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Which components would you/have you upgraded in your Mac?

  • CPU

    Votes: 168 39.4%
  • RAM

    Votes: 346 81.2%
  • Video (if applicable, i.e. PowerMacs)

    Votes: 163 38.3%
  • Other internal upgrades (hard drive(s), optical, PCI, etc)

    Votes: 222 52.1%
  • External upgrades (USB, Firewire, external SATA, etc...)

    Votes: 204 47.9%
  • I don't upgrade: I buy new ones.

    Votes: 27 6.3%

  • Total voters
    426

psycho bob

macrumors 6502a
Oct 25, 2003
639
6
Leeds, England
thogs_cave said:
Unlike the x86 architecture, which is only how old? Oh, that's right: It dates back to the 1970's! (I just couldn't resisit. Yes, I know there have beern many changes, but if we're going to date the architecture, let's be accurate, shall we?)

Sorry I don't really see the argument. I'm not talking about platforms just different generations of chips. The G5 (PPC970) was born out of the need to combat the Pentium 4. It's more efficient RISC (although it wasn't efficient by most RISC standards) allowed it to compete at AMD style clockspeeds with what on paper were much faster chips. The problem was basing it on what was an already superseded server chip designed for very specific more limited uses would never translate well in to an all conquering desktop CPU.

AMD stole a march with its Athlon T-Bird design in June 2000 and really set the benchmarks for x86 until the P4 achieved ridiculous clock speeds. Initially the G4 was competitive with these but it just didn't scale quickly enough. The G5 was bascially born out of a server design created during this period. Expecting it to be competitive with what in 2006/2007 will be Intel's new Athlon T-Bird is stupid. G5 development essentially stopped 2 years ago when Apple pulled investment we have no idea what it could have gone on to do. IBM themselves are now using Power 6 for their servers and by all accounts it is a phenominal piece of engineering but it cannot be compared to any of the chips Apple will now be using.

x86 is such a generic name which basically only accurately described the first generation of this type of processor. Today if we go by name there is no longer an x86 processor as each company has trademarked its own name for their type of CPU. Although x86 compatible todays modern CPU's cannot really be compared to the first products to be produced of this type in 1978. Technology has moved on so quickly each major upgrade is essentially a new type of chip that just happens to be backwards compatible.
 

p0intblank

macrumors 68030
Sep 20, 2005
2,548
2
New Jersey
This is awesome. :D It makes me want to do it with one, but the Core 2 Duo chips are too expensive yet. And plus, I don't even have a Mac mini. This is still really cool news, though.

Okay... so who voted this Negative? There is always someone. :rolleyes:
 

macidiot

macrumors 6502a
Aug 13, 2002
815
0
MacSA said:
A 20% speed boost over a 1.5ghz Core Solo? :p

OK, using the base mini, it's more than 20%. But then your spending >$400 on a cpu upgrade on a $600 computer.

If your price sensitive enough to buy a $600 computer what makes you think spending $400 on an upgrade makes sense?

In other words, you could have just spend $200 more to get the 1.66 dual core in the first place and would get a significant boost over the 1.5 single core.
 

Moe

macrumors regular
Apr 27, 2003
138
0
A 512MB Core Solo Mini with 60GB hard drive and 8X dual-layer Superdrive lists for $649 retail. Add $170 for 2GB of memory, $423 for a 2.16GHz Core 2 Duo (list price), $420 for a 500GB MiniStack, $300 for an ElGato EyeTV 500 (or VBox, Saseem or Fusion tuner if you're going to run XP), and you have quite a nice little HTPC for under $2,000.

Yes, the 1.66GHz Core Duo is enough for 1080i HDTV and barely for 1080p QTHD trailers. Where that 2.16GHz Core 2 Duo, 30% faster than 2.0GHz Core Duo (2.166/2.0x120%), and 57% faster than 1.66GHz Core Duo, will show big savings in time is when doing tasks that take hours, such as converting DVDs and MPEG2 .ts files to high-quality H.264. And no doubt it will improve playback of those tough scenes in 30 fps 1080p QTHD trailers.
 

MS bulldog

macrumors regular
Apr 19, 2006
108
0
macidiot said:
OK, using the base mini, it's more than 20%. But then your spending >$400 on a cpu upgrade on a $600 computer.

If your price sensitive enough to buy a $600 computer what makes you think spending $400 on an upgrade makes sense?

In other words, you could have just spend $200 more to get the 1.66 dual core in the first place and would get a significant boost over the 1.5 single core.


so is there any danger (heat wise) of upgrading the core solo minis to processors of the future (merom, core duo2 and the other compatible processors)?
 

