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Buying my Mac Pro on Monday! Should I pick Quad 2.93 or Octa 2.26?

Thanks for the input guys! As the 2.26 is gong back for various reasons, now I am torn between the 2.66 Quad or 2.93. Money is now a factor since we are going on vacation in a few days which is needed! ;) So I will have to make that decision when I get back, but since I am doing a lot of rendering the 2.93 with a Raid card and some faster drives down the road should make this thing scream and going with 2 ATI video cards as well. Right now I don't think the 8 core is worth the extra Cash... Plus I am not running enough pro applications that will take advantage of the 8 core now, and by the time most of the software programs do this, I will be most likely ready for another computer... I upgrade every 3-4 years, so the 2.93 Quad should suite me fine.
 
Tesselator said:
Yeah! For sure! I don't agree at all with Apple's design decisions nor their pricing structure. I've been in the industry on both sides of the counter so to speak since there was such a thing as a "personal computer" and it just doesn't make any sense to me either. But to me the thread was about a guy who had weighed all his cookies and wanted feedback for choosing between two specific models. In my thinking the 2.93 Quad wins that debate hands down. The octad would be better if the machine were sitting in a corner unattended and just rendering scenes with very specific software - but who here does that? There are a few of us who have macs just for that but I guess our numbers are in the tiniest of minorities. :)
Click to expand...

This is a quote from what Mac Husky put up, and I do run Pro Apps and according to this comment I might be better off with the 2.66 Octa then going with the 2.93 Quad. Also to jump up in memory, over 8Gigs will cost you more in the long run staying with the Quad Core. I wouldn't say I am in the minority but close. ;)

"DO YOU NEED AN 8-CORE MAC PRO or will a 4-Core with lotz of RAM do the job?
Apple specifies 8GB as the limit on the 4-core Mac Pro Nehalem. Even if third parties figure out that 4GB modules work in the 4-core system with only 4 memory slots, it will cost you at least $2300 as of this writing to reach 16GB. With the 8-core (8 memory slots), you can buy 16G (8x2G) of memory for $300. The gap in cost wipes out the cost penalty for the extra cores. And trust me, if you are trying to run pro apps with only 8GB of RAM, you are handicapping yourself."

The above comment makes the most sense for me? The articles written on both sides of the fence on either machine makes choosing the "right" computer very confusing!

Also I must point out according to OWC, you can buy 16Ram of Memory for just under a grand, and not $2300 bucks.
 
Yes, very confusing and very difficult. On the one hand a very fast 4-core that might be a bad choice for future apps of photoshop and stuff (even if I don´t think so) - but that you can afford - and a 2.26 8-core, that is limiting single core use right now when you just got it.
Tesselator said:
Photoshop is already multi-core aware. many parts of it use all available processor cores. Many parts do not!
Click to expand...
That´s right. Some functions and filters in PS use multiple cores (Rotate, Gaussian Blur, Lighting Effects, Lens Flare, Pointilize, and Sharpen Edges). But not the hell much right now. And not to forgett: even the quad hast 4 cores - virtually 8 ;)

I am just thinking about waiting until June and see what Snow Leopard is making out of the different options. Although I cannot believe, it will speed up the 8-core and let the quad lay down. So you may turn and rotate the pro and cons not coming to an end. And when SL will not come in June I am not one step further in 2 months. Going for an :apple: right now I would decide to get the quad with 6 or 8 GB of RAM. Without any risk to suffer from that ;)
 
I would never go with the Q2.93. It si so much money more for a VERY little performance jump. I mean even if you are planning on keeping it a while, that is still not worth the extra hundreds to me at least. I would rather buy a faster hard drive or more ram with it. I had the 2.26 and went down to the 2.66 and am VERY happy I did. I really love it for what I do with it, it is perfect.
 
