Ever since it was discovered that the new Mac Pro uses a socketed CPU, there has been some debate as to whether that meant a user could upgrade the CPU on their own. Other World Computing rolled up their sleeves and put any contention to rest.
We got our hands on an Intel E5-2667 V2 8-core 3.30GHz with 25MB Cache processor, installed it in the new Mac Pro and have done some benchmarking to get an early look at the performance vs. the stock Apple / Intel E5-1650 V2 6-core 3.50GHz with 12MB Cache model. The testing was done with 64GB of OWC memory installed. Our benchmarking showed a significant 30 percent multi-processor performance bump with the upgraded processor.
This is exactly as it should be. Yet another reason to appreciate the design of the new Mac Pro.
How many people beside super geeks that change out a processor in any computer?
I want to say it’s fewer than there used to be, but I have only anecdotal experience. The last CPU I upgraded was on my second Mac, a Quadra 650. Thanks, Sonnet!
I’d like to hear from IT people on this.
What about the item that would be more likely to be upgraded, like the video cards?
I work as a contractor in enterprise IT for fortune 100…have never seen anyone upgrade CPUs or vid cards. we purchase machine, use them, retire them. rinse and repeat.
Apart from one ad agency whose support guy kept old Mac towers running with whatever he could jam into them, that’s largely been my impression as a user in a bunch of art departments. Who has time to tinker with a division full of computers, apart from home hobbyists?
From the teardowns the video cards are upgradable, in that they can be removed and replaced. However they’re custom-built on a special circuit board with a special connector, so you’d have to rely on a hardware company to make one specifically for the Mac Pro. Given the pretty small market (Mac users->who bought a Mac Pro->who need more graphics power->who have the money, time, skill, and desire to replace it) I’m skeptical if we’ll ever see upgrades for them.