Apple Developing Narrower, Rackmountable Mac Pro Prototypes?

[Grimace]

Guys, no one said that Apple was considering making the Mac Pro into a formal rackmount server -- you can already do that on your own.

The only thing that was said was that the case may be smaller, and that because it might be less than 19" across, you could toss it in a rack.

Nothing was said about rack ears, a 1U, 3U or 6U chassis, just that the case would be smaller. 3rd party companies could do whatever they want to make it rack-compatible from there.

 

[rdlink]

And how do you operate it? A server can be accessed from a workstation but a Mac Pro IS a workstation, it's not a server. It's not a logical step. I have a professional photographer in the family, with a Mac Pro. He needs to load his RAWs onto his Mac for post processing. How to do this if that Mac is in another room, in a rack Very inconvenient if you ask me.

Not sure you quite get it. The idea here would be that the one machine could be used either as a workstation, or as a server. You could use it in a SOHO situation as a workstation/under the desk server. An enterprise could configure it as a rack mounted server. One assembly line. Two products.

 

[CIA]

I want to know what type of video you are doing because we sure don't need that and we do high end video editing for National Geographic/Discovery/Smithsonian.

Unless you are doing Hollywood stuff, I see no need for half the stuff you listed.

More internals and PCIE slots? For what? Almost all of our clients are delivering tapeless now and on externals. Dual optical bays? Seriously? Fibre is a must if you are in a post house.



Seriously? We also do full DVD high end hollywood type authoring at my facility (have been for 10+ Years) and Blu-Ray authoring and we have no need for internal optical super drives.

You guys seriously need to unhinge yourselves from those internal drives...lol

I work for a small TV station, we can't afford a $30K storage array. My MacPro (2008 3.2Ghz 8 core) has:
Internal: 2x1TB boot drives Mirrored. 2x750GB random storage drives.
Added DVD Burner (our Blu-Ray burner is in another Mac Pro)
Factory DVD Burner
Video Card
PCIe FW 400 and FW800 Combo Card
Sonnet eSATA card
Backpane adaptor running a pair of eSATA drives (both 150GB Raptors in RAID 0) off the internal unused Optical Bay SATA ports. (Video Render 1)
The Sonnet card is hooked to a pair RAIDs. 10 Drives in a old CD Duplicator with a Addonics ports multipliers. One is 4x640GB Video Storage drive RAID, the other is 4X 500GB drives. The 500's are actually a pair of 1TB RAIDS, one for Audio Render, the Other for longer term Raw Video Storage. Finally 2 other drives in that external each have their own SATA connections to the Sonnet card (Audio Storage, and Graphics Storage.)

Fibre Channel card hooked to the legacy Avid MediaNet or whatever it's called, for the ooooolllld footage from before our final cut switch last year.

Plus about 5 firewire 800 drives for backing everything up, and a firewire HDV deck, and once in awhile a control surface for Audio Mixing. We shoot tape still (HDV) because like I said, we are a small station that can't afford new prosumer card based cameras. Man would I love some though. We still get a lot of stuff delivered on tape (beta, yuck) and DV format. We do shoot some commercials occasionally using a Pani P2 based camera and a DSLR, but the road warrior cameras are still tape.
I want internal stuff because my desk is already cluttered enough. I'm constantly burning 2 DVD's at once to deliver footage to people, both in data and video. We shoot a lot for the US Ski Team, and when the world cup comes to the USA other stations always want footage. Uploading 19GB over a pair of "Shotgunned" DSL lines (400K upload, max) takes awhile, so most of the time we overnight it.

And that's just my desk. The other workstations use some drives on my machine as cold storage for finished projects. Between packages, 2 live shows, and special feature 30 or 60 minute long form shows we crunch a lot of video. No it's not big hollywood studio stuff, but the sheer volume of footage going in and out is a hassle.

I agree the future is tapeless, but where do you store all that raw? We fill 6TB of hard drive space every 6 months. During the Sundance Film Festival which happens here, we were ingesting nearly 12 hours of footage and producing 6 hours of content (live shows, pre-taped shows, packaged shows) a day. While most everything we have is on tape, going to find those (usually poorly labeled) tapes, capturing, and editing takes forever, so we try and keep as much raw as possible on the drives for quick access.

At some point I need to setup a render station to take all the prores finished projects and downconvert to H264 for storage on Blu-ray discs. But that's not really a long term solution since any burned disc will eventually fail. I don't really want the expense of HDV backups, but it's the cheapest loooong term solution I can think of.

