Hi there;
BRAND new forum member here, who ONLY joined as a result of finding THIS very thread! (Apology for the long first post. I may tend to get carried away at times.)
Truth be told, I am an original PC / Linux / Sun Solaris / Netware / Hardware guy who ONLY in the past several (6 or 8) years have been able to AFFORD the "luxury" of these shiny, silver towers.
Not going to go into my feelings towards the "elitist" mentality of many typical (?) Mac owners, but I've definitely been converted. Of course, that is ONLY if I can find "donor" machines for maybe $200 - $300 bucks.
No disparaging to ANYONE who bought into new Apple hardware (hey, us used only guys have to find gear from somewhere), but there are those of us who have to make the choice of paying the mortgage, buying food, or buying that shiny silver tower.
OK, enough of that and on to the good stuff. Since I've been rebuilding Mac Pro machines for myself and others (many professionals) over the years (maybe 50? maybe 60, probably more), I've learned a lot of tricks along the way, AND most importantly, how to keep the costs super low for my friends and clients.
First I must thank the originator, Dewdman42, for this FANTASTIC thread. I was brought here while researching how, or whether to, move my 2010 / 5,1 machine forward from Mojave which I've ONLY had on my machine now for a month or so.
Early adopter is NOT me, not in the least (I'm closer to 70 than to 60, so priorities matter). I could give a ratzazz about "Dark Mode" (whatever the heck THAT is) or any other so-called "feature" of one OS over another. Give me an OS that is a STABLE, sleek and FAST platform for the applications that I want to run . . . PERIOD.
I want an OS that will wring EVERY ounce of capability out of any given hardware that I am using. New features are for bored kids. I know serious, pro studio owners (I'm in the NYC Metro area) who had been using SNOW LEOPARD (and Pro Tools) in their studios up until very, very recently. Seriously . . .
Why? because it frickin' WORKED!!! And, because it kept working AND kept making them (and their clients) money. Now THAT, to me, is THE bottom line. Not fancy "features" in the "latest" version of whatever BS came out last week.
Many of us real working people do NOT have that luxury to constantly chase the ever moving, dangled in front of us Apple . . . err . . . carrot?
Now, at the same time, I am also NOT a power user, so am also not running eight or ten 64K screens (or whatever wealthy hobbyists can afford these days) on my humble Mac Pro. I do mostly audio, and so video does NOT have to be bleeding edge. Not even close.
My personal add to this thread is a few Metal capable video cards that WILL allow you to install AND run Mojave (and probably Catalina / Big Sur, etc.) and also do NOT cost a fortune. Remember (before Mining!) when video cards were affordable?
Here is a list of KNOWN good, usable cards, which again, may not run your four monitors (huh?!?) at 24K resolution (really? you need 4K for AUDIO?!?!), but are perfectly fine and stable for most "normal" use in our Mac Pro towers.
Not a one of these cards costs anywhere near $100 bucks (even now, today, in August of 2021) and most are under $50, while I've bought a few Metal capable cards for UNDER $20 bucks each! This is PERFECT if you merely want to check out IF the Mac Pro / Mojave experience is even worth it for you.
As far as I know, there are still no specific NVIDIA drivers available for Mojave, correct me if I am wrong, but they do work fine, albeit, with no boot screen. No worry here, as my Mojave boots in about 20 seconds on my SLOWEST Mac Pro tower (8 core, Nehalem, 2.26 Ghz w/ 16 GBs RAM) via standard SATA SSD.
NVIDIA GeForce GT640
NVIDIA GeForce GT 710
NVIDIA GeForce GT 740
The above cards can be found with from 1 GB RAM up to 4 GBs, if I am not mistaken, and as long as they are "Kepler" based cards (most are) they work fine, supporting Metal in Mojave.
nvidia Quadro K600
This card is the REAL Low End Trash card of the lot. I bought 7 of these on The Bay for about $120 bucks for ALL 7, including tax.
Supports Metal just fine, both for installing Mojave, and for running day to day. Cheap, tiny power consumption (no extra cable required, all powered from PCIe) AND is super quiet!
Even brand new right now they are MAYBE $40 bucks!
With GPU pricing like these, there is NO reason why ANYONE with a Mac Pro can't upgrade their machine RIGHT NOW to Mojave (native install support, right from Apple, no "hacks"), and possibly beyond. And, NOT have to spend a fortune!
My own personal and typical updates / upgrades for clients goes something like this;
Shop & buy the fastest processors that you can afford (the 3.46 Ghz X5690 is still maybe $50 each?)
Ditto for RAM; Buy as much as you can afford, and this also depends on intended application. 64 is plenty, 128 is way cool...
Buy a good quality SSD for your OS & apps, but ALSO add other SSD's for data, music and such. Always use a separate drive for recording and storing music. Heck, even spinners are fine just for data.
Video card / GPU has to be Metal capable in order to run Mojave and beyond, BUT, there is no "need" for those fancy $400 RX-whatever cards UNLESS you have specific video needs for them.
Unless you are running crazy amounts of effects or massive amounts of plug-ins, audio is VERY forgiving and not at all needing the Bleeding Edge of machine performance. (The Beatles had WAY less back in the '60's and look what THEY did!!!)
ALL of this information is for the user who wants (or needs?) to eke the VERY utmost out of their hard earned pennies. Granted, I was never a Mac-Boi, and so have NEVER bought ANY computer for even CLOSE to $1,000, much less 2 or 3 times that!
Again, for any who can or have done that, my hat is off to you. Bless you all for giving us these wonderful (USED) Mac Pro towers that are STILL, even after 10 or more years, doing JUST fine, thank-you very much....
AshokanKid
P.S. Thanks again to Dewdman42 for one of the most useful threads in regard to the possibilities for Mojave & beyond on The Venerable Mac Pro.