Mac Pro: Processors

[sqparnell]

I currently have a Mac Pro 2,1 with 2x 3 GHx Quad-Core Intel Xeon processors. I am currently looking at buying a newer, used Mac Pro.

Would buying a newer processor at lower speeds be a downgrade? Like would 5,1 dual Quad-Core"Gulftown" 2.4 GHz be noticeably slower than the old dual Quad-Core 3Ghz "Woodcrest" processors? Or what about even the "new" single processor 3.33GHz 6-Core Intel Xeon processor? I know cache, bus, memory performance, etc is improved with the newer models - so does all that equal a better machine?

I do video editing and use Premiere and AFX CS6, am looking to get a new machine with lots of RAM and a nice NVidia CUDA card. And maybe I am naive, but I am thinking that processor speeds in this case would mainly be seen during renders and exports, not necessarily live working in the project. Correct me if I am wrong!

Thanks!
sam

 

[derbothaus]

http://macperformanceguide.com/index_topics.html

 

[violst]

It really depends on what tasks you will be using it for?

The 6 core 3.33GHz Westmere processor has turbo boost and hyperthreading.
The 2,1 xeon you currently are using has neither. So you will see a nice step up in speed for both single processor tasks because of its base 3.33GHz turbo boosting to 3.6GHZ under load as well as multicore tasks because it hyperthreads to 12 cores.

If you do a lot of multicore tasks the 2.4GHz 8 core Westmere which turbo boost to 2.66GHz will give you 16 cores, 8 physical and 8 virtual cores but it will be slower with single processor tasks.

I think the geek bench marks for both the 6 core 3.33 and the 8 core 2.4 are very close.

I hope this helps.