Apple has unveiled a new Mac Pro line with up to 12 processing cores and up to 50% greater performance than the previous generation.
The desktop workstations feature new quad-core and 6-core Intel Xeon processors running at speeds up to 3.33GHz. These multi-core processors use a single die design so each core can share up to 12MB L3 cache to improve efficiency.
Apple has also integrated a memory controller to provide faster memory bandwidth and reduced memory latency; Turbo Boost technology to dynamically increase processor speeds up to 3.6GHz; and Hyper-Threading to create up to 24 virtual cores.
Graphics are powered by the ATI Radeon HD 5770 processor with 1GB of memory; the more powerful ATI Radeon HD 5870 is available as a custom-build option.
The Mac also has two Mini DisplayPorts and one dual-link DVI port. The additional Mini DisplayPort output allows customers to connect two LED Cinema Displays without an additional graphics card or adapter and the dual-link DVI port supports legacy DVI-based displays up to a resolution of 2560 x 1600 pixels.
For the first time, the Mac Pro supports SSD drives — as many as four 512GB SSDs in fact — thought the default installation is a 1TB Serial ATA 3Gb/s hard drive running at 7200 rpm.
“The new Mac Pro is the most powerful and configurable Mac we’ve ever made,” said Philip Schiller, Apple’s senior vice president of Worldwide Product Marketing. “With up to 12 cores, the new Mac Pro outperforms our previous top-of-the-line system by up to 50%, and with over a billion possible configurations, our customers can create exactly the system they want.”
There are two basic models to work from, available from August as follows:
Quad-core Mac Pro, with a suggested retail price of £1,999 (incl. VAT; £1,701.28 excl VAT):
- one 2.8 GHz Quad-Core Intel Xeon W3530 processor with 8MB of fully-shared L3 cache;
- 3GB of 1066 MHz DDR3 ECC SDRAM memory, expandable up to 16GB;
- ATI Radeon HD 5770 with 1GB of GDDR5 memory;
- two Mini DisplayPorts and one DVI (dual-link) port (adapters sold separately);
- 1TB Serial ATA 3Gb/s hard drive running at 7200 rpm;
- 18x SuperDrive® with double-layer support (DVD±R DL/DVD±RW/CD-RW);
- four PCI Express 2.0 slots;
Eight-core Mac Pro, with a suggested retail price of £2,799 (incl. VAT; £2,382.13 excl. VAT):
- two 2.4 GHz Quad-Core Intel Xeon E5620 processors with 12MB of fully-shared L3 cache per processor;
- 6GB of 1066 MHz DDR3 ECC SDRAM memory, expandable up to 32GB;
- ATI Radeon HD 5770 with 1GB of GDDR5 memory;
- two Mini DisplayPorts and one DVI (dual-link) port (adapters sold separately);
- 1TB Serial ATA 3Gb/s hard drive running at 7200 rpm;
- 18x SuperDrive with double-layer support (DVD±R DL/DVD±RW/CD-RW);
- four PCI Express 2.0 slots;
Both models have five USB 2.0 ports and four FireWire 800 ports, AirPort Extreme 802.11n, Bluetooth 2.1+EDR and an Apple Keyboard with numerical keypad and Magic Mouse.
Configure-to-order options include:
- one 3.2 GHz Quad-Core Intel Xeon W3565 processor for the quad-core Mac Pro;
- one 3.33 GHz 6-core Intel Xeon W3680 processor for the quad-core Mac Pro;
- two 2.66 GHz 6-core Intel Xeon X5650 processors (12-cores) for the 8-core Mac Pro;
- two 2.93 GHz 6-core Intel Xeon X5670 processors (12-cores) for the 8-core Mac Pro;
- two ATI Radeon HD 5770 cards with 1GB of GDDR5 memory;
- one ATI Radeon HD 5870 card with 1GB of GDDR5 memory;
- up to 16GB of DDR3 ECC SDRAM memory for the quad-core Mac Pro;
- up to 32GB of DDR3 ECC SDRAM memory for the 8-core Mac Pro;
- up to four 512GB solid state drives (SSD); or
- up to four 1TB or 2TB Serial ATA hard drives running at 7200 rpm;
- Mac Pro RAID card;
- dual-channel or quad-channel 4Gb Fibre Channel card;
- up to two 18x SuperDrives with double-layer support.
