I’m working on a dual cpu 2009 4,1 that I just flashed to a 5,1. I love the videos on your Mac Pro. You’re very concise and awesome at editing. True hero. I’ve seen so many good reviews and Mac Pro tutorials so far but yours truly tops the pile. Also love the hippocampus transitions. Please make more Mac Pro videos when you can!
This means so much to hear. Thank you so much! I’m really glad you’ve found them helpful and I appreciate it! I’m also working on an update video on the current state of this MP, it’s evolved quite a bit and is still my daily rig for everything.
I am still using a 2008 MacPro 2.1 8-Core for Photo Shopping and video editing. Installed is MacOS 10.10.5 Yosemite, 32GB of memory, a Radeon 5870, a USB3.0 card, Bluetooth 4.0 dongle, matrox MXO 2 rack, intel SSDs, iSight camera, and two NEC hardware calibrated displays. Great setup so far.
That’s cool! I’ve seen a lot of people getting great uses out of the 2,1s. It’s crazy that it can even run Mojave pretty well with a Patcher. What kind of Bluetooth 4 dongle are you using? Do you have New Airdrop and Continuity support?
ClipPlayTV I am using the GMYLE dongle it is plug and play and works great. For my older Power Mac G4 machines I use the TDK bluetooth adapter. I don't use continuity and airdrop so I have to give it a try.
I want to know your upgrades to date November 2022? Obviously a faster WiFi card, USB-C ability maybe? And, the latest OS which I am having a hard time installing.
Guys like you amaze me. You are almost in the same class as the Aircraft engineers who can take the remains of a long obsolete aircraft and with ingenuity, experience and persistence, create something quite beautiful that flies far better than the original. Keep up the good work. Me, I just press the power button on my iMac. If it works - great - if not - Hey Mr Google.
Thank you so much for the kind words! Really glad you enjoyed the video, comments like these really are what motivate me to continue to improve. Really appreciate it!
Awe inspiring ! I'm going to do this right away and I will then sell my 2008 quad core to help recover the costs (it's difficult to use the word "cost" when the project ends up being nearly free compared to purchasing a new Mac Pro). The video that you produced was extremely lucid, and you covered so many other details such as the SSD into the PCIe slot (not the drive bay), as well as the GPU, and the USB 3.0 external add on. Many thanks for such a great video !
I'm curious why you didn't put a 5690 Chip into it. I got 2 of them for $150. It has a few architectural differences from the 5680 that really help system response and speed in Video editing, plus a slightly higher clock speed ( 3.46Ghz across 12 cores for dual processor systems). - ( I do DIT work for film and TV and use Resolve to create 1080 Proxies from 4K footage among other things). I also put a GTX 1080 Founders edition card into it splitting the power connectors between the two motherboard connectors. Even running Premiere, it flys... AND NEVER LOCKS UP OR CRASHES!!! ( Make sure to buy ECC memory and Premiere will run much more stable ) - On the USB3 Card, Make sure you have a card that has an individual controllers for each port. I connect at least 3 raid drives at any given time, and it will generally write close to a Gig a second ( Between Them ). One thing about AMD cards, the dirty little secret is that Premiere will only give you the highest quality output with Nvidia cards. Most people not in the TV and Film industry will never run into this because they won't be outputting to high bit depth files. All that said - Cudos for looking into building this up! These machines are awesome! - A Girl
Love that setup! I would have thrown a X5690 in but at the time the price for the extra clock speed didn’t seem like a good value, especially for a single CPU model. That’s very interesting though, when I eventually get a Dual-CPU Tray I’ll definitely go for a pair of 90’s! Really? That’s very interesting. I mainly went with the RX580 for Mojave and lack of web drivers but when I start running Windows on it I’ll probably grab a 1070 off eBay. On the USB 3 card, do you mean connecting the Card to the SATA ports? Just curious how you have yours setup with RAID controllers. Thank you so much for such an informative comment!
Way to go! I did this back in 2016 with the Mac Pro 8 core duel quad and I have 32 gigs ram but can go to 64gigs of ram 3 hard drives and 1 SSD 256gig for a total of 14 TB drive storage I use it for Music & Video Production didn't do my processors They running at 2.8ghz and I LOVE IT!
That sounds like suchhhh an epic setup🙌. I reallly want to get a Dual CPU Tray at some point soon. The prices on these Macs are rising a little bit so I’m just waiting till I find a good deal on EBay.
this video in 2019 is fantastic , having owned one of these machines for a good while , your video is making me want to pick up one of them again for my development on Mac OS. amazing vid ! , you have a sub here !
Thank you so much! I’m really glad to hear you enjoyed it. I’ve actually been shopping around for a dual-CPU model lately myself haha😂 . What was your build config?
Mine was single processor with the 3.42ghz 6 core, as I'm a software developer for X Plane , unfortunately I've now had to go to a hackintosh to satisfy hardware needs :( I can't afford 5k for an iMac Pro
Great video.. I got a 2009 4,1 flashed to 5,1 dual cpu that I just bought the X5680's to install. I have the MSI RX 560 and 32gb ram 3 TB hard drive, and I am running Mojave.. I have about $325 invested in it minus the monitors... about $375 total with the 2 20" Apple cinema displays
That’s an awesome setup! Love the Dual CPU config, might look into getting a tray for mine to do the same down the road. The place I work for actually has several 30 inch Cinema displays they still use and they all seem to work very well.
Nice! I was a college freshman in 2011 when the 5,1 was new and I wanted one so bad. I finally got a 2010 Mac Pro last year with a dual processor tray, 32GB of RAM, and two Apple Cinema Displays for $800 bucks, and I've been upgrading over the past year. I've now got two X5690 CPUs, 96GB of DDR3 1333MHz, an NVMe boot drive, 4x 14TB hard drives in RAID10 for 24TB capacity for backups, a Radeon Pro WX7100 GPU, Wireless AC wifi card, and an UltraWide. This thing is the fastest Mac I own, even faster than my i9 2018 MacBook Pro! It's crazy how much life you can get out of these upgradeable machines! You can even mod the PSU to allow you to install a Vega64 GPU! That's the last upgrade I have planned for mine.
Great video-picked up this very model for free at the town dump. It’s in great shape, with original monitor. No memory or disk but I ordered some. Looking forward to powering this up. I have newer MacBook Pro so I’m looking forward to seeing how this runs..
Ooo. Those G5’s are very interesting. A lot of people have also been gutting those and turning them into bookshelves/Coffee table legs funny enough too. How much did you get them for?
Hey Thanks for the indirect shout out in the description bud! You seem to know your stuff, if you'd ever like to be a collaborator with me or guest star on Mac Yak just let me know :)
Any high end PC from 2009 onward is still practical. 2009 was a singularity moment for desktop PC's since streaming video was the last killer app for the mass market and any high end PC in 2009 could stream video without problems.
I hope Apple always, and forever continue to release upgrades for these machines. They literally last forever, and are just as fast if not faster than new computers these days. I own a 2009 (4,1 to 5,1) 12 core Westmere my self and absolutely LOVE IT!.
I have a 2010 mac pro. I upgraded it with two intel x5690 processors and 64 GB of ram. I plan on going to 128GB of ECC ram for development reason. I also put in a MSI radeon rx 580 and updated to the latest OS. I don't regret it at all. Especially when I am working on some big projects.
I’ve been hearing a bit about this! Looks very interesting. Would be great to get Thunderbolt in these, main thing is just whether or not MacOS will support it well.
Somebody below mentioned "12 core 64GB beast with Radeon 580 and 4K" -- that is exactly what I did with a 2012 chassis and it's great -- all SSD. There is no task it doesn't slice through like a Ginsu knife.
Hey man, awesome vid! I have an '08 Mac Pro with a GTX780 flashed from MacVidCards. I've had no trouble with it so far. It's also technically tested to support Metal, but if I was running Mojave on my Mac Pro I'd go with an AMD GPU. What's great is that last I checked MacVidCards is still pretty affordable. Have fun with your build, it's a good one!
@@ClipPlayTV Let's say you lacked imagination... What could you do? I have software on PC, with license, which could be used on another computer although Mac cannot be updated or get software that is viable apparently...
Okay my experience with 12-core 2010, ssd pci card boot awesome, there have been zero issues updating to new Mac operating systems using a non-flashed AMD card rx580, so really your issue is probably because of the Nvidia card requiring drivers. For Apple you are better off using AMD cards. If you are using Adobe Premiere, or da Vinci resolve the Nvidia cards are definitely faster and use less power. If you’re using Final Cut Pro and just want a little more compatibility meaning in need of support without the boot screen then use the AMD cards and I’m about to do the Pixlas mod so I can run the high-power AMD Radeon vii without having to add a separate power supply. Once I do that mod that should probably allow me to continue using the machine for a fair bit longer even though technically Apple is going to make the next operating system not support the 2012 and the earlier Mac Pros although there will be a hack I’m sure that you can apply that will enable you to install it on those older mac pros. So the life of our older machines is still not quite over and every bit I save by not having to buy their new Mac Pro or build a hackinTosh is money in the bank.
