Mac Pro... On a budget

[SoushiruiUma]

I'm looking to get one of the new Mac Pros sometime next month (I'm a student and want a free iPod nano). I'm planning to buy the ADC student membership ($99). With the awesome discount included with that package the Mac Pro starts at $1999. I'm planning to upgrade, the first harddrive to 750 GB (leaving the other 3 slots empty for now), the graphics card to the ATI 1900 that supports dual 30 inch displays (planning to get nice monitors one day in the future...), add bluetooth and wifi. This brings the price to $2500...that's alot (even considering that I save about $600 over retail).

 

So my question is, anyone have any alternate suggestions for configuration that might be better?

 

And, aside from newegg.com where's a good place to buy monitors?

[omfg]

I hope I don't get shot down in flames for beinh inappropriate... but every time I've looked at getting a Mac Pro, I simply can't justify their price when I can build a Hackintosh which will perform just as well (if not better) for far less money. They are more work to build and maintain though, I grant you, oh, and no free iPod Nano

 

As for monitors - Dell's Ultrasharp range are highly regarded. I've got an 2405FPW and I'm very happy with it. I hear that their 30inch models are also excellent and usually great value.

[glassJAw]

Well have fun with that Hackintosh when Leopard comes out. The stuff that goes into the MacPro is quality. Not cheaper budget stuff.

[Alessandro17]

And, aside from newegg.com where's a good place to buy monitors?

I don't know in the US, but in Italy you can buy monitors almost everywhere, even in local supermarket. So all you have to do is to look around for good prices and quality. I bought a Samsung SyncMaster 205BW for a very reasonable price.

Well have fun with that Hackintosh when Leopard comes out. The stuff that goes into the MacPro is quality. Not cheaper budget stuff.

Utter nonsense. When you build a hackintosh you buy parts which can be as good as you want. Definitely they don't need to be "cheaper budget stuff".And if you want to know the entire truth, OS X isn't such a unique, great, unrivalled OS that warrants spending twice as much for your hardware, especially in Europe. I am using Linux and KDE right now and i find the experience much smoother overall than being in OS X.

[apowerr]

Definitely they don't need to be "cheaper budget stuff".And if you want to know the entire truth, OS X isn't such a unique, great, unrivalled OS that warrants spending twice as much for your hardware, especially in Europe. I am using Linux and KDE right now and i find the experience much smoother overall than being in OS X.

The above reason is why I would never recommend a Mac Desktop. When the latest in new technology comes out (for example nvidia 8 Series) you have to wait untill Apple includes it in their product line to get a driver. With Windows, you just get your driver from nvidia.com (and its often included in the vid cards box). With Linux, you have sooo many talented people who make drivers that usually you can use a lot of new components pretty quickly.

[glassJAw]

I don't know in the US, but in Italy you can buy monitors almost everywhere, even in local supermarket. So all you have to do is to look around for good prices and quality. I bought a Samsung SyncMaster 205BW for a very reasonable price.Utter nonsense. When you build a hackintosh you buy parts which can be as good as you want. Definitely they don't need to be "cheaper budget stuff".And if you want to know the entire truth, OS X isn't such a unique, great, unrivalled OS that warrants spending twice as much for your hardware, especially in Europe. I am using Linux and KDE right now and i find the experience much smoother overall than being in OS X.

 

 

If you built a Dual Quad Core system with server grade ram and a nice aluminum case I'm sure it won't be that far behind a MacPro. Ya there is a delay with drivers but maybe they test them fully to make sure it works so there are less problems? I'm not sure. I don't game on the PC anymore. I recently bought a 22 Inch Acer for a reasonable price, but the screen is no where near the quality of my Macbook.

 

It's fine that you like Linux, I'm not that big of a fan of it as a home operating system. Too much terminal commands to do simple things which is why it will never go mainstream.

[Alessandro17]

If you built a Dual Quad Core system with server grade ram and a nice aluminum case I'm sure it won't be that far behind a MacPro.

 

The default Mac Pro configuration is 2 dual Xeons, not 2 quad Xeons, thus if you build a hackintosh with a Bad Axe 2 and a Quad Extreme you'll get something comparable, if not superior. Apple gives you 1GB RAM, not a big effort. As to aluminium cases, they are available for EUR 150 or less (Tsunami Dream, for instance).

 

 

It's fine that you like Linux, I'm not that big of a fan of it as a home operating system. Too much terminal commands to do simple things which is why it will never go mainstream.

 

I don't think so. I occasionally use the command line because I find it convenient, but it is hardly ever a necessity.

[antst]

With Linux, you have sooo many talented people who make drivers that usually you can use a lot of new components pretty quickly.

