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Mac pro upgrade

drupi

drupi

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Sep 26, 2018
19
0
italy
Hello everyone, I have a imac 24 "of 2009 now tired, I would like a little fun with the do it yourself.
I would like to buy a Mac Pro 2008 8 core and in the meantime use it as it is replacing the disk with an SSD and bring the ram to 32GB also put a good card for video editing with FCPX.

But I would like to have a mac pro where I can for example next year replace the processors so that it becomes a 12 core as in the video in the link below.


to do what I have in mind can I buy any 2008 8 pro core on ebay?

for example this
https://www.ebay.it/itm/Mac-Pro-3-1...430635?hash=item25f04df46b:g:7-0AAOSwmNxafsLu


and then in the future just buy the 12 core processors always on ebay and then install them as in the video I posted above?
thank you
 
I'd recommend a 2009 to 2012 model instead of the 2008. The logic boards in these are limited in what can be done with them as well as what OS they can run. The 2009 would be a far better purchase and even a 2010 or 2012 ideally.

CPU swaps on the 2008 aren't worth doing. The boards use much slower RAM and have other limitations...
 
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drupi said:
Hello everyone, I have a imac 24 "of 2009 now tired, I would like a little fun with the do it yourself.
I would like to buy a Mac Pro 2008 8 core and in the meantime use it as it is replacing the disk with an SSD and bring the ram to 32GB also put a good card for video editing with FCPX.

But I would like to have a mac pro where I can for example next year replace the processors so that it becomes a 12 core as in the video in the link below.


to do what I have in mind can I buy any 2008 8 pro core on ebay?

for example this
https://www.ebay.it/itm/Mac-Pro-3-1...430635?hash=item25f04df46b:g:7-0AAOSwmNxafsLu


and then in the future just buy the 12 core processors always on ebay and then install them as in the video I posted above?
thank you
Click to expand...
2008 Mac Pro can not use 12 core processors. See sticky thread on processor compatibility. Better off buying a 4,1 or 5,1 Mac Pro as already mentioned.
 
drupi said:
Thanks friends for answering me, so a mac pro 2009 is better but it must be 8 cores or is a 4 cores good?

this for example is a 4 core could go?

https://www.ebay.it/itm/Apple-Mac-P...145870?hash=item3faa01368e:g:ZhoAAOSwDYBbiRy-
Click to expand...
A quad core 2009 / 2010 / 2012 CPU includes hyperthreading thus providing the ability to run 8 threads. While not as effective as a true 8 cores it is helpful. Even so the architectural improvements of the 2009 / 2010 / 2012 models is considerable making a 4 core very competitive with the 2008 8 core model. A 2009 is definitely a better choice but if you can get the 2008 for a good price and you don't need the abilities of the 2009 and later models it's a great system (I have one).
 
pl1984 said:
A quad core 2009 / 2010 / 2012 CPU includes hyperthreading thus providing the ability to run 8 threads. While not as effective as a true 8 cores it is helpful. Even so the architectural improvements of the 2009 / 2010 / 2012 models is considerable making a 4 core very competitive with the 2008 8 core model. A 2009 is definitely a better choice but if you can get the 2008 for a good price and you don't need the abilities of the 2009 and later models it's a great system (I have one).
Click to expand...


Excuse me but I do not understand if a 2009 4 core can go well or if it must be an 8 core, thanks.
the google translator does not translate very well from english to italian sorry yet.
 
drupi said:
Excuse me but I do not understand if a 2009 4 core can go well or if it must be an 8 core, thanks.
the google translator does not translate very well from english to italian sorry yet.
Click to expand...
No worries. Generally speaking a 2009 quad core is preferable to a 2008 octa core. The recommendation to purchase a 2009 (or later) over the 2008 is a sound one, even if the 2008 has twice as many cores.
 
2009-2012 single CPU = 4 cores 8 threads, or with a CPU upgrade can be 6 cores 12 threads.

2009-2012 dual CPU = 8 cores 16 threads, or with a CPU upgrade 12 cores 24 threads.

To change a single CPU computer to dual CPU you have to change out the CPU board. 2009 has a different CPU board from 2010-2012. Also, to upgrade the CPU of a 2009 model you have to do a firmware update that for software purposes makes it a 2010.

