Mac pro 12 core or a top spec iMac?

Hi all,
Im after a little advice...
Ok so ive been using a mac since the start of this year, i started out with a top spec mac mini, which i love but i now need more power.
So after looking at apple computers constantly im stuck for whats gonna be best for my needs and the decision comes down to 2 computers, the iMac or Mac Pro.
What i want is a computer i can game with for games such as skyrim, borderlands, battlefield 3, starcraft 2 etc and run them at the highest graphic settings with no problems, on top of this i will be doing graphic design, web design and some video editing using adobe software and ofcourse apple software, besides that i will be using it to watch movies, play music, browse and download/upload etc as an everyday person would.
IMac
So i was first looking at the top spec iMac you can buy, has the quad i7 3.4 processor with 2gig graphics and plenty of ram, and enough hd room for me too, not to mention it looks gorgeous with the apple display, the only dissapointment is that they havnt updated it as i hoped they woukld along side the MacBook Pro, which forces me to wait for the next update if i do decide to purchase one.
Is the current spec good enough to play my games and create my graphics etc? If it is then i should have no problems with the next updated iMacs.
Mac Pro
After reading a few reviews about the iMac and Mac Pro it seems that those xeon processors are beastly compared to the iMac, so ive focused my viewing onto the Mac Pro 12 core, and with the same requirements that i need above, is the 12 core beast a little OP for me? and not to mention i sacrifice having thunderbolt and a sweet display, and if an update is heading to the iMac i could miss out on a retina display along with USB 3 and more.
But on the other hand i can upgrade a Mac Pro alot easier if i need to, and it will be massive power compared to the iMac, plus it would be more futureproof wouldnt it? Is trhe current Mac Pro 12 core spec good enough for my requirements? (im asking that question based more on gaming)
So right now im stuck, what would you suggest? Do i get a powerful monster of a computer or a pretty machine with all the latest tricks( after an update ofcourse )?
Help me out folks, im soo itching to get one or the other.
I appreciate all your help, Thanks!
Carl

Wayne said it right, "future upgradeability" is key. I saw myself witht he same dilema and at the end bought a 12 core. The Quad core might run some tasks faster than the 12 core for the fact that is 3.33GHz and the 12 is 2.4GHz, but it you can keep upgading the RAM up to 64Gig, the Quad up to 32, plus the cache is double, I'm quite happy with my purchase. If you don't want to spend that much, to some the best choice is order the quad with a 6 core chip, a hair over 3K.
Tower Power!

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But I also have a lot of Blu Ray disks.
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Thanks for your consideration.....

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Thanks for your consideration.....

What is better Mac Mini or Mac Pro and 4K 40" screen or iMac 5K for work with Exel

I am working on Macbook pro retina for around 16 hours a day, it is ok but the screen is to small. I am opening about 25 - 30 EXCEL windows, 20 - 25 safari windows at the same time. Excel windows are small, they only show 40 rows and S column Now I am considering buying iMac 5k ( but the screen is only 27", however a very high resolution but I think that fonts and digits displayed may be too small ). I am also considering Mac Mini or Pro with 40" 4K TV ( 4k computer monitors are 27 - 31" , so better idea would be purchasing iMac 5k ) . The problem is that 40 - 42" TV don't have Display Port ( I can't find it anywhere )
Please help me to choose what would suit my needs better. I need large screen to work comfortably with an Excel sheets. What is better? Mac Mini or Mac Pro and 4K 40" screen or iMac 5K for work with Excel ?. The other problem I have is that when I spend 16 hours at work with retina macbook , my eyes are ok. Using the 30'' Dell screen 2560/1440 my eyes are tired after 2 hours.
Thanks for your help on advance
Best regards
David

