Mac Pro vs Macbook Pro

[Daniel_rookie]

...btw: it's recommended to switch off all power saving features for best performance, meaning when i do music stuff i even force the computer to use the dedicated graphic card only (as recommended by native instruments)...

How is it possible to use just the dedicated graphic only? Can't find any setting....

[fishmonkey]

...btw: it's recommended to switch off all power saving features for best performance, meaning when i do music stuff i even force the computer to use the dedicated graphic card only (as recommended by native instruments)...

How is it possible to use just the dedicated graphic only? Can't find any setting....

it depends on your Mac and version of OS X. first have a look in the Energy Saver preference pane in the System Preferences — you may find an option for "Automatic graphics switching" at the top.

if you have an older MBP and don't see this option, you may be able to use gfxcard status:

https://gfx.io/

note that on MBPs with dual graphics, the dedicated GPU is always used when an external display is connected.

[Machinesworking]

the terminology is a bit confused in some of this thread. a "CPU" is a single discrete physical processor chip. most CPU chips also have multiple physical cores inside them. to confuse things further, most CPU cores also have multiple virtual cores (what Intel calls Hyperthreading).

as far as Macs go, only Mac Pros have ever had multiple CPUs. all iMacs and MacBooks have had single CPU chips, and all current models have multiple cores.

the new 15" MBPs have a single CPU chip with 6 cores, each with 2 virtual cores...

Yeah Guilty. Core is completely interchangeable between actual and virtual core which is lame for sure it makes trying to explain it difficult. Mostly what I was trying to say is the more cores the better for track count, but not necessarily for processor heavy plug ins. With heavy lifting plug ins higher CPU speed is better.

Like Artcutech mentions the new machine he bought doesn't score as well against the one he returned on single core tests, so for mastering type tasks for instance (loading heavy plug ins on a single track), it won't do as well.

[mikb]

…most CPU chips also have multiple physical cores inside them. to confuse things further, most CPU cores also have multiple virtual cores (what Intel calls Hyperthreading).…
the new 15" MBPs have a single CPU chip with 6 cores, each with 2 virtual cores...

Yeah Guilty. Core is completely interchangeable between actual and virtual core

These are not at all interchangeable. You need a real core to execute anything. Basically virtual cores only makes it ultrafast to switch in another thread creating the appearance of more threads being executed in the same time (which is an illusion). While this involves some memory registers and certainly is faster than not having hyper-threading, cores are cores and virtual cores are not.

It's pretty pointless to count virtual cores and renders comparisons difficult. Almost all multicore CPUs utilise hyper-threading in some form, so that you have the virtual cores can be assumed. Maybe not always but often enough virtual core count is unnecessary.

So counting physical cores and noting presence of hyper-threading and other performance enhancing functions is probably a more useful approach if we're going to be able to compare in a meaningful way. I'm open to suggestions though. I'm certainly no hardware expert. Just trying to be an informed prosumer.