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Mac Pro minor upgrade soon?
- Thread starter renault4
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You are not?
You think it was Apple magic that allowed them to put only one processor in the current Mac Pro? As I have followed the debate on the number of processors available in the Mac Pro since August 2006, Clovertown had to have at least 2 processors, but the "upcoming Hapertown" could have one. So when Apple switched to Harpertown, then Apple offered a choice of only one processor, for those who wanted to opt to have it at a reduced price of $500 off of the standard config.
But what about a few years back when people were predicting 8.0GHz by 2008? Just as the GHz race was replaced by the number of cores, perhaps something will replace the core race?
But what about a few years back when people were predicting 8.0GHz by 2008? Just as the GHz race was replaced by the number of cores, perhaps something will replace the core race?
Ah, good point indeed. The GHz race has been replaced by number of cores, I think the next hurdle is SSD drives and FSB and/or faster communication to all those cores.
Not to mention software that is more "core aware."
But what about a few years back when people were predicting 8.0GHz by 2008? Just as the GHz race was replaced by the number of cores, perhaps something will replace the core race?
It just depends if chip makers find it cost effective to keep upping the number of cores. It's certainly cheaper than trying to squeeze out more Ghz when there is no Ghz to be squeezed, but eventually something will become more prevalent than "QUAD CORE QUAD CORE QUAD CORE!!".
You're right. "OCTORE OCTORE OCTORE!"
Then, "SEDICIMORE SEDICIMORE SEDICIMORE!"
Or maybe, "QUBIT QUBIT QUBIT!" by that time.
Because it is cheaper to design, engineer, certify and manufacture one type of systemboard (with two sockets) instead of two (one with one socket and another with two). And, in the end, Intel hopes you will add that second processor if you only start with one.
Now, Beckton might very well launch in four-socket and eight-socket boards (I don't expect to see two-socket boards) because it would appeal to multiple server niches (blade, mid-size, large) with different thermal and power considerations, so the total market could very well be large enough to justify systemboards with different CPU socket counts.
Beckton could run in a dual-socket configuration, but since Gainestown supports ECC DDR3, I don't see a need for a dual-socket FBDIMM solution.
Gainestown cannot operate with more then two sockets because it lacks the interconnect hardware.
The only information I can find on Beckton is that it's an MP chip, not DP. Mac Pros use DP chips. MP chips take longer before they ship, I think due to the extra validation done to make sure the platform works right. DP versions of a new die generation generally ship a lot closer to that of the desktop and notebook chips than that.
It looks like Gainestown might be the DP variation of Nehalem, but that information is a bit sketchy.
I would personally expect to see a new Mac Pro April '09 or earlier.
In terms of selling a Mac Pro? Price. I think MP systems can run with fewer than four chips, but in practice, might not be done so much. The cost of MP chips is a LOT higher than that of DP chips, 2x the cost for a slower chip is not unheard of, so using MP chips that can only run in a system with only two sockets is too expensive, it's better to design the system using DP chips.
I don't think Clovertown required two processors, just Apple wanted an all-quad line-up at the time. Competitors offered DP workstations with a single processor as the base model. All Xeon DPs that I'm aware of operate just fine with a single CPU, I have run a few that way, but it's effectively an expensive single socket system.
Hopefully Apple would make a player program to go with it, and also hopefully introduce authoring capability for FCS at the same time.
A professional machine that could also be used to author the discs. A quick way to play back said discs would be to have player software in the same computer. I suppose I could back up my most critical data to a BD, but it's already not big enough for complete backups unless I like shuffling discs, and backup is not my only interest in the format. With the amount of data I need to back up, BD for backup is a secondary interest.
You're right. "OCTORE OCTORE OCTORE!"
Then, "SEDICIMORE SEDICIMORE SEDICIMORE!"
Or maybe, "QUBIT QUBIT QUBIT!" by that time.
not quite
instead of cores processors will soon have 'nodes'
and each 'node' contains 4 cores
so a quad node processor would have
um umu um
4 x 4 = 16 cores
wow i cant wait till sandy beach