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.
Updated Mac Pro Benchmarks and Video of Internals
- Thread starter MacRumors
- Start date
- Sort by reaction score
Er ... that's what *everyone* is saying. The 2.26 has performance roughly equal to the previous gen 2.8, but it costs a hell of a lot *more*. Sure, the higher-end machines put out some great specs, but the pricing is like something out of the Quadra days. The 2008 3.2 also looks like a real bargain now too -- for £2400 you can get something that is beaten in performance only by machines costing £3400 or £4700!
You can get two 2.8 2008 Mac Pros for less than the cost of one 2.66 Octo!
How do they justify that? Oh wait, right, Snow Leopard is coming, and it has Grand PixieDust X that will make these machines seem so fast they'll be worth the cost of two of the previous generation. It mysteriously won't give the 2008 models any comparable boost, and don't forget that 40% faster memory (that phrase has to be accompanied by aby law, btw) which will also help to compensate for the pitifully low clock speed.
In short: There is *plenty* of room for negative comments. I'm surprised that so few outlets are making them. To offer roughly the same power for more money is ballsy of Apple. It really does remind me of the Quadra days. It's as if as soon as Jobs went on leave the company promptly pretended the past 9 years had never happened. What's next, OpenDoc X?
*sigh* I'm utterly amazed. Has anyone bothered to take a look at the i7 on Windows benchmarks? Maybe, just maybe, the Windows performance will give you some idea about the Nehalem performance on OS X once Apple has released Snow Leopard. NONE of the benchmarks you're running are using the hyper-threading features of the Nehalem. That's where it shines.
How do I know that? Because IT SHOWS IN WINDOWS BENCHMARKS. ****ARRRRGHHHHHH****
Am I the only one who thinks that second hand Mac Pros are starting to become very good deals?
With the new release, used 2006 Mac Pros are bound to come down further in price and there's now a good number of video card options for them that are faster than the original offerings.
I just can't see it being worth $2500 for entry-level. The previous entry level Mac Pro was a couple hundred dollars less. Why in the heck has the price gone *up*?
With the new release, used 2006 Mac Pros are bound to come down further in price and there's now a good number of video card options for them that are faster than the original offerings.
I just can't see it being worth $2500 for entry-level. The previous entry level Mac Pro was a couple hundred dollars less. Why in the heck has the price gone *up*?
I've got the same machine and agree with you - it's still just as fast as it was the day I switched it on.
wow those heat exchangers are massive! I'm surprised they're passive though, but I haven't looked at any new desktop internals in 2-3 years now so have these been around for long? Less fans = less noise = good stuff.
I don't think they're passive - the fins are aligned the wrong way for passive heat removal. In addition, if you look carefully inside the case after these are removed, you'll see fans in the case itself.
Since going to the Intel chips, the machines have been considerably quieter in my experience.
"No room for negative comments"
Wow.. you are the type of Mac fanboy that makes everyone look bad.
Although the Mac Pro is an EXCELLENT machine, lets look at the numbers. The new Nehalem/5500 Xeons have nearly the same tray price as their older Penryn/5400 Xeon counterparts. (in fact, the 2.26 and 2.66 are CHEAPER than the older 2.8 and 3.0), yet the cost for a dual-CPU Mac Pro has greatly increased across the whole CPU range.
The idea that they are still a good value despite the price increase because the processors perform faster is ludicrous! That goes against the whole history of the PC market whereby over time costs decrease while performance increases.
Dang these things look amazing... I love the slideout ram.
I have a 8 Core 3.0Ghz with 6GBs ram, and my girlfriend is always complaining that its slower than her wimpy old dell. Like it takes forever to open microsoft word and powerpoint etc. Does anyone know how I could speed it up basic processes? Other than wait for snow leopard?
I have a 8 Core 3.0Ghz with 6GBs ram, and my girlfriend is always complaining that its slower than her wimpy old dell. Like it takes forever to open microsoft word and powerpoint etc. Does anyone know how I could speed it up basic processes? Other than wait for snow leopard?
Which version of Office? For both operating systems as well.
Office 2000/XP is lightning over on Windows.
Expansion Slots
1 x PCI Express x16 slot, running at x16 (PCIEX16_1) (Note 2)
2 x PCI Express x8 slots, running at x8 (PCIEX8_1, PCIEX8_2) (The PCIEX16_1, PCIEX8_1 and PCIEX8_2 slots conform to PCI Express 2.0 standard.)
1 x PCI Express x4 slot
1 x PCI Express x1 slot
2 x PCI slots
Thanks for posting your specs.
Was there anything particularly difficult about getting OSX running on it?
I'm considering this myself.
Wow - so glad I bought last year.
If I were buying today I wouldn't want the Quad and I couldn't afford the 8-core.
The Quad core model is basically the xMac people have been asking for, but in a full size casing and with an oversized price tag.
They're basically pricing the Mac Pro beyond my reach. I put 8Gb of RAM in my Mac Pro a year ago, and it's been about right (and there is still plenty of room for expansion). There is NO WAY I would buy one today with a maximum of 8GB.
If I were buying today I wouldn't want the Quad and I couldn't afford the 8-core.
The Quad core model is basically the xMac people have been asking for, but in a full size casing and with an oversized price tag.
They're basically pricing the Mac Pro beyond my reach. I put 8Gb of RAM in my Mac Pro a year ago, and it's been about right (and there is still plenty of room for expansion). There is NO WAY I would buy one today with a maximum of 8GB.
I followed the 2nd Guide here:
http://www.insanelymac.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=149505&st=160&p=1082237&#entry1082237
It did take a bit of time to get working, but everything works.
Also soon EFI-X http://www.efi-x.com/ should support this motherboard, which would make installing OS X as straight forward as installing on an Apple Mac.
surely not having a dedicated fan mounted on them is what makes them passive?
By the way, the most industrial heat exchangers are arranged this way, a lot of thermally conductive plates stacked with a cooling fluid (in this case air) being drawn through it.
Nice! Here's what the Mac Pro has:
Three open full-length PCI Express 2.0 expansion slots with mechanical support for 16-lane cards; 300W combined maximum for all PCI Express slots.
1 x PCI Express 2.0 x16 slot
2 x PCI Express 2.0 x4 slots
PCI Express slots are not compatible with PCI or PCI-X expansion cards.
1 x PCI Express 2.0 x16 slot
2 x PCI Express 2.0 x4 slots
PCI Express slots are not compatible with PCI or PCI-X expansion cards.
Sleep/wake up/poweroff working? I heard people were having kernel panics with the EX58-UD5 and 10.5.6.
Why is everyone so excited about the slide-out tray for mounting Ram? It's nothing new. Already the 1st gen MacPro had a similar system, where you could slide out two PCB's individually, each with 4 Ram slots to be filled outside the housing.
Did Apple remove that slide-out functionality in later revisions (until now)?
Did Apple remove that slide-out functionality in later revisions (until now)?