Apple intros new Mac Pro with "Nehalem" Xeon processors - Page 10

First of all, have you even checked? I wouldn't be surprised if other OEMs met similar standards.

Regardless, I wasn't talking about case materials, I am talking about the actual functional components like CPUs, Chipsets, RAM, Graphics cards... which are exactly the same as other PC manufacturers.

You guys can continue to rationalize it all you want, but the fact is that Apple greatly increased the pricing of the dual-CPU Mac Pro when their was no proportional increase in the pricing of it's components. Do we know exact figures? No.. Is is justified to think that Apple's costs for things like CPUs, Chipsets, RAM, GPUs, etc would follow the rest of the industry? Absolutely..

This information isn't difficult to find.

Dell loses points for withdrawing from its commitment to eliminate all PVC plastic and brominated flame retardants (BFRs) by the end of 2009.

Greener Electronics Dell Ranking

On chemicals, although HP provides a timeline for eliminating polyvinyl chloride (PVC) plastic and all brominated flame retardants (BFRs) by 2009, it is only in computing equipment – not for its entire product portfolio. HP has yet to put on the market products that are entirely free from the worst substances.

Greener Electronics HP Ranking

The rest of the industry is not yet using Nelahem Xeons to gain the comparison you are talking about.

If I misread that part of your post, then I retract that part of mine. Though there are three people here making these statements, and it's becoming difficult to sort them out.


The only place we really disagree here is that I'm saying that we don't know enough to say that for sure, and you say that you are sure.

There is no way we can resolve a dispute where there is no evidence either of us can dredge up to support our contention.

I therefore propose that we stop discussing this issue, as we're not getting anywhere with it.

What would be the best RAM strategy for purchasing the new 2.26 MP? Go with the standard 6GB (6 DIMM slots) or spend the extra $100 to get the 8GB (4 DIMM slots) and add 2 more DIMMs (6 slots used) for better memory speed?

It's irrelevant that there is cheaper PC hardware that can run OS X just as fast, because that's illegal. Heck, if you are ok with that, I have an even cheaper option for you: just steal an entire Mac Pro. You'll save even more money that way.

I'm tired of people bitching about trivial features that aren't up to there standards. Commpare this to a Dell desktop and then complain.

My 8800GT Mac edition looks *identical* to a PC board (down to the capacitors), Apple most certainly have not "made" it at all (though I paid $100 more for it than a PC board), the same applies to my older 7300, nor does the ATI 3870 look different to their PC parts. Apple or NVidia/ATI do need to flash some of the control chips to make them compatible, but saying Apple makes them is stretching the definition of make too far. One can buy PC 8800GTS cards which users have hand-flashed, and they work on the Mac Pro just fine.

What costs more is the driver development I assume, which Apple should not be fobbing off on hardware as displaying graphics is a core part of any operating system. Apple should be supporting its driver division as part of the OS X environment. A $150 4870 is apparently going to cost $300 for Mac users. Does flashing a chip really cost $150, the same price as a highly advanced GPU?

It doesn't matter what it looks like. Nvidia doesn't make boards like ATI does. There are standard board designs that Nvidia licenses out. Manufacturers are also allowed to deviate from that to a certain extent. Apple makes its own boards. That's all that does matter. And they don't make many of them.


Driver development also costs, naturally.

When you buy a PC board that's flashed, for examle, you will notice that not all features are enabled. There are some boards that aren't available for the Macs that you can get from some companies that sell through eBay. But those boards don't even support digital output, just VGA. Not too useful these days.

If you look at the size of the driver software coming from Nvidia and ATI recently, you'll see that it's begun to hover around 100 MB. Yes, that's 100, not 10. That shows how much work is involved.

I've also been reading that the reason why we haven't yet seen a pro board for the new models is that the Displayport output isn't yet finished.

Apple doesn't make anything. One of Apple's many Chinese OEMs (probably Foxconn) makes the cards, on the same production line as millions of other graphics cards not sold through Apple.

They make these cards for Apple, which is the same as saying that Apple makes them. There are differences in the ROMS, and are not likely to be made on the same assy. lines, at the same time. That means that costs are higher. Any time you have what is called a "pick out" the costs rise more than a little bit. It also means that the automated equipment that does the board testing needs slightly different software commands and sequences.

