Done it! - Nehalem W5590 Octad 3,33 GHz

[gugucom]

I closed a deal with a supplier of a pair of W5590 engineering samples which are tweaked for overclocking beyond 3,33 GHz. The price is roughly half of the official price for W5590s. It is my intention to purchase a 2,26 GHz Nehalem Mac Pro and upgrade.

I will be sharing the experience of this project in this thread. For now I have been told that there is one more pair of CPUs available. The seller isn't prepared to disclose his name but I can pass your email address to him if you PM it to me.

[alphaod]

Half the price of one 5590? That would make it $800 each? Very tempting.

Are these samples lidded or not?

[novagamer]

ES CPUs often have undocumented Errata... I would stay away even at that price. There are plenty of threads about stability and ES CPUs on more tweaker-oriented sites such as XtremeSystems.org, etc.

For an Overclocker's PC I wouldn't think twice but in a workstation stability is paramount. Just my 2 cents.

[Pressure]

ES CPUs often have undocumented Errata... I would stay away even at that price. There are plenty of threads about stability and ES CPUs on more tweaker-oriented sites such as XtremeSystems.org, etc.

For an Overclocker's PC I wouldn't think twice but in a workstation stability is paramount. Just my 2 cents.

I fully agree with this.

[gugucom]

Half the price of one 5590? That would make it $800 each? Very tempting.

Are these samples lidded or not?

No such feature has been named which leads me to believe they are standard IHS. But that isn't a disadvantage.

The seller claims that the chips have been thoroughly tested and work like the series production version. I'm in Europe and have to pay in €*what Americans pay in $$ so ES is an advantage particularly as the customs cannot find them in a price list. :cool: On top I will have a PayPal claim if I receive bad merchandise. So a little risk can be justified in my view. But hey I'm only speaking for myself. YMMV

[AppleWorking]

ES CPUs often have undocumented Errata... I would stay away even at that price. There are plenty of threads about stability and ES CPUs on more tweaker-oriented sites such as XtremeSystems.org, etc.

For an Overclocker's PC I wouldn't think twice but in a workstation stability is paramount. Just my 2 cents.I agree with you, and for me it also would not be worth it at any price, unless I was not using my MP for work... But I do sympathize with gugucom, he's not from the states and paying our retail... Tough choice. Good luck gugucom, I'll be following this thread closely and supporting your efforts. :)

[nanofrog]

No such feature has been named which leads me to believe they are standard IHS. But that isn't a disadvantage.
All the photos of ES Nehalems I saw did have an IHS on them.

Some might consider the need for a thermally conductive filler material a disadvantage. I don't, and you don't seem panicked over it either. ;) Necessary for the project, and well worth doing IMO. :D

The seller claims that the chips have been thoroughly tested and work like the series production version. I'm in Europe and have to pay in €*what Americans pay in $$ so ES is an advantage particularly as the customs cannot find them in a price list. :cool: On top I will have a PayPal claim if I receive bad merchandise. So a little risk can be justified in my view. But hey I'm only speaking for myself. YMMV
Rather slick. :D Good luck on it. Hopefully, the ES variants will behave nicely. ;)

I'll keep my fingers crossed. :)

[darb10]

I'll be curious to know the outcome of this as I was about to buy a couple of these processors myself (but retail, not ES). Problem is, I had been reading that they do not have the turbo-boost feature in them, according to people who had talked to Intel about it. So I contact Intel myself and received the following reply:


Thank you for contacting Intel Customer Support.

I understand you need some information on the Intel(R) Xeon(R) processor W5590.

This processor supports Intel(R) Virtualization Technology; however, it does not support the Intel(R) Turbo Boost Technology.

Please confirm this information at: http://ark.intel.com/Product.aspx?id=41643&code=Intel%C2%AE+Xeon%C2%AE+Processor+W5590+%288M+Cache%2c+3.33+GHz%2c+6.40+GT%2fs+Intel%C2%AE+QPI%2 9


I still don't know for sure about hyperthreading either. This kind of makes sense seeing as how the cost per 1000 is the same for both the 5580 and 5590. ie: The 5590 might sacrifice something.

I've started thinking that the w5580's might be the way to go, since while rendering videos they may be able to work a little faster - temperature permitting - using the turbo boost.

[gugucom]

Turbo boost is nothing but using the TDP of a CPU to take a single core to the range ceiling of 3,33GHz. Obviously a 2,26 GHz CPU profits more from it than a 2,66 GHz. And at the top of the range a 3,33 GHz unit has no head room for turbo boost. But then it doesn't need it because all four cores will run full speed.

A good read is:

http://www.anandtech.com/mac/showdoc.aspx?i=3597&p=1

I will insert some quotes and references from other threads in order to have them handy here.

No need to make a shim. Simply use adhesive thermal conductive pads. Something like this: http://www.tglobal.com.tw/en/l37-5.php


Isn't it just the opposite? The current ones have no IHS and the ones he'll be adding have them. So he'll be dealing with a thicker part - not a thinner one that needs gap filling. Right? Or did I misunderstand?

I think he's talking about the regulators that surround the CPU. When the CPU is thicker the heat-sink no longer touches them - if indeed it ever did in the 1st place. There was some discussion about this a I recommended a thermal pad. The OP at that time thought it was a great idea and all but I have some questions as to whether or not it's actually needed.

Here: http://forums.macrumors.com/showthread.php?t=738826


The info is right, as is your evaluation. :) On the OEM parts Apple's using, the naked CPU and VR's are the same height, and make contact with the copper surface of the heat sink.

Commodity W55xx/W35xx/17-9xx parts have the IHS, and will end up breaking contact with the heat sink and VR's. Using the mechanical drawing Intel provides, the gap will be 1.845 - 1.895 mm. in height that has to be filled.

If you know of a good product that can do the job, it might be helpful. :) The GapPad material I linked has good thermal conductivity, is electrically non conductive, and comes in thicknesses that can do the job without the need for multiple layers of it.

As a price example, I found the 1500 series, in a 4" x 4" sheet, 3.18 mm thick (1.5 W/m-K) @ $20.30USD from DigiKey (here (http://search.digikey.com/scripts/DkSearch/dksus.dll?Detail&name=BER165-ND)). It could be used, but personally, going through this much hassle, and not sure how hot the VR's are getting (only estimated), I was thinking a better thermal conductivity was in order, and was thinking more along the lines of the 2500 series material. ;)

My current work centers around finding a 2,26 GHz Octad Nehalem at a decent price. New rigs cost 3000€ in Germany and I will try to get a refurbished or used at 2500€ max. At present Apple store show no stock but I will regularly check and sift through ebay.

[nanofrog]

My current work centers around finding a 2,26 GHz Octad Nehalem at a decent price. New rigs cost 3000€ in Germany and I will try to get a refurbished or used at 2500€ max. At present Apple store show no stock but I will regularly check and sift through ebay.
I'd go for a refurb as well, if it were me. ;) Less expensive, and it still carries a full manufacturer warranty on the system. :)

[frimple]

I'd go for a refurb as well, if it were me. ;) Less expensive, and it still carries a full manufacturer warranty on the system. :)

Not that the warranty will matter after the new CPUs are popped in. Though I suppose if you kept the old 2.26's in storage and popped them back in to take it in for service you'd be golden. :)

I'd take you up on this deal but I just found myself the proud owner of 3 w5580's :D. Now I need to unload one of those suckers and find myself a refurb 09 2.26

[alphaod]

This definitely tempting me, but I don't think I need them considering the 2.66 is currently fine with me. If I had the 2.26 model I would have definitely gone for it.

[Abidubi]

Turbo boost is nothing but using the TDP of a CPU to take a single core to the range ceiling of 3,33GHz. Obviously a 2,26 GHz CPU profits more from it than a 2,66 GHz. And at the top of the range a 3,33 GHz unit has no head room for turbo boost. But then it doesn't need it because all four cores will run full speed.

Are you sure about that? The W3580s have turbo boost. If turbo boost does not take a single core past 3.33Ghz why would they have it on the 3.33Ghz processor?

[gugucom]

Are you sure about that? The W3580s have turbo boost. If turbo boost does not take a single core past 3.33Ghz why would they have it on the 3.33Ghz processor?

W5580 runs 3,2 GHz. W5590 runs 3,33 GHz. Actually I don't know the exact turbo boost steps of each 55xx CPU but you could read that in Anand's write up. http://www.anandtech.com/mac/showdoc.aspx?i=3597&p=1

[Abidubi]

W5580 runs 3,2 GHz. W5590 runs 3,33 GHz. Actually I don't know the exact turbo boost steps of each 55xx CPU but you could read that in Anand's write up. http://www.anandtech.com/mac/showdoc.aspx?i=3597&p=1

But I was talking about the W3580, which does run at 3.3Ghz and does have turbo... vs the W5590 which also runs at 3.33Ghz but does not have turbo.

[darb10]

I'm also still wondering about the W5590's ability to hyperthread. Although I've seen some sites claim it has it, Intel's website doesn't say, and oddly all the tests I've found just say hyper-threading disabled. In addition, the Geekbench results for people who have put the W5590 in Mac Pro's all show 8-core instead of the usual 16, which makes me question hyperthreading capability (never mind that they had abysmal results considering their cpu's).

For those interested and don't know, the turbo boost steps for the higher end chips are:

W5590 (3.33GHz):
n/a
W3580 (3.33GHz single processor version):
133 MHz for 4, 3 and 2 cores, and 266 MHz for 1 core.
W5580 (3.2GHxz):
133 MHz for 4, 3 and 2 cores, and 266 MHz for 1 core
X5570 (2.93GHz):
266 MHz for 4 and 3 cores, and 400 MHz for 1 or 2 cores.

[gugucom]

Hyper threading is a product feature of the 55xx chip architecture. How can it be not applicable to the W5590. It would be absurd.

Edit: I looked up the Intel spec sheet and they simply do not make an entry for HT. It looks strange I agree, but it could be a clerical mistake. When you do a direct spec comparison between the W5580 and W5590 you see that many other items are left out for the W5590 as well. Among them are 64-bit architecture. I think that HT is most probably available on this CPU.

I found that they exclude HT on some lower 55xx products. So my above comment was wrong. Sorry for being over confident.

[gugucom]

But I was talking about the W3580, which does run at 3.3Ghz and does have turbo... vs the W5590 which also runs at 3.33Ghz but does not have turbo.

The 3580 is a single socket CPU where the 5590 is dual socket. It could be possible that they disabled turbo to limit the power ceiling in line with some chipset conventions. Like limiting power to total 260 W TDP. It would not be applicable to the W3580 because it is well inside that spec.

[darb10]

Hyper threading is a product feature of the 55xx chip architecture. How can it be not applicable to the W5590. It would be absurd.


I completely agree with you. This comes across as being their top of the line chip and so one would assume hyperthreading should be there. However I just received a response back from Intel from my inquiry to clarify hyperthreading support:


Thank you for contacting Intel Customer Support.

At the previous link, it says: “Advanced Technologies”, there you can confirm this processor only supports Intel(R) Virtualization Technology and Enhanced Intel SpeedStep(R) Technology (EIST)

Again, the only features supported are Enhanced Intel SpeedStep(R) Technology (EIST) and Intel(R) Virtualization Technology.


That's from Intel's tech department. The "previous link" they refer to is from an earlier email about TB which I posted earlier in the thread. http://ark.intel.com/Product.aspx?id=41643&code=Intel%C2%AE+Xeon%C2%AE+Processor+W5590+%288M+Cache%2c+3.33+GHz%2c+6.40+GT%2fs+Intel%C2%AE+QPI%2 9. Again, omitting some features might explain why the pricing is the same as the model below it.

I have suspicions however that some preproduction models had all features unlocked. I'll be interested to see if the chips you scored are fully unlocked! :)

[AppleWorking]

Hyper threading is a product feature of the 55xx chip architecture. How can it be not applicable to the W5590. It would be absurd.

Edit: I looked up the Intel spec sheet and they simply do not make an entry for HT. It looks strange I agree, but it could be a clerical mistake. When you do a direct spec comparison between the W5580 and W5590 you see that many other items are left out for the W5590 as well. Among them are 64-bit architecture. I think that HT is most probably available on this CPU.

I found that they exclude HT on some lower 55xx products. So my above comment was wrong. Sorry for being over confident.

The specs on Intel's site are often wrong. Take a look at this site. No TB, but it does support HT.

http://www.cpu-world.com/CPUs/Xeon/Intel-Xeon%20W5590%20-%20AT80602000753AA%20%28BX80602W5590%29.html

[gugucom]

Just to keep you up to date. My W5590 CPUs arrived by FedEx today and I got away with moderate import bleeding.

The Chips are Q1QW ES and the seller told me they are D0 stepping which is identical with the final HW code.

The MacPro4,1 is still in Apple Nirvana. They wrote me an email that my credit card got blocked today. The bank said its routine to do so in cases of high values being cashed in from abroad (Apple apparently collect all payments in the UK). So it looks like no joy for the next 2-3 days.

I will go and get the thermal pads.

[gugucom]

My refurbushed Mac Pro is purchased from Apple Germany. It is payed to Apple UK. It is shipped by Apple Holland (NL). Here is the UPS record of my Mac's transport. Last evening 22:15 it arrived in Germany.

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

HERNE-BOERNIG, DE 22.09.2009 22:15 ANKUNFTSSCAN
EINDHOVEN, BEST, NL 22.09.2009 20:15 ABFAHRTSSCAN
22.09.2009 17:42 HERKUNFTSSCAN NL
22.09.2009 12:07 RECHNUNGSINFORMATIONEN

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

:):D:):D:)

BTW, does anybody have a service manual for the Nehalems? Please PM me!

[AppleWorking]

Last evening 22:15 it arrived in Germany.

:):D:):D:):D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:cool:;)

BTW, does anybody have a service manual for the Nehalems? Please PM me!I would appreciate this also, please. :)

[yanquis]

good luck! this sounds like a great project. id join you in it myself if i had the cash to burn right now + knowledge about replacing CPUs etc.

[gugucom]

Some bad news for now.

The 2,26 Nehalem Mac Pro arrived and I managed to get thermal pads although it was an odyssee. The Octoberfest is on full song and getting into the red light district (where all the electronics shops are) is a PITA. Traffic is a killer. None of the shops had the material and after 2h of chaos I visited a trusted Apple AASP who came up with some blue stuff of 1 mm thickness after searching all his junk drawers and card board boxes.

I carefully disassembled the CPU and RAM daughter board and took off the two heat sinks. Unscrewing works much like working on an engine cylinder block. You best approach it with the diagonal technique. I started with sink A and released all four 3 mm hex screws. I then lifted the heat sink with the cpu attached out of the socket. It is essential not to drop it back in when you have started to pull it from the socket because that is probably how Anand managed to screw his socket. Remember the sockets have no clamps!!! :eek: scary think to design!:rolleyes:

CPU B looked slightly out of angle when I took it of the heat sink. The removal must have been not quite ideal. Apple was perfect with thermal grease application I must say. A very nice pattern.

I fitted the W5590s and increased the thickness of the thermal padding at the rim of the heat sink where the little voltage regulators are contacted by the padding. I cleaned the heat sinks to mirror finish and oh so carefully mounted them back on the sockets using again diagonal tightening technique.

After carefully re assembling the CPU/RAM board I switched power back on and got a white light but no gong sound came to tell me the CPUs had posted and were booting OS X.

I have taken the CPU A out again and re seated it but it looked perfect as the socket looked perfectly ok.

I tested again without joy and I will take out the CPU B to check for damage. If this CPU is also ok I may put the X5520s back in. For now I'm badly frustrated because this project got me very excited.

For the moment I see only two possible options. I got bad CPU from my seller or Apple have enabled the Nehalems only up to W5580 as Tutor used those with success.

If someone has a good idea what could have went wrong please let me know!!!

I will come back and make further reports as the action continues.

[frimple]

For the moment I see only two possible options. I got bad CPU from my seller or Apple have enabled the Nehalems only up to W5580 as Tutor used those with success.

Do you have a dual socket 1366 motherboard to test them on? I grabbed one off the 'egg when I got my 2 w5580's to make sure they work.

