3 pretty simple questions

[mac pro]

1.) In two years, when the price of clovertowns comes way down... will it be possible to put those into my mac pro 2.66? Also... could I just replace one... and have a 6 core machine?

2.) Will doing this void my warranty?

3.) This stoakley thing I am reading about... will those processors fit into my machine if those come down in price in another 2-3 years?

 

[72930]

1.)
2.) Will doing this void my warranty?

I don't know about the other questions, but if you can, a processor swap WILL void warranty...

 

[dartzorichalcos]

1.) In two years, when the price of clovertowns comes way down... will it be possible to put those into my mac pro 2.66? Also... could I just replace one... and have a 6 core machine?

2.) Will doing this void my warranty?

If you really want to replace the processor, check this out. And yes, changing the processor will void your warranty. Are you sure you really want to do it? A 2.66 Quad Mac Pro will still be good in 2 years if you keep on upgrading the ram.

 

[dmw007]

1.) In two years, when the price of clovertowns comes way down... will it be possible to put those into my mac pro 2.66? Also... could I just replace one... and have a 6 core machine?

This has already been done. Not sure if you can have a dual-core Xeon and a Quad-Core Xeon running side by side though.

2.) Will doing this void my warranty?

Yes, it will.

 

[robbieduncan]

I'm fairly certain the two CPUs must be identical.

 

[mad jew]

If you could convince a certified technician to change the CPU for you, I imagine you might be able to keep the warranty.

 

[Umbongo]

1. Yes you will be able to replace them, no you cannot mismatch processors on a dual socket machine.

2. Yes it will void your warranty, though you may be able to make it appear that you didn't change the processors if you keep the old ones if you have a problem. I assume you have 3 years of Apple care if you're asking this?

3. Stoakley is a chipset that will be used by woodcrest, clovertown and the upcomming Penryn processors. While I've not seen it mentioned, I assume that they (penryn) will also be backwards compatible as such. Though it's possible they won't be and would be limited if used in such a way.

--------------

All in all, it's more than likely that the best overall solution for getting newer processors will be to sell your current Mac Pro and buy a new one using all the latest technology when your current machine no longer meets your needs. Infact if Apple go the route of only having $2500+ workstations as their headless (no monitor) range then I think there will be a big market for older Mac Pros.

 

[dmw007]

I'm fairly certain the two CPUs must be identical.

I believe this to be the case as well, but I do recall an article on Tomshardware.com that was about a three cpu system. They used a single core Opteron in socket 1 and a dual-core Opteron in socket 2 for three cores total.

 

[mac pro]

Okay... so once my three year applecare runs out... that will probably be prime time for when I must upgrade. thanks for the clarification on stoakley.

 

[robbieduncan]

One thing you don't seem to have considered is how easy will it be to purchase these CPUs in three years time? Intel certainly won't be making them in any volume. Have you had a look around to see how easy it is to purchase 3 year old Xeons today?

 

[Rokusaburo]

2.) Will doing this void my warranty?

Hopefully Apple will let us purchase Quad Xeons from them and install them for us, keeping our warranty.

 

[robbieduncan]

Hopefully Apple will let us purchase Quad Xeons from them and install them for us, keeping our warranty.

This would be most unlike Apple. Much more likely would be that third parties start offering the upgrade and warranting the machine themselves.

 

[CyberPrey]

This would be most unlike Apple

I was going to say something like "hell would freeze over before apple does that" Apple would prefer you to purchase a newer system rather than simply upgrade your CPU's.

 

[eluk]

Hopefully Apple will let us purchase Quad Xeons from them and install them for us, keeping our warranty.

Highly unlikely. This would mean Apple holding a stock of these and then people would gripe about the mark-up Apple were applying. The overall cost woud make your eyes water.