new mac pros
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well I did some figuring.
If I sell my current dual G5 tower with 4 gigs of RAM and a geforce 6800 Ultra, both 23" cinema displays, all 3 G4 mac Minis, my iBook G4, my wife's iBook G3 and my toyota Camry, I can get what I want.
which is as follows:
1 dual 3 mac pro with radeon x1900 and 7 gigs RAM (1 gig from apple, 6 from OWC).
2 core duo mac mini's with 1 gig RAM each.
6 300 GB sata drives (4 for the new tower and 2 that I've been meaning to get for swap with my 8 drive RAID)
2 dell 24" flat panels ($703.20 each, nice)
so you might ask why sell the 23"s to get dell 24"s, well one of the 23"s needs to get sold with the tower as they are together on applecare and I can't have an unmatched set, hence, I sell the other one (hopefully for around $703.20) and break even on displays.
the only hole in this glorious plan is the noticeable LACK of a portable. maybe we'll sell the toyota matrix too
If I sell my current dual G5 tower with 4 gigs of RAM and a geforce 6800 Ultra, both 23" cinema displays, all 3 G4 mac Minis, my iBook G4, my wife's iBook G3 and my toyota Camry, I can get what I want.
which is as follows:
1 dual 3 mac pro with radeon x1900 and 7 gigs RAM (1 gig from apple, 6 from OWC).
2 core duo mac mini's with 1 gig RAM each.
6 300 GB sata drives (4 for the new tower and 2 that I've been meaning to get for swap with my 8 drive RAID)
2 dell 24" flat panels ($703.20 each, nice)
so you might ask why sell the 23"s to get dell 24"s, well one of the 23"s needs to get sold with the tower as they are together on applecare and I can't have an unmatched set, hence, I sell the other one (hopefully for around $703.20) and break even on displays.
the only hole in this glorious plan is the noticeable LACK of a portable. maybe we'll sell the toyota matrix too
KenInHollywood
Chieftain
- Joined
- Aug 15, 2006
- Messages
- 1
I received my Mac Pro today.
I had a saved game from a huge Terra map, quick speed, 9 civs, 20 turns from the end, no space victory.
On my old dual G5 PowerMac, I was getting one frame per second or less anywhere on the map. And I could literally go to the kitchen and get a glass of water while "waiting for other civilizations..."
Well, it FLIES on the Mac Pro! I loaded that saved game, and the animations were smooth... smoother than turn one on my old machine! Very responsive scrolling! And computer turns only take a few seconds to complete! All very nice!
The only problem I've noticed so far is that jungles appear to be sunk into the ground, as if they aren't being drawn at the right altitude. I'll investigate this later.
Answers to the two obvious question: Yes, I have the patch, and I'm using the "stock" nVidia card that came with the Mac Pro. Oh, and one other thing: this is on an Apple 30" monitor at native (2560 x 1600) resolution.
And that is my brief report.
I had a saved game from a huge Terra map, quick speed, 9 civs, 20 turns from the end, no space victory.
On my old dual G5 PowerMac, I was getting one frame per second or less anywhere on the map. And I could literally go to the kitchen and get a glass of water while "waiting for other civilizations..."
Well, it FLIES on the Mac Pro! I loaded that saved game, and the animations were smooth... smoother than turn one on my old machine! Very responsive scrolling! And computer turns only take a few seconds to complete! All very nice!
The only problem I've noticed so far is that jungles appear to be sunk into the ground, as if they aren't being drawn at the right altitude. I'll investigate this later.
Answers to the two obvious question: Yes, I have the patch, and I'm using the "stock" nVidia card that came with the Mac Pro. Oh, and one other thing: this is on an Apple 30" monitor at native (2560 x 1600) resolution.
And that is my brief report.
SalmonOfDoubt
Chieftain
Listening to the Maccast, I heard news about 3rd party ram for Mac Pros, so those of you lucky enough to have them take note:
Apperently Apple is making use of ram with massive heat spreaders to keep fan speeds lower and ram speed up. Using 3rd party ram without the spreaders could result in slowdowns (or maybe worse).
So far, OWC is the only 3rd party place that seems to carry them, but they are still discounted comapared to the Apple store.
Just a heads up.
Apperently Apple is making use of ram with massive heat spreaders to keep fan speeds lower and ram speed up. Using 3rd party ram without the spreaders could result in slowdowns (or maybe worse).
So far, OWC is the only 3rd party place that seems to carry them, but they are still discounted comapared to the Apple store.
Just a heads up.
My new Mac Pro just landed 
Naturally one of my first tests was to load up Civ4, patch it, and fire it up. Wow! Smooth scrolling, fast responses. Everything works at max settings! I might even try playing a game. Where's that GOTM start file?