Have you put the original CPU's back in to make sure it still boots?

[gugucom]

Do you have a dual socket 1366 motherboard to test them on? I grabbed one off the 'egg when I got my 2 w5580's to make sure they work.

Have you put the original CPU's back in to make sure it still boots?

You were getting ahead of me there. Yes, by now I have put the X5520s back in and they boot very quickly. I had also inspected socket B for any damage and found none. I'm glad I made no mistake and my exchange technique is obviously flawless.

My frustration is growing and at the moment I have no clue what to do. I do not have another board to test the CPUs. So I'm still stuck with my two possible causes for the failure to POST. I'm improving my procedures of fitting those heat sinks back on. I can now actually feel when the connector inserts into the oval socket that hooks up all the instrumentation (thermal sensors, fans) with the board. I did not consciously realize that when I was doing it the first time. Probably too much adrenalin. ;)

[alphaod]

You were getting ahead of me there. Yes, by now I have put the X5520s back in and they boot very quickly. I had also inspected socket B for any damage and found none. I'm glad I made no mistake and my exchange technique is obviously flawless.

My frustration is growing and at the moment I have no clue what to do. I do not have another board to test the CPUs. So I'm still stuck with my two possible causes for the failure to POST. I'm improving my procedures of fitting those heat sinks back on. I can now actually feel when the connector inserts into the oval socket that hooks up all the instrumentation (thermal sensors, fans) with the board. I did not consciously realize that when I was doing it the first time. Probably too much adrenalin. ;)

Keep us updated. :)

Once it all works out, I might be interested in those 2 Quads you won't be needing.

[frimple]

You were getting ahead of me there. Yes, by now I have put the X5520s back in and they boot very quickly. I had also inspected socket B for any damage and found none. I'm glad I made no mistake and my exchange technique is obviously flawless.

My frustration is growing and at the moment I have no clue what to do. I do not have another board to test the CPUs. So I'm still stuck with my two possible causes for the failure to POST. I'm improving my procedures of fitting those heat sinks back on. I can now actually feel when the connector inserts into the oval socket that hooks up all the instrumentation (thermal sensors, fans) with the board. I did not consciously realize that when I was doing it the first time. Probably too much adrenalin. ;)

Yep, you're going to need another motherboard with a 1366 socket to test them individually. Hopefully you'll find you just got a bad processor and can return it. It would be terrible to find out that for some reason you can't use 5590's in the mac pro. I can't think of a reason why that would be though.

[gugucom]

Keep us updated. :)

Once it all works out, I might be interested in those 2 Quads you won't be needing.

NP, but for now I'm much in need of good advise what to do in this situation.

[AppleWorking]

The way I see it, until you can test the CPUs you won't know which way to proceed.

If the CPUs test okay, then it is either incompatibility or the fact that the chips are ES. If I was a betting man, I would guess the CPUs do work but because they are ES this is what is causing the failure.

Sorry to hear about your troubles, I really wanted your project to work out for you after all of the problems you've had...

Hang in there, though, I know you'll work out something, it'll just take a little more time and effort...

[alphaod]

It is possible the W5590s require the motherboard firmware to be update to support it; At the time of the Mac Pro's release, the W5580s were an option, so their compatibility was built in. I think the only option you really have is to test the processors in another board since there isn't really another way to test them.

[frimple]

It is possible the W5590s require the motherboard firmware to be update to support it; At the time of the Mac Pro's release, the W5580s were an option, so their compatibility was built in. I think the only option you really have is to test the processors in another board since there isn't really another way to test them.

Haven't there been successful w5590 transplants into quads? Maybe they've just all been i7's...

[gugucom]

... I think the only option you really have is to test the processors in another board since there isn't really another way to test them.

This makes sense to me.

I guess I have one more thing to check before I go into that adventure though. Anand reported that he had to tighten the screws considerably when he did his upgrade.

I may fit the W5590s once more and this time leave out the heat pads. They may be keeping the sensors from making contact in the connectors. Obviously with the lids on the heat sink is located 1,8 mm higher up and the contact overlap of the sensors in those connectors could be marginal. A far cry of a chance but worth trying.

[frimple]

This makes sense to me.

I guess I have one more thing to check before I go into that adventure though. Anand reported that he had to tighten the screws considerably when he did his upgrade.

I may fit the W5590s once more and this time leave out the heat pads. They may be keeping the sensors from making contact in the connectors. Obviously with the lids on the heat sink is located 1,8 mm higher up and the contact overlap of the sensors in those connectors could be marginal. A far cry of a chance but worth trying.

As long as they're seated in there correctly there should be no problem with tightening the crap out of 'em. I think Anand's fried because his was slight off center when he "put the screws to it".

[AppleWorking]

I may fit the W5590s once more and this time leave out the heat pads. They may be keeping the sensors from making contact in the connectors. Obviously with the lids on the heat sink is located 1,8 mm higher up and the contact overlap of the sensors in those connectors could be marginal. A far cry of a chance but worth trying.

:eek: Be careful... I wouldn't hercules them down if I were you...

[VirtualRain]

It is possible the W5590s require the motherboard firmware to be update to support it; At the time of the Mac Pro's release, the W5580s were an option, so their compatibility was built in. I think the only option you really have is to test the processors in another board since there isn't really another way to test them.

I think this is very possibly the problem.

The W5590 may require different microcode from the W5580 (not uncommon) and if this is true, will require a firmware update with the latest microcode for the new processor for it to be supported.

From what I understand, microcode resides in volatile memory inside the CPU and is loaded by the firmware during POST. I believe that if the checksum's don't match what the CPU expects, it will refuse the microcode and fail to POST. This is why you often see BIOS updates from many board manufacturers like ASUS that simply have change logs along the lines of "Support for new CPU's".

[nanofrog]

For the moment I see only two possible options. I got bad CPU from my seller or Apple have enabled the Nehalems only up to W5580 as Tutor used those with success.
Most likely, you need an update to the firmware (microcode), and won't happen. :( It's possible you got a bad processor, and as mentioned, the only way to be sure is to use a diffent DP 55xx board that does have the firmware to support it.

It is possible the W5590s require the motherboard firmware to be update to support it; At the time of the Mac Pro's release, the W5580s were an option, so their compatibility was built in. I think the only option you really have is to test the processors in another board since there isn't really another way to test them.
Most likely the situation, and a 3rd party board is needed to verify the CPU as functional. ;)

I may fit the W5590s once more and this time leave out the heat pads. They may be keeping the sensors from making contact in the connectors. Obviously with the lids on the heat sink is located 1,8 mm higher up and the contact overlap of the sensors in those connectors could be marginal. A far cry of a chance but worth trying.
Please don't do this. You'll end up roasting the VR's if you do.

Test the 5590's on another board first, as it's far more likely a firmware issue.

From what I understand, microcode resides in volatile memory inside the CPU and is loaded by the firmware during POST. I believe that if the checksum's don't match what the CPU expects, it will refuse the microcode and fail to POST. This is why you often see BIOS updates from many board manufacturers like ASUS that simply have change logs along the lines of "Support for new CPU's".
NVRAM (NAND flash = firmware), but the basic premise is correct. :)

[gugucom]

Those Q1QW ES definitely do not post on the Apple Nehalem system, that is 100% established. I have fitted them every way I could and I did not get them to boot. Every time I fitted the X5520s they did boot, even with very light screw torque down they would post and although sometimes the RAM reported a faulty configuration.

I guess I need to talk to my supplier. It doesn't really matter why they do not post, I simply cannot use them. Effing bad luck. :mad::mad::mad:

[nanofrog]

Those Q1QW ES definitely do not post on the Apple Nehalem system, that is 100% established. I have fitted them every way I could and I did not get them to boot. Every time I fitted the X5520s they did boot, even with very light screw torque down they would post and although sometimes the RAM reported a faulty configuration. I guess I need to talk to my supplier.
I understand that. :) But to test if it's the part/s in hand, you need another board (non Apple that has the microcode in the firmware). ;)

Perhaps they can test them, but I assume that will require time due to shipping as well as the actual work (assuming they're willing to do so). :)

Statistically speaking, the missing microcode in the firmware is far more likely the issue (unsolvable) than you got DOA parts. :(

[gugucom]

Statistically speaking, the missing microcode in the firmware is far more likely the issue (unsolvable) than you got DOA parts. :(


I dunno but I also don't care at the moment. I'll get a very stiff drink and return that Nehalem Mac.

[frimple]

I dunno but I also don't care at the moment. I'll get a very stiff drink and return that Nehalem Mac.

I'll drink to that! If there's a computer part store near you (and not blocked by drunkards in lederhosen :D) I'd go pickup a 1366 server board, 1 gig of ram and a PS if you don't have one. Build a test bed and fire those 5590's up one at a time. I sincerely hope that it's not crippled firmware on Apples stand point. Maybe it's just positive thinking, but I'd bet on a bum processor before I would crippled firmware.

[Sun Baked]

Maybe it's just positive thinking, but I'd bet on a bum processor before I would crippled firmware.

Of course this is Apple, crippled firmware always seems to edge out bad HW. :p

With a PC board, you can always update the firmware to add updated CPUs, with Apple it is a little tougher since they tend not to update firmware on old boards to fix issues with the newer CPUs.

[gugucom]

I'm not going into more investment here. Enough is enough. The postmortem to this project is of no interest to me. It would be throwing good money after bad. Those samples don't work. I based my purchasing decision on the gamble that they would work and now I have to admit I was wrong. There is no point in finding out at more cost why it went wrong. I'll get rid of everything and that's the end.

[nanofrog]

I dunno but I also don't care at the moment. I'll get a very stiff drink and return that Nehalem Mac.
I don't blame you. :D

I'd also forgotten those are Engineering Sample parts. Sorry about that. :o

I'm with frimple here, if you're willing to DIY. Or are you looking for a ready made system?

Either way, 3rd party board makers do support the boards longer in terms of firmware. :)

[gugucom]

Nano, you know I got pissed off by my MP1,1 being crippled by Apple's firmware. It is a bloody fast machine at 20.780 Cinebench 10. I was speculating on fixing the EFI issue and getting a rig that would definitely take me beyond 35.000 with decent SSD RAID0. Tutor had a very lucky hand with his rig there and it looked like a good thing to try when I came across those samples at at a nice looking price. I was thinking of selling my existing rig for the price of the new one, which wasn't so unreal, actually. Selling the X5520s would have gone half way for paying for those W5590 samples. So at a very decent investment (obviously keeping my RAID system) I would have gained the fastest "original" Mac on the planet. It was not to be. RIP to a dream!

[nanofrog]

Nano, you know I got pissed off by my MP1,1 being crippled by Apple's firmware. It is a bloody fast machine at 20.780 Cinebench 10. I was speculating on fixing the EFI issue and getting a rig that would definitely take me beyond 35.000 with decent SSD RAID0. Tutor had a very lucky hand with his rig there and it looked like a good thing to try when I came across those samples at at a nice looking price. I was thinking of selling my existing rig for the price of the new one, which wasn't so unreal, actually. Selling the X5520s would have gone half way for paying for those W5590 samples. So at a very decent investment (obviously keeping my RAID system) I would have gained the fastest "original" Mac on the planet. It was not to be. RIP to a dream!
Beleive me, I understand. :)

From what I've been able to gather from your various posts, you've definitely outgrown the '06. Not because it's slow, but the firmware is preventing you from making the necessary upgrades to keep it useful for your needs.

So an upgrade to a newer model makes loads of sense, whether it's an '08 or an '09 with upgraded processors. That one's still possible, but I had forgotten that the CPU's you tried were Engineering Samples. They can make a difference. You could get a pair of new W5590's (or other of your choice) and use those, likely without a single problem. But I'd expect you've had enough of it, and don't want to keep futzing around. Then there's the potential financial issues with returns and whatnot.

So maybe getting a 3.2GHz '08 and selling off the '06 and Engineering Sample chips, and returning the '09. Hopefully, it would be close to balancing out financially speaking, and would eliminate the hassles you've been going through as of late. :)

Just an idea. ;) Sorry about all the frustration, as I presume you're ready to throw something at a minimum. :p :p

[Tutor]

Clean up

[AppleWorking]

You probably need to remove, i.e., clip away, the upper part or rim of the black connectors that plug into the motherboard connectors at the end of each heat sink. I had to push them out of their compartments before trimming the rim near the cables at the top of each connector. Freeing them from the compartment they're plugged into allows you to gently, manually plug them into the mother board connector completely just as you position each heat sink over the cpu's. Removing the rim prevents cable pinching and allows the connectors to be manually manipulated. After you've removed the rim remember that the black connectors aren't now ( and will never again be) secured to the heat sink ( other than by the tiny cables themselves) the next time you remove the heat sink; thus, you must gently remove the black connectors from the connector port on the mother board, using needle nose pliers, before you get the heat sink to far from home. When those black connectors weren't fully plugged in, mine wouldn't post either. But I figured out the problem - the IHS height difference on the cpu transplant with respect to an 8-core, causes less than a complete connection, evidently triggering a failsafe.

Sounds like a fix to me. :D My early guess above was that the chips were ES, but if what you say works, would be very cool. Only problem I see is that gugucom would have to take the risk of being unable to return the MP after modding it. If it was me, though, I would go all in. ;)

[gugucom]

Wow, great balls of fire! I'm glad you read this and I learned of the issue. I was in the process of returning everything. Obviously I will make an attempt at this to sort the problem out.

I understand the problem but I'm not yet sure I can reproduce the cure you found. I will have to look at this and carefully read your posting. It is clear now that the fan and temperature connector isn't making a sufficient stroke to connect the contacts. Obviously that prevents the fans from spinning and naturally the processors will not be powered to prevent them from burn out.

I sounds to me that I will have to loosen one side and connect them manually. I will probably understand when I see this. How on earth did you figure this out?

Edit: Once I looked at it closely I understand what you mean. The male connector on the CPU/RAM board remains as it is. The female part is clipped into the casting of the heat sink frame. I managed to unclip it, pry the glued cable loose for some 2 or 3 cm and extract the connector from the casted frame. I also understand what you mean by clipping away the upper rim now.

I made a mounting attempt without CPU in place to see how that closed connector would slide in place when the heat sink comes down to a final position. It did not work properly at all. If a CPU had been in place I would probably have damaged the socket. Holy moley!! I do miss the clamps on that design! :eek:

I'm thinking how to do this in such a way that I still have a good leverage for getting the female connector out again. Holy cow!!

[AppleWorking]

Sounds like you would be loosening the black connector at the end of each heatsink. Trim away the rim so the connector can free float in the opening. I would assume the rim obstructs the connector from freely moving about, and it will pinch the cables, both. Thus trim it. Now, when installing the heat sink, manually connect the black connector to the MB, and remember to do this whenever removing the heatsinks since the connectors are now dangling by the wires.

[gugucom]

Gotscha

Tutor, you are my hero!!! You truely deserve your nick!! Thank you!!!!!!! :D:):D:):D:):D:):D:)

[tribe3]

This thread is good from start to finish! kudos to you Gugucom for taking the risk and all the guys especially Tutor for the fine advice

Bests,

Pablo

[gugucom]

I still don't know for sure about hyperthreading either.

I have quickly run a cinebench with the stock HDD. Hyperthreading is definitely working.

[alphaod]

Looks awesome. That's a monster.

(Now about those old processors… :D)

[frimple]

Gotscha

Tutor, you are my hero!!! You truely deserve your nick!! Thank you!!!!!!! :D:):D:):D:):D:):D:)

Congrats!!! Now, can you post a picture of these wires you needed to unhook to connect to the daughter board?

[handheldgames]

SWEET!!!! Congrats on the new toy!

[Macsonic]

Congrats Gugucom on your successful mission and for taking the risk. Thanks for sharing and for the effort. Enjoy your Mac.

[Genghis Khan]

2 x 3.33GHz Nehalem Xeons with an SSD RAID 0.

The fastest Mac in history?

Congrats gugucom :)
- Michael

N.B. And kudos to Tutor. Proved yourself once again to be an invaluable resource :)

[Cynicalone]

Congratulations! :)

You are much braver then me. I would be so afraid of breaking something. :o

[gugucom]

Thank you for all those congrats. I'm still emotionally wrecked. It's been a roller coaster.

