Category Archives: Photography

Nexus 7 2013 tablet – Part I

A serious player.


The iPad Mini and the Nexus 7.

Reasons to buy:

Three things attracted me to the Google Nexus7 marketed by Google (N7 from now on), and made by Asus.

First, I am curious to learn more about Android which I have never used, and with the N7 running the latest Jelly Bean 4.3 version, it’s high time I learned the OS which dominates mobile devices.

Second, I was intrigued by the HD display which is 1920 x 1200 pixels. The most obvious comparison is with the iPad Mini whose display is standard definition 1024 x 768, in 4:3 aspect ratio. Watch a widescreen movie on the iPad Mini and you are using a screen whose pixel size is 1024 x 576, so the N7 packs 168% more pixels into a movie image. That’s non-trivial.

Third, how could one not be interested in a tablet selling for $229, or $100 less than the base model iPad Mini?

The outside:

Packaging is ‘Apple quality’, with easy tear-off protective film and a minimum of instructions. For those new to Android, like me, there’s an excellent free 90 page book in the Google Store which went a long way to familiarizing me with the many touch screen gestures in Jelly Bean. The back is rubberized whereas the Mini’s is metal. This makes no difference in practice, both collecting fingerprints faster than the IRS collects taxes. Fit and finish of the N7 is fully the equal of the Mini. Both look and handle like high quality hardware.

The narrow size of the N7 makes it much easier to hold in one hand, the Mini being a stretch of the hand span by comparison. However, where the N7 falls down is that it uses the truly execrable MicroUSB socket for the charger, surely the acme of poor design. Small, fragile, very hard to make out the correct orientation and doomed to premature failure if you are ham handed. The new Apple connector, with no orientation need, is the state-of-the art here. The first thing to do is this:


A white pen dot identifies which side
is up on the ghastly MicroUSB connector.

The second thing to do is to spend a few dollars on the LG wireless charging pad. The N7 comes with Qi (Eh? Straight from the School of Silly Names, that one, just down the road from the Ministry of Silly Walks) technology which permits inductive, wireless charging by simply placing the N7 on the LG puck. Sure, the puck still has to be connected to the mains but thereafter you never have to curse the MicroUSB connector again. And your N7’s life will doubtless be extended. Amazon is asking $50 at the time of writing – I bought mine from Verizon online for $40. Avoid the Google charging pad whose inclined surface suggests that its designers never paid attention in school when Galileo and gravity were the topic.


A cell phone on the LG puck.

The puck should work with any device with Qi inductive charging technology. The LED indicator on the front has three states:

  • Amber – No device or device not centered on puck
  • Solid green – charging
  • Flashing green – charged

I computed the time for a 0%-100% charge at 4 hours and 10 minutes.

With charging issues resolved, the only other noticeable design change from the Mini is the absence of a Home button at the base of the screen and that’s about it. On the N7 the Home button is a touch icon. One less mechanical thing to go wrong, but it does take some time getting used to, considering I started on iOS with the iPhone 1 on the day of introduction in mid-2007.

First reactions to use:

The first surprise comes when you turn the device on with a long (3-5 second) press of the top right power button. Thereafter the button needs just a brief push. Mine came on in Malay! I sort of got through setting up wi-fi in what is not exactly my first language, and then it mercifully flipped over to English. OK, American. And the real eye opener is the display quality. An absolute knockout. More resolution than anyone could reasonably ask for and, good as the Mini is, it pales in comparison. The display will go far brighter than anyone needs. In bed at night you have to turn it down to almost zero – the auto adjustment option is consistently wrong in my experience.

Much of the learning experience after that – and I do recommend a reading of the book for Android newcomers like me – is very similar to Apple’s iOS6, with the N7 being faster in all regards than the RD full size iPad and the Mini.

Now it’s no secret that I detest Google and its evil ways. A company where you are the product and an advertiser is the customer is never going to be troubled by business scruples, doing evil at every opportunity available. So it’s little surprise that when you fire up the N7, most of the installed apps are Google-this and Google-that, each with an invocation that you sign in with your Gmail account, so that your every thought and action can be recorded, analysed and sold. So how does one get around this evil?

It actually proved surprisingly easy.

iCloud:

For those invested in the Apple Cloud there are three key databases to access which are not at Google. Apple Mail, Apple Contacts and the Apple Calendar. To access Apple Mail, avoid using the Gmail app in the N7, go straight to the yellow email icon and enter your Apple Mail account details there.


Regular Mail app is circled – that’s where you want to go.
The ‘Do Evil’ Gmail app is the one with the red M to the left.

The only difference in the N7/Jelly Bean implementation is that your Apple Mail will be ‘pull’ rather than ‘push’. You can pull in new messages automatically by electing a refresh frequency in Settings, or you can simply touch the Synch icon when in the app for an immediate update.

Next up are Contacts and Calendar, and both require the purchase of an inexpensive app to permit synchronization with Apple’s Cloud. Both these SmoothSync apps are in the Google Play Store (what Apple calls the AppStore – functionally identical) and are a must-have for Apple migrants with iCloud content:

Essential tools for Android users migrating from iOS.

Once installed these apps can be hidden away on a remote screen as you do not have to access them again. Sync is two-way, seamless and perfect, and all your Contacts become available to both the Email and Gmail apps. Hop over to the built-in Calendar app and your iCloud calendar will be displayed in full. Nice. If you wish to see your full list of Contacts, download this free app:

You can see it circled below:


eBay you ask? Just selling off old Hackintosh parts!

Don’t even think of logging in to iCloud.com using the built-in Google Chrome browser. You will be rudely told that it is inaccessible. Some schoolboys never grow up.


What you get when pointing Chrome on the N7 to iCloud.com.
Note the ‘Back’, ‘Home’ and ‘All open apps’ icons at the base of the display.

If you absolutely must access icloud.com from your N7 or Android device, I illustrate how to do that at the end of this article.

Fine tuning displayed data:

There’s a couple more fixes to replicate the iPad/iPhone/iCloud experience which need to be made. First, mysteriously, Jelly Bean lets you display the time at the top right of the home screen, but not the date. For a dollar or two, or even free, you can have your choice of many apps which add the date – see above. I used one named (amazingly) ‘Date in Status Bar’.

The other fix is to add the battery percentage remaining which, again, is strangely missing from the OS. (Musn’t carp too much – remember how long it took iOS to get rudimentary Cut and Paste?). I paid a few pennies for the ‘Battery Percentage’ app which you can see above at the top left.