I went through all of this myself before I saw your video, I work as a broadcast tech and my company got rid of a 2009 8 core 2.93ghz and a 2010 12 core 2.66ghz machine from our graphics dept. I figured I would just sell them and had them on craigslist with a few email replies one of which asking why I was selling, I looked online and found these systems were so upgradeable that I took both off sale and I have been excited about a Mac for the first time since I did a Dove upgrade to my 128k Mac to a 512k "Fat Mac" in 1984 before I bought my first Amiga. I have since upgraded the memory in each to 96gb, updated firmware, upgraded video cards to AMD 580's, installed Mojave then added ssd's and now the 12 core 2010 is my dedicated Roon music server and the 8 core 2009 is my "getting familiar with Mac again" machine, I am a PC gamer but I was surprised to find that half of my significant Steam library was Mac compatible and now I want to actually finish a game on Mac as some play fine. The last game I finished on a Mac was The Colony and I loved every minute of it. I found a few tricks along the way like only using 3 of the four memory slots for speed, only buy Rank 2 RAM if you expect to get 16gb chips to run at the 1333mhz speed. I also added an Airport wifi/bluetooth card and an outboard USB DAC. The station also got rid of two Kensington Expert Mouse Pro trackballs, I had a Kensington Turbo Mouse for my Fat Mac in 1987 before I sold it. So I am having fun on the cheap and that is something. Loved the video, I hope others will recycle these machines and have fun with them.
I was thinking weather to get a gaming PC or mac pro but you inspired me to get the mac pro I am just scared if it will supported in the next few years
I have a 2009 Mac Pro and they're great, I really hope the new Mac Pro coming this year will be like this but I think I've set my expectations a little high haha!
That's cool! I'm also very eager to see what they end up releasing this year. A lot of rumors are pointing to a sort of stackable modular one at this point. Either way, it'll be very interesting to see how Apple approaches this category again.
I bought a Mid 2012 Mac Pro after seeing your video -- looking to add a USB 3.0 PCI-E card -- you list the one you use below your video -- going to the amazon link you provide for this product, it says: "Incompatible with Mac OS X 10.10 Yosemite or Above" Which version of Mac OS X do you use on your Mac Pro and is this statement true? Thank you very much.
It does say that on the listing but I’ve been using mine on HS and Mojave with absolutely no problems. The only quirk is that when the Mac sleeps it temporarily cuts power to the card, but it’s never really affected me and has been a worthy minor trade off imo.
Thank you for your quick reply. Would you know if this card being impacted by the Mac OS X sleep mode is a function of this particular card or how the PCI-E bus works in general in the 5.x Mac Pros? Thank you.
No problem! I’m not particularly sure. From what I was reading it said it probably had something to do more with the MacOS drivers in general(which is why most cards don’t typically work), which would make sense. It still gets full USB 3 speeds and works consistently in my experience while it’s not in sleep.
Beautiful machine, i used for a long time the MacPro 3,1 (2008)... this machines are sooooo powerful!!! I Love it... Now I'm using a 2009 iMac 27" Great machine too!
I got a 4,1 last year, 2x 6-Core, and yes now with a Radeon RX 560, 32GB of RAM, nMVE boot drive and it is perfect. Paired with a HP ZR30w (better than the Cinema Display) and an IBM T221. Unbeatable and scores 24.000 on multicore Geekbench.
Still running this Mac now in 2020? Contemplating getting the new MacPro and trying to gauge lifespan if I get one. 10 years is minimum I expect to have it for the cost of it..
I’m running the latest version of Catalina with OpenCore installed. It gives me HW acceleration and native boot screen and everything with a non EFI RX 580. I’m about to install Big Sur on it as well
Good Vid, watching this now on a Macbook Pro 15" Mid 2009, only upgrade is a SSD and 8 megs of memory, my daily computer, Internet browser, video viewer, photo editor. Best notebook computer I ever own purchased off Ebay.
That's awesome! Those MacBook Pro's are some of the best Mac notebook computers in terms value around. The upgradability is just insane. I love my 2015 Retina but sometimes I miss being able to pop open my old Late 2011 13' and throw in an SSD and some more RAM...
Working on upgrading my Mac Pro 2012. Dual processor version. Current project is the graphics card. Still using the 5770 just bought an rx 570. I just started learning video editing and because I am an hobbyist not a pro went with Davinci resolve free, because iMovie does not offer much. That said, resolve relies heavily on the GPU. I already have 12 core processing and 12 GB ram which I will upgrade later but, as we all know the 5770 will not run Mojave. After the gpu I will work on getting an SSD. Likely a pcie adaptor setup. This video was super informative and helped me settle on the AMD option and what SSD setup to go with later. And yes I will remember to keep my origional 5770 lol. Thanks.
I'm still running a 2008 3.1 8 core. It is still doing the job. I just want something newer. I'm torn between another used mac pro, or grabbing a used HP Z820 and trying my hand at hackintoshing. A 16 core system running OSX does sound appealing. I still have some research ahead of me though.
That sounds really cool! The main reason I didn't do a Hackintosh was having to mess around with drivers and Ktexts. But If you can get a 16 core Mac on the fairly cheap I'd say it's definitely worth it.
Also love my mac pro 2009, I got the xeon w3690, 32gb ram, firepro w7100 (1 slot card!), pcie m2 ssd 1tb, 12tb hdd, sonnet esata card for another 12tb external drives. Only mis the usb 3. (No more pcie free)
Good video . . . I am looking at getting an older mac pro for playing around with video editing . . . pro's and con's with all . . . I like the way you laid it out for this setup. . . very nicely done! ;)
You absolutely didn’t. These are especially great for Audio editing since it has the variety of inputs and PCIE Slots for expandability. I would even argue that this would preform better for audio editing than with video editing.
Olli Garch I bought 3 of them and currently building them, I do video editing, music production and website/ logo designing No you did not waste your money It is well worth it
I decided to buy an older model Mac Pro (2009) when I saw the prices of the newer models with lower specs. It was the best thing I could've done! I've been completely happy with it ever since. I use it as my main recording studio computer. However, I have the dual processor model running 12 core and 32gb of ram. Also there is a 1TB SSD, a usb 3 card installed and a suped-up mac-flashed 2gb video card that feeds a 34" curved main video monitor and a 43" tv serving as a second screen. This thing kills!
Hi I was about to buy one of these off eBay but when I inquired with the seller as to what I would use it for (QuickBooks, Office 365, web surfing, TH-cam and Zoom) and they replied that that’s too much use for that computer. What has been your experience? Thanks......Jermaine
@@ClipPlayTV prices are a quite bit higher here in Japan, but when 4,1s are still going for around $1000 the 3,1 for $400-$600 (at a higher configuration) is still worth it. But Japanese tend to take really good care of tech before they resell it and resellers often have warranties, so it's also a lot safer. You're unlikely to get screwed, and if something goes wrong, resellers are often very kind in making restitution, refund, or repair.
i got mine for 750. but it came with 48gb ram and dual 2.93 six cores. i already bought two 3.46 zeons. it also came with a 250 ssd and a 1 tb black wd drive. i am not using those drives. put a wd black nvme drive on a pcie nvme card and getting read writes close to 3k. also use only 3 memory slots instead of four for each zeon. its a 3 channel machine. I bought an amd rx 580 graphics card , 4 x usb3.0 card and 4 x 2tb barracuda drives for storage to complete the build....you need to install mojave to get get full read / write speeds from nvme. there is a new firmware which mojave installs before the osx.
I agee! this is a great find, and it my daily driver as well. I have found 2 drawbacks though. 1. Heat/Power consumption. I have noticed an increase in my power bill since I got my mac pro. and when I edit videos the heat this thing puts out is nuts. my office turns into the hottest room in the house 2. I "can" edit 4k on my mac pro, but it's not fun. not sure if this is because I'm just using Imovie, but setting up transitions and adding effects to 4k videos really takes a tole, and I seem to get lots of drop frames while editing. however the final videos come out nice.
Thanks! Fortunately I live in a Dorm at the moment so I don’t have a power bill to worry about but every time I wake the Mac up from sleep the lights in my room flicker lol. 4K editing definitely seems to run a lot better in Final Cut Pro than it does Premiere for me, although I mainly still shoot in 1080p for the more manageable file size. Thanks for the heads up on both of these! I had a feeling I wasn’t the only one experiencing these weird power drains...
