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Considering Mac Pro single vs dual processor....

B

badcrc32

macrumors regular
Original poster
Nov 22, 2007
126
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The iMac wasnt for me....Way to many bugs with the screen bleeds, and dead pixels on two machines. I dont want an all in one technology.

I am seriously considering a Mac Pro but I am stuck if I want a single or dual processor. Any suggestions? Ill barely do video editing, Ill run fusion, photo stuff, etc...Maybe some gaming. I am a computer professional....Just not sure its worth the $500.00 for me....:apple:
 
I assume that you get the same motherboard whether you buy the single or dual processor model, and if you wanted you could simply buy an additional processor farther down the line if you felt limited. So far on my multiprocessor system the only thing that really taxes all the cores is video rendering/compressing, so if you don't do a lot of that you might be fine with 4. TBH, 4 is pretty good even if you are going to be doing it frequently.
 
I got the Quad (single CPU) and there isn't a day that goes by that I'm unhappy with my decision.

The extra $500 was bonus money in my pocket, and for everyday apps, the machine is incredibly fast.

:)

Hope that helps!
 
Right now, the extra $500 for the second 2.8GHz CPU, while not a steal, is still a darn decent value. When you consider what the heatsink alone will cost you from Apple, it's likely cheaper to get it now, plus you have the advantage of both being under warranty.

Also, I've seen some dual-Xeon servers get a bit...finicky...if the CPUs are not of the same stepping, so that is another advantage of getting both at purchase - they're either going to be the same stepping or if they are not and you do have problems because of it, you're under warranty.
 
The quad should do you well until you'll be wanting a new computer anyway. I'll add another processor to mine down the road of course, but that's really just to see if it works. I'm hard pressed to notice a slow down, even if I run a whole bunch of "yes > /dev/null"s at the same time. One thing I have noticed though is that my room is noticeably warmer than the rest of the house, but that tends to happen with hot components.
 
go single Quad all the way, as in many threads before the second processor isn't used 90% of the cases, and because its quad core it will be enough for multi core applications.
 
For what you want quad is more than enough.
Hell. Just right now I am using Vue 6 to render a little scene. it's a pro app used by studios like Disney... And it still uses only 2 cores so I got 2 free to listen to music and browse internet.

These days 8 Cores is - 1. bragging rights 2. Really some serious multi app work/rendering.

Not worth $500 considering that in at least 95% of the cases you will never use it. Put that $500 into new software or memory or whatever will make your work easier.
 
vder said:
For those went single quad what video card did you buy ?
Click to expand...
My single quad-core runs incredibly cool, 26C idle, and never goes above 34C even under full load.

I am a photoshop guy, so 2600XT i good enough for me, if you are a gamer, go for the 8800GT instead.
 
a single quad cpu is more than enough for anything you are prolly tyring to do. a dual core is plenty fast enough, a quad is what u call high end. having dual quads would be tight but i dont think its worth the extra cash
 
do not get any of the dual or triple or quad vid card set ups. either get one low end card or get the 8800GT
 
Are there any benchmarks comparing:

1. Current Gen (single cpu) quad core system at 2.8 Ghz

to a

2. Previous Gen Stock (dual cpu) quad core system running at 2.66 Ghz

I would be very interested to see the results.
 
I think the one bit of information missing here is how long you expect to use this computer before upgrading. If you're one of those who upgrades after 2 or 3 years, then the single quadcore should be plenty. If you are planning on using it for 5 or more years, then I would suggest that the dual quadcore would be worth it. Right now, not many apps can take advantage of eight cores, but that will change over the next few years.
 
I am getting a single cpu quad 2.8 with in a month or 2. One of the reasons is the power consumption.

The dual dual core quad (2x2.66) last gen has 2 65watt chips in it. The single quad is an 80 watt chip. So the dual quads is 160 watts just for the cpus, and the dual dual is 130 watts. The single quad seems to be the best bang for you power since it will use less power then the dual duals and be a faster system.
 
mchalebk said:
I think the one bit of information missing here is how long you expect to use this computer before upgrading. If you're one of those who upgrades after 2 or 3 years, then the single quadcore should be plenty. If you are planning on using it for 5 or more years, then I would suggest that the dual quadcore would be worth it. Right now, not many apps can take advantage of eight cores, but that will change over the next few years.
Click to expand...
I am in the same situation and was wondering if in 3 years when a pro app requires 3 Ghz would dual 2.8 be able to handle it. Basically I am wondering if the dual 2.8 Ghz setup would equal equal a single 5.6 ghz setup. I plan on keeping this computer till it dies but I will probably get an upgrade before the macpro dies and use it as a secondary computer. So I will get about 5-7 years of primary use. If $500 helps the power that much I will probably hold off longer to get the money.
 
