Forums | MacLife

Just a little bit about myself:

Im currently a 3rd year Graphic Design student about to take on my last year of college and try my part in the workforce of design. I currently own a MBP 2.0 GHZ from when i started school, but the last few months or so have brought on hard life to my baby. She is running sluggish, crashing constantly and really just on its last legs. Mind you I have gotten a great amount of work from her over my 3 years of owning it, but with myself going into the workforce and entering my final year of classes where I cant afford to have a buggy MBP by my side I have decided to buy a Mac Pro.

I found myself torn from where I should buy it, I currently work at Future Shop which is like the Canadian version of Best Buy. I have been working there for about 5 years and ironically work in the mac department. I want to buy it from my store as not only will I get the commission from the sale, but also a very handy financing package which apple does not offer in Canada. But, after finding out that Future Shop only carries the standard ($2899) Xeon 2.8GHZ Mac Pro, without the ability to customize I find myself with a few questions and no answers.

1. Can I buy a graphic card from my store, and install that in my Mac Pro. The one im going to be buying will come with the standard ati 256MB graphic card, but id like to have at least 3 cards running as I do ALOT of high 3D rendering and would like to run a series of monitors across my workplace. Also I would want them running at the same time, using either SLI or Crossfire to do so. Is this ability common in Mac Pros? Basically what im asking is would my Mac Pro have the ability to use 2x SLI Nvidia Graphic cards, or 2x ATI Crossfire Graphic Cards, or can I even hot swap them, and have the stock ati card inside, and purchase a high end Nvidia card and have them running insync.

2. What is the type and speed of the RAM modules used in the Mac Pro.

3. Would I be able to buy any hard drive, install it in my Mac Pro, format it to Fat32 and use it as either a ghost drive or a complete mirror of my Primary HD.

4. Would I be able to buy a hard drive, just install it in the Mac Pro, and use it to backup TimeMachine?

My biggest area of concern is the graphics, as I'm buying a $3000 computer I want the ability to upgrade the graphics periodically throughout the computers life, and I dont want to go through tons of stress to get a "Mac Compatible" Graphic Card.



Thanks in Advance Maclife!

Last edited by @pple (2008-08-22 9:52 pm)