 

[LarryC]

It's not going to happen. If Apple was still interested in offering a rack mountable system they would have redesigned the X-Serve instead of the Mac Pro.

Where is the logic in dropping a perfectly fine rack-mountable system, because apparently it wasn't sold enough, and then convert the Mac Pro workstation to... a rack-mountable system?! They could've dropped the Mac Pro and rebrand X-Serve to Mac Pro instead. Same result.

He makes a very good point. I do not understand why so many people want to make everything so small. I saw a post recently where a guy wanted Apple to drop the optical drive and use nothing but SSD in the iMac! Maybe I'm getting old and senile, but it makes no sense to me. And SSD's are still too expensive to be practical.

 

[firestarter]

CIA...

That setup screams 'old, slow legacy stuff'.

Why should a new iteration of the MacPro be a hostage to someone wanting a housing for 6 of their old, slow and small drives?

Why support 3 or 4 eSATA and Firewire expansion PCIe cards when that can all be done over a single Thunderbolt cable?

Sounds like your setup needs a bit of a spring clean. A newer, smaller box would force you to consolidate onto a smaller number of bigger and faster drives (those 150GB raptors are slow by today's standards).

 

[Joshuarocks]

doubtful, this is a key switcher market... it would be crazy to axe the very thing that will continue to switch the PC builders/gamers over the next 5 years... this is a key ingredient to apple taking the industry over with time.

I think the iMac will take care of gamers and builders.. the mac pro is NOT a gaming device, it is a high class workstation that is designed for use with using and manipulating multi-threaded pro and audio apps.. Personally, I could care less about a new case design.. right now I just care that I can prolong the 6-core machine I have now.. and for my purposes, which are far and few between, the 6 core does everything I throw at it for a DAILY, email based machine.. I use it for dvd encoding, NO VIDEO EDITING(this area does not interest me one iota). If anything, i would use it for photography and everyday stuff, such as internet surfing, researching, writing books, etc.

I only got this for its expandability, as I despise an all in one machine like the iMac - if the screen goes, the whole thing needs to be replaced or repaired.. all in one desktops such as the imac are a dead end as one can't upgrade the processor easily if not at all..

Everyone please excuse me for my attitudes, I am going through a real tough time right now and have 103 temperature at the moment.

 

[Jbgloss]

I think the iMac will take care of gamers and builders.. the mac pro is NOT a gaming device, it is a high class workstation that is designed for use with using and manipulating multi-threaded pro and audio apps.. Personally, I could care less about a new case design.. right now I just care that I can prolong the 6-core machine I have now.. and for my purposes, which are far and few between, the 6 core does everything I throw at it for a DAILY, email based machine.. I use it for dvd encoding, NO VIDEO EDITING(this area does not interest me one iota). If anything, i would use it for photography and everyday stuff, such as internet surfing, researching, writing books, etc.

I only got this for its expandability, as I despise an all in one machine like the iMac - if the screen goes, the whole thing needs to be replaced or repaired.. all in one desktops such as the imac are a dead end as one can't upgrade the processor easily if not at all..

Everyone please excuse me for my attitudes, I am going through a real tough time right now and have 103 temperature at the moment.

AMEN - 2 months into my Hex 3.33 I do minimal FCP and love this machine....I do just about what you do writing, ton's of internet work, my podcast, etc.... Same thoughts as you....

DRINK a lot of fluids bro and get well

JB

 

[goMac]

doubtful, this is a key switcher market... it would be crazy to axe the very thing that will continue to switch the PC builders/gamers over the next 5 years... this is a key ingredient to apple taking the industry over with time.

My sarcasm must not have been obvious enough.

 

[deconstruct60]

Why spend hundreds of thousands of pounds on redevelopment for an audience of, lets say 50,000 customers when you can spend the same amount on an audience of 1million+ customers.

Simply shaving the handles off the current Mac Pro would make it significantly easier to rackmount. They don't need to spend 100,000's to do that. They Don't need to create two boxes or another box. Just one box that is slightly shorter. "Rackable" is a different market than the pure rackmount market.

The shaving the 3" off the current Mac Pro width (when standing vertical) is the dubious part of the rumor. ( unless chop down number of PCI-e slots and turn them horizontal , it seems like dropping below height of PCI-e card + clearance + case sidewall . ) Shaving 3" off the current Mac Pro when horizontal is exactly what is needed. I suppose there could have been a prototype where they explored the concept of dumping slots, but I don't think it would get much traction in the Mac Pro market.

