Dear 2010 Mac Pro: It's Not You. It's 2025. (Gentoo Edition)🔗

I've squeezed a ridiculous amount of life out of a classic cheese-grater. It's been reflashed, re-pasted, rammed to the gills, and—most importantly—converted to Gentoo because I like my machines the way I like my code: compiled on purpose.

But the gap between what I do now (LLMs, big compiles, many containers, endless terminals) and what this box can deliver has become too wide to cross with clever USE flags.

Here's the vibe today:

matt @MacPro5,1 (Gentoo)
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OS: Gentoo (stable/amd64, OpenRC)
Kernel: gentoo-sources 6.x (PREEMPT)
Shell: bash
WM: Sway (Wayland)  |  Terminal: Ghostty
Theme: Catppuccin (mocha)  |  Fonts: JetBrains Mono / Inter
CPU: 2x Intel Xeon X5690 (12c/24t total) @ 3.46 GHz (westmere)
GPU: NVIDIA TITAN Xp (proprietary drivers)
RAM: 128 GiB DDR3 ECC
Storage: NVMe via PCIe adapter + SATA SSDs
MAKEOPTS: -j24  |  FEATURES: ccache distcc (sometimes)
CFLAGS: -march=westmere -O2 -pipe

I adore that this thing still rips through a modern toolchain and boots a current gentoo-sources kernel. I love that I can emerge --sync && emerge -uDU @world with a coffee and a smile. But let's be real about why an upgrade isn't optional anymore.

Why the MacPro5,1 (on Gentoo) is fighting me🔗

• Single-thread pop is dated. Westmere cores are sturdy, but modern compilers, linkers, language servers, and rust/cargo workflows notice IPC and cache gains from new silicon. My :make loop takes coffee breaks it shouldn't.
• PCIe 2.0 lanes. Yes, I'm running NVMe through an adapter. It's cute. It's not Gen4/Gen5. When I fan out builds, Docker layers, and database files, IO stops being "instant."
• CUDA… but 2017. TITAN Xp is a legend; it's also Pascal—no Tensor Cores. Great for classic CUDA, less great for FP16/bfloat16-friendly LLM stacks. I can make it work; I can't make it fast.
• DDR3 ECC bandwidth. 128 GiB is comfy, but memory speed/latency tells on me when I'm juggling compilers, containers, and browsers all at once.
• Thermals & watts. It runs. It roasts. Modern perf/-W simply wins.

The work I actually want to do🔗

• Local AI: Load mid-sized models, experiment with quantization, fine-tune a little, and not hear fans scream like takeoff.
• Big compiles: Gentoo world updates, LLVM, Rust, Go, kernels, Chromium. I like turning beans into binaries now, not after lunch.
• Many services: Postgres, NATS, Redis, Docker/Podman stacks, telemetry, and a Sway session with a petty number of Ghostty panes.

Gentoo-specific pain points that say "upgrade now"🔗

• Portage feedback loops. emerge -e @world on Westmere is a weekend hobby. On modern silicon it's an afternoon inconvenience.
• LTO/PGO reality. I can flip these for key packages; I won't on Westmere, because compile time → eternity.
• NVIDIA driver dance. It works fine on Gentoo (credit to the ebuilds), but for AI I want Tensor Cores + modern CUDA/ cuDNN targets without feeling like I'm forcing it.

What a modern platform buys me (with Gentoo sprinkled on top)🔗

• Snappier world and cargo build. New cores crush single-threaded hot paths; Portage goes from "see you later" to "one more run before bed."
• Real NVMe bandwidth. Gen4/Gen5 scratch volumes make ccache fly and Docker layers feel like RAM.
• A serious GPU. RTX with Tensor Cores turns "can I?" into "I did," which is the whole point of local LLMs.
• DDR5 headroom. 128–256 GiB at 2-3× the bandwidth of my current setup changes how gleefully I open terminals (and how infrequently I close them).
• Lower latency everywhere. From syscalls to storage queues, all the tiny waits I've normalized… vanish.

My upgrade paths (the ones I waffle between)🔗

1. High-end desktop, reasonable watts

   • Modern 16-core desktop CPU with high clocks, PCIe 5.0, and 128–256 GiB DDR5 (UDIMM).
   • Add a proper RTX for AI.
   • Gentoo angle: lightning-fast @world, zero drama with Wayland/Sway, Docker stacks that don't blink.

2. Workstation "I'm done deciding" build

   • Threadripper PRO: lanes for days, ECC RDIMM, 256–512 GiB if I want to be ridiculous.
   • Room for serious GPUs.
   • Gentoo angle: I can enable LTO/PGO on key packages without dreading rebuilds. MAKEOPTS=-j64 is not a joke anymore.

3. Compact power cube

   • Top HX-class CPU mini system + desktop RTX.
   • Smaller footprint, still modern cores, still PCIe 4.0/5.0 if I pick correctly.
   • Gentoo angle: All the perks of fresh silicon without needing a forklift.

Whichever path I pick, the target is the same: shorter feedback loops, real AI capability, and a calm, cool system under load.

Storage & memory preferences (the boring stuff that matters)🔗

• Gen4 vs Gen5 NVMe: Gen4 already slaps. Gen5 is gravy for scratch and huge file sets. I'll take thermals + reliability over chasing top-end synthetic numbers.
• ECC: If the platform supports ECC cleanly, I'm in. Bit-flip roulette is not a hobby.
• Capacity: 128 GiB has been fine; 192–256 GiB feels like the new comfy for AI + dev + containers. If I go workstation, 512 GiB becomes "why not."

My Gentoo desktop vibe (the fun part)🔗

• Sway + Ghostty + Catppuccin. Tight keybinds, buttery font rendering, instant redraws.
• Wayland all the way. Most of my apps are native; XWayland stragglers are tolerable.
• Dotfiles that assume speed. I want ripgrep across huge trees and live-grepping in Neovim without the fans doing Shakespeare.

The farewell tour (with gratitude)🔗

The MacPro5,1 on Gentoo has been a champion. It proved that careful configuration, sane USE flags, and a little stubbornness can keep "old" hardware feeling modern for a long time. But my work has outgrown it. The limiting factor isn't the OS (Gentoo rules); it's the physics of 2010 silicon.

I massively need to upgrade my PC—not for vanity metrics, but to trade waiting for working. The next box is about fewer excuses, faster loops, and more experiments shipped. Gentoo will feel right at home there, too.

Time to build the machine I actually need, and let 2025 hardware do what it does best: get out of my way.