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riverspatrick · 2 years ago

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CEXUAL MISHAPS

I rarely buy new. One's junk is my treasure, or so I thought -- sometimes junk is junk -- and my latest adventure taught me many lessons in upCEXing. Let me share the wisdom I inadvertently acquired dealing with CEX and old technology for the modern times.

This is a guide for whoever is looking to buy a used Mac and get the best value for a limited budget. Having done a lot of research during this bumpy adventure, this “essay” will answer the following existential questions:

• Can a Mac Pro shaped like a trashcan do the job today?

• Why dust off an old FireWire iSight camera and how?

• Is third party SSD blade worth the trouble?

• Which budget display comes close to Apple’s retina experience?

• Why choose an Intel Mac over a new M1 or M2 “affordable” and more powerful Mac Mini?

• Is CEX’s 24-month warranty risk-free?

My iMac 5K (late 2014) is dying. It's had three open heart surgeries (logic board replacements) within the first three years of its extended warranty. A few months after the warranty ended, I had to replace the power supply for a third party part which actually fixed several USB/Bluetooth/audio streaming dropout issues I had had from the start, issues that Apple’s geniuses attributed to software. A genius by script is a fool. Now, the iMac's wonderful screen's usable space is shrinking by the month, a beige fog thickening from the edges in, creating a widening trench where ghosts appear and fade away very, very slowly. The screen defects coupled with hardware errors that point to a bad core prompted me to look for a replacement machine. It had to be Intel. Apple's new M1 and M2 computers offer great power but no upgradeable route for the future, and many of my favourite software plugins are Intel only.

Initially I looked for a used Intel Mac Mini, which has just been discontinued by Apple with the introduction of their new M2 Mini. It had to be an i7. Sadly they go for a great lump of dough and they are highly desirable, therefore hard to find -- I love recycling, but hate the chase... During my search, I stumbled across the "trashcan" Mac Pro. To my surprise, people can’t seem to shift them on the second-hand market -- not desirable, therefore cheap and easy to find -- my kind of bargain.

I always wanted a "trashcan" Mac Pro. I once had the Power Mac G4 Cube, and find the late 2013 Pro (not so affectionally dubbed ‘trashcan’) a direct successor to my beloved Cube. It’s more than nostalgia, I assure you.

Power Mac G4 Cube 2000 - 2001

I chose CEX for their 24 month peace-of-mind warranty, and set the sat-nav for the closest Trashcan Pro available. The unit was pristine! I drove back home drooling, almost foaming at the mouth, I even resisted stopping for a toilet break -- I was the owner of the legendary "trashcan" Mac Pro! YES! The same one that went for £5K when new! I paid for it all in trade! BARGAIN!

Except it wasn't a bargain at all.

You saw that coming, of course; why would I write about happy times? The Trashcan Pro was trash. This would be the start of ongoing trials and tribulations which I hope to be done with by the time I finish writing this.

Mac Pro (Late 2013) 2013 - 2019

At first glance, the Mac Pro (late 2013) may appear like a step back from my iMac 5K (late 2014) but it actually supports a newer OS (Monterey vs the iMac's Big Sur). The Mac Pro is also still officially supported by Apple whilst the iMac became obsoletea few years back. Also, the Mac Pro's guts, including the CPU, can be upgraded up to a 12 core CPU, 128 GB RAM vs my iMac which is already maxed out with a consumer grade CPU (i7 4core), 32 GB RAM, 4 GB VRAM. It seemed like the right upgrade in theory, but I would not find out with a defective unit.

CEX has a 14-day return policy and a 24-month peace-of-mind warranty, YIPPEE!

I chose a different model located further away (London) and opted for delivery. Eventually, after an agonising week trying to rouse CEX out of their stupor (the item remained at 'stock-picking-in-progress' for five days), I received a unit that had surely gone through hell and back: scratches, discolouration, sticky spillage, dust, dust, dust, and I'm not talking fine dust; I pulled dust-bunnies from the grills the width of my pinky toe.

CEX has a 14-day return policy and a 24-month peace-of-mind warranty, so I gave it a chance.

Lesson starts here, my friends…

• SSD, or how to upgrade an old MAC’s storage.

Sadly, the Mac Pro came with a third party 512 GB SSD fitted with an adapter.

Adapters - buy cheap buy thrice!

Between 2012 and 2019, Apple used two types of connector for their SSD blades, both proprietary. In order to use a third party blade, one would need an adapter. The part is widely available and cheap. Thankfully? No. Apple rarely does things willy nilly. In order to work nice with the Mac, the SSD itself needs to comply to the Mac's and its OS' requirements, ECC being the start of many geeky terms I won't bore you with. So you think you can use any SSD with the said adapter? No. No you cannot. It might work for a little while, but you'll soon encounter issues with basic functionality. You'll see the blank folder-of-doom with the question mark. You'll have to zap the PRAM in order to force it to detect the SSD, which can only be done with a wired keyboard, I should add (I love "vintage", but I'm not a fan of wires). Latest Mac OS update that necessitates a restart will struggle to complete and leave you sitting at a blank screen hoping that another PRAM ZAP will do the trick. Beyond that, every time you turn the Mac off, the adapter will cause a kernel panic and have the Mac instantly reboot instead, punishing you for modding it with a cheap hack.

