Mac Pro Drive Configuration - Home User

Hi all
I'm trying to determine the 'best' drive configuration for my needs... I'm not a pro-user (although, I do use DVDSP and Motion for some DVDs I make from EyeTV) and so I don't think I want to set up a RAID or anything like that... here's a little background
I was recently having my MP operate really slowly (in terms of disk paging) because of my boot drive (a Seagate ST3500630AS at 3.AAC) was
1) Rather full - < 100GB free - lesser impact, I think
2) Some directory corruption - drive stopped booting from diskarb error
I was able to resolve the issue by wiping out the drive and it's working much better now.... but the whole thing got me thinking about my config... I had pretty much just been 'slapping' drives in as I needed drive space (I have the shipping 250GB, my old 200GB Seagat, a new ST3500630AS and a FW800 500GB Maxtor)
I've been doing some reading and it seems that it's optimal to not have one's boot drive have anything but the OS (w VM swap files too, right) and Applications... it seems that the two best options are either a WD 'Raptor' (either 74GB or 150GB) or a Maxtor Maxline III to serve as the boot drive... I understand why the 'Raptor' is a better option (compared to my ST3500630AS - faster RPM) but why is the Maxtor (laying aside the firmware issue on the ST3500630AS)? Is it because the Maxtor's are supposed to be better at handling small files (the OS and the swap files are that, right?)? It seems to me that the 'Raptor' isn't the option I want to choose because I don't think I actually 'need' it... 74GB seems a little small to me (but perhaps not) while the 150GB seems a bit expensive when considering if I even 'need' the 'Raptor'
I'm anticipating that the Maxtor MaxLine III will be what I want to get for my boot drive... how would I want to back that up? Does it really matter if it's external? Someone had mentioned that you can do it to a disk image but then how do I boot off of that if I have an issue? Or is that just for the purpose of 'snapshotting' the system?
As I mentioned, I have the ST3500630AS and the external FW800 500GB Maxtor... they're a perfect match in size and I like having access to all of my home data on an external drive... that way if my MP dies (as my old G5s did), I can simply connect my FW drive to my old PBG4 and I'm up and running without a hitch... but I'm a little peeved about the whole firmware thing and the handicapped performance (is there anyway I can address this or should this drive be relegated to a backup status?)...
Another question - the Seagate's have the new perpendicular technology... it seems to me that people aren't that concerned about it - I thought it was supposed to be a really good thing?
What would people do in my shoes? If a solution needs more than one additional drive - I am game for ditching my smaller existing SATA drives.... Any and all suggestions would most appreciated...
Thanks!