RSS:

Finally, you need a good RSS reader. I use the FeedHQ service to keep my feeds in sync across multiple devices ($12/year – a result of Google Reader having been discontinued by the Evil Company, allowing them to mine more of your data by trying to force you to use Google+) and the estimable Bruno at FeedHQ pointed me to Deer Reader. Though it sounds vaguely North Korean it works really well:

Another one for the big spender, this:

The interface is simple, beautifully engineered and sync with your RSS feed status at FeedHQ is perfect:


Deer Reader on the N7.

Printing:

Other hardware comments? Forget about wireless printing to a wi-fi printer if it’s an older model. You can use free apps like Cloud Print, which you set up on your desktop or laptop using Google Chrome (in Settings). Cloud Print will only work if the printer is hard-wired to a laptop or desktop on the same wi-fi network. Otherwise, forget it. There are new apps like Printhand coming to market which support wireless printing, but my older Brother laser printer is not listed among those supported. Shame. On iDevices I print using an app named FingerPrint from Collobos, and it has been working well for years. Android urgently needs to address this significant shortcoming in Jelly Bean.

Screen orientation lock:

There is no physical switch for locking the screen orientation, such as the one found on all iPads. Instead, you swipe down from the top right of the display and the orientation touch toggle presents itself. Elegant, and another wear-prone mechanical switch deleted. The one on my original iPad1 is pretty shot, I must say, so these are not purely theoretical considerations.

Use with Levi 501 button-front jeans:

Finally, the N7 fits easily in a rear jeans pocket where the Mini is a real squeeze. Just try to remember not to sit on either.

Key applications:

Check the screenshot above (to take one, depress the volume and power keys simultaneously for 1-2 seconds – it takes a bit of learning – then swipe down from the top of the display to access/mail/share your screenshot) and you will see the usual selection of Apps found on many tablets – Play Store (Android’s AppStore), Netflix (nice job, but I cannot seem to access my saved queue of Watch Instantly movies), Google Voice Search, 1Password which syncs to your password file at Dropbox with all your usernames and passwords, Amazon Kindle book reader, Play Books (Android’s version of Apple Books), Nexus Media Manager (access to MicroUSB connected storage – more of this later), IMDb for movie information and Dropbox, the invaluable file sharing utility.

Problems:

In extensive use of all of these I have only had a couple of issues. Try un-pinching text to magnify it in a Kindle book and you will quickly find that the app is unusable. The responsiveness is either zero or very delayed. This needs work – it’s perfect on iDevices. Additionally, the brightness is absurdly high and cannot be turned down. These have to be app issues as the N7 is otherwise very fast on everything it does and brightness is consistent across apps. Bad job, Nr. Bezos.

Separately, when switching to a wi-fi hotspot provided by my iPhone, I had difficulty reverting to regular wi-fi, necessitating a restart. That means holding down the power button for 5 seconds then going through a start cycle. This takes half the time to do compared with iOS. (See Part IV of these articles for the fix). It’s not like iPads have anything to boast about here, either. Frustratingly, at first the N7 asks you for your hotspot password every time you login, whereas iOS remembers it, though after a few uses of the hotspot it seems to have recovered its memory and is now working fine.

By comparison, trying to get the Mini to recognize a hotspot is an exercise in frustration, generally requiring several on/off cyclings of both the iPhone’s hotspot and the tablet’s wi-fi setting.

Google Voice – the killer advantage:

In addition to the N7’s stellar display, for me one of the most exciting features is the near-universal availability of Google Voice in nearly every app. I found I use it constantly. It also works to find apps in the home screen. For example, touch the home screen’s microphone icon top right and say ‘Run Play Store’ and the app opens. What really distinguishes Google Voice from Apple’s offering is that it works nearly every time. It’s a masterpiece of coding. Apple’s version is so poor that, like the doubting Thomas I am, I feel extreme aversion to ever wasting time with it again, no matter how many times Apple and the miserable Cook tell me it’s been fixed. Sort of like Apple Maps.

At first I struggled a bit with voice recognition. (This reminds me when, as a young immigrant in the US, I once asked for a rubber, expecting an eraser, yet being offered something distinctly different). Then it dawned on me that there was an option in the N7’s Settings for the Queen’s English as well as for the Other Kind and a quick switch fixed all that ailed.


“Pictures of Border Terriers”

Try that in Siri and you get a guided map of the Parisian sewer system, with the Eiffel Tower missing.

Google Maps – superlative:

And speaking of Apple Maps, the Google Maps app is the finest there is, leagues ahead of any other and now with spoken turn-by-turn directions you can easily integrate your N7, connected to cellular broadband through your phone’s hotspot, in your car as an excellent, large screen GPS. It’s not for nothing that Apple has poured money into Maps. They realize that direction finding and location sensitive information is the future of mobile. Call it Evil Genius. It will eventually allow them to command a meaningful income stream from everyone from car makers to advertisers. For Apple, I’m afraid, this ship has not only sailed long ago, Cupertino is attempting catch-up aboard the Titanic.

Conclusions:

Overall then, there’s little to complain about. In three days of intensive use I have not had one lock-up, any complaints about responsiveness or any display glitches. Stereo sound (still absent from iPads) is fine but cannot go super loud. Over Apple ear buds the quality is excellent. Pairing with Bluetooth headphones is fast and reliable – I still recommend the Arctic Sound ones I have been using for 2 years, even more now that they have halved in price to below $30. The microphone, which is on the right below the volume rocker, is exceptionally sensitive and Google Voice does a truly remarkable job of filtering out ambient noise, barking dogs and Asiana jets attempting landings in San Francisco Bay a few hundred yards from here. Subjectively, this is easily the fastest tablet I have used and the equal of the RD iPad for screen definition.

I am averaging 9 hours of battery life per charge with mixed use – movies, email, surfing and so on. Disappointingly, my N7 shipped only 35% charged. That and the Malaysian language start-up problem (I’m glad it wasn’t Chinese!) are really so easy to fix one wonders how Google can let these happen. For all of Apple’s shortcomings, you would be picking up a pink slip in Cupertino if you let those boo-boos get by you. This just screams schlocky, Mr. Page.

Several friends asked me about what sort of bloatware comes with the tablet. The answer is ‘None’. This is Google, not Microsoft. They give you all sorts of gateway drugs, called Google apps, to ensnare you into their advertising sell/web, as your use of these enables them to steal your data, but you do not have to use any of their apps, as I illustrate above. There is no pure advertising bloatware included.

Still to come:

In subsequent parts I will report on my son’s gaming experience with the N7, whose CPU/GPU is reputed to be exceptionally capable for this purpose. I will also look at connecting and using external storage devices, using the MicroUSB port, given that the N7 has no MicroSD expansion slot. And there will also be some commentary on the two built-in cameras, but don’t hold your breath. The only really good mobile camera I have used so far is the one in the iPhone5, ‘really good’ meaning capable of 13″ x 19″ prints needing no excuses. The cameras in the N7 are of far lower quality, and those in the Mini are pretty awful, too.

