Is Apple Quad Core Necessary

[Recked]

Hello,

I have just about reached my limit for Windows XP and am looking to move my main desktop machine to a Mac Pro, but was curious if a dual quad core is really necessary for Photoshop/Lightroom/Lightzone/DxO Optics?

Looking for the most bang for the buck of course but would prefer to put any extra cash into memory and multiple hard drives. Not sure if dual quad core processors are really needed.

Thanks for any thoughts..............

[Roy]

curious if a dual quad core is really necessary for Photoshop/Lightroom/Lightzone/DxO Optics?
[{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a]

It appears that 8 core isn't worth the extra for Photoshop. See this (and other) discussions on the Apple Mac Pro Support forum:
[a href=\"http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?messageID=4708051&#4708051]http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?m...708051�[/url]
and this article:
http://www.barefeats.com/octopro1.html

[flyangler]

Hello,

I have just about reached my limit for Windows XP and am looking to move my main desktop machine to a Mac Pro, but was curious if a dual quad core is really necessary for Photoshop/Lightroom/Lightzone/DxO Optics?

Looking for the most bang for the buck of course but would prefer to put any extra cash into memory and multiple hard drives. Not sure if dual quad core processors are really needed.

Thanks for any thoughts..............
[a href=\"index.php?act=findpost&pid=136927\"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a]

Recked,

I use imacs and whack up memory - and store images onto external drives.

It runs CS2 plus C1 Pro and a few other bits and pieces. Typically I'd only download around 1500 images per trip, so not real high end use, and although it is a bit slow doing that, everything else is pretty quick.

I use my imac primarily for images and desktop publishing.

It won't be as fast as the Mac Pro options though, but it is fast enough for my needs. Just another option to consider.

[feppe]

If you're looking for bang-for-the buck, more memory almost always beats CPU power, and especially HDD speed. Differences between CPUs are marginal, whereas doubling memory can have massive improvement on performance.

[vandevanterSH]

Hello,

I have just about reached my limit for Windows XP and am looking to move my main desktop machine to a Mac Pro, but was curious if a dual quad core is really necessary for Photoshop/Lightroom/Lightzone/DxO Optics?

Looking for the most bang for the buck of course but would prefer to put any extra cash into memory and multiple hard drives. Not sure if dual quad core processors are really needed.

Thanks for any thoughts..............
[a href=\"index.php?act=findpost&pid=136927\"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a]

I asked the same question at an Apple store. The answer was no. You also save $800 with the 2.66 processors..and go with after market memory..fast disks help..I use 10,000 RPM Raptors as my "active" discs.  If you can swing it get the Cinema 30 HD.

Steve

[Schewe]

Thanks for any thoughts..............
[a href=\"index.php?act=findpost&pid=136927\"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a]

Just be sure you understand that Photoshop (in particular) has 3 main bottlenecks...CPU, Free Ram and HD speed (I/O).

Inorder to address Photoshop needs, you need to address all three bottlenecks...

Apple always has the "middle priced" system set to be the best ""overall value". The top end machine is always sold at a premium (currently the dual quadcores) while the lowend system always specs out the cheapest (and usually hits Photoshop pretty hard in specs).

More ram is ALWAYS better than less ram and over 6 gigs is preferred-even though Photoshop the app can only make good use of about 4 gigs. You still need free ram for other apps and the system.

Photoshop is better off with the scratch disk being set to a different physical drive than the boot/OS. If the system needs to page, paging to the same disk as Photoshop's scratch will hurt. For scratch disk, faster is better-primarily if you end up working at less than 100% efficiency. Stripped drives (RAID 0) are better (but more risky) than regular drives for scratch.

The best bang for the buck right now woth be the dual dualcore 3, 6-8 gigs of ram and several fast drives. Both the ram and drives are cheaper not from Apple.

[macgyver]

Just be sure you understand that Photoshop (in particular) has 3 main bottlenecks...CPU, Free Ram and HD speed (I/O).

Inorder to address Photoshop needs, you need to address all three bottlenecks...

Apple always has the "middle priced" system set to be the best ""overall value". The top end machine is always sold at a premium (currently the dual quadcores) while the lowend system always specs out the cheapest (and usually hits Photoshop pretty hard in specs).

