| Moderated by: chrisbet, | Page: 1 2 3 4   |
|
|||||||
| Upgrading My 'New' Mac - Page 1 | |
| New to me anyway... | Rate Topic |
| Author | Post |
|---|
| Posted: Tue May 10th, 2016 16:42 |
|
1st Post |
Robert
|
I'm finding the D300s and D3 images a bit heavier work for the computer than the D200 output was. My Mac mini works well enough once the images have loaded but they are slow to load, especially in Library mode in Lightroom. That's where I first noticed it with the 600 odd D3 exposures I took at Donington Motor Racing Circuit. Going through them quickly to sort the wheat from the chaff was a slow process, I reckon each image took over three seconds to load to the screen and come up to full resolution/sharpness. That adds up and is very frustrating. So, I bit the bullet and browsed eBay for something to speed things up. Eventually I came across a 2009 four core, Mac Pro 4.1 with a pretty basic spec. In theory it's actually slower than my Mac mini but in reality it's much faster. The Mac mini has 2.5" 5400rpm drives which are pretty slow. OK I could upgrade to an SSD but getting the drives out is not easy and the possibility of damaging the internals of the computer is ever present. On the other hand the Mac Pro has 4 slide out sleds for full size drives plus two other locations where an SSD or two could lurk in the redundant optical drive bay. I have upgraded the stock video card to an NVIDIA GeForce GTX 285 1Gb card. I have upped the RAM to 32Gb (4x8Gb), although I may drop that to 24Gb (3x8Gb) It seems the RAM works more efficiently with three slots not four. Time will tell. The final master stroke will be upgrading the processor to a six core. I have been told it's a doddle, well I wouldn't call it a doddle but it's doable even by an old codger such as myself. Part of the process is to update the firmware to the Mac Pro 5.1 spec, which I have now done. I am not going 'the whole hog' but just taking it to a point where it should be comparable with equivalent current six core Mac Pro 6.1's or at least not too far behind, at a tiny fraction of the cost. The huge benefit of the aluminium 4.1/5.1 Mac Pro towers is their massive storage capacity and ready supply of cheap upgrade parts. I realise this isn't much interest to many people but hopefully for the odd one who is interested it may be a valuable resource and open up powerful computing for people on a tight budget. I will follow with some screen shots and a detailed explanation of how I updated the firmware, which up to now was the toughest part of the project.
____________________ Robert. |
||||||||
|
| |||||||||
| Posted: Wed May 11th, 2016 03:05 |
|
2nd Post |
Robert
|
The firmware update is the crucial part of the upgrade from Power Mac 4.1 to 5.1. It enables the computer to work with a six core processor. It also enables the full speed of DDR3 1333Mhz RAM with some CPU's. Otherwise the RAM runs at standard 1066Mhz. I have read reports that with Dual Processor Mac Pro's the RAM only goes to 1333Mhz if the processor is X5680 or better. Not sure yet if that applies to Single Processor Mac Pros too. I will report the outcome and update this entry once I have installed the X5675 CPU. This is a list of Intel Processors which will fit the Mac Pro 4.1/5.1 X5650 2.66Ghz X5660 2.80Ghz X5670 2.93Ghz X5675 3.06Ghz X5680 3.33Ghz X5690 3.46Ghz W3680 3.33Ghz W3690 3.46Ghz My Mac Pro has a Single Processor, things are a bit more complicated for Dual Processor versions. It's easy to change from single to dual, or vice-versa by replacing the processor tray. I don't feel the need to go to that extent, I am only using it to process still images and the occasional time-lapse video. I am fitting the six core X5675 3.06Ghz CPU, a compromise between cost and performance. The prices rise pretty quickly for the X5680 and above and I'm not sure that processor speed is the main ingredient for powerful computing, I think the extra two cores and the fact that they are divisible by three makes a big difference to processing output. I am convinced that is why the six and twelve core CPU's perform better pro-rata than the four and eight Core equivalent. To install the 5.1 firmware an utility installer is needed. It can be downloaded by clicking the link below: http://forum.netkas.org/index.php?action=dlattach;topic=852.0;attach=645 Alternatively it can be found in the first post of this thread. (Posted by the creator of the utility and should really be read and absorbed before embarking on this project): http://forum.netkas.org/index.php?PHPSESSID=vg5mha78fnft8fos0p5872jhshudn1ok&topic=852.0 You also need the Apple firmware update file which must be downloaded and unzipped from the Apple website here: https://support.apple.com/kb/DL1321?locale=en_US The install utility is intended to access the update itself, directly from the Apple site but Apple have changed the location of the file so the utility can no longer find it. The solution is to place Apple's firmware update file on the desktop and open it to reveal the package on the desktop. The utility will then see the file and install it. This firmware update is reversible using the utility, but only back to the original factory firmware. It's advisable to read up on this before actually flashing the ROM of your machine. One of the obstacles I encountered is Apples new System Integrity Protection (SIP) which was introduced in El Capitan. It prevents people (good or bad) messing with the inner workings of the system. This can be disabled temporally or permanently but I am not comfortable using Terminal, especially messing with the SIP so I took the simpler route and loaded Mavericks (OS 10.9). With Mavericks the firmware update worked exactly as expected. All the user instructions are with the software, it's a pretty simple process. These are the screenshots of the before and after flashing the new 5.1 firmware update. There is a small performance improvement just with this. My machine was actually made in the second week of June 2010, so it must be one of the last 4.1's made. 
