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Quad Core vs. 8/12 Core Advice for AE CS5
Not sure if this is the perfect forum for this, so sorry in advance if not!
I’m looking to buy a new Mac Pro and was wondering what the most affordable option was for getting a system that was “good enough” for an affordable price and not necessarily a render god, etc. I’m perfectly fine rendering over night, but what I really do need is something that can handle CS5 without too much frustration on my end.
Is the Quad Core Mac Pro good enough for these requirements, or would you suggest the $1k jump up to the 8 Core?
Thanks so much,
Evan -
5 Replies
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More processors are good only if you can fork out the cash for enough RAM to actually be able to use them in AE. So, multiply the number of processors by at least 2 and add 2 GB of RAM more at the total and that will give you the amount of RAM you need and thus the cash you need to spend. That will make the decision easier I think.
Tudor “Ted” Jelescu
Senior VFX Artist -
Tudor is definitely right that you need to have enough RAM to feed the cores. I would multiply by 3GB, myself. I have 24GB in my quad-core computer—which with hyperthreading works as if it has 8 cores.
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Todd Kopriva, Adobe Systems Incorporated
Technical Support for professional video software
After Effects Help & Support
Premiere Pro Help & Support
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Thanks guys – just out of curiosity, around how much would a quad-core pro with 24 GB RAM cost?
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Depends on from whom you’re buying it or if you’re building it yourself.
– The Great Szalam
(The ‘Great’ stands for ‘Not So Great, in fact, Extremely Humble’)No trees were harmed in the creation of this message, but several thousand electrons were mildly inconvenienced.
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To give an idea of cost, I bought a refurbished Mac Pro 8 core machine in February (16 CPUs with multi-threading) which ran to about $3,500 if I recall correctly. I then bought 32GB RAM from a third party supplier for about $500. So about $4,000 all told. Not cheap, but if you’re using it to make a living it’s worth the investment, for sure.
It’s only work if you’d rather be doing something else…
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