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Mac pro processor upgrade
- Thread starter Joell
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Yes, you can, but only to CPUs with D0 and B1 stepping. Others aren't likely to work because of the CPU microcode in the firmware.
And Intel's next-gen platform (Sandy Bridge) will move to entirely new CPU sockets as well.
I'd say to buy what your needs require now for your budget. In a lot of cases, upgrading CPUs on MPs later on ends up being more expensive (and more of a hassle) than simply selling your old machine and putting the money towards a new one. Xeon processors are not cheap. There are exceptions, of course.
And Intel's next-gen platform (Sandy Bridge) will move to entirely new CPU sockets as well.
I'd say to buy what your needs require now for your budget. In a lot of cases, upgrading CPUs on MPs later on ends up being more expensive (and more of a hassle) than simply selling your old machine and putting the money towards a new one. Xeon processors are not cheap. There are exceptions, of course.
2009 machines will only take chips with D0 stepping (Nehalem Xeons). You need a 2010 Mac Pro backplane board and processor board to be able to accept anything with B1 stepping, that would be a Westmere chip such as the 3.33GHz W3680. You can install this chip on a 2.8GHz 2010 Mac Pro but not on a 2.93GHz 2009 Mac Pro. Funny, huh?
As WardC said, you can upgrade to the hexacorre W3680 from a 2010 quad configuration, but not to the 8 or 12 core configurations, because those require slots for 2 processors.
Single Processor power Macs used to have an open slot, so they could be upgraded to dual processor configs, but the MacPro boards do not have this option.
Why not just buy the hex now? You won't be spending much more (~$100) to just buy it from apple, and you won't have to deal with messing around with delicate, expensive CPUs when switching. If you know you want it, I'd just buy now.
One possibility is current budget only allows for a quad. Either that, or the OP only needs a quad for now but wants the possibility to upgrade down the line. Hopefully, the hex will also drop in price over time while it's still available.
Yes, that's exactly what you should do. 1333mhz RAM is so close in price to its 1066mhz equivalent that it makes perfect sense to do so.
Do you know if it's possible to upgrade MacPro Nehalem 2.26 to 2.66 Ghz Westmare with the following processors : Intel Hexa Core Xeon® Processor X5650 12M Cache, 2.66 GHz, 6.40 GT/s Intel® QPI part #:BX80614X5650 ? Could you help me telling if its possible to upgrading MacPro Nehalem octa core 2.26 Ghz to Mac Pro Westmare hexa core 2.66 Ghz ?
Just read the thread. The answer has already been given. To sum this up, the simple answer is no, unless you swap your mother board where the EFI sits on.
Wow.. so i currently have a 2.93ghz nehalem quad core... this means i cant put in a hexa-core processor? is it a real HW issue or a firmware thing?
it would be awesome to get one more bump in performance before having to sell the machine
You could upgrade to a faster Nehalem. But Westmere will require new boards. If you can get hold of those parts, you could drop a hex in there.