Moe

macrumors regular
Apr 27, 2003
138
0
MS bulldog said:
so is there any danger (heat wise) of upgrading the core solo minis to processors of the future (merom, core duo2 and the other compatible processors)?

From my experience with the 1.66GHz Core Duo, and the power and heat results posted for the 2.16GHz Core 2 Duo, I'd say no. The chips are rated for operation up to 100°C. I've driven both cores on mine to 100% for 10 minutes and the hottest it got, according to the Core Duo Temp app, is 79-83°C. Room temperature was 75°F. Even at that, the fan didn't kick on, or at least kick on any faster than it runs when the processor is idling at 47°C. I still can't hear any fan noise with my ear 6" away from the exhaust. The Apple SMC firmware runs the fan at 100% for a few seconds, and it is certainly is loud and fast, so it seems to me there's a LOT of fan capability that remains unused (if used at all) with the 1.66GHz Core Duo.

FYI, the only pin-compatible processor in the Mini's future is the Merom series, which IS one of the interim first-generation Core 2 Duos. The second generation Core 2 Duos, scheduled to ship in the first half of 2007, will use a different socket configuration.
 

macidiot

macrumors 6502a
Aug 13, 2002
815
0
MS bulldog said:
so is there any danger (heat wise) of upgrading the core solo minis to processors of the future (merom, core duo2 and the other compatible processors)?


I don't know much about the core solos, mostly because they seem to be lame duck cpus.

But I do know that the merom is designed to be more efficient than the yonah, so if anything they should run cooler.
 

Moe

macrumors regular
Apr 27, 2003
138
0
Here are my XBench results with those of the Meromini appended. Note that it only has 512MB of memory compared to my 2GB, and 60GB hard drive compared to my 120GB, so it isn't entirely apples to apples in all areas, at least the memory and hard disk areas.

Code:
1.66 Core Duo Macintosh Mini, 2GB RAM, 120GB 5400 rpm Hard Drive
23" Apple Cinema HD Display, 1920 x 1200 resolution

to

2.16 Core 2 Duo Macintosh Mini, 512MB RAM, 60GB 5400 rpm Hard Drive
? Display & resolution

Results                 54.92 to 84.26 (153%)       
- System Info                
- - Xbench Version            1.2
- - System Version            10.4.6 (8I1119)
- - Physical RAM              2048 MB
- - Model                     Macmini1,1
- - Drive Type                ST9120821AS
- CPU Test              63.95 to 113.13 (177%)      
- - GCD Loop                  216.70 11.42 Mops/sec to 257.63 13.58
- - Floating Point Basic      75.60 1.80 Gflop/sec to 128.93 3.06
- - vecLib FFT                37.03 1.22 Gflop/sec to 88.41 2.92
- - Floating Point Library    56.48 9.84 Mops/sec to 80.59 14.03
- Thread Test          166.15 to 199.94 (120%)      
- - Computation               150.42 3.05 Mops/sec, 4 threads to 182.46 3.70
- - Lock Contention           185.56 7.98 Mlocks/sec, 4 threads to 221.13 9.51
- Memory Test          113.23 to 120.03 (107%)      
- - System                    105.30 to 134.80
- - - Allocate                       111.99  411.25 Kalloc/sec to 138.99 510.41
- - - Fill                            94.66 4602.74 MB/sec to 127.92 6219.88
- - - Copy                           111.16 2295.92 MB/sec to 138.07 2851.73
- - Stream                    122.44 DOWN to 108.18
- - - Copy                           116.23 2400.78 MB/sec DOWN to 100.27 2071.04
- - - Scale                          118.48 2447.80 MB/sec DOWN to 101.99 2107.06
- - - Add                            128.74 2742.38 MB/sec DOWN to 115.40 2458.26
- - - Triad                          127.26 2722.32 MB/sec DOWN to 117.22 2507.56
- Quartz Graphics Test  58.98 to 84.72 (144%)      
- - Line                       59.23  3.94 Klines/sec [50% alpha] to 79.56 5.30
- - Rectangle                  53.73 16.04 Krects/sec [50% alpha] to 73.47 21.94
- - Circle                     53.42  4.35 Kcircles/sec [50% alpha] to 72.08 5.88
- - Bezier                     76.85  1.94 Kbeziers/sec [50% alpha] to 100.2 2.53
- - Text                       56.97  3.56 Kchars/sec 111.28 6.96
- OpenGL Graphics Test 186.76 to 259.63 (139%)      
- - Spinning Squares          186.76 236.91 frames/sec to 259.63 329.35
- User Interface Test   23.46 to 56.15 (239%)      
- - Elements                   23.46 107.67 refresh/sec to 56.15 257.68
- Disk Test             31.22 to 36.45       
- - Sequential                 45.31 to 62.68       
- - - Uncached Write                 25.52 15.67 MB/sec [4K blocks] to 60.35 37.05
- - - Uncached Write                 62.47 35.35 MB/sec [256K blocks] DOWN to 60.45 34.20
- - - Uncached Read                  51.60 15.10 MB/sec [4K blocks] to 63.57 18.60
- - - Uncached Read                  72.94 36.66 MB/sec [256K blocks] DOWN to 66.81 33.58
- - Random                     23.81 to 25.69       
- - - Uncached Write                  7.72  0.82 MB/sec [4K blocks] to 8.61 0.91
- - - Uncached Write                 70.38 22.53 MB/sec [256K blocks] DOWN to 68.27 21.85
- - - Uncached Read                  72.47  0.51 MB/sec [4K blocks] DOWN to 71.08 0.50
- - - Uncached Read                  95.15 17.66 MB/sec [256K blocks] DOWN to 92.38 17.14
 