The only real answer to your question is to do what you want. There is no such thing as an "optimal" configuration or "best" drive because what's optimal is dependent upon what you do and need. The best drive depends upon what you want from the drive.
The Raptors are very fast but also very expensive. About twice the cost of a Maxtor Maxline Pro. However, if you feel the need for speed on your startup drive, then the Raptor is what you want. If you would rather compromise between speed, storage space, and noise then the Maxtor is a good choice. However, Seagate purchased Maxtor some time ago. The Maxtor Maxline Pro drives are being phased out (in the 300 GB and larger sizes) so as not to compete with Seagate's line of products.
You can find useful benchmark tests on hard drives at http://www.barefeats.com/ and http://www.storagereview.com/.
Personally, I would configure the system in such a way that you have sufficient storage space on one or two separate drives that can be used to backup the rest of the system. As an example, in my system I use three 300 GB Maxtor Maxline Pros (this system was setup last September.) One drive is used as my main startup drive. The other two are configured as a mirrored RAID. I use the RAID as the backup for the main startup drive. The mirrored RAID provides both backup and redundancy for added data protection. I use backup software (Synchronize! Pro X) to perform automated backups on a daily, weekly (entire Users folder,) and monthly (entire drive) basis.
Of more importance than drive configuration is maintaining your system for optimal performance:
Kappy's Personal Suggestions for OS X Maintenance
For disk repairs use Disk Utility. For situations DU cannot handle the best third-party utilities are: Disk Warrior; DW only fixes problems with the disk directory, but most disk problems are caused by directory corruption; Disk Warrior 4.0 is now Intel Mac compatible. TechTool Pro provides additional repair options including file repair and recovery, system diagnostics, and disk defragmentation. TechTool Pro 4.5.2 is Intel Mac compatible; Drive Genius is similar to TechTool Pro in terms of the various repair services provided. The current version, 1.5.1, is Intel Mac compatible.
OS X performs certain maintenance functions that are scheduled to occur on a daily, weekly, or monthly period. The maintenance scripts run in the early AM only if the computer is turned on 24/7 (no sleep.) If this isn't the case, then an excellent solution is to download and install a shareware utility such as Macaroni, JAW PseudoAnacron, or Anacron that will automate the maintenance activity regardless of whether the computer is turned off or asleep.
OS X automatically defrags files less than 20 MBs in size, so unless you have a disk full of very large files there's little need for defragmenting the hard drive. As for virus protection there are few if any such animals affecting OS X. You can protect the computer easily using the freeware Open Source virus protection software ClamXAV. Personally I would avoid most commercial anti-virus software because of their potential for causing problems.
I would also recommend downloading the shareware utility TinkerTool System that you can use for periodic maintenance such as removing old logfiles and archives, clearing caches, etc.
For emergency repairs install the freeware utility Applejack. If you cannot start up in OS X, you may be able to start in single-user mode from which you can run Applejack to do a whole set of repair and maintenance routines from the commandline.
When you install any new system software or updates be sure to repair the hard drive and permissions beforehand. I also recommend booting into safe mode before doing system software updates.
Get an external Firewire drive at least equal in size to the internal hard drive and make (and maintain) a bootable clone/backup. You can make a bootable clone using the Restore option of Disk Utility. You can also make and maintain clones with good backup software. My personal recommendations are (order is not significant):
1. Retrospect Desktop (Commercial - not yet universal binary)
2. Synchronize! Pro X (Commercial)
3. Synk (Backup, Standard, or Pro)
4. Deja Vu (Shareware)
5. PsynchX 2.1.1 and RsyncX 2.1 (Freeware)
6. Carbon Copy Cloner (Freeware - 3.0 is a Universal Binary)
7. SuperDuper! (Commercial)
The following utilities can also be used for backup, but cannot create bootable clones:
1. Backup (requires a .Mac account with Apple both to get the software and to use it.)
2. Toast
3. Impression
4. arRSync
Apple's Backup is a full backup tool capable of also backing up across multiple media such as CD/DVD. However, it cannot create bootable backups. It is primarily an "archiving" utility as are the other two.
Impression and Toast are disk image based backups, only. Particularly useful if you need to backup to CD/DVD across multiple media.
Visit The XLab FAQs and read the FAQs on maintenance, optimization, virus protection, and backup and restore.
Additional suggestions will be found in Mac Maintenance Quick Assist.
Referenced software can be found at www.versiontracker.com and www.macupdate.com.

Similar Messages

Mac Pro drive configuration/expansion advice for Time Machine

I have the following:
Mac Pro 1Tb internal drive (2 x 500Gb in software RAID, so 2 drive bays used, 2 free)
500Gb external drive (Formac XTR platinum - 2 x 250Gb in RAID)
I use SuperDuper to backup the internal to the external - I'm using about 440Gb on the internal and this fits on the external with about 10-20Gb spare. However, my usage of the internal drive is growing, and as Time Machine backups grow in size, my 500Gb external will very quickly lose the ability to go back in time and shortly afterwards run out of space for even a simple backup.
My options are:
1. Buy 2 500Gb IDE drives and upgrade the external to 1Tb - Cost about £140. If I put the redundant 250Gb drives in enclosures and sell them, net cost would come down to about £100
2. Buy single 750Gb SATA drive and install internally for TM backups - cost £110. Sell external drive and cost comes down to about £40
3. Buy 2 500Gb SATA drives and install inside Mac Pro for Time Machine - Cost about £130. Sell external and cost about £60
4. Buy single 1Tb SATA drive and install internally for TM backups - cost £200. Sell external and cost about £130
Pros & Cons
Option 1 - Con: Left with untidy external enclosure. Pro - 2 internal bays free for expansion.
Option 2 - Con: Less internal expansion, Pro: No untidy external box, can add another 750Gb drive when required
Option 3 - Con: No internal expansion. Pro: Ermmm, not sure.
Option 3 - Con: Most expensive. Pro: Longer time required before need to add another drive.
I know external drives are useful for off-site backups but I do have a 160Gb and a 320Gb external drives for that purpose (and for TM'ing my MacBook).
I think I've answered my own question - get a 750Gb SATA drive and stick it inside.
Regards,
Steve

