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Author Topic: 2008 MacPro Upgrade!  (Read 7878 times)

ajz

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2008 MacPro Upgrade!
« on: January 24, 2017, 05:21:18 pm »

My 2008 Early MacPro3,1 has been fine running LR 6.8 - but with 24 and 34 mp RAW editing it is begining to take more time. The MacPro is: 2x2.8 Intel processor, Mem-16GB,Graphics Radeon HD 5770 (hard to find faster cards that fit). Anyhow, the MacPro has internal HD's: a 1TB HD for just for the Mac OS and LR and a few applications plus my LR Catalog; a second 3TB HD for LR photos and a third 3TB HD as a back to the LR photo  drive - all drives are internal to the 2008 MacPro. Plus another 2GB internal drive w/Aperture images, and an external LaCie 1TB with odds and ends. So, I am considering about upgrading to a new MacPro - cost not an issue. But it seems that I will need to pull out the two 3TB HD's and the one 2GB drive and put them into a "cage" of some sort, then cabling to the MacPro Trash Can. Plus transferring everything on the 1TB HD onto the new MacPro which I can do with Macs transfer procedure.

But -I am unsure of how to go about this efficiently as possible and what possible "cages/systems" are the best to use and will interconnect easily.

I forgot to mention that perhaps an iMac might be the better choice! My NEC monitor is great, but then I am looking to make a new start with my current equipment. The Retina screen - well perhaps.

 As always, LULA forum experience and opinions would be of help to me.

thanks,

aj
« Last Edit: January 24, 2017, 06:55:39 pm by ajz »
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BobShaw

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Re: 2008 MacPro Upgrade!
« Reply #1 on: January 24, 2017, 08:16:30 pm »

Delete all crap. That means going through all the System and User Librarys and removing old printer drivers, dead applications etc.
Make a TimeMachine backup of everything.
Buy a new iMac 27" with SSD and the most RAM on two slots that you can get.
Add third party RAM to the other spare slots.
Restore the old MacPro onto it.
Get a copy of Aperture 3.6 from Apple support.
Take any drives etc out of the MacPro and stick them in a Drobo and use as an attached disk.
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Christopher Sanderson

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Re: 2008 MacPro Upgrade!
« Reply #2 on: January 24, 2017, 08:56:21 pm »

I have one of these and they are great
OWC ThunderBay 4

BobShaw

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Re: 2008 MacPro Upgrade!
« Reply #3 on: January 25, 2017, 04:47:28 am »

I have one of these and they are great
OWC ThunderBay 4
I read the specs but can't tell and it doesn't say explicitly if you can have different size drives and make a single large drive from them?
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Christopher Sanderson

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Re: 2008 MacPro Upgrade!
« Reply #4 on: January 25, 2017, 05:12:04 am »

I am uncertain. You should contact OWC and ask

My guess is that you can but there will be certain restrictions on the type of RAID that you can create.

ajz

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Re: 2008 MacPro Upgrade!
« Reply #5 on: January 25, 2017, 08:40:42 pm »

Bob, Chris,

Thanks to the both of you. the iMac 27" will be the machine. I will add 32GB of mem from OWC.

But here is the rub: Presently the 2  - 3TB drives: - one is used for my main photo drive w/the other used as back up drive - both mirrored w/ SuperDuper. If I go with a OWC ThunderBay 4 my concern is that it appears if I add both of these 3TB drives they are combined (as a 6TB drive) and my information is written across both drives! And, if I add another 3TB dirve - the ThunderBay acts as one very large hard drive - using RAID 1.  Therefore, I would still need another HD to back up this ThunderBay unit. And so, where are my photos, on which drive - and does it matter?

I like to keep both drives separate so that I know where my photos are and where the back up drive is (scorched earth mentality - comes from old age!). I realize I can set up the ThunderrBay to run as separate drives but consequently will have to give up speed - which will be dictated by my HD 100mbs .  The ThunderBay will accept different drives.

