I guess the reason I use that word is that in my mind prosumers are generally those who don't entirely rely on their computers power to make money. For example I would consider someone who perhaps makes short films with their DSLR or does little AE comps in their spare time to be a prosumer. Its like the different between a Sony FS700 and an ARRI Alexa, both are amazing cameras but are still in entirely different leagues. I on the other hand as well as many in the Visual Effects industry rely purely on how fast our machines perform in order to do our jobs, there's not a single task I do that would not be made easier by a faster computer.
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Apple Offers Sneak Peek of Completely Redesigned Mac Pro
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I guess the reason I use that word is that in my mind prosumers are generally those who don't entirely rely on their computers power to make money. For example I would consider someone who perhaps makes short films with their DSLR or does little AE comps in their spare time to be a prosumer. Its like the different between a Sony FS700 and an ARRI Alexa, both are amazing cameras but are still in entirely different leagues. I on the other hand as well as many in the Visual Effects industry rely purely on how fast our machines perform in order to do our jobs, there's not a single task I do that would not be made easier by a faster computer.
Whoa! A 16 lane PCIe adapter has 8 GB/s bandwidth. v3 has 15.75 GB/s bandwidth. Thunderbolt 2 only has 20Gb/s (minus overhead) -- Thats ~ 2GB/s. How is that going to perform any where near the same?
My apologies. I've been around the internet since my activity dropped off sharply from MacRumors. Buzzwords appear to justify going for certain bizzaro niche markets where a few whales might be found. Once again, the "prosumer" one is kicked around to justify Apple's decisions or thought process. I was here in 2005. It hasn't changed much.
Drop me into the jaded old (new) Mac user segment. I was around for the end of PowerPC and the dawn of the iPhone.
Right no pro user would. Or how do you think you can get 20TB inside?? How big should the computer be??
I could fit 20 TB inside my tower and it is just a standard ATX.
9 TB to get into Mordor isn't real anymore. 4-6 TB per drive on the high end is.
So, what about heat ? You don't thing thing to melt before your very eyes.
Seems Apple is also following case design too with the Macbook pro unibody made of aluminium...
..That is till next few years, then they'll do carbon fire like the iPhone to make it more lighter to carry.
Seems Apple is also following case design too with the Macbook pro unibody made of aluminium...
..That is till next few years, then they'll do carbon fire like the iPhone to make it more lighter to carry.
Nope.
PCIe 2.0 x16 x6 slots = 0.5GB/s*16*6 = 48 GB/s
6 x TB 2.0 = 20 Gb/s * 6 = 120 Gb/s = 15 GB/s.
Actually 3x LESS bandwidth. (Not that you'd see 96 PCI lanes off of anything in reality, though. Even dual socket workstations only have 80 lanes, 40 off each CPU.)
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^ we all pretty much new this would occur - the Mac Mini was the hint!
I'm most DEFINITELY not going to miss out on this machine first year like I did when the G5 was first announced and shipping.
Man ... when I read the blogs stating cylindrical ... all I could think about was HARDAC from an old Batman cartoon.
This thing has SICK performance ... and I'm SOOOO GLAD Apple engineers did not forget about OSX! I swear a LOT of us (non-iOS die hards) feared that iOS would control OSX going forward and I'm damn glad it is not!
I want this NOW, and I love Phil's quote " Apple can't innovate my ASS!" LOVE IT ... this is the old school Apple that I LOVE! Phil will stick with Apple until he's like 80yrs old and I for one am SO GLAD!!!
Yes that's generally true, but assuming its an LGA2011 socket you could technically upgrade to any E5 line processor, possibly even future generations if they keep the same socket, assuming the power supply can handle it of course (which I don't know). In fact people are still upgrading the older Mac Pros all the time with slightly newer processors.