Mac Husky said:
Yes, very confusing and very difficult. On the one hand a very fast 4-core that might be a bad choice for future apps of photoshop and stuff (even if I don´t think so) - but that you can afford - and a 2.26 8-core, that is limiting single core use right now when you just got it.

That´s right. Some functions and filters in PS use multiple cores (Rotate, Gaussian Blur, Lighting Effects, Lens Flare, Pointilize, and Sharpen Edges). But not the hell much right now. And not to forgett: even the quad hast 4 cores - virtually 8 ;)

I am just thinking about waiting until June and see what Snow Leopard is making out of the different options. Although I cannot believe, it will speed up the 8-core and let the quad lay down. So you may turn and rotate the pro and cons not coming to an end. And when SL will not come in June I am not one step further in 2 months. Going for an :apple: right now I would decide to get the quad with 6 or 8 GB of RAM. Without any risk to suffer from that ;)
Click to expand...

Most people are saying that Snow Leopard will be out in early August.
 
@HDnut

2.93 octad base price: $5,900
2.66 octad base price: $4,700
2.93 quad base price: $3,000
2.66 quad base price: $2,500


The 2.93 quad is only $500 more then the 2.66 quad. And the 2.93 pitches the difference where it will really counts the most - most of the time. Even an application that scales 100% across all available cores like Lightwave3D (which probably scales better than any other app there is!), I still end up spending most of my time doing tasks that benefit more from clocks than cores.

Load the app,
load the resources,
fiddle with the interface,
create the models,
edit the textures in PS,
apply and adjust the textures,
setup the lighting,
create the animation curves,
check the animation in OpenGL previews,
save everything, etc.

And many of these are tasks I must do repeatedly - again and again - every time I sit down to the machine. :)

Let's say I spend a month editing the project which is fairly common. Let's say it's a 3 minute commercial grade animation at 30FPS and the frames take 1min. to render on the 2.93 quad - that's 5,400 minutes or 90 hours or 3.75 days. If you have the 2.93 octad you can divide all those times in half. If you have the 2.66 octad you spend like 70% of those times. 70% of 3.75 days is 2.63 days. So basically you will save one day a month if you get the 2.66 octad instead of the 2.93 quad. But everything else you did that month went by faster and with less frustration on the 2.93 quad. With the 2.93 octad you get the best of both but the cost... oh my. You save now two days a month and additionally everything was edited quickly and with less frustration.

I did this everyday for 9 years (and taught the same) so this is pretty common sense to me. Pro Video editing too.

You have to ask yourself:
Is the one day a month going to be worth $1,700? (if no then the 2.93 quad is better than the 2.66 octad)
Is the two days a month going to be worth $2,900? (if no then the 2.93 quad is better than the 2.93 octad)
Is almost 10% faster editing (extra pep!) in your everyday work worth $500? (if yes then the 2.93 quad is better than the 2.66 quad)




@Mac Husky

Yeah, definitely! What Snow Leopard does for octads so will it do for quads - whatever that is. I guess not all that much though. Apple is still dealing with the same hardware limits - limits imposed by the physical architecture. I guess most application performance (however we measure that!?!) won't be increased by more than about 10%. But 10% to all intel based Mac Pros. 10% more than whatever they were before Snow Leopard. The rendering and stuff will not be (can not be) improved by the OS significantly enough to measure. Unless of course there's some magical Apple pixie-dust I don't know about yet. :D


.
 
Tesselator said:
@HDnut

2.93 octad base price: $5,900
2.66 octad base price: $4,700
2.93 quad base price: $3,000
2.66 quad base price: $2,500


The 2.93 quad is only $500 more then the 2.66 quad. And the 2.93 pitches the difference where it will really counts the most - most of the time. Even an application that scales 100% across all available cores like Lightwave3D (which probably scales better than any other app there is!), I still end up spending most of my time doing tasks that benefit more from clocks than cores.

Load the app,
load the resources,
fiddle with the interface,
create the models,
edit the textures in PS,
apply and adjust the textures,
setup the lighting,
create the animation curves,
check the animation in OpenGL previews,
save everything, etc.