Competition issues:

At $100 less than the iPad Mini, Apple has a lot to worry about here, and not just because they have a leader with the charisma of a snail and the vision of Mr. Magoo. They dare not drop the price of the Mini, which would argue with their “add features not discounts” business model (because that’s where the money is – software features cost nothing to add from a fixed cost payroll perspective). On the other hand, they cannot afford to add a Retina Display to the Mini as that would both destroy their vaunted profit margins and cannibalize the full-sized iPad yet further. By now even Cupertino must know that Android is fully iOS’s equal with a robust ecosystem. All the claims about a bazillion more apps in the App Store compared to the Play Store are sheer nonsense, statistics to be indulged in by teenagers. No user needs more than a handful of Apps with most of the others being noise. The tablet market is in a race to the bottom, not of quality but of price, and I do not see how Apple’s business model can win that.

Perhaps the biggest challenge for Apple is what I have illustrated above. You can get a competing device for 30% less which yields nothing in performance or build quality, and one whose operating functions can be made to emulate iOS in a few minutes, with full access to stored iCloud essential data. The implication is not just for tablet sales. When it comes time to sell my iPhone5 to some Russkie black marketer for a huge profit (as happened with my iPhone 4S) and move to a later model, my population of choice has just grown by an order of magnitude. No longer is it just iPhone 5 or iPhone 6. It’s now iPhone 6 or Motorola this or Nexus that or anything-which-uses-Android no matter what the labeling. Apple has just lost its stranglehold on its precious ecosystem which, until now, has kept iPhone and iPad users wedded to the company’s products. The last shoe to drop will be porting of iTunes content and you can bet some clever 15 year old is busily working on that as you read this.

Google is not free and clear either. Pressured in mobile search from below by Facebook and their traditional desktop advertising revenues showing slowing growth, they are busily adding hardware which competes head on with Apple for quality and function. With devices like the Nexus 7 and the just announced Motorola Moto X cell phone they are getting there. Given their ‘give away the hardware and software, steal and sell your data’ business model, it remains to be seen if that translates into growth.

Facebook has its own issues. Despite recent traction in mobile advertising revenues they are only so many pimply faced pre-pubescents on the planet, they are growing up quickly and getting mortgages to worry about, and their current combined aggregate global attention span is likely less than 24 hours. Not what you would call a sticky user base. Unfriend me, please.

Interesting times. But as this long time user of iOS can attest, with the Nexus 7 on the market there is a very real choice for the user of a 7″ tablet and the Nexus 7 offers a great deal at a killer price. It’s only going to get harder for Apple to maintain its premium pricing.

Fix that revolting desktop image:

One final touch. The canned selection of desktop images which comes with the N7 is truly tasteless. There’s nothing stopping you from using the classic OS X Tiger background with its graceful swooshes on an azure sky. Take a screenshot of it on your desktop, email it to yourself, then on the N7 download the image and make it your background, thus:


How a desktop should look.

Accessing iCloud.com from your N7:

This probably works for other Android devices but I can only speak for the N7.

Access is a tad sluggish, but this will get you there.

Go to the Play Store and download the Dolphin browser.

Go to Settings->Web Content and set up as shown:

Now go to Setings->Add Ons and download Desktop Toggles:

Again in Settings, set User Agent to ‘Desktop:

Nasty Google now thinks you are accessing iCloud from a desktop computer, not an Android device. Type in the iCloud.com address and you will get to the iCloud login screen. Login with your iCloud username and password:

Here I have clicked on the Mail icon and maybe 20 seconds later I see my native email boxes in iCloud:

All iCloud functionality is available, even Find My iPhone! Here’s the N7 displaying the location of my various iDevices – iPads and the iPhone:

Why, you could even run Numbers, Pages and Keynote, though preservation of sanity suggests there are better things to do than using a spreadsheet on a 7″ tablet. I have tested Mail, Contacts and Calendar – each takes some 20 seconds to load first time, 2-3 seconds on a subsequent try. Sluggish, but it works if you like that stock look, rather than what you get through the ported approaches to native Android apps which I illustrate above.

Part II is here.

Mac Pro 2009 – Part XV

As an HTPC – or a Photoshop machine.

For an index of all my Mac Pro articles, click here.

Surely, you are thinking, a Mac Pro tower as a Home Theater PC is massive overkill.

Well, maybe so, but the economics and functionality are compelling, if you can find the space.

Your basic MacMini will run you $600, with another $100 for an external Blu-Ray reader/burner and another $100-200 for drive enclosures. Want an SSD? Better be prepared to gut and remodel that sealed little toy because Apple will not sell you one with an SSD in basic trim. You have to go to the costlier Core i7 model which, with 8GB of RAM and a 256GB SSD will run you $1,200. Call it $1,500 with Blu-Ray and enclosures. Ridiculous. The only good thing to be said for it is that it comes with a working HDMI socket, allowing video and sound to be conveyed on just one cable. Nice, but at a price.

Now let’s look at the competing, used Mac Pro. I bought a 2009, 4-core, lightly used one from Stanford University (now that’s a pedigree) for $700 with 8GB of RAM and a 500GB HDD. It even included a stock Airport wi-fi card already installed – a pig of a job if you DIY. The HDD went on eBay and was replaced by the Intel 128GB SSD from my failing HackMini (a replacement for a 2009 MacMini which I sold, disgusted with its constant overheating). This SSD runs $100 and provides all the space needed for the OS and fast loading of applications. Rather than waste money on a backup SSD, I clone the SSD to a small 120GB partition on one of the internal 4TB HDDs.

Another $50 and ten minutes with a screwdriver saw the underwhelming (not so) Superdrive DVD burner swapped for an LG Blu-Ray reader/burner. Apple may never have adopted Blu-Ray but the technology works fine with OS Mountain Lion and either a tailored version of VLC (free) or Mac BluRay Player ($40). For ripping Blu-Ray discs, look here.

With four HDD bays inside the Mac Pro’s case there’s no need for external enclosures unless your storage needs are huge – like mine! The GT120 stock GPU is useless for HTPC applications as neither its Mini DisplayPort nor its DVI socket can convey sound. Off to eBay, replaced by the immensely capable EVGA nVidia GT430 which can be found used for $30. Get the one with the HDMI/VGA/DVI sockets. A perfect card for an HTPC, with 1GB of memory and its own silent cooling fan. And that’s it. After sales proceeds, the tab came to just $575, or well under half the price of the MacMini, the latter just waiting to overheat the minute you toss it a Blu-Ray ripping task.

And the Mac Pro is much more than just an HTPC. With little effort it can be enhanced to act as a whole home media and file server. Try that with your Mini.


