New Mac Pro - ideal configurations please?

[Jonno101]

Hiya,
Am looking at updating my old 2006 Quad Mac Pro which is bit slow in Flex, and really slow in Phocus.
I wandered what would be best config for new mac pro as come in many ways, basically, 4,6,8 & 12 core??

Does lastest Flex & Phocus (I use both) use all cores available?? I dont think I could afford a 12 core, but would there be any point??

From other forums it seems like the favoured flavour for price / performance is 6 core (one 3.33 GHz 6-core Intel Xeon W3680)?

For anyone in the know would you agree?

Thanks for your input
Jon

[Phil G]

Hi jonno

I use a 2008-  8core 2.8GHz Intel Xeon  Mac Pro 12GB RAM (800MHz DDR2 FB-DIMM memory)* with a 512MB ATI Radeon HD 4870** tried others this appears to be the best so far

Only 4core and 8 core listed on Apple Uk site at the moment graphics handling is much faster on these machines

Here is an upgrade site which might be of use - http://www.macupgrades.co.uk/store/machine.php?name=mac-pro#gfx

A recent Activity Monitor check shows that occasionally I get up to 500% ie 5 cores used  normally in the region of 300% CPU and up to 3GB RM when running Aperture3 in 64bit with HBlad .fff files  never bothered to check with Phocus as I use it as the import conversion then dump images as referenced files into Aperture for DAM etc only using Phocus when ultimate quality export is required.

It depends how much your time is worth you can easily spend £k to save a few seconds time often better spent having a coffee

You could consider Apple refurbished there is a Quad core "Nehalem" machine available  check out http://store.apple.com/uk/browse/home/specialdeals/mac?mco=OTY2ODY3Nw

All the best

Phil

* due to price drop I will probably replace 4x 1GB sticks with 4x 4GB sticks from http://www.crucial.com/uk/  and/or
**possibly upgrade graphics to 1.5GB GDDR3 RAM NVIDIA Quadro FX 4800 for Mac rather than buy a new machine would be my path

[Jonno101]

Phil,
thanks for the reply, very useful info.
I am keen to get the newest ones that have just been announced but not yet available. As mine is sooo old now in puter years! Not too sure ill save that much from refurb, also latest ones have wifi & bluetooth as standard. Oh yeah I forgot too Im AOP so get 7% off new Macs (not able to use on refurb section!)

I see someone else has asked same question:
http://www.hasselbladdigitalforum.com/index.php/topic,1303.0.html
in the camera platforms section??!

thanks again
jon

[Phil G]

Hi Jon

The 09 series have WiFi and Bt and a card is almost a user upgrade costs less than £100 fitted we had a couple of G5's upgraded recently.
A colleague our Mac Guru uses an early 4core Mac Pro with dual screen  which is ok but has had graphics card problems he recently upgraded card not sure if it was to the ATI -4870  I know it was not listed as a recommendation but he is happy with its performance for his FCP work I will check what and how.

yep! he just replied

"Radeon 4870 from Apple Store. It is listed as 'unsupported' for my Pro 1,1 2006 Pro, but works fine."


(And memory for the 09 series is relatively cheap at the moment)


"The new Mac Pros that have been announced. Not a huge advance on what you have (my 08 MP), but I think I'll be getting one. They come with newer graphics cards. So if he is thinking of upgrading big time...."

Not sure if Phocus will be able to take advantage of the new graphics card so I would think 8 core should be a safe bet as mine only peaks at a smidge over  500%

Phil

PS I found running drives 2+3 as a striped pair gave a performance improvement 4 as live backup, tried putting  2+3+4 in one stripe (basket) but  increases probability of failure without that much improvement. so reverted to 2+3

[alexkent]

When processing 100% view and Exporting Phocus will use as many processors as are available.
On my 8core (16cores with 'hyper threading') Phocus peaks over 1400% Cpu when exporting.

That said, more cpu's come with diminishing returns, as Phocus is only limited by the cpu for a few seconds each export the rest of the time is reading and writing the harddrives. You'd probably find a fast overall experience with an 8core and SSD disks, than a 12core with spinning harddrives.

Also Phocus will be able to take advantage of the new graphics cards. I understand Phocus on Mac uses the Apple 'Core Graphics' API's to do the heavy image processing; as soon as Apple supports a new graphics card so does Phocus.

alex.

[kenschuster]

...the rest of the time is reading and writing the harddrives.

Do you think the new Mac Pro's solid state storage options would solve that bottleneck?

http://www.apple.com/macpro/features/storage.html

[alexkent]

Ken,

yep, i would expect the SSD disk option in the new Macpro would make a significant different to Phocus's performance.
switching between images, rendering 100%, exporting, should all be sped up.

alex.