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Replace 2.93 quad with 3.2 quad - worth it?

B

bobbydaz

macrumors regular
Original poster
Jan 24, 2009
194
67
UK
I need to source a new mac pro for our studio and normally when we need to buy a new mac I take the opportunity to upgrade mine and pass on my old mac onto the new designer.

Now my question is do I replace my 2009 2.93 with the 2010 3.2 or is it really not worth all the hassle? To be honest I am totally happy with my 2009 MP and if the performance gain is negligible then I might be better just getting a 2010 2.8 for the new guy and stick with what I've got.

Budget isn't really an issue and if I wanted to I could probably push for a 3.33 hex but again am I going to see much real world difference in Photoshop, InDesign etc? I know migration assistant helps make the process of transferring from one mac to anther easier but it is still an extra job to do when you are really busy trying to get work done.
 
Does it have to be a Mac Pro or would an iMac be sufficient for the new guy? The performance is around the same but you lose upgradeability.
 
Hellhammer said:
Does it have to be a Mac Pro or would an iMac be sufficient for the new guy? The performance is around the same but you lose upgradeability.
Click to expand...

Definitely has to be a Mac Pro. Sounds selfish but I am more interested if there is any benefit to me taking up the offer of a better mac than I've currently got rather than saving money. Is a 2010 MP going to be that much different to my 2009 is my main question I guess. When I made the jump last year from G5 to MP there was a noticeable improvement, but is it worth doing another change over if it's only going to save me a couple of seconds in day to day use?
 
bobbydaz said:
Definitely has to be a Mac Pro. Sounds selfish but I am more interested if there is any benefit to me taking up the offer of a better mac than I've currently got rather than saving money. Is a 2010 MP going to be that much different to my 2009 is my main question I guess. When I made the jump last year from G5 to MP there was a noticeable improvement, but is it worth doing another change over if it's only going to save me a couple of seconds in day to day use?
Click to expand...

2009 and 2010 machines are basically exactly the same.
What you get with a 2010 is slightly faster CPU's (with the option of 6-cores) and faster graphics cards.

They can be up to 50% faster than last years models, but it all comes down to the options you chose.

From which model do you intend to upgrade, and which 2010 model are you intending to buy?

Edit: Should have read the first post, my bad.

So you've got a 2009 quad 2.93. Apparently the 2010 2.8 won't be an upgrade, the 3.2GHz will give you 9% better performance. Not worth upgrading if you ask me.
Even the 3.33GHz hex core will give you a marginally better performance of 13% in single threaded tasks. Your software can not use more than 4 cores, so multitasking performance of the hex core doesn't really matter in this case.
 
bobbydaz said:
Definitely has to be a Mac Pro. Sounds selfish but I am more interested if there is any benefit to me taking up the offer of a better mac than I've currently got rather than saving money. Is a 2010 MP going to be that much different to my 2009 is my main question I guess. When I made the jump last year from G5 to MP there was a noticeable improvement, but is it worth doing another change over if it's only going to save me a couple of seconds in day to day use?
Click to expand...

An SSD would probably be the biggest upgrade but that can be done on your current machine. 3.2GHz is ~9% faster than 2.93GHz so in real world, there isn't going to be a noticeable difference with Photoshop.
 
Hellhammer said:
An SSD would probably be the biggest upgrade but that can be done on your current machine. 3.2GHz is ~9% faster than 2.93GHz so in real world, there isn't going to be a noticeable difference with Photoshop.
Click to expand...

I have an SSD here sitting on my desk, just waiting to make a decision on whether it goes in this mac or a new one. I need to make my decision today and order a new machine ether way.
 
Overclock... If all your worried about is CPU speed then just bump it up a notch.
 
Transporteur said:
2009 and 2010 machines are basically exactly the same.
What you get with a 2010 is slightly faster CPU's (with the option of 6-cores) and faster graphics cards.

They can be up to 50% faster than last years models, but it all comes down to the options you chose.

From which model do you intend to upgrade, and which 2010 model are you intending to buy?

