Mac Pro v. Quad Core Upgrade Path Question

[DeepGreen5]

Ok, first things first. I'm a noob. I'm new to these forums. Second, I use my computer for a wide range of activities--gaming being primary but video and audio editing/encoding also take place with regular frequency.

Noob mistake 1: Buying a Mac Pro 2 years ago!

I love the hardware and its internal layout and I love the OS (though I spend more time on my Windows partition), but I can't abide Apple's lockdown on system hardware withmy itch to upgrade the system. I'm looking to get out of my Mac Pro but I am unsure of the performance benefits I will get with spending $2,000 to $3,000 on building a computer of my own. Most of my worries focuses around the two dual core Xeons running at 3.0 ghz in my machine. In all reality I have no way of determining how these two processors would compare against one of Intel's top of the line quad core processors today.

If the performance of these new quad core processors versus my Xeons is comparable or trounce it in any way shape or form, perhaps the upgrade is worth it. However, if my dual core xeons still beat these new processors coming out perhaps I should wait longer.

Flexibility in graphics cards is one of my top concerns as well. Currently the Mac Pro can only upgrade to the 3870 which is an annoying card, to say the least. It doesn't have the power options to run a 4870 because of the cards two 6 pin connectors for power. The Mac Pro only supplies two on the motherboard and you can't take any from the PSU (I looked) and, to make matters worse, the 4870 won't work with Mac OS yet so you have to run the original card that came with the system, my abysmal X1900XT. That means if I want to run a 4870 in my Mac Pro for Windows use only I need (3) 6 pin power connectors which currently is impossible. Talk about inflexibility.

These kind of comparisons are not my strong suit so I'm hoping the computer expertise residing on these forums might be able to enlighten and guide my quest for truth! And if I'm not asking the right questions, which could certainly be the case, assist me so I know what to ask and how to answer it.

Thanks.

 

[DaveSimmons]

4 cores at 3.0 GHz is still faster than all of the affordable quad-core CPUs for socket 775 [ at stock speed ] .

Next year a quad core Nehalem will be faster but right now you're as fast as it gets for a reasonable price (of course you paid much more than that to go mac)

Gaming doesn't use cores 3-4 so if you need better gaming performance it probably makes sense to build a second PC just for gaming, something like:

case & 500 -700 watt PSU
intel P43 chipset motherboard (cheap but no crossfire and only 20% overclock)
E8400 3.0 GHz dual core
ATI 4870
4 GB RAM

... for about $900. Apple will probably charge that just for a 4870 card

Or wait until next year and spend ~$1,500 for a combo gaming and work PC, but giving up Mac OS X.

 

[MarcVenice]

Whoa, you bought a two dualcore xeons at 3.0ghz 2 years ago ?! How much did that run you? Davesimmons mentions a very nice solution, build a PC rig solely for gaming, but if you throw in a q8450 and overclock it to 3.0ghz you could do video/audio encode on both your PC and Mac Pro when you're not gaming. I'm not sure about 2 dualcore xeons beating a single quadcore, it in fact might be very close?

Anyways, for 1100$ you can actually buy 2 HD4850's ($350), x38 mobo ($185), 4gb ram ($85), CPU (200$), PSU ($120), HDD ($80), Case ($80), and erm, you're done, powerhouse gaming rig. Drop the dual HD4850's, go with a single HD4870, drop the x38 mobo, get a 70$ PSU, and you've saved $150-ish.

 

[DaveSimmons]

^ good point, having 2 quad core boxes would be quite a bit of encoding power.

motherboard / video choices depend on how much gaming power you think you need.

P43 motherboard + 4850 = $275 (after $25 rebate)
P43 motherboard + 4870 = $410
(or wait and the 4870x2 card will be out later this year, P43 + 4870x2 = $600)

X38 motherboard + 2x 4850 = ~$535 (after 2 x $25 rebates)
X48 motherboard + 2x 4870 = ~$850

For current/near future games a single 4850 runs them well at 16x10 with some at 19x12. A single 4870 runs almost everything smoothly at 19x12.

Crossfire (or x2 card) lets you run everything at maxed framerates 19x12 and many at 25x?.

 

[DeepGreen5]

Sounds like a pretty decent idea and would serve my purposes until the new Nehalem processors come out and blow the socks off everything in existence. And yeah... Apple and graphics cards.... don't get me started there. Nothing makes me more furious. The X1900XT off Apple's website still costs $400.

Anyway, the performance increase for Nehalem is expected to be that big, huh? Build a small $900 system and bide my time until the next big gun comes out. I like it.

If I'm building a system to bide my time until the next heavy architecture change (from what I know, the Nehalem chips wont use 775 sockets) then I don't need to go with something like the X48 that burns holes in your wallet and pours acid on your pride when something new comes out that is incompatible with current mobo. I think the smaller system is probably the best choice. Good calls.

And yeah, one 4870 or two 4850s would be great. I'm stayin away from nvidia at the moment because ATI just annihilated them. Maybe the x38 board would work well. I like the price compared to the x48.

 

[GuitarDaddy]

You're correct S775 is dead when Nehalem comes, so X38 if you want dual graphics or P43 if not. And DDR3 has almost no added performance on current platforms, so make sure you get a board with 4 ddr2 slots, not one of those crossover boards with 2 ddr2 2 ddr3

And it's pretty amazing how relatively cheaply you can build a combo gaming/encoding/rendering rig these days.

Biostar Tforce P43 mobo $90
Q6600 $195
Xigmatek 120mm HSF $37
4gb Corsair ddr2-800 $66.50 AR
WD 6400AAKS $95
VisionTek 4870 $310 and instock!!!!

Add $250 for a nice case and PSU and your just over a $1000