Dragon + Mac Pro

[AndreeMarkefors]

Speaking of which, I recently picked up a Samsung 840 Pro EVO 1TB SSD that can both read and write at over 500MB/s. Couldn't get over 270MB/s on the cheese grater's internal drive bays.

It's unfortunate if that came as a surprise—but I'm sure it does for many.

There are however many options that let you use the internal bays in a pre-2013 Mac Pro via PCIe add-on cards. You can reach speeds up to 1800MB/s, but that won't be cheap of course. One popular simple solution is OWC's Accelsior E2 cards. They cost about $700 for 480GB, gives you around 800MB/s and two external eSATA ports. You can also buy another one of those Samsungs and put them on a Tempo SSD Pro card as RAID0 for decent speeds.

 

[Blair S. Paulsen]

It's unfortunate if that came as a surprise—but I'm sure it does for many.

I deserve that. Just because SATA III has taken over the last couple of years doesn't mean that Apple saw any reason to update that controller in the 2010 or 2012 MPs since those bays were intended for 3.5" spinning drives that generally top out at least 50MB/s below SATA II throughput limits.

I've been looking at the Accelsior E2 card as part of the final freshening of my beefiest cheese grater. Even after I get my hands on a nMP, there will be plenty of times when its tied up or in the field and I'll have to get things done on the ol' tower. With the nVivia Quadro 4000 and RedRocket installed its not a total dog, just crumming that once Dragon footy becomes my primary source media that RR stops helping :-(. That is NOT meant as a dig at RED, technology moves fast and supporting older hardware stops making sense at some point, just noting it.

Cheers - #19

 

[Christopher Barrett]

I dropped an Accelsior into my 12 Core. Nice speeds.

 

[Manfred Lopez]

I'm still trying to figure out what the internal data-transfer speed will be for the nMP. This article points out that there was a difference in ssd performance for the previous generation depending on what capacity you had in your machine. I hope this is not the case for the new ssd's in the nMP.

http://www.thessdreview.com/daily-n...taining-lesser-performing-sandisk-128gb-ssds/

 

[Will Keir]

That's what I'm hoping and will test the theory,

Tthe older towers aren't necessarily obsolete yet, and can still play a meaningful role in Dragon workflow.

 

[Alain M]

Regardless of what performance similarity we can see between the 2012 Mac Pro vs 2013 Mac Pro we all know that the new and future route is with the new Mac Pro...It is hard to swallow for us always a new trend, a new concept...bottom line is that the new Mac Pro is gonna kick ass, and that's gonna be the end of the story and a new story begins...

my 2 cents

 

[Robert Ruffo New]

Clearly you've already made up your mind. That's fine. But I don't see any point in your apparent continuing efforts to convince everyone else here to see it the way you do. Because they don't, and they won't. And they have their reasons, just like you do. You're not going to buy one. Fine. We understand. Now, why not just let it go?

I'm not trying to convince anyone of anything - I'm venting my frustration at Apple for following what appears to be the reverse of Moore's Law, by offering less power for more money, several years later,. and hiding that in some supposedly attractive new case.

I'm also trying to point out facts and draw attention to hard measured figures - which are more meaningful than "this is new" "it looks sexy" or "it's the future".

Maybe consumers for example embrace MP3s as new and better than CDs, but it's important that pros know that it is actually quite a poor sound recording format, and worse than older CD. In the same way, New Mac Pros might look nifty to consumers and technically clueless "artistic types" but if you buy one looking for more actual power than a 2010 Mac Pro - in useful terms like fps of RAW rendering - you will likely be very disappointed, especially if your 2010 model had many good GPU cards in it internally or externally via a PCI out-box. I am very disappointed by this fact as I was really hoping to be able to buy something significantly faster for our shop.

I know many tiny businesses for whom this is a major investment - so for some of those I'm also issuing a warning - be careful as this may be a total waste of your tight money in a still very tough production economy.

if you have a problem with my above listed agendas, no offense but I don't really care.

 

[Robert Ruffo New]

Agreed.

I was just thinking: what can possibly be a reason for telling everyone what you DON'T like? If people stick to pushing what works for them instead, the sharing experience becomes so much better.

