thats not what I said
I said that those workstation GPU's are a major component of the cost of the new Mac Pro, and with absolutely zero options to downgrade from them, the new Pro is absolutely not a good buy for me because my work cannot in any way use those cards. Despite bieng a "professional". Apple is ignoring the fact that not all professionals in this world are in video production.
so, if i want an OSx based professional grade workstation that has hardware reasonably optioned for any other workload, I have no options.
gaming is always a nice. but not requirement. heck, i basically only play Counterstrike these days.. I think i could use a Geforce 3ti still for it
But don't tell me i'm not a professional computer user just because I have no use for 2x expensive workstation GPU's
Ya know...."skate where the puck is gonna be", right? At this point in time, opening a second GPU to leverage computational power (Apple's goal, not
just for FCP and video rendering), is brilliant. We are seeing stacked cores and multi core/Hyper Threading/Turbo boost
because of reaching the limits of silicon and 'Moore's Law'. Developers know this. Coders are aware. Sooooo many 'other' updates to the rig, it's hard to believe you're chief complaint IS something that WILL be taken advantage of....and in the short term. GPGPU computing is and WILL be the bridge between now and Nano or Graphene silicon speed and chip design. Look at Intel's new iGPU....the CrystalWall 5200. More computational power than nVidia's GT650! That's AMAZING!!!! The CPU designers get it. Hardware builders understand it *Apple. Developers, especially engineering, heavy code compilation, CAD, and YES!!!!! I truly believe my industry (audio) indeed will benefit from this move. We ALL Will!!! It won't happen over night....buy as an early adopter of the rMBP, I remember the same line of bull when discussing developers updating their software for HiDPI optimization. Nearly EVERY app I use (less 2) have been updated....in a year!
You don't have to early adopt. If it's not for you yet....cool! Give it a bit, for some reason though, I'm not seeing ANYTHING on the market at a better price FOR you and FOR what you do with the speed and the I/O options than the nMP. PCIe SSD local storage, FAST silicon, and in a pretty sexy package with incredible post purchase support
all i'm trying to say is that it's the opposit that is true.
Apple is catering to an extremely niche group. Media Production in the computer world is actually a very very very very tiny fraction. This new Mac pro is more directed towards a smaller target audience than their last pro was, purely because they are dictating what has to be there, rather than giving choice.
It's where they CAN start and show an immediate and revolutionary improvement. There isn't ANYthing the new machine can't do the last one could and in every measure, faster! It's not like buying this one will slow you down in the least. Quite the opposite. It's guaranteed to be faster than your current confiugration....more expandable, smaller, lighter, more efficient....and from your described needs...a machine that could easily last you a half decade or more
the nMP in it's current configuration will only be as powerful as equal machines with the same CPU for industries that have no ability to leverage those GPU's.
if those GPU's, as estimated are roughtly 50% of the costs involved with the nMP, your performance per dollar of actual use is quite low.
the whole thing banks on GPGPU standards that Apple is pushing being adopted heavily. There are some who will, but there are still a lot of industries that don't really benefit from this.
if Apple chose to for example, keep the same design of this case, rip out 1 of the GPU's and then give a cheaper option for the other GPU, while keeping the ECC ram, Xeon CPU, and everything else thats amazingly fast, but sell it for 1,999 instead of 2,999, as a base I think it woudl have been a better option.
Then let the who want those GPU's upgrade to them or better if they need them.
edit: removing the use of consumer: i'm using it differently than I think most people intend in this particular conversation. when I say consumers, I mean everyone and anyone with purchasing power, including professionals, prosumers and the like.
You. Just. Don't. Get. It.
CPU Speeds are incremental...from now forward (for workstations, mobile is now where Moore's Law has moved). The NEXT step in workstation computing is GPGPU and leveraging OpenCL *Adobe Absolutely DOES support it, and continues to refine optimization* .....off loading calculations to the second GPU can increase processing power exponentially....saving minutes, hours, days for whatever your workflow is. Not. Just. Video.
Apple is going balls to the wall with FCPx....to SHOW they didn't have the idea to move motion editing to a Fisher Price piece of software on an outdated rig. Even Mari....still in Mac Beta (Pixar) usage feedback has been tremedous...FCPx came with a significant point update along with the Pro....and I can't fathom Aperture, Logic.....even our iLife suite including GarageBand and iMovie/Photo are far behind from leveraging GPU support.
It's been in the pipeline for some time....it's not new. Many software industries have been utilizing OpenCL than ever before...and don't forget, we've still got software optimized solely for single core usage!
Some will. Some won't. But truly....what is it that you REALLY do that you won't benefit from the new MP? Seriously....doesn't matter what you do (even gaming over 60fps....on a 60Hz display is essentially bragging rights!!! And tests have shown this guy to play AAA titles just fine in that FPS range!)
oh I already did, a few times in the last couple pages.
I used my own industry as an example, where a workstation with large amount of ECC ram, fast Xeon CPU's and the like would be excellent.
I for example work in banking and financial software industry. I'm not a developer but a installation technology analyst. I regularly use the high end database systems on local resources for testing purposes. Compiling code. running analysis against databases and manipulation of large amount of transactional data.
its just not something that GPU power is ever used for. is it possible? I dont know. There are smarter minds than my own who develop the backend platforms. however, currently that is not the way it works and in current iterations cannot support that sort of paralel scaling in any way.
if I could get the mac Pro for my desk here and at work but without the GPU's, it would be excellent. I like Mac's, and I own a macbook air and love it.