More ram is ALWAYS better than less ram and over 6 gigs is preferred-even though Photoshop the app can only make good use of about 4 gigs. You still need free ram for other apps and the system.

Photoshop is better off with the scratch disk being set to a different physical drive than the boot/OS. If the system needs to page, paging to the same disk as Photoshop's scratch will hurt. For scratch disk, faster is better-primarily if you end up working at less than 100% efficiency. Stripped drives (RAID 0) are better (but more risky) than regular drives for scratch.

The best bang for the buck right now woth be the dual dualcore 3, 6-8 gigs of ram and several fast drives. Both the ram and drives are cheaper not from Apple.
[a href=\"index.php?act=findpost&pid=136962\"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a]

Jeff, though I'm sure that's been on here before that was helpful to me, thanks.

[Recked]

Thank you all for your thoughts.

My initial plan was to get the high end 2 cpu dual core with 8 to 16 gig of ram and two or likely three internal hard drives to use for 1. programs 2. scratch disks where programs aren't and 3. digital photo files etc. with backup to me my Infrant ReadyNAS NV.

After reading what you have all added here I feel fairly happy with this plan though of course techno envy will sure strike when I see a quad core machine fly through tasks where the 2 dual core machine just cruises!

Jeff you mention that the drives and extra ram are cheaper elsewhere then upon initial purchase. Coming from a Windows world not sure where to get quality Mac components etc?

thanks again

[Schewe]

Jeff you mention that the drives and extra ram are cheaper elsewhere then upon initial purchase. Coming from a Windows world not sure where to get quality Mac components etc?
[a href=\"index.php?act=findpost&pid=136973\"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a]

RAM from Crucial (make sure it's lifetime warrantee wherever you get it)
Drives & other stuff I get from CDW. Google them...

I've got a dual quadcore with 16 gigs & 4, 750 internals...one 750 for boot and the three others are arrayed, RAID 0 (3 drive stripe) with nighlty backups to externals that are mirrored. The first array partition is about 300Gigs set as scratch, the remainder is a single large partition for images.

[jerryrock]

I asked the same question at an Apple store. The answer was no. You also save $800 with the 2.66 processors..Steve
[a href=\"index.php?act=findpost&pid=136959\"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a]

The savings from dual 2 core processors and dual 4 core processors is actually $1500.!

I went through this decision making process last month and ended up with the 2.66Ghx quad Mac Pro with two 500GB hard drives, 12 gigs of ram and Bluetooth option. After-market Ram from Crucial is both reliable and less expensive than ordering from Apple.

[vandevanterSH]

The savings from dual 2 core processors and dual 4 core processors is actually $1500.!

I went through this decision making process last month and ended up with the 2.66Ghx quad Mac Pro with two 500GB hard drives, 12 gigs of ram and Bluetooth option. After-market Ram from Crucial is both reliable and less expensive than ordering from Apple.
[a href=\"index.php?act=findpost&pid=137029\"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a]

You are right...I wasn't clear..the $800 is the difference between 2.66 and 3.0 GHz 2 core. As an aside, the Mac Pro does not come with wireless and the Airport Extreme card is not an end user installable item.  You either get it with the original order or buy it later and have an authorized Mac Service center install it.

Steve

[Roy]

The best bang for the buck right now woth be the dual dualcore 3, 6-8 gigs of ram and several fast drives. Both the ram and drives are cheaper not from Apple.
[a href=\"index.php?act=findpost&pid=136962\"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a]

Best value is clearly the dual dualcore 2.66, not the 3. The premium for the extra 12% CPU speed is excessive. Better to spend the money on memory.

Best memory value is to buy the machine with the minimum Apple memory (2 x 512 MB). When you get the machine, remove the Apple memory and install 4 x 2 GB modules. No point going beyond 8 GB for your planned use. Keep the Apple memory, don't sell it. If you ever have a hardware problem, Apple service will tell you it is your non-Apple memory. Put the Apple memory back in before you take the machine in for service.

For photoshop scratch space, partition one of your drives (not the boot drive) and reserve the FIRST partition (it is important that it is the first partition) as the photoshop scratch partition. 50 GB should be lots of space for photoshop. This is much cheaper than buying an expensive and noisy 10,000 rpm Raptor drive for photoshop but gives good performance since you are using the fastest part of the drive.