Funny thing, found a guy on FB marketplace with 4 old "Apple PC's" for $125. Asked him what models they were, to which he responded: "2 G4's and 2 G5's". I said ok, already noticing the dual firewire 800 ports on the front of one, and asked his bottom dollar. Met up, started looking at the one I'd noticed in the picture, but he wanted to make sure I saw the "newer" G5 as well. Dude had no clue what he had. Long story short, talked him down to $80 for all four. Got two G5's (both dual CPU but haven't checked specs yet), a Mac Pro 3,1 (2008), and a Mac Pro 5,1 (2010) 3.2ghz quad with 16gb RAM and a Radeon HD5870, though I've already swapped that out for an RX 570.
Mine's the same model, reflashed to 5,1 and upgraded pretty much everything inside the beast. Nehelam Xeon upgraded to Westmere W3680, 32 GB RAM, Radeon RX 580, NVMe PCIe boot drive, 8 TB HDD. You are good to go with AMD PC GPU, even with the bootrom updates, which you don't need to swap with Mojave. I have a Windows 10 drive in it as well, and I used iMac Pro Bootcamp app (v6.1) in Windows to boot to macOS.
Ooh an NVMe SSD? I’ve been hearing a lot about people using those and getting amazing speeds. So you don’t need to swap the GPU out anymore for Mojave? That’ll be a massive relief for sure. That’s a really cool setup you’ve got there though! Especially the RX 580👌 If you don’t mind could you send me a link to where you got that modified boot camp?
@@ClipPlayTV Yeah. You can use NVMe with bootrom version 140.0.0.0.0. After upgrading to Mojave, I no longer have to swap cards, unless I need to access the boot screen, which I have my GTX 680 Mac card on standby. I did consider getting Vega 64 card, but it is still pricy here in Singapore. You can manually download BC6.1 drivers from Apple CDN using Brigadier (This version supports APFS switching, which was released for newer Macs). It requires some elbow grease. You must have the compatible BC drivers for MP5,1 installed first, then install BC6.1.
Also booting into Windows and then back to Mac is a complete pain in the ass after updating to Mojave - using a second older GPU no longer works as most single slot cards that don't need the power leads are not metal compatible. If you need to boot into Windows and back to OSX regularly then stick with Sierra, unless you can power 2 x metal compatible GPU's where the older one still has EFI for the boot screen. Apparently Bootchamp might work if you disable SIP but it's not a great idea.
I have a 2006 Mac Pro 1,1. Working perfectly running El Capitan. Unfortunately it can’t run Mojave,which I use on a i7 Asus laptop hackintosh. Great video! Cheers from Brazil.
I recently bought a 2009 Mac Pro. It has a 286Ghz SSD startup and 1Tb HDD storage drive, 48 ghz memory, 2 x 2.8 GHz Quad-Core Intel Xeon processor, and NVIDIA GeForce GT 640 1 GB graphics. It's a beast. I'm upgrading the storage drive to a 1tb SSD. Can you recommend any other possible upgrades that will add more power and speed? Thanks!
My daily driver at the moment is a 2008 Mac Pro with Dosdude1’s Mac OS Catalina Patcher and 32GB RAM. I got it as for parts for 100€ (which is really cheap for such a machine here in Germany). The only thing wrong was an extreme amount of dust in the cooling system.
Nice video. Thanks for for all the information and talking about these great computers .. . We completed editing our feature doc on a MacPro2006 after adding some bells and whistles including upgrading the processor etc.. We had an IMAC 5G to finish it off. So prefer the MAC Pro They are amazing machines.
That’s a fantastic deal for a Dual-CPU. Nothing has changed, other than some upgrades I’ve done to the Graphics and SSD. It’s still a fantastic build and is my daily workstation. I’m working on pre-production for part III to show off some of these upgrades too. I’d highly recommend focusing on the Graphics and SSD. (Maybe an RX 580 and an NVME) those seem to play the best with Mojave.
@@ClipPlayTV I guess what I was asking was, has the landscape changed? Are there upgrades you'd do now that weren't available when you shot the vid? Thanks for the great video...I'm going to buy through your Amazon links.
@@Setmose You can't draw enough power from those to power one of those plugs for something like a 1080 Ti. I had a mate do it and his machine kept rebooting randomly.
Thanks for bringing this to my attention! I’ve actually been looking into the Pixlas mod a bit because of this comment haha. Would definitely be interesting to throw in a Vega 56 down the road when things get more intensive...
@@tonylorentzen: Yet this is the recommended solution from Macvidcards who sell the flashed Nvidia cards, along with the SATA cabling (Titan Xp Pascal, for example). Your mate has something anomalous going on in his rig. How much other stuff has he got packed in there?
Cool, you can still push a little bit more speed: A RAID 0 array with two similar HHD the resulting speed is appreciated. :-) I use this approach for my data and home dir.
Hey! I flashed my Mac Pro to a newer model number since it’s the same hardware, installed a new processor, and used a patcher installer from DosDude1 to install the latest version of MacOS Catalina.
That’s a fantastic deal. I would jump on that veryyy quickly. As the disc door, mine does that too. All you have to do is grab it with the tips of your fingers and pull it up, then push it up till it pops free. Happens all the time haha.
ClipPlayTV I agree! I think more and more people are going to start doing this. Iv already seen the pricing going up over the past 6 months that Iv been looking for one. People are wanting $500-$600 for the dual cpu ones(not modified) and Iv seen them for $900-$1300 for modified ones. And I’ve noticed a lot of people wanting at least $300 for the single cpu ones. That’s why I’m a little concerned on the condition this one might be in when I see it. I’ll keep you posted 🤓
Great Video! Clear and informative. I’m going to be further upgrading my Mac Pro 2009 your tips will help me guide through that build, thanks again! 🍎 Gang 🍏
Hi I was about to buy one of these off eBay but when I inquired with the seller as to what I would use it for (QuickBooks, Office 365, web surfing, TH-cam and Zoom) and they replied that that’s too much use for that computer. What has been your experience? Thanks......Jermaine
This one guy on some forums online actually did paint his recently! He gave it this really nice Space Grey finish. I'd rather not go through all the hassle of disassembly to paint it but the finished result looks really cool👌
It actually cost twice the price of what I originally got it for($150) 😂. It still runs it very well though. I use final cut a fair amount for quick edits.
Please update this guide to include the fact you need THERMAL PADS on the components near the CPU. They are delidded when you purchase it from Apple, the CPUs online are not. You need to pad the space between the heat sync and i beleive the SMCs?
Yes they can! The 2010 5,1 and the 2009 4,1 (after being easily flashed to 5,1 with a custom boot rom) still enjoy native support from Apple in Mojave, with the main requirement being a Metal-capable graphics card. (Best option imo is probably an AMD card like an RX 560 or 580)
12:01 you don’t need original GPU for updates. Did all software updates on my MSI Radeon R 280x, even did Mojave GPU bus upgrade without problems. You need with your setup. Mojave sucks for older Mac pro
Really? I think I've had to do that with mine just because of the Nvidia Web drivers. That's good to know though! Definitely makes a natively supported GPU more worth it for sure. How's your experience with Mojave been?
Thank you! Best video yet on this subject. I was given a Mac Pro 5,1 2010 2.66 twelve core with no hard drive at all. How do I get an operating system on it? I bought a 500g sata3 ssd. I suppose I’ll want it in a pcie slot. From what I can tell though, you must us the original sata 2 ports to install an os and update. There is a sata connection under the optical drive. Can that be used for the os installation?there are no Hdd sleds in this mac, I’m cheap and the ssd can just lay under the optical drive. Then you can clone the os to the ssd on the pcie. The computer won’t install to an external drive, but apparently you can change that once the os is installed. I was told to download Siearra and make a bootable thumb drive. Then upgrade to high Sierra. The only Sierra download I can find at the Apple store says it’s an update. I have a MacBook Pro where I can download the os and make a bootable drive if I can find it, but I can’t figure it out. There’s also something called an m.2 ssd. Is that the same as a nvme ssd? My goal is to just get an operating system in with the most cost effective ssd speed for the os drive. It has 16g ram that I plan to keep for now. Any help or links would be greatly appreciated, I really don’t know whatI’m doing and don’t want to spend much unless it’s worth it. Thank you.
