The new Mac Pro?

[robcat2075]

It's not April 1st, but I had to check when i saw the first picture on this slide show.

 

http://www.apple.com/mac-pro/

 

(There's a very tiny interface to advance to the next slide on the right side)

[John Bigboote]

Yeah, we were looking at that today too. Looks great! Looks EXPENSIVE! Anyone wager a guess?

[largento]

I think it'll start at $2500.

 

It does look great, though. Very interesting design and I like that it senses when you rotate it around to get to the plugs and that lights up.

 

Very nice.

[robcat2075]

I saw the first pic and thought "it's a wastebasket."

 

 

How long before someone starts selling imitation round PC cases?

[Simon Edmondson]

As always with Apple products it looks good, and probably performs even better but,.....

but,

but,

but,

it is likely to make the eyes cross and water when the price is announced.

 

One small point that occurred looking at the slide show, its appears to be geared towards the individual 'pro' rather than a company set up ? The tubular design of the body would seem to work against a rack set up ( unless thats part of their pitch at the time ) ?

 

A couple of winters ago I had three old PC's working away full time in my shed rendering a project. It was warmer in there than it was in the house. They make great play on the thermal conductivity of the design, and with that level of equipment in that confined space, it would need to be good. It has to go somewhere though so, perhaps its a way of offsetting the purchase price but cutting down on the heating bills ?

sceptically impressed.

simon

[robcat2075]

... It has to go somewhere though so, perhaps its a way of offsetting the purchase price but cutting down on the heating bills ?

 

With that shape I can imagine attaching some expandable dryer duct to the top and venting it out a window in the summer

[Fuchur]

... It has to go somewhere though so, perhaps its a way of offsetting the purchase price but cutting down on the heating bills ?

 

With that shape I can imagine attaching some expandable dryer duct to the top and venting it out a window in the summer

 

I ask myself: Why should I buy such a thing as a pro?

Is it really important how my workstation looks? Wouldn't it be better to make that thingy technically better than concentrating that much afford on the optics and creating a cool (trash can / punshing bag / vacuum-cleaner looking) case?

Anyhow it is properply a good device so if you have that kind of money lying around, why not buy one...

 

See you

*FuchurÜ

[Rodney]

With that shape I can imagine attaching some expandable dryer duct to the top and venting it out a window in the summer

 

It might make a handy space heater in the winter.

 

I keep saying... one of these I'm going to buy a Mac.

I think my daughters will probably beat me to that.

(buying one for themselves that is when they get the jobs to afford it)

[higginsdj]

MacPros have always been way overpriced (at least here in Aus, they have aways been 2-3x the price of their Intel/Windows counterparts). I can't imagine this one would be any different! But it is an intelligent design and I like how thye are trying to make it so it could sit anywhere - like next to the Smart TV in th eliving room and not look out of place.

 

Cheers

[largento]

In most cases, when Apple has brought out updates to their product lines the price is usually the same or less. The "built in USA" sticker might drive the price up, but I think they'll still keep it in the ballpark of the existing Mac Pros.

 

Heck, given its much smaller size and design, this one might be cheaper to make.

 

Personally, I'll miss the expandability of the old Mac Pros, but then I think this one is designed to go for the external drives given all the Thunderbolt slots.

 

And, like the other new Macs, there isn't a super drive built in, so burning media is going to require an external drive.

[robcat2075]

At least you don't have to grumble that they're abandoning the desktop market. It looks like they are trying to make it as appealing as possible.

 

Is it possible that the "assembled in the USA" angle is because this will have fairly low volume?

[largento]

I'd say that's a fair bet.

 

Just glad Apple didn't abandon the pro users like so many doomsayers were predicting.

 

[EDIT] I wonder if it'll come with a cool wireless black keyboard and mouse?

[thefreshestever]

i was looking forward to this since my mac pro is now over 4 years old... i have to admit, not what i have expected design wise ... but i kinda like it. i also think the price is going to be similar to previous mac pro releases...

[thefreshestever]

reminds me of a black r2d2 when i think about it

[robcat2075]

Anyone guess what a 12 core Xeon PC like this might cost?

[largento]

It looks kinda' like a jet engine to me. :-)

 

Having to move my setup to Mississippi while I'm here for a couple of weeks, I would have loved to have had a smaller, lighter machine like this to carry than the big honking metal box.

 

My Mac Pro is going on 5 years old, but given the current state of things, I won't be upgrading anytime soon. Would love to have one, though.

[itsjustme]

Anyone guess what a 12 core Xeon PC like this might cost?

 

Pretty high, I'm thinking. Here are some eight core Xeon E5 machines that are from $3,000-$6,000. So, probably more than that.

[markw]

I think I might be in love!

Only 10" tall !!! That's astonishing!

