I want to thank you for the information contained in these 2 videos that helped me to ressuscitate my 1,1 Mac Pro tower after 4 and a half years of collecting dust, unusable on the floor. My MP didn't turn on and the diagnose LEDs showed CPU A and B failure. I concluded that it was the old thermal paste, and it really was, and following the step by step instructions you gave, I could change successfully the thermal paste and it's functioning again, greatly thanks to you. I am using mainly because of Windows 10 64-bit compatibility with this machine, so it's still useful, and I don't want to pay the greedy Apple for a new computer. So again, thanks!
Just wanted you to know I followed this 2 part video to a T back in March & never had a single issue. My Mac is still running great and now I can easily hold off until new Mac Pros come out next year. Thank you so, so much for these great, detailed videos. I am NOT the kind of guy who ever would have thought I could crack my machine open this way and pull off this kind of upgrade. Sure, I'd upgrade RAM or change out the Video Card, but never thought I'd be able to do a CPU swap. Thanks!.
Just upgraded my mac pro 1,1 with 2 4 core clovertowns (x5365 - SLAED). Bought them from ebay, VERY DUBIOUSLY! Followed your instructions, which were very informative and recommend to anyone; I'm an amateur fiddler, it worked first time! I started by upgrading the firmware to 2,1 then, installed the CPUs and ramped up the fan speed to 1200rpm. All the cores are cool at 22 degrees C., with the fan quietly purring away. Thanks midphase.
Another thing to add for others was the fan assembly was very tricky to remove. It was stuck quite tightly and I was afraid it would jump forward against the delicate wires in front. The secret is that there's a vertical slot at the back. That was preventing it from been removed. Once you maneuver the front part out like you show in your video a bit of force needs to be applied UPWARD AT THE BACK. In other wards don't pull forward. Than it came out fine. Thanks so much for your video. Top marks
Excellent work. You are a professional clean high class guru my friend. It was a pleasure to watch your "techy", professional detailed tutorial. That's my own style.
This is a totally outstanding pair of tutorials. THANK YOU SO MUCH. I completed this upgrade last night and photo editing of large RAW files is now massively quicker. I installed a pair of X5365 purchased from iTinStock in the UK, for £193 taken from a new server and which have a 12month guarantee. However, I think there is one 'error' in the tutorial. Having purchased a long T15 screwdriver especially for the task, which did work to remove the heatsink screws, I found that on reinstalling the heatsinks, the Torx driver slipped round in the heads of the screws. The screws on the 2007 MacPro, I have, are hexagonal and an 3mm allen key fits so much better. Torx was not actually required. For thermal paste I used Arctic MX-4 and the temperatures on the cores are currently around 36ºC. Opening 20 RAW files of 30Mb in one hit increases this on one core to around 45ºC. One point, before removing the original CPUs I collected the remaining dust ( having previously cleaned the machine thoroughly) around the edges of the CPU sockets with masking tape. In addition, I covered all the old thermal paste with masking tape cut to size, on top of the CPUs, to ensure none fell off into the sockets or onto the mother board. Totally recommend this upgrade......and thanks again for the tutorials.
hey man...thanks a lot..just finished updating my mac pro 1.1 using your tutorial videos...and it´s working better than ever...your info was crucial for my success....just great..once again thanks a lot.
Just upgraded the processors. The temperature is fine and the benchmark is practically identical to yours!! I did add more arctic silver than your video showed after checking out some other videos and forums. Some people were having kernel panics and heat problems and the problem seemed to lie with not applying enough arctic silver.
Hey, I just wanted to thank you for posting this video. I upgraded my 2.66 4 core Mac Pro to a 3 ghz 8 core Xeon. I followed your instructions to a "T" and had no issues what so ever. I'm running Lion with a ATI 5770 and its running GREAT! Now my computer is good for another few years. Thanks again!!
Thanks for these videos. I followed your suggestions and everything worked just fine. Yes, the plastic parts are a bit tricky and you need to be careful not drop any screws, otherwise NO PROBLEM It's now 2020, so 9 years later and my ancient Mac Pro 1.2 is running great! Also added some RAM just for fun! What's next? an SSD card perhaps? :-)
Yeah, some techs do that regularly tho - it's not uncommon. But on his last step of applying the line of paste he put WAY too much. About 4 or 5 times too much. :P He also placed his finger on it at one point. Another BIG no-no. The oil from your fingers causes problems. Latex gloves are recommended.
Amazing video, just followed the instructions and it worked great! Thanks a lot for taking the time to produce such a high quality tutorial that helped lots of people! *respect*
Machine is running great. Note that Mac Pro 1,1 refers to the model number and generation and not the firmware revision which is a different thing. I would think that you can install whatever latest Apple firmware is available for your Mac Pro and that it shouldn't affect things...but someone else feel free to chime in if you know otherwise.