See if you can find a EVGA GTX 680 Classified 4GB for Mac. I see them on ebay. It's fully compatible with Mac Pro 5,1 and Mojave with bootscreen. No mac drivers needed. In Windows I play Forza Horizon 4 on high setting - 45-60 fps. Metro Exodus on high settings, medium shadow 30-60 fps. These are the games I've played. Just got the machine. It's unbelievable what that old card can handle. I had a Gigabyte AMD Radeon R9 280 3GB earlier, the EVGA GTX 680 Classified is in another league.
Great vid but one question... did you install a delidded cpu or a lidded one? If lidded, did you use washers under your heat sink to compensate for thickness of lid?
Originally, no. The 6 Core tray of the 2009 doesn’t use delidded processors. However I did have to use delidded CPU’s when I went to a 2009 Dual tray a few months ago.
Yeah, I have the almost setup, 6 Core 3.33GHZ, 32G ram, but I am using a GTX 980 ti with mac EFI support. I used it for 3 years in a row, amazingly fast and stable. Now I am considering to replace the GTX with a Vega 64 which can get the native support from Apple.
I didn’t, as the 4,1 Single CPU is one of the only ones that didn’t need that done from the research I did. Very much necessary on the dual CPU front, however.
I've done this same thing with my 2009 4,1 which I got for $300 at an auction and was surprised it was the 2.26 Eight-Core with four 1TB HDDs. All I need to do is upgrade the CPU firmware to 5,1 and I can use the Westmeres. However, I'm going to have to stick with High Sierra since I use a MSI 980ti and Apple nearly killed CUDA support after OS X 10.13 because they hate Nvidia. Still got the original 120 GPU it came with.
Would love to get an older Mac Pro at some point to mess around with. I own a G5, but there isn't nearly as much you can do with those machines. Definitely envious of that price though, I've been waiting to snag a good deal but haven't had much luck, especially with shipping!
Take a look around EBay and Facebook Marketplace! There are definitely some good deals on there from time to time. These machines are definitely worth it, it's crazy how well it's Intel Platform holds up.
I have a 2010 DP 2.4 mhz? I will be putting the pcie SSD upgrade and have ordered a new RX560. I have always wanted to upgrade the processors but I don't know what to get and I am a little afraid since the machine runs very well now. I have to do research. However, it is a tank of a machine. Great video.
Hey bro, just wanna say amazing job on this video. Overall I guve you 10/10. I got Early 2008 Mac Tower laying around in the house. I'm on hunt for upgrade parts but you think the listed parts also good for my Mac Pro? I'd appreciate your contribution. Cheers
Thank you so much! Glad you enjoyed it. I’d highly recommend taking a look at an NVME SSD (do some research though first just to make sure it will work with a 3,1, although I believe it should), and a good AMD RX series card.
Just bought a 1289 4.1 single CPU for 150 euros, and am planned to learn from it, the path i will take, and in this order is: order BCM94322MC Airport Extreme Wifi Adapter and install - Upgrade to El Capitan - Upgrade firmware from 4.1 to 5.1, buy the X5675 6-core 3.06 and 32 GB ECC 1333 and install, install High Sierra, buy Sapphire Pulse Radeon RX580 8GB and try to flash it to bootscreen, upgrade to Mojave- then add PCI-SSD.
i don't understand, you got it to use greater than 10.5 because of the firmware update? i ran Ubuntu on mine and it worked great and was up to date, but it was noisy.
The 2009 Mac Pro is basically identical to the 2010-2012 Mac Pro in terms of hardware. The only thing keeping it from using newer processors and running newer OS’s is it’s 4,1 identified number. This basically just removes the software limitations by flashing that identifier to 5,1.
I refused to buy the trashcan. And tired waiting for a new mac pro. I went with maxed out 5,1. Just to buy more time for a viable 2019 mac pro. Flashed GPU is working great for me NVIDIA. Stable. Drivers stable and they update often.
FYI Mojave will work with Nvidia GPU's based on Kepler architecture which includes GTX 600 and GTX 700 GPUS with the exception of the 750 and 750 Ti they are based on Maxwell. For example I have a 2009 Mac Pro with a GTX 760 and it works natively with Mojave no web drivers. You could use up to and including a GTX Titan Black. You just can't use anything Maxwell or newer.
I honestly was kinda torn between the x5680 and x5690. I gave the X5690 a serious look. But in the end, it came down to the fact that the X5690 only had a marginal performance boost over the X5680, but many people on EBay charged over $100 USD more. This was especially true for when I went to a dual CPU tray two months ago, when delidded x5690s we’re running for around $230 at the time, vs $136 for 2 delidded x5680’s. At the end of the day, the x5680’s just delivered a better value for the money.
You’re a good story teller. I don’t find this many TH-cam personalities doing stories like this. Glad, I found you.
I’m working on a dual cpu 2009 4,1 that I just flashed to a 5,1. I love the videos on your Mac Pro. You’re very concise and awesome at editing. True hero. I’ve seen so many good reviews and Mac Pro tutorials so far but yours truly tops the pile. Also love the hippocampus transitions. Please make more Mac Pro videos when you can!
This means so much to hear. Thank you so much! I’m really glad you’ve found them helpful and I appreciate it! I’m also working on an update video on the current state of this MP, it’s evolved quite a bit and is still my daily rig for everything.
I am still using a 2008 MacPro 2.1 8-Core for Photo Shopping and video editing. Installed is MacOS 10.10.5 Yosemite, 32GB of memory, a Radeon 5870, a USB3.0 card, Bluetooth 4.0 dongle, matrox MXO 2 rack, intel SSDs, iSight camera, and two NEC hardware calibrated displays. Great setup so far.
That’s cool! I’ve seen a lot of people getting great uses out of the 2,1s. It’s crazy that it can even run Mojave pretty well with a Patcher. What kind of Bluetooth 4 dongle are you using? Do you have New Airdrop and Continuity support?
ClipPlayTV I am using the GMYLE dongle it is plug and play and works great. For my older Power Mac G4 machines I use the TDK bluetooth adapter.
I don't use continuity and airdrop so I have to give it a try.
I want to know your upgrades to date November 2022? Obviously a faster WiFi card, USB-C ability maybe? And, the latest OS which I am having a hard time installing.
Yessir! Faster wifi/BT card, NVME, 96GB of RAM. No USB C though. I tried a titan ridge thunderbolt card but It had major stability issues.
Guys like you amaze me.
You are almost in the same class as the Aircraft engineers who can take the remains of a long obsolete aircraft and with ingenuity, experience and persistence, create something quite beautiful that flies far better than the original.
Keep up the good work. Me, I just press the power button on my iMac. If it works - great - if not - Hey Mr Google.
Thank you so much for the kind words! Really glad you enjoyed the video, comments like these really are what motivate me to continue to improve. Really appreciate it!
Awe inspiring ! I'm going to do this right away and I will then sell my 2008 quad core to help recover the costs (it's difficult to use the word "cost" when the project ends up being nearly free compared to purchasing a new Mac Pro).
The video that you produced was extremely lucid, and you covered so many other details such as the SSD into the PCIe slot (not the drive bay), as well as the GPU, and the USB 3.0 external add on.
Many thanks for such a great video !
i got mines single processor early 2009 for 40 dollars at a thrift store
My mind is blown. You got the deal of the century
Thanks for restoring my faith in my trusty old Mac Pro.
I'm curious why you didn't put a 5690 Chip into it. I got 2 of them for $150. It has a few architectural differences from the 5680 that really help system response and speed in Video editing, plus a slightly higher clock speed ( 3.46Ghz across 12 cores for dual processor systems). - ( I do DIT work for film and TV and use Resolve to create 1080 Proxies from 4K footage among other things). I also put a GTX 1080 Founders edition card into it splitting the power connectors between the two motherboard connectors. Even running Premiere, it flys... AND NEVER LOCKS UP OR CRASHES!!! ( Make sure to buy ECC memory and Premiere will run much more stable ) - On the USB3 Card, Make sure you have a card that has an individual controllers for each port. I connect at least 3 raid drives at any given time, and it will generally write close to a Gig a second ( Between Them ). One thing about AMD cards, the dirty little secret is that Premiere will only give you the highest quality output with Nvidia cards. Most people not in the TV and Film industry will never run into this because they won't be outputting to high bit depth files. All that said - Cudos for looking into building this up! These machines are awesome!
- A Girl
Love that setup! I would have thrown a X5690 in but at the time the price for the extra clock speed didn’t seem like a good value, especially for a single CPU model. That’s very interesting though, when I eventually get a Dual-CPU Tray I’ll definitely go for a pair of 90’s! Really? That’s very interesting. I mainly went with the RX580 for Mojave and lack of web drivers but when I start running Windows on it I’ll probably grab a 1070 off eBay. On the USB 3 card, do you mean connecting the Card to the SATA ports? Just curious how you have yours setup with RAID controllers. Thank you so much for such an informative comment!
