iFixit Shares 2019 Mac Pro Teardown: 'A Masterclass in Repairability'

[redheeler]

Give up man,
Like you I would love to have it but it won’t happen. Apple’s strategy is if you want a highly upgradable machine that you’ll keep for almost a decade, then pay the high price upfront for that privilege.
honestly I have a 2010 MP that still rocks. If you divide the high upfront costs in a span of almost 10 years it ends up a reasonable purchase and a bargain if you make good money out of it.
I’m just thankful Apple did not give up on the MP.

Apple doesn't provide ten years of OS support for a Mac. They should, but it never happens. Usually that number is 7 or 8 years, but in some rare cases 9 years (the 2010 5,1 is one of these rare cases, as for a long time there was no modular Mac Pro to replace it and they were still being sold as a current model into 2013).

After that you're left with unsupported methods only, and no guarantee that things will work properly.

 

[CrapShack]

See? That wasn't so hard - now do it for my iPhone and Macbook and we are good.

Kudos to Apple for the new MacPro, it is amazing (and damn well should be)... but "That wasn't so hard"?! Really? Probably hundreds of Apple people worked about three years on this. And they had to double the price of the finished product to get it to this level. Do you actually WANT a phone that costs two to three THOUSAND dollars and a Macbook that STARTS at $3000...?

 

[0837990]

I really think iFixit need to revaluate how they view repairability. Docking a point because of a critical security feature seems harsh, especially in light of their criticism of iCloud activation locks.

I agree Apple, and the rest of the industry, have a lot of improving to do, but some features of our tech needs to be intentionally locked down for the safety of our data/stuff.

Theres no reason to tie a drive to a physical chip. BitLocker or other hard drive encryption methods can be used, and the drives can still be portable and unlockable in other devices. Also, this is a stationary computer, and not a laptop, which redecues the likelihood for theft substantially.

the T2 integration could be a feature that the very very few that need or want it could enable themselves.

 

[NewUsername]

Kudos to Apple for the new MacPro, it is amazing (and damn well should be)... but "That wasn't so hard"?! Really? Probably hundreds of Apple people worked about three years on this. And they had to double the price of the finished product to get it to this level. Do you actually WANT a phone that costs about TWO thousand dollars and a Macbook that STARTS at $2500...?

If it was up to this forum, they would have just reintroduced the 2010/2012 Mac Pro with new components for the same price tag. Not very innovative of course, but a lot of people would have been very happy with it.

 

[PickUrPoison]

The inclusion of this feature makes for an interesting possibility of planned obsolescence. What happens when Apple decides to stop unlocking the T2 chip on your machine to no longer allow SSD upgrades/changes?

Sounds like FUD to me.

 

[iBluetooth]

I get the whole SSD/T2 security thing, but it would be wonderful if Apple employed this level of repairability on all of its product lines.

You have to balance size, repairability, security and cost. If iPhone was easy to repair the

Anyone else hoping for a Mac Pro Mini? Something this modular but with a price tag we can swallow.

If you compare the prices to Dell workstations then your saving about $2000. These computers are not intended for *us* if we have to swallow the price personally.
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Theres no reason to tie a drive to a physical chip. BitLocker or other hard drive encryption methods can be used, and the drives can still be portable and unlockable in other devices. Also, this is a stationary computer, and not a laptop, which redecues the likelihood for theft substantially.

the T2 integration could be a feature that the very very few that need or want it could enable themselves.

This is much more secure while preventing the user from having to provide multiple passwords at startup. The users of these machines will be processing the next Disney movie, etc. Security is of utmost importance to prevent movies in production leaking out!

 

[GeneralChang]

That thing looks WAAAAY easier to strip than the G5's I've pulled apart!

 

[AndiG]

SSD/T2 doesn't make sense in my eyes. There is no TouchID or FaceID as far as I can see. Having something like 4xM2 slots would be a awesome.
Especially in a working environment where a broken SSD shouldn't cause any problems. Call Apple? Is the correct SSD model from Apple available? No - your computer is too old, buy a new one and you can trade in your old MacPro for $300!!

 

[gugy]

Apple doesn't provide ten years of OS support for a Mac. They should, but it never happens. Usually that number is 7 or 8 years, but in some rare cases 9 years (the 2010 5,1 is one of these rare cases, as for a long time there was no modular Mac Pro to replace it and they were still being sold as a current model into 2013).

After that you're left with unsupported methods only, and no guarantee that things will work properly.

Yes because Apple doesn’t want to bother with old tech and wants you to upgrade. That’s not the point.
like you said you get support for 7-8 years and that’s pretty reasonable. Maybe this new MP might get 9 or 10 year software upgrades. We’ll see.
At the end of the day a mini tower won’t happen.

 

[GeneralChang]

See? That wasn't so hard - now do it for my iPhone and Macbook and we are good.

Y-you want them to make your iPhone the size of a brick and poke holes all over the back of the case? /s

 

[guzhogi]

Apple is a corporation whose main goal is to make profits for their shareholders (i.e. profits should be their main goal).

That being said, I think Apple is one of the better corporations in going Green.

Yeah, I know. It just seems sometimes that the goals of maximum profitability are at odds with being green.

 

[redheeler]

Yes because Apple doesn’t want to bother with old tech and wants you to upgrade. That’s not the point.
like you said you get support for 7-8 years and that’s pretty reasonable. Maybe this new MP might get 9 or 10 year software upgrades. We’ll see.
At the end of the day a mini tower won’t happen.

