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| To echo Greg's offer - I would be happy to help any Mac folks wanting to make the change. I have a lot of years of working with Mac since I started out on computers on an Apple II and also have a Hackintosh currently. Although you can write a novel about this stuff, here's my two cents of core points of the 4 basic options. 1. Most Mac users will be happiest with a HP/Dell/Boxx workstation system. Be sure to get the US-based support. Especially with Dell but also HP etc., they have outlet stores that offer substantial savings, often on just order cancellations or unopened returns and offers the same warranty options. Also, even more than Mac, buy the barest bone system possible and add your RAM, additional drives etc. This will not affect warranty or support. Don't automatically go for a Xeon-based system. Currently, most AE users will get far more bang for your buck with a Sandy Bridge EP system unless you do a lot of heavy 3D renders and need more than 12 render threads. I think right now a 6-core/12-thread Sandy-Bridge with 48 GB of RAM or more is fantastic AE system. 2. There are also a number of boutique PC builder shops that build custom/high-end workstations for specific niches. Great deals and amazing performance to be had but support and longevity varies, so research carefully and stick with vendors that have been in business for a while with great reviews. 3. Build your own box is the best way to get the "perfect system" but you need to be sure PC building is an "enjoyable hobby". For many of us it is and if you follow good recommendations, these systems are just as stable, powerful and reliable as Apple or Dell or HP - but if something does go wrong and sh***t happens, it's far more difficult to deal with than Dell or HP 4 hour, same day response. 4. Hackintosh is a dangerous seducer because it means OS/X. It has all the same pro/cons as #3 plus it takes careful OS tweaking and management to keep things right. OS updates can be scary as you can break a build and never get it back stable again. Not recommended for you primary #1 machine for most people - but if you do, stick to one of the tested builds out there and be sure to have multiple image-based backups to easily get your system back to usable condition. My two cents is a Hackintosh running OS/X is more work to configure and maintain then moving a complicated setup from OS/X to Windows on off-the-shelf hardware. stephen van vuuren 336.202.4777 http://www.sv2dcp.com/ http://www.sv2studios.com/ http://www.outsideinthemovie.com/ A film is - or should be - more like music than like fiction. It should be a progression of moods and feelings. The theme, what's behind the emotion, the meaning, all that comes later. -Stanley Kubrick -----Original Message----- From: After Effects Mail List [mailto:AE-List@media-motion.tv] On Behalf Of Chris Meyer Sent: Monday, June 11, 2012 5:36 PM To: After Effects Mail List Subject: Re: [AE] [OT] The Mac Pro is dead On Jun 11, 2012, at 3:21 PM, Steve Oakley wrote: > 3rd parties are flashing nVidia cards with mac firmware and they work except during boot up. Following the conversations up here, I was getting the (probably mistaken) impression that after pre-installing the drivers that the Windows cards worked out of box, except you didn't get to see the boot screen; the eBay custom-flashed cards added the boot display hack. > the effort for them to support 480 / 580 /680 is pretty minimal. they couldn't even go for a fews days of an engineer's time to tweak the firmware for boot up ? Given that third parties are flashing the cards, rather than offering an OS patch, I got the (again, perhaps mistaken) impression that "officially supporting" those cards required the third parties to update firmware to offer Mac versions, rather than rely completely on Apple. But I'm speculating based on what I'm skimming over on this list. Can those who are running "Windows" cards on their Macs give us some explicit details of exactly what they had to do, and what they have to do without (like temp sensing in the power management - something else that comes up with the eBay flashed cards)? Regardless, dismayed that Apple didn't at least add the Quadro 4000 to their Built To Order options. - Chris +---End of message---+ To unsubscribe send any message to <ae-list-off@media-motion.tv> |
