3.0 ghz vs 3.2 ghz?

[skim08]

My credit card is poised mid-air and I'm about to buy a new Mac Pro ...

3.0 ghz quad-core (8-core)
8 gig ram
1 320 gig 7200 drive (my start up)
2 - 1 TB 7200 drives (scratch and render)
8800 GT 512 mb graphics drive

Should I just suck it up and pay the extra $700 for the two 3.2 ghz quad core?

Seems the performance difference will be unnoticeable for HD video editing.... (maybe will save me a few minutes on renders)

any thoughts?

 

[Paul Hazlett]

save the money on processor and buy the ati 3870. do NOT buy the Mac ram
it is overpriced. There are a number of 3rd party ram dealers that wil give you
a better deal.

 

[David Didato]

I buy all RAM from Crucial for years now. Also the Apple hard drives are probably overpriced. Try Macsales.com for drives. You can now get 1.5Tb drives from them.

 

[Tobias Straka]

http://buyersguide.macrumors.com/

http://buyersguide.macrumors.com/

Source: http://buyersguide.macrumors.com/
If you have to buy now, that's another story of course...

 

[Paul Hazlett]

if you need one now, buy it. the update is still 3 to 5 months away,
but it will be a good one.

 

[Noah Posnick]

What about the 2.8ghz vs 3ghz? Is it worth it?

 

[Dave Blackham]

My credit card is poised mid-air and I'm about to buy a new Mac Pro ...

3.0 ghz quad-core (8-core)
8 gig ram
1 320 gig 7200 drive (my start up)
2 - 1 TB 7200 drives (scratch and render)
8800 GT 512 mb graphics drive

Should I just suck it up and pay the extra $700 for the two 3.2 ghz quad core?

Seems the performance difference will be unnoticeable for HD video editing.... (maybe will save me a few minutes on renders)

any thoughts?

1. Dont but it till you need it. it will be out of date on the day you buy it.
2. Buy the best/fastest GPU you can.
4. Get at least 4Gb ram but the more the better if you have high res and big timelines. Looks like you have this covered though.

Most of the software used is OpenGL based and uses the GPU for rendering not the processors so spend you money there. However, the top end GPU's and there a new one just been released can be disproportionaly expensive over and above the 8800 so check out the speed/cost advantage.

I think also the 8800 is only 8bit capable, so its very important to check this out too.

When you've arrived at what you think is a suitable spec go through it and work out the slowest part of the chain, could be disk interface, disk array, GPU processor(s) etc and improve it if you can. This will help get the whole system improved.

If you think of the computor as being able to procees data faster than it can move in and out of the IO (most of the time it can) then this is usualy where the choke points are.

Dave
UK

 

[Josh Negrin]

hey guys, I just want to point out, I was at the editor's office who edited "Turistas" and also "Swing Vote."
I was amazed to find out that an entire feature film (that was shot on film) was edited on a quad 2.66 (dual dual) intel mac pro with only 2GB of Ram!
I couldn't believe it. We're always being told, "buy more ram, get a better graphics card, get a faster processor." I personally have the same mac pro with 7gb of ram and the ati 3870 (which I love) and I've edited high end commercials and even feature films just fine. If you want to play it smart, don't charge the hell out of your credit card. Pick up the mac pro 2.66 quad for around $2k, get some ram and the ati 3870 from macsales.com and start focusing on your story telling. Believe me, you'll be happier in the long run, and if Kevin Costner is sitting in with an editor that is using a mac pro quad 2.66, I think you'll be fine with the mac pro quad 2.66.

Shameless plug for my latest film shot on RED
trailer- www.jnfilms.com/pushover

 

[Jonas Rejman]

And that is why you got the new MacBook 3 days after it came out.
Because it is about the story. :gun:
:biggrin:

 

[Josh Negrin]

I honestly got the new MacBook because I'm a tech geek (1) I can use it editing in the field (2) and it's shiny (3)