I am in a similar situation. I have a 160gb for my boot/system drive and two 500gb for data, backed up to two other 500gb drives. Both 500gb drives are about 80% full and I bring in 50 or gig a week, paring it down quite a bit, then importing new photos and culling them out again. I may replace my 160 backup drive for my boot partition with a 750gig, but I don't see Time Machine being capable of backing up a 500 or 750gig drive that had several hundred gigs of current data and moves gig after gig onto and then out of the hard drive. I think Time Machine will be really great for many many people, and if it allows me to "roll back" my system to an earlier known-good point in time even better than my current method of using superduper when I feel my system is stable, then Time Machine will be great for me too, but I don't see how it's going to be usable for data backup for heavy professional photographic work or for video backup where large amounts of data are entered, deleted, entered again, deleted, etc etc. There isn't enough anectodal information on Time Machine to know what size is going to be really required, but I think most folks will be surprised at how much room is going to be needed - especially those that use their machines heavily. Mom and Dad who do nothing but a few emails and surfing the web will have no problem, Mac Pro users involved with grahics and video...not so easy I'm afraid. Time will tell.

Log into TC Drive and Mac Pro Drive

I am able to log into my Mac Pro's drives, when file sharing is turned on in the OSX preferences, over the wan using TC which is very cool. Port forwarding works as it should. I use the Connect to Server under the Go menu , all is good. However, is it possible to access both the Mac Pro Drives and TC's internal drive from the wan? I don't need to access them simultaneously. But it would be nice to log into one or the other at will.
It seems that if file sharing is turned in the OSX preferences. I cannot log into TC's drive even though File Sharing and wan are both turned on under the Disk tab in TC. By the way, I have assigned a different name and password to the TC disk.
Does anyone know how this is done, or if it can be done?

I need to reply to my own message. As I mentioned at top of this post I am able to get into my Mac Pro’s drives using file sharing just fine. (read above) I now can get to TC hard drive as well with this set up. I know the IP address of TC. XXXX.XXXX.XXXX.XXXX found in the Internet Connection tab of the Internet menu in AirPort. Lets say its 12.12.12.12
I set up AirPort this way:
Disks -> File Sharing. Check both Enable file sharing and Share disks over Ethernet WAN port.
Disks -> Accounts. Click on the + to add a User
Enter a name and password, set the File Sharing Access to Read and Write
Click Done
Advanced -> Port Mapping then Clicked the + to add a new port
I did nothing with the Service dropdown. Although I enjoyed gazing at it.
Set Public UDP Port(s) XXXX (4 digit number lets say 7878)
Set Public TCP Port(s) 7878 (same number as Public UDP, 7878)
Set Private IP Address to the IP address of my Mac Pro
Set Private UDP Port(s) to 548
Set Private TCP Port(s) to 548
Clicked Continue and entered Description name Clicked done then Update
On my Mac Pro
I turned on File Sharing from the Preferences -> Sharing Panel
I drove to the office, which is generally how I get there. Powered up my Mac. Clicked Go -> Connect to Server. From the Desktop menu.
To connect to TC hard drive:
In the Server Address: field I entered afp://12.12.12.12 then Clicked Connect.
In the Name field I entered the user name and Password from the Disks -> Accounts dialogue in AirPort Utility (the stuff I set up earlier).
I Clicked Connect and saw my TC’s drive.
To connect to my Mac Pro’s Drives
In the Server Address: field I entered afp://12.12.12.12:7878 (followed by the port number I set up earlier. From the Advanced -> Port Mapping in AirPort)
In the Name field I entered the name of the login on I use on my Mac Pro and its password
Clicked Connect and saw all 5 drives installed in my Mac Pro
I sat put back, put my hands behind my head and smiled. Shear poetry. And that’s why I buy apple.
Message was edited by: mkj
Message was edited by: mkj

Can my Mac Pro drive my MacBook?

Can my Mac Pro drive my MacBook so i use the MacBook monitor/keyboard but the MacPro’s hard drives, software? How do I do it?

There's a free and much simpler way than Apple Remote Desktop since that is enterprise level software (for schools and businesses.)
All you have to do is go into the Sharing system preference on your Mac Pro and turn on Screen Sharing.
Then you connect to your Mac Pro from your MacBook desktop. On the MacBook in the Finder desktop, go into Network, select the Mac Pro, and there will be a button at the top of the Finder window for screen sharing. Click it, log in, and you will be controlling the Mac Pro from the MacBook.