2009 4-core Mac Pro – simplicity itself, with the nVidia GT430 GPU.
The massive heat sink at the top for the single CPU is total
engineering overkill, and let’s all be grateful for that.

To make the Mac Pro work with HDMI, apply the quick driver installation described here. It takes less time to do than to describe. To apply this patch, first ensure that your user account in OS X is password protected – my setup is for an HTPC with no password protection. The patch will ask you for a password and without one you cannot complete the installation. After patching you can remove the password in System Preferences->Users & Groups. Once you reboot, your HDMI-connected TV will display an HDMI option in System Preferences->Sound thus:


HDMI added.

Which Mac Pro to use? I recommend either the 2008 or 2009 4-core machines at $500 and $700, respectively. Both can run Blu-Ray ripping apps speedily owing to their 64-bit architecture, something denied earlier machines. Further, apply the 4,1->5,1 firmware upgrade (2009 only) I describe here for the latest functionality. While the 2007 and earlier Mac Pros are immensely capable machines, the savings in cost versus the lost functionality do not solve. 2010 and later machines are overpriced and any 8-core dual processor Mac Pro is total overkill for this use.


The 5,1 firmware upgrade in place.

Space? I had no issues. The big case fits neatly behind the big screen TV and my two 4-bay Mediasonic boxes with the Airport Extreme wi-fi router perch neatly on top. The base of the Mac Pro rests on the foot of the TV, conferring additional stability to what is not the most stable of arrangements at the best of times.


Mac Pro behind the TV. Note the
orientation of the DVD slot for ease of use.

Performance? Exemplary in every way.


Geekbench for the stock 2.66GHz Intel Xeon 4-core processor.

That’s 50% faster than the Sandy Bridge Core i3 in the HackMini which the Mac Pro replaced. If you want to go crazy, blow $575 or so on a new Xeon W3680 6-core 3.33GHz CPU which will drain your pocket-book but stoke your ego, returning a Geekbench score of 15,500 – close to the base 12-core dual processor 2012 Mac Pro which starts at $3,500 …. This would make an immensely capable photo processing rig for the Lightroom/Aperture/Photoshop set. The overpriced current i7 MacMini returns a Geekbench score of 8,500, by comparison.

Ah, you say, those internal drives – I have two 4TB ones for my Blu-Ray movies – are only SATA2, owing to the Mac Pro’s dated technology. True. Yet on test they render read and write speeds near-identical to external USB3 enclosures. (My external USB2 drives are too slow for Blu-Ray movies; they would need a $25 USB3 card in the Mac Pro for that use). If you must have faster, though I doubt that is needed, you can run the data connection through a $20 SATA PCIe internal card, and double your speed with SATA3 drives. So much for the Mac Pro’s purported obsolescence.

The MacMini has one other questionable advantage, in that it supports external Thunderbolt devices. That’s of no use in an HTPC, and have you checked the prices of TB cables and enclosures recently?

My OS and applications SSD is tucked away in the optical drive enclosure, making use of the provided available cable/socket, as illustrated here, a five-minute job.

USB3 vs. USB2:

If you propose ripping your Blu-Ray movies to external drives, these must be connected using USB3. USB2 is fine for regular definition movies but has insufficient bandwidth for the much larger Blu-Ray files. My 4-core Mac Pro movie machine has a 4-port USB3 Orico card (with the Fresno chip which is recognized natively by Mac OS 10.8.3 and later) and I show how to install the card here. You must provide power to the card from the optical drive bay and will experience great frustration and will waste much time if you do not. Simply stated, an unpowered card does not work.

As usual, the proof lies in the data:



USB2 disk speeds compared with USB3 disk speeds – external 4-bay Mediasonic enclosures.

Conclusion:

The single processor Mac Pros are far easier to find in mint, used condition than the dual processor machines. Do not pay more than $700 – there are many out there. Be patient.

In conclusion, the case will accommodate 4 x 4TB HDDs in stock trim and another four of these monsters if you piggyback them on the stock fittings and run SATA data and power cables. 32TB is a lot of storage.

Down the road when ultra-HD 4K TVs become affordable, you can install a better graphics card to drive the display. MacMini? You are going to be buying a new one to do that.

I cannot think of better value for your dollar than this rig, and all in a case which is as near silent as you can get. That’s an important consideration for an HTPC.

Lightroom supercharged

More speed, free.

All this talk of speed in the guise of my Mac Pro adventures – click on ‘Mac Pro’ in the menu bar – got me thinking about speeding up LR5 even more. What follows should apply equally to earlier versions. I’m on Lightroom 5.

Lightroom stores data in three files, and all of mine reside on a spinning hard disk drive:


LR files.

These are pretty much self explanatory:

  • .Previews.lrdata is the file with Previews. To maximize LR’s speed, generate 1:1 previews on import of new images. This greatly speeds access to images and you only burn time once to generate these, rather than each time you want a full-sized preview.
  • .lrdata stores development adjustments you have mede to your original files. LR never touches the original files, rather storing a set of metadata in this file telling LR what adjustments were made.
  • Pictures. These are your original RAW/DNG/TIFF/JPG files. You can actually go into this directory and see them in there.

My Previews and data files are 36GB, whereas my Pictures directory is 268GB.

Given that LR only accesses the Pictures directory on generation of exports, slideshows or prints, this means it is using the Previews and data files for most of the Library viewing and Developing that the user demands. So it makes sense to have these files on the fastest access device, and that means an SSD, not a poky HDD.

Accordingly, I moved the following two files to my SSD:


LR files moved from HDD to SSD.

This took 6 minutes. Here is the process taking place:


LR access files being moved to an SSD.

Here are the files on the SSD. after I cleaned their names up:


LR files on the SSD.

Until SSD prices fall further, it’s uneconomical to use an SSD for storage of the original files in the Pictures directory – they remain on the slow HDD.

You can now start LR by double-clicking on the .lrcat file newly moved to the SSD. Next time around you will find that your desktop icon remembers that’s where you want to start LR from, and it will remain the default starting point for loading of the catalog and previews.

The results are well worthwhile if you have an SSD with sufficient space to do this.

On my Mac Pro start up time falls from 7 to 3.5 seconds. First entry to the Develop module falls from 7 to 4 seconds and is instantaneous thereafter. You cannot hit the arrow keys fast enough – the application will easily keep up with you as you page through images in glorious 1:1 preview size. Deletion of unwanted images is instantaneous.

Me? I’m erasing my SSD Bak drive, used as a recovery from various predecessor Hackintosh catastrophes, mostly occurring on OS X upgrades – the bugaboo of many a Hack – and dedicating that SSD to the LR catalog and previews. I will move the backup of SD Boot from SSD Bak to a 120GB partition on one of the HDDs in the Mac Pro, where there is space to spare. Recovery is unlikely to be necessary, and should it be so, the slow HDD bootable partition will be just fine.