Currently you can only get 4 K at 30 Hz via HDMI. Some users have reported jerky curser movement because of the 30 Hz.
I would go for the 5K iMac. You can add a second screen at 4K.
FaceTime HD camera
Simultaneously supports full native resolution on the built-in display and up to 3840 by 2160 pixels on an external display
Support for extended desktop and video mirroring modes
The Mac Mini supports:
Support for up to two displays at 2560 by 1600 pixels, both at millions of colors
Thunderbolt digital video output
Native Mini DisplayPort output
DVI output using Mini DisplayPort to DVI Adapter (sold separately)
VGA output using Mini DisplayPort to VGA Adapter (sold separately)
Dual-link DVI output using Mini DisplayPort to Dual-Link DVI Adapter (sold separately)
HDMI video output
Support for 1080p resolution at up to 60Hz
Support for 3840-by-2160 resolution at 30Hz
Support for 4096-by-2160 resolution at 24Hz
The 2013 Mac Pro can use three and more displays:
Mac Pro (Late 2013): Using multiple displays - Apple Support
I would go for multiple screens

Where can i buy mac pro core 12 64GB (8x8GB) memory?

64GB (8x8GB)
for the mac pro core 12 memory

Yes. I've bought a lot of stuff from them over the years. And in fact when I got my mac pro I bought my ram from them too. They specifically cater to mac needs. They have a fairly liberal return policy. For example, I bought a eSATA card which turned out to not work the way I expected with my external enclosure (also bought from OWC). I returned it for another make of card with no problems. Reading these and other mac forums you will see a lot of recommendations for OWC.
And yes, I don't know why the url is macsales.com either. But it should be obvious from that choice of url they really do cater to mac ('er sales).

Wait for new Mac Pro's or buy a 27" iMac?

Hi, I currently own an early 2009 2.66 ghz Quad Core Mac Pro with 8 gigs of memory. My Mac Pro has 4 internal Hard drives filled up with data (over 4 tb of storage space).
I plan to upgrade to either the new Mac Pro's (ariving in late July or early august) or the new 27" iMac. I'm aware that if I went with the Mac Pro then I will need to buy a 27" LED Cinema display.
How do the new 27" iMac's with SSD drives in terms of performance compare to my older Mac Pro? Storage space is important to me.
If I customized a 27" imac then I would get it with 16 gb of memory, a 256gb SSD and a 2TB Drive. unfortunately it's still not much space for me. One option is to buy a Drobo FS NAS and add additional storage to my imac that way. The other is to wait for the new Mac Pro's.
The other is the price. I don't want to spend more than $4000 for a new computer. If I customized a current Mac Pro with 512gb SSD and a 2tb drive, (I will add more drives in the future) a 27" LED Apple Cinema Display, 16 gb of memory then I will be paying over $6000.
That's way higher than I'd like to spend. Will the new Mac Pro's have much improved for cheaper?
What do you think that I should do?

Why not see what Barefeats and Macperformanceguide have already done in terms of performance and buying advice?
With iMac, you don't compete with say 6-core 3.33GHz or have upgrad options and may be limited in other ways. And of course you don't want to pay for Apple price and slow SSD. Besides which most Mac Pro owners use an SSD for system, and don't want 500GB SSD (which is what Apple's would be).
just buy a good SSD now from OWC now. Buy the minimal configuration from Apple, a WD Black 2TB is less than $149.
As for outgrowning a two year old Mac Pro... see if you can upgrade the processor.
Do you think you will be ready for having to use Lion and that your software will be too?
The 2010 2.8GHz $2119 + 3 x 8GB OWC, SSD, W3670 3.2GHz 6-core $600 is not even $3995. As for 27" I leave that to others and whether 3rd party. But, you're saying you can't use the monitor you have now?

