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  • Welcome to the new site. Here's a thread about the update where you can post your feedback, ask questions or spot those nasty bugs!

Time to replace my Mac Pro

Laura Fitch

New member
Hi. My 2007 Mac Pro still works great but is becoming obsolete as far as software is concerned thus I'm looking to upgrade my computer so that I can once again keep my OS up to date. (Apple will not allow any more OS upgrades on my current machine.)

Is anyone here using one of the new Mac Pro's? What are you experiences so far?

Is anyone here successfully using a Mac Mini or iMac for photography and/or video? I've read that the new Minis are as good as my current older Mac Pro but I'm not sure how to verify that. Since the new Mac Pro seems to be offering a lot less for the same high price, I'm rather warming to the idea of a mini on my desk instead (seems much about using either will be the same since we can no longer do much expanding of these new Mac Pros).

I appreciate any comments. Thank you.
 

Asher Kelman

OPF Owner/Editor-in-Chief
Laura,

Excuse me if my reply is aimed to basic work without extensive use of giant multilayered files, as I don't know whether you're a professional photographer or a an image librarian with mainly the need to store and locate images.

There are really great bargains to be had on late models used/refurbished Intel Macs. Unless yo are a power user making movies, I'd be very happy with a computer that can handle OS X 10.6.8 or 10.7.5

Going even to Mountain Lion, 10.8 is hardly necessary, unless you really want to be able to use ipad and iphone gestures on your Mac computer too!

For a photographer, the programs that need to work well for a Mac user are

  • Adobe elements
  • Adobe Lightroom 3 up to 5
  • Adobe camera RAW
  • Adobe DNG Maker
  • iphoto
  • Photoshop CS2 up to CS 5 or a subscription to Photoshop CC with Lightroom 5
  • Phase One's Capture One 7.6.1
  • Aperture
  • or GIMP
The advantage of Mavericks is greater integration with app app store offerings and gestures and so far, no great advantage obvious for most photographers. Some, in fact or having crashes on Mavericks, OS 10.9 that they never saw previously. Some, however, are delighted with their setup.

However, a used modern machine will do everything you need and save you about $500-t $1.000 or more! Apple sells "refurbished" models for some 15-20% off here or you might try Macsales.com

APLMB950LLA_hero.jpg


Macsales.com: iMac 21.5" Diagonal Screen

Apple 21.5-inch iMac
2.5GHz
Intel Core i5 Processor
Mfr P/N: MC309LL/A
OWC SKU: APLMC309LLAA8
MC309LL/A Mid 2011
Used in Excellent condition.
90 Day OWC Fulfilled Warranty
$979.00

The latter company is really reliable can add more RAM or a larger HD, if you need it for a price that won't choke you!

Asher
 

Asher Kelman

OPF Owner/Editor-in-Chief
So, Laura,

Do you have a special preferences. You might have a great NEC or Eizo monitor that you have already invested in and works well for you. So a Mac Pro Tower might be a better option for you.

If you list the software you plan to use, then folk can give you more relevant advice geared to your own needs.

In any case, I doubt that you need to spend the extra cash on the latest model, rather it's usually to maximize on memory and a larger drive, better graphics card and modern software.

Looking forward to hearing more of your style! Maybe you could post some of your favorites!

Asher
 

Laura Fitch

New member
Thanks, Asher.

I'm a professional photographer working for a publisher. Most of my photography is documentary in nature both when shooting for my employer and when working on personal projects. I work primarily in Lightroom and Cumulus (the latter is a powerful DAM program--I'm my company's Photo Librarian) with occasional needs for Photoshop (another co-worker is our regular PS person and I tend to not want to fuss with it on my personal projects).

My employer furnishes me with a MacBook Pro w/ Retina and I have a few Mac Pro's in the office at my disposal, too, if needed, but for my home office I have long used and still prefer a strong desktop solution. Since 2006 or 2007 that has been my current Mac Pro running OS 10.6.8, 4 internal HD's keeping my various libraries separate from my main HD with an external back up solution using OWC's Mercury Elite Pro drives and automated back up software. I have an older Dell monitor that I was hoping to upgrade to something like an NEC but that is more of a want than a necessity; however, it does still cause me to pause when I consider purchasing the iMac. Never thought I'd seriously consider an all-in-one.

