[MaxPower2k3]

...or, at least, it tells people it is.

Downloaded Temperature Monitor and the CPU idles at about 37ºC. Under heavy load (encoding H.264 with Compressor) it peaked at about 54ºC. That seems extremely cool considering the close proximity of the cores to each other and the nigh-on silent cooling in the Mac Pro. Of course, the sensors could be inaccurate, but I was expecting it to be up in the 70s under heavy load.

Another interesting thing is that Compressor never maxes out the CPU. It sits at around 250% CPU usage and the processor remains 25-30% idle the whole time. Is that an unoptimized encoder or what? This is encoding DVCPROHD to H.264 (HD-DVD 60 minute preset). It's unbelievably fast as it is, but if it could eek out another 15-20% speed that'd be great. Don't want these four cores to go to waste!

[Shar]

I downloaded Istat pro and it says there are no temperature sensors for the cpu only for the harddrive and it was at about 37 or so. Do you have more than one reading showing?

[chefpastry]

My 3GHz Mac Pro seems to be around 100F to 104F all the time.

[Catfish_Man]

Originally Posted by MaxPower2k3

Another interesting thing is that Compressor never maxes out the CPU. It sits at around 250% CPU usage and the processor remains 25-30% idle the whole time. Is that an unoptimized encoder or what? This is encoding DVCPROHD to H.264 (HD-DVD 60 minute preset). It's unbelievably fast as it is, but if it could eek out another 15-20% speed that'd be great. Don't want these four cores to go to waste!

IO limited probably. I bet if you hooked it up to a RAID it'd use more CPU.

[imitchellg5]

It sounds cool to me, so I would assume it runs cool. It is wierd how cool it is, even compared to a single G5. It is like a G3 in temp.

[MaxPower2k3]

Originally Posted by Catfish_Man

IO limited probably. I bet if you hooked it up to a RAID it'd use more CPU.

I doubt it. One 60mbit DVCPROHD stream shouldn't make an internal SATA drive flinch. I can scrub through the footage at any speed and it never drops a frame. Plus, it's encoding at much less than real time, so the actual read speed from the drive is probably less than 10mbits. I'll play around with different encoders and sources and see if I can figure it out.

edit:
H.264 (10mbits) on one drive > H.264 (10 mbits) on another drive (both internal): 250% CPU
H.264 > DVCPROHD 1080i: 190% CPU
H.264 > DV NTSC: 230% CPU
DV > DV: 190% CPU

nothing will max out all four cores.

[- - e r i k - -]

Originally Posted by MaxPower2k3

I doubt it. One 60mbit DVCPROHD stream shouldn't make an internal SATA drive flinch. I can scrub through the footage at any speed and it never drops a frame. Plus, it's encoding at much less than real time, so the actual read speed from the drive is probably less than 10mbits. I'll play around with different encoders and sources and see if I can figure it out.

edit:
H.264 (10mbits) on one drive > H.264 (10 mbits) on another drive (both internal): 250% CPU
H.264 > DVCPROHD 1080i: 190% CPU
H.264 > DV NTSC: 230% CPU
DV > DV: 190% CPU

nothing will max out all four cores.

It's encoding much faster than realtime here. Sure nothing's wrong with your Mac Pro?

[Catfish_Man]

Originally Posted by MaxPower2k3

I doubt it. One 60mbit DVCPROHD stream shouldn't make an internal SATA drive flinch. I can scrub through the footage at any speed and it never drops a frame. Plus, it's encoding at much less than real time, so the actual read speed from the drive is probably less than 10mbits. I'll play around with different encoders and sources and see if I can figure it out.

edit:
H.264 (10mbits) on one drive > H.264 (10 mbits) on another drive (both internal): 250% CPU
H.264 > DVCPROHD 1080i: 190% CPU
H.264 > DV NTSC: 230% CPU
DV > DV: 190% CPU

nothing will max out all four cores.

Interesting. Dunno why that would be then.