Mac Pro 2009 – Part XIV

Adding USB3 and Blu-Ray.

For an index of all my Mac Pro articles, click here.

Adding USB3:

It’s premature to say that Intel’s Thunderbolt will become the standard for connecting external devices to computers. The PC world, with its huge – if falling – volume has not exactly embraced the technology and until it does price will remain stratospheric. External TB enclosures are very costly and, for most, USB3 is just fine offering half the speed at a fraction of the cost.

Apple was especially lazy in upgrading the Mac Pro, with the 2009 model profiled in these articles identical to the 2012 except for CPU upgrades (thank you, Intel) and one firmware upgrade which allowed the use of 1333MHz memory and accepted 12-core CPUs. Other than that the 2009 and current 2012 machines are identical a fact which, once I spotted it, clued me in to the tremendous value proposition offered by the 2009 model.

However, in its apathy, Apple missed adding some modern technology to the Mac Pro from which it can benefit. At this time there are no PCIe cards which provide TB, but there is a handful which easily add USB3. This article only addresses users of Mountain Lion 10.8.3 or later, which comes with drivers for the Fresco chipset used by the card I have installed.

This is the card we want – it comes in 2-port and 4-port versions:


The Orico PFU3-4P or 2P Four/Dual Port USB3 PCIe card for the Mac.

This version of the Orico uses the Fresco chipset and can be found at Amazon in the 2-port version for $18, or the 4-port for $33. The ‘F’ in the model designation refers to the Fresco chipset. The big black cuboid at the top of the card is a 4-pin Molex male socket to which we will have to route power.

System Profiler will recognize this card once it’s inserted in a free USB3 slot. The card may work but, if it does, it will be well below capacity. The PCI slots provides insufficient power and a power line has to be run to the card’s male Molex socket for best functioning. I illustrate this below where I do an import of 50 Nikon D3x RAW files using an unpowered and a powered USB3 card. Unpowered it performs no better than USB2. Powered it’s twice as fast. Don’t fool yourself. You need to route power to the card.

The easiest way to power the card is to run a cable from the optical drive area. If you only have one optical drive in there then there will be a spare, combined SATA data and power socket available and you can tap into that using a SATA to female Molex cable. However, if you have already used the spare cable to power an SSD, as I illustrated in Part V, you will need to use a cable splitter to provide power for the USB3 card.

In either case you can use a cable which splits the existing cable in the optical drive bay into two power and two data feeds, leaving one free for subsequent use if you decide to relocate an SSD into the optical bay area. They can be had from Lindy-USA for $14 plus a thorough hosing for shipping of $13 and a one week wait. Appalling.

Finally you will need a short Molex male-female extension cable to reach the short USB3 PCIe card, and Monoprice will get it to you cheap and fast for a couple of dollars.

You should know that Molex pin connectors are a very poor design. The pins and sockets wobble and are easily bent if you are ham handed when assembling junctions, so do a fair bit of your own wobbling to make sure the pins find their mark before mashing the two together. In what follows I used the 2-port card, as my primary USB3 need is for an external card reader; all my disk drives reside inside the Mac Pro case where they are connected using speedy SATA technology. You can choose the 4 socket version if you like or add an external USB3 hub for additional needs. As the USB3 card we are installing in the Mac Pro is powered, an external hub will be driven just fine. Multi-port USB3 hubs can be had for well under $50 and all USB3 sockets are backward compatible with USB2.

Whatever you do, do not power the USB3 card from any available backplane board socket which is ordinarily used to power graphics cards. The voltage is incorrect and you may end up frying your computer.

The pinouts for the 4-pin Molex connector are shown here, for those interested.

Conflicts:

There are many reports of interference between unshielded USB3 cables, as used here, and Bluetooth. These show up in jerky mouse pointer action. If you do use BT, shield the connecting wires. I have long considered BT a deeply flawed, poor range technology and avoid it like the plague. If you must use a wireless mouse, use one which uses an RF sender/dongle, like many of those from Logitech or Microsoft. Shock news, I know, but MSFT actually does make something which ‘just works’.

Also, avoid using an USB3 card with comes with the NEC chipset. You need one with the Fresco chipset with Mountain Lion. The native drivers were probably added for the forthcoming OS 10.9. Fresco cards use these native drivers and avoid the use of aftermarket drivers which frequently bring stability issues with them.

Finally, if you want to boot from a bootable external drive, that drive cannot be connected to an USB3 card. The USB3 sockets are not ‘live’ until after booting, so drives connected there are not bootable.

Installation:

It’s tough to route power cables from the optical drive area to the USB3 card. The only unobstructed passageway through the firewall between the power supply and the PCIe area is through a small opening at the base of drive caddy #3 (third from the left as you face the drives’ labels), and the quickest and easiest way of accessing that passthrough is to remove the power supply unit.

To connect the Lindy splitter cable with the female Molex extension cable, in addition to a cable cutters and a crimping tool I used some 16 gauge crimp connectors and a cable stripper. The cable splitter as provided by Lindy has an unused Molex and an unused 4-pin fan plug and I wanted to get rid of as much cable clutter as possible – making the run ‘SATA (optical drive) to female Molex (USB3 card)’ directly. Thus I cut the Lindy splitter cable and crimped the cut ends together after getting rid of the excess connectors and cabling, illustrated below:


Removing excess connectors and cables. Lindy SATA splitter is the lower of the two. Molex extender above.

After making the two cuts (4 cables each), you join the cut cables with cable strippers and a crimping tool, respecting colors, after threading them through the firewall, which I describe below. Both black connectors are ground, so it does not matter if you mix these up.

You will need a short 2.5mm Allen wrench and a magnetized #1 long Philips screwdriver. Remove the optical drive assembly by pulling up on it, disconnecting the plugs to the DVD drive (and the SSD if you installed one there). Using the screwdriver, remove the two screws holding the alloy shelf and remove the shelf:


Shelf retaining screws. Use a magnetic screwdriver.

The plug for the PSU will be disclosed. Pinch the ends and pull it:


Remove the PSU plug.

Now remove all the disc drives in their caddies to give you working space, and undo the four screws, circled, to free up the PSU. Use the 2.5mm Allen wrench, and avoid using a rounded end wrench which will not make your day when you round the hex inside the Loctite-retained screws:


Retaining screws for the PSU. Use the shortest Allen wrench you have.
Contrary to the Service Manual, these are alloy and will not respond to a
magnetized wrench, so do not drop them.

The PSU can now be removed by sliding it a tad to the left then lifting it out, being careful to help the cable and plug along with the other hand:


Removing the PSU.

Should you ever need to replace it, here’s the label:


PSU label. 980 watts of power!