And many of these are tasks I must do repeatedly - again and again - every time I sit down to the machine. :)

Let's say I spend a month editing the project which is fairly common. Let's say it's a 3 minute commercial grade animation at 30FPS and the frames take 1min. to render on the 2.93 quad - that's 5,400 minutes or 90 hours or 3.75 days. If you have the 2.93 octad you can divide all those times in half. If you have the 2.66 octad you spend like 70% of those times. 70% of 3.75 days is 2.63 days. So basically you will save one day a month if you get the 2.66 octad instead of the 2.93 quad. But everything else you did that month went by faster and with less frustration on the 2.93 quad. With the 2.93 octad you get the best of both but the cost... oh my. You save now two days a month and additionally everything was edited quickly and with less frustration.

I did this everyday for 9 years so this is pretty common sense to me. Pro Video editing too.

You have to ask yourself:
Is the one day a month going to be worth $1,700? (if no then the 2.93 quad is better than the 2.66 octad)
Is the two days a month going to be worth $2,900? (if no then the 2.93 quad is better than the 2.93 octad)
Is almost 10% faster editing (extra pep!) in your everyday work worth $500? (if yes then the 2.93 quad is better than the 2.66 quad)




@Mac Husky

Yeah, definitely! What Snow Leopard does for octads so will it do for quads - whatever that is. I guess not all that much though. Apple is still dealing with the same hardware limits - limits imposed by the physical architecture. I guess most application performance (however we measure that!?!) won't be increased by more than about 10%. But 10% to all intel based Mac Pros. 10% more than whatever they were before Snow Leopard. The rendering and stuff will not be (can not be) improved by the OS significantly enough to measure. Unless of course there's some magical Apple pixie-dust I don't know about yet. :D


.
Click to expand...

Rendering is the bigger issue for me, and your right, the 2.93 Quad is the best deal, and now since OWC told me over the phone that they actually tested one of these machines with 32gigs of Memory in it, the memory issue is a moot point. I think faster drive and another video card down the road with really make this machine scream. The 2.66 Octad is tempting, as the difference in price is about 1100 bucks for me, with the educational discount, that is between the 2.26 Octad and the 2.66 machines. Still, Put that money aside for a machine in the future which hopefully will do more for less.. ;)
 
Tesselator said:
@HDnut

2.93 octad base price: $5,900
2.66 octad base price: $4,700
2.93 quad base price: $3,000
2.66 quad base price: $2,500


The 2.93 quad is only $500 more then the 2.66 quad. And the 2.93 pitches the difference where it will really counts the most - most of the time. Even an application that scales 100% across all available cores like Lightwave3D (which probably scales better than any other app there is!), I still end up spending most of my time doing tasks that benefit more from clocks than cores.

Load the app,
load the resources,
fiddle with the interface,
create the models,
edit the textures in PS,
apply and adjust the textures,
setup the lighting,
create the animation curves,
check the animation in OpenGL previews,
save everything, etc.

And many of these are tasks I must do repeatedly - again and again - every time I sit down to the machine. :)

Let's say I spend a month editing the project which is fairly common. Let's say it's a 3 minute commercial grade animation at 30FPS and the frames take 1min. to render on the 2.93 quad - that's 5,400 minutes or 90 hours or 3.75 days. If you have the 2.93 octad you can divide all those times in half. If you have the 2.66 octad you spend like 70% of those times. 70% of 3.75 days is 2.63 days. So basically you will save one day a month if you get the 2.66 octad instead of the 2.93 quad. But everything else you did that month went by faster and with less frustration on the 2.93 quad. With the 2.93 octad you get the best of both but the cost... oh my. You save now two days a month and additionally everything was edited quickly and with less frustration.

I did this everyday for 9 years (and taught the same) so this is pretty common sense to me. Pro Video editing too.

