Mailing List AE-List@media-motion.tv — Message #65851
From: Stephen van Vuuren <AE-List@media-motion.tv>
Subject: Must watch Mac Pro models
Date: Mon, 23 Dec 2019 19:48:19 +0000
To: After Effects Mail List <AE-List@media-motion.tv>

If you have not seen this two looks at a complete hardware teardown and test of PCIe expansion options, they are must view:

 

https://youtu.be/xQGfVFpMpuQ

 

&

 

https://youtu.be/I0PnVHHTX1E

 

Mixed bags of news for those thinking buying base model and upgrading. RAM, yes, CPU, yes, PCIe SSDs, yes with some caveats. GPUs and other cards, YMMV.

 

The one thing missing is unclear how Apple will respond to all of these upgrades – only the memory and approved PCI cards/storage kit(s) is clear from what I can tell.

 

It does appear there is a lot of wisdom in waiting the first round out to see if third party (especially internal cables) and hack world opens up the box.

 

And absolutely confirms that the thing is ridiculously overengineered with crazy markup margins, so unless you are going to load it with top end config, that engineering goes to waste. It’s simply impossible to configure a reasonable price performance rig out of it at this time.

 

Best,

 

stephen van vuuren

336.202.4777

 

http://www.insaturnsrings.com/

http://www.sv2dcp.com/

http://www.sv2studios.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

 

From: After Effects Mail List <AE-List@media-motion.tv>
Sent: Tuesday, December 10, 2019 11:44 AM
To: After Effects Mail List <AE-List@media-motion.tv>
Subject: Re: [AE] We can order a new MacPro tomorrow.

 

Dennis said:  "As far as the new Mac Pro goes, I’m withholding judgment until I see how Redshift, Octane and Unity work in their Metal incarnations on the new machines."

 

This is totally where our motion department is right now.  We're running propped up cheesegraters with 1080 cards in them, would probably all prefer to use OSX if we could, but it's going to come down to support for the software we need to use.  Which, in addition to AE, is C4D, Octane, Redshift, Houdini, and a little bit of Nuke and Maya/Arnold.

 

From the day of the announcement, I was worried about them not having Nvidia cards and how that is going to play out with a bunch of software companies that have larger user bases on Windows/Nvidia to support.

 

We actually have the budget to spend a bunch of money on computers but its just feeling so hard to justify the Mac Pro for reasons in addition to price.  Very curious to see what the price differential for comparable hardware ends up being.  It's not even a question which way I'd go if it was my own money.

 

This has been a good discussion to read.  Thank y'all,

 - Nathan

 

On Tue, Dec 10, 2019 at 8:35 AM Mike Abbott <AE-List@media-motion.tv> wrote:

 

On 10/12/2019 15:55, Stephen van Vuuren wrote:

Windows OS will never be Mac OS and vice versa. But you can get 99% of either on either.  I move back and forth between both every day...

 

The other life saving application on Windows: Directory Opus: https://www.gpsoft.com.au/

Think of it as Windows Explorer with a PhD.

 

Mike

 
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