Well I am hunting the rare and elusive CPU's now, but after watching this, I feel like I might as well go ahead and give it a shot. I really liked your attention to detail in prepping the heatsinks and cpu's no one else mentioned that. And showing the speed tests was also motivating. And if it turns into a 50 pound paperweight I got parts to sell ;O).. Thank you
Thank You - I will do the same, with my old machine, as soon I get two X5365 (they are on the way ;.) Your Video is very helpful - The 1.1 is a great machine but a bit hard to tune. I just upgraded my 2.nd Machine (2010 2,8 Q-Core to a 3,33 Hex-Core) Easy to do and runs great (Geekbench 64 - from 10700 to 16800) . So take care and stay tuned.
Hello. There are actually three types for the x5355: SLAEG, SLAC4, and SL9YM. The difference is in the stepping. All three will work just fine on your MP, even if mixed (example, one SLAEG and one SLAC4). I think the main difference is that SLAEG, compared to the other two, has a 50% less power consumption *while idle*. That could make for some serious power savings, but apart from that they all operate the same and will work with each other just fine.
Hello, I just performed this upgrade on my macpro 1,1 running mavericks 10.9.4. I followed the tutorial to a T and I've done other PC upgrades in the past. The only difference was I used just a dime sized amount of thermal paste on the CPUs instead of a line and the temps are fine. I have the same "processor unknown" thing so I'll likely do the hack to bump it up to Macpro 2,1. Thanks again great post!
hi there so i followed this video step by step and i think i have a small problem can some 1 tell me what it means if my mac can get past the apple logo a start up i thought it ay of been a graphics card problem but then i swapped over my old 1 but still the same
Thank you! I think as long as the socket is the LGA 771 type you should be ok (big emphasis on "should"). I realize that the slower CPU's are cheaper, but you really want to ask yourself if it's worth it. You don't want to put all that time and effort to change the CPU and then do it again in a few months when you realize that you really want that extra speed. My advice is to save up until you can afford the X5365's.
Thank you! I used SMC Fan Control, but actually I found my CPU temperatures pretty stable almost right away (I think thanks to preppying the heat sink surface with the thermal paste). One of the main things to keep in mind is that your CPU's will run hotter due to the doubling of the cores per chip. It's more important than ever to make sure that your computer is sitting in a well ventilated area and that the fans are not obstructed. Other than that...enjoy your new twice-as-fast computer!
I think one of the considerations to keep in mind is that if you do a lot of graphics work (particularly video and CGI stuff), and you want to avail yourself of the CUDA supported cards like the Nvidia Quadro, you'll need a newer Mac Pro than the 1,1 generation due to the PCI bus being too slow on the 1st gen Mac Pros. Of course if dropping $1200 on a graphics card isn't an issue, then I assume picking up a new Mac Pro is not a problem either.
Thanks for the great videos! Everything went very smoothly, including the firmware upgrade to 2,1. Did have to do a PRAM and SRC reset to get it to recognize the 8 cores, but other than that, all good. Oh, the Torx drive is T-20, not T-15 (at least on my 2006 Mac Pro) Thanks again!!
There are a number of available videos showing this upgrade but I found yours to be the most complete and also the best produced of all. Thanks so much. I have seen recommendations that the firmware be upgraded from 1.1 to 2.1. Do you have a link to where I might obtain that firmware upgrade?
My x5365's shipped because of you! I'm now convinced it's possible and I've purchased all the 'surgical tools' you recommended. I see you've said that the firmware upgrade is only for aesthetic purposes to show the names of the chips. Does that mean other than swapping the CPUs (correctly), that this is basically a bolt-on upgrade? No software maintenance? Didn't think the firmware needed an upgrade.
Hi have a mac pro 1.1 with the same stats in Hardware Overview as your in the part 1 of this video, but i have a processing speed of 3 GHz and I have 32 GB of memory. You never showed the Hardware Overview stats at the end of the part 2 video after you upgraded it. I was wondering if I bought all the things you used to upgrade your mac pro 1.1 and installed the same processors that you did will the speed on my computer double or will nothing change? I would send you a screenshot of my computers Hardware Overview stats, but the comments on youtube won't let me.
@midphase : there is a config file on the forums that you can download and unzip then install but........................ This will work with Snow Leopard, but for some reason it will not work while running Lion. just an FYI.
I picked them up on eBay...keep an eye out for X5365, ideally it's best if you can pick them up in pairs, but you might need to get one from one vendor and one from another. I paid $500 for the 2 CPU's but I see the prices fluctuate and they actually seem to go for a bit more right now. Try to stick to SLAED chips and not the SL4P type which I believe are an older configuration.
Nice tutorial! I'll be doing this upgrade soon! I have the same Mac Pro as you (1,1 quad 2.66). I'll be getting my 5345s in the mail soon! Have you used SMCFanControl? That's what I use to control the fans on a couple of my Macs. If your CPUs are getting hot, you can crank up the fans. Any tips for the upgrade that you didn't mention in the video? Anything you thought of afterwards? Thanks!
thanx a million i've have done exactly what u said & it works pecfectly MacPro 1.1 xeon x5365 x 2 radeon 6870 - Yosemite - GeekBench 11790 (was 6201) it's old news, but u rock !!