And honestly, when someone describes something as "clunky", that other people obviously can make fly, then they are only mirroring their own inability and/or lack of understanding.

This post contributes very little too. But since the slandering has gone on to some length, possibly misinforming many users who take any written word at face value, I'll just leave it as a "one post feedback".

Rigorous technical inquiry requires looking at pros and cons and evaluating alternatives. This includes mentioning what you "don't like". An engineer, when evaluating cement, will in fact mention when that cement breaks, fails, and other negatives. Otherwise that engineer is a dangerous idiot.

Pitfall sharing is warning and is extremely useful. I have saved myself a lot of grief by reading/hearing about other people's horror stories and complaints about various products for cinematography - and even potential staff hires. I'm glad they didn't have a yoga-class attitude of only focussing on the positive.

I don't see how my observations on rendering benchmarks reveals any lack of vision, understanding or inability on my part. This is a thread about computer gear, not some hippie group hug.

 

[Bob Gundu]

I guess I'm the only one who loves the smaller footprint of the Mac Pro and the fact that it uses 70 percent less energy. I have a tower too and it's a huge hunk of metal. To think about the transport, material, and disposal costs, it really is sad. Tides have to shift. It's made in the USA. Lets give them some credit for this. They hit the ground running, even if you feel its the at the same pace as before. People are usually the bottlenecks I find.

 

[D Fuller]

People are usually the bottlenecks I find.

Never were truer words spoken.

 

[Jason Diamond]

I currently have this config MacPro I'm writing a detailed article for Studio Daily about.

- 8 core E-5 3ghz, 64GB RAM, 1TB internal SSD, Dual D700's 6GB RAM each -

Yesterday Tom Wong and I spent all day hammering the box through a multitude of apps and file formats. I will publish a matrix of performance for all of that with a larger article.

Here's my findings for 6KHD Dragon:

5568 x 3132

3m2s length

PRORES 422 FULL DEBAYER

9fps

HALF GOOD DEBAYER 13fps

[TD="bgcolor: #D9D9D9"] EPIC DRAGON 6KHD 5:1 [/TD]

[TD="align: right"] 23.98 [/TD]
[TD="bgcolor: #EA9999"] REDCINE-X 22.1 [/TD]

This was using the internal 1TB SSD which BMD speed Tested at 1GB/s R/W as the Read Disk and a 4xSSD TBolt1 Raid as Write Disk which BMD speed Tested at 750MB/s R/W

I can tell you right now that RC-X is the fastest of all the apps software/GPU only. As far as I know RC-X has zero optimization for the D700's so with this being the low threshold of performance we can only expect better in the future I'd hope.

 

[Bob Gundu]

Thanks Jason. Thats the same configuration I have coming. So the big question is, what are the external TB enclosure vendors up to with performance for the RR-X?

 

[Paul Harb]

Don't want to get into one of our debates Bob however I never once looked at my tower in anticipation of an upgrade and thought...I wish it were way smaller and more energy efficient. Im not saying these things aren't good, of course they are....but on the list of a power user...those things are at the very bottom of that list.

Industrial design is crucial in the brutal world of a production whether it be on a feature set or live events. I used to tour a lot with rock bands as a video director traveling every day to a new city, packing and unpacking all my gear (the editing system being only one piece of a live event camera and playback system for a tour), moving these shock mounted racks into and out of semis every day and that bumpy travel for 100's of miles. I couldn't imagine putting this non industrial design through that kind of abuse. Im sure someone will come up with some design to be able to rack mount this thing, but it will be goofy and thats not even taking into the account you are going to have a hell of a time doing proper dressing with all your io's and consumer grade Thunderbolt cables and connections that are by they way at the moment not even lockable.

I would also carry a laptop which was great for portability and would go with me to my hotel every night so I could work....so from my perspective the design is odd in the sense that its priced and has the horsepower for someone like me, but it doesn't have the design for someone like me...I think there are a lot of people like me that are Macheads that are in the same boat scratching their heads when they look at this design.

Again I don't want to argue, but hopefully this perspective makes some sense...its not everyones perspective and I hope these kinds of issues have solutions because after FCPX and now this Im at a crossroads with Apple at this point and I know Im not alone.

