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That's fair enough In all honesty I don't see a huge difference between 2.66 ghz and 3.25 so I wouldn't worry. 8 Cores is always greater than 4. That's where you'll notice the difference

That's not true, not many apps are optimized for more than two cores. 4 cores with a higher clock speed will give you better performance for things other than very specific uses (Video encoding)
 
That's not true, not many apps are optimized for more than two cores. 4 cores with a higher clock speed will give you better performance for things other than very specific uses (Video encoding)

Well Handbrake is a big part of what I use this machine for so I will definitely see better encoding times. Average use though I don't know if I will be able to tell the difference between 2.33 and 2.66.
 
That's not true, not many apps are optimized for more than two cores. 4 cores with a higher clock speed will give you better performance for things other than very specific uses (Video encoding)

I was talking about good mult threaded programs like Handbrake, in those cases going from 2 ghz to 4ghz on Quads doesn't compare to going from 2ghz quad to 2 ghz octo.
 
Well Handbrake is a big part of what I use this machine for so I will definitely see better encoding times. Average use though I don't know if I will be able to tell the difference between 2.33 and 2.66.
Going from 4x2.66GHz to 8x2.33GHz? Yes, you'll see a difference for sure.
 
I bought a Mac Pro 1,1 a year and a half ago before really researching it and was really disappointed with the lack of upgradability.

Reaslitically the upgrades you are going to want to do are hard drives, video cards and ram.

Hard drives are fine, SATA is SATA and you won't have any issues upgrading these.

Video cards are another story, because the original mac pro uses a 32-bit EFI the newer Nvidia graphics cards aren't supported. Although you can use the current ATI cards apple sells.

RAM can be upgraded up to 32 GB. I would recommend OWC for Mac RAM but people also like Crucial. RAM can be much more expensive for the Mac Pro if you buy the recommended ECC ram. My main issue with the RAM in the Mac Pro 1,1 is that it's 667 mHz.

Apple could easily update the EFI32 to EFI64 but being Apple they won't.

Well...It seems that all generations of Mac Pros could support up to 64GB of RAM.
 
Did they give a reason why? Offhand I'm fairly sure that the 1,1 Mac Pro can use 8 GB FB-DIMMs.
 
All I know is this:

4 years ago I jumped at the chance to blow my summer earnings on a Mac Pro 1,1 right before I started art school to get my BFA in Ad/Graph.

4 years later I'm the only student I know of that is still using the same machine. Everyone, I mean everyone, has recycled their mbp's and mb's and imacs. It's not even funny, I've seen them fail and drop like flies.

My only problem has been my x1900 dying on me and a recent upgrade to Radeon 4870 HD. $300. In 4 years, as a student, being able to run all the adobe suite, final cut pro, flash etc... for about $3000 initial investment... that's a signifigant value over the course of my college life.

But then again mac users shouldn't care about money, should they? ;-)
 
Got my E5345's and installed them today. Pretty hassle free following the Anandtech guide. Had to figure out the long 3mm hex. I found a 3mm hex bit, cut a slot in the base with my dremel and then inserted a long slot head screwdriver and duct taped them tgether. Worked ike a charm. Duct tape... not just for ducts anymore :rolleyes:

Handbrake is much faster now. With the quad core I would take about 35 minutes for an average movie with 70% quality. I just encoded "Oceans" in a little over 15 minutes. Definitely going to be saving me a lot of time.

Can't really notice if there is a difference in menial tasks in the OS so far by dropping from 2.66GHz to 2.33GHz. That is going to depend on how well Snow Leopard and my Parallels/Windows7 applications make use of the cores.
 
Got my E5345's and installed them today. Pretty hassle free following the Anandtech guide. Had to figure out the long 3mm hex. I found a 3mm hex bit, cut a slot in the base with my dremel and then inserted a long slot head screwdriver and duct taped them tgether. Worked ike a charm. Duct tape... not just for ducts anymore :rolleyes:

Handbrake is much faster now. With the quad core I would take about 35 minutes for an average movie with 70% quality. I just encoded "Oceans" in a little over 15 minutes. Definitely going to be saving me a lot of time.

Can't really notice if there is a difference in menial tasks in the OS so far by dropping from 2.66GHz to 2.33GHz. That is going to depend on how well Snow Leopard and my Parallels/Windows7 applications make use of the cores.

If you don't mind me asking, what did you pay for your E5345?
 
If you don't mind me asking, what did you pay for your E5345?

I got a pair of them for $280 free shipping off eBay. I just saved a search in eBay for "e5345 xeon" and waited about 1 week. There are all the usual cast of characters trying to sell them for $300 a pop but the deals come up regularly.

I never saw any deals on the e5355 however. They seem to stay above the 300 to 400 mark for each CPU. Not willing to spend more than double for 330 MHz.
 
I got a pair of them for $280 free shipping off eBay. I just saved a search in eBay for "e5345 xeon" and waited about 1 week. There are all the usual cast of characters trying to sell them for $300 a pop but the deals come up regularly.

I never saw any deals on the e5355 however. They seem to stay above the 300 to 400 mark for each CPU. Not willing to spend more than double for 330 MHz.

I bought two E5320 CPUs. I am going to pin mod then to run at 2.33 and then I will run the bus at 366 using ZDNet Clock. 400 causes kernal panics (RAM can not handle it). I am wondering if it would have been a good idea to try 800 MHz ram (some folks say that it works).