 At age 76 I am trying to make this my last upgrade for quite some time and to choose a simple but good system. Please, any additional thoughts would be most welcomed.

thank you both, very much appreciated.

aj
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davidgp

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Re: 2008 MacPro Upgrade!
« Reply #6 on: January 26, 2017, 01:32:46 am »

Hi,

As Chris says better ask to OWC, the specs say that it supports JBODs (just a bunch of disks) so, in theory, you should be able to use all disk individually without any RAID configuration... And without joining they together... Also some of them should be able to be configured as a raid unit and the rest as individual disks.

Regards

David


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kers

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Re: 2008 MacPro Upgrade!
« Reply #7 on: January 26, 2017, 04:02:21 am »

At age 76 I am trying to make this my last upgrade for quite some time and to choose a simple but good system. Please, any additional thoughts would be most welcomed.
...

I do not think it will be your last upgrade ;)
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/jan/04/105-year-old-man-sets-record-cycling-14-miles-hour-robert-marchand


But the iMac seems best value/performance at the moment....
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Joe Towner

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Re: 2008 MacPro Upgrade!
« Reply #8 on: January 28, 2017, 02:30:20 pm »

+1 for the iMac + OWC ThunderBay - get the 0gb model and put your existing disks in it. 

The ThunderBay doesn't have any RAID hardware in it - they include a license for SoftRAID in the purchase.  You don't actually have to use it as RAID, and can keep doing your SuperDuper backups.

The Mercury Elite model lineup has a selector on the back to set a RAID level and 'IND' is your best friend / recommended setting.  Quickly looking at the line up, the selector switch is on their 2 drive setups, so if you don't want a 4 bay drive enclosure, it's an option.

Depending on your internal drive selection on the iMac (I'd highly recommend a SSD/Flash drive not the Fusion Drive), you can also put a SSD in the ThunderBay and use it as your 'working' photo drive.  The spinning drives are great for long term storage, but when you're working against a series of photos, the speed of the SSD is actually more important than the extra RAM.

4gb RAM + SSD is by far greater & faster than 32gb RAM + standard hard drive.

-Joe
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ajz

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Re: 2008 MacPro Upgrade! Finished!
« Reply #9 on: January 31, 2017, 05:05:26 pm »

Joe,

thank you for your comments, they were helpfull, as well as to all.

iMac, 4gHz Core i7, 1TB flash, AMD R9 M395X, w/8GB arrived :)  Also, I got the Thunderbay 4 box since that leaves me with one open drive - all stand alone - no RAID (yet). Added 16GB mem also. Not sure how an SSD might help since they are only 1TB in size at most and my other HD's are 3TB for the photos. I may use my NEC PA242 as a second monitor.

thank you for the advice.

al z

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sgrenald

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Re: 2008 MacPro Upgrade!
« Reply #10 on: February 23, 2017, 08:27:33 pm »

I had a very similar situation. I have an early-2008 MacPro (only 12gb of RAM, and 4 of it has gone bad - gotta send it back to OWC). I wanted to upgrade, but the fact is, the current MacPros were long in the tooth back THEN! When the new iMacs came out, the i7 models were actually faster than the MacPro for a lot of stuff. I think high-end video was the only place where the MacPro was better.

I wasn't clear on your posts, but were you thinking that you'd just stick the MacPro drives into some kind of RAID and keep using them with the data intact?

I got the 4GHz iMac and put an extra 16gb in it for 24 total.

I wouldn't buy an iMac right now, though. The rumors are that the new ones are coming out soon.
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Joe Towner

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Re: 2008 MacPro Upgrade!
« Reply #11 on: February 24, 2017, 11:49:14 am »

I wasn't clear on your posts, but were you thinking that you'd just stick the MacPro drives into some kind of RAID and keep using them with the data intact?

