But what is Apple is also intent on targeting prosumers? Say someone who just wants to use a lot of Photoshop filters on his or her family photos?
The mini and iMac don't do this?
Or what about gamers; Apple once ignored them, but has now gone after them in a big way in iOS.
and the Mac Pro runs iOS? Yes, they are enabling games with iOS since that market appeared. But as games take over the app store stats I doubt Apple will look at that as an accomplished goal. It isn't a particularly good sign long term. The objective is more likely far more well rounded ecosystem.
I think games on computers may not be the wave of the future, but you never know.
It isn't whether they are the future, it is whether they are dominate driver of sales. And of sales in this class of machine at what are now normal Mac Pro price points.
There is a class of gamers are who as much about tweaking hardware and/or benchmark chasing as playing games. No, Apple never really has gone after spec porn market in a big way for long periods of time.
And I wonder about people like me. I have finally had it with iMacs for work (law). I don't need anything really fast,
So need a machine with $800-7000 worth of just CPU+GPU inside ? Pretty fast is where the Mac Pro is aimed.
but I would like to have a machine I could upgrade. Or just replace the hard drive for crying out loud.
the storage drive on the new Mac Pro is prominently easily accessible once take the cover off ( slide latch and lift cover). Upgradability is different from mature, commodity priced parts.
And in any case, the speed boost from using a SSD probably trumps the processor speed upgrades that are available for users like me that aren't rendering or doing intensive processor tasks.
so if apply a SSD to a Mac mini ????
Users whose workloads are plateaued but who several years ago might of gone into a Mac Pro will be targeted with something lower on the product line up. That is just natural cannibalization following the gap between user workloads progress and technology progress.
They are not after the same people they are targeting with the other Macs. ( this is not a back door into xMac land. )
If the non-tinker crowd is "no one", then yes no one. Just because it isn't you doesn't mean it is no one. There are several factors that you were very busily dismissing that amount to a group of "someones".
a. Folks who use the machine to generate revenue. They are less price sensitive if the revenue generated is substantially larger than the system price.
b. Folks who need performance. Not ultimate, money-is-no-object performance but "substantively faster than what I was using 5-7 years ago" faster. [ In other words folks who have increasing workloads but don't want to change infrastructure every 1-3 years. ]
For example, folks who need to "chew on" 2-3x as much data as several years ago who also just want a tool to just use. Not an upgrade project.
c. Folks who are in settings were a group of people work on the same data. Either large amounts of "sneaker net" disk sharing or LAN disk sharing.
The media industry chase as "more megapixels" to push "progress means this is a pretty good bet. The white hot business of "big data" also means this is fairly well aligned. HD -> 4K UltraHD -> 8K UltraHD .... couple with "don't delete anything, keep it all in giant catalogs" runs 180 degrees opposite of all data in a single box for a single person.
is the new MP the equivalent of a concept car or just something to get some attention to Apple's commitment to Thunderbolt and some other technologies?
No. First, they are probably going to sell 10's of thousands of these if not ridiculously priced (i.e., in same price range as before). Concept cars don't sell in anywhere near those kinds of numbers. Neither do "limited edition millionaire collectable" cars.
Apple selling over 10M Thunderbolt equipped Macs per year for the last two years is a demonstration of Apple's commitment to Thunderbolt. This new Mac Pro wouldn't bring any dramatic shift in those numbers. Far more about bringing the Mac Pro into alignment with Mac siblings than demonstrative any increased commitment to Thunderbolt.
The other "concept" that will probably be apparent once the full 2013 Mac line up is introduced is that Apple is cutting SATA loose as being the most common internal storage connection technology. It isn't where they think things might go... but rather where they they think things are going.
Coupled with that and bringing things back to "price" is the notion that Flash storage will be affordable enough for most folks' individual systems is a contributor to the cutting SATA loose mindset.
But for me it's worth having unless there are some fatal flaws prohibiting a dependable robust and speedy performance.
