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What makes the new CPU's better?

M

Macpropro80

macrumors 6502
Original poster
Jan 31, 2009
408
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I keep hearing that the new CPU's that are going to be in the next mac pro are going to be way faster but I don't understand why.

Isn't the L2 Cache the same? (does the new ones have l3?)
Isn't it still an 8 core
Isn;t the clock speed the same?

This is kind of a nooby question but I am very curious.

Also do you think I will be able to upgrade the CPU's in my early 2008 mac pro to the new ones? I have put a new CPU in my pc but never in my mac pro.
 
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intel_Nehalem_(microarchitecture)

Basically it gets rid of the Front Side Bus... and brings back a form of hyperthreading.

You can read up about all this on Wikipedia.

The point is, we're looking at around 20-40% better performance at the same clock speed and the same performance with less power... or something like that.

It is absolutely impossible for you to upgrade Harpertown to Gainestown in the same machine.
 
why can't i upgrade? They are both 45nm. Is it something with the motherboard?

also based off wiki they have the same amount of cache... i think, l3 and l2 are the same speed right? mine has 24mb l2, this new one has 256kb l2 and 24mb l3. Thats not that much of a difference right?
 
(crying) But I don't want to believe you! My mac pro is better because its big and aluminum and.... and .... and, belongs to me.


Anyway, I learned everything i know about CPU's from my Pentium 4 days were L2 ment everything. So I am confused.


Also I am a little confused, these chips are 8 cores per chip? so you could have 16 on a mac pro? or is it still a quad core?
 
Four physical cores per chip, meaning eight physical cores in the machine, but sixteen logical cores.

As in, software that is written multithreaded, like the ENTIRETY of Snow Leopard's OS files and programs, will see the processor as having sixteen cores.
 
Macpropro80 said:
(crying) But I don't want to believe you! My mac pro is better because its big and aluminum and.... and .... and, belongs to me.


Anyway, I learned everything i know about CPU's from my Pentium 4 days were L2 ment everything. So I am confused.


Also I am a little confused, these chips are 8 cores per chip? so you could have 16 on a mac pro? or is it still a quad core?
Click to expand...
Read here:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xeon#5400-series_.22Harpertown.22

And here:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intel_Nehalem_(microarchitecture)#45_nm_processor_architecture

S-
 
Darn... But will I still see a performance increase in Snow leopard with my current chips?


I still think my chips are insane because dell only offers 4 cores. (take that dell!)
 
Macpropro80 said:
Darn... But will I still see a performance increase in Snow leopard with my current chips?


I still think my chips are insane because dell only offers 4 cores. (take that dell!)
Click to expand...

You will see a very good increase - that seems to be the major idea behind Snow Leopard, greater use of all cores instead of just one. You have 8 on your Mac Pro but generally aren't using anything near the power you have due to older code written for single processor systems that's been altered along the way for better multi-core support. Snow Leopard (AFAIK) is ground up multi-core code.
 
thanks wheezy! Will programs be faster to? Or is that based on the program, and not the OS?

Sidewinder, Im acting a little childish because I just got back from vacation, and the planes TV's weren't working. (I Knew I should have bought that mac world)
 
Rjs

the only two I really care about are Imovie 08 and Final Cut pro.

Final cut currently has never slammed my cores, they all sit at about 40%. Will that change?

imovie 08 never uses all my cores. Will that change?
 
Macpropro80 said:
Final cut currently has never slammed my cores, they all sit at about 40%. Will that change?
Click to expand...

Assuming that Final Cut Studio 3 will be written specifically for Snow Leopard to be multithreaded, you should see core usage go from 40% to about 10% or lower.

You'll be able to work with 1080p video in real-time and only be at 50% usage!

Someone tell me if that's me being optimistic for once...

imovie 08 never uses all my cores. Will that change?
Click to expand...

It never will, really, as it's only a consumer app.
 
Well hopefully final cut 3 will support my camera. (mini DVD) Or else im stuck with imovie.
 
Im Saving for a Sony Professional on the shoulder camera, but man are they expensive.
 
Pretty much they took one of the few advantages AMD had over core 2 with their line of chips. This being the integrated memory controller. Having no Front side bus makes a large difference. I had too laptops, one with a centrino 2 core 2 and one with a low end turion and the memory performance on the turion was miles beyond what the centrino 2 cpu could accomplish. The centrino 2 cpu got a around 4.9 in memory performance with ddr2 1066 while the turion got 5.9 with 800mhz ddr2. Of cource the core 2 had a much higher cpu score. This is probably one of the reason why unlike the athlons and first generation phenoms you rarely hear people bashing the opteron because its mostly used in high traffic servers where memory performance is crucial. Also because its virtualization is considered one of the best on the market at the moment.
 
Tallest Skil said:
Assuming that Final Cut Studio 3 will be written specifically for Snow Leopard to be multithreaded, you should see core usage go from 40% to about 10% or lower.

You'll be able to work with 1080p video in real-time and only be at 50% usage!

Someone tell me if that's me being optimistic for once...
Click to expand...


i'm extremely interested in finding out about this.... any pointers to info about the new final cut studio would be greatly appreciated. i haven't been able to find anything other than a vague consensus that it will need to be rewritten.
 
they'll all still work no problem...but software programmers haven't embraced designing for mulit-core machines yet.

snow leopard will try to help by forcing application tasks to use the various cores, but won't be 100% efficient.
(e.g. when you open safari the load won't be evenly distributed amongst the 8 cores, but the 3 or 4 tasks required to open safari will be on 3-4 cores)


someone correct me if i'm wrong, but rendering apps (like 3ds max plugins such as Maxwell and V-Ray) and FCP are the only apps out there that can use all the cores you have?
 
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