Greetings all—
I'm curious what people would advise. My imac is now officially so old that I cannot update to current OS's and so certain software is no longer running properly (or at all). In short: it is no longer sufficient to be my daily driver at home. Because it is limited to 32gb ram (I believe it was the year after mine where OWC kits could push it to 64) I don't want to keep it as a dedicated HW computer, partly because of form-factor and partly because I've always felt limited with 32gb ram.
Now, we also need to update our laptops which are the same vintage. As much as I would looooooove to order one of the new base-model mac studio's with 64gb ram, it's $2600 and with an eye to the fact that at least one laptop needs immediate replacement too, I'm trying to be budget conscious. My wife has agreed to spending money on a dedicated HW computer with sufficient ram, because if we give my console its own computer, then we can get a more... "reasonable" daily driver. For ordinary tasks, we won't need computers with enormous amounts of ram.
Here's where I've landed:
For approximately the same cost, I can source either a 2018 mac mini (6 core i7 3.2hz) with a 1tb HD and 64gb ram, OR, a "trash can" mac pro with 1-2 tb HD and 128 gb ram, 12 core xeon 2.7hz.
I know that the mac pro is quite a bit older, but I've never been repulsed by its design, and they are powerful enough to update to the current macOS. My thought is that in either case, I will get myself all set up on the new machine and it will be a dedicated HW machine, so it's ok if it doesn't continue to update for a while. It can be a bit of a time-capsule, as it were, since I will even disconnect it from the internet.
I like the idea of the older mac pro just because I can get 128gb ram; by the same token, it's only 1066hz ram, and the single-core clock speed is slower than the intel mac mini.
Any advice or accounts of lived experience with either machine would be very appreciated. I know some people use the minis and like them. I was a *little* concerned that 6 cores wouldn't be enough to drive sets that nearly max out the ram though. Perhaps I'm wrong.
I'm curious what people would advise. My imac is now officially so old that I cannot update to current OS's and so certain software is no longer running properly (or at all). In short: it is no longer sufficient to be my daily driver at home. Because it is limited to 32gb ram (I believe it was the year after mine where OWC kits could push it to 64) I don't want to keep it as a dedicated HW computer, partly because of form-factor and partly because I've always felt limited with 32gb ram.
Now, we also need to update our laptops which are the same vintage. As much as I would looooooove to order one of the new base-model mac studio's with 64gb ram, it's $2600 and with an eye to the fact that at least one laptop needs immediate replacement too, I'm trying to be budget conscious. My wife has agreed to spending money on a dedicated HW computer with sufficient ram, because if we give my console its own computer, then we can get a more... "reasonable" daily driver. For ordinary tasks, we won't need computers with enormous amounts of ram.
Here's where I've landed:
For approximately the same cost, I can source either a 2018 mac mini (6 core i7 3.2hz) with a 1tb HD and 64gb ram, OR, a "trash can" mac pro with 1-2 tb HD and 128 gb ram, 12 core xeon 2.7hz.
I know that the mac pro is quite a bit older, but I've never been repulsed by its design, and they are powerful enough to update to the current macOS. My thought is that in either case, I will get myself all set up on the new machine and it will be a dedicated HW machine, so it's ok if it doesn't continue to update for a while. It can be a bit of a time-capsule, as it were, since I will even disconnect it from the internet.
I like the idea of the older mac pro just because I can get 128gb ram; by the same token, it's only 1066hz ram, and the single-core clock speed is slower than the intel mac mini.
Any advice or accounts of lived experience with either machine would be very appreciated. I know some people use the minis and like them. I was a *little* concerned that 6 cores wouldn't be enough to drive sets that nearly max out the ram though. Perhaps I'm wrong.