# New (used) Mac Pro for Music Production



## bjderganc (Oct 27, 2015)

Hi All,

I am looking to purchase either a 2012 Mac Mini, or Mac Pro tower (pre-trashbin) for music production to use in tandem with VEPro and a PC slave.

I tend to use a lot of soft synthesizers and Kontakt libraries with Logic Pro X. I can go as high as $2500 for the machine, but right now the 2012 Mac Mini sounds really appealing. Ideally, this computer would last 5+ years.

With all of the different Mac Pro models, making a decision can be really confusing. What does Vi Control recommend?


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## Baron Greuner (Oct 27, 2015)

I slid over to the Apple Store today and took a look at the new lMac 5K for the first time. I have an aging MacPro that is slowing down a little. Don't know if this is any good to you, but the iMac spec'd up to the max looks pretty good to me. I would expect that to give you 5 years minimum. Great screen too.
Took a look at the retina MacBook Pro 15 inch at the same time. Very good too.


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## bjderganc (Oct 27, 2015)

Baron Greuner said:


> I slid over to the Apple Store today and took a look at the new lMac 5K for the first time. I have an aging MacPro that is slowing down a little. Don't know if this is any good to you, but the iMac spec'd up to the max looks pretty good to me. I would expect that to give you 5 years minimum. Great screen too.
> Took a look at the retina MacBook Pro 15 inch at the same time. Very good too.



Thanks for your reply! I really want a "desktop" style computer [without a monitor.] That's one of my main criteria that I forgot to add to the post. The ability to add matching monitors, and have room for upgrades (extra hard drives) is really important.


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## Cowtothesky (Oct 28, 2015)

I was looking for a used mac pro a few months ago and stumbled on these guys. They were very friendly and came highly recommended, but when the new iMac came out, I decided to go that route.

http://www.ipowerresale.com/buy/Mac%20Pro (http://www.ipowerresale.com/buy/Mac Pro)


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## SillyMidOn (Oct 29, 2015)

I personally would be careful when buying a used Mac. My 2010 8 core (owned from new) has eaten two motherboards, and they are expensive to replace. When I spoke to the repair guy about this, he stated that motherboards do not last as long as they used to, as due to EU regulations, manufacturers are not allowed to use as much lead in the parts (as they don't want so much lead to end up in landfill to poison the water supply), hence they burn out quicker. If you buy a 2nd hand Mac, you have no come-back should something go wrong, sure you may get a 6 month warranty, but after that?

There is a reason why the extended Mac warranty (when you buy a new one) only goes up to 3 years. I know you said you needed a desktop, but I will chime in with the two posters above, and say give the IMac a second look, even if you need to add external enclosures for extra hard-drives. The screen is amazing.


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## mc_deli (Oct 29, 2015)

Baron Greuner said:


> Took a look at the retina MacBook Pro 15 inch at the same time. Very good too.


Beautiful machine and runs my studio and day job. But 16gb of glued ram and glued battery... and add the inevitable cost of external drives/housings and connecting them (TB2 dock woe here) and I would not recommend for a studio centerpiece...


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## bjderganc (Oct 29, 2015)

Thanks for your replies!

So -- yesterday I made a move that pretty much nullifies this thread -- I bought Cubase 8. 
I had been thinking about moving for quite a while, but was a little wary to make the leap from Logic.

Thinking about how silly it would be to buy a 6-year old machine, in addition to a new slave machine, when I could just bypass the mac all together by switching DAWs. 

I will miss Logic, but after seeing a video on MIDI workflow comparing Logic, Protools, Studio One, and Cubase, it's pretty clear that Cubase 8 is the best [FOR ME]. 

Right now, building a PC looks like the most attractive option. I have experience building computers, and since most parts are under 2-5 year warranty, a new PC seems like a safe and cost-effective investment.


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## D.Salzenberg (Oct 29, 2015)

Congrats on a brilliant decision. The more people vote with their feet and switch to pc the better.


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## bjderganc (Oct 29, 2015)

D.Salzenberg said:


> Congrats on a brilliant decision. The more people vote with their feet and switch to pc the better.



Thank you! It came down to $, but I look at Cubase as an upgrade [again, just speaking to personal workflow preferences].

