# 28 Core Mac Pro



## José Herring (Oct 17, 2019)

So, I'm looking at the New Mac Pro. Curious that the more cores that are added the more the clock speed decreases. 

My question, since plugins still run on a single core per instance is it better to go with the lower core higher clock speed or the more core lower clock speed or somewhere in the middle?

Here's my thinking. Doing some quick math. 

Let's say that you have a synth plugin like Lush 101 that's power hungry. It will spike a single core at 2.5 faster than one at 3.5ghz. On the other hand, say that you have a lot of plugins that are not that power hungry. Programs like Cubase still use one core per plugin or one core per instrument track but each new plugin that's added or each new instrument track gets it's own core. On an 8 core machine it will start to stack up plugins on a single core once you go past 8 instrument tracks or 8 plugs. If you have 28 cores though you'd have to use 28 plugins or 28 instrument tracks before it started to stack up another plugin on a single core. 

Do you think the compromise is to get a 16 core machine? It still has an impressive speed and still has enough cores. 

The 28 core beast scares me a little because the clock speed is so low and I have some VI's that would eat that up in a heart beat spiking the core.

I've left out that you can get a beast of a PC running at 4.0+ with 16-28 multiple cores because I don't want to turn this into a Mac Vs. PC. 

I've got PC's I'm interested now in getting a Mac.


----------



## DAW PLUS (Oct 18, 2019)

If you want low latency and intend to use some heavier plugins/instruments - I think almost all of us here fall into that category - you will need higher clock speed and then as much cores as you can afford. Unless your projects are moderate of size.
How it works:
-you have a single track with a heavy synth and/or heavy insert(s). They are all processed on one core of the CPU.
-if their total load is more than what the single CPU core can handle within one buffer of the interface, you will get a spike, a dropout. Either be easier with the plugs you use or get higher core speed.
-if you do not get a spike, add tracks. At some point you have 2 or 3 tracks being processed on a single core. This may at some point cause a dropout because of the same situation. All pretty logical.
-now, add groups/buses and/or send effects/auxes. They run in parallel and may be processed on their own core. However, these have to wait until ALL tracks are finished processing, and then STILL have to be processed within the same CoreAudio/ASIO buffer. If the CPU core is not fast enough, the buffer is not processed in time and pops/crackles occur.
-Then, master effects come into play, usually multi oversampling non linear EQs, a bus comp and some swiss knife multiband processor. This also needs to be crammed into that same buffer, after all tracks, sends, auxes, buses and groups have been processed. 

So, to get back to your question: you will want the fastest cores you can get, but you have to consider the size of your projects. Is there a base load when loading VEP? How many tracks are processed at the same time in the voice intensive scenes? How heavy are your plugins? This all comes into play when deciding on a CPU and basically this is the biggest challenge of my occupation, as there is no hard ruling for this, rather an estimation.
Usually something in the middle is the best solution, eg in our current lineup which goes from 6 to 18 cores, the 10 core seems the best choice for most users.


----------



## vrocko (Nov 12, 2019)

Looks like December for the new Mac Pro. 








Apple's Revamped Mac Pro to Launch in December


Apple's new high-end modular Mac Pro is set to be released in December, according to a new report from Bloomberg. The launch timing of the Mac...




www.macrumors.com


----------



## charlieclouser (Nov 13, 2019)

It kind of looks like the 16-core will be the sweet spot in terms of balancing a decently high clock speed with a good number of cores (and cost) on the new Mac Pro. As much as I love the idea of 56 threads, I definitely wish that on my 12-core cylinder the clock speed was higher than 2.7. I can easily max out Logic's "last core" with big Kontakt+plugin chains, but I just upgraded to Mojave and Logic 10.4.7 and things seem to be... different. Like it's not always maxing out the last core and leaving the rest at 5% as it used to on Yosemite and 10.2.4. It's not fully balanced, but something is different.

And of course if you host your heavy-load stuff in VEPro, even on the same machine, the whole situation changes for the better in a big way, but I haven't done that enough to be an authority on it.

I have noticed at some other guys studios that use high-clock-speed i7 machines like Mac Mini or iMacs that Logic's last core is under way less stress - but the total core count on those is typically not huge. But I'll be looking forward to whoever benchmarks the new Mac Pro against Mac Mini and iMacs.


----------