Home Network - MB Pro/PC/Mac Pro - Can't see an internal Mac Pro Drive

Hi folks... I'm the MacBook Pro user in the house.
3 drives in the Mac Pro - One is FAT32 formatted.
It has all the shared movies/music for the house on it (PC user also uses it)
I can't access the internal FAT32 drive from my macbook pro... all on leopard, no probs in seeing the other 2 drives on the mac pro.
any solutions?

Hmm.
Can the PC see the drive?
Is the Mac Pro running Leopard?
~Lyssa

Pro Mac Pro Tip for Lion Users

Been frustrated with your Mac Pro since upgrading to Lion? Maybe I can help.
I’ve spent the last few months just hating OS X Lion. I thought Apple should have given it a better nickname, like “System Hang” or “Patience is a Virtue.” I spent more time starring at the dreaded spinning beach ball of death than I did getting work done. Where I once kept open as many browser windows and tabs as I liked, I began closing everything I didn’t absolutely need right then. Aperture 3, which I adore, had become impossible to use.
Things had gotten so frustrating, I was seriously thinking about doing a clean system install — something I used to have to do every 6-12 months with Windows, and was one of the reasons I made the switch.
But there were other things I could do to speed things up, and here they are in no particular order:
• Replace system HDD with a super fast SSD. But that’s expensive, and a hassle. First you have to clone your existing system on it, and all four of my drive bays are full. So I’d have to put the SSD in a FireWire-freindly enclosure, clone it the slow way, then swap it in for the HDD.
• Put in a faster video card. This seemed the least-likely to do any good, and I’m not exactly taxing the card this machine shipped with more than two years ago.
• New CPU. I could install a non-sanctioned EFI update, and swap out my quad-core Xeon for something sexier. But not only is that expensive, it also voids my warranty.
• More memory! This is usually the go-to upgrade. It’s easy. It isn’t very expensive. And even if it doesn’t do a whole lot, you know you want it anyway.
Now, this Xeon processor has three memory channels, but the motherboard has four memory slots. If you fill all four, your memory takes a speed hit — but you can fit in more memory. If you use just three matched memory sticks, the processor can take full advantage of its memory architecture.
When I bought this box, I also picked up four 2GB memory sticks. I figured I could try it both ways: 3 sticks for 6GB of faster access or all 4 for 8GB of restricted access. Under previous versions of OS X — Leopard and Snow Leopard — things ran faster and smoother with the full 8GB.
Well let me tell you: Lion does not like slow memory. Not one bit.
Yesterday I ditched all four 2GB sticks and replaced them with three 4GB sticks. The 50% increase in memory space is a nice bit of room for Lion to run around in, but I’m wagering that leaving that fourth slot unfilled was what really did the trick. Because let me tell you, right now this Lion roars. All the bad things I said about Lion? I take them all back. And if you’re a frustrated Mac Pro/Lion user, heed my advice.
At this very moment, I’m looking at email, 40 or 50 browser tabs in six windows, my calendar and iTunes blown up to full screen, ripping a Blu-Ray and crunching it down to 720p at 30fps, sorting through more than 2,000 RAW images in Aperture, doodling around with three different Pages documents, and two Christmas shopping spreadsheets — all strewn across nine virtual desktops, while in the background iTunes is serving up two video streams to Apple TVs upstairs and Time Machine is cranking away to keep my data safe.
My Mac is a Mac again.

Hi ...
Avoid MacKeeper. Results of an ASC forum search for MacKeeper > Community Search: Apple Support Comments are discouraging for the most part. You don't need third party utlities installed to take care of your Mac. For the most part they do more harm than good.
Not enough free space on the startup disk can slow the system down.
Right or control click the MacintoshHD icon. Click Get Info. In the Get Info window you will see Capacity and Available. Make sure there's a minimum of 15% free disk space.
Disabling the Lion "resume" feature may help.
Open System Preferences > General
Deselect: Restore windows when quitting and re-opening apps
You can use Lion Recovery to repair the startup disk and reinstall the Mac OS X.

