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CORE i7 975 3.3 GHz in my New Quad!
- Thread starter AZREOSpecialist
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Could just swap it back out if you needed to bring it into the Apple Store.
Only problem is then you have to hang on to both processors, letting them both lose value. I have a 975 laying around but I'm going to part it out from the PC rig that the new Mac Pro Quad 2.93 is replacing.
Better to do this on a Mac Pro that's out of warranty or close to being there IMO. Unless you have the extra cash to burn.
I've looked at some of the benchmarks for the 2.66 quad on Bare Feats. It's difficult to know exactly what the scores are, since they are showing only bar graphs without the detailed granularity on the actual performance numbers.
However, from what I can surmise from looking at all the graphs and charts is that the performance appears to scale on a linear basis. So my 3.33 GHz quad is approximately 25% faster than the stock 2.66 and 14% faster than the 2.93 GHz quad.
I don't know how much difference the RAM made in the benchmarks, but I can say that it literally screams on real-world stuff. I also have a 30" monitor. Everything is very snappy. But then again, I'm coming from a liquid cooled dual G5 2.5 GHz PowerMac.
I was editing some photos today for some of my new foreclosure listings, and response is instantaneous. Even filters such as Neat Image and Nik Sharpener Pro, which were like molasses on the G5, are real-time on my quad.
With regards to the SAS backplane, unfortunately I did not take photos during my upgrade. I wanted to get everything done ASAP since my livelihood depend son my ability to work and produce. So I always seem to be "under the gun" so to speak. However, Bare Feats posted some photos of the setup which is almost identical to mine. You can see it here. Scroll to the bottom, those drives are using the Max Upgrade sleds with cabling to a RocketRaid 4320, same as mine.
However, from what I can surmise from looking at all the graphs and charts is that the performance appears to scale on a linear basis. So my 3.33 GHz quad is approximately 25% faster than the stock 2.66 and 14% faster than the 2.93 GHz quad.
I don't know how much difference the RAM made in the benchmarks, but I can say that it literally screams on real-world stuff. I also have a 30" monitor. Everything is very snappy. But then again, I'm coming from a liquid cooled dual G5 2.5 GHz PowerMac.
I was editing some photos today for some of my new foreclosure listings, and response is instantaneous. Even filters such as Neat Image and Nik Sharpener Pro, which were like molasses on the G5, are real-time on my quad.
With regards to the SAS backplane, unfortunately I did not take photos during my upgrade. I wanted to get everything done ASAP since my livelihood depend son my ability to work and produce. So I always seem to be "under the gun" so to speak. However, Bare Feats posted some photos of the setup which is almost identical to mine. You can see it here. Scroll to the bottom, those drives are using the Max Upgrade sleds with cabling to a RocketRaid 4320, same as mine.
The power switch is soft, with the machine unplugged its just a mini switch that does nothing.
Hey AZREO, I was curious about your selling the original CPU.
What if something breaks and you need it fixed. You won't have the original to swap in to take into the Apple Store for the warranty?
Or what if Snow Leopard or some other random Apple update bricks your system due to some unforeseen incompatibility with the regular i7 CPUs? What if a firmware update bricks it?
Just curious if you plan on doing repairs out of pocket then?
I didn't think the i7's would work without modification but if it's just a swap out then I may do the same on my 2.93 Quad that gets here in the next couple days as I have a 975 laying around form a PC build. I was going to eBay it but we'll see.
What if something breaks and you need it fixed. You won't have the original to swap in to take into the Apple Store for the warranty?
Or what if Snow Leopard or some other random Apple update bricks your system due to some unforeseen incompatibility with the regular i7 CPUs? What if a firmware update bricks it?
Just curious if you plan on doing repairs out of pocket then?
I didn't think the i7's would work without modification but if it's just a swap out then I may do the same on my 2.93 Quad that gets here in the next couple days as I have a 975 laying around form a PC build. I was going to eBay it but we'll see.
Are you.... running mission-critical apps that require the absolute fastest processor?
If not I can't see why you spent $1k on a CPU that's going to be only a little faster... especially since you're not even running eight cores. It's about a 20% improvement in speed, and one you'll hardly notice....
If not I can't see why you spent $1k on a CPU that's going to be only a little faster... especially since you're not even running eight cores. It's about a 20% improvement in speed, and one you'll hardly notice....
My upgrade is partly about performance, partly about the principle. I don't understand why Apple doesn't have a 3.2 or 3.3 GHz Mac Pro model available when the system, heat sinks, etc. can clearly handle it. Also, the cost is not a big issue. The Core i7 975 costs approx. $1,000 and I get back about $200 on the resale market for the homeless Nehalem chip. That's a net cost of $800 to go from 2.66 GHz to 3.3 GHz. If you look at the Apple Store, the upgrade cost to go from 2.66 to 2.93 is $500 retail ($450 if you're using edu pricing). Using those numbers, a net upgrade price of $800 to go from 2.66 to 3.33 seemed like a decent deal.