Hi Timothy the firmware is here - on the very first post but to see it, u have to be registered once u have the firmware, it s very easy u just have to click to "make believe" you have a 2.1 not satisfied ? just click the button "back to 1.1 " forum.netkas.org/index.php?PHPSESSID=aek7dk3vnbml274lvi3nb4i596cqrt7o&topic=1094.msg6585 to upgrade the cpu see the videos (1 & 2) make sure u have this Torkx screwdriver & a lot of patience if i did it u can do it
+Joseph Folk Thanks for that. I've heard that some sellers on ebay will accept your hard drive, install yosemite, then send it back. Would that also mod the boot files? Sorry, I've been a PC too long!
+Alan Guscott I never hear that before.But you could do it yourself but if you have no computer experience I suggest buying one.An like you said people said you could send them your HDD an they will send it back with correct boot files,I personally wouldn't trust that.Plus if you buy one you could copy it to another HDD an format that drive then you have an extra HDD you could use.
After you upgrade, check with an app like iStats to make sure you're cpu's are consuming around 20-25watts ea. If they show more like 40-50 watts, then most likely they've been mislabeled as SLAED. I think mine are mislabeled. Core are way too hot for idle
I believe that the standard 667MHz DDR2 ECC fully buffered DIMM should be fine after the processor upgrade. That's what I'm using. I suppose you could go with faster RAM but I don't think you'll see a whole lot of benefit.
+RealGuild Google TEMPERATURE MONITER. It's outdated but it still works. I'm running OS X YOSEMITE 10.10.5 on my 2006 Mac Pro 1.1. I upgraded the firmware, video card and the cpu's... Temperature Monitor works very well for me...
nice video im thinking of up graduing my mac pro 2006-2007 model im doing a course ar uni with 3 d softwear like autodesk 3ds ,max mud box i wanted to up grade my mac insread of byein g a pc what could you recomend i use to upgrade it to its fullest potenueal best wishes ken
Great Video ! Great Sound ! I would like to upgrade to mountain lion. I tried to download it to my mac pro but got a message that it can not. I have a 5 year old mac pro 2,1 with 2 Quad-Core Intel Xenon 3 Ghz processors, with 32 gig ram. Can I upgrade anything so I will be able to install mountain lion and basically get some more years out of this very great working machine ? I really appreciate if you could shine some light on this dilemma. Thank you !
Thanks for the great vid. I followed and mine seems to work great except when the processors max out I get a continuous and really annoying beep. Any help would be greatly appreciated.
So what speeds are you able to get with this upgrade since 2011? Can you run a geekbench to show what your machine can do currently? I'm looking to do this exact process and curious what scores your 1st gen dual process can crank out. Great video!!!
I am getting ready to buy some X5355 processors (cost is a factor) and since I have 4TB of disk space, and 16GB of RAM, it makes sense to spend $300 for a 4 core to 8 core up grade rather than spending a ton on a newer machine. I can get a 2008 Mac Pro for $1800, but my old machine is barely worth $1000.
Hello, I followed exactly the guidelines of the two mac pro 1.1 upgrade videos The two processors remain "unknown". I turn off the cpu and turn it on as instructed. It restarts, doesn't open the drives and restarts again without changes. Could help?
great walk thru! I picked up two of the X5365 for less than 500 each online. I followed both videos very closely, thank you for putting this up. I did want to ask if the system recognizes the chips as the model number on yours? My system (running leopard or snow leopard) when I goto the 'About This Mac' it shows the processor as '2 x 3 Ghz Unknown.' Is this the result of a bad install? or its just like that? or even worst, was I sold some bad chips?
Midphase, thank you for your contribution. Can you please tell me if upgrading my Mac Pro 1,1 to 8 cores (purchased summer of 2007; smc 1.7f10) will allow me to install 32 GB Ram? Right now I am maxed out at 16 GB Ram; and although I have a couple of 4GB sticks, my Mac will only read them as 2GBs. Thank you in advance for you answer. I noticed somewhere the the kernel has to be changed to 64 bit; is this true? But i understand it is also one great big hassle. c
Thanks for your video, it is really useful. I upgrade to X5365 did exactly the same as what u did on the video, it works really well and all cores data shows on temperature monitor. Everything seems working well except it shows" 2X3GHz unknown" instead of " 2X3GHz Intel Xeon 8cores. Is there any firmware we need to install after upgrading for mac1.1 to recognize the CPUs?? Please advise
Great Video! But you really don't have to spread the thermal paste on the heatsink because if you put like a line of thermal paste that is the size of a rice it will work just fine and you also don't have to spread it out because it does it by itself!
@SiliconSam428 Okay, so I lied. I found a pair of X5365 processor on ebay. So tomorrow sometime I'll be installing the new chips. Will let you know how it goes!