Congrats!!! Now, can you post a picture of these wires you needed to unhook to connect to the daughter board?

Sorry, I did not take pictures.

http://images.anandtech.com/reviews/mac/MacProNehalem/heatsink2.jpg

You can see how the female connector is threaded from below through the casted base of the heat sink. It has to be clipped out there and pulled up along those heat pipes until it is totally free dangling there. For this you have to unstick the cables in the shrink tube some cm from the channel where it resides between frame and the copper plate of the sink. Then the clips that hold it in the casting have to be cut away almost completely.

The pink strip is where you have to add some heat transfer padding. Two mm is optimal. I had only 1 mm stripes and added two layers.

[Tutor]

Clean up

[Tutor]

Clean up

[gugucom]

I did not remove the wires from the female connector. I just pushed the female connector back toward the heat sink until it popped out then I clipped away at that rim since the wires would now be coming around the other side of the connector's compartment, that is, the side that appears closest to you in the photo. That rim which ordinarily helps to keep the female connector in place, would now otherwise pinch the wire and prevent the heat sink from coming fully down.

Actually I did pretty much the same. It may have come across different. The cables and connectors were always kept intact. I just needed a bit more available cable lenght. This was the reason for pulling the cable free for some cms (1") from the cable duct.

[zmttoxics]

Pretty sweet rig. What are your plans for it? Web Surfing? Bubble Bobble? :D

[fandsw]

Congrat gugu!! Cool project.....

...now for the real question: Is Safari snappier???? :D

[Wotan31]

ES CPUs often have undocumented Errata... I would stay away even at that price. There are plenty of threads about stability and ES CPUs on more tweaker-oriented sites such as XtremeSystems.org, etc.

For an Overclocker's PC I wouldn't think twice but in a workstation stability is paramount. Just my 2 cents.
x2. I would never use engineering sample anything.

[Tutor]

Clean up

[Tutor]

Clean up

[VirtualRain]

Congrats... I'm envious! This thing is a beast! :eek: :D

[AppleWorking]

What's that Cinebench 10 score?+1


You need to tell Tesselator - see http://forums.macrumors.com/showthread.php?t=780300 at post#1.ditto

[nanofrog]

Gotscha

Tutor, you are my hero!!! You truely deserve your nick!! Thank you!!!!!!! :D:):D:):D:):D:):D:)
I had assumed you'd gotten the fan connectors installed correctly. Oops. :o

Apple just had to make things difficult. :eek: :p

[gugucom]

As usual the Vista64 Cinebench ist the best. This is currently with the GT120, 6GB RAM and 1 SSD, no RAID0.

But it is over 30.000, :D

I'm using the system for Movies, Handbraking, Video, Office and general entertainment. Most of my storage and the RAID is still in the old Mac.

The ODD ports are still on legacy. Im going to set them on AHCI shortly.

Of course blimming Microsoft had to de register Vista the moment I went online after pulling it over with Winclone. Not only changed the CPU and chipset, also the SSD got twice the size on this one.

CPU-Z confirms the seller's word that this is a standard D0 stepping. So I guess there will not be a great potential for bad surprises.

[Tutor]

Clean up

[gugucom]

I just gained 50% multi CPU power compared to my 2006 Mac Pro. That machine has 20.780 with Vista64 Business. That was an X5365 Octad with 12 GB RAM and ATI3870.

It appears that there isn't a great deal of oompf between 3,33 and 3,2 GHz. But my system isn't completely done as I said. The Geekbench will have to come a bit later. I'm having a date tomorrow and need to prepare something.

[Tutor]

Clean up

[Macinposh]

I'm having a date tomorrow and need to prepare something.


Date+Germany+Octoberfest = A Lot of Win.


And nice tinkering there,dude.Respect.

[tome viewer]

Errata is frequent in engineering samples, only to be corrected in the final release. It is the worst chip to consider if your computer is used professionally. Gamers love them since all they do is game. Professionals, however, consider them "throw aways" and will never touch them --- they are consistently overloaded with errors. I am not talking a few, but many. I have not read the whole thread, but I seriously hope the most you do with your rig is gaming. For you will inevitably find yourself tracking down abstract errors and attempting to troubleshoot them to no avail. Usually when you least expect it. Unless you have nothing better to do with your time, those chips are nothing but a lesson in futility. Sounds harsh, but anyone who knows what ES stands for also knows they are simply not worth the discount you receive. You could not even pay me to run those chips, the amount of headache is not worth it IMO.

[frimple]

Errata is frequent in engineering samples, only to be corrected in the final release. It is the worst chip to consider if your computer is used professionally. Gamers love them since all they do is game. Professionals, however, consider them "throw aways" and will never touch them --- they are consistently overloaded with errors. I am not talking a few, but many. I have not read the whole thread, but I seriously hope the most you do with your rig is gaming. For you will inevitably find yourself tracking down abstract errors and attempting to troubleshoot them to no avail. Usually when you least expect it. Unless you have nothing better to do with your time, those chips are nothing but a lesson in futility. Sounds harsh, but anyone who knows what ES stands for also knows they are simply not worth the discount you receive. You could not even pay me to run those chips, the amount of headache is not worth it IMO.

Huh, interesting opinion. Any testing that shows these problems? Seems like most benchmarks and testing you see done is with ES chips, I'd be interested to see some proof of this. I've never personally had any problems with ES chips or other hardware (I'm still using an ES X-25M) from Intel and I'm not a gamer. Maybe I'm just lucky.

[nanofrog]

Huh, interesting opinion. Any testing that shows these problems? Seems like most benchmarks and testing you see done is with ES chips, I'd be interested to see some proof of this. I've never personally had any problems with ES chips or other hardware (I'm still using an ES X-25M) from Intel and I'm not a gamer. Maybe I'm just lucky.
Personally, I think it's gotten better overall, but it can still be an issue. Even a single bug can be a problem, as the solution may only be in hardware (most are attempted to be repaired via firmware or the OS).

Do a search of "Intel CPU errata information" (or similar), and see what comes up. ;)

[gugucom]

http://www.intel.com/assets/pdf/specupdate/321324.pdf

Errata seem to be given by a complete line of processors which would make sense to me. The above document outlines the current errata for the D0 stepping. They do not seem to be different to the W5590 to any of the other CPUs of that range. I believe that the higher grades are just singled out from testing and that they are not different in silicone design. They just reflect the yield advances in the manufacturing process. Since these samples showed up at the end of the 5500 series release I believe that there is no more risk for errata than it would occur with a regular Apple supplied chip. Now, if I was using Gulftown samples I would perhaps be concerned, but in the specific case I'm not. In fact testers seem to be concerned with the opposite. The samples they are given may be better than what is actually initially sold to the public in order to get better reviews. Due to this reason some testers actually source their chips on the market to avoid being seen as giving out favours.

[tobyg]

The processors errata is a big problem with replacing processors in a Mac Pro and using processors such as ES processors or any processor that wasn't originally sold in the Mac Pro model you're using.

Traditionally, system makers/motherboard makers will issue bios updates in order to support new processors. It doesn't mean new processors won't work without an updated bios usually, but it's not officially supported. The reason is, when a new processor comes out, the motherboard makers have to incorporate the microcode updates into the bios to patch the system to support the errata's in each processor.

The problem is, Apple doesn't need to and probably doesn't patch their firmware to take into account for any processor errata's that may come out for future processors that may be compatible with that specific Mac Pro. Lets say Apple knows they only used a specific model and stepping of a processor in a Mac Pro. Then, a newer stepping of the same processor comes out. Apple knows what processors they used, so they know they never need to account for microcode updates for that processors errata. If you use that stepping of the processor, even though it may be an exact same model that Apple used (but a different stepping), you may have issues.

Here is some info from Microsoft on this. They explain it pretty simply and it may help people understand how this works. Basically, they are explaining how it can be updated from within Windows, but they speak to the fact that it could be updated in the bios (or in Apple's case, the EFI).

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/288302

And here is the wikipedia article.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microcode


Now, have there been any documented cases of someone actually finding a problem with a upgraded Mac Pro that has failed because of a failure related to an errata of a processor? Probably not. But it's not something I am willing to try with any production Mac Pro.

So truly, the issue is not just ES processors, but any processor that wasn't officially used on the model of Mac Pro that you're trying to upgrade the processors. And not just the model of processor, but it would have to be the identical stepping.

Good luck with your processor upgrades!

[gugucom]

Nothing that I read in those linked documents tells me about possible additional errata of speed steps within one stepping (in this case D0). So my conclusion is that a different socket compatible CPU model with different stepping not anticipated by Apple might be a big risk, but staying inside one design but with a faster clock should not be a problem. I'm by no means an expert so additional information on that issue by more knowledgeable people would be appreciated.

[tome viewer]

The samples they are given may be better than what is actually initially sold to the public in order to get better reviews. Due to this reason some testers actually source their chips on the market to avoid being seen as giving out favours.

This is completely false, Intel never has and never will release engineering samples for review. The only chips that are sent for legitimate review are product samples. Engineering samples are used internally by Intel engineers only. They are used to stress test their new design and to make improvements on them before release. Outside of this context they are illegal, and Intel will never release them for the purpose you state. Even showing them off on this forum is showing off stolen merchandise. The chips are defective, all of them, due to the abnormal testing done to them. Further, if you worked for Intel you would know that they are considered beta, are equivalent to prototypes, and not a single one of them will function as a final release CPU. The bottom line is that these CPUs are damaged, and are always selected from poorer silicon examples. There are no ifs, ands, or buts about this. If you knew someone at Intel, or you yourself worked there, you would know this. Almost all of the false information about ES samples are invented by gamers with vivid imaginations. By “gamers” I mean enthusiasts who share the same mentality whether they game or not. Only this type of individual promotes the myth that ES samples are handpicked, something to be desired, etc. Nothing could be further from the truth. The truth of the matter is you would have been better off if your project failed and you returned them. You just don't know this yet. Please do not promote false information to unsuspecting readers on this forum...

[tobyg]

This is completely false, Intel never has and never will release engineering samples for review. The only chips that are sent for legitimate review are product samples. Engineering samples are used internally by Intel engineers only. They are used to stress test their new design and to make improvements on them before release. Outside of this context they are illegal, and Intel will never release them for the purpose you state. Even showing them off on this forum is showing off stolen merchandise. The chips are defective, all of them, due to the abnormal testing done to them. Further, if you worked for Intel you would know that they are considered beta, are equivalent to prototypes, and not a single one of them will function as a final release CPU. The bottom line is that these CPUs are damaged, and are always selected from poorer silicon examples. There are no ifs, ands, or buts about this. If you knew someone at Intel, or you yourself worked there, you would know this. Almost all of the false information about ES samples are invented by gamers with vivid imaginations. By “gamers” I mean enthusiasts who share the same mentality whether they game or not. Only this type of individual promotes the myth that ES samples are handpicked, something to be desired, etc. Nothing could be further from the truth. The truth of the matter is you would have been better off if your project failed and you returned them. You just don't know this yet.

Woah woah woah, slow down there. Lots of review sites use ES chips for testing and reviews.

Here are two, from some fairly well known sites.

http://www.anandtech.com/cpuchipsets/showdoc.aspx?i=3634

http://www.tomshardware.com/gallery/core_i7_core_2,0101-164571-0----jpg-.html

Please do not promote false information to unsuspecting readers on this forum...

Yes, please don't. And this is directed at you, tome viewer.

[frimple]

This is completely false, Intel never has and never will release engineering samples for review. The only chips that are sent for legitimate review are product samples. Engineering samples are used internally by Intel engineers only. They are used to stress test their new design and to make improvements on them before release. Outside of this context they are illegal, and Intel will never release them for the purpose you state. Even showing them off on this forum is showing off stolen merchandise. The chips are defective, all of them, due to the abnormal testing done to them. Further, if you worked for Intel you would know that they are considered beta, are equivalent to prototypes, and not a single one of them will function as a final release CPU. The bottom line is that these CPUs are damaged, and are always selected from poorer silicon examples. There are no ifs, ands, or buts about this. If you knew someone at Intel, or you yourself worked there, you would know this. Almost all of the false information about ES samples are invented by gamers with vivid imaginations. By “gamers” I mean enthusiasts who share the same mentality whether they game or not. Only this type of individual promotes the myth that ES samples are handpicked, something to be desired, etc. Nothing could be further from the truth. The truth of the matter is you would have been better off if your project failed and you returned them. You just don't know this yet. Please do not promote false information to unsuspecting readers on this forum...

So if I were to bullet point this for you it would be

Anand never gets or tests ES chips, in fact no one outside of Paul Otellini's grasp uses ES chips
They're crap
Gamers really like them, use them and rave about them but they don't know what they're talking about
They're going to fail
They're crap


Would that about sum up your opinion? :cool::p

[tome viewer]

The ES chips are not meant to be reviewed no matter what you may think or see. The chips they are using are product releases stamped ES, and there are so few of these legitimate samples around it is impossible that a consumer could obtain one. They are on loan only. The only ES chips that can be obtained by the consumer are the ones I described.

Here is an article that has most of its information correct:

http://www.techarp.com/showarticle.aspx?artno=407

[tobyg]

The ES chips are not meant to be reviewed no matter what you may think or see. The chips they are using are product releases stamped ES, and there are so few of these legitimate samples around it is impossible that a consumer could obtain one. They are on loan only. The only ES chips that can be obtained by the consumer are the ones I described.

Here is an article that has most of its information correct:

http://www.techarp.com/showarticle.aspx?artno=407

That article contradicts itself. Initially they talk about ES samples being given out for reviews...

They used to be very limited units used within Intel and sent to select (lucky) reviewers.

Then they say they are only used internally and by partners...

First of all, these ES processors are meant for internal use by Intel engineers and their partners. They are not meant for sale at all. They are generally used in Intel's quality control tests and remain Intel's property after the fact.


I'd like to see the more details that are supposed to follow the conclusion of that report, but they seem to be missing.

They're just trying to scare people into not buying ES samples. I agree with some of their points, but this is just a scare tactic post, trying to make sure people who buy these things understand what they would be buying. I do believe ES is not to be sold, even though they are, but I do know they are used for reviews and testing. This is easily seen and found by reading many of the review sites.

This is similar to how the first Mac Intel based development systems were 'sold' to end users. They bought them with the understanding that at the end of the program they had to return them, and would lose their $1k they spent on them. Apple, in the end, realized they probably wouldn't get a lot of them back so they changed their mind and as an incentive for returning the product, they were given a new iMac that was actually worth more than the initial $1k they spent. I think their motive, at the time, was to keep the TPM chip out of the general public's hands. There were still a few boxes that made it to eBay (not sure if they ever got sold). Granted, they no longer use the TPM chip to protect OSX from being installed on only Mac hardware, the idea was the same. You didn't own this box, just as you don't own the ES samples that you may obtain legitimately being a review site or partner. You can bet that if Intel promised to give you a retail copy of a processor if you returned the ES after the retail versions were available, there would be far fewer ES processors out there, as almost everyone would rather have the real thing than a sample processor.

The ES samples are cheaper for a reason. I wouldn't buy them for any machine that I used in production.

[TheBritishBloke]

Some bad news for now.

The 2,26 Nehalem Mac Pro arrived and I managed to get thermal pads although it was an odyssee. The Octoberfest is on full song and getting into the red light district (where all the electronics shops are) is a PITA. Traffic is a killer. None of the shops had the material and after 2h of chaos I visited a trusted Apple AASP who came up with some blue stuff of 1 mm thickness after searching all his junk drawers and card board boxes.

I carefully disassembled the CPU and RAM daughter board and took off the two heat sinks. Unscrewing works much like working on an engine cylinder block. You best approach it with the diagonal technique. I started with sink A and released all four 3 mm hex screws. I then lifted the heat sink with the cpu attached out of the socket. It is essential not to drop it back in when you have started to pull it from the socket because that is probably how Anand managed to screw his socket. Remember the sockets have no clamps!!! :eek: scary think to design!:rolleyes:

CPU B looked slightly out of angle when I took it of the heat sink. The removal must have been not quite ideal. Apple was perfect with thermal grease application I must say. A very nice pattern.