It is funny when professionals look to 5-6 year old Westmere systems, and 3-4 year old Mac Mini's because they are better than the current crop.. Can't help but think Apple is ignoring the pro audio crowd.

Sources speculate that the Mac Pro is due for an upgrade mid-2016, so here's hoping they get back into the game!


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## D.Salzenberg (Oct 29, 2015)

Yes, my day job is design, and more and more people are leaving Apple and moving to pc there also.
There was a time years ago when pros used Macs because they were better machines and ran the software much better than pcs. Now I think most people realise they are just a lot more expensive and not so upgradable. How long people will stay fooled by the Apple image of desirability I've no idea, but for machines to actually do work on, they are way overpriced.


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## Cowtothesky (Oct 29, 2015)

mc_deli said:


> Beautiful machine and runs my studio and day job. But 16gb of glued ram and glued battery... and add the inevitable cost of external drives/housings and connecting them (TB2 dock woe here) and I would not recommend for a studio centerpiece...



Agreed - it is a limited machine.

The new iMac does not have the glued ram, at least on the 32gb option. You can upgrade it to 64gb by buying 3rd party ram. I plan on getting the maxed out new iMac in a few months. Will go ssd and get external ssd drives. I will use my 2010 iMac as a slave. I'm just not sure if I can use it as an external monitor while using it as a slave. But other than that, it should work well.


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## NYC Composer (Oct 29, 2015)

But...but...my early 2008 refurb Mac Pro is still going strong, it has 4 drive bays , 4 pci slots, can take 64 gig of RAM and and and....

Ah, never mind.


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## Elephant (Nov 2, 2015)

bjderganc said:


> Thanks for your replies!
> 
> So -- yesterday I made a move that pretty much nullifies this thread -- I bought Cubase 8.
> I had been thinking about moving for quite a while, but was a little wary to make the leap from Logic.
> ...



Was this the video ? If so, it;s really good.


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## bjderganc (Nov 2, 2015)

Elephant said:


> Was this the video ? If so, it;s really good.



That's the one!

Here are some takeaways after a few days of using Cubase 8 (coming from Logic).
-The GUI looks pretty terrible compared to Logic X. The Mac version looks a liiitle better though  
-MIDI in Cubase does things that I have intuitively wanted for a while (automation lanes, virgin territories, "midi regions" better display the data from the project view)
-Navigating the project in Cubase is easier (the enter/return key to open and close windows, windows remember how big they were and where they were located, has a lightweight feel)
-Logic's included instruments are lightyears ahead of Cubase's 
-They are different programs with their own strengths/weaknesses. I can't see myself ever not using Logic


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## Elephant (Nov 2, 2015)

bjderganc said:


> That's the one!
> 
> Here are some takeaways after a few days of using Cubase 8 (coming from Logic).
> -The GUI looks pretty terrible compared to Logic X. The Mac version looks a liiitle better though
> ...



So is the plan to run Logic just to use the old box ?
Rgds


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## bjderganc (Nov 2, 2015)

Elephant said:


> So is the plan to run Logic just to use the old box ?
> Rgds


Yup! It's a 2010 mbp 2.66 (3.33), so it can certainly handle certain tasks with the help of a slave.


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## Audio Birdi (Nov 2, 2015)

bjderganc said:


> Yup! It's a 2010 mbp 2.66 (3.33), so it can certainly handle certain tasks with the help of a slave.


Running a 2.8 2010 mbp with a slave here, runs Logic Pro X fine . Shall be investing in an SSD / removing the optical drive soon! if you're using VEP, 1-2 buffers per VEP instance would make the load distribute evenly across both machines.


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## Elephant (Nov 4, 2015)

KaBirdi said:


> Running a 2.8 2010 mbp with a slave here, runs Logic Pro X fine . Shall be investing in an SSD / removing the optical drive soon! if you're using VEP, 1-2 buffers per VEP instance would make the load distribute evenly across both machines.



Good to know that config works fine - What slave build are you using, and how much RAM do you have on the MBP, (that 2.8 MBP must also be one of the two i7 processor models from that year) ? Also (presumably as I am guessing the slave is a Windows box and all the Logic internal instruments are used in the MBP) can you give an idea of the number of tracks of Logic instruments and the number of tracks from the libraries hosted in the slave ? Trying to get an idea of the way you share tasks and libraries between the MBP and slave and what sort of music you are doing on it. That config sounds like a great way to go if you want access to Logic and its instruments. Thanks very much !