On this subject one thing that I found odd when scrolling through the photos on Apple.com/macpro was that there didn't appear to be any mounting mechanism for a CPU cooler of any kind. Based on this photo it would appear the CPU is cooled from the inside using the new "Thermal Core" which would mean no thermal paste required, just a torx wrench it would seem.
I could be wrong but they don't show any other CPU dedicated cooler that I can see, nor does it seem to have enough room within the shell to accept one.
Mac Pro: Polished Black Aluminum
If you check the Apple site, you'll read that the enclosure is polished aluminum, not plastic.
If you check the Apple site, you'll read that the enclosure is polished aluminum, not plastic.
For all the people concerned about existing PCI cards and how they can protect their investment with the new Mac Pro, I would like to find out what cards are still being used.
I'd like to start a list. Please post
I'd like to start a list. Please post
lol I love all the ranting over this, some fair points by all but there are some that are not getting the big picture of the Mac Pro
Firstly you have to admire the design of such a radical machine, every part has been replaced for a good reason.
Ok some are saying WTF no expandability , now as an audio engineer, with a stack of 10 external drives on my desk, a Mac Pro with 4 full Sata bays, 2 x SSD crammned into the second optical bay as well as the standard optical drive , add to that I have a PCIE UAD card & a USB 3 slotted, you might guess I'm one that needs expand ability !
But look the writing has been on the wall for internal drives for ages. I work solely off my SSD's and only use the old SATA drives for storage and backup. It makes perfect sense to design a future PC with no room for old style hard drives, Apple just needs to make sure they can deliver cost effective storage solutions for Thunderbolt.
PCIE graphics cards for video Pro's are the killer, yes an expansion bay might solve it but they are not cheap, however my first thought was like some other poster said I garuntee there is a small round black expansion chassis being designed to match the new Mac Pro as we speak!
Not that solves existing "Pro" users expansion fully, however I think we have to accept now that Apple are a "Prosumer" company, it doesn't make money from me buying a Mac Pro now and again ( althought I have 2 MacBook Pro's and an iMac as well) So if they can make a PC that the odd dad might buy to make video's for the family as well as me to make music they will sell a lot more. Painful but this small form factor will sell a lot more, and future video makers will use FCPX on it very easily.
For me its size is great, I can't tell you how many Artists houses I've had to lug my super heavy Mac Pro up flights of stairs or tours I've done with it racked up. But due to new audio over network tech that is coming in like "Dante" the last tour I used my 13"MacBook pro to record 64 tracks of live audio! this new Mac Pro will be brilliant for those jobs where a MacBook just hasn't got the power. Fair enough I'll have to drag a screen and some external storage but I have to do that now anyway!
As for the price I thought at first blimey this is going to cost thousands, but looking at it it's size I wonder how much tech they have borrowed from third MacBooks , is the flash strage the same form factor ? now the GPU's and CPU might not be cheap but this is next gen chipsets and I have sneaking suspicion they have waited this long so they can get the cheaper new power chipsets, and it might not be as expensive as you think. If they are say sub £2000 and can produce cost effective Thunderbolt chassis expansion it could be as big a hit. Think not just design, video and studios, but schools, colledges or even homes as a central computer sharing out CPU resources. I mean this thing is going to be super fast!
Excuse the long post, a lot of rambling there but I love it, I love the boldness of the design the forward thinking, and yes it does leave some of us Pro's behind but not too much, if I look back at my carreer all of the tools I use to make music have been replaced over and over, for me it looks like the computer of tomorrow, not just an update.
Firstly you have to admire the design of such a radical machine, every part has been replaced for a good reason.
Ok some are saying WTF no expandability , now as an audio engineer, with a stack of 10 external drives on my desk, a Mac Pro with 4 full Sata bays, 2 x SSD crammned into the second optical bay as well as the standard optical drive , add to that I have a PCIE UAD card & a USB 3 slotted, you might guess I'm one that needs expand ability !