Using smcFanControl I find that I can keep my over clocked temps lower than stock temps.

Right now my dual 5150s are clocked at 2.9 GHz and with fans at 1500 rpm I have temps in the low 20 to mid 30 Celsius. Even my RAM is cool!
 
I bought two E5320 CPUs. I am going to pin mod then to run at 2.33 and then I will run the bus at 366 using ZDNet Clock. 400 causes kernal panics (RAM can not handle it). I am wondering if it would have been a good idea to try 800 MHz ram (some folks say that it works).

Using smcFanControl I find that I can keep my over clocked temps lower than stock temps.

Right now my dual 5150s are clocked at 2.9 GHz and with fans at 1500 rpm I have temps in the low 20 to mid 30 Celsius. Even my RAM is cool!

What are the side effects of running ZDNet Clock tool? I read that it messes up the system clock because Apple chose to get their time info from the FSB (odd choice). I also heard that system reboots are an issue. Have you seen any of this? Any workarounds?
 
What are the side effects of running ZDNet Clock tool? I read that it messes up the system clock because Apple chose to get their time info from the FSB (odd choice). I also heard that system reboots are an issue. Have you seen any of this? Any workarounds?

No crashes, but my clock was off earlier today (I was wondering how that happened).

I got my hands on 8 GB or 800MHz FB-DIMMs with normal heat spreaders. They work. Like most ram, their EPROM's (or whatever) are programed with several speed settings. These show up as 667 but I know they are rated for 800. I'll try the bus at 400 later.

I am using smcFanControl to keep the ram temps below 50 Celsius. Once I verify them with MemTest I'll take the heatsinks off my 512 MB modules and put them on the 2 GB modules.

When the 8 GB I ordered arrives I'll have 12 GB that cost me $220. I splurged a bit.

My tally looks like $1340 for an Mac Pro with 8 Cores, 12 GB RAM, 2.25 TB HDD and a 5770. Its no dual Hexacore monster but its not bad either!

Plus I keep a bunch of retro gear out of a landfill. :D
 
That's an excellent price for what you have built. I am about $300 more than that but 16gb of 667 ram.

I tried Zdnet clock and it seems to be stable at 380fsb which gives me a 2.66ghz clock. Ran a few hand break runs and improvement is pretty much linear with the clock change (14%). A file that took 390s took 345s (11.5%).

System seems stable. Been running CPU test on 8 cores for last 2 hours and not a single parity error. Cores are in the high 30's with fans at 1500rpm. However the 2 ram temp monitors labelled memory module a2 and b2 are at 77c and 81c respectively. I have never paid attention to what those run at normal clocks. Are those the memory temps you are monitoring?
 
Yes those are the memory temps I watch. The actual temps on the DIMMs. With my CPU fan at 2000 my RAM is 55 Celcius. On Default fan speed I see them in the 65-75 range most of the time.

I have 4 instances of Ripit compressing DVDs right now. Every time a Rip completes, I start a new instance to Rip a disc while the other instances are compressing. LOL

I had a lot of fun with 7600, 8600 and 9600 PowerMacs about ten years ago, then I switched to goofing around with old Sawtooth G4s. Now I have this.

It says a lot about Apple computers that after a lifetime of work, they can become more fun than ever.

They truly are engineering marvels.
 
Pardon if this is not best appropriate place to post this question,,, when comparing the 1,1 version to the others, would it make more sense for a person to acquire at least a 3,1 model, so that at least the (for example) EFI would be 64 instead of 'only' 32 - esp. for future proofing (as much as possible when buying an older model)? With that said, I'm looking at a 4,1 model... unless there are issues with that path?
 
Pardon if this is not best appropriate place to post this question,,, when comparing the 1,1 version to the others, would it make more sense for a person to acquire at least a 3,1 model, so that at least the (for example) EFI would be 64 instead of 'only' 32 - esp. for future proofing (as much as possible when buying an older model)? With that said, I'm looking at a 4,1 model... unless there are issues with that path?

I would say that unless you are getting a really, really good deal you should buy a refurb from apple or watch for deals at macmall (new i7 Xeon recently for $1800) et all.

By going with old stuff I saved about $1400 (refurb + extra RAM and HDD). To me that is worthwhile, but I don't use this PC to derive my livelihood.
 
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That's an excellent price for what you have built. I am about $300 more than that but 16gb of 667 ram.

I tried Zdnet clock and it seems to be stable at 380fsb which gives me a 2.66ghz clock. Ran a few hand break runs and improvement is pretty much linear with the clock change (14%). A file that took 390s took 345s (11.5%).

System seems stable. Been running CPU test on 8 cores for last 2 hours and not a single parity error. Cores are in the high 30's with fans at 1500rpm. However the 2 ram temp monitors labelled memory module a2 and b2 are at 77c and 81c respectively. I have never paid attention to what those run at normal clocks. Are those the memory temps you are monitoring?

Dadioh, sorry nothing to do with this thread, but could you please PM me at 'de-spam' + '@blueyonder.co.uk' regarding an old thread that you started back in the summer - I would like to ask you a quick question - thanks bobtib
 
So the E5345's seem rock solid even overclocked to 2.66GHz.

I guess I may as well sell off the E5150's to recoup some of my cost. Does Macrumors have a forsale section? I don't see one.
 
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