iMac Pro Described as Blazingly Fast, Quiet, and Fairly Priced, But Lacks Upgradeability

[Woyzeck]

This is a product in search of a market. The performance differences between fully loaded regular imac and one of these for 99% of what people do will be negligible and in some cases the raw speed of the regular maxed imac will beat it. This is a very niche segment of the market for people doing high end rendering that need more than 4 cores and are willing to pay for it and don't care about upgrade ability. Aside from that, it makes no sense to me unless you just like to waste money. The rumored mac pro modular however is possibly a whole different ball game.

People who render have long gone to PCs or to cloud based services, as those are much more cost effective. Rendering is done on GPUs now and those get obsolete much quicker than CPUs. And as you can‘t upgrade those darn iMac „Pro“s, you‘re lost with a slow machine after a year or so.

I don‘t understand what the market for those should be.

 

[aks650]

Anyone know what kind of speakers those are on the desk?

Those are Kantos

https://kantoaudio.com/product/yu2/

 

[D.T.]

put together a similar speced computer with components and let us know what it comes out too.

Also make sure it's a machine from a single source supplier with a decent service channel too. The NewEgg BYO is +not+ comparable.

No commentary on the lack up of upgradability, just that there is more to this marketspace (even more so than the straight up consumer market), than just specs.

Wish my company thought that way I have been using the same laptop since 2009

Jeezus, PM your boss's email or phone number and I'll have a little chat with them

Look no further than this —-> Modular Mac Pro

Some of us professionals can't factor in janky reliability of a Hackintosh when we're on deadlines, have client expectations to meet, etc. (Yes, I've built them a number of times)

 

[Hagrid]

I ordered 50 of them and then found out.....No VGA port.....Cancelled my orders too

I was hoping for an integrated Centronics parallel port interface, along with at least 2 RS-232 ports for my external 300 baud modem and tape drive

 

[Bryan Bowler]

iMac Pro Described as Blazingly Fast, Quiet, and Fairly Priced..?

Will you and the rest of the people injecting these one-off comments please move on? Yes, it is fairly priced. You may not have a need for a machine like this and that's ok, but working pros do.

 

[69Mustang]

8K monitors are around the corner with HDMI 2.1 standard! LOL! Who wants a 5K when 8K is the standard?

Just spit ballin' but those who haven't quite gotten to the corner yet. Those who realize when they get to the corner the first one's around it are going to pay through the nose to essentially beta the new 8K's. Those who realize that 4K is just becoming the new standard and will probably be the new standard for the next 3-5 years.

So pretty much most people. What you're talking about is those out on the bleeding edge. You know what you usually find on the bleeding edge? Bloody people.

 

[PickUrPoison]

I'm passing what good is it if you can not upgrade to make it better.

This machine is for pros. They buy what they need upfront, having absolutely no desire or intention to upgrade before they replace it.

This is not a computer meant for you, or most home users. Apple will sell plenty to corporate and smaller businesses too. And even solo/independent users, people who bill $100, $200 or more per hour.

To them, computers are a tool they use for their job, and for them a few hundred bucks a month for a couple years is incredibly cheap, especially compared to most of the other costs they incur.

 

[cwazytech]

Its an iMac, what was he expecting?

It’s a review. He’s just trying to get all the necessary information out there so real life customers are not caught off guard. I don’t think he set his expectations anywhere. It’s a downside and now we know. You’re welcome.

 

[elfxmilhouse]

Stopped reading at "Fairly Priced"..

what is a "fair price" to you? I think when it comes to the "pro" stuff apple does price stuff pretty competitively.

I just spec'd out a PC (with 5K monitor) with similar specs and I reached $4,999 really quickly. This was using the cheapest stuff I could find that matched the specs. If I were to really dig in to match it apples to apples I would be easily a $6,000+ machine.

 

[CWallace]

I ordered 2 and then found out.... No HDMI... Cancelled my orders

I ordered 20 and they threw in the USB-C Digital AV Multiport Adapters. Gotta spend money to save money.

I ordered 50 of them and then found out.....No VGA port.....Cancelled my orders too

You need a better Apple Enterprise Rep.

Of course, I live in 2017 and not 1997, so I have no need for the USB-C VGA Multiport Adapter,

 

[Fried Chicken]

Why are they giving their products to morons for early reviews?

Is apple scared?

 

[Wowereit]

How about using some real workstation grade GPUs instead of AMD's Vega 'Pro' mid-range crap?
Most professional applications can utilize CUDA. That's some penny pinching on Apple's site I'm not going to support. Now you can buy yourself a 18.000$ machine with GPU performance absolutely not matching CPU or I/O.

