Every year that I see the performance numbers on Mac Pro systems, I wonder why their disk subsystems are so slow compared to iMacs? Looking at these new 2009 performance numbers from Macworld, I'm again amazed that an iMac is faster working on a Zip archive than a Mac Pro is.
Intuitively, I think, okay, the Mac Pro has a lot more space to work with, so I assume they can have more room for disks, with everything needed to make their hard drives faster. They also have a RAID controller, which the authors mention is easier to install, so I assume they configure these disks for striping (or maybe mirroring and striping).
Looking at the technical specs now ... the latest iMac has a "7200-rpm Serial ATA hard drive", and the Mac Pro has the same thing, but anywhere from 16MB to 32MB cache, with an "optional Mac Pro RAID Card with 512MB cache". Wow.
How are these disks slower than iMacs? Are the tests flawed?
Macworld slams the Mac Pro Eight-Core/2.26GHz model
One more thing I just noticed on that Macworld link ... I just read this statement under the "cons" list for the Mac Pro Eight-Core/2.26GHz model:
"Most routine apps perform better with fewer, faster processors."
Wow, that sounds like they're saying "For most applications you'd be wasting your money buying this system."
books by alvin
 |
 |
 |
 |