4,1 Mac Pro with Mavericks or El Capitan performance

[brandflakes7969]

Running the 8 core 4,1 with a k5000, seem to be having issues with graphics card for whatever reason with El Capitan. Wondering if anyone runs an older OS. I am trying to convert this into a pure workstation at the moment so I want performance more then any 10.9+ bells and whistles. Any suggestions on downgrading or staying with El Capitan in terms of performance ?

 

[Ebenezum]

I'm using similar Mac Pro with Radeon 207X for database and VM work. I tested El Capitan and didn't like it, Mavericks works much better for my needs and is faster.

Have you tested another card to rule out faulty component?

Downgrading is a lot of work if you don't have clone of Mavericks volume at hand... In my case it was worth it, only you can if it would be beneficial or not.

 

[Draeconis]

You could run Mavericks, but as of today it probably won't receive any further security updates, since Sierra will be available. Just FYI

 

[brandflakes7969]

I have no other card to rule out faulty components unfortunately. Is there a reason why Mavericks is considered "faster" ?

 

[F1Mac]

I have no other card to rule out faulty components unfortunately. Is there a reason why Mavericks is considered "faster" ?

Mainly because the UI is less demanding and there are less background tasks. I was running Mavericks on my Mac Pros until very recently but a major upgrade from Native Instruments now requires Yosemite or later. So I upgraded to El Capitan again (installed it last year when it came out). While I do like Mavericks very much, I have to admit for me 10.11.6 is sold as a rock, and though the flat UI is not as easy on the cpu than Mavericks, El Capitan is very responsive, fast and, dare I say, a pleasure to use. Now if only I could stop spotlight from indexing the whole neighborhood after each boot...