Naturally one of my first tests was to load up Civ4, patch it, and fire it up. Wow! Smooth scrolling, fast responses. Everything works at max settings! I might even try playing a game. Where's that GOTM start file?
Sam_Yeager
Another Original Geezer
AlanH said:My new Mac Pro just landed
Naturally one of my first tests was to load up Civ4, patch it, and fire it up. Wow! Smooth scrolling, fast responses. Everything works at max settings! I might even try playing a game. Where's that GOTM start file?
How to make friends and influence people Alan!
Out of interest do you have the sound problems that others have encountered?
Sorry, had to tell someone 
I haven't really tried it exhaustively yet, and I haven't actually tried *playing* Civ4 yet, but I've already experienced two interesting "issues":
1. I was playing with zooming and panning, using Harkonen's late game save, and suddenly the graphics started flickering badly when I moved the cursor around. I couldn't get it to stop by playing with graphics options, so I quit the game. I then found that my whole Mac desktop was slightly larger than life, and I could use the mouse scroller to slide it around the screen, as if it was a window a bit larger than the screen. The only way I could recover was to reboot (I might have been able to do so by logging out and in again I guess).
2. I had a buzzing noise instead of normal ambient sounds once after starting a random game. It wasn't at painful volume level, though, which I think has been reported by others. Switching sounds off and back on again in Options removed that. That didn't happen again on two or three more starts.
Incidentally, I had no problems with the install and patch sequence. I drag installed the DVD version to my Applications folder, launched it as far as a game starting position, quit, ran the patch, checked the version - no problem.
I haven't really tried it exhaustively yet, and I haven't actually tried *playing* Civ4 yet
, but I've already experienced two interesting "issues":1. I was playing with zooming and panning, using Harkonen's late game save, and suddenly the graphics started flickering badly when I moved the cursor around. I couldn't get it to stop by playing with graphics options, so I quit the game. I then found that my whole Mac desktop was slightly larger than life, and I could use the mouse scroller to slide it around the screen, as if it was a window a bit larger than the screen. The only way I could recover was to reboot (I might have been able to do so by logging out and in again I guess).
2. I had a buzzing noise instead of normal ambient sounds once after starting a random game. It wasn't at painful volume level, though, which I think has been reported by others. Switching sounds off and back on again in Options removed that. That didn't happen again on two or three more starts.
Incidentally, I had no problems with the install and patch sequence. I drag installed the DVD version to my Applications folder, launched it as far as a game starting position, quit, ran the patch, checked the version - no problem.
sounds like you accidentally turned on screen zooming from the universal accessibility control panel. command-option-8 is what toggles it. any chance you hit this combo fro some reason while playing?
on the second issue, I get that as well but it usually stops after the first turn. no idea what causes it.
on the second issue, I get that as well but it usually stops after the first turn. no idea what causes it.
Checking CPU utilisation, It's running pretty constantly at about 103%. So that's one core running flat out on the main thread, and one picking up the audio thread, though the actual core doing the heavy lifting seems to hop after each user action.
Can't find a readout app to display CPU temperatures currently. I'll keep looking.
Can't find a readout app to display CPU temperatures currently. I'll keep looking.
Skippy_Kangaroo
Prince of Denmark
Temperature Monitor works for MacBook Pros and may well work for your beastie. It gives me a readout on the temperature of each core. (But they are always with in a degree or two of each other anyway so it doesn't make much difference if you only get a readout on one core - with four there may be more of a difference.)
Skippy_Kangaroo
Prince of Denmark
Temperature Monitor has been updated to version 3.8 which claims added support for the New Mac Pros.AlanH said:
You might want to give it a whirl.
Thx! I've been frying other fish today, so I missed that, but it'll be interesting to see what it shows now. Reason is ...
I got Parallels Desktop running and added two virtual machines loaded up with Ubuntu Linux and Windows 98se. They are all networked to OS X. So I can now play Civ3 in OS X while running CivAssist II in Windows, and I can have Civ4 running as well, plus my usual suite of OS X apps for mail, chat, browsing. And I can compile the tools we use on this Linux site. And they are all sitting in their own core, seemingly not affecting each other's performance in any significant way. Ubuntu really hits its core hard only when its screensaver cuts in
It's rather cool to see the Exposé F9 screen with Civ3 and Civ4 both still running their animations, along with the Activity Monitor graphs indicating all four cores are working ...
BTW. Civ3 screams on this Mac. The interturns are so fast you can't really see any detail of the AI unit movements as they flash around the screen.
