Mid 2010 best upgrade options for video editing

[esatamacmodular]

Hello,

I am upgrading my
Apple Mac Pro "Eight Core" 2.4 (2010/Westmere) Specs
Identifiers: Mid-2010 - MC561LL/A - MacPro5,1 - A1289 - 2314-2

I normally work in motion design - C4D, After Effects, and FCPX. I usually render at work or with a render farm from work, but since I am doing more freelance I need to be able to keep up some rendering on my personal MacPro 5,1. Currently OSX 10.7. 8CX/ 1TB HDD 7200 / 6x1GB 1066mhz RAM / 5770 Video. My most recent render took over 5 hours for a very modest project. I think I can do better with just a few good upgrades. Thanks in advance for your suggestions!

I'm thinking the best value upgrade would be 500GB SSD (samsung EVO?) and 2x8GB 1333mhz RAM (for total 22GB RAM). I plan on upgrading to OS X 10.11 El Capitan as well.

What about video card? It looks like I have PCIe 2.0 x16 slot available (I guess 2 of them since I am running the 5770 on one). Specs say I can do 2x 5770 but I'm sure there is a more energy efficient option out there.

Thanks for any input!

 

[pastrychef]

You may be interested in THIS THREAD where the original poster has dual GTX 970s running with internal power.

 

[esatamacmodular]

You may be interested in THIS THREAD where the original poster has dual GTX 970s running with internal power.

Very nice! Cuda and Open GL strength... just what I'm looking for .. thanks!

 

[esatamacmodular]

from what I have read, 1333mhz 8 GB sticks should be fine alongside the OEM pc3-8500 1066mhz 1GB sticks as long as they are put in correct slots. The 1333mhz sticks automatically downgrade to 1066mhz but I wonder if it would just work better with the two 8GB sticks alone at 1333mhz?

 

[esatamacmodular]

so two of those overclocked GTX 970s would total about $500-650 in new/like new condition. Any better value out there?

 

[pastrychef]

from what I have read, 1333mhz 8 GB sticks should be fine alongside the OEM pc3-8500 1066mhz 1GB sticks as long as they are put in correct slots. The 1333mhz sticks automatically downgrade to 1066mhz but I wonder if it would just work better with the two 8GB sticks alone at 1333mhz?

As long as you buy the same type of memory, they should work with the existing RAM and, yes, they will operate at 1066MHz.

If all your RAM is 1333MHz, they will run at 1333MHz. I don't know how much real world advantages there are to doing this.

 

[pastrychef]

so two of those overclocked GTX 970s would total about $500-650 in new/like new condition. Any better value out there?

Personally, I would avoid overclocked models of the GTX 970 if you intend to run two of them on the internal power of the Mac Pro. The reference GTX 970s have a TDP of 145. Overclocked models could potentially pull much more power and exceed the amount of power the Mac Pro power rails can provide.

Try going to the original thread and asking those who have done the same which video cards they used.