You are not really friendly with a suject.In case of NVidia/ATi hardware, open-source drivers are still incomplete. And vendor drivers: NVidia has a huge memory leak when working with AIGLX, ATI...ATI drivers just {censored}, I'm tired of ATI after using Linux as a main platform on my home PC with ATI card. And although I'm skilled anough to have working everything what I need, I hate this driver and this company after this 4 years of headaches

And if you want to know the entire truth, OS X isn't such a unique, great, unrivalled OS that warrants spending twice as much for your hardware, especially in Europe.

It isn't true anymore. Don't follow old rumors. Just take MacBook Pro config and compare price with other vendors(although it is diffcult to find vendors who provide such excellent configs), you'll be surprised. We did it (here, in Europe) weak ago. No way to compete with Apple. (Which is a reason why Apple doubles notebook sells every Q)The same, basically, about Mac Pro. When you want to make powerfull, cold and silent station with approximately the same config. Probably, if you take really lowest config of Mac Pro - then you can assemble yourself cheaper. But slightly better configs - no way.And monitors...Good 19" monitor still costs 600+ EUR. (and if you looking for excelency - double this value).

I am using Linux and KDE right now and i find the experience much smoother overall than being in OS X.

No way again I'm using many unixes for many years, and there is nothing which is so polished as OS-X in terms of usability on GUI. And I'm not talking about how it looks like, but how it works like. Integration, integration and integration.And, generally, before OS-X, probably, there has been only one unix which was more or less really GUI oriented - Irix (for it's time of course). Linux is going to right direction, but lack of integration...you still can't choose your prefered browser once. You have do it separately for Gnome programs, KDE programs, then for something else... it is not such awfull how it was 10 years ago, of course Bu still. Even there is still problems of clipboard, to be honest (different clipboards for different apps). There is still no real drug-and-drop which is supported by ALL apps, not KDE/GNOME/XFCE/SomethingElse separately . Try to drag from KDE app to gnome app. Sometimes it will work (we are in 21st century though), but sometimes..I have top admit that FreeDesktop put a lot of efforts to force unification of things, it is progressing fast, but it is still far from ideal. And, generally, I don't like idea of tens of incompatible GUI toolkits (QT, GTK and so on). And idea of absence one, systems-wide (or user-wide) look. That's chaos and overcomplexity in the system.

[antst]

And finally to author of the thread, there is not much sense in buying Mac Pro in minimal config. It is kind of bying Altix 3000 with 1 CPU and 1GB memory loaded

Mac pro made to be powerfull workstation and default Mac Pro config at Apple Store - is a kind of minimal config for this machine. Otherwise you'll pay for something which you don't use. Because All things which make Mac pro expensive - it is things which really important when you go to fully loaded configs.

It is also answer to Alessandro 17. Try to calculate config of self-assembled PC with dual quad-core 3.0 GHz Xeons + 16GB of RAM + 4 HDDs + 2 DVD + couple of graphics cards, taking into account proper case, proper cooling, proper PSU, proper motherboard. Then remove from this config all extra CPUs, RAM, HDDs (but keep MoBo, case, PSU, cooling etc) and look at price, then compare with Mac Pro. You will find that most of the price isn't CPU+Graphics anymore. Most of the price will be all this cooling, case, M/B, PSU etc.

It is easy to compare minimal config to average PC and then claim that Mac Pro is overpriced. Try to assemble dual quad-core + 16GB of RAM PC and immediatelly you will see that it is not cheaper that Mac Pro with the same config, but very noisy and hot.

[Alessandro17]

It isn't true anymore. Don't follow old rumors. Just take MacBook Pro config and compare price with other vendors(although it is diffcult to find vendors who provide such excellent configs), you'll be surprised. We did it (here, in Europe) weak ago. No way to compete with Apple. (Which is a reason why Apple doubles notebook sells every Q)

 

OK, let me consider only this point for now. I'll use Italian, but I hope you can read it.

 

Macbook Pro:

 

 

* Intel Core 2 Duo a 2,4GHz

* 2GB 667 DDR2 SDRAM - 2x1GB

* Disco rigido Serial ATA da 160GB (7200 giri/min)

* MacBook Pro 17" con schermo widescreen

* Apple USB Modem

* SuperDrive 8x (DVD+R DL/DVD±RW/CD-RW)

* Tastiera retroilluminata (Italiano) & Mac OS (Italiano)

 

# Bluetooth 2.0

# Apple Remote

# Power Adapter

# Battery

 

Eur 2.893,99

 

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

 

Dell Inspiron 1720

 

 

Processore Intel® Core™ 2 Duo T7500 (2,2 GHz, FSB 800 MHz, cache L2 4 MB)

SISTEMA OPERATIVO Windows Vista™ Home Premium autentico,

SCELTA COLORI Colore Alpine White lucido e webcam integrata da 2.0 megapixel

LCD Schermo TFT widescreen WXGA+ (1440 x 900) da 17"

MEMORIA SDRAM DDR2 a doppio canale da 2048 MB a 667 MHz [2 x 1024]