My point here was that it's not reasonable to buy a Mac Pro and expect to be supported for ten years. That's not what Apple does.

Plus, for the price a single Mac Pro, you can buy two 27" iMacs. Assuming each gets 7 years of OS support (at a minimum), that's 14 years vs. 9 (at a maximum) with the Mac Pro. The base model Mac Pro is still terrible value even when taking into account upgradability / longevity.

 

[CIA]

There is nothing stopping you from adding a PCIe based nvme drive. Same speed as internal but not tied to the T2 chip. For once there’s plenty of spare PCIe slots. Or use the internal SATA port and a bracket and put a massive cheap slow spinning HDD in there.

 

[Puppuccino]

When you can pay over £50k for this machine, I'm not surprised it's this easy to service. The target market is very different to that of MacBooks or iPhones.

 

[GtrDude]

That's good Apple, now bring all of this mentality to your laptops and your iPhones and your iPads.

 

[brdeveloper]

What if I need to replace a RAM slot? Or sharpen the cheese grater? It's not an unbiased review.

Regarding the SSD: why couldn't it work as a security token, so you could sign any SSD once you've put the right password? Not being user-replaceable is pretty sad. Are there additional NVMe slots at least?

 

[gugy]

My point here was that it's not reasonable to buy a Mac Pro and expect to be supported for ten years. That's not what Apple does.

Plus, for the price a single Mac Pro, you can buy two 27" iMacs. Assuming each gets 7 years of OS support (at a minimum), that's 14 years vs. 9 (at a maximum) with the Mac Pro. The base model Mac Pro is still terrible value even when taking into account upgradability / longevity.

MP are upgradable, so you could still have a very solid performance down the road.
the iMacs are a very good buy but in 7 years I doubt you can get a solid performance.
i am just saying people need to give up on a mini tower at cheap price. I really don’t see Apple moving into that direction.

 

[BigJohno]

If only this mac was about 1500 to 2000 dollars less I’d take a base one and upgrade it myself. Hard to justify when my workflow is cross platform and my ryzen PC is a screamer.

 

[WaxedJacket]

Different requirements lead to a different solution. Makes a lot of sense.

I never thought of it that way.

 

[theluggage]

Mac mini with a PCIe slot is no longer mini. It would need a power supply 3-4 times larger, and it would have to dissipate 3-4 times as much heat. (Memory is already upgradable in the mini btw.)

However, the only alternative is to connect an eGPU enclosure, which means a second box on your desktop with its own big power supply and a second mains connection... and, last time I looked, still came with a laundry list of caveats about software support (although maybe some of those are for laptops/iMacs which have an internal screen...?)

There is also an option (3rd party) that doesn’t use the MPX slots, it uses the SATA connector on the logic board. I haven’t looked into it but it attaches to the frame iirc. 2 x SATA.

Currently, that only comes with 8TB of spinning rust - maybe someone else will do a 'bare' version since it doesn't look like it needs any special Apple tech (...but, for shame, Apple, its a $6k computer and you leave out the HD mounting cage and PCIe power cables!?) However, even if you used it to add a SSD it would still be limited by the SATA interface (not the worst limitation you could imagine, but its not going to be as fast as a PCIe SSD). Its really a secondary drive to store bulky files (which is good to have) but not really a replacement for the system drive.

There are plenty of full-sized PCIe adapters that can take 1 or more M.2 cards, which would be the obvious alternative to Apple's modules. The question is (a) do they work in the MP at all (maybe questionable with the ones that take more than 1 M.2) and (b) will the T2 let you boot from them?

Certainly, if you're prepared to pay the price (which is a whole other argument), the MP looks gorgeous - the "locked" SSD module seems like the biggest fly in the ointment. The T2 security concept - where only Apple has the master key - is for iPhones, not desktop computers. Fully encrypted hard drives are a double-edged sword and the sort of users the MP is aimed at should be big enough and ugly enough to make that decision for themselves and guard their own master key if necessary.

I'd say that you're not going to leave the Mac Pro on a train... but someone's already started a thread about how to fly with an MP as carry-on luggage.... There's always one (...actually, on the Internet, there's always 10,000).

 

[WaxedJacket]

What was thin about the trash can Mac Pro?

I don't understand the question.

 

[NoNothing]

Apple doesn't provide ten years of OS support for a Mac. They should, but it never happens. Usually that number is 7 or 8 years, but in some rare cases 9 years (the 2010 5,1 is one of these rare cases, as for a long time there was no modular Mac Pro to replace it and they were still being sold as a current model into 2013).

After that you're left with unsupported methods only, and no guarantee that things will work properly.

I am still getting updates for my nearly 11 year old iMac.

 

[GtrDude]

I really think iFixit need to revaluate how they view repairability. Docking a point because of a critical security feature seems harsh, especially in light of their criticism of iCloud activation locks.

I agree Apple, and the rest of the industry, have a lot of improving to do, but some features of our tech needs to be intentionally locked down for the safety of our data/stuff.

I think it's fair.
iFixit is only interested in repairability. Nothing else. As such I think they're being fair.

 

[redheeler]

Different requirements lead to a different solution. Makes a lot of sense.

Having a thinner design does improve portability, which is important with a laptop. Not so much with an iMac. Yet that didn't stop Apple from releasing the 2012 thin iMacs, and retaining that design for the iMac Pro...

 

[GtrDude]

A computer that will last just as long as the old ‘cheesgrater’ Mac Pro design
And considering some people are still happily using that older design machine that’s a long time.

How do you know this new Mac Pro will last "just as long"?