Interestingly no word about it on their UK website.

Shame I won't be able to afford one. What dose that say about a company that your second reaction is "it's not for the likes of me"

[robcat2075]

So this thing includes no hard drive, it's all SSD? That can't be cheap.

[largento]

This was just a sneak peek, Mark. It's not supposed to come out until the Fall.

 

My Mac Pro was $3K when I bought it and I've definitely gotten every penny out of it in the last five years. It's been a solid workhorse and hopefully, it'll last me for a few more years.

[robcat2075]

Here's an article from RedShark on Apple announcements including the Mac Pro

 

 

The new OS update will be called "Mavericks"?

[largento]

If I've got it right, they are naming the OS after locations in California.

 

Mavericks is a surfing location in Northern California.

[robcat2075]

Something I noticed in that Redshark article.... Adobe is moving away from NVidia-only CUDA GPU computing to OpenCL so future versions of Adobe software can run on this Mac with AMD graphics cards.

[jakerupert]

On a sidenote:

Great presentation runing supersmoothly even on my i-pad.

Guess its html 5?

[jason1025]

Im guessing base model $2499.00 will get you a 256GB internal SSD.

and 12GB of ram

and the lowest GHZ 12core xeon.

 

Bumping up the ram to 32GB will probably cost and extra $756.00

Bumping up the Internal SSD to 500GB will cost extra $300.00

Bumping up the Internal SSD to 1TB will cost extra $724.00

Bumping up the Clock speed to just a fraction of a GHZ will cost $1000.00

 

They are acting as if the base model will have plenty of graphics power with the 2 AMD cards. Enough to power 3, 4K monitors so I am assuming we will not need to bump that up.

 

All in $4979.00 when properly configured. I do not feel this is a conservative number. It may actually be more than this.

 

I like the design. Its not what I had expected. It could have been worse.

 

If I was given 1 APPLE wish I would ask that OSX be legally put on PC's.

 

Apple says they are first and for most a software company and OSX is what makes a mac a mac. If thats true Let us Spend $2000.00 on a killer PC and put OSX on it.

There are sites that teach you how to do this but its risky and a bunch of work. With any new update you could BRICK the system.

[Roger]

It looks like a trashcan. I'm not excited by the design.

 

The specs sound interesting, particularly the dual FireGL cards. I wonder is that 6GB RAM per card or 6GB total?

Surprised they didn't make this a dual socket system, a single 12 core xeon may not be enough for some people.

Upgrades will be very limited, I imagine.

 

Not a bad machine but I'm sure for the same amount of money I could put together a killer PC. I'd have a hard time spending

more than $2000 or $2500 on a PC these days.

[Roger]

I saw the first pic and thought "it's a wastebasket."

 

 

How long before someone starts selling imitation round PC cases?

 

My bet is within 3 weeks of release.

[largento]

If I was given 1 APPLE wish I would ask that OSX be legally put on PC's.

 

Apple says they are first and for most a software company and OSX is what makes a mac a mac. If thats true Let us Spend $2000.00 on a killer PC and put OSX on it.

There are sites that teach you how to do this but its risky and a bunch of work. With any new update you could BRICK the system.

 

Apple is first and foremost a *hardware* company (always has been.) OS X is designed to run on the hardware they design to run it. Their inroads into software were written to create a need for their hardware. They don't want to encourage people to buy other companies hardware. They want you to use theirs.

 

I've heard people gripe for 20 years about the premium cost of a Mac, but that price guarantees me a computer that just works and that price tag is worth it to me.

[Darkwing]

I've heard people gripe for 20 years about the premium cost of a Mac, but that price guarantees me a computer that just works and that price tag is worth it to me.

 

 

As someone who's had nothing but trouble using a Mac (and now has to replace their computer after only not even 4 years of use) I could really disagree with you on that. Expensiveness does not necessarily denote quality.

[largento]

I've owned SIX Macintoshes and except for the one that I gave away, they all still work perfectly ...including my Quadra that I bought in 1995!

 

I've also worked at places using Macs over a 20 year period and the work machines were reliable and durable.

[Darkwing]

Well I must have had bad luck or something, but it's enough to put me off of Mac. I think the thing that got me the most in some ways wasn't even the hardware failures, but Apple's corporate model which means a month after you buy one of their products, if you don't keep pumping money into new OS's and stuff, you fall very far behind very quick and the software becomes quite limited actually rather quickly because it's like they'll introduce something like a new OS and so everything new will require that OS and be incompatible with the previous version. This was my case because I bought mine in late summer of 2009 and it was Leopard and literally a month or two later they released Snow Leopard. Once snow leopard came out, new software (including AM) would only work on that. The same deal goes for their phones. I've read they actually will remove features on older phones via the updates in order to prompt you to buy a new one. I'm sure if you're well off for money Apple is a good buy, but for us poor people who have to try and get as much as possible out of their machines it just isn't worth it. Not in my opinion at least. /endrant

[robcat2075]

When I started at Nortel in 1995 it was all-mac for office computers. Two years later they announced we were changing to PC and there was much shrieking gnashing of teeth.

