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The headless mid sized mac desktop machine

Jamo12

Jamo12

macrumors 6502
Original poster
Mar 23, 2009
332
217
Ohio
I know everyone on this forum right now is asking for a headless mini Mac Pro. Apple tried to do this with the G4 cube for about a year and a half. I am aware that it was about 10 years ago, but with the failure of that, plus the fact that most people don't really need/would know how to use it to it's potential, apple will stay away from it because it would not make them nearly as much money as just keeping the iMac and Mac Pro.

I honestly can't see the reason why people on this site would think that apple would sell a lot of them...

Enlighten me please.
 
There are a lot less calls for it now the gap between the iMac and Mac Pro has closed, in fact I don't even know of posts talking about it recently. There were certainly a lot when you could only choose between a dual core mobile based desktop and a dual socket high end workstation. As far as performance goes, there is no room for such a device in Apples line up. Apple put the hardware people seemed to want in the single socket Mac Pro, they just used a bigger form factor and priced it $1,000 above everyone else.
 
What Apple could do in my view is selling a basic Mac Pro with one generation Xeons down at a basic price that matches what they had in G5 days.

So when the Mac Pro goes to 5600/3600 chips they should do a low cost 3520 quad at 1500$. They did this with the late 2004 1,8 GHz SP machine.
But I doubt that they would do this nowadays where the desktop business is dwindling into a niche that gets smaller and smaller each year. They simply have no focus on the MP and no desire to fight for customers at all.
 
gugucom said:
What Apple could do in my view is selling a basic Mac Pro with one generation Xeons down at a basic price that matches what they had in G5 days.

So when the Mac Pro goes to 5600/3600 chips they should do a low cost 3520 quad at 1500$. They did this with the late 2004 1,8 GHz SP machine.
But I doubt that they would do this nowadays where the desktop business is dwindling into a niche that gets smaller and smaller each year. They simply have no focus on the MP and no desire to fight for customers at all.
Click to expand...

I would not be surprised if the towers disappear all together and the only thing out there would be the iMacs and laptops.
 
JesterJJZ said:
Won't happen. The MacPro is used heavily by the audio/visual world.
Click to expand...

For Apple nothing matters but profit. My personal guess is that Apple will one day terminate the Mac Pro when they have a big Intel Tock redesign on their hands and cannot justify the development costs or cannot shove the cost to their manufacturing partner. If you sell 100,000 MPs its profitable but if sales fall to 5,000-10,000 MPs units the cost of the Pro apps will probably kill the thing. So one can speculate whether it will hit with Sandy Bridge (32 nm new architecture) or two years later with the 22 nm. Nothing is guaranteed to continue as it was in a market economy.:(
 
gugucom said:
For Apple nothing matters but profit. My personal guess is that Apple will one day terminate the Mac Pro when they have a big Intel Tock redesign on their hands and cannot justify the development costs or cannot shove the cost to their manufacturing partner. If you sell 100,000 MPs its profitable but if sales fall to 5,000-10,000 MPs units the cost of the Pro apps will probably kill the thing. So one can speculate whether it will hit with Sandy Bridge (32 nm new architecture) or two years later with the 22 nm. Nothing is guaranteed to continue as it was in a market economy.:(
Click to expand...

You have to take into account that a large percentage of people buying Mac Pros are doing so from 3rd parties who have them at less ridiculous prices. Many people I know that have them have bought used or refurbished (not from Apple). I would think with the sales dwindling this fast it would become obvious for the folks in Cupertino that the market they are trying to reach (however lethargically) isn't going to be tricked so easily into buying marketing ******** to justify an overpriced machine. If Apple wants to make more sales to high end customers, they need to increase value, not profit.
 
I expect there's some room to move on price, if Apple needed to. But rather than decreasing prices on Mac Pros, Apple has actually increased prices in recent years. That tells me the Pro is still selling pretty well to those who can justify the expense.
 
