Depending on what apps you're using, that would probably be another argument in favour of more RAM - I assume the more you have the less the hard disks need to work. Im buying an 8 core (2.66, as this seems the best price performance sweet spot for my needs, but have not got it yet). STuff that is disk intensive really doesn't work any faster at all. Mac Pro Early 2009 (4 versus 8 core) Reports Ive read suggest Quad is certainly a capable machine. The only fly in the ointment is that there doesn't seem to be any improvement in hard disk performance. All systems were running Mac OS X 10.5.6 with the Mac Pro 2.66GHz Quad Core outfitted with 3GB of RAM, and the Mac Pro 2.26GHz 8-Core with 6GB of RAM.

From the reviews test benchmarks, there is not much speed difference between a Quad Core and an 8-Core as far as graphics is concerned. As far as I know, Adobe softwares still only utilizes 2 cores at the most. I'll probably up mine to 4gb (I live somewhere where you can't get this stuff, I have to wait till I travel). It reviewed the 2009 2.93 8-Core Nehalem MacPro with 12 gigs ram. The new one only has 1gb, as I haven't got round to upgrading it. mp4 etc, but it does it at roughly 10 x the speed the old one did.Īnd it seems it's purely the processor that makes the difference. It maintains all the ports that the original launch machine including 5 USB 2.0 ports, two FireWire 400 ports, two FireWire 800 ports, and four PCIe expansion slots. The Mac Pro Quad Core is powered by 2.8 GHz Quad Core 45-nm Intel Xeon E5462.

I recently moved from a G5 1.8 single to a quad 2.66, and the one thing I noticed it absolutely BLASTS through is rendering video. The Mac Pro released in 2008 has some differences from its predecessors.

I'd take a shot and say if you can afford it, go for 8.

Quad core vs 8 core mac pro 2008