And you can also run a Geforce GTX Titan X 12GB in a 5,1 as well :)
My
Fav mac machine🔥🔥🔥🔥
Still mine too!
Way to go! I did this back in 2016 with the Mac Pro 8 core duel quad and I have 32 gigs ram but can go to 64gigs of ram 3 hard drives and 1 SSD 256gig for a total of 14 TB drive storage I use it for Music & Video Production didn't do my processors They running at 2.8ghz and I LOVE IT!
That sounds like suchhhh an epic setup🙌. I reallly want to get a Dual CPU Tray at some point soon. The prices on these Macs are rising a little bit so I’m just waiting till I find a good deal on EBay.
this video in 2019 is fantastic , having owned one of these machines for a good while , your video is making me want to pick up one of them again for my development on Mac OS. amazing vid ! , you have a sub here !
Thank you so much! I’m really glad to hear you enjoyed it. I’ve actually been shopping around for a dual-CPU model lately myself haha😂 . What was your build config?
Mine was single processor with the 3.42ghz 6 core, as I'm a software developer for X Plane , unfortunately I've now had to go to a hackintosh to satisfy hardware needs :( I can't afford 5k for an iMac Pro
This. Was. Incredible.
Great video.. I got a 2009 4,1 flashed to 5,1 dual cpu that I just bought the X5680's to install. I have the MSI RX 560 and 32gb ram 3 TB hard drive, and I am running Mojave.. I have about $325 invested in it minus the monitors... about $375 total with the 2 20" Apple cinema displays
That’s an awesome setup! Love the Dual CPU config, might look into getting a tray for mine to do the same down the road. The place I work for actually has several 30 inch Cinema displays they still use and they all seem to work very well.
Nice! I was a college freshman in 2011 when the 5,1 was new and I wanted one so bad. I finally got a 2010 Mac Pro last year with a dual processor tray, 32GB of RAM, and two Apple Cinema Displays for $800 bucks, and I've been upgrading over the past year. I've now got two X5690 CPUs, 96GB of DDR3 1333MHz, an NVMe boot drive, 4x 14TB hard drives in RAID10 for 24TB capacity for backups, a Radeon Pro WX7100 GPU, Wireless AC wifi card, and an UltraWide. This thing is the fastest Mac I own, even faster than my i9 2018 MacBook Pro! It's crazy how much life you can get out of these upgradeable machines! You can even mod the PSU to allow you to install a Vega64 GPU! That's the last upgrade I have planned for mine.
Wow, you definitely went all the way with the specs on that build. So awesome! I’m still baffled by how these run circles around so many modern Macs.
Do you find the max usable 1333MHz Ram speed a problem?
Do you find the max usable 1333MHz Ram speed a problem?
As an added bonus, you can turn down the thermostat to have it heat your room! You can "save energy and be green" by computing!
Lol. Cheese grater heater😂
Great video-picked up this very model for free at the town dump. It’s in great shape, with original monitor. No memory or disk but I ordered some. Looking forward to powering this up. I have newer MacBook Pro so I’m looking forward to seeing how this runs..
Wow! That’s an awesome deal! Best of luck!
I picked up two g5 towers today so I’ll be staying tuned
Ooo. Those G5’s are very interesting. A lot of people have also been gutting those and turning them into bookshelves/Coffee table legs funny enough too. How much did you get them for?
@@ClipPlayTV nice I got them for free
Hey Thanks for the indirect shout out in the description bud! You seem to know your stuff, if you'd ever like to be a collaborator with me or guest star on Mac Yak just let me know :)
I loved you as the villain in Wild Wild West
This honestly just made my day😂👌
that is him
🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣
Any high end PC from 2009 onward is still practical. 2009 was a singularity moment for desktop PC's since streaming video was the last killer app for the mass market and any high end PC in 2009 could stream video without problems.
I hope Apple always, and forever continue to release upgrades for these machines. They literally last forever, and are just as fast if not faster than new computers these days. I own a 2009 (4,1 to 5,1) 12 core Westmere my self and absolutely LOVE IT!.
I have a 2010 mac pro. I upgraded it with two intel x5690 processors and 64 GB of ram. I plan on going to 128GB of ECC ram for development reason. I also put in a MSI radeon rx 580 and updated to the latest OS. I don't regret it at all. Especially when I am working on some big projects.
do u have the 5.1? if u do which one? i have the dual 2.4 ghz
Juan Cano I have the 5,1 running two intel Xeon x5690 clocked at 3.46 GHz. It was a much need upgrade over the stock CPUs it had.
@@RetroPlayer93 awesome! time to bring back to life my old beast then, ty so much man
Juan Cano just be careful because Depending on which Mac Pro you have. The cpu May have the heat spreader removed
I installed windows on this bypassing Mac os completely. Worth it.
Check info on the Titan Ridge Thunderbolt card for the Mac Pro
I’ve been hearing a bit about this! Looks very interesting. Would be great to get Thunderbolt in these, main thing is just whether or not MacOS will support it well.
Somebody below mentioned "12 core 64GB beast with Radeon 580 and 4K" -- that is exactly what I did with a 2012 chassis and it's great -- all SSD. There is no task it doesn't slice through like a Ginsu knife.
Will Cate Ginsu knife! This guy won't even know what that means without looking it up. I remember when those were always on TV
@@CF542 LOL... yeah, a cultural reference from the Cheech-and-Chong generation
I'm now on the look-out for a 2009 Mac tower! Cheers!
Awesome! Best of Luck!
Hey man, awesome vid! I have an '08 Mac Pro with a GTX780 flashed from MacVidCards. I've had no trouble with it so far. It's also technically tested to support Metal, but if I was running Mojave on my Mac Pro I'd go with an AMD GPU. What's great is that last I checked MacVidCards is still pretty affordable. Have fun with your build, it's a good one!
Just got a Mac 09 Pro. I would be interested to see what I can do with it.
Trust me, you can do quite a bit still :-)👍🎥
@@ClipPlayTV Let's say you lacked imagination... What could you do? I have software on PC, with license, which could be used on another computer although Mac cannot be updated or get software that is viable apparently...
Okay my experience with 12-core 2010, ssd pci card boot awesome, there have been zero issues updating to new Mac operating systems using a non-flashed AMD card rx580, so really your issue is probably because of the Nvidia card requiring drivers. For Apple you are better off using AMD cards. If you are using Adobe Premiere, or da Vinci resolve the Nvidia cards are definitely faster and use less power. If you’re using Final Cut Pro and just want a little more compatibility meaning in need of support without the boot screen then use the AMD cards and I’m about to do the Pixlas mod so I can run the high-power AMD Radeon vii without having to add a separate power supply. Once I do that mod that should probably allow me to continue using the machine for a fair bit longer even though technically Apple is going to make the next operating system not support the 2012 and the earlier Mac Pros although there will be a hack I’m sure that you can apply that will enable you to install it on those older mac pros. So the life of our older machines is still not quite over and every bit I save by not having to buy their new Mac Pro or build a hackinTosh is money in the bank.
I went through all of this myself before I saw your video, I work as a broadcast tech and my company got rid of a 2009 8 core 2.93ghz and a 2010 12 core 2.66ghz machine from our graphics dept. I figured I would just sell them and had them on craigslist with a few email replies one of which asking why I was selling, I looked online and found these systems were so upgradeable that I took both off sale and I have been excited about a Mac for the first time since I did a Dove upgrade to my 128k Mac to a 512k "Fat Mac" in 1984 before I bought my first Amiga.
I have since upgraded the memory in each to 96gb, updated firmware, upgraded video cards to AMD 580's, installed Mojave then added ssd's and now the 12 core 2010 is my dedicated Roon music server and the 8 core 2009 is my "getting familiar with Mac again" machine, I am a PC gamer but I was surprised to find that half of my significant Steam library was Mac compatible and now I want to actually finish a game on Mac as some play fine. The last game I finished on a Mac was The Colony and I loved every minute of it.
I found a few tricks along the way like only using 3 of the four memory slots for speed, only buy Rank 2 RAM if you expect to get 16gb chips to run at the 1333mhz speed. I also added an Airport wifi/bluetooth card and an outboard USB DAC.
The station also got rid of two Kensington Expert Mouse Pro trackballs, I had a Kensington Turbo Mouse for my Fat Mac in 1987 before I sold it.
So I am having fun on the cheap and that is something. Loved the video, I hope others will recycle these machines and have fun with them.
You could probably play most of those Steam games on Linux as well, especially with the aid of Proton. They might all run, in fact.
