I regularly use 7.25+ GB of ram on one of my machines that as 8GB of ram. There are some of us that need it. I think it's absolute ******** that Apple did not get a motherboard with 6 ram slots. Nehalem motherboard is very very low end.
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Mac Pro QuadCore 2008 Max = 32GB RAM Now 2009 Max = 8GB!
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I regularly use 7.25+ GB of ram on one of my machines that as 8GB of ram. There are some of us that need it. I think it's absolute ******** that Apple did not get a motherboard with 6 ram slots. Nehalem motherboard is very very low end.
For me 8GB would be a dream and more than enough. But thats not the point. My question is why the downgrade. There is no reason for it so, I guess it just has to be money saving. Shame apple didn't pass on the savings!
and a few years ago 4 gigs was more than enough, before that 2 gigs was.
Who needs more than 128k of memory?
As time goes on programs need more and more memory. A mac pro is a long term investment and for work machines that upgrade path is often necessary.
If I had 32GB of RAM, I would mount 24GB of it as my scratch disk for Photoshop and stuff. It'll make a decent RAM disk.
I love it when people claim because they don't need any more then no-one else does either.
I'm going to be watching for an old 8 core job in the refurb store I think.
yeah, I don't get it either. I understand why only 4 slots (integrated memory controller) by why wouldn't it be 16 gig?
So according to the Specs page they list this:
http://www.apple.com/macpro/specs.html
But why are we only able to use 1GB or 2GB DIMMs for the Quad Core? Is this a technical limitation?
-Kevin
Or is apple starting to branch into two separate markets with two different machines. The entry level MacPro seems to be a very solid high end consumer model/entry level prosumer. While the upper model is still the High End prosumer model. Apple seems to be prepping us for two seperate towers that will be comming down the road sometime.
I have 4GB in my low-end white macbook, about a year old. I use all of it sometimes. It only cost me about £70 for the upgrade.
8GB max on a massive, brand new, high-end workstation machine that is 20xthe size, weight, and many times the cost of my macbook is frankly taking the piss.
Some people have even got 6GB to work in the macbooks and 8GB in the MBPs.
8GB might be a lot now, but it will be nothing for a desktop in 5-8 years time, which is easily the working life of a Mac Pro.
8GB max on a massive, brand new, high-end workstation machine that is 20xthe size, weight, and many times the cost of my macbook is frankly taking the piss.
Some people have even got 6GB to work in the macbooks and 8GB in the MBPs.
8GB might be a lot now, but it will be nothing for a desktop in 5-8 years time, which is easily the working life of a Mac Pro.
I am guessing that you don't run any virtual machines. If I want to have the VM's for 2 clients open at once with any decent performance, I need 6-8GB of RAM for the VM's alone - not counting what I need for anything running on the system itself.
As a side note to anyone interested, the new iMacs are listed as being able to expand to 8GB now (at least officially from Apple).
Nice for those that don't quite need a Mac Pro, buy need more RAM to run VMs and such.
-Kevin
Nice for those that don't quite need a Mac Pro, buy need more RAM to run VMs and such.
-Kevin
I believe if you have all 4 full your drop down to dual channel. Tri channel is limited to 6gb AFIK.
Kinda funny really considering my Single Socket PC motherboard (with a Nehalem Chip) can support 24GB. (6 Slots each with 4GB). Even with 2GB Dimms I can get 12GB in there and still have full use of Triple Channel memory.
Crucial sell some 4GB ECC Registered 1333MHz DDR3 RAM that will work in the Mac Pro so I would think you could easily get 16GB in the Single Socket Quad Core Mac Pro by using those.
Crucial sell some 4GB ECC Registered 1333MHz DDR3 RAM that will work in the Mac Pro so I would think you could easily get 16GB in the Single Socket Quad Core Mac Pro by using those.
I spoke with someone at apple today. I actually emailed them and to my surprise I got a phone call a few hours later. He was saying he spoke to this and that department and read through this and that manual. If the 8core can support 4gb dimms he doesn't see why the 4core couldn't. Bottom line is he really couldn't say for sure. I guess we just wait for a consumer to just try it.
Not true... if you have 4x2GB sticks (8GB), the first 6GB or memory is split across three channels and will provide full memory bandwidth. The last 2GB is attached to one of the channels and doesn't gain the benefit of multi-channel bandwidth (access is effectively single channel on the last 2GB).
Maybe Apple figures that nobody on a budget is dumb enough to buy their ridiculously priced 4GB memory sticks, so they only offer memory for the 4-core machine in 1GB and 2GB sizes. Did you notice that for the 8-core machines, 8x4GB of memory costs an extra $6,100? That's $762.50 each! wtf
The quad core Mac Pros not supporting 4GB DIMMs is probably just Apple marketing. The 8 core systems have a higher margin so they will want to use everything they can to sell one over a quad. Apple have a history of doing similar things on the other product lines.
I would expect 8GB DIMMs to work in both too when they are on the market.
I would expect 8GB DIMMs to work in both too when they are on the market.
Not sure about the 8GB part. Intel's documentation does not mention about 8GB memory module support for Core i7.
The i7 platform only works with unbuffered non-ECC memory.
There probably won't be unbuffered non-ECC 8GB DIMMs. There will be registered ECC 8GB DIMMs and maybe unbuffered ECC 8GB DIMMs. Maybe there isn't support on the Xeon 3500 IMC, but the Xeon 5500 does support 8GB and 16GB DIMMs.