechanical hard drives, the protocol doesn't matter - the bottleneck is platter speed so that's pretty fast. A usb3 external is cheap while you decide how to best maximize the performance budget.

I still want one. Quad core will be fine. That neat little external or a TB-2 version so that my libraries will load before I even think about them, right? And then I want the adapter that fits on top to make my morning coffee while I check my email and figure out my morning routines.

Yea... Sweet!