Why Mac pro is better & more expensive than IMac?!

can you advice me on this:
tell me which one is more practical and powerful for 3D rendering and animation?! why?!
and why Mac pro is more expensive than IMac?! even though numbers in IMac are higher than Mac pro.......
IMac:
          - 27-inch
          - 3.4GHz Quad-Core Intel Core i7
          - 16GB 1333MHz DDR3 SDRAM - 4x4GB
          - 2TB Serial ATA Drive
          - AMD Radeon HD 6970M 2GB GDDR5
or
Mac pro:
Two 2.66GHz 6-Core Intel Xeon “Westmere” (12 cores)
12GB (6X2GB)
2TB 7200-rpm Serial ATA 3Gb/s hard drive
2TB 7200-rpm Serial ATA 3Gb/s hard drive
ATI Radeon HD 5870 1GB
One 18x SuperDrive

Apparently you don't fathom or realize what I said:
Better value: Mac Pro 6-core 3.33GHz. You can buy base and throw in W3680.
You can buy a single 6-core like that from Apple and pay $900 more.
I do not recommend 12-core.
I do not recommend the slower 2.66 processor
I do recommend avoiding the 2009 model.
Better off starting with the 2.8 4-core and go from there.
Ivy Bridge socket LGA2011 will have a lot of other features making them the "to die for" but no one knows and I for one would not want to be on cutting edge with any chipset or new revision. Seriously, Apple has always had issues with first silicon whether 2011 MBP or iMac or 2008/2009 Mac Pro. And always takes a couple OS updates. And then things break. And then software has to catch up.
A slower 12-core is not going to future proof. It is going to cost more and not deliver.
For last year we've all been seeing and saying 6 x 3.33.
why I sent you link to MPG site.

Original Mac Pro vs. New High End iMac

I need some advice on whether to upgrade my system, based on the new iMacs just released. Here is what I currently own:
Mac Pro with two Intel 2.66 dual-core processors
(Early 2007 edition)
16x SuperDrive
6 GB of RAM
1 TB HD
ATI Radeon X1900 XT (512 MB)
23" Apple Cinema Display
I'm thinking of selling all of that and buying the new high-end 27" iMac...
2.66 GHz Intel Core i5
4 GB of memory (I'd upgrade it to 8 GB)
2 TB Hard Drive
ATI Radeon HD 4850 graphics card
27" display (included)
I've done the research and I would roughly break even. Cost is not a concern. The following factors are under consideration...
What is the performance difference between the 4 cores I have in the 2.66 Xeon vs the 4 cores in the Core i5?
My X1900 graphics card is not supported under Snow Leopard's OpenCL. The new HD 4850 would be.
I'd like to have the larger display (27" vs. 23") and the built-in video camera for iChat video conferencing.
I am not a professional user. I consider myself a high-end consumer user, primarily doing HD video editing with iMovie, some video encoding with Handbrake, and "prosumer" work with RAW files in Aperture. The rest is basic use- such as email, internet, etc.
I would love to have some objective advice on this decision!
Thanks....

If performance of the current system is acceptable, I would keep it and use it as long as possible. You have the capability to do things like replace the display (with a new one of your choosing), upgrade the video card, and add additional internal SATA drives. Having additional internal storage at SATA speed, and using separate drives to store OS/apps and user data, will increase your system's productivity.
When performance of your Mac Pro is no longer acceptable, get a new Mac Pro.

Home music recording- is the Mac Pro better for this than an iMac?

I know it seems like a daft question but if you were to recommend a Mac for a DECENT home studio and money were (within reason) nearly no object WHAT Mac would you recommend? I always believed that a good sized desktop would be better than an iMac or a MacBook Pro (which is what I have been using for just a hobby home recording set-up) but is this a myth?
Please advise because the Mac Pro looks SCARY. I mean- the options are vast but what DO I NEED as opposed to want? Thank you kindly for reading.