I was thinking weather to get a gaming PC or mac pro but you inspired me to get the mac pro I am just scared if it will supported in the next few years
I have a 2009 Mac Pro and they're great, I really hope the new Mac Pro coming this year will be like this but I think I've set my expectations a little high haha!
That's cool! I'm also very eager to see what they end up releasing this year. A lot of rumors are pointing to a sort of stackable modular one at this point. Either way, it'll be very interesting to see how Apple approaches this category again.
Do you ever use the optical audio?
Yes! I occasionally plug in my sound bar which uses an optical connection. Works very well from my use cases👍
I bought a Mid 2012 Mac Pro after seeing your video -- looking to add a USB 3.0 PCI-E card -- you list the one you use below your video -- going to the amazon link you provide for this product, it says: "Incompatible with Mac OS X 10.10 Yosemite or Above" Which version of Mac OS X do you use on your Mac Pro and is this statement true? Thank you very much.
It does say that on the listing but I’ve been using mine on HS and Mojave with absolutely no problems. The only quirk is that when the Mac sleeps it temporarily cuts power to the card, but it’s never really affected me and has been a worthy minor trade off imo.
Thank you for your quick reply. Would you know if this card being impacted by the Mac OS X sleep mode is a function of this particular card or how the PCI-E bus works in general in the 5.x Mac Pros? Thank you.
No problem! I’m not particularly sure. From what I was reading it said it probably had something to do more with the MacOS drivers in general(which is why most cards don’t typically work), which would make sense. It still gets full USB 3 speeds and works consistently in my experience while it’s not in sleep.
Beautiful machine, i used for a long time the MacPro 3,1 (2008)... this machines are sooooo powerful!!! I Love it... Now I'm using a 2009 iMac 27" Great machine too!
I got a 4,1 last year, 2x 6-Core, and yes now with a Radeon RX 560, 32GB of RAM, nMVE boot drive and it is perfect. Paired with a HP ZR30w (better than the Cinema Display) and an IBM T221. Unbeatable and scores 24.000 on multicore Geekbench.
Love that setup🙌 I really wish I had a Dual CPU tray. Looking into grabbing an NVME drive soon though.
@@ClipPlayTV The nvme is amazing. Mine does 1400MB/s reads and 1200MB/s writes. =) That's more than the trash can MP.
Still running this Mac now in 2020? Contemplating getting the new MacPro and trying to gauge lifespan if I get one. 10 years is minimum I expect to have it for the cost of it..
Yes. I use it for heavy 4K editing and it outperforms my 2016 15” MacBook Pro with Touchbar
ClipPlayTV what OS are you running?
I’m running the latest version of Catalina with OpenCore installed. It gives me HW acceleration and native boot screen and everything with a non EFI RX 580. I’m about to install Big Sur on it as well
Good Vid, watching this now on a Macbook Pro 15" Mid 2009, only upgrade is a SSD and 8 megs of memory, my daily computer, Internet browser, video viewer, photo editor. Best notebook computer I ever own purchased off Ebay.
That's awesome! Those MacBook Pro's are some of the best Mac notebook computers in terms value around. The upgradability is just insane. I love my 2015 Retina but sometimes I miss being able to pop open my old Late 2011 13' and throw in an SSD and some more RAM...
Working on upgrading my Mac Pro 2012. Dual processor version. Current project is the graphics card. Still using the 5770 just bought an rx 570. I just started learning video editing and because I am an hobbyist not a pro went with Davinci resolve free, because iMovie does not offer much. That said, resolve relies heavily on the GPU. I already have 12 core processing and 12 GB ram which I will upgrade later but, as we all know the 5770 will not run Mojave. After the gpu I will work on getting an SSD. Likely a pcie adaptor setup. This video was super informative and helped me settle on the AMD option and what SSD setup to go with later. And yes I will remember to keep my origional 5770 lol. Thanks.
I'm still running a 2008 3.1 8 core. It is still doing the job. I just want something newer. I'm torn between another used mac pro, or grabbing a used HP Z820 and trying my hand at hackintoshing. A 16 core system running OSX does sound appealing. I still have some research ahead of me though.
That sounds really cool! The main reason I didn't do a Hackintosh was having to mess around with drivers and Ktexts. But If you can get a 16 core Mac on the fairly cheap I'd say it's definitely worth it.
Also love my mac pro 2009, I got the xeon w3690, 32gb ram, firepro w7100 (1 slot card!), pcie m2 ssd 1tb, 12tb hdd, sonnet esata card for another 12tb external drives. Only mis the usb 3. (No more pcie free)
That's a really cool setup! I do kinda wish they had an extra PCIE Slot.
Good video . . . I am looking at getting an older mac pro for playing around with video editing . . . pro's and con's with all . . . I like the way you laid it out for this setup. . . very nicely done! ;)
Thanks! Glad you liked it! I’ve loved mine for video editing. Handles all my 4K edits I do for my freelance client work without breaking a sweat.
I just ordered this one for audio editing. Please tell me I didn’t waste my money. Be honest though. Thanks
You absolutely didn’t. These are especially great for Audio editing since it has the variety of inputs and PCIE Slots for expandability. I would even argue that this would preform better for audio editing than with video editing.
ClipPlayTV good news to hear. Thanks so much
Olli Garch I bought 3 of them and currently building them,
I do video editing, music production and website/ logo designing
No you did not waste your money
It is well worth it
You can get Mac flashed GFX cards - even high end ones. Search for MacVidCards on eBay
Is that a google home mini behind him
Yup. Got it for $0.99 cents through a Spotify Promo😉
I decided to buy an older model Mac Pro (2009) when I saw the prices of the newer models with lower specs. It was the best thing I could've done! I've been completely happy with it ever since. I use it as my main recording studio computer. However, I have the dual processor model running 12 core and 32gb of ram. Also there is a 1TB SSD, a usb 3 card installed and a suped-up mac-flashed 2gb video card that feeds a 34" curved main video monitor and a 43" tv serving as a second screen. This thing kills!
I spent ~$5K on mine (multi-socket) new and over the years in upgrades. Now it is a 12 core 64GB beast with Radeon 580 and 4K.
I just bought a 2011 model :) going to use it to replace my 2014 macbook pro
Hi I was about to buy one of these off eBay but when I inquired with the seller as to what I would use it for (QuickBooks, Office 365, web surfing, TH-cam and Zoom) and they replied that that’s too much use for that computer. What has been your experience? Thanks......Jermaine
I have one. I got it for $150 at Goodwill and I love it. Upgraded the RAM to the max. It's been great.
That’s a steal of a deal!
Great video man! I love the high quality 👌
Thank you! I’m really glad you enjoyed it
👍
I really wish there was a Thunderbolt card you could throw in. I have a Mid-2010 12-core 2.66 GHz.
I installed a low Profile MSI RX560 last night. And I got the boot screen in mine...
Should add it is Mojave, and the MSI 560 is one of their officially supported cards for Mojave. Great video
I am about to do the second part of my own 8 core 2008 3,1. It is obviously a bit more restricted than a 4,1 or 5,1, but it's still great.
Those 3,1's still offer a great value!
@@ClipPlayTV prices are a quite bit higher here in Japan, but when 4,1s are still going for around $1000 the 3,1 for $400-$600 (at a higher configuration) is still worth it. But Japanese tend to take really good care of tech before they resell it and resellers often have warranties, so it's also a lot safer. You're unlikely to get screwed, and if something goes wrong, resellers are often very kind in making restitution, refund, or repair.
I love My 09Mac Pro wouldn't trade it or sell it for it's weight in gold.
It's weight in gold might get you the new Mac Pro. These things are quite heavy. Lol
You could buy 200 of them dumb ass
Yeah that was sarcasm, don’t want some internet person attacking me
Great video. Loved it.
i got mine for 750. but it came with 48gb ram and dual 2.93 six cores. i already bought two 3.46 zeons. it also came with a 250 ssd and a 1 tb black wd drive. i am not using those drives. put a wd black nvme drive on a pcie nvme card and getting read writes close to 3k. also use only 3 memory slots instead of four for each zeon. its a 3 channel machine. I bought an amd rx 580 graphics card , 4 x usb3.0 card and 4 x 2tb barracuda drives for storage to complete the build....you need to install mojave to get get full read / write speeds from nvme. there is a new firmware which mojave installs before the osx.
That's a great deal! What USB card do you use?
I agee! this is a great find, and it my daily driver as well. I have found 2 drawbacks though.
1. Heat/Power consumption. I have noticed an increase in my power bill since I got my mac pro. and when I edit videos the heat this thing puts out is nuts. my office turns into the hottest room in the house
2. I "can" edit 4k on my mac pro, but it's not fun. not sure if this is because I'm just using Imovie, but setting up transitions and adding effects to 4k videos really takes a tole, and I seem to get lots of drop frames while editing. however the final videos come out nice.