I fitted the W5590s and increased the thickness of the thermal padding at the rim of the heat sink where the little voltage regulators are contacted by the padding. I cleaned the heat sinks to mirror finish and oh so carefully mounted them back on the sockets using again diagonal tightening technique.

After carefully re assembling the CPU/RAM board I switched power back on and got a white light but no gong sound came to tell me the CPUs had posted and were booting OS X.

I have taken the CPU A out again and re seated it but it looked perfect as the socket looked perfectly ok.

I tested again without joy and I will take out the CPU B to check for damage. If this CPU is also ok I may put the X5520s back in. For now I'm badly frustrated because this project got me very excited.

For the moment I see only two possible options. I got bad CPU from my seller or Apple have enabled the Nehalems only up to W5580 as Tutor used those with success.

If someone has a good idea what could have went wrong please let me know!!!

I will come back and make further reports as the action continues.

Good luck!

With the Oktoberfest, did you hear about them shutting off the entire outside road for a suspicion of a terrorist attack?

[gugucom]

Common sense would indicate that tome viewer is following his own agenda here. He has not addressed any of the technical points at all. Instead he builds up a scare scenario which isn't entirely convincing. How about answering those questions tome viewer?

1. Is W5590 silicone any different to W5570 silicone which would indicate that there can be errata particular to that hardware version?

2. What are the differences in design?

3. Where can documentation about those errata - if they exist at all - be found?

On a different note we seem to have no forum contributors here who had negative experience with ES. To the contrary we had Tutor running regular chips outside Apples marketing scope with good success for some time.

[gugucom]

With the Oktoberfest, did you hear about them shutting off the entire outside road for a suspicion of a terrorist attack?

No, that escaped my attention. But then I never listen much to radio or to TV anyway. So I may have missed that one.

[tobyg]

Common sense would indicate that tome viewer is following his own agenda here. He has not addressed any of the technical points at all. Instead he builds up a scare scenario which isn't entirely convincing. How about answering those questions tome viewer?

1. Is W5590 silicone any different to W5570 silicone which would indicate that there can be errata particular to that hardware version?


tome viewer is talking about ES chips, as I was also.

The other point that I was trying to make was that chips with newer/different steppings may have a different errata, and microcode patches that normally would be introduced into the bios on boards that officially support newer processors, may not be fixed on a Mac Pro that never supported that processor. A W5590 with the same stepping and errata as a W5570 that was officially used in the Mac Pro should work fine. The only issues I can think of would possibly be thermal issues.

As far as the different chips and steppings, for instance, running a 5300 series processor in a 2006 Mac Pro may not work as well because the 2006 Mac Pro never came with a 5300 processor, so they don't have to add in any microcode patches into the firmware of a 2006 Mac Pro. A 2007 Mac Pro did come with 5300 chips, so as long as you stick with chips using the same steppings and same errata as the ones that came with the 2007 Mac Pro, you should be fine. Then again, nothing is 100% of course.

[Macinposh]

As far as the different chips and steppings, for instance, running a 5300 series processor in a 2006 Mac Pro may not work as well because the 2006 Mac Pro never came with a 5300 processor, so they don't have to add in any microcode patches into the firmware of a 2006 Mac Pro.


Afaik the peeps who updated the 1.1s with 5365s got the same benchmarks as the 2.1s?
Cant find the goddam charts now though.

[tobyg]

Afaik the peeps who updated the 1.1s with 5365s got the same benchmarks as the 2.1s?
Cant find the goddam charts now though.

I'm not talking about benchmarks at all, I'm talking about bug fixes for errata's for processors.

[gugucom]

tome viewer is talking about ES chips, as I was also.

But you were not addressing my point there. This is an engineering sample for the fastest version of that chip. It was preceded by several versions with identical D0 stepping with slower speed grades. As such it may not even have any different hardware at all but only been build to check the thermal situation or other possible issues. So what I'm trying to get to is the question of any difference between W5570 and W5590 hardware wise. If there isn't any there ought to be no difference in errata and this whole discussion is pointless.

[AZREOSpecialist]

Here is an Intel Specification Update (http://www.intel.com/Assets/PDF/specupdate/321333.pdf) document which discusses errata specific to the W3500 series Xeon. You will note that the vast majority of errata is the same for all steppings, but some of the errata has been eliminated in the later steppings. In the case of errata AAM69 (CPUID Instruction), it was not present in the C-0 or C-1 steppings but is present in the D-0 stepping. This is the only example I could find where a later stepping introduced an errata not present in a previous stepping. Here is the Specification Update for the W5500 Series (http://www.intel.com/Assets/PDF/specupdate/321324.pdf) (including W5590). This references errata specific to the W5500 series and may be of interest to those who are contemplating upgrading their 8-core Mac Pros.

From what I see in this document, some of what tome viewer has said is correct. From my obviously non-technical reading, errata appears specific to stepping but not necessarily clock speed. Example - W3520 @ 2.66 GHz used in the 2009 Mac Pro Quad is the same D0 stepping as the new W3580 @ 3.33 GHz. Same goes for the Mac Pro 8-core - E5520 (2.26 GHz) has same D0 stepping as W5590 @ 3.3 GHz. It would appear that all 2009 Mac Pros in production are using D0 steppings. Since errata is specific to steppings, replacing the stock CPU with a higher clocked version of the same stepping should not introduce any errata not already addressed in the original firmware.

Of course I know nothing about this topic, so I could be completely wrong. :D

[yanquis]

man, i am so jealous. congratulations gugu for having the courage & skill to do this. what was the total cost, roughly? it sounds like you got an amazing bargain. man, you now have my dream computer. just needs the gtx 285 now :D

[gugucom]

Total cost was 3900 €. Prices being generally higher here you can take that for a $ figure if you translate it. My x5365 octad is on ebay now and I expect it to fetch 2600 € next Sunday. It currently has 8 bids topping over 1700€ after 36 h out there. I had over 370 hits and have over 80 observers of that auction. I expect the pair of X5520s to get me another 800€ if it goes well. So effectively the upgrade should cost me about 500€ if all goes well. If Apple would offer a 3,33 octad the extrapolated price (linear from the 2,26 - 2,93) here would be 6500€.

[JmeltzFX]

Hat's off to you Gugucom. Well done! I'm very impressed, you now own my dream machine. With any luck, I'll be attempting the very same build in the next week or so. This thread is a phenomenal resource. The details you provided in your posts have been excellent.

THIS MESSAGE IS FOR TUTOR:

Apologies for the unorthodox method of contact. Although, I've gathered much from the amazingly informative forums here, I have an urgent and specific question to ask you. I can send you my email if need be. Please PM me at your earliest convenience. Thank you!

[gugucom]

My old X5365 MP1,1 with 12 GB RAM went for 2.810€ on Ebay last night. So it did exceed my expectations. It got me more than the basic 8 core Nehalem which I got refurbished at 2.599€. I will be selling the original E5520s soon.

I had a contact with the supplier of the W5590 ES at the weekend but I don't know if any of the samples remain available. You can give me your email address and I will pass it on.

[gugucom]

I have a question for Tutor here. Did you manage to set your memory to 1333? And are the DIMMs supplied by Apple capable of running the higher memory speed?

[Tutor]

Clean up

[gugucom]

THX, Tutor. I guess I should nevertheless get 1333 MHz sticks if I go to replace the 1 GB sticks I have.

[kham]

Excellent work!

any still available? cost?

[gugucom]

Excellent work!

any still available? cost?

If you are talking the ES chips I have no clue. Several users here have given me their email to pass on. I payed about half the Newegg price of regular CPUs.

[huscat]

I was about to buy a 2.26 and upgrade it with either W5580's or W5590's, but now it seems like W5580's make more sense. How do you get ahold of Tutor by the way? I have some questions for him.

[nanofrog]

I was about to buy a 2.26 and upgrade it with either W5580's or W5590's, but now it seems like W5580's make more sense. How do you get ahold of Tutor by the way? I have some questions for him.
The firmware would work for either of those CPU's, so go with the one that makes the most sense of cost/performance to you (usage pattern).

You can send a PM to make contact, and Tutor does have it enabled in his profile (here (http://forums.macrumors.com/member.php?u=332616), on the right side, under Contact Info). You can get to this page by clicking or right clicking the user you want, and open in another tab or window.

[frimple]

I was about to buy a 2.26 and upgrade it with either W5580's or W5590's, but now it seems like W5580's make more sense. How do you get ahold of Tutor by the way? I have some questions for him.

Shoot me a PM if you're serious about picking up some 5580's, I've got one that I can part with on the cheap.

Couldn't send you a PM, sorry! :o

[huscat]

I looked under Tutor's contact info and I could not see anything that I could click on......

I thought the W5590 does NOT work in the Mac Pro 2009? Has anyone done it yet and had it work? What about Turbo?

[frimple]

I looked under Tutor's contact info and I could not see anything that I could click on......

I thought the W5590 does NOT work in the Mac Pro 2009? Has anyone done it yet and had it work? What about Turbo?

No turbo, but you're posting in the thread of the guy that did the 5590 upgrade

EDIT:

There's probably a post count limit before you can PM, it's probably like 10 or something

[nanofrog]

There's probably a post count limit before you can PM, it's probably like 10 or something
Good point. I hadn't even thought about this. I seem to only remember that's an issue with the Market Place. :o :p

[huscat]

No turbo, but you're posting in the thread of the guy that did the 5590 upgrade

EDIT:

There's probably a post count limit before you can PM, it's probably like 10 or something
OK I see that he got it done, can't quite understand about the thermal pads and cutting connectors, can someone elaborate?

[nanofrog]

OK I see that he got it done, can't quite understand about the thermal pads and cutting connectors, can someone elaborate?
IIRC, this should have to do with the headroom available (clocks upper limit in the design). So if you used the W5590, though there's no Turbo, it's going to operate all cores at it's limit, which is still higher than what all cores can run at on the W5580.

So the question you need to ask yourself, is your software use primarily single threaded or multi-threaded, and how do you use it?

That is, if you run single threaded apps, but run enough simultaneously to keep enough cores busy that Turbo won't kick in, or not. If it's the latter, then the W5580 would make more sense. Otherwise, no, and especially the case if you're using mostly multi-threaded apps.

Try to figure out which will give you the fastest clocks for your use, and if it's worth the added cost if it's the faster part (rated clock). Only you can determine this.

Sorry it's not easier than this. :eek: :p

[gugucom]

OK I see that he got it done, can't quite understand about the thermal pads and cutting connectors, can someone elaborate?

It is not so difficult to understand. There are pictures in the thread which shows the thermal pads on the rim of the heat sink. Apple CPUs have no heat spreaders but use the naked die for contact with the heat sink. The additional heat spreader on the standard CPU adds 1,8 mm to the heigth of the CPU. This means the heat sink doesn't make contact with the voltage regulators on the CPU/RAM tray. If you want to keep them cooled you have to add a bit of thermal padding.

The connector issue is similar. In the original design the contacts are automatically snapped in due to sufficient insertion stroke. The added height of the IHS prevents the connector to snap home. You have to make it fit or the CPUs will not start up. The connector closes the thermocouple and the internal heat sink fan wires. Obvious, that the CPUs need protection if the fans don't run. The male and female parts of the connectors are fitted to the CPU/RAM tray and the heat sink. For the CPUs with heat spreaders you have to disassemble the heat sink side connector and manually connect it. Cutting the plastic clips from the connector will help the thing to slide into position when you bolt the heat sink down without blocking the final assembly.

[huscat]

It is not so difficult to understand. There are pictures in the thread which shows the thermal pads on the rim of the heat sink. Apple CPUs have no heat spreaders but use the naked die for contact with the heat sink. The additional heat spreader on the standard CPU adds 1,8 mm to the heigth of the CPU. This means the heat sink doesn't make contact with the voltage regulators on the CPU/RAM tray. If you want to keep them cooled you have to add a bit of thermal padding.

The connector issue is similar. In the original design the contacts are automatically snapped in due to sufficient insertion stroke. The added height of the IHS prevents the connector to snap home. You have to make it fit or the CPUs will not start up. The connector closes the thermocouple and the internal heat sink fan wires. Obvious, that the CPUs need protection if the fans don't run. The male and female parts of the connectors are fitted to the CPU/RAM tray and the heat sink. For the CPUs with heat spreaders you have to disassemble the heat sink side connector and manually connect it. Cutting the plastic clips from the connector will help the thing to slide into position when you bolt the heat sink down without blocking the final assembly.

For some reason I cannot contact anyone on this site, how do I go about getting your email address? Can you AOL IM me? I have just a few more questions for you. When will you run Geekbench?

[gugucom]

You need a number of postings - probably ten - and your PM will work. Read the rules. They are probably somewhere in user CP or a general section.

I don't plan running geekbench. If I add more RAM and a better graphic card I will do another cinebench. That is the most interesting figure for me. I need the CPU power for transcoding, remuxing and similar tasks.

[BeerdedOne]

I am wondering why the dual W5570 upgrade article on Anadtech:

http://www.anandtech.com/mac/showdoc.aspx?i=3597&p=11

makes no mention of needing to modifying the black connectors at the end of the heat sinks (or the necessity for thermal pads to close the gap on one side of the heat sinks) to work with stock procs featuring an IHS.

Am I missing something obvious? Does anyone have an explanation on how they apparently avoided this necessity?:confused:

[AZREOSpecialist]

I am wondering why the dual W5570 upgrade article on Anadtech:

http://www.anandtech.com/mac/showdoc.aspx?i=3597&p=11

makes no mention of needing to modifying the black connectors at the end of the heat sinks (or the necessity for thermal pads to close the gap on one side of the heat sinks) to work with stock procs featuring an IHS.

Am I missing something obvious? Does anyone have an explanation on how they apparently avoided this necessity?:confused:

The issue with needing thermal padding and modifying the black connector were mentioned in one of the other threads here regarding the same upgrade. I don't know if Anand missed that, but it's absolutely necessary to make those modifications due to the added hight of the replacement chips w/ heat spreaders. Of course, the ideal solution is to buy chips without heat spreaders, but I don't think such chips exist outside of Intel and its OEM vendors.

[huscat]

they were $650 a piece, the W5590's were $1150 a piece. I decided to try the 5580 first, and if I can do the upgrade successfully I'll probably go ahead and buy the W5590's. I think perhaps I might start selling the upgrades as a working unit. We've been selling tons of Clovertown Mac Pros already.

One question about RAID cards, did anyone ever finally get a RAID card working with 10.6? We tried three different RocketRAIDs and none of them worked, and we also tried an ATTO card; all right after the release of 10.6. No joy on any of them without kernel panics.

I bought my thermal pads and the procs, I'm hoping I can figure out how to trim the cables, or whatever was said on here.

[AZREOSpecialist]

they were $650 a piece, the W5590's were $1150 a piece. I decided to try the 5580 first, and if I can do the upgrade successfully I'll probably go ahead and buy the W5590's. I think perhaps I might start selling the upgrades as a working unit. We've been selling tons of Clovertown Mac Pros already.

One question about RAID cards, did anyone ever finally get a RAID card working with 10.6? We tried three different RocketRAIDs and none of them worked, and we also tried an ATTO card; all right after the release of 10.6. No joy on any of them without kernel panics.

I bought my thermal pads and the procs, I'm hoping I can figure out how to trim the cables, or whatever was said on here.

I'm using RocketRAID and it works fine under Snow Leopard on a 2009 Mac Pro. You just need to ensure you are running the latest firmware, WebGUI software, and drivers. There is a RAID bug in the SL kernel that requires you update to the latest RocketRAID drivers (driver 2.0.4, WebGUI 1.0.4).

[gugucom]

I'm running the Areca 1210 in boot mode with two 80 GB Intel 2nd Gen SSDs in Raid0 and another 160 GB Intel 2nd Gen on the second ODD Sata port for Vista64. My 4 HDD ports are all reserved for mass data storage.