[Gurglamei]

RAM from Crucial (make sure it's lifetime warrantee wherever you get it)
Drives & other stuff I get from CDW. Google them...

I've got a dual quadcore with 16 gigs & 4, 750 internals...one 750 for boot and the three others are arrayed, RAID 0 (3 drive stripe) with nighlty backups to externals that are mirrored. The first array partition is about 300Gigs set as scratch, the remainder is a single large partition for images.
[a href=\"index.php?act=findpost&pid=136977\"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a]

I am planing on seting up a new computer for PS and have read this with considerable interest.  However, I have a couple of more questions I need help with.  I take liberty to post them here, since they elaborate somewhat on the thread's topic:

Question 1
If I Mr Schewe correct, you have the images you are working on and the scratch disk on the same physical raid but on differnt partitions.  Would it speed thing up to have them on separat physical raids?  I guess it makes no difference if I am working on say just one image, but what if I batch process several images?  Will PS load them all into RAM and scratch so there is no "competition" between the two partitions on your raid setup?

Question 2
When PS is started and thus loaded into RAM, I understand that a fast disk will speed up the initial loading (whiich is of no importance for me . coffe time!)  However, what about when PS is running?  I understnd that the operating system frequently accesses the OS disk and thus benefits from a fast drive, and wounder it it is the same withe PS: Does PS frequently access the program disk and thus work faster if located on a faster drive?

Question 3
What happens to the scratch disk apon closing the current pictures you are working on?  Are all data on scratch considered "lost" and apon opening a new set of pictures it starts using the scratch disk from the beginning?  What about when PS is closed and started again?

Question 4
How often should I do maintainence on the scratch disk to maintain speed, like defragmenting it?



Sincerely,


Christopher

[tived]

RAM from Crucial (make sure it's lifetime warrantee wherever you get it)
Drives & other stuff I get from CDW. Google them...

I've got a dual quadcore with 16 gigs & 4, 750 internals...one 750 for boot and the three others are arrayed, RAID 0 (3 drive stripe) with nighlty backups to externals that are mirrored. The first array partition is about 300Gigs set as scratch, the remainder is a single large partition for images.
[a href=\"index.php?act=findpost&pid=136977\"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a]

G'Day Jeff,

I am somewhat surprised to read that you have your raid partitioned and then use part thereof as your scratch disk.

:-) read with smile on face !
Will that not reduce the reason for having the scratch disk in the first place. I mean, with all due respect, you are getting your beer from the store(local 24hour) (RAID 0) you place them (in the fridge, to cool down, the perfect host you are :-) ) in memory and you take a handfull into to the table (processing on the CPU), but you have very thirsty guests and you are need to get more beer, now unless you are living at the local 24hour store) which is your current setup. You will be hit with a penalty, Mrs Schewe, is going to tell you can either go to the store or you can go to the fridge, but not both. On the other hand you could seperate your raids or bulid a second, and use that as your scratch disk and if placed on a second controller you can do both (get beer from the fridge and the store) at the same time.
:-)
I could be wrong and if so, please advise - I am also here to learn

thanks

Henrik
 A Dane Down Under

[Wayne Fox]

It probably has to do with what else you might be doing and running on the machine. I upgraded to the dual quad when it was released, but still have the dual 2-core machine as well.

I have 12 to 15 programs open on the machine, and rarely quit any program.  Lately I've been doing a lot of ripping of DvD's with virtually no impact while doing photoshop, and often I'm streaming to my AppleTv at the same time.  Of course, it could be the other machine would perform just fine, but I'm guessing if there is any difference at all, it normally won't show up comparing 2 computers running only 1 task.  Only if the application is incredibly optimized and has a need to run large numbers of threads, which most of the time photoshop doesn't need to do.

Photoshop by itself itself operates almost identically on both machines.

My current setup is similar to Jeff's, except I have the 4 750 gig drives running in a Raid 0+1 setup.  I've been realy happy with the performance, and I've always liked raid 1 as the ultimate backup over raid 4/5. The downside is 3TB of drives only yielding about 1.4Tb of storage, but heck, 1.4tb of fully rendundant storage running close to Raid 0 speeds ... not bad, and the drives really aren't that expensive anymore.

