Homelab: Mac Pro 2013 32GB
Did I mention that I have recently purchased the iconic Mac Pro 2013 desktop for virtualisation and macOS experiments in my homelab?
Yes, the year is 2024 and Mac Pro 2013 is now more than 10 years old, but many models are still in perfect working order and pack quite a punch for something this old.
Typical Mac Pro 2013 Hardware Specs
Here are the key hardware specifications for the Mac Pro 2013 model:
- CPU: 3.5 GHz 6-Core Intel Xeon E5 (upgradable to 12-core)
- RAM: 32GB 1866 MHz DDR3 ECC (upgradable to 64GB or 128GB)
- Storage: 512GB PCIe-based flash storage
- Graphics: Dual AMD FirePro D500 GPUs with 3GB GDDR5 VRAM each
- Ports:
- 6 Thunderbolt 2 ports
- 4 USB 3.0 ports
- 2 Gigabit Ethernet ports
- 1 HDMI 1.4 port
- Wireless: 802.11ac Wi-Fi, Bluetooth 4.0
- Dimensions: 9.9 inches tall, 6.6 inches in diameter
- Weight: 11 pounds (5 kg)
The model I got comes with 6-core Xeon CPU and 32GB RAM and 512GB SSD. I think it has 6 thunderbolt connections and 4 USB ones, not to mention two Gigabit network interfaces and HDMI. It’s an old system so HDMI only supports 30Mhz for 4K, but thunderbolt connection should support 60Mhz.
If I really want to, I can upgrade it to 64GB RAM or even a much better 12-core CPU - both upgrades seem to be overkill but also sound like quite fun projects (and spares for such an old system are really cheap these days).
As always, initial post-config is done using Ansible and homebrew.