I find it far more likely Apple would discontinue the iMac before the Mac Pro, as consumers are dropping desktops more and more, but the Pros will always need a workstation.
 
TuffLuffJimmy said:
I find it far more likely Apple would discontinue the iMac before the Mac Pro, as consumers are dropping desktops more and more, but the Pros will always need a workstation.
Click to expand...

No, quite the opposite. Even though people are migrating to the mobile side, the iMac is one of the most sold computers at Apple. It is ignorant to think that a company would act against one of it's most important bottom lines.
 
TuffLuffJimmy said:
I find it far more likely Apple would discontinue the iMac before the Mac Pro, as consumers are dropping desktops more and more, but the Pros will always need a workstation.
Click to expand...

Of course pros need workstations but if Apple's value proposition keeps dropping like a lead balloon the pros will buy Sun and Dell workstations. Pro software manufacturers like Adobe offer their products for Windows as well. So if your figures don't add up anymore people will vote with their pocket books.
 
Techhie said:
No, quite the opposite. Even though people are migrating to the mobile side, the iMac is one of the most sold computers at Apple. It is ignorant to think that a company would act against one of it's most important bottom lines.
Click to expand...
In the recent quarter concluded in September, 74% of Apple's computer sales were portables. So the iMac is not likely "one of the most sold computers at Apple." More likely, it's the MacBook.

But in any case, I doubt Apple will quit selling iMacs if only because it's an icon for them. I'd bet the Mac minis outsell both iMacs and Mac Pros combined (in units sold), but few people outside of Apple know for sure.
 
Undo Redo said:
I'd bet the Mac minis outsell both iMacs and Mac Pros combined (in units sold).....
Click to expand...

This is very unlikely, IMO. You only have to look at the upgrade frequency to see that the Mac mini is far less important for Apple than the iMac. The iMac has a unique selling proposition with the all in one design. No cable clutter and a propriatory design style helps it to an iconic position in the Apple Mac lineup.
 
gugucom said:
This is very unlikely, IMO. You only have to look at the upgrade frequency to see that the Mac mini is far less important for Apple than the iMac. The iMac has a unique selling proposition with the all in one design. No cable clutter and a propriatory design style helps it to an iconic position in the Apple Mac lineup.
Click to expand...

The upgrade frequency has little to do with how well it sells. Apple works on margins (like all computer companies) the longer they wait to upgrade the more margin they get per machine. The Mac minis sell extremely well, as noted by Amazon.com.

So the mac mini is anything but a poor seller, especially since it outsells the iMac. I'm sure the hypothesis that it outsells the iMac and Mac Pro is spot on too.
 
TuffLuffJimmy said:
The upgrade frequency has little to do with how well it sells. Apple works on margins (like all computer companies) the longer they wait to upgrade the more margin they get per machine.
Click to expand...

You may hold any opinion you like but there are some holes in your logic. Life cycle in computers are bloody short and competitors upgrade in quarterly intervalls. So Apple's unique philosophy of combining firmware with hardware steps hurts them to some extend. They tend to compensate this by higher upgrade frequencies for their high volume products. By this token both the mini and the Pro are likely to have a lot less sales than the iMac. If you don't believe this I will give you some Apple quotes from their last 10-K.

Mac® Pro
The Mac Pro desktop computer is targeted at business and professional customers and is designed to meet the
performance, expansion, and networking needs of the most demanding Mac user.

iMac®
The iMac desktop computer is targeted at consumer, education and business customers. All iMac models include a built-in iSight video
camera, AirPort Extreme 802.11n wireless networking, Bluetooth 2.1 and come with the new wireless Magic
Mouse, the first mouse with Multi-Touch technology.

Mac® mini
The Mac mini is a desktop computer measuring 6.5 by 6.5 by 2-inches.
Click to expand...