Then they have to be qualified. We don't know what the differences are there, but there will be differences.

All of this adds up.

While I'm sure that there is a bit added to the top, to account for the costs Apple needs to add in for special ordering and such, the prices are very likely in line with their costs.

I've been reading as much as possible about this topic and figured I would post a question.

I've been working on towers my entire professional career as a computer illustrator (14 years). I work mostly in Photoshop and Illustrator and a lot of my files can get rather large. Up to 2-3gb at times. I currently have a 30" Cinema Display and a 19" LCD. My tower just decided to "fry" this weekend, weird sound and then poof, shut down and a horrible smell came out from the back. So needless to say I'm in the market for a new computer ASAP!

I was all ready to order a new 8-Core Mac Pro with the 8gb of ram (and then order another 8 from an outside vendor) and the upgraded ATI video card. So at those specs we are talking $3600 before adding the additional 8gb of ram and tax. So I started thinking about an iMac. The 24" 3.06 model and upgrading to the ATI video card as well. It's considerably cheaper! But I'd only want to get the 4gb of ram since upgrading to 8 would be way too expensive. (about $700 more)

So I'm concerned that the 4gb of ram will just not be enough for the larger Photoshop files. The wait time for the iMac ATI models is 4-6 weeks and 2-3 weeks for the Mac Pros, which is a really long wait considering I need a computer now. I'm also wondering how big of a speed difference I would be able to feel between the two. I work on a 2x3ghz Dual-Core Intel Xeon Mac Tower at work right now and I don't want to feel like I'm working on a slower computer at home. I have the latest edition of Photoshop CS4 as well. I also do a little video stuff and play the occasional game but most of the time is spent in PS & Illustrator.

Well anyway, thanks in advance for any help!

Jamie

You know as a PS user that Adobe has the small bottom window on the image window. When efficiency is 100%, all is fine, and you don't need more memory.

Generally, PS needs at least 3 times as much RAM as the largest file you are working on. Plug-ins have their own needs. Then the computer OS takes what is needed for itself.

For a 3 GB file, and 100% efficiency, you would need, to be practical, at least 12 GB RAM.

The problem of banging on your HDD every time PS does an internal save, or change to the file, is considerable if you can't get at least two copies of that file into PS's RAM. So, a minimum of 8 GB is indicated.

Otherwise, the iMac is pretty fast. not as fast as a Nehanem Xeon with 4 cores. But, right now, PS only uses 2 cores properly. But more cores do help as it allows the OS to spend much of its time elsewhere, making the two cores available to PS, possibly speeding the program up by another 15 to 20%.

When CS5 comes out, not only will it be 64 bits, but it should be better able to use more cores. Apple's 10.6 has Grand Central, which makes parallel processing much easier to implement. It also has Open CL which makes the better graphics card another speed booster.

Unless you plan on buying another machine in 18 months or so, the Mac Pro will prove a better investment because of the additional cores and threads, along with the upgradability.

Do you know this or is it a guess[1]? Flashing a ROM shouldn't require a different assembly line! and the various companies that make these cards (each with a small slice of the pie, i.e. sales much smaller than the overall market), can customise ROMs (clock frequencies and other added value) just fine keeping competitive pricing. Regarding the flashed cards, as far as I can tell, they function identically to the Apple-labelled cards:

http://www.hardmac.com/articles/78/

And how does this affect the pricing of the ATI cards which are made by ATI. My prices comparison of the 4870 is actually $200 more on Mac, i.e. you could buy 2X4870s for a PC and still have $50 change. Flashing a ROM simply should not cost ATI $200 on top of a $150 card.

The simple fact is that Apple are still lagging behind the PC with GPU technology for Nehalem Mac Pros (old generation NVidia cards or ATI cards with no crossfire), and for the option we do have we get charged more than the price of the card itself in some cases for mystical customisations we can only guesstimate at. With Snow Leopard touting OpenCL so prominantly, it seemed ideal to at least try to catch up with a workstation[1] where its profit margins should allow "the best" to apply to all of its components...

