2019 Mac Pro is Now Available at Apple.com

[trs96]

New Mac Pro gets a 9 out of 10 Repairability score. How long since any Apple Mac has gotten one that high ?

 

[trs96]

Here is the Gigabyte Aorus Xtreme C621 motherboard. Build your own T2 chip free 2019 Mac Pro. You get to use any NVME SSD you'd like to. Put it in any E-ATX case you'd like to and have fun creating your own 2019 Mac Pro Killer.

The motherboard will only set you back over $2,000 USD. Ask your bank to raise up those CC spending limits. If you can get by with a paltry 192 GB of ram then this might be the best way to go. The Xeon W 3175X costs much less than the 28 core Xeon that Apple offers as their highest core count CPU. It sells for just over $3,400. Less than half of what Apple asks for the 28 core Xeon upgrade.

You can also save about $1,000 if a 16 Core Xeon is good enough for your needs and high 5.0 GHz overclocks aren't as important.

You should be able to easily keep the total cost well under 8 grand for this build.

The 192 GB ram kit should cost less than $1,200. So a Maxed out 28 core Hack Pro could be done for:

C621 Motherboard -- $2,065
Xeon CPU -- $3,492
192 GB Ram -- $1,149 (96GB kit goes for around $500)
Graphics $375 (single card) RX Vega 64
NVME 2TB -- $350
E-ATX case -- $250
1200W ATX PSU -- $300

Total Estimated Cost: $7,981 USD

Note that you don't have to use ECC memory with the Aorus Xtreme board. I've attached the QVL from Gigabyte so you can see all the ram options. Here is the server ram from Crucial and Samsung that most closely matches what Apple uses. Personally, I would simply go with the lowest cost 2933 MHz non-ECC ram that is supported by the Gigabyte board.
Start out with six 16GB DIMMs of ram for a total of 96GB of six channel ram. You can always double that later to 192 GB.
Gigabyte has tested most of the Kingston Hyper X ram (Crucial) and you can get exact model specs from the QVL.

If you definitely need ECC then go with one of the two below.

Prices taken from Amazon.com and Newegg.com on 12/17/19

A new Mac Pro with similar specs to the above costs more than double what the Gigabyte C621 based Hack Pro would cost. Even if you double up on the Vega 64 graphics card.

 

[pastrychef]

Here is the Gigabyte Aorus Xtreme C621 motherboard. Build your own T2 chip free 2019 Mac Pro. You get to use any NVME SSD you'd like to. Put it in any E-ATX case you'd like to and have fun creating your own 2019 Mac Pro Killer. The motherboard will only set you back over $2,000 USD. Ask your bank to raise up those CC spending limits. If you can get by with a paltry 192 GB of ram then this might be the best way to go. The Xeon W 3175X costs much less than the 28 core Xeon that Apple offers as their highest core count Xeon. It sells for just over $3,000. Less than half of what Apple asks for the 28 core Xeon upgrade. You should be able to keep the total cost under 15 grand for this build.

View attachment 440874

I don't understand why motherboard makers have failed to evolve with the times... The vast majority of video cards now take up two and often three slots. Keeping their PCI-e slots in their existing configuration will effectively block two slots (or four with triple wide cards) in a dual video card configuration.

By blocking off all those ports, it effectively negates one of the most important features of workstations/HEDT systems, lots of PCI-e lanes.

Besides the T2, there's also currently no way for builders to get an Afterburner card.

To come close to mimicking a single AMD Radeon Vego Pro II Duo, the builder would need at least two Radeon VIIs. That will leave him/her with just three PCI-e slots for things like Red Rocket-X cards, Apogee cards, etc. Also, let's not forget that this Gigabyte motherboard, despite being over $2000 still doesn't come with 10GBase-T... Adding 10GBase-T will mean yet another PCI-e slot gone. Thunderbolt doesn't seem to be an option and, again, he/she still wouldn't be able to get an Afterburner either..

 

[trs96]

I don't understand why motherboard makers have failed to evolve with the times... The vast majority of video cards now take up two and often three slots. Keeping their PCI-e slots in their existing configuration will effectively block two slots (or four with triple wide cards) in a dual video card configuration.

In the case of the C621 Aorus Xtreme they are still designing the slots as if they were only for single slot workstation graphics cards. It's obvious that many will use dual and triple slot cards with that board. Gigabyte probably thinks that buyer's won't care if they lose 2 or 4 slots when using double or triple wide cards.

 

[remington]

Looks like the CPU is soldered to Mac Pro's motherboard so it's impossible to upgrade the CPU.

 

[trs96]

Looks like the CPU is soldered to Mac Pro's motherboard so it's impossible to upgrade the CPU.

Not true. iFixit was able to easily remove the CPU. Here's the socket with the CPU removed.
Apple doesn't give official instructions on how to do that but anyone can do it easily.

You may have been looking at the onboard PLX chip.

 

[jaymonkey]

Sigh ... SSD Modules on New Mac Pro are still Apple proprietary and bound to T2 chip so not user replaceable :-

Still iFixit give it a score of 9 for repairability, it's just a shame about the SSD as that is probably one of the things that most owners would want to update themselves so having to pay the huge Apple TAX on their storage updates is unavailable ... nice one Apple.



Cheers
Jay

 

[trs96]

Sigh ... SSD Modules on New Mac Pro are still Apple proprietary and bound to T2 chip so not user replaceable

From what I've read Apple is doing this for security reasons among others. Prevents access to the data on the drive by someone removing it and connect to another PC or Mac. I would think that encrypting the drive would be enough but they are adding this extra security layer.

 

[trs96]

Thunderbolt doesn't seem to be an option and, again, he/she still wouldn't be able to get an Afterburner either..

TH3 add in cards are an option. I think most people will get along fine without an afterburner card. An average Prosumer doesn't need to play back 6 streams of 8K footage simultaneously. If not having dual 10 GbE is a deal breaker then it's best to go with the 2019 MP instead and pay the Apple tax. OTOH you're really getting a lot of bang for your buck with a 28 core 8000 dollar 2019 Hack Pro. The overclocking with this board is going to be excellent. 5 GHz plus on all 28 cores is never going to be possible with a Mac Pro. I do have to wonder how someone will cool that 3175X Xeon that is overclocked on all 28 cores ??? Time to find a good liquid Nitrogen supplier.

Aorus Xtreme C621 Motherboard.

Look at the size of the heatsink over the 32 phase VRM... Massive.

 

[jaymonkey]

From what I've read Apple is doing this for security reasons among others. Prevents access to the data on the drive by someone removing it and connect to another PC or Mac. I would think that encrypting the drive would be enough but they are adding this extra security layer.

@trs96,

Yup that the line that Apple keep telling everyone ... it's the same on any Apple device that has a T2 chip such the iMacPro and latest MacBook Pro's ... etc, if they really cared about their customers (like they say they do) they would give users options.

• No Encryption
• Software Encryption via MacOS FileVault 2
• Hardware Encryption via T2 Chip

The reality is that this is a very easy way for Apple to make a lot of Money with no effort, the mark up on their M.2 NVMe SSD's is well over 50%, taking the Hack Pro build you posted above as an example a good quality, fast 2TB NVMe can be bought for $350 where as Apple charges $800 ...



It's just insulting ... and users have no option but to pay it, it's clearly Apples way of kicking back against the right to repair, and they justify it by telling everyone its for security ... shame on you Tim.

What worse is that you are at Apples mercy if you need data recover services on a T2 protected SSD.

Cheers
Jay