But look the writing has been on the wall for internal drives for ages. I work solely off my SSD's and only use the old SATA drives for storage and backup. It makes perfect sense to design a future PC with no room for old style hard drives, Apple just needs to make sure they can deliver cost effective storage solutions for Thunderbolt.
PCIE graphics cards for video Pro's are the killer, yes an expansion bay might solve it but they are not cheap, however my first thought was like some other poster said I garuntee there is a small round black expansion chassis being designed to match the new Mac Pro as we speak!
Not that solves existing "Pro" users expansion fully, however I think we have to accept now that Apple are a "Prosumer" company, it doesn't make money from me buying a Mac Pro now and again ( althought I have 2 MacBook Pro's and an iMac as well) So if they can make a PC that the odd dad might buy to make video's for the family as well as me to make music they will sell a lot more. Painful but this small form factor will sell a lot more, and future video makers will use FCPX on it very easily.
For me its size is great, I can't tell you how many Artists houses I've had to lug my super heavy Mac Pro up flights of stairs or tours I've done with it racked up. But due to new audio over network tech that is coming in like "Dante" the last tour I used my 13"MacBook pro to record 64 tracks of live audio! this new Mac Pro will be brilliant for those jobs where a MacBook just hasn't got the power. Fair enough I'll have to drag a screen and some external storage but I have to do that now anyway!
As for the price I thought at first blimey this is going to cost thousands, but looking at it it's size I wonder how much tech they have borrowed from third MacBooks , is the flash strage the same form factor ? now the GPU's and CPU might not be cheap but this is next gen chipsets and I have sneaking suspicion they have waited this long so they can get the cheaper new power chipsets, and it might not be as expensive as you think. If they are say sub £2000 and can produce cost effective Thunderbolt chassis expansion it could be as big a hit. Think not just design, video and studios, but schools, colledges or even homes as a central computer sharing out CPU resources. I mean this thing is going to be super fast!
Excuse the long post, a lot of rambling there but I love it, I love the boldness of the design the forward thinking, and yes it does leave some of us Pro's behind but not too much, if I look back at my carreer all of the tools I use to make music have been replaced over and over, for me it looks like the computer of tomorrow, not just an update.
http://anandtech.com/show/7049/intel-thunderbolt-2-everything-you-need-to-know
I was surprised that all it took for Thunderbolt 2 was combining the channels for 20 Gb/s instead of the existing 10 Gb/s. Still, it's not PCIe 3.0. That's what I wanted along with others.
"it's plastic!" no, read: http://www.apple.com/mac-pro/
"thunderbolt not fast enough" it's thunderbolt 2, 20 GB bi-directional throughput: http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2420031,00.asp ...it has TWO channels as well, 3 ports for each channel, 6 total, 36 devices can be connected.
Here are some current thunderbolt devices, but, I am sure there are people making thunderbolt 2 devices right now that will be ready at time Mac Pro is available http://www.sonnettech.com/product/thunderbolt/(expansion card boxes here for old timers that have to have cards)
http://eshop.macsales.com/shop/Thunderbolt/
need external optical drive? omg. here: http://eshop.macsales.com/shop/optical-drives/superdrives/
you're a bunch of winers complaining about no more floppies or serial ports.
going external is the best move to make. period.
no, read: http://www.apple.com/mac-pro/"thunderbolt not fast enough"
it's thunderbolt 2, 20 GB bi-directional throughput: http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2420031,00.asp ...it has TWO channels as well, 3 ports for each channel, 6 total, 36 devices can be connected. Here are some current thunderbolt devices, but, I am sure there are people making thunderbolt 2 devices right now that will be ready at time Mac Pro is available http://www.sonnettech.com/product/thunderbolt/(expansion card boxes here for old timers that have to have cards)
http://eshop.macsales.com/shop/Thunderbolt/
need external optical drive? omg. here: http://eshop.macsales.com/shop/optical-drives/superdrives/
you're a bunch of winers complaining about no more floppies or serial ports.
going external is the best move to make. period.