They could perhaps shave off a 1.1" to make it 4U ( 7") but probably already expanding into the depth dimension to shrink the vertical height.
However, they'd probably have to abandon the easily removable CPU daughtercard concept.

 

[Ryth]

CIA...

That setup screams 'old, slow legacy stuff'.

Why should a new iteration of the MacPro be a hostage to someone wanting a housing for 6 of their old, slow and small drives?

Why support 3 or 4 eSATA and Firewire expansion PCIe cards when that can all be done over a single Thunderbolt cable?

Sounds like your setup needs a bit of a spring clean. A newer, smaller box would force you to consolidate onto a smaller number of bigger and faster drives (those 150GB raptors are slow by today's standards).

Yah CIA, I think you'd be surprised with what little you can get by on these days in smaller boxes and with Thunderbolt.

And I agree with you, I hate tapes...lol. I wish we would go to 1 damn standard but we know that is how people make their money...no standards. I'm so sick of all the formats and all the output formats. I just want 1080p and that's it. Burn the rest.

 

[Joshuarocks]

AMEN - 2 months into my Hex 3.33 I do minimal FCP and love this machine....I do just about what you do writing, ton's of internet work, my podcast, etc.... Same thoughts as you....

DRINK a lot of fluids bro and get well

JB

Thanks.. I am about to sign off.. My neck is burning up.. I just took two ibuprofen so I hope this works.. I am glad you and I have something in common. gnite.

 

[JoeG4]

I always thought the case was one of the best things about the Mac Pro.

If only Apple would do what tons of people have been whining and screaming and begging Apple for - shove a regular i7 + nice board with some PCIe slots + REGULAR DDR3 in there and sell it as a Mac Sorta Pro.

 

[JoeG4]

1080p is such a low resolution -_- BAH! You stink.

WTF is wrong with lots of expandability? If I can shove 4 drives in my machine instead of having 4 externals.. heck yea!

 

[CIA]

Yah CIA, I think you'd be surprised with what little you can get by on these days in smaller boxes and with Thunderbolt.

And I agree with you, I hate tapes...lol. I wish we would go to 1 damn standard but we know that is how people make their money...no standards. I'm so sick of all the formats and all the output formats. I just want 1080p and that's it. Burn the rest.

Ya, you know what, it is OLD and Slow, and Legacy. Because that's what small (under 20) staff TV stations usually have. We're not WNBC, we are a small town TV station that is held together by ducktape and fishing wire. I would LOVE a brand new station with cutting edge equipment, but that's just not in the cards when we are fighting to stay above water. So we use what we have available and it works. I didn't buy that whole setup all at once. (yes, it's my PERSONAL setup, since when started I refused to use the PC based Avid system.) It was pieced together over the last few years as we slimmed staff over the recession and sold off Avid machines to buy new macs. Thunderbolt is awesome, but right now it's 1998 all over again, when my first DV deck and Premiere running B&W G3 system cost $10,000 put together. Is there a single SHIPPING thunderbolt device yet? No, and the first few that do ship will cost a zillion dollars that we don't have. I love the promise of thunderbolt, but I'm more excited for 2014 thunderbolt when devices are cheap and plentiful. Right now hard drives are cheap, tape is cheap, and legacy firewire cases are all over the place. It's old, legacy, but here and essentially free. If I was swimming in cash it would be a different story.

So for the moment I'd prefer a single big box that does the job of many less expensive boxes that add up in cost to more then the one box. I need a box that I can add to over the years since buying new $2,000 machines every year is out of the question. Our Edit bay is 2 Mac Pro's, and a pair of 27" 2.93 iMac i7's. A G4 for Cold Storage, and a G5 for when interns need to learn the basics of Final Cut. (also a few OLD HP Avid Workstations from 2003 or 2004.)

 

[deconstruct60]

Reducing the Mac Pro's size is a huge step backwards!.....
The only thing that will increase is HEAT! That will lead to reliability problems as more stress will be put on internal components with the increase in HEAT!

No. Much more likely to increase the noise. More noise getting rid of he heat, but the temperature levels could be made to remain constant. Thinner means using smaller diameter fans which will either be more in number , blow harder , or both. All of which tends to increase noise.