You have to ask yourself:
Is the one day a month going to be worth $1,700? (if no then the 2.93 quad is better than the 2.66 octad)
Is the two days a month going to be worth $2,900? (if no then the 2.93 quad is better than the 2.93 octad)
Is almost 10% faster editing (extra pep!) in your everyday work worth $500? (if yes then the 2.93 quad is better than the 2.66 quad)




@Mac Husky

Yeah, definitely! What Snow Leopard does for octads so will it do for quads - whatever that is. I guess not all that much though. Apple is still dealing with the same hardware limits - limits imposed by the physical architecture. I guess most application performance (however we measure that!?!) won't be increased by more than about 10%. But 10% to all intel based Mac Pros. 10% more than whatever they were before Snow Leopard. The rendering and stuff will not be (can not be) improved by the OS significantly enough to measure. Unless of course there's some magical Apple pixie-dust I don't know about yet. :D


.
Click to expand...

The thing about thats keeping me away from the quad machines is that its really a 4 core machine with 2 threads in each.

Basically 4x2.93GHz with the little more % for the 2 threads in each core to have 4 more virtual cores to help I guess compared to 8x2.26GHz plus 2 threads in each core to get a little more % bump in speed.

I'd choose the 8 core still. I mean really think about it, once all 8 core are fully utilized wouldnt it be much faster in pro apps to finish work faster. Working all 8 cores at 2.26GHz with the help of 2 threads as to 4 cores working at 2.93GHz with the help of 2 threads. I think the 8 cores will get things done still almost 2x faster in the end.
 
jjahshik32 said:
The thing about thats keeping me away from the quad machines is that its really a 4 core machine with 2 threads in each.

Basically 4x2.93GHz with the little more % for the 2 threads in each core to have 4 more virtual cores to help I guess compared to 8x2.26GHz plus 2 threads in each core to get a little more % bump in speed.

I'd choose the 8 core still. I mean really think about it, once all 8 core are fully utilized wouldnt it be much faster in pro apps to finish work faster. Working all 8 cores at 2.26GHz with the help of 2 threads as to 4 cores working at 2.93GHz with the help of 2 threads. I think the 8 cores will get things done still almost 2x faster in the end.
Click to expand...

I agree, but by the time the software catches up with the hardware there will most likely be different machines out by then. Hence one could bank the money you save now using it on some thing else or save it for the next best machine. Plus, it would have to be a pretty decent bump in speed to justify the cost. That's the problem I am having, I went from an older 2006 Mac Pro, with only 2 gigs of memory so anything Apple is making now (Almost) is going to be a huge jump in performance. The two machines I have picked out are a decked out 2.94 Quad or a 2.66 Octa 8 core, just not sure if I will use the 8 cores for some time, since Mac Pros hold there value it would be easy to off either of these at a decent price! Right now I have the 2.26 Octa 8 core and I am now not that impressed yet, plus this unit is going back do to a video issue. This article shows that even the new Quads out preform the older 8 cores.

http://www.macworld.com/article/139507/2009/03/macpro2009.html

The difference in price is about $1200 bucks from the two machines 2.93 verses the 2.66 Octa, the question I have is the difference worth it....
 
Tesselator said:
2.93 octad base price: $5,900
2.66 octad base price: $4,700
2.93 quad base price: $3,000
2.66 quad base price: $2,500
Click to expand...
Tears in my eyes:

Prices in Germany are
2.93 octad base price: $ 7,075 (6GB RAM)
2.66 octad base price: $ 5,645 (6GB RAM)
2.93 quad base price: $ 3,645 (3GB RAM)
2.66 quad base price: $ 3,050 (3GB RAM)
Tesselator said:
You have to ask yourself:
Is the one day a month going to be worth $1,700? (if no then the 2.93 quad is better than the 2.66 octad)
Is the two days a month going to be worth $2,900? (if no then the 2.93 quad is better than the 2.93 octad)
Is almost 10% faster editing (extra pep!) in your everyday work worth $500? (if yes then the 2.93 quad is better than the 2.66 quad)
Click to expand...
Very good summary of the ****ing problem :D
Should lead me to go for a quad definitely ;)
HDnut said:
The difference in price is about $1200 bucks from the two machines 2.93 verses the 2.66 Octa, the question I have is the difference worth it....
Click to expand...
Exactly. Here in Germany we are talking about 2.000 bucks difference - corrected by RAM (6GB each) it is still a difference of 1.825 USD.
Tesselator said:
Yeah, definitely! What Snow Leopard does for octads so will it do for quads - whatever that is. I guess not all that much though. Apple is still dealing with the same hardware limits - limits imposed by the physical architecture. I guess most application performance (however we measure that!?!) won't be increased by more than about 10%. But 10% to all intel based Mac Pros. 10% more than whatever they were before Snow Leopard. The rendering and stuff will not be (can not be) improved by the OS significantly enough to measure. Unless of course there's some magical Apple pixie-dust I don't know about yet. :D
Click to expand...
As I wrote in the other thread maybe - after all - things will change with Snow Leopard significantly. When I read the following right (my native language is not English), than the limitating factor is the operating system Leopard.

"Unfortunately for our testing (but fortunately for Apple), the Mac Pro is a machine that far surpasses the capability of the current Mac OS X Leopard operating system. OS X 10.5 is a 32-bit operating system which inherrently is limited to 3GB of memory usage per process. After the 3GB of real usage is attained, the rest of the memory in the system is essentially not recognized as being available to use. Snow Leopard, a true 64-bit operating system, should alleviate this dilemma and allow single processes to use all the memory available to it. This is a far cry from stating that 3GB is all that is needed in a machine until Snow Leopard is released."
Source: OWC
cmaier said:
They should be revealing the details at WWDC in june.
Click to expand...
So are the rumours, yes. But no one really knows when it will be available in the stores. If this would be within the next 3 month, I could wait for that.
Still not sure, if the new operating system will definitely influance the fundamental decision between a quad or the 2.26 8-core due to new benchmark tests with SL?!
 
Mac Husky: Those prices do seem very steep! When I get back from my vacation next week, it will be decision time. If I don't spend too much extra on this relaxing vacation then I will most likely go for the 2.66 8 core, if we go over the top then it is the 2.93 Quad.. ;) I should point out the 2.26 8 core has been decent performance wise, but too many quirky things wrong with it. CD/DVD drawer gets stuck when I close or open it, the video card doesn't always read both monitors and the CD/DVD is very noisy and a cosmetic flaw in the casing.
 
HDnut said:
Mac Husky: Those prices do seem very steep!
Click to expand...
YES they are. If I would go for a 2.66 8-core, there might be no vacation this year :D
So it is for sure: I will definitely not go for it. Due to the reasons Tesselator wrote down.
So much nice things else to do with the difference of 2.000 bucks :)
 
I have decided to buy a WESTERN DIGITAL VELOCIRAPTOR 300GB 3.5# 10K RPM SATA/300 16MB does this one fit?

It is marked as WD3000HLFS.

Or is it faster to buy two 500Gb harddrives and run them in raid? I know nothing about raid so is there some software I can use to put them in raid if that is faster then the WDV.
 
MasterM6 said:
I have decided to buy a WESTERN DIGITAL VELOCIRAPTOR 300GB 3.5# 10K RPM SATA/300 16MB does this one fit?

It is marked as WD3000HLFS.

Or is it faster to buy two 500Gb harddrives and run them in raid? I know nothing about raid so is there some software I can use to put them in raid if that is faster then the WDV.
Click to expand...

The mac comes with the software you need for raid.
 
HDnut said:
I agree, but by the time the software catches up with the hardware there will most likely be different machines out by then.
Click to expand...