Edit: Should have read the first post, my bad.

So you've got a 2009 quad 2.93. Apparently the 2010 2.8 won't be an upgrade, the 3.2GHz will give you 9% better performance. Not worth upgrading if you ask me.
Even the 3.33GHz hex core will give you a marginally better performance of 13% in single threaded tasks. Your software can not use more than 4 cores, so multitasking performance of the hex core doesn't really matter in this case.
Click to expand...

Thanks, that's kind of the answer I was expecting. I guess most people would always take a new slightly better mac over their existing one, but for me it's more about the time I need to invest transferring everything over.
 
Hellhammer said:
That is only for pre-2009 Mac Pros, I think.
Click to expand...

Ahh didn't realise apologies.

Although thinking about it you could Overclock in windows and as the CPU has some storage on the later Mac Pro's the clock speed would be retained in OSX
 
neckarb said:
Although thinking about it you could Overclock in windows and as the CPU has some storage on the later Mac Pro's the clock speed would be retained in OSX
Click to expand...

Do you have any proofs that it works? At least with GPU OCing with iMac, the clock speeds are reseted when rebooted thus it will only work under Windows.
 
I know that when you set the FSB with Zdnet Clock and reboot into windows it retains the FSB, it makes sense that it works the other way round

Hellhammer said:
Do you have any proofs that it works? At least with GPU OCing with iMac, the clock speeds are reseted when rebooted thus it will only work under Windows.
Click to expand...

Also GPU overclocking in Mac Pro's is retained between windows and OSX, my 5870 is overclocked in both.
 
neckarb said:
I know that when you set the FSB with Zdnet Clock and reboot into windows it retains the FSB, it makes sense that it works the other way round
Click to expand...

You are just assuming that it works the other way around. That is not a concrete proof that it works.

neckarb said:
Also GPU overclocking in Mac Pro's is retained between windows and OSX, my 5870 is overclocked in both.
Click to expand...

How do you know the clocks under OS X? AFAIK there is no utility that tells you that.
 
Hellhammer said:
You are just assuming that it works the other way around. That is not a concrete proof that it works.


No but there's no good reason to think that it dosent...

How do you know the clocks under OS X? AFAIK there is no utility that tells you that.
Click to expand...

Just run xbench once without increasing clock, then re-run after clocking up...

Also, if you use Zdnet clock in OSX with a 2006 mac pro then try to restart you get a kernal panic, flashing power button etc as the CPU has no memory, the same happens if you try to do this in windows and then reset...
 
What I've heard and read over the years fight against what you are saying. Can you provide some concrete proofs that support your statements, such as articles, screenshots or links to threads?

I spend a lot time in these forums so I would be extremely surprised if you were the only one that has OCed his Mac Pro as I've never heard of this before. The ZDnet utility works for some Mac Pros but otherwise all OCing has to be done under Windows and clocks are reseted when rebooted back to OS X.

I've heard it so many times from so many different people that I can't just believe what you're saying. I want to see concrete proofs.
 
I don't know about the pre 2009 models, but anything later than that can not be overclocked (at least CPU wise).
 
Hellhammer said:
What I've heard and read over the years fight against what you are saying. Can you provide some concrete proofs that support your statements, such as articles, screenshots or links to threads?

I spend a lot time in these forums so I would be extremely surprised if you were the only one that has OCed his Mac Pro as I've never heard of this before. The ZDnet utility works for some Mac Pros but otherwise all OCing has to be done under Windows and clocks are reseted when rebooted back to OS X.

I've heard it so many times from so many different people that I can't just believe what you're saying. I want to see concrete proofs.
Click to expand...

My Mac Pro is a 2006, dosen't benefit this thread. You cant reboot after overclocking pre-2009 google it, you can find lots of people who overclock in OSX then boot into windows, no idea about the other way round, but logically it makes more sense to say it would work than it wouldn't as your doing the same thing in windows as OSX, increasing the FSB

Try 3rd post down on this thread: http://forum.hardmac.com/index.php?showtopic=1639&mode=threaded&pid=8998
 
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