milo

macrumors 604
Sep 23, 2003
6,891
522
Stella said:
Excellent as it may be, you are still limited by the ( relatively poor ) graphics card.

Only on apps that need 3d acceleration. Most apps don't need that, the integrated graphics are fine.

ChrisA said:
the "Core 2 Dual" is only 20% faster than the "Core Dual" 20% is hard to notice without a stopwatch and is unnoticable for many tasks. Also after the upgrade the Mini stil only holds 2GB of RAM. I doubt many people will spend almost $300 for such a small increment of performance.

Most people doing this will probably start with a core solo mini, which means more than double the performance. Even the duo mini is only 1.66G, so that's a 30% boost in clock speed. And I don't agree that 20% is nothing to sneeze at.

Analog Kid said:
Yeah, it feels good to laugh doesn't it? Nothing like outpacing a 3 year old chip to really get out the giggles though...

Wow, that's so weak. That three year old chip is still the best IBM can do right now. And we're talking about a $2500 machine versus a $599 machine plus an upgrade of a few hundred. And a portable chip/compact configuration versus a full-blown desktop. I have to admit, I'm laughing pretty hard.

macidiot said:
Merom is a quality upgrade from the Yonah. But installing one in a Mac mini seems really stupid. Spending 3-500 to upgrade a $800 computer to get a ~20% speed boost is a waste of money imo.

The solo mini is $599. Add a $500 upgrade and you're at $1099. You think THAT is the bad deal...not the $2499 G5 tower that loses to it? And GPU is only a limiting factor on 3d apps.

Dont Hurt Me said:
So here we have a Mini that can outdo a Quad:D

Read the article again, it beat a DUAL G5. The quad will still spank any of the dual machines, PPC or intel. I agree that buying a dual G5 in the last few months is a bad deal, but the quad is still unmatched at this point, no other mac even comes close.
 

macidiot

macrumors 6502a
Aug 13, 2002
815
0
milo said:
The solo mini is $599. Add a $500 upgrade and you're at $1099. You think THAT is the bad deal...not the $2499 G5 tower that loses to it? And GPU is only a limiting factor on 3d apps.


Yes, because in a couple of months, merom cpus will be appearing all over the place. And within 6 months, those G5 desktops will be replaced by Conroe or Woodcrest cpus. So, to use your example a $2500 (guess at the cost of an intel mac pro desktop) will blow the doors off your $1099 mac mini. And the G5 desktops. And you'll probably get some things like slots, a real gpu, much faster drives, more ram slots, etc.

So again, YES it is a bad deal.

Just because the G5 desktops happen to be incredibly bad deals doesn't make upgrading the mac mini (and almost doubling the cost) a good deal.
 

thogs_cave

macrumors regular
Sep 25, 2003
208
0
State of Confusion
psycho bob said:
x86 is such a generic name which basically only accurately described the first generation of this type of processor. Today if we go by name there is no longer an x86 processor as each company has trademarked its own name for their type of CPU. Although x86 compatible todays modern CPU's cannot really be compared to the first products to be produced of this type in 1978. Technology has moved on so quickly each major upgrade is essentially a new type of chip that just happens to be backwards compatible.