And yes, the 2009-2012 models are better than the 2008, in numerous ways.
 
drupi said:
Very good friend, so a mac pro 2009 4 core works great and in the future just buy a kit as in the link below and turn it into 12 cores, I mean?


https://www.ebay.it/itm/12-Core-X56...966019?hash=item4b4f2e1003:g:e40AAOSw0UdXwfZn
Click to expand...
Unfortunately that kit will not work if you have a 4 or 6 core Mac Pro. In order to turn a 4 or 6 core Mac Pro into an 8 or 12 core version you will also need to replace the CPU tray. If you intend to upgrade to 12 cores I highly recommend just buying an 8 or 12 core Mac Pro to start with.
 
pl1984 said:
Unfortunately that kit will not work if you have a 4 or 6 core Mac Pro. In order to turn a 4 or 6 core Mac Pro into an 8 or 12 core version you will also need to replace the CPU tray. If you intend to upgrade to 12 cores I highly recommend just buying an 8 or 12 core Mac Pro to start with.
Click to expand...

so this mac pro 8 core should be fine with the 12 core kit that I have linked you before?
thank you


https://www.ebay.it/itm/Early-2009-...286757?hash=item3f9efc7ca5:g:AVYAAOSwDYBbooaj
 
drupi said:
so this mac pro 8 core should be fine with the 12 core kit that I have linked you before?
thank you


https://www.ebay.it/itm/Early-2009-...286757?hash=item3f9efc7ca5:g:AVYAAOSwDYBbooaj
Click to expand...
Yes, it should. However the CPUs in the upgrade kit are lidded and the dual CPU 4,1 uses de-lidded CPUs. You can use the kit but there are steps you'll need to take to use it. If you decide to move forward with upgrading the dual 4,1 make sure to post here first. Then we can provide the details of what needs to be done.
 
Resuming this discussion, I would like to understand what difference I would have between a mac pro 2008 8 core and a mac pro 2010 12 core?
what would you change? what advantages would I have?
I always mean for video editing with premiere or final cut pro x and that's it, I'm not interested in video games.
thank you
 
2008 Mac Pros are slow. They heavily lack single core performance. Let me just say that they heavily bottleneck a GTX 1060 by nearly 50%. That's pretty bad.

Editting/scrubbing videos will be choppy. They can't handle it.
 
2008 8-core is really very old technology. Not very upgradeable, though many here are using them.

2009/2010/2012 are very similar. The technology is still old, but still works for many in modern applications like the latest FCPX and 4K editing. The right options and upgrades are needed to do this.

All of these 2009-2012 Mac Pros can be upgraded with CPUs, RAM, USB3, very fast NVMe SSD, and modern AMD GPUs.
- 2009 MP: single CPU can be upgraded. Single CPU systems came with 4-core, but can be upgraded to 6-core Intel X5680 or X5690. Dual CPU systems are much harder to upgrade, but it can be done. This is because they are de-lidded for the cooling mechanism.

- 2010 and 2012 single or dual CPU systems can be easily upgraded. Single CPU to a faster 6-core CPU, and dual CPU to faster duals CPUs, with more cores. It is very expensive to upgrade a single CPU system to.a dual CPU system.

The best upgrade to any system is an SSD.

Everything about upgrading can have an issue. But they can be avoided by asking here in Mac Rumors, or by reading the vast collection of knowledge.
 
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drupi

If you have enough money buy a 2012 5,1 Dual Quad. This mac Pro uses lidded CPUs - much, much easier to upgrade.

Younger too ! Only 7 years old. :p

( Italian ; Se hai abbastanza soldi, acquista al Dual Quad 5.1 del 2012. Questo mac Pro utilizza CPU con coperchio: molto, molto più facile da aggiornare.

Anche più giovane! Solo 7 anni )
 
drupi said:
Resuming this discussion, I would like to understand what difference I would have between a mac pro 2008 8 core and a mac pro 2010 12 core?
what would you change? what advantages would I have?
I always mean for video editing with premiere or final cut pro x and that's it, I'm not interested in video games.
thank you
Click to expand...

I'll offer you a different viewpoint on the Mac Pro 2008 and its video editing capabilities. You never said what type of video you are editing. There is a difference between 1080pHD video editing and 4K, 6K and 8K video editing either in Pro Res, DNxHD/HR, h.264 or h.265 10bit format. Basically, the 2008 when upgraded properly "CAN" be used as a video editing platform for Premiere or Final Cut ProX. You will have to use Dosdude's patch to use High Sierra on the 2008. The only limitation with the 2008 Mac Pro is that the system architecture is too slow to support more modern GPU cards like the Nvidia GTX TitanX or the 1080Ti or the AMD Vega64 where they have a higher video ram ceiling -- larger than 4Gb of ram. If you're editing below 4K, 4Gb of GDDR5 ram is more than enough and video editing won't be choppy. But you will be limited with 1080pHD and some basic 4K editing and some video editing freelancers in our area "STILL" use the 2008 to make money. Not everyone is flushed with lots of cash to do temp gigs with video editing these days. If you're editing higher than 4K, then having 8Gb of ram and up (12 to 16Gb of video ram) is better.