☒ 2012 - mid 2013 7-17 pin SSD APPLE connector

☑︎ Mid 2013 - 2019 12-16 pin SSD APPLE connector

Cometh OWC, the Mac friendly people who offer a solution at a premium price, of course. Their Aura Pro X2 blades offer speeds the Mac's old architecture can realise, but at 4x the price of SSD blades on the market, I decided to look secondhand. Remember CEX and their peace-of-mind warranty?

CEX happened to have a 1 TB OWC at a bargain price — oh goody! Several days later, the order got cancelled. Apparently they couldn't dispatch the item without further explanation and the item returned online for the taking. I tried again. I'm still waiting. I expect the same outcome, but I have decided to play along and see where that leads me.

In the meantime, I discovered that Apple used three manufacturers for their SSD blades: Samsung, Toshiba and Sandisk. They used two different connectors: 7-17 pin between 2012 and up to mid 2013, and 12-16 pin from mid 2013 up to 2019. Technically, it's possible to source out an OEM Apple part! Good news! CEX, 14 day, 24 month. Can’t go wrong… Unless the item remains in stock picking limbo and ends in cancellation. The OEM Samsung did not return in-stock, however, and I’m still waiting on the OWC...

Cometh eBay. £45 shipping included, Apple OEM made by Samsung, 512 GB, apparently in good condition. I should get it in 48 hours. More on the SSD saga later.

• DISPLAY for MAC peeps.

Coming from a 5K retina display at 218 PPI which looks like ink on paper -- no apparent pixelation -- I could not go for the common sub 100 PPI display. High pixel density monitors are not easy to find, mainly because the PC market caters to gamers (fast refresh rate performance over quality). You'll find plenty of 4K screens at 120 Hz, but what about PPI?

Well...

Research lead me to a 2016 LG 24inch 4K display which offers 185PPI and a displayport. LG has since updated the model, rebranding it under their ultrafine line which only adds 1 pixel “advantage” over the old one (186PPI)... But with the latter using USB-C connectivity, and being twice as expensive, the old model it is! CEX, 14-day, 24-month warranty… But there’s a snag… They don't ship displays. Collect only.

The nearest one of the three available was in Bradford, seventy miles from my door. I love an adventure — DAY TRIP! Bradford is a massive crater illuminated to the brim with rows and rows of fairylights, like standing at the heart of a gigantic beehive breeding glowing larvas. I enjoyed the sight. The CEX employees were lovely. I discovered Dunkin' Donuts had infiltrated the UK too! Bonus! I got a £10 box of 6 (3 maple, 3 Boston creams) possibly for the first and last time, at least on this side of the pond. Dunkin’ Donuts isn’t worth nearly £2 a piece. But I felt the rush of the adventure, and the fruition of a successful bargain hunt raised my spirit.

CEX was too busy to let me test the display. 14 day. 24 month. Can return it to any store. High spirits. Sugar rush. I chose the countryside roads. Sundown. Narrow lanes. No street light. Peaks, twists, the thickest fog I have ever encountered. An omen.

Home, safe, the display turned out to be complete garbage: rows of dead pixels; wide long “burn marks” or "smears" with a bubble on the physical surface of the screen. I began to ask myself what is a 14-day / 24-month warranty worth if everything I buy from CEX is unusable?! I promptly returned the display at my local CEX. Despite it all, spellbound by their 14-day / 24-month warranty, I gave them another chance. What are the odds that a second display turned out as bad as the first? Sheffield? Crystal Peaks? Haven’t been in a while, why not… I waited for the online confirmation the next day, but got a cancellation notice instead. Apparently, the display can’t be located.

(…)

Cometh eBay. Pristine condition. No warranty, but fuss-free. Lovely seller. Unit like new. Why was he selling such a wonderful display? Because he is using Windows, and Windows can’t scale a high pixel density display like the Mac does. My gain. Cheaper than CEX’s. Jackpot!

One last piece of the puzzle missing, though…

• SSD saga continued…

After a week, the 1 TB OWC gets cancelled at CEX on the day I received the 512 GB Apple OEM from eBay. I could finally test my new Trashcan Pro properly.

Let’s gather up the gear I’m playing with first.

My "new" kit

• Mac Pro (Late 2013) 3.5 GHz 6-Core Intel Xeon E5 with dual AMD FirePro D500 3 GB

£380 from CEX

I added 2x 16 GB 1866 MHz DDR3, leaving 2 empty slots for later IF the Mac Pro is a good egg. The good egg gets more ram. The bad egg goes back to CEX and I rethink the whole thing.

I switched the problematic third party SSD with an Apple OEM (Samsung) 512 GB SSD, bypassing the need for an unsupported adapter.

