Apple Mac Pro (Mid 2010) Review
by Anand Lal Shimpi on October 6, 2010 9:26 PM ESTNew GPUs
In one fell swoop Apple pulled NVIDIA out of almost all of its desktop products. With the exception of the Mac mini, every single Apple desktop uses an Intel CPU, an Intel chipset and an AMD GPU. To be fair though, Apple has alternated between NVIDIA and AMD for graphics every year for the past four years.
The GPU of choice in the Mac Pro is the Radeon HD 5770 equipped with 1GB of GDDR5. Clocked and spec'd identically to the PC version, this is the graphics card you get in all three standard models. For an extra $200 you can get a Radeon HD 5870 with 1GB of GDDR5, and for an extra $250 you can have two 5770s instead of one. Don't get too excited, the multi-GPU route is explicitly for more displays there's no concept of CrossFire under OS X at this point.
The Radeon HD 5770 is a huge step up from the GeForce GT 120 that previously came standard in the Mac Pro. The performance difference between the two is staggering! Where the 5770 does disappoint however is in comparison to EVGA's GeForce GTX 285 Mac Edition. It's slower.
I used Half Life 2 Episode 2 under OS X to get a general idea of gaming GPU performance. The improvement is huge compared to the old GeForce GT 120 that shipped in last year’s Mac Pro. Ultra high resolution frame rates improved by over 5x, while even 19x12 performance tripled.
If you’re curious about Starcraft 2 performance of the Radeon HD 5770 at 2560 x 1600, ultra quality settings, I saw an average frame rate of ~21 fps with a minimum at 17 fps and maximum at 27 fps. Note that this is in our CPU intensive battle test, so peak frame rates will be higher but if you’re doing a lot of unit management that’s pretty much what you can expect. In other words it’s not fast enough to play on a 30” at full resolution without feeling a bit choppy at times. To average above 30 fps you have to drop resolution and quality settings.
Display Outputs and Frame Buffer
The 5770 has three outputs in the form of two mini-DP and one dual-link DVI. The mini-DP ports can each drive a 27-inch LED Cinema Display while the DL-DVI port can drive a 30. This is a Radeon HD 5000 series card so you can actually have all three outputs active at the same time. That's right, with a single card you can drive three monitors. And with two, six monitors.
While 1GB of memory is enough to drive a single high resolution panel, it can be a stretch for two or three depending on what you're doing. As I've pointed out in the past you can have around 130 open Safari windows before you'll max out a video card with a 1GB frame buffer at 2560 x 1600. However, fire up Photoshop and open twenty 12MP images and you'll get the same effect. For heavy imaging work you'll still want more than one 5770 if you are going to drive multiple high resolution (2560 pixels wide) displays.
What would've been better is for Apple to offer a 2GB card, at least as an option, for very high end multi-monitor users.
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mattgmann - Thursday, October 7, 2010 - link
I understand including a nice case, as the mac case is quality. But you're right, $250 is a bit steep. There are plenty of less expensive cases that are just as nice, and some real budget cases that would be serviceable.hellotyler - Thursday, October 7, 2010 - link
If I had the money, I'd buy one of these in a second. Apple rules. In today's world though, budget is important and PC beats out Apple heartily on the mid-powered PC market. I own both Mac and Pc (side by side, my two babies) and I love them both dearly. If I had to choose a brand new super powered computer though, I'd have to go with the Mac because of the OS.noiseunit - Thursday, October 7, 2010 - link
Maybe I'm missing something here but a quick search on newegg showed a $700 difference in the price of the graphics cards, maybe thats why the dell is so expensive?Stokestack - Tuesday, October 12, 2010 - link
The Mac IS a PC. If you mean a Windows system, then say that.ViperV990 - Thursday, October 7, 2010 - link
Didn't see it mentioned in the article, so I'm assuming no, but I want to double-check: Does the Mac Pro support 3x1 Eyefinity setup?Also, it's a shame that they're not offering the Eyefinity 5 or 6 models as an option.
Porksmuggler - Thursday, October 7, 2010 - link
Really appreciate the honest comparison to the custom built, but the Dell T5500 isn't exactly comparable. It's easy to say "other than the graphics card" but seriously:Apple's ATI Radeon HD 5770 1GB - $249 from Apple or $125 from Newegg
Dell's ATI FirePro V8700 1GB - $860 from Newegg
Anand Lal Shimpi - Thursday, October 7, 2010 - link
It's a tough comparison to make if you really want to dive into it. The FirePro price premium is due largely to the driver work and it's tough to tell what equivalent driver work (if any) Apple has done in OS X. Either way, it does change things quite a bit and I've updated the text to reflect that there is an Apple tax that's just hidden by the GPU cost differential.Thanks for the comment :)
Take care,
Anand
Porksmuggler - Thursday, October 7, 2010 - link
Thanks for the update, it truly is a tough comparison.I think an even greater concern with both the Dell and Apple tax is that both are using what might be considered as "commodity components"; Apple certainly would be using Foxconn, and I do not know of Dell's core supplier. The point being, these components do not have the same reputation of quality and performance as those used in the custom built.
The extent of the tax goes even further...
Sunburn74 - Thursday, October 7, 2010 - link
Not sure how you managed to reach the $324 number you published in the edit in the article. The cheapest fireprov8700 I can find costs 600 flat (ebay buy it now). The difference is at least $500 once you deduct the street costs of the packaged gpu.jecs - Thursday, October 7, 2010 - link
To me the "why a Mac Pro" is I have been afraid to build myself a solid dual socket PC workstation class machine for Pro 3D modeling, rendering and compositing with Maya and Final Cut Pro. But now I am very used to some pro Apple and none Apple software and happy. So in my case my current 2.8 octacore has been very, very reliable. For graphic design I agree it gets more difficult every time to justify a dual socket machine like a Mac Pro. Why 8-12 core for illustrator or even Photoshop?, Get the fastest quadcore PC for this. But also is a matter of personal preference.The Mac Pro is not the fastest machine out there but not either the most expensive or exotic hardware as there are usually faster PC hardware and more specific software options and features. But, if you like me are using specific multithreaded Pro software with decent performance and like OSX, then the Mac Pro is very solid. No Mac Pro has died on me yet, they are easy to upgrade for the most common features, work very well out of the box, is reliable, offers dual socket options and no Apple tax on comparable Dell or similar workstations.
On the other hand, even I use the Mac Pro all day long I builded a SFF quad core PC and this is the machine I am going to upgrade this year. The PC is "my back up" machine but the one that goes outside with me when I need performance, and also one very useful rendering machine.
By the way Anand, very good article! I enjoyed very much reading through the lines, not defensive at all, not too long and I learned on some features and coments. At least to my experience as a Mac Pro user from the beginning and even from the days of the G5s.