Hi Midphase, amazing videos on this, thank you. I am thinking about doing this and can see there is quite a price difference between the x5355s and the x5565s.. Because of this I'm thinking of getting the x5355s, but they seem to come in a few different configurations. I haven't seen ant x5355s that are called 'SLAED', instead all I can find is x5355 'SLAC4' and 'SLAEG'. Are these ok to use? and should it be possible to find an x5355 SLAED? Thanks again!
hey mid phase great vid's but i have a question im running the dual core 5150's with stock everything , will i need to upgrade the fan? and mainly what cpu's do you think i should go with? Im in music production and 4 cpu is not cutting it. Thank you so much
@kod3ZeroZeroZero Yes! you're right, I installed win64 with no problems and it recognized the chips. I appreciate the help with "About this Mac" I found the thread and made my own customization to it. :) Again great tutorial and many thanks!
Many thanks a really good tutorial, I am keen to upgrade my 1,1 now. There seems to be a few places selling refurbished CPU's. Have you any suggestions on where best to find a couple of X5365? Some people advertise a matched pair ... is there even such a thing?
Sounds like you might be overheating the cores. I would advise that you get Temperature Monitor and check to see what's going on. If the cores are overheating you will need to either better ventilate the Mac Pro, or possibly reapply the thermal paste. A few people are reporting issues that I think are related to temperature. The fact that it's the middle of Summer doesn't help!
Hello! Why is it a ’’house’’ over the GPU in Mac Pro? Is it for cooling? Is this an old solution? Now there are no more computers like old Mac Pro, so the new one, the black cylinder, must have quite a different GPU from this?
helo i just wondering since i am new in mac and just bought used mac first generation 1.1 with xeon 2ghz late 2006.i have seen some forum and i saw that the first gen cant't boot to 64bit.so any ideas to get 64bit to work in my unsupported 64bit mac?
I tried to removed the heat sinks off the CPU's and no ways . . . they are fused solid. Had to abort it or bend the heat sinks. Any advice on this please !
***** I did update to 2.1 before I actually installed the processors. I did that in hopes to install Mavericks, which I had no luck with. It is working extremely well, not a problem anywhere, and the exporting of FCP X is at least 2X as fast.
what about a video card ??? whats a good video card to run a 30" cinamac monitor the original one that came with my original 2006 1,1, seems to lag a lot with youtube videos.. also , i noticed this video is a few years old, is there new chips or any new updates ??? thanks
hello, are you sure that the motherboard is enough powerful to make a change for the whole computer. I heard about north bridge south bridge etc.... and i heard many time that you can upgrade cpu, ram or Vram, but it wont change because of the strugle of the motherboard.
Thanks for your good tutorial. I followed step by step. Unforunately my mac 1,2 won"t chime, boot and just shows a black screen. Tried to reset the PRam with the keyboard and ny keeping the power button pressed. I only hear the fan blowinf like a turbine. I"d appreciate your Or anyones advice.
Hi Jake O'Bryen, I found the reason why it didn"t start. I bought a second pair of CPUs and they worked right away. Something must have been wrong with the first ones. Thanks for your humorous approach.
Thank you for supporting
I want to thank you for the information contained in these 2 videos that helped me to ressuscitate my 1,1 Mac Pro tower after 4 and a half years of collecting dust, unusable on the floor. My MP didn't turn on and the diagnose LEDs showed CPU A and B failure. I concluded that it was the old thermal paste, and it really was, and following the step by step instructions you gave, I could change successfully the thermal paste and it's functioning again, greatly thanks to you. I am using mainly because of Windows 10 64-bit compatibility with this machine, so it's still useful, and I don't want to pay the greedy Apple for a new computer. So again, thanks!
Just wanted you to know I followed this 2 part video to a T back in March & never had a single issue. My Mac is still running great and now I can easily hold off until new Mac Pros come out next year. Thank you so, so much for these great, detailed videos. I am NOT the kind of guy who ever would have thought I could crack my machine open this way and pull off this kind of upgrade. Sure, I'd upgrade RAM or change out the Video Card, but never thought I'd be able to do a CPU swap. Thanks!.
Just upgraded my mac pro 1,1 with 2 4 core clovertowns (x5365 - SLAED). Bought them from ebay, VERY DUBIOUSLY! Followed your instructions, which were very informative and recommend to anyone; I'm an amateur fiddler, it worked first time! I started by upgrading the firmware to 2,1 then, installed the CPUs and ramped up the fan speed to 1200rpm. All the cores are cool at 22 degrees C., with the fan quietly purring away. Thanks midphase.
Another thing to add for others was the fan assembly was very tricky to remove. It was stuck quite tightly and I was afraid it would jump forward against the delicate wires in front. The secret is that there's a vertical slot at the back. That was preventing it from been removed. Once you maneuver the front part out like you show in your video a bit of force needs to be applied UPWARD AT THE BACK. In other wards don't pull forward. Than it came out fine.
Thanks so much for your video. Top marks
Excellent work. You are a professional clean high class guru my friend. It was a pleasure to watch your "techy", professional detailed tutorial. That's my own style.
This is a totally outstanding pair of tutorials. THANK YOU SO MUCH. I completed this upgrade last night and photo editing of large RAW files is now massively quicker. I installed a pair of X5365 purchased from iTinStock in the UK, for £193 taken from a new server and which have a 12month guarantee.