----
[1] Just as for component margins I think we are all speculating here. I do think your speculation regarding graphics cards is not as parsimonious.
[2] Note: I do love my Mac Pro, and if I'm critical it is only because I care! I want the Mac Pro to be undoubtedly the best Workstation on the market for all market sectors.

I know this, it's not a guess. I was a manufactures of electronics, and I know how this works. It's not a different manufacturing line. As I said, it's a "pick put". That's when one, or a batch of products, are "picked out" of a production line for special treatment, testing, packaging and whatnot. This increases cost. We also don't know if these cards are being made specifically to Apples specs. They could be in some way.


This is amusing, because it shows that many, if not most other cards can't be flashed at all. Also, as they point out, unlike Apple's cards, these can't be used on the older models.

That should show you that they aren't the same. There are small but notable differences.


Made for Apple, with a different ROM, and whatever other minor differences there may be.

Thanks for all of the GREAT information! I think I have decided to go with the tower. I've always had them and I just can't see using an iMac for what I do. I was also very concerned about the amount of Ram. I think that was the final straw that sold me on the tower.

Thanks again for your help!

So I decided I'm gonna fork over the money and go for the 8 core 2.66. After looking at the benchmarks on Macrumors today, I realized the 2.26 sucks... especially when it can't be last year's 2.8 which was the lowest 8 core you could get. And it sucks even harder on single threaded apps. I work off of my macs and make a living off of my computers, so this is something I need. Just so hard to justify that extra 1200 difference between the 2.26 and 2.66. Also the 2.8 from amazon (2600) is out because I need virtualization. All in all I think I'll be very happy with the 2.66 and the 4870. Now to get an IPS panel 24" so I can run dual 24" lcds. Ugh... so much $.

Good post!

Thanks for the info...

It's clear to see now, in hindsight, that the 1st and 2nd generation Mac Pros were exceptional value for money. In both cases, you were able to purchase a standard configuration which could be upgraded without any false limitations being imposed.

Apple have obviously seen a lot of people purchasing the base configuration and upgrading it with cheaper third party components. As a result, they have reverted to their old ways of crippling the entry level machine and reserving core features for the 'upper' start configuration. I guess Apple want to make their cut up-front.

It reminds me of the stunts that they pulled with the Power Mac G5.

In the next few years, there are going to be a lot of pro users who require 8GB+ of RAM. With the 1st and 2nd generation of Mac Pros, you were looking at £1,749 for a suitable platform. Today you are looking at £2,499. That's a £750 price hike for a feature that should be a given in a professional Mac.

Are there any technical reasons why Apple couldn't have simply left the second processor socket empty and retained the 32GB ceiling in the entry level machine? If not, I fear the good days are over. I fear that 'Sneaky Apple' is back.

Personally, I think the 8gb limit should be 16gb from a technical point of view. I think apple intentionally crippled that part. However, I think there is a 16gb limit per chip. Keep in mind the memory controller is built into these cpus now. And I believe the limit of the memory controller is 16gb, though I couldn't find any urls to back that up. However, it does make sense if you think that running dual quad cores and each quad core has 1 memory controller.... 2x16 = 32gb.

I'm thinking that the new quad mac pros have a real expansion of 16gb, but apple isn't selling the 4gb modules with this machine. It wouldn't be the first time apple said the ram limit is xx while the real limit was something else. OWC is famous for finding and selling ram that will go beyond apple's listed "limit".

I really don't see what was so upgradable on the 1st and 2nd gen mac pros. Sure you could upgrade the cpu's, but it cost an arm and a leg. You'd be better off buying a new machine. Not to mention it is a complete pain in the ass to do so. So I suppose you could put more ram in them. Bigger hard drives. The 1st gen gets burned on getting upgraded GPUs, even though NVidia FINALLY came out with a 1st gen 8800gt. Just doesn't seem that upgradable to me. Not like back in the day with the G4's. You could upgrade anything in those. Great machines for great prices then.

With that cinebench image earlier, I'm definitely getting the 2.66 8 core. It just makes sense. Look how poorly that 2.26 does in comparison to machines 2 revs earlier on a single core render.

I'm reading too many different threads..... here's the image i was referring to.