Not to mention if you do plan on using a Mac Pro as a server, redundant power supplies are a must! That means more space is needed!

Redundant power supplies are generally not a standard feature for most x86 servers sold. It isn't a must (requirement); it is an optional feature need if want to sell to the relatively small subset of the market that wants them. (e.g, none of Google's, Microsoft's ,etc search/cloud servers have dual power supplies and they number in the many, many thousands. ) It isn't necessary for a rackable Mac Pro. The objective would not to be a perfect replacement for the XServe in call case just some. All the Mac Pro has to do to remain healthy is add some , not all , of the old XServe buyers to those already buying it as a workstation. Being rackable is just an optional feature to slightly expand the market. Not the primary objective.

 

[doctor-don]

It seems the present size could be reduced to the 5 x 19 size without turning the optical drives vertical. The tower configuration would still be oriented vertically, and many mounts are available to attach it under a desk. Optical drives don't need to be phased out because they are needed for writing CD / DVD back-ups

What I would like to see is an air filtration system that will prevent all of the dust from getting into everything inside my MP. I can add my own filter, but that might not be advisable due to the fan having to work overtime, and that could lead to heat problems.

Perhaps the overall weight could be reduced in this rumored size reduction.

When prices drop substantially, SSDs will be a good storage plan. However, that may not be in the next couple of years, so the present drive bay size should not be reduced.

 

[skyline r34]

i think the Mac Pro is going to remain the same just with upgraded CPU, GPU and thunder bolt but the Mac Pro server will have redesign case but who know until it comes out

 

[toujames]

And I give you....

Steve: "Introducing, the new iRack!"

 

[abhimat.gautam]

Anyone make any good mockups yet?

 

[JesterJJZ]

During the Sundance Film Festival which happens here, we were ingesting nearly 12 hours of footage and producing 6 hours of content (live shows, pre-taped shows, packaged shows) a day.

Not to sound harsh or anything, but maybe you guys should be charging more for your services. The way you described how much work you guys are doing over there, you should be able to afford a new MacPro for everyone there...and maybe a couple grip trucks...

 

[beangibbs]

I just don't wanna see the Mac Pro...key word here is "Pro"...iOS-ified.
This isn't a consumer level device, it's not for buying it to show off the latest Apple toy.
It is a workhorse, it is a behemoth, it is the king of kings when it comes to Mac desktops. Size-as long as it has power, i could care less how big it is/gets within reason. I want power, expansion capabilities, no SSD...especially no SSD...
I don't mind solid state stuff in the iOS devices...I've even come around lately to liking solid state stuff to a certain degree more than in past months...but I don't want it exclusively in the Pro. If prices come down...which they will over time...cool. I'd put two HDDs in and two SSDs in.
Optical drives...I want them in the unit. But if they can make it write or read CDs just as fast outside of it...(I admit not being educated on the differences performance-wise between an internal and external optical drive) I'd be fine getting it separate.

I'm very excited, in any case to see what's going to come of the (supposed) update...if nothing else to ogle some shiny new piece of hardware.

 

[LightSpeed1]

Not gonna happen

And I hope it doesn't.

 

[seek3r]

You are right, I fold. I know nothing about 19" racks (1.80 meters tall and 150 kg. in weight), and nothing about conditioned server rooms with dual power feeds at all. Flight cases with equipment I also know nothing about. I'm sorry I'm doubting your knowledge and insight.

You do realize "rack *mountable*" doesn't mean "has to be in a rack to function"?

Over the years I've had plenty of mountable equipment that for one reason or another didn't live in the machine room, or lived on a shelf in the machine room instead of on a rack (or on a table in the case of several servers and one particularly finicky disk array a while back).... Simply giving the option of rack mounting doesn't dictate it has to be racked remotely in your datacenter!

 

[grue]

How utterly retarded does one have to be to get to the point where they put workstations on top of the desk instead of on the floor where they belong? Do you really need to put your Apple computer next to your overpriced, glossy Apple display to prove yourself?

 

[beangibbs]

Pros and cons to both.m
On desktop, you don't risk kicking it...but it takes up space that can be used for other stuff...speakers, screen, scanner, printer, wacom...
On the floor, it's out of the way, but more risk to kicking it, or, if you have a cup of coffee or something on the desk, you risk it spilling and going in the tower.
I'd put mine on my desk if I had one just because that's how one of the desktop design labs is set up at the college, and I'm just used to that.