____________________ Robert. |
||||||||
|
| |||||||||
| Posted: Wed May 11th, 2016 03:24 |
|
3rd Post |
jk
|
Well done Robert. I wish I was in the UK so I could do some of these updates a bit more easily. Getting all the bits and waiting for them to arrive in the past has been very off-putting. Looks like you have a 10% increase in processing power but the biggest win is on the disk I/O on the MacPro. A SSD in a MacPro really speed up the boot process.
____________________ Still learning after all these years! https://nikondslr.uk/gallery_view.php?user=2&folderid=none |
||||||||
|
| |||||||||
| Posted: Wed May 11th, 2016 04:25 |
|
4th Post |
Robert
|
Thanks JK, I am enjoying the adventure. I fitted a Crucial MX250 SSD in the optical drive bay on day one! The optical drive bay SATA is on a different, separate bus from the other four drive bays so it may be more efficient in there. I had intended fusing it with a WD 1Tb Black drive but having given it some thought I decided against it. By storing my images on a WD Black drive, I get them on the screen pretty well instantly. I decided the added complexity of a fusion drive was't warranted to solve a problem I don't have. As for boot times, the SSD boots my Mac Pro in about 20 seconds, booting from the Seagate 2Tb drive which was installed at purchase was just over 1 minute. Boot times aren't much of an issue for me, unless for maintenance or installing OS updates I tend not to shut my computers down for weeks on end. The real benefit from an SSD is when launching and using software, Lightroom takes about a minute to launch on my Mac mini, where with the Mac Pro and SSD it's under 20 seconds, also moving between modules of Lightroom or Photoshop is pretty well instant whereas on a normal HD there is a noticeable lag. I haven't tried the Nik filters yet, that WILL be interesting because I was suffering artefacts on some images at the edges which became very pixelated and blocky, could only be fixed by cropping. I put it down to the integrated GPU of the Mac mini, which is another reason for this adventure.
____________________ Robert. |
||||||||
|
| |||||||||
| Posted: Wed May 11th, 2016 04:35 |
|
5th Post |
Robert
|
One other point which I have picked up on... Adobe Lightroom has a setting to enable GPU acceleration. The Graphics card I fitted, an nVidia GTX285 1Gb, doesn't have the required spec to achieve that, which sent me into a slight panic. I calmed down when I learnt that Lightroom only accesses the GPU acceleration in the Develop module, which would not have helped me get the images to screen any quicker in the Library module. So the graphics acceleration remains inaccessible but I am no longer concerned about that.
____________________ Robert. |
||||||||
|
| |||||||||
| Posted: Wed May 11th, 2016 12:07 |
|
6th Post |
jk
|
Call me a Luddite but I think OpenGL and Video GPU value is hugely overplayed unless you are playing games!
____________________ Still learning after all these years! https://nikondslr.uk/gallery_view.php?user=2&folderid=none |
||||||||
|
| |||||||||
| Posted: Wed May 11th, 2016 12:18 |
|
7th Post |
Eric
|
When I read the title, I thought you had bought a new raincoat, Robert.
____________________ Eric |
||||||||
|
| |||||||||
| Posted: Wed May 11th, 2016 13:56 |
|
8th Post |
Robert
|
Eric wrote:When I read the title, I thought you had bought a new raincoat, Robert. You are awful Eric!
____________________ Robert. |
||||||||
|
| |||||||||
| Posted: Wed May 11th, 2016 14:01 |
|
9th Post |
Robert
|
jk wrote:Call me a Luddite but I think OpenGL and Video GPU value is hugely overplayed unless you are playing games! You are a Luddite. But I agree with you. I guess that makes me a Luddite too... I don't do games. (Don't tell anybody but I did once play Mac Sokoban)
____________________ Robert. |
||||||||
|
| |||||||||
| Posted: Thu May 12th, 2016 14:05 |
|
10th Post |
Robert
|
I have edited the title of this topic to better reflect the content and avoid enticing people who may have been expecting something about raincoats!!! Today I had a message to say my CPU has arrived at Argos, ready for collection. I now have some heatsink cleaner and a syringe of silver heat sink paste ready to install the six core CPU. I will take a few photographs of the installation process. I have found my torque screwdriver which I bought about 20 years ago but have never used! It ranges up to 12Lbs Inch, I think I need 4 Lbs Inch for the heat sink clamping screws. That's something I need to check. There are 4 hex cap screws which need a 3mm key, so I expect they will be 4mm ISO thread. About 12 turns of the screws from start to tight.
____________________ Robert. |
||||||||
|
| |||||||||
| This is topic ID = 1313 Current time is 07:24 | Page: 1 2 3 4 | |
| Nikon DSLR Forums > Computer Hardware for Digital Photography. Computers, OS, Scanners, etc. > Hardware for Image Processing > Upgrading My 'New' Mac | Top | |
Users viewing this topic |
||
Current theme is Modern editor
| A small amount of member data is captured and held in an attempt to reduce spammers and to manage users. This site also uses cookies to ensure ease of use. In order to comply with new DPR regulations you are required to agree/disagree with this process. If you do not agree then please email the Admins using info@nikondslr.uk Thank you. |
Hosted by Octarine Services
UltraBB 1.173 Copyright © 2008-2025 Data 1 Systems
Page processed in 0.0627 seconds (66% database + 34% PHP). 83 queries executed.
UltraBB 1.173 Copyright © 2008-2025 Data 1 Systems
Page processed in 0.0627 seconds (66% database + 34% PHP). 83 queries executed.