However, I think there is one 'error' in the tutorial. Having purchased a long T15 screwdriver especially for the task, which did work to remove the heatsink screws, I found that on reinstalling the heatsinks, the Torx driver slipped round in the heads of the screws. The screws on the 2007 MacPro, I have, are hexagonal and an 3mm allen key fits so much better. Torx was not actually required. For thermal paste I used Arctic MX-4 and the temperatures on the cores are currently around 36ºC. Opening 20 RAW files of 30Mb in one hit increases this on one core to around 45ºC.
One point, before removing the original CPUs I collected the remaining dust ( having previously cleaned the machine thoroughly) around the edges of the CPU sockets with masking tape. In addition, I covered all the old thermal paste with masking tape cut to size, on top of the CPUs, to ensure none fell off into the sockets or onto the mother board.
Totally recommend this upgrade......and thanks again for the tutorials.
hey man...thanks a lot..just finished updating my mac pro 1.1 using your tutorial videos...and it´s working better than ever...your info was crucial for my success....just great..once again thanks a lot.
Just upgraded the processors. The temperature is fine and the benchmark is practically identical to yours!! I did add more arctic silver than your video showed after checking out some other videos and forums. Some people were having kernel panics and heat problems and the problem seemed to lie with not applying enough arctic silver.
Hey, I just wanted to thank you for posting this video. I upgraded my 2.66 4 core Mac Pro to a 3 ghz 8 core Xeon. I followed your instructions to a "T" and had no issues what so ever. I'm running Lion with a ATI 5770 and its running GREAT!
Now my computer is good for another few years. Thanks again!!
Great video!!! I didn't think that I could upgrade the CPU in the Mac Pro from a 4 core to a 8 core!! THANKS for the video.
Fantastic two vids! Big difference with the render times too.
Thank you for offering such clear instructions for doing this ...I'm waiting for my new CPUs to arrive to give this a go!
Great tutorial! Fantastic video quality. Just completed my upgrade and all is well. My 1,1 runs better than ever. Thanks a lot!
Thanks for these videos. I followed your suggestions and everything worked just fine. Yes, the plastic parts are a bit tricky and you need to be careful not drop any screws, otherwise NO PROBLEM It's now 2020, so 9 years later and my ancient Mac Pro 1.2 is running great! Also added some RAM just for fun! What's next? an SSD card perhaps? :-)
Great to see the first video and this last one! Well done DIY. Cheers
Yeah, some techs do that regularly tho - it's not uncommon.
But on his last step of applying the line of paste he put WAY too much. About 4 or 5 times too much. :P
He also placed his finger on it at one point. Another BIG no-no. The oil from your fingers causes problems. Latex gloves are recommended.
Amazing video, just followed the instructions and it worked great! Thanks a lot for taking the time to produce such a high quality tutorial that helped lots of people! *respect*
Machine is running great. Note that Mac Pro 1,1 refers to the model number and generation and not the firmware revision which is a different thing. I would think that you can install whatever latest Apple firmware is available for your Mac Pro and that it shouldn't affect things...but someone else feel free to chime in if you know otherwise.
Well I am hunting the rare and elusive CPU's now, but after watching this, I feel like I might as well go ahead and give it a shot. I really liked your attention to detail in prepping the heatsinks and cpu's no one else mentioned that. And showing the speed tests was also motivating. And if it turns into a 50 pound paperweight I got parts to sell ;O).. Thank you
Hello are these computers worth buying today and doing what you done? and how big can you go the ram and hard drives?
Thank You - I will do the same, with my old machine, as soon I get two X5365 (they are on the way ;.)
Your Video is very helpful - The 1.1 is a great machine but a bit hard to tune.
I just upgraded my 2.nd Machine (2010 2,8 Q-Core to a 3,33 Hex-Core) Easy to do and runs great (Geekbench 64 - from 10700 to 16800) .
So take care and stay tuned.
Hello. There are actually three types for the x5355: SLAEG, SLAC4, and SL9YM. The difference is in the stepping. All three will work just fine on your MP, even if mixed (example, one SLAEG and one SLAC4). I think the main difference is that SLAEG, compared to the other two, has a 50% less power consumption *while idle*. That could make for some serious power savings, but apart from that they all operate the same and will work with each other just fine.
Thanks So Much. I followed step by step and now my 2006 Mac Pro is an 8 core =) Again Much Respect, Now Pro Tools 10 will Fly =)
Hello, I just performed this upgrade on my macpro 1,1 running mavericks 10.9.4. I followed the tutorial to a T and I've done other PC upgrades in the past. The only difference was I used just a dime sized amount of thermal paste on the CPUs instead of a line and the temps are fine. I have the same "processor unknown" thing so I'll likely do the hack to bump it up to Macpro 2,1. Thanks again great post!
hi there so i followed this video step by step and i think i have a small problem can some 1 tell me what it means if my mac can get past the apple logo a start up i thought it ay of been a graphics card problem but then i swapped over my old 1 but still the same
Thank you! I think as long as the socket is the LGA 771 type you should be ok (big emphasis on "should"). I realize that the slower CPU's are cheaper, but you really want to ask yourself if it's worth it. You don't want to put all that time and effort to change the CPU and then do it again in a few months when you realize that you really want that extra speed. My advice is to save up until you can afford the X5365's.
