7 replies to this topic

[garyyoss]

Hello All,
Seeking some assistance in choosing the processor for a Mac Pro I intend to purchase within the week.
After some research I have narrowed my choice down to the 3.2 Quad-Core or 3.3 Six-Core. Once I decide on the processor I plan on ordering a 120g SSD, 12g RAM and 2TB Caviar Black HD from OWC.
Shooting with a D300 at the moment, knowing my next camera within a year or so will have HD video and further on up the road getting a dedicated video camera is the reason I am thinking about the Westmere 3.3 Six-Core.
I would appreciate any recommendations for you Mac users out there.
Thanks,
Gary

Edited by garyyoss, 12 February 2011 - 01:13 PM.

[gina]

I would appreciate any recommendations for you Mac users out there.

In the words of my programmer husband: Always buy the most you can afford. You will eventually grow into it, and that's better than having to upgrade down the road.

-Gina

[echeng]

... I think the 6-core is great (I bought the 12-core, and it was a waste for me), although the quad-core will probably be fine unless you do a ton of transcoding. Only transcoding will tax all of the processors these days. Most of the time, my Mac Pro sits idle even though I'm multitasking hard on it.

[Drew]

I agree. Only a few apps actually use all cores available. If you are doing a lot of rendering with AEFX, then more cores the better. Compressor can also use many cores but it slows down because it has to reassemble the segments and is fastest use 3/4 of cores available. But for CS5 Photoshop and Lightroom, there's not going to be much of a difference (maybe 10-20% render times). Is that worth the $1000 for a 6 core? I'd get a bigger SSD/drive/RAM/GPU.

[echeng]

An SSD will change your computing life! The top eSATA ports can be used for SSDs, or you can buy an adapter that lets you slide one right into one of the existing 4 slots in the backplane.





More about SSDs and Mac Pros here:

http://echeng.com/jo...c-pro-mid-2010/

[johnspierce]

Agreed on the SSDs. Almost any process you can think of will benefit. When transcoding, a program will undoubtedly be swapping out temporary files to disk while working so that 10X faster SSD will really help out more than the 6 cores I would think.

[recd]

An SSD will change your computing life! The top eSATA ports can be used for SSDs, or you can buy an adapter that lets you slide one right into one of the existing 4 slots in the backplane.


http://echeng.com/jo...c-pro-mid-2010/

Eric

How have you configured the SSDs. Are you running the OS on one and using another as a scratch disc and so how are the other 4 utilised.

Thinking about my 2008 2*4core.

cheers

col

[echeng]

I'm using one SSD as OS/apps/selective library, one SSD for scratch, and 4x2TB in a RAID stripe (backed up constantly, of course).

I'm not sure how I feel about the cheapie SSD as scratch. It does random well, but sequential is a lot slower than my RAID, which does over 500MB/s sustained.

Haven't noticed it ever slowing down, though, so I think it's in a good state.

Oh -- I ended up disconnecting the SuperDrive and connecting two SSDs. I use an external USB DVD burner.