I guess there is nothing wrong with the set-up except that the MacBook Pro is mine and the musicians need their own as I need mine for work.
Ah, I see. I think an iMac should be sufficient. Just be sure to get more RAM than the stock 1GB. Apple's prices on RAM are pretty severe compared to other vendors, so I'd recommend adding RAM after purchase. If you search the iMac forum for "RAM UK", you should find recommendations on reliable vendors. Don't go with lowest price; there's nothing that can cause you fits with a computer system more than flakey RAM, so you want a vendor with a good reputation for quality. I'd suggest bumping the iMac to the maximum 4GB. As to screen size, I tend to prefer having two screens rather than one big one - you can put palettes on the second monitor - so if it's a choice and desk space is sufficient, consider a 20" iMac and a second 17" or 20" screen to go with it.
If you reckon the interface is enough to do the mic justice and that Logic Express or Pro would do when the musicians know and love Cubase then I am happy to help them learn more Mac-based software and get that instead as it is also cheaper and looks like it would make more sense to ME.
Unless they're wedded to Cubase, I'd think that Logic Express should work quite well. You may all want to take a trip to an Apple reseller and take a look at it.
Unless there is a reason to "upgrade" the interface I guess that is one less item to acquire
An upgrade would seem logical only if the Safire isn't giving the quality you want or there aren't enough inputs.
I'd call your recommendation but I am in the UK and will probably talk to the nice folk at Dolphin Music in Newcastle as that is where I got the interface.
I wasn't sure where you were. If you are located in or near Newcastle-On-Tyne, you can find a list of authorized resellers here, or if you're near Manchester or Sheffield or don't mind taking a paddle down, you can drop by an Apple Store. You can then perhaps preview Logic Express before you decide. You might want to call before you make a special trip just to make sure your dealer can indeed demo LE.
Final recommendation; get really good microphones. Garbage in, garbage out, as they say, and having the right microphone, one that's suited for the instrument that's being recorded, is vital. The Neumann is of course high quality, but if you haven't already purchased, check around. You can find really good mics for less than Neumann charges; unless things have changed, you pay a bit of a premium for their reputation. AKG used to make really good mics, quite well suited for piano and acoustic guitar in particular, and there are no doubt others as well (my knowledge of specific models is rather out of date).
Cheers.
Message was edited by: Dave Sawyer
EDIT: P.S. If you can find Mix Magazine or EQ Magazine, those are pretty good reading. Lots of tips, product reviews, etc. Also, you can read a brief review of Logic Express 8 here:
http://www.macworld.co.uk/digitallifestyle/reviews/index.cfm?reviewid=2370

Smart Mailboxes - I use smart mailboxes on my mac pro without issue. On my iMac OS X v10.7.4 the smart mailboxes disappear when ever mail is restarted. This does not happen on my mac pro. Other functions work as intended.

The OS on my iMac is OS X v10.7.4. No issue setting up the smart mailboxes and they work fine until I restart the imac or restart the mail application. When I do this the all smart mailboxes (not folders) are gone. Can someone please point me to where I might look for resolution??

The OS on my iMac is OS X v10.7.4. No issue setting up the smart mailboxes and they work fine until I restart the imac or restart the mail application. When I do this the all smart mailboxes (not folders) are gone. Can someone please point me to where I might look for resolution??

My friend has the mac pro core 12, but what kind of hard drive he needs?

to fill all the empty slots on the upper area
what kindhe wants 3.0 tb hard drives
or 2tb