I find it amazing that someone would think a 2.26 GHz machine sucks because it only equals the multithreaded scores of the just now discontinued 3.2 GHz machine, even if the single threaded scores were lower. The second result shows a 2.8. so it's possible that it's in between.

I would tend to think it's pretty damn good!

If they left the second socket, the machine would have cost even more.

We don't yet know if the machine can hold 16 GB or not.

[QUOTE=emig647;1388166]Personally, I think the 8gb limit should be 16gb from a technical point of view. I think apple intentionally crippled that part. However, I think there is a 16gb limit per chip. Keep in mind the memory controller is built into these cpus now. And I believe the limit of the memory controller is 16gb, though I couldn't find any urls to back that up. However, it does make sense if you think that running dual quad cores and each quad core has 1 memory controller.... 2x16 = 32gb.

I'm thinking that the new quad mac pros have a real expansion of 16gb, but apple isn't selling the 4gb modules with this machine. It wouldn't be the first time apple said the ram limit is xx while the real limit was something else. OWC is famous for finding and selling ram that will go beyond apple's listed "limit".

I really don't see what was so upgradable on the 1st and 2nd gen mac pros. Sure you could upgrade the cpu's, but it cost an arm and a leg. You'd be better off buying a new machine. Not to mention it is a complete pain in the ass to do so. So I suppose you could put more ram in them. Bigger hard drives. The 1st gen gets burned on getting upgraded GPUs, even though NVidia FINALLY came out with a 1st gen 8800gt. Just doesn't seem that upgradable to me. Not like back in the day with the G4's. You could upgrade anything in those. Great machines for great prices then.

With that cinebench image earlier, I'm definitely getting the 2.66 8 core. It just makes sense. Look how poorly that 2.26 does in comparison to machines 2 revs earlier on a single core render.[quote]

It's known that if a program isn't programmed properly, so that its multithreading performance is poor, it won't perform as well on an Nehalem. I'm willing to bet that companies will fix these problems with their programs as soon as they can, so they won't be shown up as running slowly.

As most programs that need the speed are fairly effective at multithreading, they will do better.

I know you saw the cinebench scores in the url above... the 2.26 was slower in single and slower in multi-threaded than the 2.8 in cinebench. Also the 2.8 beat the 2.26 on a benchmark on macrumors



So that's 2 benchmarks that show the 2.26 being beat by the lowest end 8 core from last year.

So yah, I find it amazing that apple can start off with the 2.26.


It's easier said than done to optimize a program for multi-threading. Yes it's easy to implement when you design from the ground up, but it becomes more difficult when the app has a 10 year code history behind it. It starts to boil down to a cost / performance issue. If a company can get away without making something fully optimized and still sell the app, they aren't going to focus on making it multi-threaded until they absolutely have to. Also a time factor is involved.

With that being said, I think it will be interesting to see how many NEED to be converted with GCP / OpenCL / Snow leopard around the bend. Only time will tell. In the mean time I'm gonna shoot for the 2.66 since it seems to be the best value for the buck according to what few benchmarks there are to go off of.

First, to set things straight. I also ordered the dual 2.66 with the 4870. It comes in Friday the 13th. My lucky day in several ways.

Most apps that need the speed, as far as I've seen, already are threaded fairly well, at least. PS will see an improvement there in CS5.

As we both have been saying, apparently, Apple's new tech will make the single threaded apps act better. So that performance will get better.

I think the performance now is pretty good.

These chips, and AMD's new chips as well are optimized for multithreaded performance, and memory bandwidth.

You're not going to find anything different anywhere. It's not Apple, it's the world that's going this way.

But, as you know, these benchmarks aren't representative of the read world. No synthetic benchmarks ever are.

Very true, but I've always felt cinebench is a very good indication of what you can pull from a machine, especially if you're a render farm. If you're constantly compiling, rendering, or encoding... the scores are a great indication of what you should expect. Obviously in real world you have a lot of idle time and human interface time.

I do agree, most of these big time apps are there already. Just makes me nervous to go after a 2.26 when this machine is intended to last 3-4 years. When spending that much $ it better last that long.

I've been advising people to go for the 2.66 myself.

