Turtlerock Forum

a heads up to anyone (lots of us i expect!) still packing a pro tools HD/ HD native/ HDX system on PCIe cards in a mac pro tower.
all the towers have recently been demoted to "heritage" items by apple.
up until recently 4.1 and 5.1 builds where still servicable.
but that is no longer.. only the black trash can is a servicable device.
that means you cant get parts, or service, or assistance with any issues from apple.

obviously you can still buy old machines on ebay and swap out parts/ attempt repairs - but apple will no longer sell spare parts etc to their service personelle so the machines are no longer supported.

just a heads up!

Well, that's really Crapple of them. I have a 4.1 2009 Octo that I plan to do a processor upgrade on to a 3.4ghz 12-core. Think I'll do that upgrade soon while there are still parts around. Thanks for the info.

Also if anyone is thinking of going for a "trash can" Mac, (or buying a Thunderbolt audio device) I'd suggest you hold off until the Thunderbolt/USB-C dust settles.

Apple have abandoned the Thunderbolt connector on their new laptop. (Just the connector, not the underlying transfer protocol). They are now using the USB-C connector.

Back when Thunderbolt arrived, PC motherboard manufacturers didn't want to jam yet another connector type onto their motherboards. So Thunderbolt (like Firewire) it is dying a death in its current form.

However the new USB-C connector is universal and can run all forms of Thunderbolt (1, 2 or 3) and USB 3.1.

Thunderbolt 3 (40 Gbit/s) is already appearing on PC motherboards (but not available on any Mac, as of yet).

Meanwhile, Mac is also supporting USB 3.1. (USB 3.1 is about equal to Thunderbolt 1 @ 10 Gbit/s). Every PC vendor is also supporting USB 3.1.

So will audio vendors currently releasing stuff on Thunderbolt (UAD, etc) shift to the universal USB 3.1? Or will they stick to Thunderbolt and run the risk that only Mac users can buy their products?

Hopefully in 6 months or so this will all sort itself out.

thanks manning..
interesting info.
having not too long ago done the HDX upgrade, ill be sticking on the towers for a while yet.
i have bought a spare machine to keep me covered.
assuming ill get another year, maybe two, and by then the whole shebang might be different anyway (PT20?)

Just to clarify...

This only applies to 2008/2009 Mac Pro's.

This is actually pretty much expected, as apple has always stopped supporting products five years after they were discontinued.

The 2010 Mac Pro is a 2012 Mac Pro with slower processors, so parts are otherwise identical.

The 2012 Mac Pro will be supported until at least 2017.

https://support.apple.com/en-au/HT201624

Simon "Smash" Ashby.

hi smash
the 2008/2009 model went heritage a couple years ago - which was when i changed all my machines to 4.1 - mid 2010 models.
it is that machine that is now heritage.
SOME parts are the same as the 2012 and you might get lucky.
BUT
1 - some parts are different (for instance the backplane that is faulty in the machine im currently talking about , which is a known issue of the 4.1 breed)
2 - apple technicians wont work on them as they are not trained to/ their paperwork says they are not supported.

so with whats avail on ebay, and the similarities of the 2012 machine you might be lucky.
or you might not depending on what issues you have.
also - 2017 is only 9 months away! so "supported till 2017" isnt much of a safety net when you have a 10thousand dollar PT card in the machine!

Hey Gareth

The 2010 Mac Pro (Released in August 2010) is the 5,1 Mac Pro
The 2012 Mac Pro (Released in June 2012) is a still a 5,1 Mac Pro.
The 5,1 was still sold in 2013, so parts will be available until 2018 at least


(The 2013 Mac Pro is the 6,1)

Simon "Smash" Ashby

If at some point you need Mac parts, this guy in Ultimo, has truck loads and is very reasonable;

http://microseconds.com.au/

2018 is looking a bit better!!
but still no way to repair my 4.1 build (which by our standards is a very "current" computer and in lots of studios, i expect owned by a lot of people on this forum - ie: anyone with an HDX card like me)
im not preparred to upgrade 5 macs to a slightly newer build to get one more year of support.
my point was (and remains) that the aluminium mac towers are dropping off the face of the earth.
but i imagine a number of people here have 10 thousand dollar HDX cards in them...
its a point worth noting!

Looking for any advice and best value for an updated Mac Pro. Currently running 1.1 ex Gareth machine which has been rock solid. But I'd like to run OSX10.8 and HD 10 as a few plugins I like won't run on 10.6.8.
A 3.1 machine will work for 10.8 and fit the budget. Any thoughts or people with idle machines?? Thx.

