Mac Pro or iMac

HI

I am new to the world of Macs and hope that this is the right area to post to.
I am in the market for a new Mac for use in a studio. It needs to run over a network as we use a NAS storage device for large scale storage. I also need it to comfortably run:
FCP pro studio 2
Shake
and be able to do Blue-Ray and High def editing. I have been looking at possibly 2 2.8ghz iMacs or a single 8 core Mac Pro. Whilst I understand that the Mac pro will perform far better than the iMac if theiMacs will do the job then having 2 would be far more convenient.

Any comments or thoughts appreciated


Dean

The iMac should be just fine. Bear in mind that the Mac Pro may NOT substantially outperform the iMac just because it has more cores. The actual speed difference per core between the Mac Pro and the iMac is only 0.2 GHz, or 7%. The cores are not the same of course, and the Penryn core used by the Mac Pro is reputed to get up to about 5% better performance in real life tasks, clock-for-clock, vs. the Core 2 Duo that the iMac uses. So, lets be generous and say that you will be up to 12% better raw throughput in the Mac Pro.

That may be it. The additional cores only count if the software you are using is coded to make use of them. If not, what you will find is that none of your cores ever achieve full occupancy even though your job (whatever it is) isn't going as fast as you would like. For example, if the software you are using is organized into four threads and you have 8 cores, you will see all 8 cores running, but only at about 50% occupancy. There was a post complaining of this very thing just a few days ago.

SO, it all comes down to the software you are using. The Mac Pro *will* run a little faster, and it does have a better video card, but unless your software can take advantage of the extra cores, it is not clear to me that the added expense of the Mac Pro makes sense vs. a 2.8 GHz iMac.

A member here does a lot of high end video editing. I think he said he can use 4GB of RAM without breaking a sweat. 4GB is the max on the iMac, 32GB is the max on the Pro.
The Pro is designed around video editing. I would get the Pro. It's a millions times more powerful.

Ahhhhh, RAM, of course. My bias (performance) is showing. Yes, I agree with bryphotoguy. For video editing, bags of RAM is essential, and you have far more options on the Mac Pro. For this particular use, I must admit that my original advice stinks! Go with the Mac Pro.

+Virtual rep bryphotoguy (it wouldn't let me give you any actual rep!)

Oh Mac57, sometimes I wonder about you...
The OP said he was thinking about getting the 2.8GHz iMac or 2.8GHz Pro. Where do you get this ".2GHz" difference?

The iMac actually runs a 2.6GHz processor overclocked to 2.8GHz. I don't how safe that is for long periods of intense use.
Also, the poster Mac57 mentioned that had some issues with Final Cut was using an 8-core and FC was only using 50% of its power. We figured FC only utilized 4 of the cores. We're not sure though. If you get the Pro, it should run at full strength.
What kind of app is Shake?

Thanks for the posts guys, It all helps. Shake is a 3D modelling/rendering app. I don't know how much it will get used as the users are fairly new to it. I believe it was the app used to create the "transformer" citreon C4 tv add.


From your post though Mac57 I think the Mac Pro is going to be the right choice and if I don't go too mad with options I may have the budget for 2 Pros as we currently have 3 users all trying to use a Macbook Pro, a 5yr old eMac and a G4. Sadly the older machines no longer seem to do the job.

Cheers
GDD

bryphotoguy said:

The iMac actually runs a 2.6GHz processor overclocked to 2.8GHz. I don't how safe that is for long periods of intense use.

Click to expand...

As a somewhat extreme overclocker on the the windows side of things, just an FYI:

Have a P4 3.4 Ghz, 4 years old this month. It has been running right at 3.9 Ghz for pretty much the entire 4 years - on air. It was a hot rig back then.

Of course I did change out the heat sink and lap it. Wasn't enough into it to go the water cooling route. Most of the people I knew that did go with water cooling were only able to manage about a 0.1 Ghz kick to what I was achieving on my set up. There were a couple that were able to reach close to 4.2.

That rig was used quite extensively as a DVR device. Has spent many an hour encoding (running at 100% CPU usage). And quite frankly, it still is a pretty good box. For encoding, it still blows away my MBP - even without using RAID0. (Have been O/C'g my rigs to some extent starting back with that first AMD chip I bought, the 100 Mhz I think.)

I just worry about Apple designs lately. They're choosing form over functionality. The iMac is a lot slimmer and it has the aluminum case now. With the extra heat, I wonder if Apple added any fans near the vents or not. I also wonder if the aluminum enclosure traps in more heat. Because it's an all-in-one system, the iMac has more heat coming from more places than your DVR device.
But the Core 2's run significantly cooler than P4's so maybe it will be ok. 200MHz isn't much of an overclock; it's just another thing to consider.

To the OP, I would definitely recommend the Pro if you'd be doing any 3D work. I don't know how long the graphics card in the iMac will cut it. I would recommend what I did: Order the Quad 2.8GHz with the 8800GT and don't upgrade anything else through Apple. If you need more RAM or a Blu-ray drive, visit OWC and if you want a larger or faster boot drive, go to newegg. Apple charges WAY too much for upgrades a monkey could do.