Thank you! I used SMC Fan Control, but actually I found my CPU temperatures pretty stable almost right away (I think thanks to preppying the heat sink surface with the thermal paste). One of the main things to keep in mind is that your CPU's will run hotter due to the doubling of the cores per chip. It's more important than ever to make sure that your computer is sitting in a well ventilated area and that the fans are not obstructed. Other than that...enjoy your new twice-as-fast computer!
I think one of the considerations to keep in mind is that if you do a lot of graphics work (particularly video and CGI stuff), and you want to avail yourself of the CUDA supported cards like the Nvidia Quadro, you'll need a newer Mac Pro than the 1,1 generation due to the PCI bus being too slow on the 1st gen Mac Pros.
Of course if dropping $1200 on a graphics card isn't an issue, then I assume picking up a new Mac Pro is not a problem either.
Thanks for the great videos! Everything went very smoothly, including the firmware upgrade to 2,1. Did have to do a PRAM and SRC reset to get it to recognize the 8 cores, but other than that, all good. Oh, the Torx drive is T-20, not T-15 (at least on my 2006 Mac Pro) Thanks again!!
There are a number of available videos showing this upgrade but I found yours to be the most complete and also the best produced of all. Thanks so much.
I have seen recommendations that the firmware be upgraded from 1.1 to 2.1. Do you have a link to where I might obtain that firmware upgrade?
Also - the magnet stripe from credit cards can cause problems as well
3.0ghz 8 cores wowzas.
I just watched to help take mine apart thanks. Im doing new thermal past and get the dust out.
Next time ill put CPU in :)
You don't need to spread the thermal paste. When the pressure of the heatsink touches the CPU, the thermal paste will distribute evenly.
great video, thanks for the really useful info, successfully upgraded my macpro1,1 to 8 cores
Thank you for sharing. Videos like this help me want to put new life into the old Mac Pro. :)
My x5365's shipped because of you! I'm now convinced it's possible and I've purchased all the 'surgical tools' you recommended. I see you've said that the firmware upgrade is only for aesthetic purposes to show the names of the chips. Does that mean other than swapping the CPUs (correctly), that this is basically a bolt-on upgrade? No software maintenance? Didn't think the firmware needed an upgrade.
Thank you, took me a while, but all seems to working OK.
Just need to update my software now!
i upgraded the third Macpro 1.1 with the same success
thanx again ;-)
Absolutely outstanding tutorial. Very thorough.
You're must welcome, I'm glad everything worked out smoothly with the swap!
Thank you this video really helped me out, very well explained now running 2 x 3 GHz Quad-Core Intel Xeon and flashed my mac from 1,1 to 2,1 :)
Hi have a mac pro 1.1 with the same stats in Hardware Overview as your in the part 1 of this video, but i have a processing speed of 3 GHz and I have 32 GB of memory. You never showed the Hardware Overview stats at the end of the part 2 video after you upgraded it. I was wondering if I bought all the things you used to upgrade your mac pro 1.1 and installed the same processors that you did will the speed on my computer double or will nothing change? I would send you a screenshot of my computers Hardware Overview stats, but the comments on youtube won't let me.
@midphase : there is a config file on the forums that you can download and unzip then install but........................
This will work with Snow Leopard, but for some reason it will not work while running Lion. just an FYI.
Great Tutorial! Thanks for all the attention to detail
I picked them up on eBay...keep an eye out for X5365, ideally it's best if you can pick them up in pairs, but you might need to get one from one vendor and one from another. I paid $500 for the 2 CPU's but I see the prices fluctuate and they actually seem to go for a bit more right now. Try to stick to SLAED chips and not the SL4P type which I believe are an older configuration.
Nice tutorial! I'll be doing this upgrade soon! I have the same Mac Pro as you (1,1 quad 2.66). I'll be getting my 5345s in the mail soon! Have you used SMCFanControl? That's what I use to control the fans on a couple of my Macs. If your CPUs are getting hot, you can crank up the fans. Any tips for the upgrade that you didn't mention in the video? Anything you thought of afterwards? Thanks!
thanx a million
i've have done exactly what u said
& it works pecfectly
MacPro 1.1 xeon x5365 x 2 radeon 6870 - Yosemite - GeekBench 11790 (was 6201)
it's old news, but u rock !!
+davidAll5 Did you have to upgrade the firmware? Could you send me a link to how to do that. Im looking to do this upgrade soon. Thanks
Hi Timothy
the firmware is here - on the very first post
but to see it, u have to be registered
once u have the firmware, it s very easy
u just have to click to "make believe" you have a 2.1
not satisfied ? just click the button "back to 1.1 "
forum.netkas.org/index.php?PHPSESSID=aek7dk3vnbml274lvi3nb4i596cqrt7o&topic=1094.msg6585
to upgrade the cpu see the videos (1 & 2)
make sure u have this Torkx screwdriver & a lot of patience
if i did it u can do it
Thanks for this helpful tuto.