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## Audio Birdi (Nov 4, 2015)

Elephant said:


> Good to know that config works fine - What slave build are you using, and how much RAM do you have on the MBP, (that 2.8 MBP must also be one of the two i7 processor models from that year) ? Also (presumably as I am guessing the slave is a Windows box and all the Logic internal instruments are used in the MBP) can you give an idea of the number of tracks of Logic instruments and the number of tracks from the libraries hosted in the slave ? Trying to get an idea of the way you share tasks and libraries between the MBP and slave and what sort of music you are doing on it. That config sounds like a great way to go if you want access to Logic and its instruments. Thanks very much !


All libraries are on my Slave PC. It's a Windows box yes. it's a 6 core xeon 3.2 GHz E5-1650, 64gb RAM, 60gb SSD boot drive, 2x 1tb RAID0 Samsung 850 EVO SSD's. I connect the Slave to the MBP via ethernet and use Vienna Ensemble Pro on my slave which contains all 255 VEP M-Frames. Each M-Frame contains 1 instance of PLAY. I do this so that there's an instrument per track within Logic Pro X, so in this case it's 255 instrument tracks (the maximum) inside LPX. I use 2 buffers per instrument track via the VEP plug-in so that it doesn't give me CPU overload. (even when selecting a blank audio track and playing back). This way. I get around 50% CPU usage on my Slave and around 50% usage on my MBP.

If you have any more questions, just ask.

Cheers,
Kabir


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## EastWest Lurker (Nov 4, 2015)

You mean 255 v-frames (projects), not m-frames of course, as you can only have 1 m-frame, consisting of multiple v-frames, open. Why so many if I may ask? Are you using a different v-frame for each articulation? I have, if memory serves me, 32 v-frames, which covers the entire Hollywood Orchestra. With the SkiSwitcher 2, they are addressed by 40 tracks, each with a VE Pro server plug-in, in Logic Pro X.
Here is what mine looks like.


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## Elephant (Nov 4, 2015)

bjderganc said:


> Hi All,
> 
> I am looking to purchase either a 2012 Mac Mini, or Mac Pro tower (pre-trashbin) for music production to use in tandem with VEPro and a PC slave.
> 
> ...



What do you use at the moment ?


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## EastWest Lurker (Nov 4, 2015)

I would go for an i7 27" iMac instead. You can have 32 GB instead of just 16 and you get a nice display as well. Previous gen should be in your price range.


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## samphony (Nov 4, 2015)

EastWest Lurker said:


> I would go for an i7 27" iMac instead. You can have 32 GB instead of just 16 and you get a nice display as well. Previous gen should be in your price range.


You will be able to upgrade to 64gb soon if you have to.


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## angelonyc (Nov 12, 2015)

I recently had a 2008 mac pro die.. Stores won't touch them, cause apple doesn't carry parts for them anymore... So that means, the later models (2009, 10, etc)... will get phased out too.. I bought a new mac pro.. Expensive proposition.. You got to buy new enclosures to hold your drives.. need to buy a lot of adaptors.. Other World Computing sells upgrade kits.. which are a good savings.

Still can't get 2015 mac pro (same as 2013) to drive my Gateway 30" monitor (2560 x 1600 dpi).. Dozens of phone calls.. Apple is more interested in selling 'iwatches', iPhones, iPads, iMacs.. In fact when I call or go into a store and talk about the MacPro, 70% of the staff assumes and aims me towards MacPro Laptops.


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## dtonthept (Nov 12, 2015)

I feel for you! Still running my 2009 machine here, my next computer most likely won't be an apple...


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## JPQ (Nov 12, 2015)

Whole thing makes me think maybe going back to pc only problem getting new DAW again and something which can replace in my ears Logic ES2. Maybe Prophet V becouse also its filter is not very colourful and digital waveforms,and vector synthesis. But getting new daw is pricey but buying new mac when get problems is also expensive many times we can change in pc part which is problem. Now i look what kind computers is available here i mean build in my country.(of course parts come China etc but are carefully selected etc)


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## dtonthept (Nov 13, 2015)

Switching to PC seems like a no brained now. You could keep your old Mac to run es2 in mainstage if you really need it on a song...


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