Mac Pro RAID configuration advice needed to address photography workflow

I am a semi-professional photographer and I am moving off a Windows machine and over to a Mac Pro.
I am waiting for the new Mac Pro to arrive and have purchased (4) 500GB SATA drives to replace the 250GB drive the system will arrive with.
I am considering setting up drive #1 as a stand alone boot drive. The second and third drives would be set up in a RAID 0 config and the 4th drive set up as a RAID 1 drive which would mirror the content on my RAID 0 set of drives to automatically backup the content on drives 2 & 3.
I think it would be beneficial if I describe my image processing workflow briefly so that you can understand why I am considering this RAID configuration (I've never set up a RAID configuration in the past so this is all new to me).
Image Processing Workflow
It isn't uncommon for me to return from a photo shoot with an 8GB Compact Flash card full (approx 750 8mb RAW files).
1) I plan on uploading my card to the boot drive (#1) where I would hold them temporarily.
2) I would sort thru the images and trash 80% immediately in most cases.
3) Next I would open up the "keepers" and do the initial post processing in Adobe RAW and save them to drives 2 & 3 (the RAID 0 set).
4) Further post processing (the heavy lifting and the most taxing operations in Photoshop and associated filters) would take place as I access these files from the RAID 0 set of drives.
5) All of my files would be mirrored to drive 4 as I work them. Once post-processing is complete I would copy the files from drive #4 (RAID 1)to an additional external 500GB drive for archiving purposes and then eventually delete the files from drive #1 and the RAID 0 set.
6) Once drive #4 (and the external drive) is nearly filled I would pull both and archive them and replace both with fresh drives.
Is there anything wrong with taking this approach? Can a single drive be set up in a RAID 1 configuration to mirror a set of drives in a RAID 0 configuration?
Is there anything else I should be considering?
Thanks for any assistance you guys can provide! I appreciate it!!

For the purposes of 500GB drives in RAID, I would go with WD RE2. they format to 465GB and performance falls off @ 65% and beyond anyway.
I even "short-stroke" drives to just 60% and then stay within 1/3 full - if I want to insure the maximum I/O.
Memory: 4GB is pretty much minimum but using more than 8GB isn't efficient. Ideal: 4 x 2GB.
Shame that the Hitachi 1TB drive costs over $399 for now, fast and might be better than 10K Raptor. There are also 750GB drives for $249, but the RE2 isn't quite ready to ship.
Never want to get into using 75% or more usually, though large (8-20 drives) RAIDs can hold sustained I/O for video editing and multiple streams.
One 750GB or 1TB (930GB formatted, 800GB "usable") might make sense.
How about a SATA drive case w/ hot-swap. Think of 1TB "floppy" if you will :-)) Unlimited archiving of projects.
All you want is an inexpensive eSATA 1x 2-channel PM controller and any cases. Two drives that you can use drive trays as needed.
there are also 'spare' drive sleds if you want to have the option of popping a drive out, and use it internally. $29 each or $49 a pair.
http://www.xlr8yourmac.com - link to TransIntl site
Vista 64-bit can or does work quite well now on Mac Pro... if you ever get into a jam and just need to. SP1 by end of the year will even have more support for UEFI 2.0 (Apple uses Intel EFI 1.1).

Best Mac Pro (2013) configuration for photo editing/processing?

Hi all,
I couldn't find a reliable answer to this in my searching here or on google, hence I'm posting it here.
I'm going to buy and upgrade to the new mac pro when it's announced this month (Dec 2013). My primary use will be photo processing in photoshop.
Configuring it with 64gb RAM is the no-brainer part. And probably a 512gb or 1TB flash drive too.
The bit I'm unsure about is whether to opt for the 6 core processor option over the quad core? For photo editing (adding layers, filters, brushing in, multiple files open at times, running batch edits etc), does anyone have an opinion on whether the performance increase (if there is in fact any increase for photo work?) of the 6 core 3.5ghz would justify paying the extra AU$1300 difference over the quad core 3.7ghz option?
And from my earlier research paying the huge prices for 8 or 12 cores would simply be a waste for photo processing.
Thanks for the advice...

