Got a tip for us?
Let us know
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.
Upcoming 12-Core Xeon CPU Destined for Apple's New Mac Pro Posts Impressive Benchmark Scores
- Thread starter MacRumors
- Start date
- Sort by reaction score
Are you kidding? A lot of the apps I use scale *exponentially* with added cores... 2x would be terrible performance for a lot of them if I doubled the cores...
(I'm not saying it's a common case mind you, but I did specifically talk about MD sims in the post you replied to)
Go back and read again.....
This isn't on a Mac Pro and it isn't even running 10.9. This is just on the processor expected to be in the MP.
HP had 16 core machines launching back when Apple was launching the outdated 2012 Pro model. If they could figure out the heat issue than Apple could too.
----------
Net Render
There will certainly be more than one model configuration, but I think we can say with a high degree of certainty that there will be no dual cpu option.
Highly unlikely. Have you seen the pictures? There's no room for a dual configuration. Seeing as there are 12 core Xeons this time around, logic would dictate they are what's going to be used.
Not a hater here. I'm taking a wait and see approach on the new Mac Pro. But that statement means nothing. Every new model is the "fastest ever." And that really wasn't a hard goal considering they're upgrading from 2 year old hardware. The fact is that the PC counterparts will be offering "faster" alternatives.
That's exactly what they're going for. However, that also depends largely on the software developers. It would have been nice if they offered an Nvidia option from the jump.
4K is definitely coming. It's still overrated though.
The problem with a lot of Apple's products that are "designed for the future" is that by the time that future gets here, they will be woefully outdated.
The original MacBook Air was clearly designed to be the future of notebooks, but it is only this year's model with the Haswell chips that they have managed to put together a system which has good battery life, reasonable performance, and good connectivity.
The Retina iPad was pushed out the gate to stick to their schedule, even though the hardware to drive the display properly wasn't available, and they were replaced in 6 months.
The Retina MacBook Pros were pushed out before they had the hardware to drive the displays properly.
The new Mac Pro manages to best a system that was years out of date when it was new - what a feat!
Admittedly, it's doing this with a single CPU rather than two now, but that means it's now woefully under-powered compared to the dual CPU class systems it is supposed to be competing with.
Focusing on GPU compute is a nice idea in theory, but there's not much that currently takes advantage of it. By the time it makes sense to have a dual GPU setup for compute, the upcoming Mac Pro will be underpowered - and you can't upgrade the graphics cards, because they aren't using standard PCI-E slots, and Thunderbolt is far too slow.
And for that matter, it's nice that they are using PCI-E SSDs to bypass the limitations of SATA3, but your storage expansion is severely limited now that you have to rely on external drives. Decent Thunderbolt enclosures are still very expensive, and to have say 16TB of storage now means that I require a second tower the same size as the Mac Pro itself, rather than it being contained inside a single unit - and the previous Mac Pro tower design was already rather limited for expansion compared to similar size PC towers.
No way is it overrated. DCI 4K uses JPEG2000 video compression, 12-bit 4:4:4 video, up to 250Mbps video bitrate, and a much wider color gamut. It's amazing.
Now if you're talking UHD, then the difference is more subtle. But a doubling of vertical resolution increase of the chroma resolution will make even 8 bit color video (Not sure what the final color bit spec for it is...) look much better on lots of program material types, so I say bring it on!
Wait, a question... why would you ever run a process with just a single thread? (Like encoding music)
Exactly. I don't mind paying more but I want as much horsepower possible. I guess beauty is more important to Apple than the beast.
----------
...MacPro, new car, MacPro, new car, MacPro, new car, MacPro, new car, MacPro, new car, MacPro, new car.........
How about:
Mac Pro + New Car = Get another job!
----------
I need something to render my videos without it taking too long. While rendering, I have to use another machine.
If the new Mac Pro would have 2x CPU, this would really help speed the rendering time.
Actually, it would be cool if we could connect 2x Mac Pro for 2x the performance. But Adobe Premiere wouldn't be able to use it.
Huh. A story on something more interesting than what the new iPhone buttons are going to look like. Bravo MacRumors, Bravo.
I'm confused. Why would an app reside on an external HDD and not the internal SSD?
There will definitely be more than one, but apple has shown the guts of the machine and it's definitely single socket.
Not an option for real time apps like Logic.
I'm not sure if this is serious or a joke. Of course 12 cores will be the high end and not the low.
Because intel charges crazy money for not much more performance. What they DIDN'T SHOW on their graphs was the COST of the Xeon chips vs the i7. Intel charges WAY more for the slower Xeon, and about TRIPPLE for the motherboard hardware to hold it.
Complain about Apple all you want, but Intel is the one dragging feet here. They haven't releases useful new Xeon chips in years, to the point the mobile i7 chips are "almost" as good for regular users. All you really gain using Xeon is the high-end interfaces... The wide PCIE and PCIX busses, access to multiple Gigabit nics, support for Fibre Channel and SCSI RAID boards, support for large memory sets... All stuff that intel demands crazy premium prices just to SUPPORT, so you can pay EXTRA for all the Add-on cards that are $500+ each.
Apple's Mac Pro woes are more about how Intel protects their expensive server business by preventing "desktop" chips that are faster from access to the high-end IO cards and power management needed to be "real servers". It's remote power tools, lights out management, BIOS for RAID cards, etc that Intel has pulled the wiring right out of the i7 chips for, and forbids cheap manufactures from adding back in. Without that stuff, your super fast gaming box is just a shiny toy to somebody building a data center. Or the difference between a zippy sports car and semi truck for moving stuff down the information super highway.
Last edited:
* my note -- referencing one comment higher in the thread.
The question cuts both ways. Software developers have to code for GPU processing but don't they also have to code to take advantage of multiple CPU's? Maybe Apple feels the tools are getting better to go the GPU route instead of the multiple CPU route.
Doesn't work for a lot of externals because the sleep function is controlled by the drive's firmware. The only workaround is to install a small script that constantly pings the drive to keep it active.
For video, external drives can be a nightmare.
But, hey, the Mac will be smaller and look cool!
What difference will that make? If the drive is asleep, who cares how it's connected.
It's about spinning down constantly. You won't understand the problem if you don't demand sustained performance from drives. If you're just editing photos or storing movies and music, you'll never have a problem and I'm happy for you. But I need more.
Last edited:
Not the point. If it's external, it's got an external controller. Do you really not know that?
Yes, but you didn't give any reasonable argument why that would be a problem, or any hint that is where you imagined the problem was.