The problem is that my Mac Pro can no longer upgrade the OS and Apple doesn't even let me upgrade to Mountain Lion (I waited too long to do so but before the App Store that was never an issue). Lightroom is starting to get sluggish and some software can't be upgraded at all if I'm below 10.7. Frustrating to say the least. I need my upgrade plan now so that I can begin to make the transition to another computer that can continue to keep up with the speed of software.

I understand what you're saying about simply buying a newer used Mac Pro and at first thought I would definitely do this (and it's still an option) but research is making me wonder if the smaller Mac Mini or even the iMac could do for my use instead? I recently moved and lost my once large home office space. I'm now tucked into a corner of a room so a smaller computer might be helpful. I have always wrote both of these lesser computers off as not powerful/fast enough for professional use but it seems they have come a long way in recent years, no? And, if the future is external expansion over internal expansion then I need to decide if I want to spend less money now but need to turn around in a few years to make that change or if I'd rather just take the leap now.

So, I'm hoping to hear from other photographers with an at least moderately busy shooting schedule who use either a Mac Mini or an iMac successfully and what they think they compromise to do so. Or, to hear from photographers who've splurged on the new Mac Pro to learn how they are fairing and what sort of external drive set up they have going, etc.
 

Asher Kelman

OPF Owner/Editor-in-Chief
Laura,

My wife has a 21" iMac and I've used it extensively. I do event shooting and coverage of major charity events. It can handle the image fine with Media Pro as the catalog software and Photoshop for editing. I wouldn't use this for photoshop with many layers as it only has 4GB RAM and not a large scratch drive. However, you can control these parameters when you choose your iMac. For more demanding files, I use my more powerful desktop machine in a color controlled workflow. But the iMac is often my first place to look at the files.

I could do all the editing there I need and the screen is fabulous, although of course it is not an Eizo, LOL! Still, I often just reference the color profile for the particular camera and then use a WB card and never alter the white balance otherwise on the iMac or any computer without a profiled monitor.

So I can reassure you that you'll be very happy with an Intel iMac! Get one that could load Mavericks but I'd stay with 10.7.5 as it's the most stable or 10.8, Mountain Lion if you must. One can get the original software on an Apple USB thumb drive. There's a company in the UK that sells them for about 45 pounds sterling. The iMac a beautiful design and with external HD as you use, you'll have zero issues. Just get the most modern iMac from OWC, (Macsales.com) as you can afford.

BTW, I am struggling with Mavericks right now and am reformatting my hard drive and trying to work with the latest Capture One. Right now even iPhoto takes 30 seconds to start and edit! For Capture One, I wait 20 seconds to a minute to see a new local adjustment in their equivalent of Photoshop's layers. If I cannot resolve this by tomorrow, I will go back to OS 10.7.5 where the world works in a predictable fashion!

Asher
 

Robert Watcher

Well-known member
I have been very tempted to purchase the Mac Mini for my pro work - - - and if I settle down in the future, most definitely will. For real work it will handle my needs quite well.

For several years I have been following professional photographer and photo writer David Brooks on his use of Mac Minis - how successful and economical that can be. The latest Shutterbug review I could find was of an older lower spec'd machine than what is currently available. http://www.shutterbug.com/content/2011-apple-mac-mini-affordable-dream-computer-photographers

For myself, I have been running a basic 2007 White Macbook (non-pro model) until the power supply went on it this summer. I replaced with a new 13" basic Macbook Air - despite so much being written on the web about how it won't handle serious applications. I'm glad that I didn't pay attention as I love my light weight little gem.

I predominantly use Lightroom 5.3 for all of my pro and travel work - and my little Macbook is up to the task. I have Lightroom libraries with thousands and even tens of thousands of images in them. I process the files in Lightroom using all of the editing tools available - including spot removal, adjustment brushes, gradient and radial filters. I print out straight from Lightroom, export and save for web and full size with adjustments, open into Photoshop 6 from Lightroom for more advanced edits, send to my pro print lab in California - files that have been processed and saved in Lightroom.