I guess I'm the only one who loves the smaller footprint of the Mac Pro and the fact that it uses 70 percent less energy. I have a tower too and it's a huge hunk of metal. To think about the transport, material, and disposal costs, it really is sad. Tides have to shift. It's made in the USA. Lets give them some credit for this. They hit the ground running, even if you feel its the at the same pace as before. People are usually the bottlenecks I find.

 

[Bob Gundu]

Indeed we have different reasons for gear Paul. When I was a Flame/Inferno artist those crazy fridge size SGI servers needed its own room. When I worked at Alias|Wavefront, I had to have a PC, Mac, and a linux box on my desk. I worked at IMAX for years with a supped up Linux machine too under my desk. For the last 2 years I gave a nice laptop a try doing Maya, Nuke, FCPX, Mocha... wow... serious progress. Its takes a lot of effort to get people to go another direction, but once that happens, you can work on making it better.

 

[Will Keir]

Thanks for the numbers Jason. Truly, they do seem low for the New Mac Pro. It will be good news when more optimizations takes place.

So if you want to place a RRX card into that trash can, how's it gonna work?

I currently have this config MacPro I'm writing a detailed article for Studio Daily about.

- 8 core E-5 3ghz, 64GB RAM, 1TB internal SSD, Dual D700's 6GB RAM each -

Yesterday Tom Wong and I spent all day hammering the box through a multitude of apps and file formats. I will publish a matrix of performance for all of that with a larger article.

Here's my findings for 6KHD Dragon:

5568 x 3132

3m2s length

PRORES 422 FULL DEBAYER

9fps

HALF GOOD DEBAYER 13fps

[TD="bgcolor: #D9D9D9"] EPIC DRAGON 6KHD 5:1 [/TD]

[TD="align: right"] 23.98 [/TD]
[TD="bgcolor: #EA9999"] REDCINE-X 22.1 [/TD]

This was using the internal 1TB SSD which BMD speed Tested at 1GB/s R/W as the Read Disk and a 4xSSD TBolt1 Raid as Write Disk which BMD speed Tested at 750MB/s R/W

I can tell you right now that RC-X is the fastest of all the apps software/GPU only. As far as I know RC-X has zero optimization for the D700's so with this being the low threshold of performance we can only expect better in the future I'd hope.

 

[Jason Diamond]

So if you want to place a RRX card into that trash can, how's it gonna work?

It's gonna be a TB2 enclosure of some kind. expansion chassis or whatever ends up being avail. It's been stated here on the boards that even TB2 won't max out the cards full x16 abilities but even if the card performs around 60fps or so with Dragon its way better than the current options for even regular MX Epic. Awaiting enclosures and Rocket-X of course to do the real math

 

[Eric Santiago]

I tell yaa, tech for this new computer is moving faster than previous new Apple products.

Some vendors didnt even finalize drivers for nearly a year back in the day.

I experienced this with tech as old as NUBUS

These are great times for getting new gear

 

[Paul Harb]

Again, I can't imagine spending all that cash on a RRX card just to put it in a TB2 external chassis that will not let its full potential be utilized. Seems a bit counter intuitive to me.

It's gonna be a TB2 enclosure of some kind. expansion chassis or whatever ends up being avail. It's been stated here on the boards that even TB2 won't max out the cards full x16 abilities but even if the card performs around 60fps or so with Dragon its way better than the current options for even regular MX Epic. Awaiting enclosures and Rocket-X of course to do the real math

 

[Will Keir]

If you can't get full performance from a TB2 enclosure, can you get full performance in a PCIe slot in the older Mac Pros?

Which one makes better use of the card?

It's gonna be a TB2 enclosure of some kind. expansion chassis or whatever ends up being avail. It's been stated here on the boards that even TB2 won't max out the cards full x16 abilities but even if the card performs around 60fps or so with Dragon its way better than the current options for even regular MX Epic. Awaiting enclosures and Rocket-X of course to do the real math

 

[Bob Gundu]

If you can't get full performance from a TB2 enclosure, can you get full performance in a PCIe slot in the older Mac Pros?

Which one makes better use of the card?

Performance from the card is going to be way better from the older macPro tower.