MPG - Desktop Hard Drives - Hitachi 3TB Deskstar 7K3000

12 core Mac Pro does not improve render time over iMac quad core

I'm rendering the same composition independently on two computers and they are basically rendering at the same rate, which is slightly better than 1 frame per second.
The project settings and preferences are identical in each instance (with the exception of memory and multiprocessing, which I have experimented with ad nauseum). The composition includes no motion blur, no effects, just a couple of layers of chroma keyed .mov files (using keylight 2.0) and some still images. Neither machine is running any other applications, except occasionally Google Chrome, which seems to have no effect on performance.
Both systems are running the latest version of After Effects CC (2014) and using the Classic 3D renderer.
System 1 MAC PRO:
Mac Pro 12 core 2.7 GHz Intel Xeon E5
dual AMD FirePro 500D 3072 MB GPUs
32 GB RAM
OS X 10.9.4
System 2 iMAC:
iMac quad core 2.5 GHz Intel Core i5
AMD Radeon HD 6750M 512 MB GPU
8 GB RAM
OS X 10.9.3
As you can see, system 1 is vastly more powerful, and yet no combination of memory/multiprocessing settings can get the system to render faster than system 2.
It doesn't seem to matter how much or little RAM I reserve for other applications (I have settled on 4 GB), or the number of CPUs I reserve for After Effects. The one setting that has improved performance is turning OFF render multiple frames. And even then it only brings the performance of the Mac Pro up to par with the iMac. I have cleared my cache, rebooted the computer, and read everything I can find online regarding the optimization of render settings.
Here's a comparison of the respective CPU Loads:
iMac
Mac Pro
With such a low CPU load, After Effects is obviously not utilizing the resources available to it on the Mac Pro. What a waste.
Can anyone help?

There's plenty of debate about the new Mac Pro vs a kitted out iMac. Benchmarks show that some iMac After Effects processing can actually be faster than on a Mac Pro, depending on the content and some other factors. If you're using software that has been optimised for the Mac Pro's GPU-centric architecture, like Final Cut Pro X, you will see great benefits.
mac pro vs imac
In my own facility recently we opted out of purchasing Mac Pros this year, and bought top-end iMacs instead. The benefit to cost ratio simply didn't make sense for us right now. Mac Pros are awesome machines, but a significant component of their cost is the dual GPUs, which are simply no benefit to After Effects.
Reports say that the After Effects engineers are working on a major revamp of the After Effects processing system, so I'm betting you will realise far greater benefits from your Mac pro in coming AE versions. For now, you may continue to see performance that is not spectacularly better than a souped-up iMac, depending on the type of processing involved.
I've seen a few benchmarks that suggest the 8 core systems give better bang-for-buck than the 12 cores. Try reducing your processors to 8 in After Effects and see if it makes a difference. With 8 cores, allocate 3GB of RAM per core to leave some RAM for the OS.

IMac 27" or Mac Pro Quad-Core?

Hello all,
I understand that this topic has been covered before although I am still unsure and I am looking for some help please!
I am currently looking into purchasing a new computer to complete my architectural post-graduate degree. I currently use a PC, which I have done so for many years and initially I was thinking about buying a customisable Dell XPS sticking to using PC’s. Having recently been sent an email from Apple regarding student discounts offered on the Mac range I thought I'd look into getting an Apple having heard nothing but praise and also that it can also run Windows XP (via ‘Bootcamp’). This would mean I would effectively get 2 “computers” for the price of one, however, after hours of research, scrolling through web pages I am torn between the Mac Pro Quad-Core and the iMac 27” (Intel i7) !
I mainly use Microstation V8/AutoCAD, Maxwell Render, Adobe Photoshop/Illustrator/InDesign, SketchUp, etc, and require a computer which can run programs quickly and efficiently, including some rendering. I will be switching between both operating systems, but will heavily use Windows to run most of my software.
I was first hooked onto the iMac due to its sheer simplicity, elegance and also the specification (Intel i7) which was on par with the Dell I was considering. Although reading deeper on various forums, articles, I found that the Mac Pro Quad-Core might be a better alternative for future proofing (IE. Upgradable hardware) but it costs a little bit more than the iMac plus no monitor included. I feel that the iMac will suffice for what I need but I am not sure how about its longevity. I will be using the computer intensely for the next year, however, after I graduate I will see the computer being used casually.
Another question is, if I were to use Bootcamp how would I share drivers (printers and scanners) between both Windows & Mac OSX? Also, when running Windows OS, would I need to install anti-virus software just like a PC?
I am wondering if anybody could shed some light, assistance, experience and guidance to help me with my purchase please.
Many thanks in advance!

