6 replies to this topic

[BigAl3D]

I keep seeing promising reports about a long-awaited refresh for the Mac Pro. My old reliable 2007 8-core went two red lights up the other day. I'm going to drop it off for service to see what the damage is.

I'm hoping I can drop a few bucks to keep this one going until the new Mac Pro ships later this year.

Anyone have any clue as to the power jump we could expect to see from a 16-core Ivy Bridge rig?

[hulaboy]

It's a third more cores to start with, so I guess maybe a 30% reduction in render times would be the baseline. I'm not sure what impact any other technical advances in the chips might have.

I dread to think what they're gonna cost, tho'...

Mark

[BigAl3D]

Apple's pretty good about keeping the same prices (high) but increasing the horse power. My 2007 MP cost around $5000 before adding some goodies later. I bet 5K is a good bet. Still worth it for me since a lot of my income comes from Final Cut Studio, but the idea of PC boxes rendering faster than my Mac makes me jealous!

[morpheus]

I have been holding off for ages to see when a new Mac Pro announcmenet happens.
Gimme gimme gimme! I've been needing a desktop computer for a while to handle the large fluid and particle sims.

A

[Atomic101]

@ BigAl3D

Check your memory riser cards. Unplug, clean contacts & place back. I used to get the red light thing all the time -cleaned my riser card contacts & is fine now. Might be something else though.

Mountain lion also has some elements of drivers for new graphics cards (7970).

[adamfilip]

I hope apple goes for the Xeon E7 with 10 Cores and 20 Threads each.. x 2 CPU's = 20 Cores / 40 Threads

Edited by adamfilip, 21 February 2012 - 08:04 PM.

[brasco]

I hope apple goes for the Xeon E7 with 10 Cores and 20 Threads each.. x 2 CPU's = 20 Cores / 40 Threads

At about $5500 per mid-range chip and $8000+ for the top end I wouldn't hold your breath! And they're clocked very low to get the cores in there, great for rendering, massive choke for any single threaded tasks.

I think the sweetspot will be the E5s for dual cpus.

cheers
brasc