SSD vs 3.33 Westmere upgrade?

Looking to do my next upgrade on my 2010 Mac Pro 3.2 Quad w/ 24GB RAM 1333 running at 1066, 5870GPU, and the 1TB drive. Is there really that much difference going from the 3.2 to the 3.33.. Since I have enough RAM, is the main bottleneck going to be my processor or my drives in terms of performance?

Main uses:

For work: 2D 1080p Animation. Some Photoshop.

For home: General use, HD home video editing for fun, some gaming.

Power is more important to me than cores as my Adobe work software doesn't utilize more than one, but if the 3.33 is much more powerful even on one core, then I would consider that the next upgrade. If it's a negligible difference, I will look to the SSD first.

At the moment I notice some timeline scrubbing can be chuggy at times. The longest waits seem to be the opening of the software, and copy/paste procedures. Mainly exporting 1080p SWFs.

I will upgrade both eventually

derbothaus said:

I know Adobe is not the best multi-core software but all the products use more than 1 core. Maybe not saving in pre-CS6 Illustrator On 1 core W3680 boosts to 3.6GHz. Unless you are running OS 8 you are using more than 1 core at all times. The 6-core is quite a bit faster than the 3.2 Quad.
Geekbench:
3.2: 10000
3.33: 14400
But still the biggest boost to your general happiness would be SSD 1st. Then get the hex. The you can consider yourself maxed out. IF you can't do what you need with this then something is most likely wrong with the software or settings. What app anyway? If you are using premier without Nvidia GPU it will run 500% slower.

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Sorry, I should have been more specific. I am using Flash CS5.5... From what I have read Flash doesn't support multiple CPU's and maxes out at 3GB of RAM. Unlike PS it doesn't give you options to increase the memory available. In general, more Ram installed can help but only in the realm of not bogging Flash down with anything else you have open at the time. It's a bit crash happy to be honest, I can open 5 files at a time before Flash gives me the "out of memory" warning and then crash to desktop. Painted backgrounds can get large in some shows, and Flash doesn't deal with it well. The software will drop frames like a sieve when exporting anything other than an SWF. i.e.:Quicktime mov's. It's a real headache.

Researched a lot, and this is the most that I can find regarding Flash coupled with my own experience. It's what the industry uses, so I try to optimize it and my workstation the best I can. Any little bit helps.

Posted this so I can make an educated decision on what may or may not allow my work to be more efficient and enjoyable.

Amethyst said:

Your situation, I think SSD before Hex.

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Took your advice and went with the SSD. 256GB Crucial C400 for @$200. I was a bit concerned as I read afterwards that the Samsung 830 is the preferred one for Macs by many. Although it is a larger investment for perhaps negligible differences in the real world. ?

Drive should be in soon, curious to see how an SSD performs.

I'll wait on the Westmere for the time being.

Loa said:

Hello,

You know that going from 3.2 to 3.33 is a 4% difference, right? And that unless you're going to use all cores (which you said you weren't), it's meaningless?

I'm really wondering why you're even considering it.

For the SSD, I can't help you regarding the animation software, but it'll be useless with PS with the RAM you have.

Loa

Click to expand...

I understood it was a bigger difference than that... considering Ram speed, L3 cache(?), Cpu clock..etc. Whether I would notice that in my situation though you may be correct.

To answer your question, I am considering it because I like to get the most speed and power out of the equipment I have...at the best value/dollar.