[roastedpeanuts]

Hey guys.

Is there a significant speed difference between the dual 2.26, 2.66, and 2.93 Ghz models to justify the huge price differences?

Thanks.

[the Battle Cat]

roastedpeanuts, on March 3rd 2009, 05:00 PM, said:

Hey guys.

Is there a significant speed difference between the dual 2.26, 2.66, and 2.93 Ghz models to justify the huge price differences?

Thanks.

No popsnizzle, it's $1K per 300MHz. That's crazy. Crazy like putting a mouse in your ear because you are afraid of cheese crazy.

[Dark_Archon]

Probably not. Especially for games.

If you were doing something where every bit of processing power mattered, you'd know.

[roastedpeanuts]

Dark_Archon, on March 3rd 2009, 06:19 PM, said:

Probably not. Especially for games.

If you were doing something where every bit of processing power mattered, you'd know.

What about the difference between getting two processors or one when it comes to gaming?

Here's the debate:
I am going to upgrade to the ATI card for sure, but the RAM and processor choices are up in the air.

Processor: Either the single 2.66 or 2.93 Ghz processor or the base dual 2.26 Ghz processor
RAM: Either 3, 6, or 8 GB. I'm thinking 6, 8 seems like overkill.

Any suggestions?

[Dark_Archon]

I like the idea of getting the dual processor configuration. You'll also probably want more than 3GB RAM. I had 3GB RAM(Stock 1GB, 2GB added) in my Mac Pro, and adding another 4 made a pretty noticeable difference.

You get the best memory bandwidth when there are 3 DIMMs per processor, so I think the base dual processor configuration with 6GB RAM sounds pretty good.

Edit: And I bet the dual processor model will hold its resale value better than the single processor model.

[Eric5h5]

roastedpeanuts, on March 3rd 2009, 08:27 PM, said:

What about the difference between getting two processors or one when it comes to gaming?

None whatsoever. One CPU is already 4 cores...most games barely make use of more than 1 core as it is. 8 cores + gaming = massive overkill, at least for now.

--Eric

[Dark_Archon]

Eric5h5, on March 3rd 2009, 09:40 PM, said:

None whatsoever. One CPU is already 4 cores...most games barely make use of more than 1 core as it is. 8 cores + gaming = massive overkill, at least for now.

--Eric

True, assuming the game is the only thing running. While adding more cores may not help that one task, it will help prevent slowdowns when running multiple things simultaneously.

I'm surprised new games aren't more SMP aware yet. Dual core processors have been the norm for a while and having four cores isn't uncommon anymore. The second physical processor gives you some more headroom for running things in the background while gaming when programmers finally catch up.

[ltcommander.data]

Dark_Archon, on March 3rd 2009, 09:55 PM, said:

True, assuming the game is the only thing running. While adding more cores may not help that one task, it will help prevent slowdowns when running multiple things simultaneously.

I'm surprised new games aren't more SMP aware yet. Dual core processors have been the norm for a while and having four cores isn't uncommon anymore. The second physical processor gives you some more headroom for running things in the background while gaming when programmers finally catch up.

Well technically that's what HT is for. A single processor Nehalem already has 4 cores which is more than enough for current games. Having 4 additional virtual cores allows it to handle background tasks and for future scaling. Although with HT, I'm concerned whether Leopard's scheduler is sufficiently optimized to not schedule 2 threads on the same physical core until the other physical cores are full and it needs to double up otherwise HT harms performance. I'm guessing 10.5.7 most adds recognition of HT, SSE4.2, and maybe NUMA memory access awareness for Nehalem, while actual optimization to take advantage of those features won't come until Snow Leopard. Kind of like 10.2.8 added G5 recognition while Panther actually took advantage of the new features.

What's disappointing is that Apple seems to be using the Xeon 35xx series for the single processor Mac Pro. That means that these are actually uniprocessor limited CPUs with only 1 QPI link. You won't be able to just drop in a 2nd processor to upgrade to dual processor later since that requires the Xeon 55xx series. Incidentally, the 2.66GHz W3520 Nehalem that Apple is using in the new $2499 Mac Pro only costs $284, compared to 2 x 2.8GHz E5462 Harpertown Xeons worth 2 x $797 or $1594 in the old Mac Pro that costs $2799. Apple has increased their profit margin in the Mac Pro by $1000, by skimping on the CPU without passing on the savings.

Overall, I don't find the Mac Pro compelling anymore since they reintroduced a single processor option as standard. No matter how fast Nehalem is, I just don't see 1 x 2.67GHz Nehalem beating 2 x 2.80GHz Harpertown, especially in games, but even in heavily threaded applications. I guess that's why Apple only compares the 2 x 2.93GHz Nehalem against the 2 x 3.2GHz Harpertown since that's a safe bet. The best value would probably be to get an older 2 x 2.80GHz Harpertown and buy the HD4870 separately. The GPU is more important for gaming anyways. The 3.06GHz iMac with the HD4850 is also a pretty good option.

[teflon]

I spotted that these Xeons pull some clever tricks when it comes to power management. For instance, if only one core is being used, then the other cores will shut down until needed. Also, if that single core is being pushed quite hard, then, because of the extra power etc. etc., the core will temporarily upclock itself to give you better performance...

thats pretty nifty.

but i agree that the single cpu being on a modified mobo is annoying for us incessant tinkerers/future proofing...

