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mikehalloran wrote:

MIDI Life Crisis wrote:...I think I could boot externally if I had to and hope that never becomes a necessity. ...

I did that for a year before screwing up the courage to open my iMac and replace my HHD. In your case, USB 3 would be the slowest and TB would be faster—SATA on the external SSD is the bottleneck. Neither would be as responsive as the PCIe internal but it would get you through.

MIke, aren't there some TB enclosures that use PCIe (as opposed to SATA) attached storage? Something like that should approach the speed of an internal PCIe drive, no?

HCMarkus wrote:

mikehalloran wrote:

MIDI Life Crisis wrote:...I think I could boot externally if I had to and hope that never becomes a necessity. ...

I did that for a year before screwing up the courage to open my iMac and replace my HHD. In your case, USB 3 would be the slowest and TB would be faster—SATA on the external SSD is the bottleneck. Neither would be as responsive as the PCIe internal but it would get you through.

MIke, aren't there some TB enclosures that use PCIe (as opposed to SATA) attached storage? Something like that should approach the speed of an internal PCIe drive, no?

Yes, it's possible but you might as well upgrade the internal drive unless prices have come way down recently—if so, I don't see them.

At OWC, a single space TB-PCIe box is $299.99 incl. cable + the 2T PCIe SSD for $1,299.99 for $1,600. 4T isn't available in a single card. I don't find any 2-slot chassis but 3-slot is $979-$1,200. So, 4T runs you around $3,600 +/-
https://eshop.macsales.com/item/OWC/HELIOS1TB2/
https://eshop.macsales.com/shop/ssd/owc ... sior-pro-q

A 2T Internal blade is $1549 and includes a USB 3 external for the one you've removed from the nMP. $70 less without the housing (though why wouldn't you get that?). 4T costs $2,299.99 ($2,29.99 without the USB 3 enclosure).
https://eshop.macsales.com/item/OWC/SSDA13MP4.0K/

Upgrading the internal or using SATA SSDs in a USB 3 or TB external just makes more sense. A 2T is $650 or 4T is $1,400 on Amazon and you can do a little better by shopping around.
https://www.amazon.com/Samsung-2-5-Inch ... 44OOO?th=1

[quote="mhschmieder"]
I may be at the end of the road with my Late 2010 MacPro, but have always loved the design concept and thought it would last me ten years through upgrades.

I am with a mid-2010 12 core, and having problems - the rainbow wheel appears all the time, epscially with Vienna Eno Pro with the hollywood library and Play. 64gb RAM. Any ideas how to speed up? I am so looking forward to upgrading!

grantmclnic wrote:

mhschmieder wrote: I may be at the end of the road with my Late 2010 MacPro, but have always loved the design concept and thought it would last me ten years through upgrades.

I am with a mid-2010 12 core, and having problems - the rainbow wheel appears all the time, epscially with Vienna Eno Pro with the hollywood library and Play. 64gb RAM. Any ideas how to speed up? I am so looking forward to upgrading!

I'm sure that you'll get suggestions but there's not enough info about your setup for anyone to make anything but blind guesses.

Thank you yes - added some details.

If you are not running SSDs for all but backup tasks, I'd start there. You could also upgrade the CPUs to X5680 3.33GHz for about $140 total, or to X5690 3.47 for about $225 using used CPUs from Ebay.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Intel-Xeon-X569 ... SwPCVX8rQw

Good idea about the upgrades. I have a SSD system drive 512GB, and 3 x 7200 drives. I will do a big clean up and get another SSD for the samples. Thanks.

grantmclnic wrote:Good idea about the upgrades. I have a SSD system drive 512GB, and 3 x 7200 drives. I will do a big clean up and get another SSD for the samples. Thanks.

There is no advantage to having a large number of sample drives. In fact, because of the SATA II buss, the more that you can get onto your boot drive, the better.

A 2T Crucial MX300 is around $550; the Samsung 850 EVO 2T is just under $700. 1T SSDs are cheap nowadays.

Getting something like that and moving your 512G drive to samples (no reason to toss it, after all) is a good way to go.

mikehalloran wrote:
A 2T Crucial MX300 is around $550; the Samsung 850 EVO 2T is just under $700. 1T SSDs are cheap nowadays.

I got a 1T Crucial MX300. I've loaded most of the libraries onto it, and the difference is amazing - the rainbow has gone, and I'm working fast. Here in South Africa it was R5999 which is about $460 (plus the transposer). I would have to order a 2T. When I have time I will make it the boot drive. Thanks for the help.

grantmclnic wrote:

mikehalloran wrote:
A 2T Crucial MX300 is around $550; the Samsung 850 EVO 2T is just under $700. 1T SSDs are cheap nowadays.

I got a 1T Crucial MX300. I've loaded most of the libraries onto it, and the difference is amazing - the rainbow has gone, and I'm working fast. Here in South Africa it was R5999 which is about $460 (plus the transposer). I would have to order a 2T. When I have time I will make it the boot drive. Thanks for the help.

It's funny to see myself quoted above, as I had forgotten I was already getting early warning signs in April, but I didn't realizer video cards can fail before other stuff and that such failures can prevent proper bootstrapping, so I improperly diagnosed the early warning signs as SSD or CPU.

Alas, I had to buy an iMac today as I couldn't wait a week or more for a video card replacement to arrive (I didn't order it yet as a result, but probably will), and am not confident that's the only problem.

Re-reading this thread, I'm confused, as a lot of people seem confident there'll be a new MacPro by end of year, yet other people are saying it may not even be by next summer.

The new iMac Pro looks delicious and super-powered, but user-expensive as the starting-point is $5K minimum!

We'll see how well this new iMac 27" 3.8 GHz quad core performs vs. the mid-2010 MacPro quad-core. It may toast it, in which case I'll be thrilled. I couldn't see going to the trash can, as I still would have to deal with replacing my data drives, amongst other issues.

I must say, I am impressed by Apple's latest offerings, and also surprised that the best bang-for-buck was to go for the top-of-line 27" iMac vs. something mid-tier (the usual sweet spot). Of course, under time pressure, I had to buy a stock model vs. an i7 processor upgrade.

Not sure how these new iMacs compare to the trash can, but I suspect they are better all-around than the Porsche design from 2010 and 2012 by now. I know some people here bought the trash cans and it was probably the best choice at the time. But that's a few years ago now as I recall. Just as the Mac Mini's aren't very good buys at the moment compared to the new iMacs.

I will personally be surprised if new MacPro's come out any time before the end of 2018, as they could steal thunder and cut into the market for the upcoming iMac Pros.

.Re-reading this thread, I'm confused, as a lot of people seem confident there'll be a new MacPro by end of year, yet other people are saying it may not even be by next summer

To be clear (I know you are): In June, an upgraded 2017 iMac with an available 2T SSD was announced that is shipping now. The iMac Pro has been announced for December with up to a 4T SSD. If that 4T becomes available in the iMac, I may forgo the Pro. I expect to buy in 2018 assuming that my 2010 hangs on that long.

The new, New Mac Pro was announced earlier this year but no date was announced. Last month, those who talked about it are saying it will be after the iMac Pro. This pushes it into 2018.

Thanks, Mike, and I hope you 2010 MacPro hangs on longer than mine did so that you don't have to make the Fusion Drive compromise that I just made. We'll see how that plays out, and as I am in the "heavy user" category, my experience may help alleviate concerns others may have, who have to move on from their 2010 or 2012 MacPro's before the next model is available.