PS. I checked the temperatures with the new version. The cores are running around 37ºC at rest. With Civ4 running, and vigorously panning and zooming, a couple got up to around 44ºC. Max rating is 85ºC. I'll check it some more, under real operating conditions, using the history graph to see the variation over time..
I got Parallels Desktop running and added two virtual machines loaded up with Ubuntu Linux and Windows 98se. They are all networked to OS X. So I can now play Civ3 in OS X while running CivAssist II in Windows, and I can have Civ4 running as well, plus my usual suite of OS X apps for mail, chat, browsing. And I can compile the tools we use on this Linux site. And they are all sitting in their own core, seemingly not affecting each other's performance in any significant way. Ubuntu really hits its core hard only when its screensaver cuts in
It's rather cool to see the Exposé F9 screen with Civ3 and Civ4 both still running their animations, along with the Activity Monitor graphs indicating all four cores are working ...
BTW. Civ3 screams on this Mac. The interturns are so fast you can't really see any detail of the AI unit movements as they flash around the screen.
PS. I checked the temperatures with the new version. The cores are running around 37ºC at rest. With Civ4 running, and vigorously panning and zooming, a couple got up to around 44ºC. Max rating is 85ºC. I'll check it some more, under real operating conditions, using the history graph to see the variation over time..
Parallels Desktop is an application that runs in OS X, a bit like Virtual PC. You create a virtual machine for each guest OS. Tell it where to find the bootable installer CD or CD image, and it runs the OS installation as though it were on its own hardware. You then have a window displaying each guest OS. Eack guest OS has its own dedicated chunk of disk which it formats as it requires. It looks like an unreadable file to the rest of OS X.
You just click a Parallels window to move keyboard and mouse focus to that OS, and use an escape key sequence (alt-control) to release them back to OS X.
You just click a Parallels window to move keyboard and mouse focus to that OS, and use an escape key sequence (alt-control) to release them back to OS X.
Skippy_Kangaroo
Prince of Denmark
AlanH said:Thx! I've been frying other fish today, so I missed that, but it'll be interesting to see what it shows now. Reason is ...
I got Parallels Desktop running and added two virtual machines loaded up with Ubuntu Linux and Windows 98se. They are all networked to OS X. So I can now play Civ3 in OS X while running CivAssist II in Windows, and I can have Civ4 running as well, plus my usual suite of OS X apps for mail, chat, browsing. And I can compile the tools we use on this Linux site. And they are all sitting in their own core, seemingly not affecting each other's performance in any significant way. Ubuntu really hits its core hard only when its screensaver cuts in
It's rather cool to see the Exposé F9 screen with Civ3 and Civ4 both still running their animations, along with the Activity Monitor graphs indicating all four cores are working ...
BTW. Civ3 screams on this Mac. The interturns are so fast you can't really see any detail of the AI unit movements as they flash around the screen.
PS. I checked the temperatures with the new version. The cores are running around 37ºC at rest. With Civ4 running, and vigorously panning and zooming, a couple got up to around 44ºC. Max rating is 85ºC. I'll check it some more, under real operating conditions, using the history graph to see the variation over time..
That's just crazy - when are you going to get the cybernetic implants so you can keep up with all that activity? (And a screensaver that uses more power than the operating system? - guess they don't call them CPU savers...)
Your temperatures are positively icy. Mine idles around 58ºC and Civ IV pegs one core at around 72ºC. If both cores are going (as Civ IV used to do) it stabilises at 78ºC. These seem to be the designed specs for MacBook Pros. But what do you expect from packing a CPU and GPU into an enclosure that is less than 2cm thick. I believe the Core Duos are rated to 100ºC.
Our network in the Boston U Super-K group is based around a single big server (named neutrino), plus a half-dozen or so desktops that pick up some of the load. Quad processors, 8 GB of RAM or so, it's a pretty good machine.Skippy_Kangaroo said:
But if somebody forgets to turn off their screensaver (the default one in Red Hat), it brings the entire system down. Saturates the network capacity and consumes all the CPUs and RAM. Somebody then has to go in as root and log them out - and that process is a trial in itself, since there's no system capacity available to do it!
And speaking of BU, I've been a grad student there as long as I've been here... but my dissertation defense is Tuesday. Dissertation written and most revisions done, talk ready. 62.25 hours from now, I'm in the hotseat.
Good luck, Beamup 
Yeah, I think Linux engineers detest unused CPU cycles, so they put *very* compute intensive animated rendering sequences on the screensavers to keep the idle time down.
Yeah, I think Linux engineers detest unused CPU cycles, so they put *very* compute intensive animated rendering sequences on the screensavers to keep the idle time down.
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