Thanks! Fortunately I live in a Dorm at the moment so I don’t have a power bill to worry about but every time I wake the Mac up from sleep the lights in my room flicker lol. 4K editing definitely seems to run a lot better in Final Cut Pro than it does Premiere for me, although I mainly still shoot in 1080p for the more manageable file size. Thanks for the heads up on both of these! I had a feeling I wasn’t the only one experiencing these weird power drains...
We still use ours from day one (June 01, 2009), as our studio server. Almost 10 Solid years!
That’s so awesome! Not many computers you can pick up that will work this well for that long eh? The value on these things is fantastic.
Funny thing, found a guy on FB marketplace with 4 old "Apple PC's" for $125. Asked him what models they were, to which he responded: "2 G4's and 2 G5's". I said ok, already noticing the dual firewire 800 ports on the front of one, and asked his bottom dollar. Met up, started looking at the one I'd noticed in the picture, but he wanted to make sure I saw the "newer" G5 as well. Dude had no clue what he had. Long story short, talked him down to $80 for all four. Got two G5's (both dual CPU but haven't checked specs yet), a Mac Pro 3,1 (2008), and a Mac Pro 5,1 (2010) 3.2ghz quad with 16gb RAM and a Radeon HD5870, though I've already swapped that out for an RX 570.
Mine's the same model, reflashed to 5,1 and upgraded pretty much everything inside the beast.
Nehelam Xeon upgraded to Westmere W3680, 32 GB RAM, Radeon RX 580, NVMe PCIe boot drive, 8 TB HDD. You are good to go with AMD PC GPU, even with the bootrom updates, which you don't need to swap with Mojave. I have a Windows 10 drive in it as well, and I used iMac Pro Bootcamp app (v6.1) in Windows to boot to macOS.
Ooh an NVMe SSD? I’ve been hearing a lot about people using those and getting amazing speeds. So you don’t need to swap the GPU out anymore for Mojave? That’ll be a massive relief for sure. That’s a really cool setup you’ve got there though! Especially the RX 580👌 If you don’t mind could you send me a link to where you got that modified boot camp?
@@ClipPlayTV Yeah. You can use NVMe with bootrom version 140.0.0.0.0. After upgrading to Mojave, I no longer have to swap cards, unless I need to access the boot screen, which I have my GTX 680 Mac card on standby. I did consider getting Vega 64 card, but it is still pricy here in Singapore. You can manually download BC6.1 drivers from Apple CDN using Brigadier (This version supports APFS switching, which was released for newer Macs). It requires some elbow grease. You must have the compatible BC drivers for MP5,1 installed first, then install BC6.1.
What about Thunderbolt?
Also booting into Windows and then back to Mac is a complete pain in the ass after updating to Mojave - using a second older GPU no longer works as most single slot cards that don't need the power leads are not metal compatible. If you need to boot into Windows and back to OSX regularly then stick with Sierra, unless you can power 2 x metal compatible GPU's where the older one still has EFI for the boot screen. Apparently Bootchamp might work if you disable SIP but it's not a great idea.
Honestly that’s why I’ve held off installing windows 10 on mine... seems to be too much of a complicated process
I have a 2006 Mac Pro 1,1. Working perfectly running El Capitan. Unfortunately it can’t run Mojave,which I use on a i7 Asus laptop hackintosh. Great video! Cheers from Brazil.
That thing would look amazing in blue like it looks in the thumbnail!
I know right! Some people on various online forums have actually done some pretty cool paint jobs with these too.
Excellent video! thanks for sharing
I recently bought a 2009 Mac Pro. It has a 286Ghz SSD startup and 1Tb HDD storage drive, 48 ghz memory, 2 x 2.8 GHz Quad-Core Intel Xeon processor, and NVIDIA GeForce GT 640 1 GB graphics. It's a beast.
I'm upgrading the storage drive to a 1tb SSD. Can you recommend any other possible upgrades that will add more power and speed? Thanks!
My daily driver at the moment is a 2008 Mac Pro with Dosdude1’s Mac OS Catalina Patcher and 32GB RAM. I got it as for parts for 100€ (which is really cheap for such a machine here in Germany). The only thing wrong was an extreme amount of dust in the cooling system.
Nice video. Thanks for for all the information and talking about these great computers .. . We completed editing our feature doc on a MacPro2006 after adding some bells and whistles including upgrading the processor etc.. We had an IMAC 5G to finish it off. So prefer the MAC Pro They are amazing machines.
Does it run DaVinci Resolve?
Yes! I actually use Davinci quite frequently for color grading purposes for Clientwork...
I just picked up a 2009 dual CPU set up today for 500 bucks. Has anything changed since you recorded this, or should I run with your recommendations?
That’s a fantastic deal for a Dual-CPU. Nothing has changed, other than some upgrades I’ve done to the Graphics and SSD. It’s still a fantastic build and is my daily workstation. I’m working on pre-production for part III to show off some of these upgrades too. I’d highly recommend focusing on the Graphics and SSD. (Maybe an RX 580 and an NVME) those seem to play the best with Mojave.
@@ClipPlayTV I guess what I was asking was, has the landscape changed? Are there upgrades you'd do now that weren't available when you shot the vid? Thanks for the great video...I'm going to buy through your Amazon links.
Do the pixlas mod to the power supply and you can get whatever GPU in it. I currently run mine with an RX 580 and I've even had a GTX 1070 Ti in mine.
Tony Lorenzo Or take power from one if the SATA drive connectors. MUCH less invasive than pixlas surgery.
@@Setmose You can't draw enough power from those to power one of those plugs for something like a 1080 Ti. I had a mate do it and his machine kept rebooting randomly.
Thanks for bringing this to my attention! I’ve actually been looking into the Pixlas mod a bit because of this comment haha. Would definitely be interesting to throw in a Vega 56 down the road when things get more intensive...
@@ClipPlayTV My pleasure! :-)
@@tonylorentzen: Yet this is the recommended solution from Macvidcards who sell the flashed Nvidia cards, along with the SATA cabling (Titan Xp Pascal, for example). Your mate has something anomalous going on in his rig. How much other stuff has he got packed in there?
Cool, you can still push a little bit more speed: A RAID 0 array with two similar HHD the resulting speed is appreciated. :-) I use this approach for my data and home dir.
Is there a way to make these revert back to Snow Leppard? OS9? You said something about the machines op ID number can be changed? Yes?
Hey clipplaytv, how do you update to the latest macos if your machine is so old
Hey! I flashed my Mac Pro to a newer model number since it’s the same hardware, installed a new processor, and used a patcher installer from DosDude1 to install the latest version of MacOS Catalina.
@@ClipPlayTV good to know, thanks
I just found one for $180 that I’m going to go look at today. For that price it comes with Apple Magic Mouse and keyboard
Nandor ooh. Is it a 2009 or 2010? If so that’s a killer deal for the included peripherals👌
It’s a 2009 single cpu. So I’ll pretty much do what you did. Then I’ll use it like that till I save up the money to get the dual cpu tray
The top disk drive door doesn’t close right but I’m sure that’s an easy fix. I’m just hoping the rest of the case looks as good as he says it does
That’s a fantastic deal. I would jump on that veryyy quickly. As the disc door, mine does that too. All you have to do is grab it with the tips of your fingers and pull it up, then push it up till it pops free. Happens all the time haha.
ClipPlayTV I agree! I think more and more people are going to start doing this. Iv already seen the pricing going up over the past 6 months that Iv been looking for one. People are wanting $500-$600 for the dual cpu ones(not modified) and Iv seen them for $900-$1300 for modified ones.
And I’ve noticed a lot of people wanting at least $300 for the single cpu ones. That’s why I’m a little concerned on the condition this one might be in when I see it.
I’ll keep you posted 🤓
Great Video! Clear and informative. I’m going to be further upgrading my Mac Pro 2009 your tips will help me guide through that build, thanks again! 🍎 Gang 🍏
Hi I was about to buy one of these off eBay but when I inquired with the seller as to what I would use it for (QuickBooks, Office 365, web surfing, TH-cam and Zoom) and they replied that that’s too much use for that computer. What has been your experience? Thanks......Jermaine
That case would look nice in a power coat purple.
This one guy on some forums online actually did paint his recently! He gave it this really nice Space Grey finish. I'd rather not go through all the hassle of disassembly to paint it but the finished result looks really cool👌
ClipPlayTV yeah, maybe even royal blue.
Doesn't Final Cut cost almost the same as this system?