The basic model has a 120GB Solid State Drive - - - but that is just fine with me as my practice for many year with my desktop workstations, is to only use the main internal hard drive for OS and programs. All of my data is read from and saved to external hard drives.

With my new Air, I can use USB 3 Hard drives and my portable 2TB USB-3 WD read and write at a satisfactory speed for any of my work - - - and that includes video creation and rendering. Yes I also regularly process images in Photoshop CS6 and video in Final Cut Pro and am able to work in those with ease.

True that a faster machine, may render out a video more quickly or a ton of layers and heavy processing in PS may run more smoothly, but I have nothing to compare to and am fine with the way things are accomplished on my laptop. Something that is to die for with my Macbook Air, is the amazing 10 to 12 hour battery life. Nothing can beat that when you are all day in airports and airplanes and you don't have to charge up.


The Mac Minis are more powerful than my Macbook Air and so that is why I would have no issues using a Mini or two as a desktop computer with a nice monitor attached. I'm thinking how nice it would be to have a Mac Mini that I can take with me in my carry on bag - and have a monitor in Canada and one in Nicaragua or whatever other country I happen to be in - so that I can benefit from a desktop experience.

The exception may be if I was in the video or high end computer animations business where a ton of processing power can be a benefit in rendering times or handling massive file sizes and multiple monitors. Then a more powerful machine can save time and will work better. A lot of such a decision will depend on your expectations (and probably budget). No one can answer that but you.
 

Asher Kelman

OPF Owner/Editor-in-Chief
A reassuring note, Laura, OS 10.8, aka, "Mavericks" is now working just fine for Capture One 7.6.1. So now I have a 750GB Apple HD drive with ONLY my applications, (external drives for data), and it works perfectly! No issues now with either Capture One 7.6.1 or iPhoto. So with this, I give Mavericks a thumbs up.

As to speed, a lot of folks insist that Mavericks slows some things down. So if I hadn't upgraded to Maverciks I'd stick with Lion or Mountain Lion as it is fussy and needs a clean HD to be really happy! but right now, I couldn't be more delighted that Mavericks is allowing my photo editing to work and so I don't want to make her unhappy tonight.

But really ..... does she have to be so particular?

Asher
 

Robert Watcher

Well-known member
A reassuring note, Laura, OS 10.8, aka, "Mavericks" is now working just fine for Capture One 7.6.1. So now I have a 750GB Apple HD drive with ONLY my applications, (external drives for data), and it works perfectly! No issues now with either Capture One 7.6.1 or iPhoto. So with this, I give Mavericks a thumbs up.

As to speed, a lot of folks insist that Mavericks slows some things down. So if I hadn't upgraded to Maverciks I'd stick with Lion or Mountain Lion as it is fussy and needs a clean HD to be really happy! but right now, I couldn't be more delighted that Mavericks is allowing my photo editing to work and so I don't want to make her unhappy tonight.

But really ..... does she have to be so particular?

Asher

I guess that I should just get at it and upgrade to Mavericks. I've been putting it off because of some of the stuff being said around the web when it was introduced. I'm looking forward to the 15+ hours of battery life and the increase in speed - - - which my Macbook air with Haswell processor is already faster than the Macbook Pro without.
 

fahim mohammed

Well-known member
Hi Laura...

I am my family's photo librarian and go to guy for everything to do with DSM and pp and printing!!

As a payment for my services they bought me an iMac beginning this year. Luckily my work load has not increased!!

It is a 27" core i7 machine with 32GB. Storage is 3TB.

I am running OSX 10.9.1 and so far have experienced no issues with LR, Capture 1 Pro, Aperture and CS6.
I have a complement of add-on filters ( Nik, Alienskin etc.. ). Luckily I have not experienced any issues so far..I however did upgrade my filters to their latest versions ( free ).

I do have iPhoto, but hardly use it unless as a sync with other OSX products.