Query: Do you think, then, that the architecture itself has not been at all limited by maintaining backwards-compatability with chips designed almost 30 years ago?

(By the way, I'm not a G5 fanboy, as evidenced by my .sig, but I don't see where Any CPU could be called "modern". Name one mainstream (or even semi-maninstream) microprocessor that has an architecture that isn't somehow limited by what came before....
 

thogs_cave

macrumors regular
Sep 25, 2003
208
0
State of Confusion
kingtj said:
I don't think there's anything wrong with people giving computer gaming a lot of attention. The fact is, the latest games always push the limits of a given machine in practically all areas - so they tend to be really good indicators of absolute performance.

I don't find that true at all. For example, I think a gaming box would make a piss-poor database server.

Yes, gaming stresses the CPU (useful), the GPU (not really of any use in a server), and the memory subsystem (not a bad thing). Does it stress I/O?
 

Mord

macrumors G4
Aug 24, 2003
10,091
23
UK
thogs_cave said:
Query: Do you think, then, that the architecture itself has not been at all limited by maintaining backwards-compatability with chips designed almost 30 years ago?

(By the way, I'm not a G5 fanboy, as evidenced by my .sig, but I don't see where Any CPU could be called "modern". Name one mainstream (or even semi-maninstream) microprocessor that has an architecture that isn't somehow limited by what came before....

EPIC.
 

JAT

macrumors 603
Dec 31, 2001
6,473
124
Mpls, MN
macidiot said:
OK, using the base mini, it's more than 20%. But then your spending >$400 on a cpu upgrade on a $600 computer.

If your price sensitive enough to buy a $600 computer what makes you think spending $400 on an upgrade makes sense?
I'd say you're spending about half that for the upgrade, because you buy the Mini now, and it works! it isn't dead in the box, but wait til the price drops on Merom for the upgrade. I was going to do this with the Solo, and upgrade RAM and processor in 2007 or something, but decided on a refurb Duo instead because of the price and wanting 1GB of RAM. Lucky me, I got a maxed out Duo (2GB, 120GB) in the refurb roulette. Now I'm not sure if I'll ever need to upgrade the processor, or anything else other than additional external drives. But once there is more 1080p to worry about, and I have a TV to match, maybe I'll want to pick up a 2.33 Merom cheap.

I'd agree, otherwise. Anybody buying the cheapest computer only to upgrade it with the most expensive parts the same day is pretty silly.
 

aegisdesign

macrumors 6502a
Apr 19, 2005
875
0
Dont Hurt Me said:
G5 has allways been overblown Apple hype, They never were all that Apple was saying and the U.K. forced Apple to stop spinning lies on G5.

Not entirely true. The UK Advertising Standards Agency ruled that the claim Apple made that the G5 was the 'Worlds fastest personal computer' was not true 'in all circumstances for all applications' even if on average over a set of tests it was it was. Oddly, the proof they gave for the ruling was Apple's own benchmarks which showed it getting beaten by a Dell in some of the benchmarks.

Dont Hurt Me said:
So here we have a Mini that can outdo a Quad:D

No, A Dual. And only at fairly specific benchmarks of iTunes encoding. Great if that's what you want it for I guess. If you want to run Photoshop however, best not.

Dont Hurt Me said:
Thats funny but whats even more funny is my 2 yr old AMD 3500+ can still spank any G5 in Gaming, you can use 1,2 even 4 G5s and they still get spanked by 1 Athlon 64. Please G5 was nothing more then feeding the fan club. Anyone buying a G5 machine the past few months just isnt paying attention.

Ah, gamers, they think the world revolves around them when in reality they're such a small tiny, teeny, weeny, miniscule part of the computer market. PC game sales last year fell to the same level they had in 1993. Why would Apple even bother with games and why would anyone care if an Athlon can "spank any G5 in Gaming" if it can't run MacOSX?
 

aegisdesign

macrumors 6502a
Apr 19, 2005
875
0
macidiot said:
But I do know that the merom is designed to be more efficient than the yonah, so if anything they should run cooler.

Yes they're more efficient but that doesn't mean they run cooler. It just means you get more performance for the SAME power consumption. Both the Yonah and Merom have the same thermal design package.