• LG 24inch 4K UHD IPS LED 24UD58-B DISPLAY

£130 on eBay

As close to Apple’s retina display as a budget monitor can get. I’m very pleased with this purchase. I work with it at a 3008 x 1692 scale. My eyes can’t focus at a close enough distance from the screen to notice any discernible pixelation. At 185 PPI versus the iMac’s 218 PPI, the window round edges aren’t as smooth, but by a narrow margin. You’d need to be as hopelessly finicky as me to notice.

• Accessories

Magic keyboard + trackpad (space grey), Apple HI-FI (more on that), ORICO SSD 10 Gbps enclosure + various USB3 external HDDs, Apple iSight camera (more on that).

First, I dressed the Apple OEM SSD with a layer of thermal tape then formatted it in online recovery mode (command + option + R on restart), and installed Monterey from scratch. Since, the Mac Pro has behaved like a Mac should.

LESSON #1: don’t use third party SSD with adapter.

I should add that I tested 3 different adapters — all resulted with a less than desirable outcome. Unless you prevent your Mac to ever go to sleep and never, EVER restart it — I can’t recommend a third party solution.

Orico 10 Gbps SSD enclosure

Since I had bought a WD 1 TB “green” SSD to test the setup with, I opted for an ORICO SSD enclosure for fast external storage, which brings us to the Mac Pro’s older connections problem.

However tempting it is to get a Thunderbolt 2 enclosure, HDD, RAID, etc… DON’T! I already had a G-TECH raid for my iMac 5K, and the external SSD enclosure proved faster despite being limited by the Mac Pro’s USB3 speed (5 Gbps versus Thunderbolt 2’s 20 Gbps) which comes down to the mechanical HDD’s limitation versus the SSD’s. And yes, the SSD on USB3 outperformed the 7200RPM RAID 0 speed on both small and large files using Blackmagic’s speed test software.

LESSON #2: don’t waste your time and money searching for a Thunderbolt 2 solution.

Many RAID enclosures or external HDDs with Thunderbolt 2 are now too old to be trusted, and unless the unit is designed for the Mac, their software won’t be supported with the latest Mac OS. My G-Tech works with the Mac’s own disk utility tool, but others don’t and will be formatted for Windows.

Apple Hi-FI still rockin'

Speakers… I have 2 HomePod Minis that I wrestled with for a while. I used them -- or tried to use them -- as a stereo pair. Ideally I wanted to reproduce the look of the old Powermac G4 Cube with its gorgeous spherical speakers (see G4 Cube picture at the very top). But the HomePod Minis never worked as expected with the iMac 5K nor with the Mac Pro. I suspect it comes down to the older bluetooth 4 as the HomePod Minis play well with my Macbook Air M1 (bluetooth 5). Never mind, my Apple HI-FI still works and the Mac Pro has and optical sound output. The HI-FI is a fabulous boombox. They are hard to find and fetch a fortune, but I’m lucky to have gotten one back then. Apple’s HI-FI truly sounds amazing.

LESSON #3: old gear is fun

Apple iSight Camera 2003 - 2006

Speaking of legacy products… I love Apple’s old iSight camera. With the iMac 5K sporting a superior and integrated cam, I benched the FireWire iSight Camera and never thought I’d use it again… Except, the Mac Pro doesn’t come with a webcam, and it’s enough that I have to stare at LG’s generic plastic design all day that I thought of resurrecting the old iSight for a bit of Apple chic.

But it has FireWire 400, I hear you say dismissively?

Thunderbolt to FireWire 800 + FW800 - FW400 adapters

I found Apple’s Thunderbolt to FireWire adapter on Amazon for a reasonable price, £2 more than the cheapest one on eBay or CEX. With a £3 FW800 to FW400 adapter, my iSight camera is standing proud above all this “new” kit and working fine. Nostalgia? No! Not “entirely”! I call it recycling. Good for the environment, and I look better in standard definition too!

• SO IS IT WORTH ALL THE FUSS?!!!

Or is it Mac-fanatic indulgence? The Mac Pro actually outperforms the iMac 5k on many things, and I got quite lucky. As it turns out, the first Mac Pro I returned was manufactured in February 2014, not long after the model was first introduced. The second one, which is running smoooooothly so far, was manufactured in October 2018, not long before the model was discontinued. How can you find out when your secondhand Mac was manufactured? Here’s the link for you.

PROS

• Runs Monterey like a top

• Faster with multi-thread computation (particularly with video encoding) than many newer Macs

• Standalone unit — if it goes bust, I still have a working screen — if the screen dies, I still have the Mac Pro

• Upgradable to impressive specs - CPU - RAM

• Can boot with Windows unlike the M1/M2 Macs

• Compatibility with existing software

• Still handles latest pro apps without a sweat

CONS

• Very slightly slower on every day single-thread tasks such as surfing and mail (more cores = lower GHz)

• Output: Thunderbolt 2 (legacy mini displayport connection), USB 3 (5 Gbps), HDMI 1.4 (30Hz @ 4K), bluetooth 4

• Expensive eGPU expansion only

Right, enough geeking about for a while. I do hope this has helped some of you.

#Apple #Mac Pro #SSD #recycling #compatibility #iSight #thunderbolt #firewire #retina display #hifi

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