I would say a lot of it depends on just how extensively you expect to be using it after you graduate. Either system should carry you through a single year easily, but the Mac Pro obviously has the expandability advantage that will help extend the tail of its useful life.
IMO, a reasonable expectation for an iMac is 2-3 years, while a Mac Pro is 3-4 for the quad core, 4-5 for the 2x4-core, and if you're buying one of those 12-core systems, odds are you're doing some serious number crunching and you'll be replacing the thing pretty quickly.
So, if you think there's a better than 50% chance of needing to keep this computer for a longer than 2-3 years, go for the Mac Pro, otherwise you can get the iMac now and see where life has taken you in 2-3 years.
As for bootcamp... Think of it like dual booting on a PC. Bootcamp does NOT allow you to run both operating systems at the same time, it's one or the other. Think of it like a time share. Programs like VMWare and Parallels let you run Windows in a virtual machine, but odds are you won't want the performance hit the emulation brings with it. So, there's no need to share drivers, because you'll need to install drivers for all hardware on both operating systems. You'll just need to make sure that any hardware you buy will work with both Mac OS X and Windows. When you're running Windows, it's no different from as if you had bought the Dell you were contemplating. Everything you would have done on the Dell as far as security software, you should do on the Mac with bootcamp. Mac OS X doesn't necessarily need AV software (yet), but Windows absolutely does.

New Mac Pro or 27" iMac

I apologize in advance for the length but I need some help in making a decision.
SITUATION:
I run a small business and currently have a Late 2012 21.5" iMac and two 23" monitors (3 screens total for running multiple applications and copy/pasting). My day-to-day includes always having 4-8 browser tabs open running external sites that I input order information into, a huge multi-thousand line Excel Spreadsheet (2008 MS Office for Mac), Google Voice tab open for phone calls/texts, Skype always open to talk to my technical team, Calendar, Notifications, Mail, etc... I keep most all emails because I have to search and refer to previous emails for customer issues, etc... so I have more than 10,000 emails in Mail. I take screenshots and screenvideos for our Help library at times as well. All day long I'm pretty much copying and pasting information to and from my spreadsheet to these other applications to process orders and using most of these applications simultaneously. I'm also backing up all data via Time Machine and Dropbox. Due to the volume or orders I process each day, I need my computer to be FAST!!!!
ISSUE:
My 21.5" iMac only has 8GB of RAM and is not user upgradable. I've had this iMac less than a year and I'm seeing the "colorwheel of death a lot", usually when copying and pasting, but sometimes other places as well. I think I need a more robust computer for reasons listed below, plus my wife's 7 year old iMac is on it's last leg so I'm planning on giving the 21.5" iMac to her and upgrading for my business.
Not that it happens all the time, but quite often an application will stop functioning and I have to Force Quit the application and reopen.
Each time I copy data from a cell in Excel it takes at least 5 seconds for the dotted line to appear around the cell indicating it's copied, so I have to be very careful not to paste the wrong data. This did not used to be the case. It would respond as fast as I could copy then paste. Excel and Word also take a lot longer to open and close than other programs.
When scrolling in various applications, sometimes the computer seems to stall then all of a sudden catch up and the page quickly scrolls to catch up.
I've run the Activity Monitor (which I know little about) and seen that I'm running normally 6.5-8GB of Memory Used. On the "DISK" tab often times my "Reads In" is higher than my "Reads Out" which I don't know if that's normal or not.
QUESTION:
I would like to know what you guys recommend for my situation.
Should I purchase a "beefed-up" 27" iMac with 16-32GB RAM or should I purchase one of the new Mac Pro models?
If Mac Pro, should I go with the 12GB Quad-Core or the 16GB Six-Core? (I realize I would have to purchase another monitor and microphone for phone calls).
I don't mind spending the money, but moreso I'm trying to get the right machine for my application without wasting money.
Thank you for your time and help to make this decision.
<*///><