It actually cost twice the price of what I originally got it for($150) 😂. It still runs it very well though. I use final cut a fair amount for quick edits.
Please update this guide to include the fact you need THERMAL PADS on the components near the CPU. They are delidded when you purchase it from Apple, the CPUs online are not. You need to pad the space between the heat sync and i beleive the SMCs?
Can these be upgraded to Mojave? These are pretty much the dream Mac with them being 100% user upgradable.
Yes they can! The 2010 5,1 and the 2009 4,1 (after being easily flashed to 5,1 with a custom boot rom) still enjoy native support from Apple in Mojave, with the main requirement being a Metal-capable graphics card. (Best option imo is probably an AMD card like an RX 560 or 580)
@@ClipPlayTV that's awesome, thanks for getting back to me. I'll be on the hunt for a dual Xeon 4,1 :)
No problem! Best of luck! If you have any questions always feel free to hmu!
Thank you very much for the knowledge drop. I might try this one day.
12:01 you don’t need original GPU for updates. Did all software updates on my MSI Radeon R 280x, even did Mojave GPU bus upgrade without problems. You need with your setup. Mojave sucks for older Mac pro
Really? I think I've had to do that with mine just because of the Nvidia Web drivers. That's good to know though! Definitely makes a natively supported GPU more worth it for sure. How's your experience with Mojave been?
Thank you! Best video yet on this subject. I was given a Mac Pro 5,1 2010 2.66 twelve core with no hard drive at all. How do I get an operating system on it? I bought a 500g sata3 ssd. I suppose I’ll want it in a pcie slot. From what I can tell though, you must us the original sata 2 ports to install an os and update. There is a sata connection under the optical drive. Can that be used for the os installation?there are no Hdd sleds in this mac, I’m cheap and the ssd can just lay under the optical drive. Then you can clone the os to the ssd on the pcie. The computer won’t install to an external drive, but apparently you can change that once the os is installed. I was told to download Siearra and make a bootable thumb drive. Then upgrade to high Sierra. The only Sierra download I can find at the Apple store says it’s an update. I have a MacBook Pro where I can download the os and make a bootable drive if I can find it, but I can’t figure it out. There’s also something called an m.2 ssd. Is that the same as a nvme ssd? My goal is to just get an operating system in with the most cost effective ssd speed for the os drive. It has 16g ram that I plan to keep for now. Any help or links would be greatly appreciated, I really don’t know whatI’m doing and don’t want to spend much unless it’s worth it. Thank you.
See if you can find a EVGA GTX 680 Classified 4GB for Mac. I see them on ebay. It's fully compatible with Mac Pro 5,1 and Mojave with bootscreen. No mac drivers needed.
In Windows I play Forza Horizon 4 on high setting - 45-60 fps. Metro Exodus on high settings, medium shadow 30-60 fps. These are the games I've played. Just got the machine.
It's unbelievable what that old card can handle. I had a Gigabyte AMD Radeon R9 280 3GB earlier, the EVGA GTX 680 Classified is in another league.
Great vid but one question... did you install a delidded cpu or a lidded one? If lidded, did you use washers under your heat sink to compensate for thickness of lid?
Originally, no. The 6 Core tray of the 2009 doesn’t use delidded processors. However I did have to use delidded CPU’s when I went to a 2009 Dual tray a few months ago.
Yeah, I have the almost setup, 6 Core 3.33GHZ, 32G ram, but I am using a GTX 980 ti with mac EFI support. I used it for 3 years in a row, amazingly fast and stable. Now I am considering to replace the GTX with a Vega 64 which can get the native support from Apple.
Xuanren Zhou does it support Metal🤟🏽
Manuel Hernandez 980ti doesn’t support Metal, therefore my Mac Pro currently can’t run Mojave. Vega 64 should support but it requires firmware update.
for the CPU installation, did you de-lid or use thermal pads?
I didn’t, as the 4,1 Single CPU is one of the only ones that didn’t need that done from the research I did. Very much necessary on the dual CPU front, however.
I am gonna get a mac pro now asap
Is it possible to install Catalina on that machine?
Yes! Just use DosDude1’s Patcher.
I've done this same thing with my 2009 4,1 which I got for $300 at an auction and was surprised it was the 2.26 Eight-Core with four 1TB HDDs. All I need to do is upgrade the CPU firmware to 5,1 and I can use the Westmeres. However, I'm going to have to stick with High Sierra since I use a MSI 980ti and Apple nearly killed CUDA support after OS X 10.13 because they hate Nvidia. Still got the original 120 GPU it came with.
Oooh. A Dual CPU eh? Really good price for that. Love the build setup! What Apples doing with NVIDIA is definitely a bit sketchy...
Would love to get an older Mac Pro at some point to mess around with. I own a G5, but there isn't nearly as much you can do with those machines. Definitely envious of that price though, I've been waiting to snag a good deal but haven't had much luck, especially with shipping!
Take a look around EBay and Facebook Marketplace! There are definitely some good deals on there from time to time. These machines are definitely worth it, it's crazy how well it's Intel Platform holds up.
I have a 2010 DP 2.4 mhz? I will be putting the pcie SSD upgrade and have ordered a new RX560. I have always wanted to upgrade the processors but I don't know what to get and I am a little afraid since the machine runs very well now. I have to do research. However, it is a tank of a machine. Great video.
Sounds like you need SuperDuper! for back up to avoid having to install apps again.
im picking up one now, i heard that the 2009-2010 models dont support thunderbolt 2
Hey bro, just wanna say amazing job on this video. Overall I guve you 10/10. I got Early 2008 Mac Tower laying around in the house. I'm on hunt for upgrade parts but you think the listed parts also good for my Mac Pro? I'd appreciate your contribution. Cheers
Thank you so much! Glad you enjoyed it. I’d highly recommend taking a look at an NVME SSD (do some research though first just to make sure it will work with a 3,1, although I believe it should), and a good AMD RX series card.
Just bought a 1289 4.1 single CPU for 150 euros, and am planned to learn from it, the path i will take, and in this order is: order BCM94322MC Airport Extreme Wifi Adapter and install - Upgrade to El Capitan - Upgrade firmware from 4.1 to 5.1, buy the X5675 6-core 3.06 and 32 GB ECC 1333 and install, install High Sierra, buy Sapphire Pulse Radeon RX580 8GB and try to flash it to bootscreen, upgrade to Mojave- then add PCI-SSD.
i don't understand, you got it to use greater than 10.5 because of the firmware update?
i ran Ubuntu on mine and it worked great and was up to date, but it was noisy.
The 2009 Mac Pro is basically identical to the 2010-2012 Mac Pro in terms of hardware. The only thing keeping it from using newer processors and running newer OS’s is it’s 4,1 identified number. This basically just removes the software limitations by flashing that identifier to 5,1.
ClipPlayTV Still worth buying one today for 400$? Upgraded CPU 3,46 GHz 6-Core Intel Xeon (only 1 CPU available) , Nvidia GeForce GTX 680 2GB, SSD, 16 GB 1066 MHz DDR3 , its using 10.14.6 Mojave today.
I would see if you could get maybe $50-100 dollars off of the asking price. Mainly because of the lower ram and non-flashed 4,1 identifier
I refused to buy the trashcan. And tired waiting for a new mac pro. I went with maxed out 5,1. Just to buy more time for a viable 2019 mac pro. Flashed GPU is working great for me NVIDIA. Stable. Drivers stable and they update often.
Even for Mojave?
Picking one up tonight. Need a decent video and music editing platform. Looking forward to seeing what I can do with it.
FYI Mojave will work with Nvidia GPU's based on Kepler architecture which includes GTX 600 and GTX 700 GPUS with the exception of the 750 and 750 Ti they are based on Maxwell. For example I have a 2009 Mac Pro with a GTX 760 and it works natively with Mojave no web drivers. You could use up to and including a GTX Titan Black. You just can't use anything Maxwell or newer.
Really? That’s interesting. I’d heard of some people using 750 Ti’s but didn’t know that they all worked like that. Thanks for the heads up!
The 750ti is Maxwell based not Kepler same with the GTX 750
@@ClipPlayTV
just a question. Why didnt you go with a x5690?
I honestly was kinda torn between the x5680 and x5690. I gave the X5690 a serious look. But in the end, it came down to the fact that the X5690 only had a marginal performance boost over the X5680, but many people on EBay charged over $100 USD more. This was especially true for when I went to a dual CPU tray two months ago, when delidded x5690s we’re running for around $230 at the time, vs $136 for 2 delidded x5680’s. At the end of the day, the x5680’s just delivered a better value for the money.
@@ClipPlayTV That is actually quite a wise choice, i had concidered two x5690s but now i am not so sure about that