Thread: Nehalem W5590 Octad upgrade project - one more deal available

Nano, you know I got pissed off by my MP1,1 being crippled by Apple's firmware. It is a bloody fast machine at 20.780 Cinebench 10. I was speculating on fixing the EFI issue and getting a rig that would definitely take me beyond 35.000 with decent SSD RAID0. Tutor had a very lucky hand with his rig there and it looked like a good thing to try when I came across those samples at at a nice looking price. I was thinking of selling my...

Quote: Originally Posted by gugucom I dunno but I also don't care at the moment. I'll get a very stiff drink and return that Nehalem Mac. I'll drink to that! If there's a computer part store near you (and not blocked by drunkards in lederhosen ) I'd go pickup a 1366 server board, 1 gig of ram and a PS if you don't have one. Build a test bed and fire those 5590's up one at a time. I sincerely hope that...

Quote: Originally Posted by gugucom I dunno but I also don't care at the moment. I'll get a very stiff drink and return that Nehalem Mac. I don't blame you. I'd also forgotten those are Engineering Sample parts. Sorry about that. I'm with frimple here, if you're willing to DIY. Or are you looking for a ready made system? Either way, 3rd party board makers do support the boards longer in terms of firmware.

Quote: Originally Posted by gugucom I may fit the W5590s once more and this time leave out the heat pads. They may be keeping the sensors from making contact in the connectors. Obviously with the lids on the heat sink is located 1,8 mm higher up and the contact overlap of the sensors in those connectors could be marginal. A far cry of a chance but worth trying. Be careful... I wouldn't hercules them down if I were you...

It is possible the W5590s require the motherboard firmware to be update to support it; At the time of the Mac Pro's release, the W5580s were an option, so their compatibility was built in. I think the only option you really have is to test the processors in another board since there isn't really another way to test them.

Quote: Originally Posted by gugucom Hyper threading is a product feature of the 55xx chip architecture. How can it be not applicable to the W5590. It would be absurd. I completely agree with you. This comes across as being their top of the line chip and so one would assume hyperthreading should be there. However I just received a response back from Intel from my inquiry to clarify hyperthreading support: Quote: Thank you for contacting Intel...

Quote: Originally Posted by gugucom W5580 runs 3,2 GHz. W5590 runs 3,33 GHz. Actually I don't know the exact turbo boost steps of each 55xx CPU but you could read that in Anand's write up. http://www.anandtech.com/mac/showdoc.aspx?i=3597&p=1 But I was talking about the W3580, which does run at 3.3Ghz and does have turbo... vs the W5590 which also runs at 3.33Ghz but does not have turbo.

ES CPUs often have undocumented Errata... I would stay away even at that price. There are plenty of threads about stability and ES CPUs on more tweaker-oriented sites such as XtremeSystems.org, etc. For an Overclocker's PC I wouldn't think twice but in a workstation stability is paramount. Just my 2 cents.

Quote: Originally Posted by novagamer ES CPUs often have undocumented Errata... I would stay away even at that price. There are plenty of threads about stability and ES CPUs on more tweaker-oriented sites such as XtremeSystems.org, etc. For an Overclocker's PC I wouldn't think twice but in a workstation stability is paramount. Just my 2 cents. I fully agree with this.

good luck! this sounds like a great project. id join you in it myself if i had the cash to burn right now + knowledge about replacing CPUs etc.