But I can't justify, especially to the accountants why i need a $3k budget for a machine that comes with parts that are unusable. Meanwhile, There really was no reason why apple didnt provide a machine without workstation GPU's and let people add them as options, like previous mac pros.
by ram rodding 2x workstation GPU's at everyone, no matter what, they've sort of artificially jacked the base price of the unit up. And made it a tough sell for anyone who does not have the ability to leverage the GPU's.
people are harping on the Verge article for being slightly biased. While they are in a sense, They did point out the fact that, unless those GPU's can be leveraged by the software, they are at the core, a money sink into an unusable hardware choice.
IMO, that will due to accountants and the like end up making the new Mac Pro a really tough sell outside of the media profession. those not doing video in Final Cut Pro, if they have to answer to any sort of corporate accountability, will have a hard time convincing the powers to be to hand over the money.
and if theres not enough purchasing going on, with such a remarkably small audience, it will be harder to convince software houses to invest in developing for it.
its a bit of a catch 22. Apple is trying to jump start it by releasing the hardware anyways. I'm just not convinced at this particular configuration, there's enough of an audience.
the unfortunate part, is that there are just some industries like mine that no matter what, cannot widely benefit from GPU processing.
Financial? And you're having a hard time justifying it's viability? It's a write off. It's going to do what you want faster than anything you've got now. Forget the second GPU for now. Two yeard down the road you may find your updated Quickbooks is running 1000% faster!
My Mac Pro tower has two USB and two FireWire ports on the front. That's not a "token" amount, it's enough for everyday use. Occasionally I have to access a port in the rear, but not often. I do keep a Lightning cable permanently plugged into the back of my tower so it's easy to connect iDevices without using up a front port.
On the iMac and Mini, all the ports are on the back, even the SD card slots, lol. So that's where we got the "idea" that Ive is hostile to ergonomic port placement.
Can you imagine iMac ports on the front? Have you a hard time spinning a mini? Why in the WORLD would ANYone have an issue with the port layout of the nMP? It's brilliant! We've always had the bulk of our ports and plugs 'in the back'. Now you can actually turn it without breaking YOUR back!
Daily.
USB mass storage devices for transferring data are still commonly used.
Daily----USB hubs. Available for some time now
Actually, that's what I would say, too.
Software development, for example, unless you can compile your app using GPGPU (which AFAIK no compiler supports). Also in my case, I need a LOT of VMs, so the number of cores (and memory) is more important than 2 GPUs (which are also not used in this scenario).
And even with software that can use 2 GPUs IN THEORY, it remains a theory until it is actually supported. Therefore the verge is mostly right.
We should look at facts and hard numbers, and not solely speculate on what MIGHT be happening in the future. And no, "automatic success" is neither guaranteed with OpenCL nor with thunderbolt. Apple already has failed in the past with their proprietary tech, so we will see what happens this time.
Web apps.
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Benchmarks, for example.
About every app that cannot fully leverage the nMP power. Ie all apps that are not able to support 2 GPUs via OpenCL. I hope I must not list them all, would take some time
But think of Audio, Databases, VMs, Compilers etc
And if you think that OpenCL enabled Apps leverage the GPU for just everything, think twice.
I'm at a serious loss for why this wouldn't be an exceptional development machine. Especially with it's unbelievable display connectivity and awesome expandibility for out board storage, 1000/1000 read/write speeds, a TON of RAM, even portable if need be.
The support is coming....again, 'where the puck is going'
This can has been made for Pros? really, I guess they have never actually stepped foot into a Professional recording, dubbing, mastering, post mastering studio one bit.
It's all fine and dandy for graphic artist or video editors, but a lot of them will tell you that they do not think the design was intended for Pros.
For us in the recording industry, it really isn't thought out one bit. The lack of internal expandability means that you wil have a mess of wires running about the production desks (for those that do not have machine rooms to store their computers and other noisy equipment) where the occasional doped up artist (if just that and not drunk also) will have all the luxury of finding a way to actually have a mishaps with the computer.
There's also the fact that there's no reason for any of us who rely heavily on DSP cards to do the audio processing to actually have a need of the dual Graphical Processing Units, as the audio software will not be using it as there's no sense in it. Pro tools, Logic, Nuendo, Cubase, VEP5, REAPER, etc have no need for dual GPUs. That means that we who have invested thousands in cards would now have to invests thousands again just to get the required amount of expansion chassis which will be laying around our Machine rooms as most are not rack mountable either.
Truly this design is not catering to the pro in the music industry around the world, which the mac pro has been a staple in thousands of studios with multiple mac pro units for many of them.
Way to go apple.
I'm with ya. It's my bread n butter. I think it's coming and we'll see it with Logic first. I'd betcha.....within the next 18 months....P/Toold, Cubase and Nuendo will follow Logic. For plugins, more tracks, less latency, faster processing....it's inevitable.
I'm waiting (I've got an 09 and 10 Mac Pro with a lot of FW4/800 gear, older Logic plugins we run on 10.6, etc)....I've also got a pretty spendy PCIe interface (Sound card) for a SoundCraft console that I'm leary of....BUT, I've got hope. I tend to buy my software and plugins from the bigger companies with HOPES they'll follow suit...keep up with the times. Regardless, as is, this Machine will SMOKE either of my Pros (My '10 is a fast n loaded 12 core for After Effects primarily....as well as Smoke as we do a LOT of video as well).
Again...I'm with ya, but as an audio producer in Alaska, I do A lot of traveling. I'm excited for this machine's portability (and power in package per pound) when necessary vs. the new rMBPs.
I'm excited....but I know what you mean. Even with our Apogee Symphony gear I'm a bit anxious