[huscat]

I'm running the Areca 1210 in boot mode with two 80 GB Intel 2nd Gen SSDs in Raid0 and another 160 GB Intel 2nd Gen on the second ODD Sata port for Vista64. My 4 HDD ports are all reserved for mass data storage.

What do you mean by "boot mode" is that a special setting or something? Do you think the Intel 80GB SSD's are the best bang for the buck? I get dealer pricing on OCZ and Intel, just not sure which to get. We have installed the 80GB SSD in 2007 Mac Pros running on the normal bus and it works fine.....

So back to the 10.6 RAID Card issue...... no kernel panics or crashes?

ATTO just sent me a R30F card to eval, but I also have a 4320 RR here. What about the Areca 1210 card, how much are they? I've never heard of that company until recently.

With regards to this site, are you saying I have to make 10 posts before I can email anyone?

[gugucom]

What do you mean by "boot mode" is that a special setting or something? Do you think the Intel 80GB SSD's are the best bang for the buck? I get dealer pricing on OCZ and Intel, just not sure which to get. We have installed the 80GB SSD in 2007 Mac Pros running on the normal bus and it works fine.....

So back to the 10.6 RAID Card issue...... no kernel panics or crashes?

ATTO just sent me a R30F card to eval, but I also have a 4320 RR here. What about the Areca 1210 card, how much are they? I've never heard of that company until recently.

With regards to this site, are you saying I have to make 10 posts before I can email anyone?

I just ment that I'm booting OS X from the RAID0. I do think the Intels are superior, particularly for RAID. No crashes or kernel panics, no.

I was searching for a RAID card booting OS X and Windows in RAID0 but never found one. I had some hope for the 1210 but had to abandon my search as hopeless. So now I just boot OS X in dual SSD RAID0 from the card and Windows from the single SSD off the 2nd ODD SATA port.

Honestly I think that a RAID card is an inferior solution to having more SATA ports with decent band width. If I could choose I had four additional SATA ports more on the logic board. They should be usable in SW RAID for Bootcamp as well. Apple has a poor design there compared to other high end workstations.

Four ports for 2,5" in the 2nd ODD space and just one optical drive would be nice. If people require two optical drives they could use slim line drives. You would do all the booting from the 2,5" drives and have four HDDs left for mass data storage. There would be no lag for RAID card firmware syncing.

[huscat]

I just ment that I'm booting OS X from the RAID0. I do think the Intels are superior, particularly for RAID. No crashes or kernel panics, no.

I was searching for a RAID card booting OS X and Windows in RAID0 but never found one. I had some hope for the 1210 but had to abandon my search as hopeless. So now I just boot OS X in dual SSD RAID0 from the card and Windows from the single SSD off the 2nd ODD SATA port.

So are you not wanting to Geekbench your machine in deference to Tutor? I understand if that is the case, because clearly you would have the top score. How much are the Areca 1210 cards?

[gugucom]

People on this site like Tesselator said that Geekbench is useless, so I never bothered to run it. The W5590 beat the W5580s by a very slim margin in Cinebench, but I was using just 6 GB of RAM and the stock GT120. So that margin would be a bit wider with RAM and graphics on the same level. Tutor published some benchmark with single Xeon quads, that came out of his original octad. He build rendering machines for less than 2000$ from them and they scored incredibly beyond 20.000 with some serious OCing. Of course all done in Windows64.

The Areca was 240€ here in Germany but there are better deals in the US I believe. I have seen it down to 180$ in bulk packaging and re sale. I used the Areca on recommndation of nanfrog the resident expert here. I have to say the technical service is impressive compared to similarly priced products.

[nanofrog]

How much are the Areca 1210 cards?
Here's a source I use for Areca cards in the US (ARC-1210 (http://www.ewiz.com/detail.php?name=ARC1210)). They're usually the least expensive source. But there may be a caveat; check the return policy on each card, as some are non-returnable (special order/non-returnable status = those go for a little less than from other locations). This one's returnable, and seems to be the same price as other e-tailers.

I also checked newegg, who has it for the same price for new, but they have an open box (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16816131003R) unit/s available as well. Just don't expect the disk, SATA cables, or manual. The cables are easy and cheap, the rest of it you can get off Areca's web site.

[huscat]

People on this site like Tesselator said that Geekbench is useless, so I never bothered to run it. The W5590 beat the W5580s by a very slim margin in Cinebench, but I was using just 6 GB of RAM and the stock GT120. So that margin would be a bit wider with RAM and graphics on the same level. Tutor published some benchmark with single Xeon quads, that came out of his original octad. He build rendering machines for less than 2000$ from them and they scored incredibly beyond 20.000 with some serious OCing. Of course all done in Windows64.

The Areca was 240€ here in Germany but there are better deals in the US I believe. I have seen it down to 180$ in bulk packaging and re sale. I used the Areca on recommndation of nanfrog the resident expert here. I have to say the technical service is impressive compared to similarly priced products.

A couple of questions:

so Cinebench is the best Mac performance test?
Tutor built a Hackintosh with a single Xeon that was OC'd and it beat some of the dual proc machines? Is that what you are saying?

[huscat]

Here's a source I use for Areca cards in the US (ARC-1210 (http://www.ewiz.com/detail.php?name=ARC1210)). They're usually the least expensive source. But there may be a caveat; check the return policy on each card, as some are non-returnable (special order/non-returnable status = those go for a little less than from other locations). This one's returnable, and seems to be the same price as other e-tailers.

I also checked newegg, who has it for the same price for new, but they have an open box (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16816131003R) unit/s available as well. Just don't expect the disk, SATA cables, or manual. The cables are easy and cheap, the rest of it you can get off Areca's web site.

So you buy the Areca card and then use the MaxUpgrades bypass cable to hook the 4 drives into the card?

[nanofrog]

So you buy the Areca card and then use the MaxUpgrades bypass cable to hook the 4 drives into the card?
What exactly are you trying to do?

I suggested the ARC-1210 thinking you would mount the drives in the empty optical bay, and just run SATA cables. If you want to attach it to the HDD bays, you have two basic routes you can go.

1. Get this (http://www.maxupgrades.com/istore/index.cfm?fuseaction=product.display&product_id=176), but it tacks on $89USD.
2. Get a different model card (they do exist, and are actually more common; it needs an SFF-8087 port instead of the 4x SATA ports on the ARC-1210). The iPass cable end that attaches to the logic board is an SFF-8087 (internal MiniSAS connector).

I think a different card would be less expensive, and certainly a cleaner installation (less cable to contend with).

Please post the details as to location for the drives, drive count desired,...

EDIT: The ARC-1212 (http://www.ewiz.com/detail.php?name=ARC1212) can be had for $320USD, has a faster processor on it, and includes an SFF-8087 to 4i*SATA. You can attach this cable to the logic board to continue to use the SATA ports on the board for drives located in the empty optical bay, or even to an eSATA bracket (though it won't support hot swap or hot plug).

[huscat]

What exactly are you trying to do?

I suggested the ARC-1210 thinking you would mount the drives in the empty optical bay, and just run SATA cables. If you want to attach it to the HDD bays, you have two basic routes you can go.

1. Get this (http://www.maxupgrades.com/istore/index.cfm?fuseaction=product.display&product_id=176), but it tacks on $89USD.
2. Get a different model card (they do exist, and are actually more common; it needs an SFF-8087 port instead of the 4x SATA ports on the ARC-1210). The iPass cable end that attaches to the logic board is an SFF-8087 (internal MiniSAS connector).

I think a different card would be less expensive, and certainly a cleaner installation (less cable to contend with).

Please post the details as to location for the drives, drive count desired,...

I was wanting to have the 4 drive bays hooked to the card.

I ordered a 2.26 8 core and a couple of W5580's. The 5590's were $1150 each and the 5580's were only $650 each so I didn't think the extra $1000 was worth it.

I was wanting to put a RAID card in it to run the 4 drive bays and I was probably going to buy a few of those Intel X25-M 160GB drives to put in it.

One stray questions...... A single proc hackintosh based on a Gigabyte X58 board running the same chip overclocked to around 3.8 or 3.9 would yield what kind of Geekbench score theoretically?

[huscat]

By the way how many more damn posts do I have to make before I can email people on here?

[nanofrog]

I was wanting to have the 4 drive bays hooked to the card.

I ordered a 2.26 8 core and a couple of W5580's. The 5590's were $1150 each and the 5580's were only $650 each so I didn't think the extra $1000 was worth it.

I was wanting to put a RAID card in it to run the 4 drive bays and I was probably going to buy a few of those Intel X25-M 160GB drives to put in it.

One stray questions...... A single proc hackintosh based on a Gigabyte X58 board running the same chip overclocked to around 3.8 or 3.9 would yield what kind of Geekbench score theoretically?
Ah. The '09 MP changes things, especially if you want to use the card with the HDD bays.

You need an adapter to make the HDD bays work with any 3rd party RAID card, and it's from Maxupgrades (http://www.maxupgrades.com/istore/index.cfm?fuseaction=product.display&Product_ID=189) (adds $165USD above the cost of the card and drives).

The minimum card would be the ARC-1212 (http://www.ewiz.com/detail.php?name=ARC1212) that would be needed (4 port, using SFF-8087 to work with the adapter).

If you want to have the ability to add additional drives later, you'd want a card with additional ports (say 8 for example), and the drives can be placed in an external enclosure or in the empty optical bay.

Please note that with the '09 models, the use of the adapter with the HDD bays, causes you to loose access to the 4 SATA ports normally attached to the HDD bays. There's no cable, so you can't get access to them (the data's caried on traces on the PCB).

The ARC-1210 (uses SATA ports, not SFF-8087), can still be used, provided, you place the 4x SSD's in the empty optical bay. You can do this either with an adapter available from Maxupgrades (here (http://www.maxupgrades.com/istore/index.cfm?fuseaction=Product.display&product_id=188), use the one for 2x SSD drives for an '09 MP; you'd need 2 of them), or by making something. This would be less expensive. :D

Quite a bit actually if you DIY (not so much with 2x the ready made adapter), so it's worth considering, and you get to keep the HDD bays for use with other drives, as it still uses the ICH10R on the logic board. HINT: backup drives. ;)

You'd need to make a power adapter for the latter, but it's not that hard or expensive. You get a backplane extension cable (http://www.cooldrives.com/sainexca22ex.html), and splice the 4x SATA Power connectors to it. Please note, the data side will be attached to the logic board, so you only use this for power. But there's no modification of the original wiring to cause warranty issues. (About $16USD to make).

As per the Geekbench question, it should be faster, but I'm not sure how much, though I'd expect it to be notable. ;) But if you build a hackintosh, the information above wouldn't apply, and it's easier to do RAID installations in PC systems. No strange adapters, and no EFI firmware to deal with. You stick with BIOS, but you do have to make sure the card has drivers for OS X. Areca cards would still work, and are one of the best companies for RAID cards. They're really hard to beat for the $$$ given the features and performance you get.

[gugucom]

A couple of questions:

so Cinebench is the best Mac performance test?
Tutor built a Hackintosh with a single Xeon that was OC'd and it beat some of the dual proc machines? Is that what you are saying?

Yes, I think rendering is the most taxing task for a multi core machine with high bandwidth and cinebench is one benchmark appropriate for that.

http://forums.macrumors.com/showthread.php?t=766942

This is Tutor's thread on the use of his original CPUs.

http://forums.macrumors.com/showpost.php?p=7942923&postcount=10

This is Tutor's post including Geekbench scores of his W5580

http://forums.macrumors.com/showpost.php?p=8726241&postcount=13

This is how I did the three SSD.

[huscat]

I need thermal pads to put on top of the chips?

[nanofrog]

I need thermal pads to put on top of the chips?
It's not for the CPU's, but the Voltage Regulators beside the socket (still makes contact with the Cooling tower with naked CPU's).

The new parts have the Inegrated Heat Sink, and change the height of the cooler to the top of the Voltage Regulators by almost 2.0mm (1.82mm or so)If the thermal contact is broken, you'd burn them up, and need a new board.

So you need thermal paste for the CPU's, and a thermal gap material to make contact between the Voltage Regs and the copper surface of the Cooling Tower to keep them cool enough to prevent them from being damaged.

Maybe gugucom (hint, hint :p) has a pic of the daughterboard without the CPU's added (cooler missing) to show what I'm describing. ;)

[gugucom]

Maybe gugucom (hint, hint :p) has a pic of the daughterboard without the CPU's added (cooler missing) to show what I'm describing. ;)

Actually I have no pic of the tray, but you cannot see the padding there.

http://images.anandtech.com/reviews/mac/MacProNehalem/heatsink2.jpg

But Anand published a picture of the heat sink which shows the padding in pink. You just have to add 2 mm more padding there.

http://img137.imageshack.us/img137/1833/1001190e.th.jpg (http://img137.imageshack.us/my.php?image=1001190e.jpg)

These are the naked CPUs.

[nanofrog]

Thanks gugucom for the pics. They help a lot. :)

I didn't know you used an adhesive type, as I've gotten it without it, especially the silicon rubber + boron nitride based material (it's tacky enough it doesn't require an adhesive, so long as the parts surfaces are clean).

[artivideo.nl]

Does this mean that we can still expect a minor Mac pro update for the Octa from 2.93 to 3.33 GHz before we get the 6 and 12 cores next year?

[gugucom]

Does this mean that we can still expect a minor Mac pro update for the Octa from 2.93 to 3.33 GHz before we get the 6 and 12 cores next year?

There is no reason to believe that. Apple have said that this year there will be no more product upgrade and two in one quarter would be unprecedented.

[artivideo.nl]

ok missed that message :-) How is the speed bumb between 2.93 and 3.33 GHz ??? I need a Mac pro for editing AVC-I-100 .

[gugucom]

ok missed that message :-) How is the speed bumb between 2.93 and 3.33 GHz ??? I need a Mac pro for editing AVC-I-100 .

Actually I have no idea, because I upgraded a 2,26 GHz octad. I never ran the original machine but compared to my 2006 X5365 octad it is approximately 50% faster. If you want to know more you can check Tesselator's Cinebench sheet. The 2009 octad upgrade is pretty much what I have.

http://tesselator.gpmod.com/Images/_Equipment_n_Tutorials/Cinebench10_Numbers.jpg

[AZREOSpecialist]

I guess I don't understand why folks think the quad is a bad value. It gives you the best "real world" performance (see green bars in previous chart and note at the bottom). This is for applications people use the most, and at significantly less cost than a dual CPU system. Yes, the quad costs more than a comparably equipped Dell, HP, or vanilla PC, but so do the iMacs and most flavors of Mac that Apple has ever made. Why is this a surprise?

I may get some heat for this, but when comparing prices does anyone take into consideration the operating system, quality of the cases, overall design, components, etc.? There is value in all of that too. I have never seen a "cheap" PC -- even Dell, HP, and the big boys -- produce as nice and friendly a case design as the Mac Pro. I've seen the Gigabyte motherboards that folks use to make hackintoshes and "vanilla" PCs. Frankly they seem unimpressive and very inexpensively made. You can't compare something like that to Mac Pro components.

My office mate uses a Dell. I've used it on occasion. Given a choice I wouldn't touch it with a ten foot pole. They really are that bad compared to what I have to choose from on the Apple side of the fence. That's just my opinion, of course.

[nanofrog]

I guess I don't understand why folks think the quad is a bad value. It gives you the best "real world" performance (see green bars in previous chart and note at the bottom). This is for applications people use the most, and at significantly less cost than a dual CPU system. Yes, the quad costs more than a comparably equipped Dell, HP, or vanilla PC, but so do the iMacs and most flavors of Mac that Apple has ever made. Why is this a surprise?
It's due to the fact that an i7-920 is less expensive in terms of hardware than an Apple MP base Quad (W3520). The processors are the same, save the ECC functionality, and sell for the same price in quantity. Memory is the only difference, and ECC (UDIMM's in the case of DDR3) are a little more expensive than their non ECC counterparts.

The same goes for the higher clocks. It's due to Apple's insistance on higher margins than their PC vendor counterparts, such as Dell and HP.

