Old good Mac Pro or new Macbook Pro

[Rodion Zhabrev]

Hi!

It's a big question for me. I have early 2008 Mac Pro with Radeon 5770 and 32 Gb RAM added. Main software: Photoshop, After Effects, Redcine, Davinci Resolve, Final Cut, Cinema 4D. A lot of 5K or 4K footages to work with.

Apple don't try to be quick with Mac Pro upgrades. So I need to upgrade my one or buy new Macbook Pro. The only reason I think about Macbook Pro is multiple topics about "how great 5K r3d works in Premiere without render on Macbooks". They have much newer CPUs and RAM, but I can replace my 32Gb machine only with 16Gb one, and I need even more than 32Gb in my work. Typically every Mb of my 32Gb is in use. And of course GPU. Davinci wants me to install additional GPU and I can with Mac Pro and Can't with Macbook Pro.

So. What's the deal? I need to upgrade my old one (new GPU, SSD vs HDD and so) or buy new Macbook Pro and it will work faster?

I'm from Russia. We have not official Apple stores, so I can't just try different systems at work. Every machine I need to order online. Hope you guys help me to decide.

Thank you!

[Paul Provost]

why not stick in an Nvidia GTX580 GPU along with your existing GPU and see how that improves your davinci and after effects? and give CS6 premiere a try as well

[Brian Merlen]

and add an ssd? maybe even a pci one?

[Mark Noland]

Both the Nvidia and AMD/ATI card need a X16 slot.

With the older Mac Pro like this you can get one X16, one X8 and the other two are X1.

Two X16 graphics cards in this machine will not play nice.


Best
Mark

[Rodion Zhabrev]

So no Macbook Pro. Great! I'll add SSD first and GPU after. I have two x16 pci in Mac Pro, so it's possible. Thank you!