K3mp said:
I am in the same situation and was wondering if in 3 years when a pro app requires 3 Ghz would dual 2.8 be able to handle it. Basically I am wondering if the dual 2.8 Ghz setup would equal equal a single 5.6 ghz setup. I plan on keeping this computer till it dies but I will probably get an upgrade before the macpro dies and use it as a secondary computer. So I will get about 5-7 years of primary use. If $500 helps the power that much I will probably hold off longer to get the money.
Click to expand...

No, it doesn't work like that. No process will operate faster then the 2.8ghrz on any of the cores. The benefits are multi-threaded applications can use multiple cores at once to cut down computing time and single threaded apps can have dedicated cores.

I wouldn't worry about the 3ghrz barrier, chances are by the time you need something faster you'll want a new mac pro anyways.
 
It will be many years before a 2.8 GHz multi-core system will be insufficient for anything. I'm still using a dual 800 MHz G4 Quicksilver. It wasn't until I couldn't load the latest version of iMovie (Intel processor required) last year that there was anything I wasn't able to load and run on it. It wasn't until Leopard was released that I started thinking about upgrading (since my computer isn't officially supported).

So, no, you won't have to worry about 2.8 GHz not being fast enough for a very long time. However, in a few years, many more apps will be able to take advantage of more than four cores. In my opinion, if you plan to keep the computer for more than 3 or 4 years, it's probably worth it to get the 8-core system. If you upgrade every 2 or 3 years, the 4-core system is probably fine.
 
zmttoxics said:
I wouldn't worry about the 3ghrz barrier, chances are by the time you need something faster you'll want a new mac pro anyways.
Click to expand...

I am not worried about the 3 Ghz barrier I was just using something just over 2.8 as an example. I just wanted to clear something up. $500 is still a good deal.
 
K3mp said:
I am not worried about the 3 Ghz barrier I was just using something just over 2.8 as an example. I just wanted to clear something up. $500 is still a good deal.
Click to expand...

It's not if you never use it. Trust me, the only thing you need an octo core for is making 8-hour rendering chores finish in 4 hours. If you're not doing that, you'll never notice the difference.

Programming for multi-core is really, really hard, and unless the task is embarrassingly parallel it probably won't ever hit the other cores much at all.

Barefeats benchmarks say the single quad-core is as fast as the first dual-cpu dual-core Mac Pro 3.0ghz.
 
There is no 3ghz barrier. For example if you had an application that needed over 1.7ghz, well the old athlons (I had a 1.3ghz Athlon) totally owned a 1.7ghz P4, and an 867mhz G4 beat it as well IIRC. And as schnee said, the previous 3ghz quad core Mac Pro is as fast as the current 2.8ghz quad core.

And a Pentium Dual Core E2140 at 1.6ghz, is just as fast as a 3ghz Pentium D, so you see there is no specific barrier.
 
Multitasking is also great for multiple cpus. OSX automatically gives each application its own cpu to hog while the others hog their own (Unless you are running a multithreaded program).
 
badcrc32 said:
I am a computer professional....Just not sure its worth the $500.00 for me....:apple:
Click to expand...

If your _professional_ life depends on a Mac (or its productivity), I wouldn't hesitate a second... Even if you'll be able to spare 10-20% of your time thanks to a more powerful machine, it's a huge gain. More free time, an ability to accomplish more orders etc.

BTW, you still can order 2x CPU system, work on it for a few days in order to assess if it's worth it, and if not -- you'll have 14 days to return it to Apple.

sash
 
I was doubting just like the TS is doing now. Yesterday I ordered my MacPro single 2.8 Xeon with a 30" Cinema Display. To replace the 2nd cpu I added 4gb ram extra.

Reasons for Single CPU vs Dual CPU:
- The 2nd cpu provides only 2% performance increase
- More memory is better than a second cpu
- Braggin' rights about a 2nd cpu don't justify $500 :D
 
schnee said:
the only thing you need an octo core for is making 8-hour rendering chores finish in 4 hours. If you're not doing that, you'll never notice the difference.

Programming for multi-core is really, really hard, and unless the task is embarrassingly parallel it probably won't ever hit the other cores much at all.
Click to expand...

That's true today and will probably be true a year from now. However, it will not be true in a few years. That's why I feel it's important to understand how long someone plans to use their computer before giving them advice on this matter.

When I buy my MacPro, I plan to use it for at least six years, maybe longer. In my case it makes sense to buy the 8-core system. If someone upgrades their computer every two or three years, the 8-core probably doesn't make sense unless they are doing specialized tasks that can take advantage of eight cores (like video rendering).
 
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