Mozzzaaa
I have the exact same requirements, here are my findings based on some observations from Activity Monitor and research based on how the hardware works.
Photoshop does not utilize multiple cores well for many standard editing ativities - therefore one core will be busy while the rest remain idle, however I have noticed over time that upgrades to Photoshop seem to take more advantage of multiple cores as Adobe updates the code. For example, appling filters utilize all of the cores while the filters are computing changes (smart sharpen for example). Try running CPU monitoring in Activity Monitor (double click the CPU graph to display all cores).
Lightroom utilizes all of the cores for Import, export and other activities that process multiple files. Being more modern code, it beter utilizes muti cores.
Keep in mind that each core handles two code threads, therefore a four core system is capable of processing 8 "streams" of code, the 6 core can manage 12 threads, etc.
Here is a screen shot of Mac Book Pro running PS CC Smart Sharpen:
All the new Mac Pro run at 3.9Hz Turbo Boost - they are all the same in that respect. This means that when the processers are not hot, at least one core will run at 3.9Hz - therefore on a relativly idle machine (just editing in PS for example) you would likley be running at 3.9Hz on all the Mac Pro 2013.
There are also the GPUs to consider. Apple as usual has not made enough information available to easly determine the cost benefits of the more powerful GPUs and I don't know if PS would utiliize the AMD GPUs well now, or perhaps better utilize them for the future. Perhaps someone could comment on that. Here is an interesting article: http://architosh.com/2013/10/the-mac-pro-so-whats-a-d300-d500-and-d700-anyway-we -have-answers/
Clearly the D500 that is standard with the 6 core seems a major bump over the 4 core D300 (therefore the costs of the 6 core reflect that). I don't know how much the D700 would cost - it would be helpful if this were published so I could consider my order.
There are two GPU in the new Mac Pros - but the purpose of the second one is not toally clear (thanks again to Apples's communication). It likley will be utilized for all sorts of things that don't really exist now and FCP X is scheduled for a new release better utilize the GPU for video (as nwaphoto mentioned video processing will be a major use of this equipment).
I was interested in your comment regarding 64 Meg ram. Yes that would be a hudge boost to PS performance, but would it be better to purchase from Apple or wait for OWC who offer RAM at major discounts over Apple. Once again, no info yet that I am aware of.
I believe the flash drive is upgradable but rumor has it that it uses a proprietary connecter. Makes me want to go with the largest size but once again OWC might be the way to go for an upgrade in a year or two.
In the past, the 6 core 2012 Mac Pro's were somewhat of a sweat spot in terms of horsepower vs cost. I will be considering that in my decession to upgrade. So I am considering a 6 core, will check out the Ram and Flash diIsk based on price - which is the infor I don't have. If you have anything please post
Thanks

New Mac Pro Tower Configuration

Hi
I am currently looking at purchasing a new Mac Pro Desktop Tower to run CS 5.5. I am planning to use it for longer video projects with premier and AE. I would also be using audition to some extent.
I don't think that I can afford to go with a twelve core version of the Mac Pro, but I am wondering what is the best way to configure the ram/processor/video card?
Also are there any compatability issues with OSX Lion?
Any help will do.
Thanks

While the case for building a PC is strong and valid, and while I would build a PC if I needed a new system right now, I also understand the needs of some institutions to build a Mac. Here is my advice in that regard:
1. You don't need dual processors. I have a single 6-core 3.33GHz chip in my 2009 Mac Pro (which I upgraded myself) and it handles heavy work in Premiere and After Effects CS5.
2. Don't buy any RAM from Apple. With the price of hard drives today, it isn't such a big deal to have Apple install extra drives for you, but if you're even slightly technically inclined, you can install more RAM and hard drives for less if you shop and buy from other vendors. There is a great Mac-specialty website where I buy my RAM from called OWC (Other World Computing link) that has excellent deals and service. I think 24GB is minimum ($322), and 32GB is better... only $425 right now.
3. If you have the budget, a proper third party RAID card is a much better deal and performer than Apple's Mac Pro RAID Card, so don't waste your money there unless you really want to limit yourself to an internal RAID 5 of no more than four disks. I got by with a 3-drive RAID (AID) 0 stripe of disks for a year before needing to expand to a proper RAID. With three Apple drives striped together, you'll get a sustained data throughput of 330MB/sec both read and write speed, which is good enough to edit some HD video. I edited a feature-length film shot on P2 at 108060i/24p using only three internal Apple 1TB disks, with backups to external drives holding a safety net for my data.
4. You don't need to buy an NVIDIA /CUDA card (Quadro 4000). I have the 5870 from Apple, and I can edit DSLR 5DMkII footage in smooth real-time, but that is helped by the 32GB of RAM and fast RAID. I have a CUDA card, an older GTX285, and while it was good for Premiere, I felt it was slower than the 5870 in After Effects, which is where I spend more time rendering anyway.
I'm not sure how much weight you'll be placing on student projects being safe from loss in the event of a drive failure, but you could either have them back their projects up themselves on their own external drives, or build a robust RAID. I have an Areca RAID card that runs eight 2TB disks in RAID6, which yields 12TB of very fast data that is also still safe if any two of the eight drives fails before being replaced. Depending on the number of students using the system, it could cost less to build a similar RAID than have each student buy their own drives. Question is, does the school eat that cost of security for the students, or let them shoulder that cost themselves?
I was a film school student myself, and I know what it's like to sign up for a four-hour block on a limited number of edit suites. You want the system to run faster than the students, so they can be creative without wasting their time slot waiting for the computer.
With your education discount from Apple, you should be able to get a 6-core 2010 Mac Pro, RAM, disks (and RAID if you go that route) from 3rd parties about $6000... much less if you skip the RAID system. If I can help in any way, let me know. I love my system, even if I could build it in a PC today at half the cost. Adobe works the same (or better) on a PC as it does on a Mac once you're in the software, but if you have to go Apple and can't wait for what may come out in the future, consider a system like mine.
2009 Mac Pro (updated to 2010 firmware... you'd buy a 2010 and not worry about that.)
3.33GHz 6-core CPU
ATI Radeon HD 5870 (still runs software acceleration very nicely)
32GB RAM @1333MHz
(4) internal hard disks (1=OS X, Adobe CS5, 2+3=RAID0 (stripe) for scratch files, 4=other backups and storage)
Areca 1880ix-12 RAID card
Sans Digital 8-bay tower
(8) 2TB WD RE-4 hard disks in RAID6 = 12TB parity array (sustained 816MB/sec write, 714MB/sec read speeds)
Various backups in external disks.
Good luck!