 

I waited until the very last possible day to get my mac switched out. and then the other people in the office were jealous because the PC i got was faster than the PCs they began the conversion with a year earlier.

[largento]

I wouldn't know anything about being well off, Darkwing. Not only have I been poor my whole life, but for the last 4 years, I've been unemployed! I don't buy them because they're expensive, I buy them because they work ...and I might add that I've produced a hell of a lot of stuff on them over the years.

 

As to the other things. Apple will give you a free upgrade if you buy your machine within a month or two of a new OS. And given that new upgrades cost only around $30, it's hardly an unbearable expense.

 

Not everything requires the latest OS. I still run old apps that I bought years ago. A change in the OS can require an update in the software, but that's hardly a Mac-only thing.

 

This whole removing features from a phone to force you to buy a new one sounds like hogwash. I've had iPhones since they came out in 2007 and I've never had any feature removed from my phone.

 

Nobody is telling you to buy a Mac or a PC. Buy what you want. Spend what you want.

 

I'm just pointing out that your one bad experience doesn't damn Apple as a company. Clearly the vast majority of people have a much better experience.

[Gerry]

I'm with Mark on this, though the last few years I've been unable to give a full endorsement of Apple due mostly to changes in the OS. We are a PC office and I find the PC platform mostly annoying. But last year my boss brought her son's MacBook Air to work for viewing some kind of files, and since I was the office Mac guy, she asked me to come in and show her how it worked. I could not figure the thing out. It was highly embarrassing. I don't even like to work with my wife's MacBook Pro, the touchpad gestures and other navigation tweaks are beyond me and I have no real reason to learn them.

 

The new cylinder design I think is mostly to sex things up, sort of like the cube. Totally a gas to look at and lust after, but looks like it comes with zero peripherals. Give me a machine I can take out of the box and operate!

[Darkwing]

To each their own. I will note though that I've found it funny that any time I've brought up my troubles using a Mac, people get incredibly defensive about it and start treating me like I have two heads. I'm not making this stuff up. I've had a really terrible experience with Apple. Whether or not that condemns them as a company, probably not. But personally, they've proven to be less than adequate and if people are upset by that, well I'm sorry.

[robcat2075]

I've always been a bit baffled at the perception that there is a huge difference between Mac OS and Windows.

 

Basically i launch programs and use them and when I've used the same program on both platforms they were pretty much the same but for cosmetic differences.

 

I'm not sure I could name many things that i could do on one and not the other.

 

I haven't seriously used a mac since OSX came out but... don't you still use it to launch programs you want to use and then use them?

[Darkwing]

Yep, that's pretty much the general concept. Really it comes down more to things like stability and program compatibility. For example, AM (at least for me) isn't that stable on my Macbook. Also hardware upgrades is another thing. I'm sure some tech wizard can upgrade their Mac hardware, but my perception is that upgrading Microsoft hardware is a heck of a lot easier to do.

[Roger]

For me personally, while I prefer PC I don't hate Mac.

It's just not my thing. Working in IT support, though,

there are lots of little tricks for things I know how to

do in Windows but don't seem to have a Mac equivalent.

Or if they do, I don't use it often enough to remember it.

For most things they seem to be more or less equivalent.

[thefreshestever]

my first mac was a 7600 power mac, and since then i was hooked. i used windows before, and i never was able to go back. i often thought about it because of the money, but everytime i was sitting in front of a windows pc i just got frustrated. not because a mac can do things windows pcs can´t, because there really is no difference, but it just feels different. hard to explain somehow, but that´s just the way it is to me.

 

i´ve never had bad luck with apple products either, everything was always working just fine, for most of the time i was at least one osx version behind, and i use a lot of different software, never had any issues... i remember one time the hard disk of my old g4 died on me, but after 5 years of more or less non-stop usage that´s acceptable i think. my old mac book, which is now over 8 years old is still used by an ex-GF of mine, and the 4 years i´ve used it, it was running also more or less 24/7... but i´ve also heard of people having different experiences, i guess i was always lucky... i often see people with shattered iphone-displays, i´ve dropped all the iphones i´ve had about a thousand times, never more than a tiny scratch at most... i guess the apple gods must be with me

[jimd]

Feels different

yep that about sums it up for me ( i too think it's a feel thing can't explain it )

I use both a PC and Mac at work and at home I have all macs (got 6 here) and gave 1 away they all work

 

 

bottom line if you like the machine your on then thats the one for you