You can now thread the wires through the opening – it’s the same one used by an existing cable:


USB3 wires passed through the opening.

Replace the PSU, carefully threading the plug through to the optical drive area, reconnecting it and refastening the 2.5mm bolts after making sure the shelf is properly aligned – there are two tabs which slot into the firewall:


Wires threaded into the optical drive area.

Here’s a view of the backplane area with the USB3 card in place:


USB3 card in place with Molex connector (green), with the power wires threaded
through at the base of drive #3 for connection to the optical drive area (red).

Don’t worry, drive #3 will fit fine.

Be generous with the cable length so that there is no issue with any later PCIe cards you may elect to install. Note the small, black cable ties used to keep the wiring harness tidy:


Cable ties in place.

Mac Pros and untidiness do not go together, so spend a few pennies on 1/4″ cable sheath to tidy up those ugly wires for both the USB3 card and the power cables for the GPU:


Cables neatly dressed.

You are done.


PCIe card in place showing two USB3 sockets. Use PCIe socket #3 (shown)
or #4 to the right for the card, both 4-bit. #2 is 16-bit and is wasted for this purpose.

Confirmation of function:

Here’s System Profiler after installation:


After USB3 installation. This shows an
external 3TB USB3 drive connected.

Performance comparisons:

First I ran the Xbench disk test using a Mediasonic external enclosure with a 7200rpm HDD.

Using USB2:


Xbench – USB2, external drive.

Using USB3 – 1.7 times as fast as USB2:


Xbench – USB3, external drive.

Then for reference, I ran Xbench on the internal Sandisk 120GB boot SSD, which is in a different league altogether:


Xbench – SSD, internal drive.

Now xBench is a fairly dated benchmarking tool, and has not been updated in years. A more modern test is BlackMagic’s DiskSpeedTest, and here the results are more compelling, using the same Mediasonic enclosure.

Using USB2:


BlackMagic DiskSpeedTest – USB2.

Using USB3:


BlackMagic DiskSpeedTest – USB3.

That’s 5x the speed for Write and 4.4x for Read. That’s more like it!

And for the SSD boot drive:


BlackMagic DiskSpeedTest – SSD.

The conventional, spinning disk actually has faster Write performance than the SSD.

I then made a simple import of 50 RAW files from my Nikon D3x, a real world test. What follows is import time only – no generation of previews or application of lens profiles which processes have nothing to do with import speed. I used a Kingston FCR-HS3 USB3 card reader and a Lexar Professional 400x 8GB UDMA CF card.

Import time for 50 RAW files using USB2: 52.7 seconds
Import time for 50 RAW files using USB3: 52.1 seconds – with no power feed to the USB3 card
Import time for 50 RAW files using USB3: 28.1 seconds – with power connected to the USB3 card – 87% faster than USB2

While my 2 socket card is recognized by OS X with no power provided (I cannot speak for the 4 socket, not having tried it), the card is starved of power and performs far slower than a powered card.

Here is what you are looking for in System Profiler for a USB3 card with card reader attached:


Ample excess current capacity is available for a powered card reader.

Next I connected my Mediasonic USB3 movie storage box which contains 4 x 3TB 7200rpm HDDs. I copied a 5.75GB movie over from the Mac Pro’s SSD to one of the HDDs in the Mediasonic.

Export time over USB2: 172.5 seconds
Export time over USB3: 51.9 seconds – 3.3 times as fast
Import time over USB3: 52.0 seconds

So here USB3 really works, but compared to the theoretical limit of 5 gigabits/second (Gb/s), which is 0.625 gigabytes/second (GB/s), I am only realizing 0.11 GB/s, or 18% of the maximum. Still, it’s a lot faster than USB2. Further, whereas a ripped Blu-Ray movie will not play without stuttering over USB2, it’s fine over USB3, so this effort is not wasted.

One anomaly: A friend reports that if he leaves an external USB3 drive connected to the USB3 card, if the Mac Pro goes to sleep a disk ejection error (“The disk was not ejected properly”) pops up on wake. This is a non-functional error as the Mac Pro will have been inacrive when it went to sleep, so there is no risk of data loss.

USB3 update – April, 2014:

Technology marches on. A recent Mac Pro I upgraded saw me installing the Inateck 4-port USB3 PCIe card:


Inateck 4-port USB3 card. Click the image to go to Amazon.

The beauty of this card is that the maker claims it requires no additional power supply to function properly and my tests confirm this is true. That’s a great time saver and removes wire clutter from inside the Mac Pro’s case or, if you prefer, frees up the power supply source you ran earlier for additional HDDs, etc. The price is a mere $27 and my speed tests suggest the card is maybe 2-5% slower than the powered Orico installed above. That’s a worthwhile trade-off for USB3 speeds with far less work.

USB3 update – June 2015:


The Sonnet 4-controller USB3 4-port card.

Sonnet manufactures a 4-port USB3 PCIe plug-and-play card which has four controllers, compared to one for the Inateck. This means that if you simultaneously use more than one USB3 connected device, there will be no performance penalty as the controller is not shared between all four ports. The Sonnet Allegro Pro (must have ‘Pro’ in the name to get the four controllers) retails at $130 and only makes sense compared with the much cheaper Inateck if you propose to use more than one USB3 connected peripheral simultaneously and can tolerate no performance hit. I have not used the Sonnet but the maker has a good reputation. I’m sticking with the Inateck as I mostly use it to download image and video files from the cards in my digital cameras, using only the one port.

Adding Blu-Ray:

You can buy a Blu-Ray internal drive for under $70 from Amazon. Take a straightened paper clip, insert it in the small ejection hole to the lower right of the front tray and push to release the tray. (Good to know if a DVD ever gets stuck in the drive, and not something you can do with the miserable slot-loading drives fitted to many iMacs, MacMinis and MacBooks). Turn the drive upside down and you will see two small clips retaining the front tray bezel, each one third of the way in. Push away and down (in that order) from the tray’s front and the bezel will slide off. The drive is now ready for installation.

While you are in there connecting the USB3 power circuit, you can undo the four side screws retaining the dated and slow Superdrive (a standard drive with Apple hype added), replace it with the Blu-Ray drive and slip on the integrated SATA power and data cable. This really could not be simpler. That tired old Sony/Toshiba/Hitachi ‘Superdrive ‘ has no resale value – recycle it.


Tray bezel removal. Not nuclear physics.

OS X Mountain Lion works fine with Blu-Ray and you can learn about Blu-Ray players here and about the excellent MakeMKV ripping application here.

* * * * *

Here is what you have to look forward to with a modified 2009 Mac Pro:


Mac Pros in Geekbench.


Fanboy heaven. The mug comes from the mothership itself, 1 Infinite Loop, Cupertino, CA.
The computer is how they used to make them.