My son just brought back a 128GB iPad Air with Retina screen and I have installed Photogene, Snapseed,
on it. Works wonderfully. His work requires high definition, but not that much volume of storage, on the machine. He runs a specialized medical sw which is image intensive.

Get anything with a Thunderbolt connect and external storage should not be a problem.

If the latest ( speed, greater integration with newer OSX products etc. ) is not required, I would go the refurbished route as Asher suggested.

But if the company is paying, I seriously would consider the latest products.

Good luck with your search and let us know how it goes.

Best regards.
 

Jerome Marot

Well-known member
A studio I know with 3-4 photographers / retouchers has replaced 2 of their old mac pros with minis last year. They seem happy with it.
 

nicolas claris

OPF Co-founder/Administrator
Hi there
I use Macs since… 1984!
I'll come back later to explain why I've just ordered a new Mac Pro.
My today's working machine:
MacPro 2 x 2,8 GHz Quad-Core Intel Xeon
RAM 18 Gb 800 MHz DDR2 FB-DIMM (2x1 + 2x2 + 2x3 + 2x4)
Mac OS X Mavericks
ATI Radeon HD 2600 XT
ATI Radeon HD 5870 1024 MB
SSD Boot disk: SAMSUNG MMDOE56G5MXP-0VB - 256 Gb
Working Disk : 2 x Western Digital 3,5´´ S-ATA III 6 Gb/s HD Caviar Green (WD30EZRX) - 7200 RPM, 64 Mo - Mounted in RAID 0 - 6 Tb

My son Romain who's editing days long HD video is using :
iMac 27 ", mi-2010
Processeur 2,93 GHz Intel Core i7
RAM 16 Go 1333 MHz DDR3 (4x4)
Graphisme ATI Radeon HD 5750 1024 MB

He's happy with it.

But the more important to compare and understand your needs, is to know what file size you currently or intend to work on, from raws to 16 bit files.
The're an incredible amount of difference of power demanding, depending of your files size…
 

Laura Fitch

New member
Many thanks for the replies and all the great information! I think I am almost sold on a Mac Mini. I may spend a few months changing my current internal HD set up to an external system before I buy the new computer. With the savings over a new Mac Pro, I think, I might also be able to buy a better monitor before a year is gone. That'd be really great.

What sort of external HD set up do you use? How do you like it or what are the current drawbacks? I've always filled my Mac Pro HD bays and used them to separate my OS from my various file libraries (Documents, Music & Photography) with OWC external drives for back up of each. I know that I could buy enclosures for my current drives and just connect and work that way but I'd like to learn about other options like RAID set ups and these Drobo things I've read a bit about.

I shoot in the RAW and think my photo files probably average between 25 & 30 MB in size. I don't do a lot of retouching or saving of even larger TIFF files (occasionally but not often). I work in Lightroom extensively but PS only when retouching is truly necessary--so not often. I haven't tried editing video, yet, so pretty clueless about my needs there but whatever I do in the beginning, at least, will be novice and simple.

One more question at the moment: what does i5 and i7 really mean in the Mac specs? I assume i7 is better/faster or something than i5 but what does that stand for exactly?
 

Robert Watcher

Well-known member
What sort of external HD set up do you use? How do you like it or what are the current drawbacks? I've always filled my Mac Pro HD bays and used them to separate my OS from my various file libraries (Documents, Music & Photography) with OWC external drives for back up of each. I know that I could buy enclosures for my current drives and just connect and work that way but I'd like to learn about other options like RAID set ups and these Drobo things I've read a bit about.

MY personal preference for my external hard drives for my desktop workstation, is to use the Hard Drive Bays (or Toasters) that allow me to easily swap in and out any 3 1/2 or 2 /12 inch drives that I want to. It is far easier than managing hard drive housings and takes us much less space than a bunch of external hard drives. I also do use a Raid configured Network drive that I can access from all of my computers.

The docks are wonderful and allow me to use inexpensive hard drives. I personally feel that the drives last longer because of running cooler as a result of the circuitry being exposed to unrestricted air flow. As well there is no chincy enclosure wiring and circuitry to malfunction as has happened to me with self contained external drives in the past.




what does i5 and i7 really mean in the Mac specs? I assume i7 is better/faster or something than i5 but what does that stand for exactly?