January 9th, 2014 -- Final Cut Pro X 10.1 Shootout: 2013 Mac Pro vs 2010 Mac Pro
January 3rd, 2014 -- 'late 2013' Mac Pro 6-core versus 'mid 2010' Mac Pro 6-core
December 31st, 2013 -- Slowest 'late 2013' Mac Pro 4-core versus Fastest 'late 2013' iMac 4-core
December 28th, 2013 -- Does Final Cut Pro X 10.1 render faster on Mac Pro towers with Dual AMD GPUs? What about Motion 5.1?
December 16th, 2013 -- 'Late 2013' Retina MacBook Pro beats the 'Late 2013' iMac on Thunderbolt 1.0 Write Speeds
Good review on new vs old Mac Pro
My nMP Review (vs my old 4,1 Mac Pro)
I feel you outgrow an iMac sooner while almost impossible with Mac Pro (other than new software and such in 6 6yrs time) One is an investment and can be upgraded. No throttling (hopefully) and Haswell cpu while nice is not a 24/7 Xeon designed for the type of work loads.
http://macperformanceguide.com/blog/2013/20131218_3-MacPro-CPU-choice.html
http://www.macperformanceguide.com/
If it weren't for the fact that software in 6 yrs will require newer hardware to meet the demands, your nMP will still be going strong. Other than Apple dropping support for whatever OS X in 5-6 yrs instead of 8-10 years it would still be able to run and do what it is designed for for years to come. Say that about an imac that can be outgrown or "why did OS X 11.99 make my system slow?"
nMP review from a 3,1 owner
My nMP 6core Arrived Today -- View from a non-Pro user
Nice photos: nMP FINALLY

How does Mac Pro compare to iMac?

Ok I'm Pisssed!
I just bought a mac pro with AMD FirePro D700 6144 MB to photo editing. I noticed that it's a bit sluggish with my 4k Dell monitor. I figured what I can do I already have the best mac there is guess I'll have to live with it.
And then BAM, the new iMac comes out with AMD Radeon R9 M295X. Will it perform better with photo editing?

Actually you are wrong.
You can change CPU in mac pro, but you cannot fit inside anything better or newer as you are limited to specific TDP and chipset. For instance, putting in new generation of xeon won't give you TB3 support and so on. It can also lead to instability of the system overall. So in basic words: you shouldn't change CPU you already have inside so no CPU upgrade there as well.
Also iMac is much better in single core performance than mac pro and 99% of applications don't use more than 2 cores and even if they do those actions are not so critical (rendering where you can wait or go get one coffee meantime,...) compared to for instance 3D modelling or animation, where you need smooth rendering and good CPU real-time computation.
Also new radeon R9 M290X and M295X is much better supported from AMD side and also in windows. We all know OS X 3D performance is miserable compared to windows and having one year old drivers for mac pro GPU's (13.25 version) compared to newest radeon drivers (14.9).
In addition to all, 4K monitors are very poorly supported on mac pro. For example sometimes when I start OS X half of the screen remains black on my dell UP2414Q and only solution is to restart my computer again. Dell says that they haven't tested with apple hardware and it should be apple to fix this while apple says dell should fix it while customers remain in the dark and with poor support. Thank you dell and apple.
And there is more bad news for apple: adobe has started to shift their support to nvidia and windows system as Illustrator CC2014.2 now supports hardware accelerated graphics rendering with nvidia GPU on windows! And even more, new GTX980 beats any AMD cards on the market and AMD probably won't make anything better because they can't. I never understood apple latest fascination with AMD. AMD is the worst company for GPU's and their support is so bad I'm considering selling my mac pro.
The release of new iMac with 5K was a big slap in the face of professional apple customers who paid big money for their pro machine which can only run final cut pro X in it's full power. Any other software is unable to utilize all that "power" that apple put into mac pro. It's a big shame and a good waste of money to have just a nice room warmer.
Instead of fixing old things apple went and made new version of consumer class PC that is better or at least equivalent to pro class PC's the sell.
What apple need to fix is:
-10-bit support for displays. I don't know why we throw so much money on good displays when computer only outputs 8bit at the end.
-drop AMD and pick up nvidia cards. Apple already supports openCL 1.2 with nvidia cards under OS X and nvidia offers physX and CUDA in addition to only openCL that AMD offers. Also nvidia drivers are much more stable and performance of nvidia cards is better in all aspects.
-give more support to developers like adobe and others to upgrade their software to take advantage of GPU's we throw so much money on. What good is it to have a good computer and then software that can't even use that computer in it full potential except only few operations while majority of operations are still slow and laggy.
-give better support for 3D under OS X. Right now I'm watching like 9-30 FPS in Maya and Unity, and sometimes I even run some games to free my mind. WoW hardly reaches 60FPS on low settings while under windows bootcamp on same hardware I can get easily 60FPS! OS X still only has openGL 4.1, while we have there 4.3 and 4.4 GPU's out.
There has been almost one year since the release of this mac pro and nothing pretty much changed. This "pro" computer is actually pretty slow compared to what competition offers and the only good thing on mac is now the friendliness of OS X, stability and good integration with everything which windows lacks. But overall it's a very slow system to work on. Apple promised much but we got nothing of it except high price tag and a lot of lost nerves!
I'm very very disappointed in apple right now and really considering switching back to normal PC where at least I get latest drivers for everything and things at least runs at normal frame rate I can work with.
And don't even let me start on new Yosemite "flat" look which they obviously copied from windows and it is ugly as ****. Instead of changing icons they should fix old mac problems and give us professionals more to work with. In reality we get slapped and pushed on the edge. Don't try and make professional multimedia computer if you can't support it!