Mac Pro drive confiuration

I'm about to buy a new MacPro box, the base Mac Pro 2.8 Quad.
I have a 26" NEC monitor, hoping to add the 30" NEC to that. Also have an e-SATA 5 bay Burley external enclosure.
Will be running PS CS5, Lightroom, C1, some Premiere/FCP plus the usual business related software that doesn't push the hardware too much. I'm concentrating on the photography aspect here, not the video.
I'm a pro photographer, but running a business, so trying to build to what I need, while keeping a hard eye on budget.
Shoot 99.9% RAW files, DSLR 21MP + hi res film scan and medium format (45MP) RAW. Current LR catalog has 25,000 image files.
I'm now down to deciding on the drive configuration. Would love to hear any comments or suggestion on how to simplify or make this more efficient etc.
Put in after market RAM to bring up to 24MB as 3x8MB chips, so I can later add another 8MB chip to make it 32MB total (4x8MB).
Stick with the base video card in the base 2010 MacPro.
BOOT (System + Apps) - OWC SSD drive 240GB - also set as scratch drive AND have Lightroom Previews and Catalog.
QUESTION - enough room for scratch and for LR Previews and Catalogs?
4 internal drive HD bays set up as:
MASTER 2x2TB HD's set-up as RAID-0 stripe - all working files
TIME MACHINE 2x2TB HD's set-up as RAID-1 Mirror - back up of MASTER and
QUESTION - can I manually have Time Machine back up my LR Previews and Catalog from the SSD Boot drive they are on?
External Burley 5 bay.
Set-up as "ARCHIVE". Images files that are not in current active use. As soon as a job is finished and delivered, files are moved from MASTER to ARCHIVE.
ARCHIVE 1 - 2 TB HD
ARCHIVE 1 (Backup) - 2 TB HD
Bays 3-5 remain empty and fill with drives as Archive increases.
Any comments, suggestions, improvements, flaws in my reasoning?
Thanks!

I wondered if you'd be able to pop it into the optical slot, but didn't know. Will the adapter slow it down?
Yep, the consensus is that right now, SSD's should not be used where a lot of small writes/reads/writes are being done. Fragmentation turns out to be a really really big problem.
Hmm... here's a non-technical article that shows why: http://www.bit-tech.net/hardware/apple/2010/07/01/mac-ssd-performance-trim-in-osx/1
End result, using it for something like a preview cache or scratch disk is contraindicated.
What you're doing for backups makes reasonable sense, as long as you realize that you will lose the entire backup with one failure, and will have to take immediate action to recover from another source and restore that one segment of your backup. The biggest fault I have with Raid1 (mirroring) is that you can actually lose both disks if you aren't watching carefully. Raid1 will read from whichever drive is responding fast enough/has the correct data. So if you have (for simple example) two drives and 5 things on them... the first drive might go back in section 1, the second drive might go bad in section 3... and unless you make sure to notice, you could cascade the failure and lose both of them at once.
I haven't seen it happen, but have seen it come close. Lost both drives a week apart. I had just enough time to get a new drive in for the first one (didn't have one on site as I figured I had time, right?) and get it installed and copied, when I lost the second one. Fun. Switched to Raid5 and have a spare disk onsite.
But with 2 levels of local and offsite backups, the most likely scenario is you will probably lose only a day's work (depending on what goes bad when you notice).
Oh, and keep in mind: DVD/CD backups are only good for between 5 and 10 years... Then you need to rewrite/copy to make SURE it keeps integrity.
Cheers!