Two good articles that I found that may help you decide (I presume that you are trying to figure out the value of the $799 i7 Mac Mini over the $599 i5 Mac Mini). As you will find it isn't really cut and dry the value that the more expensive i7 has over the i5 in working terms:

http://www.pugetsystems.com/labs/articles/Haswell-Core-i3-vs-i5-vs-i7-Which-is-right-for-you-475/

http://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2012/10/core-i5-or-core-i7-does-your-computer-need-the-extra-juice/
 

Asher Kelman

OPF Owner/Editor-in-Chief
Hi Laura,

Now I can see how you will do so well with the mac mini! Just go into an Apple Store with LR on your hard drive and your images and plug in to the computer of your choice and time the operations! Will take just a few minutes. I bet you'll be thrilled with the lesser expensive model! The wonderful thing is that you can compare any computers on the spot and be totally secure in your choice!

In fact, I'll do the same thing, LOL! I'll set up some tasks and go down the line in the store.

Asher
 

nicolas claris

OPF Co-founder/Administrator
Hi Laura,

Now I can see how you will do so well with the mac mini! Just go into an Apple Store with LR on your hard drive and your images and plug in to the computer of your choice and time the operations!an compare any computers on the spot and be totally secure in your choice!
It's a good idea, but you better have a fast external HD with firewire 800 or USB3 plugs, otherwise the HD will be the bad part of the chain and your tests won't be usable!
 

nicolas claris

OPF Co-founder/Administrator
One of the very first advantage of the new Mac Pro (besides of the multi processors) is its ability to use the processors of the graphic cards for calculation accelerator.
 

Jerome Marot

Well-known member
One of the very first advantage of the new Mac Pro (besides of the multi processors) is its ability to use the processors of the graphic cards for calculation accelerator.

That is a feature of OSX and is supported on all machines, as far as I know. Of course, the mac pro has more powerful coprocessors, so the feature is more useful on them.
 

Asher Kelman

OPF Owner/Editor-in-Chief
One of the very first advantage of the new Mac Pro (besides of the multi processors) is its ability to use the processors of the graphic cards for calculation accelerator.

Nicolas,

A lot of work has been shifted over to the graphics card for some time. Do you mean something new? I have never upgraded on a Mac and had my mind blown by an increase in speed although from reviews one would think that the machine would take off like a Porche at the lights turned green! So this time, the case is round but what increases in Photoshop or Capture One speed can we expect? Digilloyd's reviews are likely the most honest. Anyone recently checked?

Asher
 

Laura Fitch

New member
Great info, thank you! I appreciate the two links to articles about the i5 vs i7--much clearer in my head now. And, Asher, I have a Firewire 800 external drive I could format and place LR and PS onto for testing at our tiny local Apple store--great idea!

I may wait 6 months to see if the Mac Mini's get any significant upgrades from Apple before I actually buy but I'm happy to see that the mini is a viable option for me. In the meantime I wish I could find a way to get my current Mac Pro up to Mountain Lion to alleviate some of the issues I'm running into with software--any links to companies selling this in the U.S.?
 

Asher Kelman

OPF Owner/Editor-in-Chief
In the meantime I wish I could find a way to get my current Mac Pro up to Mountain Lion to alleviate some of the issues I'm running into with software--any links to companies selling this in the U.S.?

Laura,

So what glitches do you have. Mountain Lion might not be needed. Lion is pretty stable and matured.

Asher
 

Alain Briot

pro member
Congratulations Nicolas. The new Mac Pro is a fantastic machine. Plus it looks cool and is small enough to fit on the desktop instead of under it !
 

Asher Kelman

OPF Owner/Editor-in-Chief
Congratulations Nicolas. The new Mac Pro is a fantastic machine. Plus it looks cool and is small enough to fit on the desktop instead of under it !


Alain,

Why is it any more fabulous than a late model machine. How will it change our workflows? Really!

