Reader comment: Mac Pro or iMac?

Reader Hendrik P writes:

I'm a 3D artist and designer from Germany. I wasn't sure if I should get a iMac i7 or the pricier MacPro. I went for the 6-core 3,33 GHz MacPro and I’m so glad I did.

As you recommended, I bought 2 of the insanely fast OWC SSDs for my system. This brought me tenfold speed in terms of rendering in AfterEffects or Cinema 4D (my old machine is a 2009 MacBook Pro 2,26 GHz Core 2 Duo).

Your blog and your great tips helped A LOT in making the right decision. Especially your very in-depth review of the MacPro (vs. iMac i7). The remark about the exchangeable internal drives was the turning point. If you rely on your computer for a living, it has to work, and if it doesn't it shouldn't take long to get it up and running again.

Thanks a million!

DIGLLOYD: smart move. The Mac Pro is a hugely better value, and while the iMac quad-core is a fine machine for what it is, it’s extremely limited for serious work where speed and reliability for drives and backup come into play, not to mention a 16GB memory limit. It’s a dead-end Mac when those things are considered carefully, which is not to say it’s no good, just that I definitely would not build a business on it. See my in-depth comments.