New Mac Pro (2010) Configuration for Photoshop

Multiple questions for this august body of knowledge holders...
Consider the following problem statement:
---->> "To purchase a new Mac Pro as a *Photoshop / Aperture* rocket sled."
Now the questions:
1 Is the 6 core 3.33 GHz option the best CPU option? Can Photoshop make use of more (slower) cores?
2 What about the video card? Stock card (ATI Radeon HD 5770) Or are there gains to be had springing for the upgrade (ATI Radeon HD 5870)?
3 What about RAM - go for 24GB (8GB modules) or 32GB? Apple says limit is 16GB, aftermarket seems to think 32GB is limit (4GB vs 8GB modules) ( I've heard some say use only the first three RAM slots - the 3rd and 4th slot use the same bus and are therefore slower...true? )
4 Last question: Storage. Who makes the most reliable hard (2TB) drive? Seagate? WD? Other?
Thanks, in advance, to all those who provide brilliant advice!

I think it depends on your needs as to what will be optimal.
No to PS being very well threaded at all.
So GHz rule. So do SSDs! and RAM helps as long as you work with large files.
3 x 8GB is fine. Apple never lists the max RAM or drive capacity.
$200 BTO for 5870 now rather than later.
Hitachi, OWC SSD, WD.
http://macperformanceguide.com/index_topics.html
Even the 4-core 3.2GHz might do just fine and better $$ investment.
Or this 3.33 2009 Special
http://store.apple.com/us/product/G0G81LL/A?mco=MTcyMDg3MDQ
http://twitter.com/diglloyd

Apple part number for newer Mac Pro drive carriers?

I need to get my hands on some drive carriers for the newer Mac Pro. Does anyone have a part number and/or a source to get them?
Greg

Thanks Richard. Very helpful indeed. I see at $47 each, they're probably making a killing. Not much cheaper than some drives Glad my company is buying them and not me.
Cheers,
Greg

Intel Mac Pro Drive Selection

What would be the best internal drive for the mac pro and HD/HDV editing? I would like to but a pair and stripe them together. I use FCP 5.1.4. I am considering the Seagate 1TB barracudas. Any suggestions? Would I be better off by buying a g-tech g-raid2?

That would be a Seagate ST31000340AS, correct?
That's what I put into all my systems. They benchmark anywhere from 102 to 112 MB/sec in the 2008 MacPros. I've installed a lot of these for my clients - no failures yet.
http://www.zipzoomfly.com/jsp/ProductDetail.jsp?ProductCode=10005936&prodlist=ce lebros
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822148274
Message was edited by: Brian Conner

Mac Pro Drive

Does Writing and deleting files off the Mac Pro reduces the performance of the Drive with time? and If so how are we to maintain it?? How To Format it? etc ...

Aim for 50% on your drives. Especially your system's. On data drives you can go higher. The free space is what can often get highly fragmented rather than files and OS X does not try to consolidate.
I am slightly opposed to defragging itself, there is another method.
Clone the drive and pull the old drive. The clone is now your new system or data volume and the old drive is your backup.
How to format? Generally with Disk Utility ERASE tab.
How to Clone a Volume
Using Cloning as a Backup Strategy

NEW Mac Pro - best configuration

I'm going to purchase the latest top of the line Mac Pro for my FCP and After Effects projects. Can someone suggest what configuration works the best - such as which graphics card and any other add-ons etc. Ideally I'd like to max the RAM but that costs too much. What RAM would suffice FCP and AE workflow?

For the moment, as far as I know, the ONLY benefit of the beefier graphics card in FCP is to speed handling of FxPlug plugins; other plugins, Unlimted RT and the rest of the code base of FCP are not affected by your choice of graphics card (and even with the FxPlug plugins I believe its only those that are coded specifically to leverage the GFX card hardware that will see a boost)
BUT (big but) the development of FCP does seem to be leaning towards increasing utilisation of the GPU, so a powerful graphics card may well be a very good investment
If you plan to use Motion at all then its a no brainer. Motion relies heavily on the GPU, the beefier the better.

Mac Pro Drive Configuration - Home User

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