Apple Mac Pro (Early 2008) vs Apple Mac Pro (Late 2013)

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Mac Pro (Early 2008) compared with Mac Pro (Late 2013)

	AppleMac Pro (Early 2008)	AppleMac Pro (Late 2013)
Overview
Released
Released	January 2008	December 2013
Performance
Processor
Processor	Intel Xeon E5462, 2 × Intel Xeon E5462, 2 × Intel Xeon E5472 or 2 × Intel Xeon X5482	Intel Xeon E5-1620 v2, Intel Xeon E5-1650 v2, Intel Xeon E5-1680 v2 or Intel Xeon E5-2697 v2
CPU cores
CPU cores	4 or 8	4, 6, 8 or 12
CPU threads
CPU threads	–	8, 12, 16 or 24
Graphics
Graphics	ATI Radeon HD 2600 XT, NVIDIA GeForce 8800 GT or NVIDIA Quadro FX 5600	Dual AMD FirePro D300 (2 GB GDDR5 each), Dual AMD FirePro D500 (3 GB GDDR5 each) or Dual AMD FirePro D700 (6 GB GDDR5 each)
Memory
Memory	2 GB, 4 GB, 8 GB, 16 GB or 32 GB	12 GB, 16 GB, 32 GB or 64 GB (better)
Storage
Storage	300 GB to 1 TB	256 GB to 1 TB (better)
CPU
CPU	One 2.8 GHz quad-core Xeon or two 2.8, 3.0 or 3.2 GHz quad-core Xeons; four or eight total cores. Each processor has 12 MB L2 cache (6 MB shared by each pair of cores), SSE4 and 1600 MHz independent frontside bus. EveryMac identifies E5462, E5472 and X5482 respectively.	3.7 GHz quad-core, 3.5 GHz six-core, 3.0 GHz eight-core or 2.7 GHz twelve-core Intel Xeon E5. Exact identities are E5-1620 v2, E5-1650 v2, E5-1680 v2 and E5-2697 v2, cross-checked against Geekbench device records and Ars hardware testing; Intel specifications supply thread counts and maximum Turbo frequencies.
GPU
GPU	Radeon HD 2600 XT has 256 MB GDDR3, GeForce 8800 GT has 512 MB GDDR3 and Quadro FX 5600 has 1.5 GB GDDR3; each has two dual-link DVI ports. Quadro adds stereo 3D. Maker also confirms two, three or four Radeon HD 2600 XT cards; no unconfirmed mixed-card configurations expanded.	Dual AMD FirePro D300 with 2 GB GDDR5 per GPU, D500 with 3 GB per GPU, or D700 with 6 GB per GPU. Memory is specified separately for each GPU, rather than pooled. All graphics options are available by upgrading the original quad-core base configuration.
Memory type
Memory type	800 MHz DDR2 ECC fully buffered DIMMs; eight slots on two removable risers, up to 32 GB; factory options 2, 4, 8, 16 or 32 GB	Four user-accessible slots for 1866 MHz DDR3 ECC memory; 12 GB (three 4 GB modules), 16 GB (four 4 GB), 32 GB (four 8 GB) or 64 GB (four 16 GB)
Storage type
Storage type	Four independent SATA 3 Gb/s bays and up to 4 TB. Primary SATA drive options 320/500/750 GB or 1 TB at 7200 rpm; 300 GB 15,000 rpm SAS requires optional Mac Pro RAID Card. Configurations show one primary drive; additional independent drives, RAID arrangements and one or two 16x double-layer SuperDrives are separate options.	PCIe-based SSD; 256 GB, 512 GB or 1 TB. No internal hard-drive bays or optical drive.
Expansion slots
Expansion slots	Four full-length PCI Express slots including two PCI Express 2.0 x16 slots (one double-wide) and two x4 slots; mechanical support for x16 cards, 300 W combined maximum. PCI/PCI-X incompatible.	No internal PCIe card slots; peripherals and compatible external expansion chassis connect through Thunderbolt
Display
Screen
Screen	None built in	None built in
Connections
Ports
Ports	5 × USB-A, 2 × Ethernet, headphone jack	4 × USB-A, 6 × Thunderbolt 2, 2 × Ethernet, HDMI, headphone jack
Ethernet
Ethernet	1 Gb/s	1 Gb/s
External displays
External displays	Up to 8 (better)	Up to 6
Wi-Fi
Wi-Fi	Optional 802.11n	802.11ac
Bluetooth
Bluetooth	2.0 + EDR	4.0
Front ports
Front ports	Two USB 2.0, FireWire 400, FireWire 800 and headphone output	–
Back ports
Back ports	Three USB 2.0, FireWire 400, FireWire 800, two Gigabit Ethernet, optical TOSLINK input/output and analogue line input/output. DVI outputs depend on graphics configuration; included keyboard ports excluded from chassis count.	Four USB 3 USB-A ports, six Thunderbolt 2 ports, two Gigabit Ethernet ports, HDMI 1.4 Ultra HD, 3.5 mm headphone jack with headset support, and a separate combined optical digital audio output/analogue line-out minijack. Thunderbolt ports are divided across three controllers, as explained in Macworld and Ars reviews.
External displays
External displays	Up to eight 30-inch displays requires four Radeon HD 2600 XT cards. Digital resolutions up to 2560 × 1600, analogue up to 2048 × 1536 using included DVI-to-VGA adapter.	Apple's current support specifications allow six Thunderbolt displays or three dual-cable 5K displays. The launch announcement specified support for three 4K displays; the later 5K statement should not be read as launch-day capability.
Speakers
Speakers	Front-panel speaker	Built-in speaker; HDMI supports multichannel audio output
Keyboard and mouse
Keyboard and mouse	Apple Keyboard and Mighty Mouse; display sold separately	Keyboard, mouse and display sold separately
Design and power
Type
Type	Tower	Compact
Weight
Weight	–	5 kg
Width × depth × height
Width × depth × height	206 × 475 × 511 mm	167 × 167 × 251 mm
Operating system
Operating system	macOS	macOS
Size and weight detail
Size and weight detail	Standard-configuration weight 19.2 kg; actual weight varies by configuration and manufacturing process, so shared scalar weight omitted	Cylindrical enclosure; 251 mm high and 167 mm in diameter, with 5 kg weight from Apple's Japanese specification sheet. Weight varies by configuration and manufacturing process.
Power supply
Power supply	100–120 V or 200–240 V AC, 50–60 Hz single phase; maximum 12 A in low-voltage range or 6 A in high-voltage range	100–240 V AC, 50–60 Hz, single phase; maximum continuous power 450 W
Noise
Noise	–	Apple's overview reports 12 dBA operator-position sound pressure at idle, while the acoustic table reports 14 dB at idle and 14.5 dB during wireless web. These are conflicting maker statements; no single noise value is selected.
Materials
Materials	–	Highly recyclable enclosure; BFR-free and PVC-free, with regional exceptions for the power lead
In the box
In the box	Mac Pro, keyboard and mouse, DVI-to-VGA adapter, USB keyboard extension cable, install/restore DVDs and documentation; Mac OS X Leopard and iLife '08	Mac Pro and power lead. Launched with OS X Mavericks; the current support page describes the later macOS Mojave release. Original standard configurations were quad-core with 12 GB memory and D300 graphics, and six-core with 16 GB and D500. The current support sheet also lists an eight-core standard configuration with 16 GB and D700. Configurations below include independent processor, memory, graphics and storage upgrades of the original quad-core base, so 12 GB or D300 with a higher-core processor represents a customised base model.