If you're mainly editing 4K and up, then skip the 2008 and go right into the 2009 to 2012. 12 cores vs the stock 8 cores is really mainly about CPU encoding speed, because encoding and decoding h.264 is mainly done by those CPUs. Only the rendering and the color grading portion of your video editing are done via the GPU. "Majority of all" video editing software offered today in 2019, are multicore and multi-threaded. The upper limit of GPU that the Mac Pro 2008 can use without causing the CPU bottleneck is the GTX770, which is a Kepler card. But that card is still capable to do some heavy duty video editing "BETTER" than any 2009 Macbook Pro or 2011 Mac Mini, because in video editing, having a capable GPU counts a lot.

So if you tell us what are your plans in regards to the type of videos you are planning to edit, then we can better ascertain your needs. Lastly, I'll link a video of a lady in Japan who made a good video explaining the video editing capabilities of the 2008 Mac Pro and in a part 2 of the episode (2 years later) upgraded her 2008 Mac Pro to 28Gb RAM, a GTX770 and running Mojave and the thing screams in video editing. So just be aware that for modest budget needs, the 2008 is still capable. I personally own the 2009 flashed to Mac Pro 5,1 and the reason was I needed the Radeon RX580 support, higher ram ceiling on the GPU for a few photographic applications that need them that the 2008 won't be able to deliver performance wise. Video editing is certainly nicer with the Mac Pro 5,1 than with the 3,1 2008, but I think that as long as you understand your needs clearly and match a Mac Pro that can address your needs, why not save some some money in the process? Her use of Firewire drive clearly tells us that she's not doing any high end 4K editing and up as the drive is too slow to process 4K RAW and up.

Link to the 2008 Mac Pro review for video editing is below part 1.


Here's part 2

 
Last edited:
first of all I ask if anyone knows this type of mac pro 8 core at 3.2 gh / z and has a very good price, what do you say?
are its 2 processors good and powerful?


https://www.ebay.it/itm/Apple-Mac-P...671808?hash=item2f2c98c300:g:o-YAAOSwkV9cgoIT
[doublepost=1565796626][/doublepost]
iluvmacs99 said:
I'll offer you a different viewpoint on the Mac Pro 2008 and its video editing capabilities. You never said what type of video you are editing. There is a difference between 1080pHD video editing and 4K, 6K and 8K video editing either in Pro Res, DNxHD/HR, h.264 or h.265 10bit format. Basically, the 2008 when upgraded properly "CAN" be used as a video editing platform for Premiere or Final Cut ProX. You will have to use Dosdude's patch to use High Sierra on the 2008. The only limitation with the 2008 Mac Pro is that the system architecture is too slow to support more modern GPU cards like the Nvidia GTX TitanX or the 1080Ti or the AMD Vega64 where they have a higher video ram ceiling -- larger than 4Gb of ram. If you're editing below 4K, 4Gb of GDDR5 ram is more than enough and video editing won't be choppy. But you will be limited with 1080pHD and some basic 4K editing and some video editing freelancers in our area "STILL" use the 2008 to make money. Not everyone is flushed with lots of cash to do temp gigs with video editing these days. If you're editing higher than 4K, then having 8Gb of ram and up (12 to 16Gb of video ram) is better.

If you're mainly editing 4K and up, then skip the 2008 and go right into the 2009 to 2012. 12 cores vs the stock 8 cores is really mainly about CPU encoding speed, because encoding and decoding h.264 is mainly done by those CPUs. Only the rendering and the color grading portion of your video editing are done via the GPU. "Majority of all" video editing software offered today in 2019, are multicore and multi-threaded. The upper limit of GPU that the Mac Pro 2008 can use without causing the CPU bottleneck is the GTX770, which is a Kepler card. But that card is still capable to do some heavy duty video editing "BETTER" than any 2009 Macbook Pro or 2011 Mac Mini, because in video editing, having a capable GPU counts a lot.

