My new Mac Pro: a 2009 with a Intel Xeon Westmere 3.33 6 cores
Firmware flash 4.1 > 5.1: http://netkas.org/?p=781
Intel Xeon 3.33 6 cores: http://www.provantage.com/intel-bx80613w3680~7ITEP374.htm
A long 3 mm Hex Key:
Instructions
Results:
Geekbench 64-bit score rose from 9460 to 16062
Before:
After:
Xbench score rose 324 to 392
Results 324.08 > 392.98
System Info
Xbench Version 1.3
System Version 10.6.8 (10K549)
Physical RAM 16384 MB
Model MacPro5,1
Drive Type OWC Mercury Extreme Pro SSD
CPU Test 196.22 > 245.31
Thread Test 849.04 > 1261.41
Memory Test 416.89 > 488.96
Quartz Graphics Test 268.19 > 327.42
OpenGL Graphics Test 296.64 > 354.98
User Interface Test 409.66 > 476.90
Disk Test 295.38 > 341.27
Cinebench CPU went from 4.86 to 8.87 while OpenGL rose from 30.14 to 37.64.
Video conversion was nearly twice as fast as before the upgrade. 
The total cost of the upgrade was approx $610 while OWC turnkey charges $1499.00 for a 2.8/4 cores to 3,33/6cores upgrade!
A real bang for the buck.
Comments
Now for Netkas to release a set of EFI for the entire Radeon 7xxx series so that we can have graphics cards newer than three years old.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Tallest Skil
Now for Netkas to release a set of EFI for the entire Radeon 7xxx series so that we can have graphics cards newer than three years old.
Sapphire released a Radeon 7950. Not all of the benchmarks are huge gains, but I suspect that is partially due to immature drivers and lack of validation or official support within those software packages.
Originally Posted by hmm
Sapphire released a Radeon 7950.
I refuse to acknowledge that this pathetic excuse for extortion exists.
All I can hope is that the 2013 Mac Pro still supports PCIe graphics cards of SOME type. Then I'll be able to get something newer, myself.
When the heck is Windows going EFI-only, anyway?! DO they even have a timeframe for that?
Quote:
Originally Posted by Tallest Skil
I refuse to acknowledge that this pathetic excuse for extortion exists.
All I can hope is that the 2013 Mac Pro still supports PCIe graphics cards of SOME type. Then I'll be able to get something newer, myself.
When the heck is Windows going EFI-only, anyway?! DO they even have a timeframe for that?
I missed your response before for some reason. The Mac version seems to be roughly $100 higher, or am I missing something? You called it extortion, which seems a little dramatic there. There isn't a reason for an updated Mac Pro not to accept them unless they went out of their way to block it. Apple has stuck with EP configurations through this point. This means it would be v2 versions of E5-16XX and 24XX, the former having 40 PCI lanes with 80 on the latter. The former may be over subscribed as they've done in the past, but even if they went with embedded graphics of some kind, most of those are 8 lane cards, so you could still have a free 16x slot and a 4x or something like that. USB, ethernet, etc. draws from available lanes as well, so it's not like all lanes are available to add-in type cards. I'm not sure regarding Windows and EFI. I haven't paid attention to it. The only reason I mentioned embedded graphics was due to thunderbolt, but even then, you get 2 ports. There are no plans in the public domain to support more than 2 thunderbolt ports on a given machine, although the switch to PCI 3 will grant more bandwidth. I'm curious whether Apple will in fact adopt it in the first year. It's likely to be more expensive. Intel has commented on this in the past. Even their choice to debut lightpeak over copper rebranded as thunderbolt was a cost cutting measure.
Originally Posted by hmm
I missed your response before for some reason. The Mac version seems to be roughly $100 higher, or am I missing something?
Yeah, it's $160 more because it has EFI on the boot chip.
That's it. It's identical to PC cards otherwise. Completely unacceptable.
There are no plans in the public domain to support more than 2 thunderbolt ports on a given machine, although the switch to PCI 3 will grant more bandwidth. I'm curious whether Apple will in fact adopt it in the first year.
I bet they will. They'll need everything they can to reposition themselves in the pro market.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Tallest Skil
Yeah, it's $160 more because it has EFI on the boot chip.
I just noticed there's a 680 mac edition.
http://www.barefeats.com/gpu680v.html
Gaming specs look okay, although I would imagine the drivers could be better tuned. I wish it was 3GB. That would be useful once CUDA is supported on that card with certain applications, but it still looks like a nice card.
Originally Posted by hmm
I just noticed there's a 680 mac edition.
SIX HUNDRED DOLLARS. PC model? $439.
Only two gigs of RAM, but it blows past the 7950. I imagine the power draw and noise also decimate the 7950…
Unrelated, but what's with FIVE HUNDRED BUCKS for a BENCHMARK?!
Quote:
Originally Posted by Tallest Skil
SIX HUNDRED DOLLARS. PC model? $439.
Only two gigs of RAM, but it blows past the 7950. I imagine the power draw and noise also decimate the 7950…
Unrelated, but what's with FIVE HUNDRED BUCKS for a BENCHMARK?!