I may get some heat for this, but when comparing prices does anyone take into consideration the operating system, quality of the cases, overall design, components, etc.? There is value in all of that too. I have never seen a "cheap" PC -- even Dell, HP, and the big boys -- produce as nice and friendly a case design as the Mac Pro. I've seen the Gigabyte motherboards that folks use to make hackintoshes and "vanilla" PCs. Frankly they seem unimpressive and very inexpensively made. You can't compare something like that to Mac Pro components.
Yes, some take the OS into account.

But don't confuse Dell's consumer systems with thier enterprise models (server/workstation systems), as they're really clean internally, and are even easier to service than MP's (more modular designs). :eek:

The consumer models are all over the place, and particularly evident in the previous systems that used IDE as the primary drive interface. It's gotten better with SATA, as the cables are smaller, and easier to route cleanly.

[pulverizer]

I just got some dual W5590s up and running. The whole system is 2 X W5590s, 32GB of RAM, 2 X 2TB Hitachis mirrored on a Mac Pro Raid Card and a GTX 285 MAc Edition.

I basically followed the Anand write-up. I didn't add any extra thermal padding and I can also confirm that modifying the plugs wasn't necessary, at least in my case.

Since I consulted this thread many times while troubleshooting I'd like to give back. I'd be happy to answer any questions or post pics.

[gugucom]

I can also confirm that modifying the plugs wasn't necessary, at least in my case.

Did your W5590s POST at the first instance?

I'm wondering if there are differences in the height of the heat spreader.

[nanofrog]

Did your W5590s POST at the first instance?

I'm wondering if there are differences in the height of the heat spreader.
From the pic you posted, the surface is just flat. It makes sense, as it's the easiest and least expensive way to finish the surface.

I'd be concerned about burning out the Voltage Regs without the use of a thermal gap material.

[VirtualRain]

Interesting... a 3.33Quad is equivalent to a 2008 2.8Octo and is actually getting close to the 2.26Octo in multithreaded tasks (while, of course, killing it in single threaded operation). :eek: :D

Given you can now get a 3.2GHz W3565 (http://www.tcmagazine.com/comments.php?shownews=30618) for just over $500, the value of buying a 2.66 and upgrading the CPU to the 3.2 (3.5GHz with Turbo) is very attractive. In effect, you can get close to the multi-threaded performance of the entry level Octo Mac Pro with vastly superior single-threaded performance, all for around $3K!

[pulverizer]

Did your W5590s POST at the first instance?

I'm wondering if there are differences in the height of the heat spreader.

No post on first instance. Which is what bought me to this thread. I had actually separated the plugs from the heatsink during my troubleshooting per the suggestions in this thread. Still no joy. I ended up using a second new eight core machine as a control so I could isolate the issue. In the end, it all had to do with how I tightened down the heatsink. I ended up screwing down the screws on the side which lined up with the plug first, until i couldn't hand tighten it anymore. Then I did the same with the other two screws. I also tried to keep the heatsink level. This caused it not to boot, but the power led would flash. Then I backed off the screws about a quarter turn on each until it would boot. I also booted with just CPU A installed first, then installed CPU B.

Now that I've been successful, I can reproduce the installation with ease.

[gugucom]

I ended up screwing down the screws on the side which lined up with the plug first, until i couldn't hand tighten it anymore. Then I did the same with the other two screws.

I would probably be too scared to wreck the socket to try this. But congrats to you for making it work. Enjoy your fast Mac.

[pulverizer]

By the way, Cinebench score was 30151 and Geekbench was 16338.

[Dark Goob]

I have to say... very damn impressive, dude. The only way to one-up you would be to try and remove the IHS's hahahaha ^.^;;;

Yeah right. Maybe if I win the lottery. For now I ain't goin' near those cores! No wai! But it's good to know it's possible. Just a damn shame Apple doesn't make these things more upgradeable; the old Power Macs were easily upgradeable. Sigh. Sometimes the new Apple really ticks me off heh.

Of course, I do live near Intel. Maybe I can bribe one of their employees to sneak me some non-capped CPUs....... of course they will just tell me, "I like my job, sorry." /me shrugs

[huscat]

By the way, Cinebench score was 30151 and Geekbench was 16338.

Not that 16338 is a good Geekbench score, but that's not as good as Tutor got with his 5580's...... Am I missing something here?

[gugucom]

Tutor was running Windows-64 which is better at rendering than OS X.

[huscat]

Tutor was running Windows-64 which is better at rendering than OS X.

According to this URL:

http://browse.geekbench.ca/geekbench2/top

the 6th one down shows that he was running 64 bit Geekbench in Mac OS X and got above an 18000.

Any other theories? If you'd just do us all a favor and humor us and run yours on it we'd love to see the results....... :)

[gugucom]

I was talking about the Cinebench. With my minimum RAM config I do not expect good Geekbench scores. I may give it a try tonight just to stop the nagging.

[gugucom]

I got 15662 Geekbench with OS X 32-bit (vs 64-bit in Tutor's case) and really insufficient memory (6 GB compared to 32 GB in Tutor's). Do not expect me to buy a 64-bit Geekbench license and more RAM unless you want to sponsor it. :D

I do accept PayPal though. ;)

[Transporteur]

OS X 32 bit?
Shouldn't it be 64 bit with a '09 Pro and SnowLeo, or is it just the app that is 32 bit?

[gugucom]

OS X 32 bit?
Shouldn't it be 64 bit with a '09 Pro and SnowLeo, or is it just the app that is 32 bit?

The Geekbench 64 app costs money. I'm not prepared to pay.

[Transporteur]

Of course not. I was just curious about your 'OS X 32-bit', because Snow Leopard should be running in 64 bit mode with a '09 Mac Pro.

[dsiew81]

The Geekbench 64 app costs money. I'm not prepared to pay.

I wonder if Tutor could possible loan you his licence temporarily ... though I'm interested but not desperate to see the result.

[BeerdedOne]

I got 15662 Geekbench with OS X 32-bit (vs 64-bit in Tutor's case) and really insufficient memory (6 GB compared to 32 GB in Tutor's).

This is interesting as it is virtually identical (15690) to the score I got with my 4,1 2.66 Octo 6GB machine using geekbench x64 on Snow Leopard. Any idea if the metric is comparible between the 32 and 64-bit geekbench?

If so, it seems like there is a really huge performance penalty for 32-bit applications since we have the same amount of RAM and your machine is running at so much higher clocks.

[huscat]

This is interesting as it is virtually identical (15690) to the score I got with my 4,1 2.66 Octo 6GB machine using geekbench x64 on Snow Leopard. Any idea if the metric is comparible between the 32 and 64-bit geekbench?

If so, it seems like there is a really huge performance penalty for 32-bit applications since we have the same amount of RAM and your machine is running at so much higher clocks.

Historically Geekbench has largely divergent numbers between their 32 and 64 bit versions.

[gugucom]

BTW, if you are interested in the details, I have logged the results in. They are some pages down but you will find them easily.

[huscat]

BTW, if you are interested in the details, I have logged the results in. They are some pages down but you will find them easily.

One question, as I'm about to try my install. How do you know how hard to tighten the screws for the heatsinks? That worries me a bit as I prepare to do this.

And oh yeah, what size screw driver is it again that I need to get to take the heatsinks off?

[gugucom]

It is a 3 mm hex key. Nothing fancy this time.

Pulverizer managed to get the connectors closed by tightening the screws on the connector side first. I have never tried that technique. In my understanding you ought to bring the torque on in the most even way by diagonally moving forward and backward, but apparently there are several ways to skin the cat. I can confirm that over tightening can result to damaging your socket. Anand was having that problem and I went over the top with torque once as well. It is a matter of feeling. I cannot give you a Nm figure for a torque wrentch. In my case I could recover the damage to the little contact blades by carefully lifting them with a needle. There is obviously some scope for those little things to get out of shape and return to their previous state. But if you overdo it you may end up with some very expensive scrap. So Tutor's method of modding the connectors appears as a less risky approach to me. Take your pick.

[huscat]

It is a 3 mm hex key. Nothing fancy this time.

Pulverizer managed to get the connectors closed by tightening the screws on the connector side first. I have never tried that technique. In my understanding you ought to bring the torque on in the most even way by diagonally moving forward and backward, but apparently there are several ways to skin the cat. I can confirm that over tightening can result to damaging your socket. Anand was having that problem and I went over the top with torque once as well. It is a matter of feeling. I cannot give you a Nm figure for a torque wrentch. In my case I could recover the damage to the little contact blades by carefully lifting them with a needle. There is obviously some scope for those little things to get out of shape and return to their previous state. But if you overdo it you may end up with some very expensive scrap. So Tutor's method of modding the connectors appears as a less risky approach to me. Take your pick.

Where in the sam hell do you find the thermal padding? I can't seem to find it anywhere.

[nanofrog]

Where in the sam hell do you find the thermal padding? I can't seem to find it anywhere.
Digikey (http://search.digikey.com/scripts/DkSearch/dksus.dll?lang=en&site=US&WT.z_homepage_link=hp_go_button&KeyWords=thermal+gap+material) is one example. The .080 GP 1500 4"X4" version (BER164-ND (http://search.digikey.com/scripts/DkSearch/dksus.dll?Detail&name=BER164-ND)) would suffice quite well (2.03mm thick, and would compress nicely to the ~1.82mm you need).

You could also try Mouser (http://www.mouser.com/) and Allied Electronics (http://www.alliedelec.com/) (all 3 are US locations).

[huscat]

Digikey (http://search.digikey.com/scripts/DkSearch/dksus.dll?lang=en&site=US&WT.z_homepage_link=hp_go_button&KeyWords=thermal+gap+material) is one example. The .080 GP 1500 4"X4" version (BER164-ND (http://search.digikey.com/scripts/DkSearch/dksus.dll?Detail&name=BER164-ND)) would suffice quite well (2.03mm thick, and would compress nicely to the ~1.82mm you need).

You could also try Mouser (http://www.mouser.com/) and Allied Electronics (http://www.alliedelec.com/) (all 3 are US locations).

Do I need to remove the pink strips that come on the heatsinks when I use the new pads or just go over the existing pads?

[nanofrog]

Do I need to remove the pink strips that come on the heatsinks when I use the new pads or just go over the existing pads?
How thick are the existing pads?

If they're thick enough, you may not need to do anything (you'd want a little better than 2.0mm).

Otherwise, remove it, clean the HS surface (to get any adhesive off), and apply the new material.

[huscat]

How thick are the existing pads?

If they're thick enough, you may not need to do anything (you'd want a little better than 2.0mm).

Otherwise, remove it, clean the HS surface (to get any adhesive off), and apply the new material.

The existing pink pad on the heatsink is about the same thickness as what you told me to buy from Digikey. I assume I just cut a strip the same length and apply it to what is already there, correct?

[huscat]

The existing pink pad on the heatsink is about the same thickness as what you told me to buy from Digikey. I assume I just cut a strip the same length and apply it to what is already there, correct?

I went right over the top of the pink pad with the new stuff, in essence doubling the thickness. Right now the machine doesn't boot and there's a red light on right underneath the first hard drive bay. I think I'm close, I just can't figure out where to go from here.

[gugucom]

Your first objective should be protecting your sockets from damage. Check them and apply Tutor's connector mod to avoid excessive torque.

[nanofrog]

The existing pink pad on the heatsink is about the same thickness as what you told me to buy from Digikey. I assume I just cut a strip the same length and apply it to what is already there, correct?
If it's thick enough, you may not need to add anything. I don't know how compressable the existing material is, and it could actually put too much pressure on the Voltage regs, breaking the solder joints. Then there's the issue with the thermal conductivity with the additional thickness (the VR's get too hot anyway). Gap material isn't the most thermally efficient product out there. So making it thicker means it transfers less heat away to the heat sink.

So I'd go with one or the other, not a combination. ;) You need to get a good measurement, and keep in mind, the original material was selected for this purpose. So it's thermal conductivity is adequate for the job (I don't know what it is without knowing the exact material though. Guesses, yes, but not specifics).

I went right over the top of the pink pad with the new stuff, in essence doubling the thickness. Right now the machine doesn't boot and there's a red light on right underneath the first hard drive bay. I think I'm close, I just can't figure out where to go from here.
I'd recommend removing the thermal gap material, and apply a single layer. It could even be the cause as to why it's not posting (fan socket isn't making contact with the connector due to the extensive thickness, if it's not compressible enough).

Check the connector, and follow gugucom's advice about Tutor's mod of the connector to make it work. Check the pins for damage, while you're at it. Just be extremely careful.

Good luck. :)

[huscat]

Well, as it turns out..... I wasn't waiting long enough for the machine to chime..... so it boots fine and shows 3.19ghz. However, I think the processor/memory riser card is defective as no matter whether it's the new procs or the originals, it shows some red lights showing bad memory DIMMs so I think I gotta take it to the apple store. Hopefully since it was a refurb, they won't bitch about my little plastic connectors being broken off...... wish me luck.

[bozz2006]

try re-seating the DIMMs before you take it in. They could be loose. that's a fairly common occurrence in the older machines, not sure about the 09s though.

[gugucom]

Well, as it turns out..... I wasn't waiting long enough for the machine to chime..... so it boots fine and shows 3.19ghz. However, I think the processor/memory riser card is defective as no matter whether it's the new procs or the originals, it shows some red lights showing bad memory DIMMs so I think I gotta take it to the apple store. Hopefully since it was a refurb, they won't bitch about my little plastic connectors being broken off...... wish me luck.

You should be aware that the sockets provide direct access to the memory slots. So besides the chance of faulty RAM some pins in your sockets could be damaged. Apple may take this a bit ungracious.

http://img97.imageshack.us/img97/7719/bildschirmfoto20091111u.png (http://img97.imageshack.us/i/bildschirmfoto20091111u.png/)

Here you see a block diagram how memory is directly connected to the CPU sockets. So if a few socket pins get disabled you can end up with malfunctioning RAM.

http://images.anandtech.com/reviews/mac/MacProNehalem/borkedsocket.jpg

This how bad pins look. Some times they are recoverable with a needle and a magnifying glas. There are 1366 of the little buggers per CPU and no clamp to protect them. Fat chance to bend 'em.

http://images.anandtech.com/reviews/mac/MacProNehalem/borkedsocket2.jpg

These are from Anand's article. They seem to be unrepairable. Sometimes they just get out of shape and you can prod them back.

[gugucom]

Thanks to a sponsor I have Geekbench2-64 now. I was getting 18320 high score with 12 GB 1066 MHz RAM and the GT120. When I tried fitting a flashed 4870 to get better graphics scores my 10.6.2 install would not boot any more.

I have booted SL DVD and repaired the partition and the permissions. There was a lot of repair indicated. On reboot OS X freezes and tells me Finder was terminated unexpectedly. I cannot get this to unfreeze.

So currently I'm out of OS X and my MP4,1 runs only Win7. Geekbench scores are lower there, slightly above 16,000 if I remember right. I need to find out what is screwing up the OS X. It could be the 4870 or the 10.6.2 update I did yesterday, or both.

More later

[huscat]

I got the replacement computer from Apple, put the procs in and it worked easily. My only problem now is for some reason the drive out of my Hackintosh running Chameleon won't boot my Mac Pro. It keeps kernel panicking. So I'm just a bit at a loss to figure out how to get my user data over to the new machine.

I tried to install fresh over the top of it it and it didn't fix it. I tried to use the Migration Utility to move my stuff to a new drive, and it does the same kernel panic after it's done so it must be moving whatever is wrong.

Anyone have an idea about how to get all my data over to a new drive without it crashing?

[frimple]

I got the replacement computer from Apple, put the procs in and it worked easily. My only problem now is for some reason the drive out of my Hackintosh running Chameleon won't boot my Mac Pro. It keeps kernel panicking. So I'm just a bit at a loss to figure out how to get my user data over to the new machine.

I tried to install fresh over the top of it it and it didn't fix it. I tried to use the Migration Utility to move my stuff to a new drive, and it does the same kernel panic after it's done so it must be moving whatever is wrong.

Anyone have an idea about how to get all my data over to a new drive without it crashing?

No, also this sounds like a great topic for a new thread.