Asher
 

nicolas claris

OPF Co-founder/Administrator
That is a feature of OSX and is supported on all machines, as far as I know. Of course, the mac pro has more powerful coprocessors, so the feature is more useful on them.

True; but "smaller" machines such as mini and iMacs can't change/upgrade their graphic cards…
 

Asher Kelman

OPF Owner/Editor-in-Chief
True; but "smaller" machines such as mini and iMacs can't change/upgrade their graphic cards…

Nicolas,

I just think it may be possible with the Thunderbolt connection to add on boxes. They can hold cards. I need to research more, but one opinion is pessimistic, (except for remedying slow macbook or mac mini systems with limited graphics performance):

"Essentially, even Thunderbolt isn't fast enough to keep up with a modern, high-end graphics card going at full-pelt. Using an external graphics card arrangement will, if anything, slow your system down. Unless, that is, you're using a computer with lamentably slow graphics in the first place!"

...........so for a slow Macbook air, a 5-7 fold increase might be achieved for $250 plus the card.

So if one has modest sized files and a slow graphics card, this might be worth looking into.

Otherwise, Thunderbolt, even Thunderbolt II is just not fast enough. Still, the latest report I've discovered allows the Graphic card speed to be increase 10 fold to native Thunderbolt speed and at a cost of just $100 plus the card.

http://forum.techinferno.com/diy-e-...onnet-echo-express-se-@-10gbps.html#post63754

So if you have a macbook or mini, this might still be a decent option. After all, increasing Graphics card performance 10X is not something to be overlooked as a practical upgrade if you can follow the instructions!

Asher
 

nicolas claris

OPF Co-founder/Administrator
Alain,

Why is it any more fabulous than a late model machine. How will it change our workflows? Really!

Asher

If you work with 100 Mb files you may not see any difference, but if like Alain and I you work on MF files (raw files about 80/90 Mb and 16 bit tiff around 260 Mb) and if you enlarge them to 12 feet long side at 150 dpi, you'll see a real difference !
 

Alain Briot

pro member
If you work with 100 Mb files you may not see any difference, but if like Alain and I you work on MF files (raw files about 80/90 Mb and 16 bit tiff around 260 Mb) and if you enlarge them to 12 feet long side at 150 dpi, you'll see a real difference !

Nicolas answered the question for me. Faster is better for demanding uses, simple as that.
 

nicolas claris

OPF Co-founder/Administrator
A good read

If it is true for FCPX, it should be also for LR and Photoshop, AFAIK C1 users will have to wait for serious upgrade…
 

Laura Fitch

New member
Laura,

So what glitches do you have. Mountain Lion might not be needed. Lion is pretty stable and matured.

Asher

There are times I cannot buy software because I am still using Snow Leopard instead of Lion or Mt. Lion but my main issue is that I'm getting the spinning beach ball a lot these days, mostly when trying to work in Lightroom 4.4. The slowness when trying to work is keeping me from upgrading to Lightroom 5--which I'd really like to do.

My computer's specs:

Mac Pro (probably bought in 2006)
MacPro 1,1
2.66 GHz Dual-Core Intel Xeon processor
ATI Radeon X1900 XT (graphics which I do not pretend to understand)
500GB Western Digital SATA HD
9GB RAM

Would upgrading to Lion now that Apple is offering this option again help my speed issue with LR? Or, do I just need a lot more RAM?

I don't want to spend too much money as I think I'd like to eventually upgrade to a new Mac Mini but if I could improve my Mac Pro's performance easily now then I could spend some money on a better monitor (which I think I really need) and in a better external drive system before I upgrade the actual computer itself. Suggestions?
 

Asher Kelman

OPF Owner/Editor-in-Chief
Laura,

I'd get a mall SSD drive from Macsales.com for my scratch disk. This 120 GB drive would wake up your machine, just for $99! You could get even just a 40Gb drive aand save %30 or so! Format it with Apple disk Utility into to partitions. Put Mac OS X and photoshop on one and then designate the other for scratch.

Also see if you can bring your RAM up to 12GB, again from Macsales.

Snow Leopard will purr!

Asher
 
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