The Thunderbay enclosure is just a TB to 4x SATA connection, no RAID involved.  So, yes you can shuck a few external USB enclosures and insert the hard drive into a Thunderbay and 98% of them will be fine and your data intact.   The 2% are for those times that your drive is setup in 512b clusters buy the USB to SATA adapter, but the drive really wants to be a 4k cluster.
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David Eichler

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Re: 2008 MacPro Upgrade!
« Reply #12 on: March 01, 2017, 05:05:12 pm »

You don't have to buy SoftRaid with a Thunderbay enclosure. However, it can be of some use even if you are not going to create a RAID. Also,  is  bear in mind that the version of SoftRaid that comes bundled with the enclosure will only work with that enclosure, not with any other brand of enclosure, which is what the full version will do. And, Apple no longer offers the capability to create RAIDs, at least not easily, as it used to. So, if you prefer software to hardware RAIDs, you will need some kind of second-party software.
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Moritz

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Re: 2008 MacPro Upgrade!
« Reply #13 on: November 29, 2017, 05:48:52 am »

Have you guys heard that Apple is apparently developing an entire new MacPro again? Apparently it's not gonna be the garbage bin form factor anymore but an upgradable modular system as it used to be in the past. I was tempted to order the new iMacPro but now I think I'll wait until they announce the new MacPro.... no external 'cage' systems needed.
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David Eichler

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Re: 2008 MacPro Upgrade!
« Reply #14 on: December 20, 2017, 05:52:00 pm »

If you buy the Thunderbay enclosure and want the SoftRaid software, my suggestion is to buy the enclosure without the SoftRaid package and then buy the SoftRaid software separately. If you buy the Thunderbay/Software package, you can only use the software with that enclosure. The real benefit of software RAID over hardware RAID is that it does not tie you to particular hardware, and there are some additional things that SoftRaid can do, such as certifying disks and providing info about disk status and health.
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bcooter

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Re: 2008 MacPro Upgrade!
« Reply #15 on: January 04, 2018, 09:17:31 am »

My 2008 Early MacPro3,1 has been fine running LR 6.8 - but with 24 and 34 mp RAW editing it is begining to take more time. The MacPro is: 2x2.8 Intel processor, Mem-16GB,Graphics Radeon HD 5770 (hard to find faster cards that fit). Anyhow, the MacPro has internal HD's: a 1TB HD for just for the Mac OS and LR and a few applications plus my LR Catalog; a second 3TB HD for LR photos and a third 3TB HD as a back to the LR photo  drive - all drives are internal to the 2008 MacPro. Plus another 2GB internal drive w/Aperture images, and an external LaCie 1TB with odds and ends. So, I am considering about upgrading to a new MacPro - cost not an issue. But it seems that I will need to pull out the two 3TB HD's and the one 2GB drive and put them into a "cage" of some sort, then cabling to the MacPro Trash Can. Plus transferring everything on the 1TB HD onto the new MacPro which I can do with Macs transfer procedure.

But -I am unsure of how to go about this efficiently as possible and what possible "cages/systems" are the best to use and will interconnect easily.

I forgot to mention that perhaps an iMac might be the better choice! My NEC monitor is great, but then I am looking to make a new start with my current equipment. The Retina screen - well perhaps.

 As always, LULA forum experience and opinions would be of help to me.

thanks,

aj


I wouldn't give up on your Mac Pro too soon.    There are three companies I've used that will upgrade you mac tower and it will be as fast as about any new mac you can find.

One in London   https://create.pro,  one in LA  https://ibuildmacs.com and one in Minneapolis  https://www.macs4u.com/macbooks-macbook-pros/

I just had a special configured 2015 pb by the minneapolis guys and instead of them talking me up to a 2016/17 macbook pro, they promised this machine, configured correctly would be better and if I didn't like it, they offered a free 100% return.

I've used it for a month and so far it's so quick even with resolve which is hugely power hungry it doesn't skip a beat.

The good thing about these companies is they test with all sorts of high end software, in other words your not the beta tester, they are.

You might want to find a used 2011 5.1 as it's easier to customize and all your peripherals will work.

None of these companies are cheap, but when you figure in new drive interfaces, screens, everything it takes to make a new computer run, you'll probably come out ahead, especially since your not stuck in running a new os so no need to rebuy all of your software and plug ins.

Just a thought.

IMO

BC
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