Deciding between iMac and Mac Pro

My current desktop computer (a PC) is basically dead. It is under extended warrenty but the custom build place I got it from tells me nothing is covered (because of their negligence but they won't admit that) And basically they want me to pay out of pocket for a brand new computer.
However after having a Macbook Pro for a year and loving it I decided to just change my desktop over to a Mac which I want to purchase by the end of October (or if this computer gives out before then earlier) However I just can't decide between an iMac or a Mac Pro.
The 2 big things are video editing at the moment just Final Cut Express and gaming when/if I get a chance. The iMac I'm looking at is the 3.06 GHz, with 4 GB ram, and a Geforce 8800GS video card. On the Mac Pro side it'd be more or less the Stock Mac Pro with 2.8 GHZ Quad core x2, 4 GB Ram, and I'd purchase the ATI HD 3870 video card for it.
The other difficulty is I do need a new monitor as well with the iMac a new monitor isn't an issue but with the Mac Pro it's extra and I guess I'm trying to debate if the difference between the 2 computers is really worth the cost. I'd like for the new computer to last me 3-4 years maybe a bit longer so it's just a matter of which is better for my needs. Is the Mac Pro really worth it over the iMac? I know I cant replace anything in the iMac but if it can do me for awhile I don't see why that'd be a downside
The other factor is, buying at the end of october, is it wise or should I try and get as much life out of my dead PC and try and wait for the next iMac/Mac Pro refresh?
Thank you to everyone who replies with their opinions.

The biggest advantage of the MacPro is its expandability. Yes, it is faster too, but is the speed difference worth the extra cost? Looking at what you can expand in a MacPro (unlike PCs which can be swapped out component by component until nothing but the case is original equipment) I decided that expandability was too limited to be worth the price and the speed increase wasn't either.
In the past I'd bought a Mac tower and kept it 5 years, over those five years upgrading the graphics card, swapping out the CPU, bigger drives, etc. I looked at the MacPro and concluded there wasn't much I would or could do to expand it other than a bigger hard drive or more hard drives and more memory. Maybe a better graphics card. Meanwhile, I could buy an iMac, keep it for 2 1/2 years, sell it, buy a new iMac and keep it for 2 1/2 years and wind up spending less (thanks to the high resale values of Macs).

Mac pro 12 core or a top spec iMac?

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