Backing-up:

Here is the back-up strategy I adopt – 5 drives in the Mac Pro’s case and Cloud storage off site:


Mac Pro backup strategy.

Daily backups of the SSD Boot drive (OS X, applications and the Lightroom catalog/previews) and the HDD Data drive are made using CarbonCopyCloner. CCC is set to wake the sleeping Mac Pro so that it can do it’s job, as you cannot do backups with a sleeping computer.

Constant versioned backups are made using TimeMachine – very handy for recovering older versions of files.

Daily backups are made to CrashPlan in the cloud. The fifth drive – SSD Bak – resides in the optical drive area, as I illustrated earlier. If the Mac Pro fries, CrashPlan can ship you a disk with all your files overnight; the alternative of restoring over the air can take many days for large data sets.

When I travel, I pop open the Mac Pro’s case and pull the TimeMachine drive after first ejecting it in Finder, taking the drive with me.

This is a simple and robust back-up strategy. Crash Plan is essential as all the local drives are in the case and thus exposed to fire, earthquake or a power supply failure.

Finally, at some $1,100 a pop for a 2009 Mac Pro, there’s no excuse for having just one:


I really need to clean up those cables on #2 ….

Mac Pro 2009 – Part XIII

Cost to build.

For an index of all my Mac Pro articles, click here.


My 2009 Mac Pro – Turbo model. Beauty and a beast.
Not an external enclosure in sight.

In Part IX I looked at the upgrade costs of a 2009 Mac Pro compared with a like specification Hackintosh. This was relevant to my case as I was moving from a Hack and reusing many of the components.

Here I look at the all in cost of a fully loaded machine:


Cost to build.

The specifications here are very complete, and only displays are excluded. This build will drive four displays (2 x DVI, 1 x DisplayPort, 1 x HDMI).

Let’s look at the core components:

  • The 2009 used Mac Pro represents the sweet spot in pricing using stock RAM (unlike the 2008 which uses expensive FB DIMMs) and with full 64-bit functiionality unlike the pre-2008 models. The 2010 and 2012 are discounted, being far too expensive.
  • While the stock GT120 graphics card is retained if you ever need to see the splash screen at cold start, the excellent mid-range nVidia GTX660 is used, the Zotac model being exceptionally quiet.
  • A deep slot Kingston USB3 card reader is used, the deep slot preventing the pin-bending behavior common with CF cards in cheaper readers. The Kingston reads all types of cards in addition to the CF ones used by my Nikons.
  • Longer monitor cables move the large Mac Pro case from under the desk into the open.
  • Shockingly, while they were busy making cell phones, Apple forgot to add USB3 to the Mac Pro, so we install a powered PCIe card to do just that.
  • Most 2009 Mac Pros come without Airport, so a used Airport wi-fi card is procured.
  • You can pay up for ‘Apple Certified’ RAM (40% more) or buy Corsair, as good a brand as there is. 6 x 4GB sticks maximize cost efficiency and complement the triple channel addressing of memory in the two Xeon CPUs, meaning three sticks for each CPU.
  • A boot SSD, containing OS X and your applications, is essential. Life is too short for HDDs.
  • Rather than spend on a backup SSD, a 120GB partition is created on one of the pair of 2TB data HDDs to clone the boot SSD. The cost of that storage space on an HDD is under $6! Two 2TB HDDs add all the storage you will reasonably need. Need more? Opt for 4TB HDDs or buy external USB3 enclosures.
  • A 3TB HDD is added inside the case for sequential Time Machine back-ups as a further failsafe. All drives are inside the case.
  • Wireless mice and keyboards are high maintenance toys. Get the Logitech G500 gaming mouse and a proper wired keyboard. Add $20 for SteerMouse to access all the G500’s features. Avoid Apple keyboards and mice – ergonomic catastrophes all, if nice showpieces.
  • A pair of Logitech speakers rounds out the ensemble.

So for around $2,200 you have a high performance, extremely robust, stock system which will match the best iMacs. Sure you can save and buy a used 2009 4-core machine, but the $250 or so saved makes little economic sense in the long run. A 27″ top quality Dell matte display will add $630, for a total of $2,830.

What does that buy you in iMac land, replete with unfixable and non-upgradable components and a ghastly glossy display? $3,000 gets you a Core i5 machine with one SSD (good luck getting any more in the chassis), and you can add $500 for the external drives and case to match the above.

Now let’s make that MacPro compete with the best there is, the 2012 12-core Mac Pro. That machine comes with three choices of CPU. To match the 2.66Hz middle model, whose CPU performance is identical to our 2009 with the processor upgrade, you are looking at $6,335 with a self installed SSD and the 3TB TimeMachine HDD added to the two 2TB drives in the case. The available GPUs are inferior to the GTX660 used in the 2009. The 2009 with upgraded CPUs is $2,660, both machines without displays. The upgraded 2009 Mac Pro offers 100% of the performance of the 2012 for 40% of the cost.

What are the main model differences?

The dual-processor Mac Pro has had a long life. What to choose and which to avoid?

Version 1,1, MA356LL/A, August 2006:

  • Avoid. This Mac Pro can only run 32-bit applications. (See the Comment for specifics.)
  • Came with two 2.66GHz Xeons.
  • 667MHz fully buffered memory is very costly to upgrade.
  • 32GB memory maximum.
  • Abundantly available.

Version 2,1, unknown order number, April 2007:

  • Avoid. This Mac Pro can only run 32-bit applications. (See the Comment for specifics.)
  • Came with a choice of two Xeons in 2.8GHz, 3.0GHz or 3.2GHz.
  • 800MHz fully buffered memory is very costly to upgrade.
  • 32GB memory maximum.
  • Abundantly available.

Version 3,1, MA970LL/A, early-2008:

  • Consider. Less refined processor cage design makes memory changes a little harder, but a capable machine.
  • First Mac Pro to run 64-bit applications.
  • Came with a choice of Xeons in 2.8GHz, 3.0GHz or 3.2GHz speeds.
  • 800MHz fully buffered memory is very costly to upgrade.
  • 32GB memory maximum.
  • CPUs can be upgraded to X5492 running at 3.33GHz but these are rare and costly. Reckon on $500 a pair. Not much of a speed gain over stock.
  • PCIe slots 3 and 4 are PCIe 1.0, not 2.0 – slower, so not that good for an SSD, say.
  • If you can find one with 16GB or more memory for under $700, buy it, if that’s your budget.
  • Fair availability in stock trim.
  • Good parts availability.
  • The first Mac Pro to run OS 10.8 Mountain Lion out of the box.