On a side note - anyone having luck running the newer iMacs?

Barney Loveland wrote:Looking for any advice and best value for an updated Mac Pro. Currently running 1.1 ex Gareth machine which has been rock solid. But I'd like to run OSX10.8 and HD 10 as a few plugins I like won't run on 10.6.8.
A 3.1 machine will work for 10.8 and fit the budget. Any thoughts or people with idle machines?? Thx.

If you can stretch the budget to a 4.1 machine is would be worth it. It is pretty much the same as the 5.1 models. Same Intel 58x chipset. Same Quick Interconnect system buss (which has replaced the front side bus). You can even pop in much more recent CPUs, flash the firmware to a 5.1 machine. Be aware though that these computers came in two versions - with either a single CPU tray or a double CPU tray.

Thx Nath.

Sammas wrote:

Barney Loveland wrote:Looking for any advice and best value for an updated Mac Pro. Currently running 1.1 ex Gareth machine which has been rock solid. But I'd like to run OSX10.8 and HD 10 as a few plugins I like won't run on 10.6.8.
A 3.1 machine will work for 10.8 and fit the budget. Any thoughts or people with idle machines?? Thx.

If you can stretch the budget to a 4.1 machine is would be worth it. It is pretty much the same as the 5.1 models. Same Intel 58x chipset. Same Quick Interconnect system buss (which has replaced the front side bus). You can even pop in much more recent CPUs, flash the firmware to a 5.1 machine. Be aware though that these computers came in two versions - with either a single CPU tray or a double CPU tray.

I don't suppose you'd have any links handy for more info on this process, would you? As it happens I have a 4,1 Mac Pro and would love to be able to upgrade the CPU.

a.beck wrote:I don't suppose you'd have any links handy for more info on this process, would you? As it happens I have a 4,1 Mac Pro and would love to be able to upgrade the CPU.

http://eshop.macsales.com/shop/turnkey/ ... r/Upgrade/

Simon "Smash" Ashby

If anyone wants to buy a 2006 Mac Pro Tower I have one that I'm looking to sell. Located in fitzroy.

Found a couple of options. Not sure which is more upgradable though. If anyone has time to advise that'd be great?

Mac Pro Xeon Quad Core/2.26Ghz Dual (8 cores; E09) MB535 A1289
Mac Pro Xeon 6 Core/2.66Ghz (6 cores; E09/M10) •BTO• A1289

a.beck wrote:

Sammas wrote:

Barney Loveland wrote:Looking for any advice and best value for an updated Mac Pro. Currently running 1.1 ex Gareth machine which has been rock solid. But I'd like to run OSX10.8 and HD 10 as a few plugins I like won't run on 10.6.8.
A 3.1 machine will work for 10.8 and fit the budget. Any thoughts or people with idle machines?? Thx.

If you can stretch the budget to a 4.1 machine is would be worth it. It is pretty much the same as the 5.1 models. Same Intel 58x chipset. Same Quick Interconnect system buss (which has replaced the front side bus). You can even pop in much more recent CPUs, flash the firmware to a 5.1 machine. Be aware though that these computers came in two versions - with either a single CPU tray or a double CPU tray.

I don't suppose you'd have any links handy for more info on this process, would you? As it happens I have a 4,1 Mac Pro and would love to be able to upgrade the CPU.

Here you go - http://www.everymac.com/systems/apple/m ... ssors.html

I haven't actually done it to mine 4,1. With 8x 2.26ghz cores I haven't really felt the need to, but it is nice to know the option is out there. If you search eBay US for something like "mac pro CPU upgrade" you will find a lot of stuff available. To go from an 8x 2.26gHz machine to a 12x 2.6ghz machine is only about $400AUD if you are handy with the tools and aren't afraid to give it a go yourself.

4,1 and 5,1 machines will also use standard non-ECC ram as well. The key is you can't mix and machine non-ECC with ECC stuff. I am running 24gig of corsair blue vengeance ram in mine without any issues.

Thx again.

Barney Loveland wrote:Found a couple of options. Not sure which is more upgradable though. If anyone has time to advise that'd be great?

Mac Pro Xeon Quad Core/2.26Ghz Dual (8 cores; E09) MB535 A1289
Mac Pro Xeon 6 Core/2.66Ghz (6 cores; E09/M10) •BTO• A1289

I am not familiar with those particular models, but I reckon both will be very capable machines. I would expect the 6 core model to only have one CPU socket on the CPU tray - this also limits the number of ram slots. A dual CPU tray will have 8 slots. A single CPU tray will only have 4.