With few exceptions, the bulk of Mac software (and the ones I use most) cannot utilize 8 cores properly. Most of my work is done in Photoshop, Illustrator, InDesign, Word, Excel, Entourage, and Safari. Except for a few filters in Photoshop, none of those programs take advantage of 8 cores. Why pay for 4 extra cores when they will sit there idling most of the time? Looking at the costs for just the Mac and CPU upgrade (no RAM or anything else), my 3.33 GHz quad cost $3,100. The closest priced 8-core is a 2.26 GHz @ $2,999 with educational pricing. I would benefit much more from a 4-core @ 3.33 GHz than an 8-core @ 2.26 GHz. To go to an 8-core 2.66 would put me over $4,200 without any increase in performance.
With regards to "what if" the machine ever breaks down... perhaps I'm tempting fate here... I own two Power Books, two Mac Book Pros, have owned three Power Macs (one a liquid cooled G5 that is being replaced with the new Pro), a Mac Mini which I use as a phone server running Linux, and this new Mac Pro. I've NEVER had any problems with any of my Macs except for the G5 PowerMac which had a leak in the liquid cooling system, frying both CPUs. Apple paid for the repair even though the system was 2 years past the warranty period. I have had an overwhelmingly positive experience with Macs, and a very high reliability rate. I'm rolling the dice.
With few exceptions, the bulk of Mac software (and the ones I use most) cannot utilize 8 cores properly. Most of my work is done in Photoshop, Illustrator, InDesign, Word, Excel, Entourage, and Safari. Except for a few filters in Photoshop, none of those programs take advantage of 8 cores. Why pay for 4 extra cores when they will sit there idling most of the time? Looking at the costs for just the Mac and CPU upgrade (no RAM or anything else), my 3.33 GHz quad cost $3,100. The closest priced 8-core is a 2.26 GHz @ $2,999 with educational pricing. I would benefit much more from a 4-core @ 3.33 GHz than an 8-core @ 2.26 GHz. To go to an 8-core 2.66 would put me over $4,200 without any increase in performance.
With regards to "what if" the machine ever breaks down... perhaps I'm tempting fate here... I own two Power Books, two Mac Book Pros, have owned three Power Macs (one a liquid cooled G5 that is being replaced with the new Pro), a Mac Mini which I use as a phone server running Linux, and this new Mac Pro. I've NEVER had any problems with any of my Macs except for the G5 PowerMac which had a leak in the liquid cooling system, frying both CPUs. Apple paid for the repair even though the system was 2 years past the warranty period. I have had an overwhelmingly positive experience with Macs, and a very high reliability rate. I'm rolling the dice.
Congrats! Nice job and great write-up. I will probably do the same upgrade at some point in the future.
It can be done. But I think you may run into a few problems with the heat spreaders.
How do you just have one laying around.Damn you AZREO!
You're temping me to do this since I have a 975 laying here.
I don't think so. You'd have to use the Xeons. The regular i7's can't do dual socket since they have the multi-processor communication (having a brainfart and too lazy to Google the actual name for it) flipped off. It's what differentiates them from the Xeons.
At least I think so, unless I'm confusing it with another socket.
How do you just have one laying around.
From the BYO PC that the Mac Pro is replacing. Haven't sold the 975 yet, so it's still sitting here. I'm seriously considering it.
My drives are going to be third party, as well as any RAID cards or extra RAM or graphics cards. So if any of those fail I have to replace them myself anyway.
My only worry is if the board dies. Because I'd have to foot the bill for the board. But if any of the other components fails it's third party warranty anyway. Only thing you're really gambling with is the motherboard, power supply and superdrive.
There's only one QPI link on Core i7 and the single socket processors. Xeons have the second QPI enabled for the dual socket systems.
Aaa, thats right. You can upgrade the processors in the 8 core machines, such as replacing a 2.26ghz processor with a faster xeon processor. I believe there is a 3.2ghz one that someone did. And he ran into a few minor setbacks with the heat spreaders I believe.
I got confused there for a sec. I have to retract my previous statement, The i7's will not work with a dual socket system.
I got confused there for a sec. I have to retract my previous statement, The i7's will not work with a dual socket system.
First off, thanks for the great write-up! Nice to see people who don't conform
It's just a shame though that you have 975 and can't overclock that puppy... wish it were possible...
It's just a shame though that you have 975 and can't overclock that puppy... wish it were possible...