UNITÀ DISCO RIGIDO Doppio disco rigido SATA da 320 GB (5400 rpm) (2 x 160 GB)

SCHEDA GRAFICA nVidia® GeForce™ Go 8600M GT con 256 MB di memoria grafica dedicata DDR2

UNITÀ OTTICHE Unità interna fissa DVD+/-RW 8x con software

BATTERIA PRINCIPALE Batteria principale a 9 celle agli ioni di litio (85 Wh)

Accessori

BLUETOOTH Modulo Dell™ Wireless 355 Bluetooth 2.0 (fino a 3 Mb/s), velocità avanzata trasm. Dati

CONNETTIVITÀ WIRELESS Mini scheda Wireless-N Intel® di ultima generazione, Europa

SOFTWARE MICROSOFT Microsoft® Works 8.0, italiana

Servizi e Software

SERVIZIO DI ASSISTENZA 1 anno di garanzia di base - Ritiro e restituzione

SUPPORTO IN CASO SI DANNI ACCIDENTALI Nessun supporto per danni accidentali

SOFTWARE DI SICUREZZA Nessun software di sicurezza e antivirus, italiana

Il sistema include inoltre

Riferimento pacchetto Gedis N0717206IT - Inspiron 1720

Informazioni sull'ordine Ordine Inspiron (Italia)

Futuristic SKU contrassegno ordine futuristico

Documenti di spedizione Italian Documentation and Eur Power Cord Inspiron 1720

Supporti sistema DVD di risorse (contiene diagnostica e driver)

Alimentatore Adattatore 90 W

Modem Adattatore e modem interno 56,6 k V.92

Tastiera Tastiera interna, italiano (QWERTY)

Supporto standard 1 anno di garanzia di base - Ritiro e restituzione

Ordine Internet Dell Ordine Internet Dell.

 

Eur 1.677,00

 

 

As you can see only the CPU is slightly slower, but you have for instance 2x160 GB Hard Drives.

 

A difference in price of Eur 1200!

 

Can it be justified in terms of quality? I don't think so.

Why did I choose Dell? Not because I like it a lot, but because I could make a quick comparison.

If I choose another brand I am pretty sure I can find even better value for money. For instance a local store is going to sell a laptop on special offer, great specs, Eur 800!!!

[antst]

Look at Sony shop for VGNAR31S.CEK model. Then look at price, look at specs and try to guess, why this differences in price between Dell and Sony. Then compare price and specs of MacBook Pro and Sony.

 

Generally, I can't say too much about Dell, but about year ago I've been looking for small and light notebook. Dell X1 was perfect in terms of weight and size and was also very cheap. So, it was perfect choice on a paper, but when I've got it into my hands, I thought that this cheap X1 is really overpriced )) So, at the end I've bought another notebook, which is more heavy, bigger and more expensive. In this case I didn't have enough funds for some good Toshiba or Sony models, so I end up with Asus.I don't know what could force me to buy X1. If I don't have enough money for something better - I would stay without notebook at all, but not with X1

 

There is some reasons why some Dell notebooks are cheap, but it isn't because Dell owned by altruists.There is a lot of details, which makes notebook or desktop good or bad, cheap or expensive. Not only CPU speed and amount of RAM.

 

And coming back to Dell 1720. Your spec will be about 4kg in total and work not longer than 1 hour from battery. Compare to MacBook Pro, then you will get why price is so differ. 4 kg +1 hour - it isn't "notebook", it is a so called "desknote" or "desktop-replacement". If you want to compare - compare with notebooks.I'm sure that if you look for notebook, you couldn't find something really cheaper than macbook pro. Few my colleagues have bought macbooks during last couple of weeks, and everyone of them did this investigation and found out that macbook is a good choice in terms of money for x86 notebook

 

Generally, I think that macbook pro 17" is a bit heavy and big for notebook also, but it seems that macbook pro 15 and macbook 13 - is a best choice on notebook market right now.

[Alessandro17]

OK, you seem to like Toshiba. Me too

Have a look here:

 

http://it.computers.toshiba-europe.com/cgi...ERIES_ID=111510

 

Satellite A100-881

 

The specs aren't too bad for Eur 1.498,75, are they?

[antst]

OK, you seem to like Toshiba. Me too

Have a look here:

 

http://it.computers.toshiba-europe.com/cgi...shibaShop=false

 

The specs aren't too bad for Eur 1.498,75, are they?

 

It is good example

Add to this spec: new generation CPU/platform, better graphics, LED screen(important for batteries) and good remote control and you'll get current mackbook pro 15 with the same price and config )) When macbook pro 15 had old screen and old CPU, price of this Toshiba model was about 2K EUR(at least in NL), I've checked price archive

In principal, AFAIR, A100 also a bit bigger (thicker) but this we can forget

Apple hardware isn't overpriced this days. It is not cheap, but not overpriced like in the past. Apple goes somewhere inbetween Sony and Toshiba on notebook market, in terms of price and in terms of features. But has extra advantage advantage: OS-X, without loosing compatibility with windows or linux

 

If you complain about Apple - also complain about Sony They play on the same market with somehow similar strategy.