So if you tell us what are your plans in regards to the type of videos you are planning to edit, then we can better ascertain your needs. Lastly, I'll link a video of a lady in Japan who made a good video explaining the video editing capabilities of the 2008 Mac Pro and in a part 2 of the episode (2 years later) upgraded her 2008 Mac Pro to 28Gb RAM, a GTX770 and running Mojave and the thing screams in video editing. So just be aware that for modest budget needs, the 2008 is still capable. I personally own the 2009 flashed to Mac Pro 5,1 and the reason was I needed the Radeon RX580 support, higher ram ceiling on the GPU for a few photographic applications that need them that the 2008 won't be able to deliver performance wise. Video editing is certainly nicer with the Mac Pro 5,1 than with the 3,1 2008, but I think that as long as you understand your needs clearly and match a Mac Pro that can address your needs, why not save some some money in the process? Her use of Firewire drive clearly tells us that she's not doing any high end 4K editing and up as the drive is too slow to process 4K RAW and up.

Link to the 2008 Mac Pro review for video editing is below part 1.


Here's part 2

Click to expand...





I thank you for your advice, I do amateur editing and not by profession, using FullHD files and if need be converted to ProRes 422hq, so I think a mac pro 2008 3.1 8 core should succeed without problems, both with premiere pro and with final cut pro X true?
Of course I can't have the same power as an I7 4790K clearly, but I can still edit without jerks or slowdowns.
I would also like to replace the video card with a better GTX 960 2gb type, and increase the RAM up to a total of 32gb, I would also install all SSDs as disks, and high sierra as the operating system.
what do you suggest me?
For 4K I still don't care, but in the future when I use it I will always be able to convert 4k files to prores 444 in order to make them more fluid as I work in the timeline, I don't care about file export times, if instead of exporting to 30 minutes were there for 2 hours I do not care, what interests me and work in the timeline without jerks or slowdowns, and not with native files, but with files converted to prores si fullhd and 4k in the future.
thank you
 
I also wanted to know about a Mac Pro 3.1 since 2008 8 cores change a lot if the processors are 2.8 Gh/z or 3.2 Gh/z?
Does the difference for video editing change or are they the same?
thank you
 
drupi said:
first of all I ask if anyone knows this type of mac pro 8 core at 3.2 gh / z and has a very good price, what do you say?
are its 2 processors good and powerful?


https://www.ebay.it/itm/Apple-Mac-P...671808?hash=item2f2c98c300:g:o-YAAOSwkV9cgoIT
[doublepost=1565796626][/doublepost]





I thank you for your advice, I do amateur editing and not by profession, using FullHD files and if need be converted to ProRes 422hq, so I think a mac pro 2008 3.1 8 core should succeed without problems, both with premiere pro and with final cut pro X true?
Of course I can't have the same power as an I7 4790K clearly, but I can still edit without jerks or slowdowns.
I would also like to replace the video card with a better GTX 960 2gb type, and increase the RAM up to a total of 32gb, I would also install all SSDs as disks, and high sierra as the operating system.
what do you suggest me?
For 4K I still don't care, but in the future when I use it I will always be able to convert 4k files to prores 444 in order to make them more fluid as I work in the timeline, I don't care about file export times, if instead of exporting to 30 minutes were there for 2 hours I do not care, what interests me and work in the timeline without jerks or slowdowns, and not with native files, but with files converted to prores si fullhd and 4k in the future.
thank you
Click to expand...

If you are working on ProRes files, then you will encounter less overhead vs h.264 and h.265. The files are going to be larger than h.264, so you would need to RAID a few platter HDs for media to improve I/O performance. Your OS should be on RAID0 (a pair of PCIe SSD cards) and an example of that is on the 2nd video I attached earlier. 4Gb of video ram or more; more video ram means less lag on the timeline. Technically speaking, the 2008 Mac Pro should do fine with Full HD. 4K can be a struggle unless you work with proxies.
 
Last edited:
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You appear to keep asking the same question over and over hoping for an answer you are unlikely to get.

Unless you have a specific need involving low-res video, you should not consider anything earlier than 2009. Even better, a 5.1 is less hassle with less expense even though the initial outlay may be a bit more.
 
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One thing I do not understand, for example let's look at the benckmark of a mac pro 2008 3.1 8 core https://browser.geekbench.com/macs/254 on this score.
If instead we look at that of an I7 4790 k we have this other score https://browser.geekbench.com/processors/1536
So the second, mine has about twice the power, but how are these benckmarks made?
With HD video games or with export or import rendering proofs, I mean that maybe for video games, the Mac pro and lower but for video editing instead is more powerful, isn't it?
Is there a benckmark for PCs where the power is calculated based on editing with a specific software x video and a specific video card?
 
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