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Another Mac Mini upgraded to T7600!
- Thread starter macenforcer
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a fast CPU can make up for a slow video card, but the video card is responsible for rendering video. I can't say i'm positive about this, but take any windows box and turn off hardware acceleration, then play a high res video. Without the hardware acceleration the CPU usage will jump way up as the CPU tries to take over the processing, and on my old server box (nvidia 6100 sempron 2500) anything over 640x480 divx will start dropping frames and use 100% cpu as opposed to about 25% with hardware acceleration.
I can't claim to be an expert on the matter, but in my experience rendering video is mostly (and preferably) a GPU task. I've never seen the ability to turn off hardware acceleration on my macs (why would you need to since you'll never get a mac without full driver support, thank you apple).
A regular mac mini user definitely won't have much use for a powerful GPU, but a $1400 computer would be rather unbalanced for many users if it lacked the option of adding a GPU. For $1400 in apple's lineup the imac has discrete graphics, so they also seem to recognize that this class of machine benefits from good GPU performance.
Doesn't have the horsepower, and shouldn't since it's intended for the lower consumer market. It just can't handle the pixel output of 2560x1600 apparently, it would require too much memory and/or power to put out a quality signal.
Not driving a 30" wouldn't be a big deal to me, but I always run 2 or more monitors. The MBs and iMacs allow 2 monitors (including their own built in screens), but then again the mini's not meant for folks like me, and it's great for the average user.
I thought 30" displays required two DVI ports on the video card, as is shipped with the Mac Pros?
You're confusing 'dual link' with just plain old dual. a dual link dvi port is a different type of dvi port which uses all the pins instead of having a gap between 2 sets of pins. It's perfectly compatible with single link dvi monitors. The MBP and many powerbooks also have dual link DVI ports (and obviously have only 1 DVI port) and can drive 30" 2560x1600 monitors.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_Visual_Interface
But that other chap said that displaying movies at high res was all to do with CPU speed, not the GPU. Does this mean he's wrong? Or are you both right, and I'm missing something?
The GPU processes everything that goes to the screen, and therefore determines how many pixels the computer can display and how fast they can be updated. If the CPU was terribly underpowered it wouldn't be able to process data to send to the GPU, but that would be a very unbalanced machine.
Displaying movies at high res, as I understand it, is nearly all GPU under normal circumstances. The CPU has to read the data from the HDD and send it to the GPU, but the GPU does most of the work of making it into pixels on the screen.
Without a fully functioning GPU (as in a windows machine without proper drivers) the CPU will use software to accomplish the same task (always much slower). If the load is too much for a properly functioning GPU I believe the CPU aids in the processing, but I have no proof of this, it just seems to be what happens (after a certain resolution/number of videos playing, the CPU use starts to spike).
I suppose the video format must have some effect as well, since i assume some more complex codecs and formats require more decoding, but I'm certainly no expert on the matter.
IIRC most video decoding was traditionally done on the CPU. Only certain codecs allow or even mandate that the GPU be used (like h.264, the new wmv, divx maybe... i'm not certain on that one). But some clever people down at the GPU companies began to realize, hey since we're dealing with graphics why not let the GPU take over some of the tasks of decoding the video so they built in some functions to help decode codecs and hey presto thats what we have now. Its not all GPU though...
Actually, I was just plain ol' ignorant. But thanks for giving me the benefit of the doubt (and for the lesson).
macenforcer, that's one sweet mini you have there! I absolutely love the minis, they're such an amazing form factor! The only thing I wish for is HDCP compliance and maybe even dual link. The former could possibly be enabled if they were to ever update the Mac Mini to the Santa Rosa platform.
Now I am super glad I did the cpu upgrade. Can now take full advantage of the 64bit Leapord when it comes out. Now its a must have upgrade!
nice! did a T7200 upgrade awhile ago, and agree that it is money well spent. back then the 7600 was just under $1000, so couldn't justify the cost...
mine runs 24 x 7, FOLDING at 100% on both cores, and has been up for months now without a problem. totally sweet machine, like nothing else i have ever owned.
lots of bench data on google that show the faster cpu really drives the 950 to very usable levels, but will second the OP, runs great, never drops a frame. Wow runs fine, farcry runs well but has a texture issue. all my oldschool games freaking fly on this thing. not going to replace my game machine but not bad for a 6 inch square with integrated graphics.
for an un-scientific benchmark, i have the mini/T7200 and an intel mobo/E6700 both folding at 100%. the mini will average about 1100 points per day, and the the desktop will average about 1300 points per day. not a huge difference from the mobile to the desktop, and at a much lower cost. and less power. and less noise. and less space. and less upgrades (as per the haters above...). anyway, love mine, wish i had more.
great job.
mine runs 24 x 7, FOLDING at 100% on both cores, and has been up for months now without a problem. totally sweet machine, like nothing else i have ever owned.
lots of bench data on google that show the faster cpu really drives the 950 to very usable levels, but will second the OP, runs great, never drops a frame. Wow runs fine, farcry runs well but has a texture issue. all my oldschool games freaking fly on this thing. not going to replace my game machine but not bad for a 6 inch square with integrated graphics.
for an un-scientific benchmark, i have the mini/T7200 and an intel mobo/E6700 both folding at 100%. the mini will average about 1100 points per day, and the the desktop will average about 1300 points per day. not a huge difference from the mobile to the desktop, and at a much lower cost. and less power. and less noise. and less space. and less upgrades (as per the haters above...). anyway, love mine, wish i had more.
great job.
Actually, I was just plain ol' ignorant. But thanks for giving me the benefit of the doubt (and for the lesson).
It gets really fun when video card manufacturers try to show off the fact that their cards have two dual link dvi ports - I've seen "Dual dual link" used far too often >_<