Great video thanks. I have exactly the same Mac pro 1,1 running Snow leopard 10.6.8. After the upgrade that you have shown, can I run Yosemite?
You will need to mod the boot files.I suggest you buy a hard drive on eBay that has El Capitan or Yosemite pre installed on it.
+Joseph Folk Thanks for that. I've heard that some sellers on ebay will accept your hard drive, install yosemite, then send it back. Would that also mod the boot files? Sorry, I've been a PC too long!
+Alan Guscott I never hear that before.But you could do it yourself but if you have no computer experience I suggest buying one.An like you said people said you could send them your HDD an they will send it back with correct boot files,I personally wouldn't trust that.Plus if you buy one you could copy it to another HDD an format that drive then you have an extra HDD you could use.
Thanks a lot Joseph. You've been a big help.
+Alan Guscott No problem!
After you upgrade, check with an app like iStats to make sure you're cpu's are consuming around 20-25watts ea. If they show more like 40-50 watts, then most likely they've been mislabeled as SLAED. I think mine are mislabeled. Core are way too hot for idle
Thank you ! Very well made
Would you have a suggestion which 4GB ram sticks would work in the 1.1 2006 Mac with the upgrade?
Thanks in advance
Excellent Tutorial, very clear.
I believe that the standard 667MHz DDR2 ECC fully buffered DIMM should be fine after the processor upgrade. That's what I'm using. I suppose you could go with faster RAM but I don't think you'll see a whole lot of benefit.
Worked like a charm only problem where can I find that app to check the temperature?
+RealGuild Google TEMPERATURE MONITER. It's outdated but it still works. I'm running OS X YOSEMITE 10.10.5 on my 2006 Mac Pro 1.1. I upgraded the firmware, video card and the cpu's... Temperature Monitor works very well for me...
is it really needed to tint the heatsink and the CPU?
nice video im thinking of up graduing my mac pro 2006-2007 model im doing a course ar uni with 3 d softwear like autodesk 3ds ,max mud box i wanted to up grade my mac insread of byein g a pc what could you recomend i use to upgrade it to its fullest potenueal
best wishes ken
you are the best ! i have Same computer an trying to do same you did upgrade to 8 core . what about upgrading up 12 core ? any suggestion let me know
Great Video ! Great Sound !
I would like to upgrade to mountain lion. I tried to download it to my mac pro but got a message that it can not. I have a 5 year old mac pro 2,1 with 2 Quad-Core Intel Xenon 3 Ghz processors, with 32 gig ram. Can I upgrade anything so I will be able to install mountain lion and basically get some more years out of this very great working machine ? I really appreciate if you could shine some light on this dilemma.
Thank you !
Hello there, after you installed the cpus, where you able to install MAC OSX mountain Lion?
TNX
Thanks for the great vid. I followed and mine seems to work great except when the processors max out I get a continuous and really annoying beep. Any help would be greatly appreciated.
hi will 2 Intel Xeon Processors E5345 2.33 ghz SLAC5 work in a mac pro 1.1
THANKS great videos
Really great tutorial , many thanks
So what speeds are you able to get with this upgrade since 2011? Can you run a geekbench to show what your machine can do currently? I'm looking to do this exact process and curious what scores your 1st gen dual process can crank out. Great video!!!
I am getting ready to buy some X5355 processors (cost is a factor) and since I have 4TB of disk space, and 16GB of RAM, it makes sense to spend $300 for a 4 core to 8 core up grade rather than spending a ton on a newer machine. I can get a 2008 Mac Pro for $1800, but my old machine is barely worth $1000.
But yeah, other than that I think that picking up an X5355 or X5356 is a great option for getting another year or two of life from your Mac Pro.
Hello, I followed exactly the guidelines of the two mac pro 1.1 upgrade videos
The two processors remain "unknown". I turn off the cpu and turn it on as instructed. It restarts, doesn't open the drives and restarts again without changes.
Could help?
great walk thru! I picked up two of the X5365 for less than 500 each online. I followed both videos very closely, thank you for putting this up. I did want to ask if the system recognizes the chips as the model number on yours? My system (running leopard or snow leopard) when I goto the 'About This Mac' it shows the processor as '2 x 3 Ghz Unknown.' Is this the result of a bad install? or its just like that? or even worst, was I sold some bad chips?
i just got a 1.1 mac pro. wondering if any intel based processor will work. or does it have to be certain kinds?
thanks a lot. really very useful for me.
@midphase ok thanks were did u get ur cpus and much
Midphase, thank you for your contribution. Can you please tell me if upgrading my Mac Pro 1,1 to 8 cores (purchased summer of 2007; smc 1.7f10) will allow me to install 32 GB Ram? Right now I am maxed out at 16 GB Ram; and although I have a couple of 4GB sticks, my Mac will only read them as 2GBs. Thank you in advance for you answer. I noticed somewhere the the kernel has to be changed to 64 bit; is this true? But i understand it is also one great big hassle.