[nanofrog]

I got the replacement computer from Apple, put the procs in and it worked easily. My only problem now is for some reason the drive out of my Hackintosh running Chameleon won't boot my Mac Pro. It keeps kernel panicking. So I'm just a bit at a loss to figure out how to get my user data over to the new machine.

I tried to install fresh over the top of it it and it didn't fix it. I tried to use the Migration Utility to move my stuff to a new drive, and it does the same kernel panic after it's done so it must be moving whatever is wrong.

Anyone have an idea about how to get all my data over to a new drive without it crashing?
I wouldn't think a hack drive would boot in a Mac, as the patching (Chameleon) is designed to make OS X think a PC is a Mac. It's likely interfering with the boot process on the MP. If you boot off of a separate OS X disk, you might be able to mount the hack drive, and transfer files.

Otherwise, you'd have to put it back in the hack, connect the systems, and transfer it that way (network cable, FW,...).

[huscat]

didn't work either as it must have brought over the same "hack" as it kernel panics as well.

[nanofrog]

didn't work either as it must have brought over the same "hack" as it kernel panics as well.
You can't copy everything. Just the pertinent data (i.e. iTunes, email, specific application data,....), that's not part of the OS. The settings should be transferable though.

[huscat]

You can't copy everything. Just the pertinent data (i.e. iTunes, email, specific application data,....), that's not part of the OS. The settings should be transferable though.

There are four options in Migration Assistant, which of them DON'T we transfer over?

[nanofrog]

There are four options in Migration Assistant, which of them DON'T we transfer over?
I was thinking of manual file transfer, rather than the assistant, as I'm not sure of all of the files that would be copied. (I only recall 3 possibilities with Migration Assistant, and none of them allowing for the level of selective control you need).

Worst case, you may have to transfer settings by hand (write them down, and manually enter them in the new system).

Given your situation, this isn't really a bad thing, as it will prevent any of the hack patching to be transferred to the new MP.

Sorry if it's not going to be super simple, but it will work, and get things like your iTunes data transferred. Things like applications, just install them to the new system, and transfer the associated data (saved work).

[huscat]

24GB RAM, two SSDs striped as my boot drive, clean install of 10.6.2 only getting score of 17921. I have two W5580's installed. What gives here? My score is slower than people with a 2.9 8 core.

[Transporteur]

Do SSDs and the amount of RAM really affect the score?

From what I understood, Geekbench just marks the raw processor speed plus the memory bandwidth, the actual amount of memory should not affect the score, either does the speed of the boot disk.

[gugucom]

I do get 18,440 now with W5590s and SL k64. It seems that Tutor had another trick up his sleeve or RAM does have an effect.

[Tutor]

Clean up

[nanofrog]

Processors differ in performance even though they carry the same nominal speed designation. I have built 4 systems with overclocked 2.66 Ghz rated i7's and not one of them has the same capability as another one. One is stable at 3.9 Ghz, another at 4.1 Ghz, another at 4.2 Ghz and the fourth at 4.4 Ghz. Moreover, their Cinebench 10 scores do not evenly correspond to their relative speeds - go figure. I've been experimenting with using water cooling in my 8 core Mac Pro system. That may have allowed my system to achieve the most recent higher geekbench score (18791) that I've posted. Before anyone asks, I'm using modified Masscool 7WA002L Water Coolers ( http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835150097 ) for all of my systems. My sleeves are almost bare.
I'd like to see that. Pics please. :D

[Tutor]

Clean up

[Tutor]

Clean up

[huscat]

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=130372159327

I have done a few of these for people so now I'm going to go ahead and build them up since I'm getting so many requests.

Chris
Dealstar
913-317-8511

[nanofrog]

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=130372159327

I have done a few of these for people so now I'm going to go ahead and build them up since I'm getting so many requests.

Chris
Dealstar
913-317-8511
You should include all the OEM parts with the system (CPU's,...), as they'd be needed in the event of an Apple Care claim. Those new processors would disappear, and they expect a set to be installed (in this case E5520's).

[huscat]

You should include all the OEM parts with the system (CPU's,...), as they'd be needed in the event of an Apple Care claim. Those new processors would disappear, and they expect a set to be installed (in this case E5520's).

What do you mean those new processors would disappear? I suppose I could include them, but I had the sale of them built into my price at $5999. I thought I would keep a set and handle the AppleCare claims for the clients, and that way I'd only have to keep one set rather than a 1:1 ratio for each one I upgrade. I can't imagine having a claim honestly since my own machine has yet to crash once in over 5 months since doing the upgrade. In effect, I'm facilitating the Apple warranty for the client.

[Eithanius]

What do you mean those new processors would disappear? I suppose I could include them, but I had the sale of them built into my price at $5999. I thought I would keep a set and handle the AppleCare claims for the clients, and that way I'd only have to keep one set rather than a 1:1 ratio for each one I upgrade. I can't imagine having a claim honestly since my own machine has yet to crash once in over 5 months since doing the upgrade. In effect, I'm facilitating the Apple warranty for the client.

To my knowledge, Apple has a database of Mac Pro system serial numbers matching relevant processor tray serial numbers. If you keep that particular set to mix and match multiple systems, I believe Apple may find out the discrepancies and reject any warranty claims.

[nanofrog]

What do you mean those new processors would disappear?
Someone buys one, and the faster chips are installed. But the system breaks during Apple Care, and they're told to bring/send it in to Apple (i.e. you're not involved). They end up replacing the machine. The new one will have the E5520's in it, as Apple DOES NOT transfer any user add-ons that weren't part of the original system (base or CTO).

Things like additional RAM, HDD's, PCIe cards would be lost, and this will definitely be the case with different CPU'S (you can't even tell by looking in the system, and it may not even work, which they'd never check for). Even Apple states that users have to pull their upgrades for this reason.

I suppose I could include them, but I had the sale of them built into my price at $5999. I thought I would keep a set and handle the AppleCare claims for the clients, and that way I'd only have to keep one set rather than a 1:1 ratio for each one I upgrade. I can't imagine having a claim honestly since my own machine has yet to crash once in over 5 months since doing the upgrade. In effect, I'm facilitating the Apple warranty for the client.
If you and your customers are willing to do that, then it's a way around it. It would add time though, as you'd have to get the system physically, and go from there.

Then there's the shipping involved, as I don't know how you planned to handle that one (I presume the customer would balk at having to pay to ship it to you one way, let alone both :eek:). :(

[AZREOSpecialist]

Processors differ in performance even though they carry the same nominal speed designation. I have built 4 systems with overclocked 2.66 Ghz rated i7's and not one of them has the same capability as another one. One is stable at 3.9 Ghz, another at 4.1 Ghz, another at 4.2 Ghz and the fourth at 4.4 Ghz. Moreover, their Cinebench 10 scores do not evenly correspond to their relative speeds - go figure. I've been experimenting with using water cooling in my 8 core Mac Pro system. That may have allowed my system to achieve the most recent higher geekbench score (18791) that I've posted. Before anyone asks, I'm using modified Masscool 7WA002L Water Coolers ( http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835150097 ) for all of my systems. My sleeves are almost bare - latest does not always mean greatest.

You are over clocking a Mac Pro? How are you doing this?

[rickvanr]

You are over clocking a Mac Pro? How are you doing this?

Read what you just quoted.







Do you still need to ask that question?
He's over clocked i7's, not MPs. As for the MP, he said he may have gotten a higher score, because his system is running cooler.

[jetjaguar]

man i wish i could do this to my mac pro :(

[AZREOSpecialist]

Read what you just quoted.







Do you still need to ask that question?
He's over clocked i7's, not MPs. As for the MP, he said he may have gotten a higher score, because his system is running cooler.

Was it necessary for you to reply to my question with another question asking me whether I still needed to ask the question? That's so very useful, isn't it? When I read that a liquid cooling system was installed in a Mac Pro, I thought it was because it was being over-clocked. Thank you so very much for answering my question, you have been most helpful.

[Quad 2.5 G5 =)]

As usual the Vista64 Cinebench ist the best. This is currently with the GT120, 6GB RAM and 1 SSD, no RAID0.

But it is over 30.000, :D

I'm using the system for Movies, Handbraking, Video, Office and general entertainment. Most of my storage and the RAID is still in the old Mac.

The ODD ports are still on legacy. Im going to set them on AHCI shortly.

Of course blimming Microsoft had to de register Vista the moment I went online after pulling it over with Winclone. Not only changed the CPU and chipset, also the SSD got twice the size on this one.

CPU-Z confirms the seller's word that this is a standard D0 stepping. So I guess there will not be a great potential for bad surprises.

Es scheint, dass Sie das schnellste Xeon Mac jetzt haben. I still have the fastest PowerPC-based Macintosh on the face of the planet :) :apple:
Specs? Dual processor, dual core 2.5GHz G5 processors, 16GB of RAM, Nvidia Quadro FX4500, and two 500GB SSD 3.5" Hard Drives, and a T1 line at my dad's work ;)
P.S. Greetings from faraway Vienna, Austria..

[Tutor]

Clean up

[Transporteur]

Specs? Dual processor, dual core 2.5GHz G5 processors, 16GB of RAM, Nvidia Quadro FX4500, and two 500GB SSD 3.5" Hard Drives....

Which SSDs are you using?
Could you say something about the performance?

[Quad 2.5 G5 =)]

Which SSDs are you using?
Could you say something about the performance?

Stupid me..the SSDs I used were a pair of OCZ Colossus drives, the price..if you have to ask...
Bootup times are slashed in half, 24 seconds, give or take a few seconds.
Video encoding is a bit faster, but it is more of a CPU heavy application.
I'm sorry for giving just specs without anything to back it up :)

[Transporteur]

I know the price of those babies. :)

Hardware or software RAID?

[Quad 2.5 G5 =)]

I know the price of those babies. :)

Hardware or software RAID?

Not until I get the kit and 3 additional SSDs, I'm going for RAID10..if it supports it. :)
No, I'm not super rich..I know people who work at places..who can get discounts..

[Transporteur]

Not until I get the kit and 3 additional SSDs, I'm going for RAID10..if it supports it. :)


RAID10 won't work with 5 drives. What do you mean by "if it supports it"?

Edit:
BTW:
Es scheint, dass Sie das schnellste Xeon Mac jetzt haben.
Es ist der Mac, nicht das Mac. ;)

[Quad 2.5 G5 =)]

RAID10 won't work with 5 drives. What do you mean by "if it supports it"?

if the Mac supports it*
Well..how many drives do I need to do RAID10?

[Transporteur]

RAID10 requires at least 4 drives, but won't work with an uneven count of drives.

However, you do know that your Mac does only support two drives, which are furthermore SATA I, don't you?

[Quad 2.5 G5 =)]

RAID10 requires at least 4 drives, but won't work with an uneven count of drives.

However, you do know that your Mac does only support two drives, which are furthermore SATA I, don't you?

I do know about the SATA I limitations, but..isn't there some sort of upgrade kit for G5s?

[Transporteur]

Well, since you say that you've already got two of those drives, what's the particular reason to go for a RAID10?

[Quad 2.5 G5 =)]

Well, since you say that you've already got two of those drives, what's the particular reason to go for a RAID10?

You do have a point, but I have not decided that I even do need to have RAID, thus it does not matter what type, if I don't have it. I also have..the fastest PowerBook G4 12", it also has an SSD. :D

[Quad 2.5 G5 =)]

RAID10 won't work with 5 drives. What do you mean by "if it supports it"?

Edit:
BTW:

Es ist der Mac, nicht das Mac. ;)

It is Mac, not Mac. :)

[xarga]

I'm interested - please send me details. Thanks

[philanthrope]

Hello,

Thanks for this tread, it has enlighten me a lot.
I hope my following question won't be too bold to ask.

Do you think it would be possible to put a pair of Xeon X5650 2.66 GHz CPUs in a 8-core Nahalem 2.26Ghz MacPro?

I've already read (http://macperformanceguide.com/Reviews-MacProWestmere-MemoryBandwidth.html) that 1066Mhz are compatible (http://www.intel.com/Assets/en_US/PDF/datasheet/323369.pdf) with the Westmere CPUs. But will the rest be ok (i.e power supply, motherboard, CPU socket)?

Looking forward to your response.
:)

[feins]

im building a Mac Pro 2009 from scratch by buying part and will eventually try to assembly the whole unit. Could anyone be helpful by providing me a link to where i manage to get 2 unit of X5570 ES or W5590 ES which would provide international delivery to Malaysia. I've try eBay but anything for Xeon X5500 series wont be cheat either.:(

[hyram]

feins,

Welcome to the forums. Good luck on finding an ebay place that will ship to MY...almost impossible. What I do for ebay is have it delivered to someone stateside and then have them ship (or sometimes hand carry if ther're coming) to me. A little more costly but sometimes the only way.

Locally GagetZone can order Xeons for you, but they won't be ES's. It's the only place I've found that can source them. Thier prices are good but not great.

[bearcatrp]

Deleted.

[feins]

feins,

Welcome to the forums. Good luck on finding an ebay place that will ship to MY...almost impossible. What I do for ebay is have it delivered to someone stateside and then have them ship (or sometimes hand carry if ther're coming) to me. A little more costly but sometimes the only way.

Locally GagetZone can order Xeons for you, but they won't be ES's. It's the only place I've found that can source them. Thier prices are good but not great.

Hi hyram,

Tq for responding yes i manage to nearly get most of the part from German, UK and US to ship to Malaysia and some parts i manage to get a quite good deal. Below are the parts that i've got and some are still waiting for finalize invoice. I just got my deal for 2x W5590 for quite a good deal yesterday and its on its way.

Mac Pro 2009 Case with 980W PSU: £239.99 GBP ($381.90 USD)
Mac Pro 2009 Logic Board & UK Spec power core: £212.98 GBP ($338.88 USD)
Mac Pro 2009 Restoration DVD kit: €38.00 EUR ($27.97 USD)
24GB 6x4GB DDR3 1066 ECC Ram for Mac Pro: $570.00 USD
Xeon W5590 x2 OEM Processor: $1,850.00 USD
Mac Pro 2009 Technical and Installation document: $7.49 USD
2mm 100mm x 200mm Thermal Pad: $12.00 USD
Mac Pro 2009 Support Tray: $51.60 USD
Mac Pro 2009 8 core Processor Board: $369.53 USD
Mac Pro 2009 CPU-A heat sink: $159.35 USD
Mac Pro 2009 CPU-B heat sink: $285.10 USD
Ati 5870 for Mac: RM1,330.00 MYR

So far the amount i've spend on Parts so far are in total USD 4053.82

So mostly that's all for now hopefully i dont mess up the whole project :)

[formal]

Just wanted to chime in on this and get some feedback on the successful X5570 upgrade.

I am about to buy a few X5570 ES and put them in my 2.26Ghz 8 Core 2009 MP.

So firstly has this config been stable since setup?

Has anyone tried to remove the IHS, are they soldered?

Thanks

[Transporteur]

Has anyone tried to remove the IHS, are they soldered?


Heat-spreaders are glued to the PCB and I wouldn't recommend trying to remove them. Many people destroyed their CPU's trying to remove the HS with razor blades.

A little safer approach is to sand the HS till you reach the DIE, but again, you have to be VERY careful because if you sand too much... well I don't have to explain it, do I?

[sch8mid]

wondering why there are so many people putting so much efforts
in outdated technology in some kind of Jobs distorsion field..

if they can build a custom mac in one day that will cost about 1000 $
with better case , better airflow, better temps, 6 GB sata , esata, usb 3 , better RAM ,better graphics , better performance
with native OSX 10.6.4 and Win 7 in a double boot system
with a geekbench in the 15000 range (i 7 950)

or if you want..mhhh 19000 (i 7 Q 980x) ...(that will be my new project)

and yes... sorry..I am on a mission .... , cause after 20 years Mac i stopped right now to be treated like a complete idiot by Jobs and his shareholders.


http://forums.macrumors.com/showpost.php?p=11198876&postcount=296

[Transporteur]

wondering why there are so many people putting so much efforts
in outdated technology in some kind of Jobs distorsion field..

if they can build a custom mac in one day that...

Your not building a custom Mac, you're building a PC. Period.

And the reason why so many people by and maintain their Mac Pro's is fairly simple, because maybe they don't want a PC, regardless of the performance (which is quite impressive for what you've build for less than 1000 bucks, I have to admit).

