Which Mac Pro? More cores=slower speeds? And most of us know the speed matters or FPU for music and I don't understand the faster is for the least amount of procs. And while I get the whole rendering thing and why it makes sense.

The slower per core speed as the number of core increases is based on the Thermal Design Power for the Xeon E5 chip. The TDP for the chip is 130 watts...that is divided among all cores. So if you go from four to six to eight cores you have to reduce the spread so the overall TDP stays within that 130 watt limit.

...have to reduce the speed... Terrible typing while watching the Olympics :-)

If you are interested in the actual design data for the Xeon processor, go to the Intel site and the actual CPU part numbers are:

Xeon 4 core - E5.1620v2

Xeon 6 core - E5.1650v2

Xeon 8 core - E5.1680v2

Xeon 12 core - E5.2697v2

Is it a poor design and perhaps why they are holding back on the release? Sure for rendering and Grapchis, (GPU), its fine but audio deends on FPU and I see no way of getting it from the slower speeds. I mean, I went to school for computer and BSEE and for Apple to tell me in the store, the more cores, it will spread out better may be true, but it would be much faster if the speed was faster. Audio always depends on FPU and AVID is probably very excited as they can now push their cards on customers (Although I do have a quad Apollo) and suppose a 6 core and an Applo quad core CPU to take all the FX load of the CPUs will help.

But for those that do not have cards, until the GPU works with Audio, SPEED IS KING, thus the delay as I'm sure the 2010 are probably still a bit faster? Not sure.

Thoughts..🙂

Remember, 12 core are great but 12 at 2.93 or 3.9 vs 2.0 is going to be 1/3-1/2 times faster?! No?

Peace, am sure Apple will sort it out.

Thanks for your reply via email/msg. He wrote:

If you are interested in the actual design data for the Xeon processor, go to the Intel site and the actual CPU part numbers are:

Xeon 4 core - E5.1620v2

Xeon 6 core - E5.1650v2

Xeon 8 core - E5.1680v2

Xeon 12 core - E5.2697v2

______

I read that the CPU is easy to swap out but am sure something goes wrong at a certain point - even if solderedon they make material to absorb the solder, making your work area VERY clean.

My Question now is this, get an 8 core, then replace with 2 3.7 QUAD CHIPS, what would happen?

I also noticed that the 8 core Mac Pro is 3.0 when in fact they do have a 3.4 8 core chip, so 2 =16? Or if correct, wouldn't you be able to replace a QUAD CHIP WITH THAT? I;M SURE THEY ARE UO TO SOMETHING AS 1) WE HAVE SEEN NO AUDIO FPU OR PERHAPS I SHOULD CHECK OUT PC MAKERS WINDOWS machines for Sisoft Sandra "B-E-N-C-H-M-A-R-K-S" -

SOMETHINGS UP AND AM SURE WE'LL ALL BE PLEASED, AS the mac pro was announced Last year, barely made the December mark, then pushed to January, then February and now April.

Would rather wait and have it done correct than released to early only to have it benchmarked in audio and found to be slower in a few areas- - - the logical part of my brain is wondering what else I would have to swap out as I am sure it would run, and fine for a while, then, poof....

PEACE===AM SURE APPLE WILL BLOW US AWAY 🙂 - they have to figure out how to increase the power for 150 watts or make the GPU work which in regard to FPU, I thought was NVIDIA?

Responding to your first post:

There is a huge misunderstanding here about computer "speed" and if you do have a BSEE and CSc degree I would point you back to your courses in which multithreading was discussed.

More cores, i.e., processors, running at a slower speed will have a far greater throughput than lesser cores running at higher speed IF the software has been written in such a way as to multithread. If the software can take full advantage of multiple cpus, which means not only that the software has been written to break the tasks down into discrete segments for the different cores, but also that the problem being solved CAN be broken down into independent segments, then the more cpus, or cores, available will result in greater throughput and problem solving. That is, unless the higher number of cores are not running at too great a speed deficit.

There are areas of science where this falls down...thermal-hydraulic and heat transfer problems can only be discretized to a limited degree.

Rendering, however, should handle discretization very well and, thus, benefit from more and more cores available.

You cannot compare raw speed numbers for a 12 core vs 8 core processor, as noted above, you must compare the actual throughput of the system which is comprised of the cores and software. A properly multithreaded program running on more cores will have much greater throughput than the same program running on fewer cores unless there is a very large speed deficit coming into play.

Responding to your second post:

Apple does not advertise this, but the Mac Pro Xeon E5 processors all use the LGA-2011 socket. That is, the processors are not soldered to the logic board. The differences going from Mac Pro spec to spec is that all one needs to replace is the processor. You can see the Intel prices for each processor vs the Mac Pro prices by going to the Intel site. That does become misleading because Intel will not sell YOU the chip at those prices. You cannot beat Apple's pricing on your own. But as the processor improves, as they all do, there is an avenue in the Mac Pro to take advantage of the improvement in processor speed and performance. That has not been the case in the past. This machine has potential that far exceeds the tech specs that are being quoted.

Apple has put the pieces together for the Mac Pro that make an exceedingly power piece of computing hardware. The challenge, as I said above, is for the software to now take advantage of that potential.