 

Only mac-mini, probably, overpriced. Maximal config costs about 1250 EUR.

But...taking into account size and design - I can understand why people pay this.

I also would like to throw away my huge home PC and buy mac-mini instead

If you assemble same thing on a same quality level and with minimal size, it will cost to you about 700-800 EUR I've checked right now(using 2.5" HDD and slim DVDRW, micro-ATX MoBo and case), but still will be substantially bigger. You can try to find mini-ITX MoBO for Intel CPUs, if there are such things on a market (or use notebook MoBo), and mini-ITX case, then it will be smaller (but still bigger than mac-mini) and more expensive So, I guess that if one would try to assemble most closed to mac-mini system, he will end up with not less that 1K EUR + extra time for internet searching and case/cooling modding.

And, keep in mind that I adidn't include WiFi and remote, which will also increase price somehow (and in case of WiFi add headache how to fit it into the case, which means probably PCMCIA card and slot, if you didn't find mini-ITX mobo with WiFi onboard). Plus Windows Vista license, if this person happen to be Windows user

 

Of course, if you don't care about size and noise, you can easy assemble same config for about 500EUR + Windows license price. So, you can see how same config can cost very different price, depending on how it is assembled.

[sarahbau]

Allesandro, you do a very good job of comparing Apples and Oranges in your comparison between the MacBook Pro and Dell Inspiron 1720. First of all, the extra .2 GHz is about a $300-$400 difference by itself. You might say that it's not worth that much of a price increase to you, but that's how much it costs, even at Dell! You can't compare a 2.2 to a 2.4 and complain that the 2.4 costs more. The Dell also has a lower resolution screen. They don't offer a 1680x1050, so let's upgrade both the Mac and Dell to the 1920x1200 screen so they are the same. Add $150 to the Dell and $100 to the Mac. I'm not going to increase the memory to make the Mac look better, but Apple actually charges $100 less than Dell for 4GB of RAM ($750 vs $850).

 

The Dell comes out to $2019, without the second hard drive. The MacBook Pro comes out to $2899. Still more expensive, but not as big a difference as you claimed. The MacBook is also better in several areas. It weighs a pound less, is more than 40% thinner, has gigabit ethernet instead of 10/100, DVI output instead of VGA, backlit keyboard, etc.

[Alessandro17]

Pity that I was using Euro while you are using Dollars...

So who is comparing apples with oranges now?

Pity that you can't even spell my name...

[Hagar]

I think this argument is at crossed purposes.. whilst comparing macbooks & pc laptops is one thing, and comparing the Mac Pro to something similar from Dell is another, a third point is being missed.

Namely that although the macbooks may be not far different in price to their PC equivalents, and a Mac Pro may even be cheaper than a similarly-specced dell server/workstation, very few people need/want an 8-core xeon box with FB-ram etc for home use..

And Apple don't make any other towers.

 

To say that you could build yourself a machine that is much cheaper and will serve the same purpose, however, is plainly true. Even though it won't be component-for-component a match for the Mac Pro, and may not have *quite* the same performance, it is likely to occupy a better price point and thus give better value.

 

I think Apple have been quite clever in how they price their products, choosing sectors of the market which already have high-ish prices, in this case high-end workstations and premium laptops.

Likewise the mini can be recreated in an aopen mini-pc case, but it's unlikely to be very much cheaper due to the cost of the compact components. The iMacs are hard to compare, as you are buying the form factor and design as well as just the cost of the raw components, so essentially, Apple has avoided competing head-to-head with the PC market.

[antst]

To say that you could build yourself a machine that is much cheaper and will serve the same purpose, however, is plainly true. Even though it won't be component-for-component a match for the Mac Pro, and may not have *quite* the same performance, it is likely to occupy a better price point and thus give better value.

 

About Mac Pro not really sure. I have 25 amost self-assembled dual-Opteron hosts. They aren't cheap When you go to this market, be ready that price of components increases a lot. Good PSU - couple of hundreds, good case - couple of hundreds. 2GB registered DIMMs? triple price(2-3 years ago price factor was even 4x) of 1GB registered DIMMs which are already more expensive than non-registered. And so on. Market is tighter, so prices is higher. I can say that now we are trying to estimate price for specs like: 16GB of RAM+2 dual quad-core Opterons@2.4GHz + no HDD/DVD/Video, simple dumb number-crunching hosts. It goes to 6K EUR in VERY noisy config. If you want to make it silent and nice-looking with HDDs and Graphics - add 1-2K