[sch8mid]

Your not building a custom Mac, you're building a PC. Period.

And the reason why so many people by and maintain their Mac Pro's is fairly simple, because maybe they don't want a PC, regardless of the performance (which is quite impressive for what you've build for less than 1000 bucks, I have to admit).


Interesting interpretation - can you tell me the difference ?
if I look in my system profiler there is no evidence of a PC .
The only difference I see is that theres a faster Mac with all the features Apple couldn´t deliver , with BLURAy, faster RAM (1600) 3 PCI e HiSpeed slots, 6 GB Sata, USB 3 and a 3d Gen ATI HD 5770 at a fraction of the price with superiour performance and able to boot 2 OS natively.
,... isn`t it :-)
and if I look at my 64 bit 10.6.4 boottime I see a spinning wheel for 8 seconds..

EDIT: 6 seconds :-)

Isn´t it nice.

If you mean the design experience and haptic of an Apple case designed 7 years ago , oh... i am a happy camper with
my Lian-Li aluminium case ( design-wise) ..simple..clean ..perfect air flow...manufactured to highest standards.

Period.

[feins]

Interesting interpretation - can you tell me the difference ?
if I look in my system profiler there is no evidence of a PC .
The only difference I see is that theres a faster Mac with all the features Apple couldn´t deliver , with BLURAy, faster RAM (1600) 3 PCI e HiSpeed slots, 6 GB Sata, USB 3 and a 3d Gen ATI HD 5770 at a fraction of the price with superiour performance and able to boot 2 OS natively.
,... isn`t it :-)
and if I look at my 64 bit 10.6.4 boottime I see a spinning wheel for 8 seconds..

EDIT: 6 seconds :-)

Isn´t it nice.

If you mean the design experience and haptic of an Apple case designed 7 years ago , oh... i am a happy camper with
my Lian-Li aluminium case ( design-wise) ..simple..clean ..perfect air flow...manufactured to highest standards.

Period.

Previously i build my PC with the so call top notch parts 2 years ago with the respected price listed below.

Silverstone Case TJ10 USD330
Gigabyte Odin GT 800W true power PSU USD190
5 Silverstone heavy duty fan with control for fan speed USD145
5PCs Silverstone high quality Sata Cable USD40
Asus Rampage Formula mobo USD330
8GB 1066 DDR2 high performance rams USD240
Creative Platinum Xfi Fatal1ty Champion sound card with front console USD160
Nvidia GTX 280 Display which is the highest can get during the time USD770
5Pcs SATA 2 320GB HDD for Raid5 performance USD300
Intel Q9550 2.83 Processor OC to 3.2 USD330
Swiftech Radiator USD50
Thermal Take Bigwater Water cooling system USD110

Come out to a price tag of USD2665

Running windows7 no issue but will eventually reformat the system due to thing getting slow after few month of usage and viruses and Trojans are an issue as well.

Running Mac i cant import video into iMovie i don't know why so it turns out running Mac is just to show off that i can run Mac on a PC so no big deal at all.

So if compare it doesn't come cheap if u r going to some quality parts.

[fabriciom]

Would stepping SLBGE work with a nehalem mac? Also do I need to get 1333 ram? I currently have a 2,26.

-Thanks

[nanofrog]

Would stepping SLBGE work with a nehalem mac? Also do I need to get 1333 ram? I currently have a 2,26.

-Thanks
Yes, the SLBGE will work (X5590 @ D0 steppings).

But the firmware is fixed at 1066MHz rather than follows the SPD timings when the memory controller could utilize the faster clocked RAM (1333MHz RAM will function, but downclock to 1066MHz). So your existing RAM will work. If you need more, go for cost/capacity (which ever is cheaper between 1066 and 1333 sticks/kits jto get you where you need to be).

[fabriciom]

Yes, the SLBGE will work (X5590 @ D0 steppings).

But the firmware is fixed at 1066MHz rather than follows the SPD timings when the memory controller could utilize the faster clocked RAM (1333MHz RAM will function, but downclock to 1066MHz). So your existing RAM will work. If you need more, go for cost/capacity (which ever is cheaper between 1066 and 1333 sticks/kits jto get you where you need to be).

Hi, thanks for your reply. Would you happened to know how "reliable" these ES chips are? There is a seller from hong kong saying that this ES chips (SLBGE) are the same as final chips. What do you think?

-Thanks

[nanofrog]

Hi, thanks for your reply. Would you happened to know how "reliable" these ES chips are? There is a seller from hong kong saying that this ES chips (SLBGE) are the same as final chips. What do you think?

-Thanks
SLBGE is the letter code used on the OEM and retail versions of the X5590 sold by Intel (only letter code that showed up on ark.intel.com; so no different steppings, ...). So they may be the same in this case.

But generally speaking, ES parts have bugs in them that were solved before the final release (whether or not they're an issue, can really only be determined by testing, as the errata <bugs> typically aren't listed anywhere; on the design .pdf's if it is - it's internal data they tend not to want public, and ES chips aren't supposed to be sold).

[fabriciom]

Have any of the users of these ES chips on here reported any problems with the chips? My mac is for music production. Im looking to get more power to be able to run more plugs at the same time in logic. Not sure if I should get one of these ES chips. Also I have the system on 24/7, as I also download stuff.

[feins]

Heat-spreaders are glued to the PCB and I wouldn't recommend trying to remove them. Many people destroyed their CPU's trying to remove the HS with razor blades.

A little safer approach is to sand the HS till you reach the DIE, but again, you have to be VERY careful because if you sand too much... well I don't have to explain it, do I?

Ok finally all the parts had arrived after i come back from China for nearly a month of holiday and there is a question. Since the CPU come with IHS so how height does the IHS have increased so I've notice that the Processor Board CPU spacer can be adjusted so if i know the height of the IHS have increased i can adjusted the spacer so that it wont damage the Pins if i've accident over tighten them am i right?

Some more question about the Thermal Pad on the Heatsink which suppose to cool down the row of regulator should i just add another 2mm thermal pad or i remove the original pad, as i notice that the original pad are indeed 2mm so if remove then I should laid 2 layer of thermal pad on it am i right?

[dondog]

I purchased from bay 2x Intel Xeon E5345 Quad Core 2.33 GHz MATCHED PAIR CPU. They were Confidential Engineering Samples and one had the markings:

Intel Confidential
QWTW ES Costa Rica
imc '05 HH80563QJ0538M
3720A955 e4

The other had similar markings.

I used them to replace the original 2.66 GHz processors in my Mac Pro 1,1 (2006). Upon startup I got a "panic" the first line of which read:

panic (cpu B caller 0x295aab): "Should have 2 Cores, but only found 1 for Die 2"
@/SourceCache/xnu/xnu-1504.7.4/osfak / i386/cpu_threads.c:1118

After replacing my old cpu's my machine runs fine.

Any suggestions????

Please excuse me but I posted this two days ago on another thread but thought it might be ok to post in this thread also since someone here was asking about using ES chips in the Mac Pro.

[nanofrog]

I purchased from bay 2x Intel Xeon E5345 Quad Core 2.33 GHz MATCHED PAIR CPU. They were Confidential Engineering Samples and one had the markings:

Intel Confidential
QWTW ES Costa Rica
imc '05 HH80563QJ0538M
3720A955 e4

The other had similar markings.

I used them to replace the original 2.66 GHz processors in my Mac Pro 1,1 (2006). Upon startup I got a "panic" the first line of which read:

panic (cpu B caller 0x295aab): "Should have 2 Cores, but only found 1 for Die 2"
@/SourceCache/xnu/xnu-1504.7.4/osfak / i386/cpu_threads.c:1118

After replacing my old cpu's my machine runs fine.

Any suggestions????

Please excuse me but I posted this two days ago on another thread but thought it might be ok to post in this thread also since someone here was asking about using ES chips in the Mac Pro.
Bad chip is likely (these get abused during testing, and may have been overheated and damaged the transistors on the die = not fully functional any longer).

I hope you can return them.

[feins]

Can anyone provide me a guide on how replace the W5590 on the the Mac Pro 2009 Processor board. Since the original Mac Processor doesn't come with IHS and the normal Intel Xeon have the IHS so how much high do i need to justify so that i wont be over tighten the heatsink and damage the socket 1366 pins.

[nanofrog]

Can anyone provide me a guide on how replace the W5590 on the the Mac Pro 2009 Processor board. Since the original Mac Processor doesn't come with IHS and the normal Intel Xeon have the IHS so how much high do i need to justify so that i wont be over tighten the heatsink and damage the socket 1366 pins.
Here (http://www.anandtech.com/show/2800/10).

There's also another How-To somewhere in MR (look for a couple of users known as Tutor and gugucom).

[feins]

Here (http://www.anandtech.com/show/2800/10).

There's also another How-To somewhere in MR (look for a couple of users known as Tutor and gugucom).

TQ my friend,

I've already gone through what Anandtech website but they dont go in to deep on how high does the IHS actually is and the thickness of the non IHS processor compare to with IHS.

But today after some research i've found out that the W5590 IHS was increased by app 1.7mm compare to the non IHS and the processor actually sink by 0.5mm into the tray after tightening where i got this reading by compare to a X58 board with a 1366 Clamp as the original Spacer was 5mm in height so by placing 2pcs of washer which is a total of 1.7mm increase in height and come to a total of 6.7mm which was perfect and wont damage the pin even if over tighten as it will not go any more where the washer has stop the tightening :)

[feins]

Need help,

I've got all the part and assembly the Mac pro early 2009 I'm now facing the issue of no post. There is no indication CPU fan are spinning and no ram led light up. But just no post at all someone pls help.

[fabriciom]

Need help,

I've got all the part and assembly the Mac pro early 2009 I'm now facing the issue of no post. There is no indication CPU fan are spinning and no ram led light up. But just no post at all someone pls help.

Make sure the connector in the heat sink/fan is connected to the base. I think there is a problem where it doesnt reach and the motherboard thinks the cpu is dead and does not turn on. Read back on this thread.

P.S. What CPU did you buy and from where?

[feins]

Make sure the connector in the heat sink/fan is connected to the base. I think there is a problem where it doesnt reach and the motherboard thinks the cpu is dead and does not turn on. Read back on this thread.

P.S. What CPU did you buy and from where?

I bought retail W5590 which highly it's not the processor.
I also cut the connector and I check both heatsink fan are spinning.
I try everything by just test both processor on CPU A socket but no luck :(.
Anyway to test if it's the back panel board or powesupply issue?

Any guru can help me troubleshoot this as I'm totally lost.
The power indicator light up but no chime and no display.

[feins]

Any Guru out there can confirm me that those who success upgrade to the W5590 is using the revision A back panel board or Revision B board as i notice there are 2 version of Back Panel board. Pls help need the info urgently.

[gugucom]

My ES chips run without any faults. The only problem is the higher thermal rating of the CPUs compared to the standard. It makes the booster fans run above 1,900 rpm all the time. I can run the CPUs idle with less than 1% load and I can never get the fans under 1900. Tutor used water cooling but I'm a bit of a chicken when it comes to water cooling because it is bloody risky to get it wrong. I would only use a certified system that is fool proven.

[feins]

My ES chips run without any faults. The only problem is the higher thermal rating of the CPUs compared to the standard. It makes the booster fans run above 1,900 rpm all the time. I can run the CPUs idle with less than 1% load and I can never get the fans under 1900. Tutor used water cooling but I'm a bit of a chicken when it comes to water cooling because it is bloody risky to get it wrong. I would only use a certified system that is fool proven.

Dear gugucom,

So could you confirm that your back panel board are Ver 1 or Ver 2 because i notice that Applecomponents.com had 2 version but the one i got is Ver 1 which part# 661-4996. But the ver 2 EEE CU7 is part# 661-5444.

I dont know what's the different in both Version of Back Panel Board but both are for Mac Pro 2009.

Second question gugucom could you help to confirm is the PSU PWROK diagnostic light will light up by its own or only light up once u press the Diagnostic button, because mine doesn't light up at all so i dont know is it normal or not or there is an issue with the power supply.

[gugucom]

ATM I cannot stop the machine but I will see if I can do some checking later for you.

[feins]

ATM I cannot stop the machine but I will see if I can do some checking later for you.

TQ very much gugucom for all the help.

I manage to get it boot its was a faulty HDD slot on Slot 1:mad:. Now Im temporary using Slot 2 and 3 since i had two HDD and setting up Raid 0.

I've been toying it around since this afternoon till now and its already been up and running for 10 hours and it was stable like a rock. The only fan sound i can hear was my 5870 all other fan cant even notice that its there compare to my previous PC counterpart the fan are spinning like a tornado. Really love it. Only issue is that the System Serial was missing as predicted.:o

[fabriciom]

Would be nice if someone wrote a guide. Since there is so much information spread around. I like the above idea of using washers as to no over tight the CPUs. But Im not to clear on it. Also what type of thermal paste is the best, etc.

[feins]

Would be nice if someone wrote a guide. Since there is so much information spread around. I like the above idea of using washers as to no over tight the CPUs. But Im not to clear on it. Also what type of thermal paste is the best, etc.

Hi fabriciom you mat head here to my FB Photo album all photo and detail are there :) hope you can have a little piece of information from the start of the project until the final.

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=26683&id=100000988159185

http://i349.photobucket.com/albums/q364/feins1971/P1030538.jpg

http://i349.photobucket.com/albums/q364/feins1971/P1030500.jpg

[Fuzzb]

First of all - great thread, lots of useful info here.

I just upgraded my 2009 Mac Pro Octo from 2x Xeon E5520 (2.26) to 2x Xeon W5590 (3.33, SLBGE, D0 stepping, ES), but I've run into a stumbling block and I was wondering if anyone could help me out.

After upgrading the processors, putting it all back together and switching on, the machine powers up, the fans spin, but the machine doesn't post. There's no video output, and I don't see the grey boot screen. The status light is solid white (i.e. no flashing), and none of the red LEDs are lit on the logic board. The only way to turn off the machine is to hold down the power button for 8 secs, i.e. it is unresponsive. When I press the caps lock key it doesn't illuminate either. I've also pressed the diagnostics button on the motherboard and the LEDs are solid green.

After noticing it didn't post correctly, I took everything apart to check that no pins were bent on the socket and that the heatsink fan connectors were correctly seated. I verified that no pins were bent in either socket, nor were the pins used to connect the CPU riser board to the logic board. The CPU fans were definitely running as I gently inserted a plastic rod and it caught the fan.

I also tried resetting the SMC by disconnecting the power cable, pressing the power button to discharge and taking out the battery for over an hour, but still the problem persists.

I'm at a loss to explain why it's not working. Does anyone have any ideas?

Thanks!

[Fuzzb]

OK, I've done some more troubleshooting:

1. Tried each W5590 CPU in the CPU A socket. According to the service manual, it's possible to use one CPU. Both CPUs booted fine and I was able to get to the OSX desktop.

2. After the above worked, I thought there may have been a connection problem or something so I tried both CPUs together again, but they didn't work. The machine just hung at the EFI init stage.

3. At this point I thought there may be a problem with the CPU B socket, so I tried my original E5520's together and the machine booted fine.

Right now I've concluded that the CPU board is working perfectly, but there is something wrong with one or both of the W5590 CPUs which is annoying!

What might be wrong with the CPUs which would stop them working together, but work perfectly fine individually? The QPI interface?

Is there any way for me to diagnose the problem in software, given that I can boot to the desktop when running one CPU?

[Transporteur]

What might be wrong with the CPUs which would stop them working together, but work perfectly fine individually? The QPI interface?


Are you 100% sure that you've got 55xx series CPUs instead of 35xx?

Seems a little odd that 55xxs don't work together properly.

[Fuzzb]

Are you 100% sure that you've got 55xx series CPUs instead of 35xx?

Seems a little odd that 55xxs don't work together properly.

Yep, I'm 100% sure (unless it has been re-marked).

Here's a photo of the CPU:

http://img827.imageshack.us/img827/6857/w5590cpu.jpg (http://img827.imageshack.us/i/w5590cpu.jpg/)