Agreed. It does look like the CPU is mounted "facing" the internal cooling which goes along with their marketing. That doesn't necessarily mean they don't use thermal paste.
On a personal note, due to the long periods of time between computer purchases and the lack of significant speed increases in the CPUs during those times, I've given up on the CPU upgrade path. By the time I came around to upgrading a CPU, the CPU I wanted required a new motherboard. But that's just me.
This Mac Pro excites me because the two GPUs they're putting in there is more "powerful" than anything on the market currently for the majority of users. After all, how many people have a 4K monitor? I believe it'll be a "long" time before we, as in the critical mass, will exceed the power these two GPUs will provide. Or maybe more practically, can afford to have more than one 4K monitor attached to our Mac Pro.
Had they done so there would have been complaining. Apple's job is to innovate and make the best computer they can. The upgrades you speak of could be achieved by adding cards are changing the processor in the current model. You can still do that. Thunderbolt would have required a completely new motherboard design, and if you complain about buying TB drives then there is little chance you would have paid to upgrade. A system is only as good as it's weakest link and legacy hard drives would have dragged down the raw speed of this computer and while thunderbolt drives are fast the internal Flash drives are what they really needed to fulfill its true potential. Keep in mind that Thunderbolts target speed is 100 GBps bi-directional. What Apple showed today for both the Mac and iOS is just a new beginning.
I agree, DVD is dead and for those who must have it there are loads of options. Just the other day I wanted to rip a movie I recorded off the TV. Put the DVD into a PC on the same network, shared the drive and thanks to HandBrake 15 minutes later I had a 600 Mb mp4 sitting on my iMac ready to watch.
I'm have the 2012 since January and only a few times needed DVD, each time just shared one on my network to install software or rip a DVD. Most power users who buy the new Pro will likely have a 2nd computer they can borrow the DVD from if needed. For those needing one full time just get an external USB on or even go out and get a BluRay unit from another maker.
plastic? said who?
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OPEN TOP!
In less than a weeks this new Mac Pro will be FULL OF DUST.
So it's only pratical to make it look like a trash can, because you will have to empty it every few days.
Thanks
I had a Mac Cube, never had any issues with dust. It had an open top as well.
TOTALLY AGREE!
All of your supposed "pros" sound like a room full of emotional preschool children. Apple has given us a totally modular Mac Pro to satisfy almost everyone out there... but in order to see it as such, you have to pull your heads out of your collective a**es and look at the opportunity this machine affords. The graphics processing is ridiculous, it powers 3x 4k displays - but boohoo, we don't know if the graphics card is upgradeable. Forget that we've been whining for years about the Mac Pro not having the latest graphics technology...
Yes, it has 4 memory slots. Why? Because Apple has determined that the majority of those who purchased their Mac Pros didn't even make use of all the available memory slots. PCI slots? Don't get me started... most Mac Pro owners have, at most, 1-2 cards installed in their huge cases. The point here is that the typical (i.e., majority) Mac Pro user is not going to require server rack mounting, or 256 GB of RAM, or internal expansion. Apple has decided to give us a CORE - and that is exactly what the new Mac Pro is. It's a core, to which you add what you need. It's perfect for everyone in that regard.
And everyone is presuming that the Mac Pro is going to cost the same or more than the current model... I suspect, with all of the shedding that this new Mac Pro has undergone, that it will come in at a lower price that will shock a lot of people. And, perhaps one of the most important aspects of the Mac Pro - it's assembled here in the USA. But you pros wouldn't care about that, you would rather keep shipping jobs overseas.
All in all, this is a tremendous upgrade that is going to make a lot - the majority - of Mac Pro users happy. The few niche and fringe users who are mad they can't rack mount it or can't put their crappy sound card inside the cylinder, and are so quick to jump to conclusions without even seeing what other accessories and peripherals Apple is going to also ship with this product, can go fly a kite because there aren't enough of you to matter.