Jeff probably gets  a little better performance with his system/applications on a different physcial drive, and he may get a little more storage space with that arrangement as well.  I thought about that approach, and it might be better, but decided to try the Raid 0+1 because I"ve never used it before.

BTW, the fact that you can use 4 sata drives so easily in the new macs is one of its best design features I think ... very cool.

[peterhorsley]

The first array partition is about 300Gigs set as scratch, the remainder is a single large partition for images.
[a href=\"index.php?act=findpost&pid=136977\"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a]

Jeff, It's slightly off topic, but why 300gigs for the scratch?

My images rarely get above a gig, even with lots of layers, so I would have thought that 15Gb or 20 Gb of scratch disk would be plenty...

Peter

[Schewe]

I could be wrong and if so, please advise - I am also here to learn
[a href=\"index.php?act=findpost&pid=138146\"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a]

Well, the beer analogy went right over my head...

The boot drive and the Photoshop scratch disk wants to be on separate physical drives for the simple reason that if you hit scratch, you don't want the drive heads trying to serve both the system VM and Phtoshop VM at the same time. The fact I've got scratch on a separate physical drive means system paging and Photoshop paging will never collide on the same drive/drives. Now, I may be opening (reading) and saving (writting) to the same series of physical drives arrayed that are also on my scratch but simply opening and savng images doesn't colide with the read/write heads for the scratch array...

As to why 300 gigs? Because I could...and I'll _NEVER_ have to worry about setting a second drive as the 2nd scratch disk...I still have over 1.7 TB as a working partition...what's a few hundred gigs these days?

[The View]

For photoshop scratch space, partition one of your drives (not the boot drive) and reserve the FIRST partition (it is important that it is the first partition) as the photoshop scratch partition. 50 GB should be lots of space for photoshop. This is much cheaper than buying an expensive and noisy 10,000 rpm Raptor drive for photoshop but gives good performance since you are using the fastest part of the drive.
[a href=\"index.php?act=findpost&pid=137144\"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a]

What do you mean by "fastest part of the drive"?

I am ordering a 24" iMac (matte screen) tomorrow, and this iMac can take a second hard drive.

So what kind of hard drive would your recommend to use? I definitely appreciate a silent drive.

To the original poster:

I also had great experience with Crucial. Their prices are low - and it's still best quality.

Regarding the MacPros: they are overdue for an upgrade. What you buy today is pretty much what you could buy a year ago (except the dual 4-core). The graphics cards are, as far as I know, still the same: the Nvidia 7300GT (except a special card for powering the 30 inch display) (the same 7300GT you will find in the white, matte screen iMac, just with less Vram).

So, if you are not hard pressed to buy a computer just now, check sites like macrumors or appleinsider. It would be too bad if you bought a MacPro, and a month later: there comes the upgrade.

But I don't know your situation. If you really need it now, buy it now.

[Gurglamei]

Now, I may be opening (reading) and saving (writting) to the same series of physical drives arrayed that are also on my scratch but simply opening and savng images doesn't colide with the read/write heads for the scratch array...

Aha !!, thank you!  

However, does this also apply when I work in ACR and batch process several images say with the sync settings command?

[tived]

Well, the beer analogy went right over my head...

The boot drive and the Photoshop scratch disk wants to be on separate physical drives for the simple reason that if you hit scratch, you don't want the drive heads trying to serve both the system VM and Phtoshop VM at the same time. The fact I've got scratch on a separate physical drive means system paging and Photoshop paging will never collide on the same drive/drives. Now, I may be opening (reading) and saving (writting) to the same series of physical drives arrayed that are also on my scratch but simply opening and savng images doesn't colide with the read/write heads for the scratch array...

Hello Schewe,

don't worry too much about the beer analogy :-) what I am understanding is that you PS scratch disk is on the same disk as your data storage and away from your system disk.

depending on how you work, this probably works fine, I am just a little surprised as I understand this as you will write and read from your scratch disk and data disk simmutanously and will therefore get a performance penalty that is not uptimal. YMMV
but had you had the scratch disk on a physical diffrent disk to both your system disk as well as your data disk, you would improve your I/O operation and again this would be improved if they were on seperate channels (yes it is always the last 5% that cost the most!)

perhaps these setups are a bit over the top :-) but hey as long as it works

thanks for sharing

Henrik