Perhaps you looked at more sites to compare pricing. Amazon has the PC version for $477 and their pricing typically isn't high. I would imagine this took some amount of development time, and it is a fairly limited market. Anyway there are many cases where I would view it as a perfectly valid purchase, especially those with 2009 models. Apple's 5770 and 5870 offerings aren't that great. They charge $449 for a 5870 even today. If it was an upgrade or a replacement for a dead gpu, I would go with $600 for the NVidia over $449 for the older AMD card, especially if it gains official CUDA support from the appropriate software developers. On a side note, this is why I think the people asking for thunderbolt gpus are silly. Thunderbolt is somewhat constrained on bandwidth for these cards, and by the time they've done the driver development necessary for certification and wrapped a case around the card, it could be more expensive than these ones. The overall perceived value would be out of alignment if they released one today.
Also I think that benchmark app is aimed at developers, but it was pretty funny. It costs about as much as an iOS unity license.
Originally Posted by hmm
Anyway there are many cases where I would view it as a perfectly valid purchase, especially those with 2009 models.
You're telling me. I'm looking into my options in that regard, and the only things I'd even consider are the 7950 and this new GeForce 680 (thanks for mentioning it; it's really the leading chip right now, eh?) since direct-from-Apple options are so expensive and OLD, but SERIOUSLY. Six hundred bucks.
I'll wait for this year's Mac Pro. If it even has removable graphics, then I'll have four options from which to decide (well, three; the 7950 would be last-gen by then), and beyond that I'll still probably just buy a PC model card and flash it with a ROM.
Netkas is working on converting the Mac 7950 ROM into one that works for the entire 7xxx series (already works with the 7970), so that's progress. I'm sure in a few months the 680 file will work with the 6xx series, too.
No way am I being extorted.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Tallest Skil
You're telling me. I'm looking into my options in that regard, and the only things I'd even consider are the 7950 and this new GeForce 680 (thanks for mentioning it; it's really the leading chip right now, eh?) since direct-from-Apple options are so expensive and OLD, but SERIOUSLY. Six hundred bucks.
I'll wait for this year's Mac Pro. If it even has removable graphics, then I'll have four options from which to decide (well, three; the 7950 would be last-gen by then), and beyond that I'll still probably just buy a PC model card and flash it with a ROM.
Netkas is working on converting the Mac 7950 ROM into one that works for the entire 7xxx series (already works with the 7970), so that's progress. I'm sure in a few months the 680 file will work with the 6xx series, too.
No way am I being extorted.
Well some past gpu options have come down in price. The Quadro 4000 maintained basic parity with its Windows side pricing and eventually dropped from $1200 to around $700. It was only a potentially worthwhile purchase for very specific applications. The 7950 didn't seem terribly impressive in actual benchmarks, but I attributed that to a lack of driver tuning. I don't know whether they'll improve later. If you were buying at the moment then replacing the machine later in the year, there's a fair chance that it would still be an upgrade from the entry model and likely pretty close to parity with whatever upgrade option is offered. I say this as there aren't any major gpu architectural overhauls planned for the current year.
I don't think they'll kill the slots on a Xeon EP machine. That just wastes available bandwidth. You could knock off 4-8 lanes for embedded graphics and hook up thunderbolt that way, but there isn't a good reason to restrict the machine, as they don't have any other good method of assigning that bandwidth. Such bandwidth doesn't really exist in the mainstream lines, like the LGA 1155 cpus have 16 lanes allocated. The single version of Sandy Bridge E would have 40. They're on the cpu so the dual would have 80 available. I'm not sure whether Apple would split configurations further or allow the single to be slightly over-subscribed. They have gone the route of over-subscription in the past, so it's an option. I don't see them dumping slots completely due to 2 thunderbolt ports. I mention this as the other machines do not have that level of untapped bandwidth. I have noticed intel seems to be spacing Xeon EP out further from the mainstream lines. While the notebook and desktop cpus will still cap out at quad cores, Xeon EP is supposed to go as high as 12 per chip. That would be a fairly big jump, considering Sandy tops out at 8. I'm personally more interested in CUDA, as in the areas where it has been implemented, it offers far more performance per dollar than bleeding edge X86 core counts. The reason I'm less interested in mobile variants is due to ram. Most of those functions either run or they don't, which is why it's a concern.
Originally Posted by hmm
I don't think they'll kill the slots on a Xeon EP machine. That just wastes available bandwidth.
Not if they give it to 5 next-gen Thunderbolt ports.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Tallest Skil
Not if they give it to 5 next-gen Thunderbolt ports.
The big bandwidth increase is when they move thunderbolt to PCIe 3 standards. At that point it would be 4 lanes over PCIe 3. I mentioned up to 8 in case they're sharing embedded graphics used in the macbook pros or imacs to route thunderbolt. There aren't any chips where intel supports more than 2 thunderbolt ports, which is why I mentioned that. It also seems unlikely due to the number of devices really available for the protocol. I could see mini displayport only ports, but really how many thunderbolt peripherals are you going to hook up out of what is available? In the past Apple hasn't gone terribly crazy with ports, even on the towers. Firewire typically got 2-3 ports and however many usbs. Even 5 wouldn't technically consume all available lanes. I think much of the hype regarding a redesign motivated in the same direction as the rest of the line is due to how long it has languished up to this point. I mean it wouldn't surprise me to see design changes, but I don't see an end to slots if they're still supporting some of the higher end configurations that can spec out for $10k. Such customers may wish to add SAS or specialized hardware of some kind. I realize that doesn't make up the bulk of sales, even mac pro sales. It's just I think they are likely to take a more balanced approach with that line than what some people anticipate.