But except for one person here who was aghast when I mentioned it, I think it's a good idea to look at the chip offerings Intel will have in late 2010.

While it was a pain, I've replaced dual core cpu's in Mac Pros with the 4 core, faster versions, over a year and a half later. It's what I intend to do with mine when the 6 core 3.2 GHz versions are available.

These machines look much easier to upgrade than the older ones.

Hrm, well it all depends on the cost of the chips. I remember when anandtech upgraded the woodcrest machines to clovertown, it cost a lot more than it was worth. Better off buying the new machine from apple. I mean, you can't really sell chips out of the mac pro that easily. That's a big jump. I'd rather just sell the machine in hand and buy a new one.

I've been waiting for this rev since woodcrest came out. I've waited far too long, so I'm ready to jump on board. I can't wait any longer. It will be a great machine. When do you expect to get yours mel?

Friday the 13th! A lucky day for me over the years

Sweet man. Hope you post your impressions here. At the very least message me. I won't be ordering mine until I get back from St. Louis (business trip). I'm still debating if I should get the apple 24" LCD with it or the HP IPS 24"... I hate glossy so i don't know.

When are you getting back?

I've not bought an Apple monitor since the Studio 21".

I get back the 21st. My ex-business partner bought the aluminum 23" lcd and had nothing but problems with it. It makes me weary buying an apple LCD.

I honestly don't think I've ever bought an apple display (cept the one that came with my performa 630cd).

Not to derail the thread too hard, but this kinda relates to the new mac pro. They come with a DVI and DisplayPort. Has anyone had any issues using the Mini-DisplayPort -> DVI converter? Any loss of color / detail? i heard it goes digital to digital instead of digital to analog to digital in a review on apple's site. Not sure why this would be a bad thing.

What do you recommend for 24" melgross?

The conversion is just minor standards interfacing. The signal isn't touched.

What is your main purpose for the monitor, and what is the budget?

The main purpose will be my development monitor. I have a 24" samsung TN panel and it blows. Trying to do a web page design sucks as 1 color will be different shades because of the vertical viewing angle. But I mainly do xcode / bbedit coding. I also game a bit, but I can use the samsung for that. (I HAVE to run 2 monitors for the work i do, I'd die without it).

So what are the main points?

Text needs to be crisp
Colors need to be accurate
Viewing angle needs to be non existent (178° would be nice)
Refresh rate needs to be acceptable (no ghosting would be nice).

Since I'll be doing a lot of text, it'd be nice if it wasn't glossy. I can't stand reading on a glossy screen more than a few minutes.

this is the lcd I was considering:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16824176104

As much as I hate to say it, the Dell ultrasharp 2408 WPF is a pretty good monitor, and goes for something in the $600's.

I don't know much about that model Hp.

Well that HP monitor is a H-IPS panel... so that's hard to argue with right away. But just fyi... I'd rather chew glass than use a Dell LCD on my mac pro

I think in the end I'll end up with that HP or the Apple display... probably the HP. What I really want is one of those NEC IPS displays, but I don't want to spend 1200, and they use the same panel as that HP.

The electronics plays a big part in this, as does some handpicking of the panels.

When dell and Boxx release their workstations with these chips in them, and they are 3-500 cheaper. Then we'll listen to you. Until then, you don't know the cost involved with these chips. Remember this rev took a new motherboard redesign (new socket / northbridge / ram), completely new chips (that means they start out with low bulk #'s), and apple got them before ANYONE. There is always a cost when being first.

First, that's not necessarily true about the pricing.

And second is that it has nothing to do with how MS took over the market.

Saw this question over on macrumors and it seemed pertinent here, perhaps someone knows the answer:


Sounds like some problem on the 2.26ghz nehalems to me...

Some tests here show why these machine ARE worth their price tags in performance, esp if you need high performance in many pro video editing apps etc., when these apps are properly written as many of them are. Note the performance of the 2.26 8 core model as compared to the 3.2 GHz and 2.8 GHz older 8 core models.

For pro video editing, an 8 core 2.26 GHz model is better in most tests than the 8 core older 3.2 GHz model.

http://www.barefeats.com/nehal03.html

We should be seeing a lot more tests shortly.