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Thanks for your video, it is really useful. I upgrade to X5365 did exactly the same as what u did on the video, it works really well and all cores data shows on temperature monitor. Everything seems working well except it shows" 2X3GHz unknown" instead of " 2X3GHz Intel Xeon 8cores. Is there any firmware we need to install after upgrading for mac1.1 to recognize the CPUs?? Please advise
Great Video! But you really don't have to spread the thermal paste on the heatsink because if you put like a line of thermal paste that is the size of a rice it will work just fine and you also don't have to spread it out because it does it by itself!
@SiliconSam428 Okay, so I lied. I found a pair of X5365 processor on ebay. So tomorrow sometime I'll be installing the new chips. Will let you know how it goes!
Hi Midphase, amazing videos on this, thank you. I am thinking about doing this and can see there is quite a price difference between the x5355s and the x5565s.. Because of this I'm thinking of getting the x5355s, but they seem to come in a few different configurations. I haven't seen ant x5355s that are called 'SLAED', instead all I can find is x5355 'SLAC4' and 'SLAEG'. Are these ok to use? and should it be possible to find an x5355 SLAED? Thanks again!
hey mid phase great vid's but i have a question im running the dual core 5150's with stock everything , will i need to upgrade the fan? and mainly what cpu's do you think i should go with? Im in music production and 4 cpu is not cutting it.
Thank you so much
@kod3ZeroZeroZero Yes! you're right, I installed win64 with no problems and it recognized the chips. I appreciate the help with "About this Mac" I found the thread and made my own customization to it. :)
Again great tutorial and many thanks!
Many thanks a really good tutorial, I am keen to upgrade my 1,1 now. There seems to be a few places selling refurbished CPU's. Have you any suggestions on where best to find a couple of X5365? Some people advertise a matched pair ... is there even such a thing?
are the 3.1 and 1.1 heatsinks really not compatible? they look exactly the same to me
What different types of CPUs can you use for the Mac Pro 1,1 that don’t have to be flashed ?
Sounds like you might be overheating the cores. I would advise that you get Temperature Monitor and check to see what's going on. If the cores are overheating you will need to either better ventilate the Mac Pro, or possibly reapply the thermal paste. A few people are reporting issues that I think are related to temperature. The fact that it's the middle of Summer doesn't help!
Will you be able to install Mountain Lion?
Hello! Why is it a ’’house’’ over the GPU in Mac Pro? Is it for cooling? Is this an old solution? Now there are no more computers like old Mac Pro, so the new one, the black cylinder, must have quite a different GPU from this?
helo i just wondering since i am new in mac and just bought used mac first generation 1.1 with xeon 2ghz late 2006.i have seen some forum and i saw that the first gen cant't boot to 64bit.so any ideas to get 64bit to work in my unsupported 64bit mac?
Brillant - Very tempted - Cheers Fella
is it possible to upgrade a MacPro 3,1 single Quad-Core processor to 2 Quad-Core processors?
But the video card??? It’s fantastic video
Also, forgot to mention that running on 50% less power also means less heat..
I tried to removed the heat sinks off the CPU's and no ways . . . they are fused solid. Had to abort it or bend the heat sinks. Any advice on this please !
Excellent video/tutorials. Just wondering, would I have to upgrade the firmware to 2.1 to use the X5365? With the 5355 1.1 is fine I assume.
***** I did update to 2.1 before I actually installed the processors. I did that in hopes to install Mavericks, which I had no luck with. It is working extremely well, not a problem anywhere, and the exporting of FCP X is at least 2X as fast.
The E5345 "should" work, but since I did not use those, you might want to read up from others who have used those CPU's to get their impressions.
Is the machine still running fine? About to try this upgrade myself on my Mac Pro 1,1. Did you have to update the firmware to 2,1?
what about a video card ??? whats a good video card to run a 30" cinamac monitor the original one that came with my original 2006 1,1, seems to lag a lot with youtube videos.. also , i noticed this video is a few years old, is there new chips or any new updates ???
thanks
Can you run yosemite with this upgrade?
I have only 1 processor inside, could you please give an advise, how to find correct cooler for Mac Pro 3.1 (early 2008)?
hello, are you sure that the motherboard is enough powerful to make a change for the whole computer.
I heard about north bridge south bridge etc.... and i heard many time that you can upgrade cpu, ram or Vram, but it wont change because of the strugle of the motherboard.
Awesome, many thanx from AUT!
Thanks for your good tutorial. I followed step by step. Unforunately my mac 1,2 won"t chime, boot and just shows a black screen. Tried to reset the PRam with the keyboard and ny keeping the power button pressed. I only hear the fan blowinf like a turbine. I"d appreciate your Or anyones advice.
amajorseven download more ram
Hi Jake O'Bryen, I found the reason why it didn"t start. I bought a second pair of CPUs and they worked right away. Something must have been wrong with the first ones. Thanks for your humorous approach.
amajorseven your welcome
I think if you have all the tools in place and everything that you need, you should be able to do the entire thing in less than two hours.