Lately, many community members have been asking about how to do a "Mac Pro like" build for
a lot less money than a 6 core Mac Pro will cost this December. So I thought I'd take a closer look
and spec one out with the parts that are available as of today, November 2nd, 2013. Remember that
this is all speculative as their isn't any support for IvyBridge EP in Mavericks 10.9. The best approach
in my opinion is to wait at least 1-2 months before making any hardware purchases for a new Mac
Pro Socket 2011 build. There will be a recommended Socket 2011 build in the Buyer's Guide after the
2013 Mac Pro is available for purchase.
For those that just can't wait that long, here's some early adopter info:
We know that the 3.5 GHz, 6 core $3,999 Mac Pro will have the Intel Xeon
E5-1650 V2 as listed on the Apple website.
The only place I found this for sale on the web was at Acemicro.com for $612 Dollars. It's a no show
on either Newegg or Amazon. They will likely sell it for under $600 US.
Next is the motherboard. We also know that this will require a socket 2011 motherboard to house
the Xeon chip. The Asus X79 Deluxe would work with this CPU but I looked for a server board instead
specifically with the C602 chipset to be compatible with the new Mac Pros. I discovered a very interesting possibility that is a dual CPU board for $290. You can use these with a single E5-1650 v2 and have the option to later upgrade to a dual CPU build if you ever need that. Problem is that you'd need to buy two of the E5-2600 v2 series Xeons to use dual cpus
. (The E5-1600 series Xeon chips do not work in a dual CPU configuration only the E5-2600's will.)
If you wanted to start right away with two of the high end 2600 series chips that is also an option with this board. A build like that would be incredibly powerful. (How about a 24 core 48 thread dual Xeon build with 128 GB of Ram!) Not many could afford a monster build like that.
The Asrock board model is:
EP2C602 SSI EEB and is available from Newegg. I'm not sure how friendly the Asrock bios would be with a CustoMac. Anyone willing to try it
The downsides of this server board are a lack of USB 3.0 and no onboard audio. There are workarounds for those problems that are fairly simple solutions. The Asus X79 Deluxe has the advantage of USB 3.0, onboard audio and 2 esata outputs onboard. Whatever board you may choose you'll likely need to flash the bios to the latest version for it to work with the Intel Xeon chips. Check the motherboard manufacturer's website for details.
So those are the most important "major" choices for a build that approaches what a 3.5GHz 6 core Mac Pro can do. I didn't find the D500 FirePro cards anywhere but you can buy two of the AMD R9-280x for a build like this. Some TMx86 members are already using these in their CustoMac builds.
Here's the rest of the 6 Core Mac Pro's specs from Apple.com
Below (in screenshots from NewEgg) You can see all the rest of the choices that I matched as closely as possible to what the 6 core Mac Pro will offer. The Ram of course is not ECC like in the Mac Pro, another way you can save some cash on this build.
Fractal Design makes the Define XL, an E-ATX version of the Define R4. The PSU has plenty of power for multiple HDDs and the two graphics cards. The SSD is 256 GB 840 Pro from Samsung, an excellent performer. Ram is 16GB 1866 MHz LP from Corsair, similar specs to the Mac Pro's ram. You also have
the option to go with quad channel Corsair ram. 4x4gb sticks of 1600 MHz quad channel would save you about $30 and should perform just as well as the 1866 MHz ram.
So the total would come in at just over $2,225 US. Significantly lower than the 6 core Mac Pro.
Another bonus is that you get all the internal storage space you'll need without having to buy
expensive Thunderbolt enclosures for drives.
Would it perform the same as the new 6 Core Mac Pro? I have no idea as the Mac Pro isn't out yet and no one has built one of these with Mavericks installed yet. This is the best I could come up with in answer to the now common question " How do I build something like the new Mac Pro for a lot less money." Feel free to share your ideas about what hardware you would choose for the build. If you do start building one of these it would be great if you detail your build in the user builds section so that everyone can learn more about building a Socket 2011 CustoMac Pro !
Note: This isn't a build you would choose for a high end gaming computer. Xeon builds are for servers
and work stations, they cannot be overclocked and wouldn't perform as well as some of the more
expensive 4 and 6 core I7 cpus would with gaming software.
TRS96