You hit the nail on the head. Virtually NONE of that tasks that a day to day user currently does will utilize multiple cores, and even when Snow Leopard comes out with it's multi core functionality guns blazing, the third party software will not have caught up. Building assets, loading programs, saving, moving the viewers, switching between apps...who needs 8 cores if they're not helping with any of these tasks?

The 2.93GHz Quad sounds right to me, and I'm using the CS4 suite (AE, AI, PS) on a daily basis, as well as Final Cut and even some Cinema 4D thrown in there.

Rendering in AE and C4D are the last part of a LONG process that truly benefits from fast "single core" performance, i.e. faster clock speeds.

I have a Quad G5 at home and I use a Mac Pro at work and 90% of the time those cores are sitting there being idle. When I leave I may ramp up a render, but that's an overnight task.

I'd get the Quad and save up for more RAM, more HD space and AppleCare for sure.

By the time all of this software actually uses all 8 cores at once for day to day tasks, we'll have 16 core machines available. :)
 
ANIM8R said:
The 2.93GHz Quad sounds right to me, and I'm using the CS4 suite (AE, AI, PS) on a daily basis, as well as Final Cut (...)
Click to expand...
Returning to Tesselator´s last question:
Tesselator said:
Is almost 10% faster editing (extra pep!) in your everyday work worth $500? (if yes then the 2.93 quad is better than the 2.66 quad)
Click to expand...
Having a second look at the OWC benchmarks I see an increase of speed for After Effects Render Test by 7% and DigLloyd Photoshop Speed Test by not even 2%?!

I don´t now for my decision right know :confused:
 
Mac Husky said:
Returning to Tesselator´s last question:

Having a second look at the OWC benchmarks I see an increase of speed for After Effects Render Test by 7% and DigLloyd Photoshop Speed Test by not even 2%?!

I don´t now for my decision right know :confused:
Click to expand...

Seems that if you want the best performance/price, the 2.66GHz Octad is the way to go. Just a hair behind the 2.93GHz models.
 
jjahshik32 said:
Seems that if you want the best performance/price, the 2.66GHz Octad is the way to go. Just a hair behind the 2.93GHz models.
Click to expand...
That´s the way it seems and the way I would like to go. Unfortunately no one can tell, what Snow Leopard with Grand Central is going to change.
Especially with reference to a decision for or against a 4 or 8-core system. Is Grand Central effective for all apps coming with OS X only or does it
influence the speed of external apps as photoshop as well by even changing the core management for third party apps?! I cannot believe, that it
will make e. g. Photoshop using more cores than it usually does?! Beta testers are asked :D

Or will it change nothing at all that influences the - fundamentaly - decision?!
 
Mac Husky said:
Returning to Tesselator´s last question:

Having a second look at the OWC benchmarks I see an increase of speed for After Effects Render Test by 7% and DigLloyd Photoshop Speed Test by not even 2%?!

I don´t now for my decision right know :confused:
Click to expand...

Yeah, that's true. When I said "almost 10%" it was actually 8.6% or something. I did the math but forgot now. Just divide the two numbers if you want to know. And yeah, it's a tough call I think.

The 2.66GHz Octad is too ridiculous IMHO though.

I honestly think all current Apple offerings are. So I'm going to wait a few months till Intel and ATI are caching their breath and build my own OS X system from scratch. I'll probably end up with a 3.2 GHz 16 V-Core, 12GB, 4TB HDD Raid, ATI4890 system running OSX as good or better than Apple does for less than $4000 or very near it.
 
One other way to look at the upgrade to the 2.66 Octad is to consider that as an alternative, you could buy the 2.93 Quad AND a nice Macbook for the same investment!!!
 
DrawingArt said:
Hey MasterM6 please report us how you are satisfied with it when you get your hands on it ...
Click to expand...

Ha ha ha don´t you worry I will be here dancing all over the place about my new monster! This will be the first thread my new Mac Pro will deliver its input! ;)
 
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