So, in the case of the Mini, if it's designed to run ok with a 35W Yonah in there, it'll run with a 35W Merom in there in theory.
 

aegisdesign

macrumors 6502a
Apr 19, 2005
875
0
- - Floating Point Basic 75.60 1.80 Gflop/sec to 128.93 3.06
- - vecLib FFT 37.03 1.22 Gflop/sec to 88.41 2.92
- - Floating Point Library 56.48 9.84 Mops/sec to 80.59 14.03

Those are nice improvements. Floating Point and Vectors are where Intel were bad previously so it looks like the SSE improvements are finally giving us a chip as nice as the G4 there.
 

bloodycape

macrumors 65816
Jun 18, 2005
1,373
0
California
Hector said:
thats a dual 2.5GHz G5, not a quad.

anywho it's not all that surpassing seeing as a 2.66GHz core 2 duo outpaces an FX 62 by some 30% according to some quick maths that puts the core2duo 36% odd percent faster clock for clock than your beloved K8

now if this 2.16 beats the dual 2.5GHz G5 by 10% that means that it's about 27% faster clock for clock.


yes i know the fsb is double with the conroe and that pretty much makes up the difference but by bashing the g5 you bash your own cpu of choice.
Wasnt that a preproduction FX62 they tested against? And wasnt the intel also preproduction. I think once the both are out we will that both are equally fast in their own way.
 

Multimedia

macrumors 603
Jul 27, 2001
5,212
0
Santa Cruz CA, Silicon Beach
Don't Hurt Me Didn't Hurt Me But Did Exhibit His Ignornace

Dont Hurt Me said:
G5 has allways been overblown Apple hype, They never were all that Apple was saying and the U.K. forced Apple to stop spinning lies on G5. So here we have a Mini that can outdo a Quad. :D Thats funny but whats even more funny is my 2 yr old AMD 3500+ can still spank any G5 in Gaming, you can use 1,2 even 4 G5s and they still get spanked by 1 Athlon 64. Please G5 was nothing more then feeding the fan club. Anyone buying a G5 machine the past few months just isnt paying attention.
Well that's a crock if I ever read one. I am certainly one who pays attention more than 99.99999% of Mac users and I can't tell you how brilliant it was for me to sell my Dual 2.5 G5 for $2500 and buy a Quad for $3000 in February. If I had waited any longer, I would have been lucky to get $2000 for my Dual 2.5. As for regretting owning a Quad - NO WAY Jose. For one thing it can still run classic - not that I ever do. For another it is dead silent. For another it is still the world's fastest Mac. So put a sock in it Don't Hurt Me. You don't know what you are writing about. I love my Quad and will continue to love it after the Woodie Quads ship. :eek:

And I NEVER play games. ;)
 

Mord

macrumors G4
Aug 24, 2003
10,091
23
UK
bloodycape said:
Wasnt that a preproduction FX62 they tested against? And wasnt the intel also preproduction. I think once the both are out we will that both are equally fast in their own way.

the difference in production and pre is near non existent
 

Multimedia

macrumors 603
Jul 27, 2001
5,212
0
Santa Cruz CA, Silicon Beach
Waiting For Core 3 Is Until 2008 or '09 - I Doubt You Will Do That

BornAgainMac said:
Since I already have a Core 1, I'll wait for the Core 3. I'll stick with odd numbered cores. Core 1 gave me the biggest jump from the G4 compared to Core 2 vs Core 1 so it made sense to start with Core 1.

I think the naming is going to be like G3, G4, G5. You will get use to it.
Waiting For Core 3 Is Until 2008 or '09 - I Doubt You Will Do That. By the end of 2007 Core 2 Quad Leopards will be the rule inside everything. You gonna wait with a Core 1 past then? No way. :rolleyes:
 

Nar1117

macrumors 6502
Apr 15, 2006
313
5
THX1139 said:
Okay, yeah I agree. If people are waiting for Merom before they buy their mini or macbook or macbookpro so that they can surf the web faster. Well, that's just stupid. What I was talking about is that Merom is going to be a nicer chip than the Yonah for a lot of reasons than a 10-20% bump in speed. Those reasons don't necessarly translate to the average user as has been mentioned in other posts. I for one, need a Merom for a portable solution. Sure the Conroe/Woodcrest desktops are going to be waaay faster then Merom, but you can't haul a desktop into Starbucks or use it on an airplane or hotel when you have business out of town. Looks like we agree, so that's pretty cool. :D



Okay, but if you go back and read my post, you will notice that I was talking about the MacbookPro - not the mini. Sorry if my off topic reply to a post confused you. In summary, I simply said that waiting for Merom before buying a MBP was a good idea. Least that is what I meant to say.


Im glad that we have come to an agreement :D

Its tricky sometimes to articulate what you mean on the internet... so thanks for putting up with it and not starting a flame war. :)
 
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