 

[Avieshek]

Will you and the rest of the people injecting these one-off comments please move on? Yes, it is fairly priced. You may not have a need for a machine like this and that's ok, but working pros do.

And you know each of the people including me?

 

[bcomer]

I ordered 2 and then found out.... No HDMI... Cancelled my orders

Thunderbolt 3 to HDMI adapter.

 

[AJ5790]

It's an iMac Pro. They should make at least the most basic components user upgradable.

It's an iMac Pro.

 

[HarryWild]

Just spit ballin' but those who haven't quite gotten to the corner yet. Those who realize when they get to the corner the first one's around it are going to pay through the nose to essentially beta the new 8K's. Those who realize that 4K is just becoming the new standard and will probably be the new standard for the next 3-5 years.

So pretty much most people. What you're talking about is those out on the bleeding edge. You know what you usually find on the bleeding edge? Bloody people.

I was the first to pay big time for the Dell 2715 monitor and then 7 month later then came out with a 5K and discontinued my 2715 4K monitor. The had trouble with the first software and compatibility but the monitor is solid. Using it with a Lenovo Workstation; it recognized it but had to use two displayports combined for 4K at 30fps or that 60fps. Do recall now. But works perfectly when the software got updated 6 month later that is! LOL!
[doublepost=1513098537][/doublepost]

Why are they giving their products to morons for early reviews?

Is apple scared?

They are the Apple fanboys! Do you real want to give it out to a Tom's Hardware or Anandtech to do a review on it? Only if you want real truth! Apple is about marketing and promotions! That want they are good at!

 

[jonnysods]

I just want the keyboard and mouse, and I doubt I could afford them. Bet they are premium priced

 

[HarryWild]

I ordered 20 and they threw in the USB-C Digital AV Multiport Adapters. Gotta spend money to save money.




You need a better Apple Enterprise Rep.

Of course, I live in 2017 and not 1997, so I have no need for the USB-C VGA Multiport Adapter,

VGA port????? That goes back to the 1970s and 640 resolution as max! We are at 4K going on 8K resolution!

 

[PickUrPoison]

Apple should really pay attention to the pros and re-relase the Mac Pro to match the new HP Z8 workstations. Damn those things are incredibly upgradable and massively powerful. Just imagine running macOS on up to 56 cores, 3TB of RAM and a RAID0 of 4 PCIe SSDs. If only you could virtualize High Sierra on ESXi you could potentially run 8 iMac Pros off of a single Z8.

Anyway. I can only hope the new "modular" Mac Pro will be as good.

That HP is well over $100,000... can you imagine the outrage on this forum if Apple sold a $100,000 computer? And someone would still complain it’s “gimped” because Apple didn’t offer 4TB of RAM.

 

[Baymowe335]

Stopped reading at "Fairly Priced"..

Depends on your needs and definition of fair. An airplane can be fairly priced at $100,000,000, but the fact you can’t afford it doesn’t mean the price isn’t fair.

 

[Bryan Bowler]

And you know each of the people including me?

Your words paint the picture we see.

 

[PickUrPoison]

It’s a review. He’s just trying to get all the necessary information out there so real life customers are not caught off guard. I don’t think he set his expectations anywhere. It’s a downside and now we know. You’re welcome.

Except he got it wrong. He meant to say lack of user upgradability.

But it’s really a moot point, since the buyers in the target market aren’t upgraders. They buy what they’re going to need for the next two or three years before it’s replaced.

 

[kemal]

The three or four Xenon chips Apple are using will make a fantastic Hackintosh.

 

[videotape74]

Ppl complaining about upgrading?? Haha, like any of these components would have to be upgraded for a long while. I can hear some of the ppl now...

“Only 128gb of RAM and only a 16gb Graphics Card??? WTF Apple!”

Like most of the ppl complaining even need anything close to that. Don’t worry guys, YouTube and MacRumors forums will be fine.

 

[PatriotInvasion]

This machine is for video editing pros who want a Mac, would never consider a PC, and want some style on their desks at the same time. For those that can justify the cost for the work they will generate from it, and are wiling to sell it and upgrade every 3-4 years if needed, it's a great buy. Let's also not ignore the fact that there is literally not one 5K monitor available on the market that isn't clunky and ugly. 5K is the holy grail of desktop display resolution. It's fantastic.

At the very least, I think everyone has been clamoring for Apple to address the Pros out there and build a Porche-like machine, even if it doesn't sell well, just to set the bar high for the models below it. This is that machine and although I don't need one I'm glad it exists.

Hopefully all of you that want to upgrade and tinker with internals will get what you're looking for with the Mac Pro next year.