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2008 3.2 8core Macpro to the latest 3.33 6 core

R

Ronnie roo

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Jul 23, 2012
8
0
Dublin, Ireland
Going from a 2008 3.2 8core Mac Pro with 20 GB ram, SSD boot drive to the latest 3.33 6 core maxed out with 32 GB ram, is it worth it , would there be a significant speed increase? That is the question i am wondering, or should i just wait until the next proper upgrade in a years time or whenever that might be?

I work in only photoshop and illustrator CS5 though plan to upgrade to CS 6 shortly and i've always changed my machine every 31/2 - 4 years once apple care has run out, keeping the old machine as a back up incase it's ever needed. For the past few months i've been wondering if I should keep ploughing on with the present 2008 Mac Pro or would there be a significant speed increase with the newer 3.33 6 core. As i work primarily in photoshop, regularly with 2/3 GB layered files, i could get another 2 ssd's for work files / scratch disk and maybe max out the ram at 32GB and keep the 2008 model going or move on to a new hex with the ram maxed out and ssd's.

I would appreciate any suggestions, thoughts
thanks
Ron
 
You can't upgrade 2008 Mac Pro with that processor. Your 3.2 GHz Haprertown CPU is the fastest CPU for that machine.

Hex core Westemre CPU can be used in flashed Mac Pro 2009 and 2010/2012.
 
2008 = last of pre-nahalem processors. You can't upgrade past what you have, AFAIK.
 
Am I the only who gets what Ron's asking? He wants to know if a 2012 will be better then a 2008 model. He's not asking about a CPU upgrade of his 2008 model.

that being said... The 2010-12 hex model will score about 14,000 on geekbench... the 8 core 2008 model scores about 10,300. This is according to the scores on the Geekbench website. From a processing perspective I don't see the value in upgrading unless you are taxing the processors to the point where you are waiting around a lot and it's costing you money.

If you are consistently taxing your RAM, that may be a reason to upgrade. Monitor your page file to see. (EDIT: OR... buy more RAM).

The new machines aren't much different then the old ones, so I can say if you can hold out, you would be better off. If Apple kills the Mac Pro line next year, you can then get the 2012 for a discount.
 
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If the OP is using his current 2008 Harpertown for video rendering and encoding, there will be a HUGH difference in processing power with the 6-core w3680 or even a 12-core model. For basics, NO.. not much except maybe faster opening and executing of applications. Really, the hexcore and decacore models benefit through heavy video rendering and encoding. Even most games don't handle more than 2 cores.

All in all, the 2008 Mac Pro's are still nice machine. I had one and enjoyed it a lot, but I wanted to stay current with the technology. The biggest benefit for the 2008's which is why they have been alive for this long is: EFI64 and the ability to take advantage of video cards whether the 5770/5870 or PC flashed ones.



pprior said:
2008 = last of pre-nahalem processors. You can't upgrade past what you have, AFAIK.
Click to expand...

keysersoze said:
Am I the only who gets what Ron's asking? He wants to know if a 2012 will be better then a 2008 model. He's not asking about a CPU upgrade of his 2008 model.

that being said... The 2010-12 hex model will score about 14,000 on geekbench... the 8 core 2008 model scores about 10,300. This is according to the scores on the Geekbench website. From a processing perspective I don't see the value in upgrading unless you are taxing the processors to the point where you are waiting around a lot and it's costing you money.

If you are consistently taxing your RAM, that may be a (the only) reason to upgrade. Monitor your page file to see.

The new machines aren't much different then the old ones, so I can say if you can hold out, you would be better off. If Apple kills the Mac Pro line next year, you can then get the 2012 for a discount.
Click to expand...
 
PowerPCMacMan said:
If the OP is using his current 2008 Harpertown for video rendering and encoding, there will be a HUGH difference in processing power with the 6-core w3680 or even a 12-core model. For basics, NO.. not much except maybe faster opening and executing of applications. Really, the hexcore and decacore models benefit through heavy video rendering and encoding. Even most games don't handle more than 2 cores.
Click to expand...

I agree, but he says he's using it for Illustrator and Photoshop. I am not sure how much of a gain he will see (read- if those even tax his current 2008 Mac Pro). I think the biggie will be RAM usage, so he should monitor that to see if being able to upgrade to 32GB would be worth the cost of a new machine.

EDIT: Stupid me. Ron could just upgrade the RAM in his 2008... no need for a new machine if RAM is only problem.
 
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I missed your point obviously. For photoshop I doubt you'll see much advantage to make the investment now - the next generations of workstations that are now coming out for windows will be much faster than what we have on mac and it's foolish to drop that much coin on 2 year old technology, IMO. Countless threads on this topic right after they bombed the "new" 2012 mac pro.

Check out mac performance guide (http://macperformanceguide.com/index_topics.html) - a lot of photoshop specific data there, but personally I'd spend some coin on a large SSD for your photoshop stuff and swap and if you're using GPU accelerated CS6 functions (more on video than photoshop, though there are some there) then consider upgrading GPU, which is what I'm doing.
 
thanks guys for your replies and apologies for not making myself clearer to begin with.I'll hold fire and just add an additional SSd for my photoshop stuff , maybe max out the ram and see what apple do next year with the Mac Pro
thanks
Ron
 
Correct me if I am wrong, but photoshop doesn't make use of all the cores, correct? I don't use it, since I do mostly encoding on my Hexcore 2010 Mac Pro. I thought I read somewhere that CS5 or CS5.5 are not multi-core capable?


pprior said:
I missed your point obviously. For photoshop I doubt you'll see much advantage to make the investment now - the next generations of workstations that are now coming out for windows will be much faster than what we have on mac and it's foolish to drop that much coin on 2 year old technology, IMO. Countless threads on this topic right after they bombed the "new" 2012 mac pro.

Check out mac performance guide (http://macperformanceguide.com/index_topics.html) - a lot of photoshop specific data there, but personally I'd spend some coin on a large SSD for your photoshop stuff and swap and if you're using GPU accelerated CS6 functions (more on video than photoshop, though there are some there) then consider upgrading GPU, which is what I'm doing.
Click to expand...
 
depends on function, but yes photoshop in many areas falls short of using all cores. CS6 I believe has improved and some functions are GPU accelerated as well, but not most. Premiere and AE are much more multi-core aware and GPU boosted as well in Cs6. It's frustrating x 1000 why photoshop has such a crappy multi CPU support.
 
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