[The Liberator]

teflon, on March 4th 2009, 07:57 PM, said:

I spotted that these Xeons pull some clever tricks when it comes to power management. For instance, if only one core is being used, then the other cores will shut down until needed. Also, if that single core is being pushed quite hard, then, because of the extra power etc. etc., the core will temporarily upclock itself to give you better performance...

thats pretty nifty.

but i agree that the single cpu being on a modified mobo is annoying for us incessant tinkerers/future proofing...

Damn, that sounds pretty cool. That is a new level of CPU intelligence right there.

Is that that i7 or…?

Liberator.

[teflon]

I looked it up quickly (its called "turbo boost") and it looks like its on all the Nehalem chips, so i7 i5 and the new Xeons.

On the downside, the new iMacs havent switched up to Nehalems. Possibly because of heat worries, or perhaps because everything but a couple of the Xeons is quad core when it comes to Nehalem, which would then give rise to worries that the top iMacs would then challenge the audience of the bottom end Mac Pros...

[bobbob]

Dark_Archon, on March 3rd 2009, 08:55 PM, said:

While adding more cores may not help that one task, it will help prevent slowdowns when running multiple things simultaneously

If you were going to do something else while playing a game, it would be much much cheaper to get one 2 or 4-core tower to game on and one cheaper headless one to encode. Quad-core towers start at, what, $600 for the parts?

[teflon]

In some configurations yes, but with OpenCL and CUDA on the way, having a single dedicated kick-ass machine with a good solid GPU in there is going to really outpace that headless machine you plan on having, taking the time that you waste waiting for the encode right down and letting you play games on your own time as opposed to playing games to wait for the encode to finish.

nice way to twist the situation on its head though. Usually its "I want a MP for work, but then a PC for gaming". Youve turned it into "I want a Gaming rig for play and a second PC for "work""

[Dark_Archon]

The whole second machine thing doesn't really work that way. It ends up sitting there collecting dust.

[bobbob]

If only XGrid was useful for something.

[mattw]

teflon, on March 4th 2009, 05:45 PM, said:

In some configurations yes, but with OpenCL and CUDA on the way, having a single dedicated kick-ass machine with a good solid GPU in there is going to really outpace that headless machine you plan on having, taking the time that you waste waiting for the encode right down and letting you play games on your own time as opposed to playing games to wait for the encode to finish.

nice way to twist the situation on its head though. Usually its "I want a MP for work, but then a PC for gaming". Youve turned it into "I want a Gaming rig for play and a second PC for "work""

I'm on the fence between the single Quad 2.66 (cheaper option) or 2.93 versus the 8-core 2.26 (close in price). The only easy choice is the 4870:) My dual G5 has been nice and is still fine for the web, iLife etc. but I'm looking for much faster H264 video encoding and ideally the ability to play games whilst this is happening. I already have a pile of Intel only Mac games waiting. I'm also hoping the new machines will be nice and quiet as well - I imagine the graphics card fan is likely to be the noisiest one.

[Sneaky Snake]

If I were you I'd stick with the Quad 2.66. That leaves you a couple hundred bucks to upgrade your RAM, Hard Drive(s), get a second optical drive (which is extremely handy) and still have a few hundred left over for getting some other goodies (games, iTouch etc.). The only reason I would get the dual 2.26 would be if I was doing a serious amount of video encoding, at least one decent encode per day.

The single 2.66 will actually perform better in games as well as it has a higher speed.

For the same price as the dual 2.26 I'd get this (hopefully you can see the upgrade options I selected)


-Snake

[teflon]

sadly they dont stick from one person to the next...

anyway, for extra HDDs, RAM, and even optical drives always go 3rd party, itll always be much cheaper than Apple for sure, and will work flawlessly unless the part is faulty. For the optical drive, though, Id say to stick to a better brand rather than "cheapest". Im particular to Pioneer.

heck, while youre at it you could get on of LGs fantabulous BD-R combo drives for future proofing yourself (and praying that Apple get over the "world of hurt")

[Sneaky Snake]

teflon, on March 5th 2009, 09:20 PM, said:

sadly they dont stick from one person to the next...

anyway, for extra HDDs, RAM, and even optical drives always go 3rd party, itll always be much cheaper than Apple for sure, and will work flawlessly unless the part is faulty. For the optical drive, though, Id say to stick to a better brand rather than "cheapest". Im particular to Pioneer.

heck, while youre at it you could get on of LGs fantabulous BD-R combo drives for future proofing yourself (and praying that Apple get over the "world of hurt")

Totally agree about getting 3rd party stuff, you could probably save yourself at least a hundred bucks. An optical drive can be had for ~$25 vs the $100 the apple charges for a second one

[roastedpeanuts]

So most people seem to be saying ditch the second processor. Does anyone have any benchmarks comparing two quad cores versus a single one for gaming tests (pc or mac)? What about when mac os x supposedly "embraces" multi-cores and multiprocessing with the upcoming Grand Central feature? Maybe then it could make a big difference, especially for processor intensive games (a future simcity perhaps)?

Speculation? Pie charts? I can't emphasize enough the need for pie charts.