This is Apple's product description for investors and analysts. I left the development detail out because they do not characterise Apple's attitude towards the product. The Mac mini description doesn't sound too enthusiastic to me.
 
gugucom said:
You may hold any opinion you like but there are some holes in your logic. Life cycle in computers are bloody short and competitors upgrade in quarterly intervalls. So Apple's unique philosophy of combining firmware with hardware steps hurts them to some extend. They tend to compensate this by higher upgrade frequencies for their high volume products. By this token both the mini and the Pro are likely to have a lot less sales than the iMac. If you don't believe this I will give you some Apple quotes from their last 10-K.
Click to expand...

Oh really? So people who are looking to test the waters with OS X (the largest computer market for Apple right now) will look at a Mac or.... yeah that's right. There are no competitors. So someone with a keyboard, monitor and mouse looking for a Mac will first consider a mini.

Believe me, I've spent a lot more time around here than you.
 
My guess is the mac pro is safe, they wouldn't cut it for many reasons. Even losing money on each mac pro made or the numbers dwindle, more money would be lost in the software sales from apple. Plus take into account the exposure at major audio / visual production companies and other users of the mac pro to apples hardware and software and it would be more detrimental to apple to lose their flagship pro machine.

Just my opinion, but I would be surprised if they killed off the mac pro.
 
gugucom said:
This is very unlikely, IMO. You only have to look at the upgrade frequency to see that the Mac mini is far less important for Apple than the iMac. The iMac has a unique selling proposition with the all in one design.
Click to expand...
The iMac is Steve's baby. It saved the company in 1998-1999. And Steve lead the team that developed Apple's first all-in-one computer, the Macintosh. So sure, it's going to get a lot Apple's development attention.

As for the mini being neglected...it's a low margin product which tends to rob sales from other high-dollar products, so less money is spent on it, regardless of how well it sells.

I have a feeling Steve Jobs would like to discontinue the Mac mini, but it would be a hard thing to explain to stockholders if it's selling a million units per year. And to the original topic, there's no way he wants to introduce another desktop Mac (which would rob sales from the precious iMac) when desktops represent only a quarter of Mac sales.

...all just my opinion, of course.
 
This thread is veering way off topic. I'll dip my toe into the sales speculation fray and say that iMacs outsell Minis. The thing is, iMacs have become amazing value (24" refurbs under $999) and are just plain gorgeous! Yes, the Mini is 'cute' but the iMac is modern art for your house - even the older white plastic ones still look great.

Having said that, I'd love a headless midsize (xMac). I don't do professional work, yet I require 4 native DVI outputs and really prefer having 6 SATA ports. I guess I could daisy chain external drives or yank the optical drive (like I've done in my MBP) but I don't need ECC memory or XEON power at all.
 
Off topic much?

Lol, I made this topic so that people could explain why they wanted a mid-sized apple tower... Not to fight over which computer sells best/which will die first...

So lets stay on topic shall we?
 
Jamo12 said:
I know everyone on this forum right now is asking for a headless mini Mac Pro. Apple tried to do this with the G4 cube for about a year and a half. I am aware that it was about 10 years ago, but with the failure of that, plus the fact that most people don't really need/would know how to use it to it's potential, apple will stay away from it because it would not make them nearly as much money as just keeping the iMac and Mac Pro.

I honestly can't see the reason why people on this site would think that apple would sell a lot of them...

Enlighten me please.
Click to expand...

Headless means that there is no display output of any kind. It's commonly used for clustering and in render farms. It's a very specialized configuration and represents less than about one eighth of one percent of folks' desires and needs.

I've never seen anyone ask for or about anything like that from Apple. And it wouldn't be feasible for Apple an all-in-one solution creator, to offer something that is less than a complete personal computing solution. It would totally confuse Apple users most of whom are not savvy to what a headless system is nor how to make use of it.

Additionally headless systems are usually incorporated where more that one are acting together and so Apple's usual over-pricing policy wouldn't fit this scheme very well at all.


If per chance by headless you mean that it's sold without a monitor or built-in display Mac Pros already are filling this niche very nicely. Mac Pros are low-middle to middle class desk-top workstations. Mini covers the low-class DT niche. What other niches are there?
 
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