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Author Topic: Comparing Mac Pro perfo with 16 vs 32GB  (Read 7448 times)

BernardLanguillier

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Comparing Mac Pro perfo with 16 vs 32GB
« on: March 07, 2009, 03:00:12 am »

Dear all,

Having just upgraded my Mac Pro from 16GB to 32GB, I did a bit of comparison in order to figure out to what extend I had wasted 970 US$.

It turns out that on my typical heavily parallelized usage, there is some value, but not all applications show the same level of gains:

PS CS4: important gains with 10 mins saving on a simple scenario on a large image
PTgui: 20 mins saving on the computation of a large panorama
C1 Pro: no gains
Autopano Pro: no gains

Details

Test conditions
Hardware
first gen 8 core Mac Pro (667 Mz) 3.0 Ghz
Test 1: 8x2GB = 16GB RAM
Test 2: 8x4GB = 32GB RAM
OS: OS 10.5.6
Internal storage
Boot disk: Velociraptor 300GB
Scratch 1 (APP): single 150GB raptor
Scratch 2 (PS and PTgui): softraid controlled Raid 0 volume with 2x150GB Raptor

External storage
Wiebetech RTX600 with 6x1TB Seagate in Raid 5 mode and SCSI320 interface

Key imaging applications
PS CS4
C1 4.6.2
PTgui Pro 8.1
Autopano Pro 1.42

Background applications
Bridge CS4
Safari 4 beta
iTune 7.6
Activity Monitor

Scenario preparation
Boot OSX
Launch all applications
Point to the right folders

Scenario (all files read and written from Wiebetech SCSI unit) – all tasks launched at about the same time
PS CS4: Open from bridge CS4 a 3.5GB .psb file and then flatten the layers in the file
C1: export of 213 D3X raw files to jpg
PTgui: batch compute a 150 megapixel pano
APP: launch an interactive computation of a 150 megapixel HDR pano

The scenario was played once with 16GB RAM and once with 32GB RAM.

Test results

Time
PS CS4
- 16GB RAM:
Open: 4:30 min
Flatten layers: 15 min
Total: 19:30 min
- 32GB RAM:
Open: 5:40 min
Flatten layers: 5:30 min
Total: 11:10 min

C1
16 GB RAM: 32 min
32 GB RAM: 32 min

PTgui
16 GB RAM: 59 min
32 GB RAM: 40 min

APP
16 GB RAM: 90 min
32 GB RAM: 89 min

Memory usage
16GB
- VM size: 58GB
- Peak active memory usage: 10GB
- Used memory: 15.8/16 GB
32GB
- VM size: 58GB
- Peak active memory usage: 21GB
- Used memory: 31.5/32 GB
« Last Edit: March 07, 2009, 03:00:51 am by BernardLanguillier »
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icke

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Comparing Mac Pro perfo with 16 vs 32GB
« Reply #1 on: March 07, 2009, 09:58:01 am »

Quote from: BernardLanguillier
Having just upgraded my Mac Pro from 16GB to 32GB, I did a bit of comparison in order to figure out to what extend I had wasted 970 US$.
that's a great price... i was just looking for memory for my mac pro as one of the dimms shows ecc errors. as result the mac has has actually blocked 1 gb each, from dimms 1 and 2... so my 16gb have been reduced to 14 gb

but while looking around for 667 MHz fbdimms, i still see rather astronomical prices if i can find 4gb modules at all...
one online source offers original apple 2x2gb for only (as they say): 1.107,- €    

so if you don't mind me asking, where did you shop?

cheers,
olaf
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olaf

francois

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Comparing Mac Pro perfo with 16 vs 32GB
« Reply #2 on: March 07, 2009, 10:11:17 am »

Quote from: icke
that's a great price... i was just looking for memory for my mac pro as one of the dimms shows ecc errors. as result the mac has has actually blocked 1 gb each, from dimms 1 and 2... so my 16gb have been reduced to 14 gb

but while looking around for 667 MHz fbdimms, i still see rather astronomical prices if i can find 4gb modules at all...
one online source offers original apple 2x2gb for only (as they say): 1.107,- €    

so if you don't mind me asking, where did you shop?

cheers,
olaf
Try Other World Computing ( http://www.otherworldcomputing.com/ ).
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Francois

BernardLanguillier

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Comparing Mac Pro perfo with 16 vs 32GB
« Reply #3 on: March 07, 2009, 10:25:11 am »

Quote from: francois
Try Other World Computing ( http://www.otherworldcomputing.com/ ).

Precisely.

Ordered on Wed, got them Friday PM in Tokyo...

Cheers,
Bernard

Jack Flesher

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Comparing Mac Pro perfo with 16 vs 32GB
« Reply #4 on: March 07, 2009, 11:21:39 am »

Good test Bernard, thanks for sharing.  Note that Lloyd Chambers has also done some extensive RAM testing in Mac's: www.diglloyd.com  His tests showed some added benefit too, though not on the same order as yours.  Anyway, time for me to decide if I want to pony up the $990 to upgrade.  I rarely am doing more than C1 batch while I work on a few images in CS4 or render a pano with APP or focus stack with Helicon...
« Last Edit: March 07, 2009, 11:26:21 am by Jack Flesher »
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Jack Flesher

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Comparing Mac Pro perfo with 16 vs 32GB
« Reply #5 on: March 07, 2009, 11:24:04 am »

Re RAM for 1st gen Mac Pro:  Note that you can use the 800MHz DDR2 RAM modules in the 1st generation boxes that require 667MHz DDR2 RAM.  It will still only run at 667, but it fits, works fine and is often LESS expensive than the older 667  

FWIW,
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BernardLanguillier

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Comparing Mac Pro perfo with 16 vs 32GB
« Reply #6 on: March 07, 2009, 05:52:32 pm »

Quote from: Jack Flesher
Re RAM for 1st gen Mac Pro:  Note that you can use the 800MHz DDR2 RAM modules in the 1st generation boxes that require 667MHz DDR2 RAM.  It will still only run at 667, but it fits, works fine and is often LESS expensive than the older 667

Jack,

Too late for me, but thanks for the information.

Cheers,
Bernard

BernardLanguillier

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Comparing Mac Pro perfo with 16 vs 32GB
« Reply #7 on: March 07, 2009, 05:54:50 pm »

Quote from: Jack Flesher
I rarely am doing more than C1 batch while I work on a few images in CS4 or render a pano with APP or focus stack with Helicon...

Hum... in this case not sure whether you'll see as much benefits as I did.

On the other hand, as you probably already know, APP will soon release a 64 bits beta version of APP Giga for OSX that should be able to use Ram better.

Cheers,
Bernard

Jack Flesher

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Comparing Mac Pro perfo with 16 vs 32GB
« Reply #8 on: March 07, 2009, 07:17:28 pm »

Quote from: BernardLanguillier
Hum... in this case not sure whether you'll see as much benefits as I did.

On the other hand, as you probably already know, APP will soon release a 64 bits beta version of APP Giga for OSX that should be able to use Ram better.

Cheers,
Bernard

And then there is the other issue of CS4 maxing out at 2.8G instead of 3G RAM when you stuff 32G in your box...  Maybe the sweet spot is 24G or 28G
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