Version 4,1, MB535LL/A, early-2009:

  • Buy. The most desirable model, easily upgraded to 2010 or 2012 specifications.
  • Runs 64-bit applications.
  • Came with a choice of 8-core Xeons in 2.26GHz, 2.66GHz or 2.93GHz speeds.
  • 1066MHz ECC memory is cheap to upgrade. No need to use overpriced ‘Apple approved’ type. Reckon on $65 per 8gB of 1333MHz.
  • 128GB memory maximum – I know as I have built one.
  • Lots of CPU upgrade options, many readily available, with the 2.66GHz Xeon W5650 12-core offering the best price/performance – 25,000 Geekbench with a pair of used CPUs costing $300. These offer a 100% speed gain over stock.
  • Upgrade of CPUs needs care to avoid damage to CPU sockets.
  • 4,1 firmware is easily upgraded to 5,1 which will recognize 1333MHz memory with no other work. 5 minute DIY job.
  • 5,1 firmware upgrade permits use of 12-core CPUs and is mandatory for these.
  • PCIe slots 3 and 4 are PCIe 2.0 – fast.
  • Hard to find since I wrote these articles! Be prepared to pay up to $1,200 for a mint example.
  • Excellent spare parts availability.

Version 5,1, MC561LL/A, mid-2010:

  • Consider. Runs 64-bit applications.
  • Came with a choice of Xeons in 2.40GHz (E5620, 8-core), 2.66GHz (X5650 12-core) or 2.93GHz (X5670 12-core) speeds.
  • 1333MHz ECC memory is cheap to upgrade. No need to use overpriced ‘Apple approved’ type. Reckon on $65 per 8gB.
  • 128GB memory maximum.
  • 5,1 firmware is stock, supports 12-core CPUs
  • CPUs use standard design with Integrated Heat Spreader, making upgrades easy.
  • Top 8-core CPU upgrade is E5640, running at 2.66GHz for an 11% speed gain over base stock CPU – not worth the expense. Install a W5590 instead.
  • PCIe slots 3 and 4 are PCIe 2.0 – fast.
  • 12-core CPUs can be upgraded to faster 12-core CPU with an Xeon X5687, running at 3.60GHz for a 35% speed gain over base 12-core stock CPU. Still very costly on the used market, if you can find them.
  • Hard to find used and seldom under $1,800 for the base model. You are better off buying the early-2009 and upgrading the CPU ($250-450) and firmware (no cost).

Also version 5,1, MD771LL/A, mid-2012:

  • Overpriced but excellent. Almost identical to the mid-2010, but with different CPU choices.
  • 8-core CPU is the 2.66GHz E5645.
  • 12-core choices are the 2.66GHz X5650 (same as the 2010) and the 3.06GHz X5675.
  • 128GB memory maximum.
  • Same CPU upgrade options as the mid-2010.
  • PCIe slots 3 and 4 are PCIe 2.0 – fast.
  • Expensive used, as it is the current model.
  • Can’t hold a candle to the mid-2009 for economic value.
  • Only for those spending other people’s money.

Buying used? Don’t be cheated.

The model number has direct bearing on a Mac Pro’s market value, so it’s important to see what you are buying. A fraudulent seller can easily upgrade firmware from 1,1 to 2,1 or from 4,1 to 5,1 (see here) and will show you the upgraded model number in System Profiler, thus:


My Mac Pro as shipped – model 4,1 – on the left.
My hacked 5,1 machine – the same chassis – is on the right.

Or the seller may claim that the machine has been ‘upgraded’ from stock.

Find or ask for the Mac Pro’s serial number on the rear ledge below the sockets. Alternatively go to About This Mac (Apple icon, top left of your screen) and click twice where it says ‘Version 10.8.4’ or whatever, and your serial number will be disclosed. Here’s mine:


Disclosing the serial number.

Now go here, input the serial number and you will get something like this:


Data on my Mac Pro, an April 2009 model made in week three of the month.
Goodness, ‘Built in the USA’ no less.

Now if someone says it’s a 2009 or 2010, you can check. The serial number lookup is of the original build, allowing you to confirm the ‘upgrade’ status, and while I do not show the whole screen above, it reports Model Number 4,1, even though I have upgraded to 5,1, which is what System Profiler reports. Thus a 2009 being passed off as a 2010 or 2012 is easily spotted by running the serial number report.

Other things to look for:

You will see many Mac Pros whose lower foot or feet are distorted. The chassis panels may also be misaligned. This can only mean one thing. The machine has been dropped. Run like blazes. You never know what sort of damage ensued until you stress test the machine, and it’s not likely a dishonest seller will let you do that in any case. Plus, do you really want to wake up to that every morning? Likewise avoid machines with heavy scratches, dirt inside or from a smoking environment. Scratches often indicate studio use with the computer inserted in and out of racks, having led a hard life. Move on. There’s always another machine.

Light scratches and a general absence of bumps are fine, but my advice is to go for a pristine machine and pay a bit more. This is a 5-10 year investment and the marginal cost is immaterial over that period of use. The best are ones from amateur users which come with the original box. These are likely to have been babied. And for heaven’s sake, do not buy a machine which runs Windows only. Not only does that confirm the seller has execrable taste, you really want to know why it cannot run OS X.

Further, you will find many machines listed by people who are completely clueless about the specifications, model number, year and so on. These are likely high volume brokers and good luck with that lot. Or perhaps they are thieves, though pinching one of these is a non-trivial matter owing to the weight and bulk. Try and buy from knowledgeable Apple Mac fans who know their stuff. If you are into Rolls Royces, chances are you will look after yours, no? What you want is an original owner, Apple fanboy, cream puff who is upgrading. They are out there.

Finally, avoid heavily modified machines (like mine!). Buy stock. A modified machine means you are taking a gamble on the competence of the modifier, an irrational risk (doesn’t apply to mine, of course …. and it’s not for sale in any case). Stock CPUs, stock GPU, stock RAM (especially with 2008 and earlier machines using costly buffered RAM) – these work best. You can always upgrade to your heart’s content. Specialist machines with multiple cards and RAID capability, boasting of their processing power and listed with several monitors will have had an awfully hard life in a studio environment. You can do better. A little patience goes a long way. While I bought mine on Craigslist and got lucky, I would broadly characterize most Craigslist sellers as crooks and/or thieves. It’s a perfect market for fencing stolen goods. The ethically challenged lot exists on eBay too, and shipping is a pain with these behemoths, but you are covered by PayPal insurance against fraud and should get transit damage insurance as part of the purchase.

The best of luck with your search. When you are done you will not regret it, for you will end up with a professional tool, one which is easily upgraded or repaired, rather than a recyclable, mass market toy. You know, like those two iMacs of mine which melted all those years ago.

The next in this series of articles will address installation and benchmarking of USB3, once I get the necessary cables.