Hardware updates and the beginning of the fiscal year might not line up too. You have the money now but there is not any new hardware.
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Intel Chip Delays Suggest No New Mac Pro Until at Least Early 2012
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I hope Apple wakes up and provides both AMD Bulldozer based and Intel Ivy based Mac Pros.
They would triple or quadruple their sales with them.
Imagine a 4 Socket Bulldozer totaling 32 Cores, 128GB Ram, 3 6970s with a 1.5KW Power Supply all being fully leveraged by an OS that used GCD, OpenCL 1.1 throughout.
You'd see money well spent.
I'd buy one or two of them.
Being stuck with overpriced Intel boxes is getting old, real fast. The world of computing is moving to a CPU/GPGPU marriage world.
Waiting on Intel just to sell the traditional $4k box and a limited set of GPUs when AMD has fully optimized OpenCL for their latest GPUs and CPUs is absurd.
Lots of work is going into Clang/LLVM for OpenCL and multicore support.
Concurrency work is currently the one area Clang will be seeing the most focus on for LLVM/Clang 3.1.
http://clang.llvm.org/cxx_status.html
They would triple or quadruple their sales with them.
Imagine a 4 Socket Bulldozer totaling 32 Cores, 128GB Ram, 3 6970s with a 1.5KW Power Supply all being fully leveraged by an OS that used GCD, OpenCL 1.1 throughout.
You'd see money well spent.
I'd buy one or two of them.
Being stuck with overpriced Intel boxes is getting old, real fast. The world of computing is moving to a CPU/GPGPU marriage world.
Waiting on Intel just to sell the traditional $4k box and a limited set of GPUs when AMD has fully optimized OpenCL for their latest GPUs and CPUs is absurd.
Lots of work is going into Clang/LLVM for OpenCL and multicore support.
Concurrency work is currently the one area Clang will be seeing the most focus on for LLVM/Clang 3.1.
http://clang.llvm.org/cxx_status.html
Freescale e6500
I still miss the PowerPC era ;-)
http://www.hardmac.com/news/2011/10/07/freescale-unveils-new-12-core-power-pc-processor
I still miss the PowerPC era ;-)
http://www.hardmac.com/news/2011/10/07/freescale-unveils-new-12-core-power-pc-processor
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Sounds like an interesting alternative if the AMDs can be used on a Mac Pro.
But the Apple overpricing on workstations will not stop here, and the AMD boxes wouldn't be any cheaper than the Intel machines, I suppose.
Four socket setup would require a whole new form factor. Dual CPUs in Mac Pro is already a tight fit, two more would require a lot more space. Then if you need space for three full size GPUs like AMD 6970, we are looking at a massive box, which isn't really a workstation anymore.
I would also argue that the high-end Mac Pro don't exactly sell like hot cakes, so investing a lot on them doesn't make much sense.
I dunno, Apple's current cooling design could take a few tips from IBM or Oracle.
Apple's cooling system is rubbish in the Mac Pros. You could fit so much more on the CPU tray if Apple used much better cooling. I don't know about the latest series of Mac Pros, but my sister's 2008/9(?) has Aluminum fins. So disappointing, especially when a low end server from IBM has copper fins.
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Actually, the Mac Pro's heatsink (the SP at least) is one of the best I've ever come across.
Huge amount of surface area + decent spacing = good airflow + good heat dissipation + low noise.
Having had a few of the 'best' heatsinks money can buy during my over clocking days I'm very very very impressed with the current Mac Pro's setup.
But the MP will not go Bulldozer. The performance per watt is appalling. And there is simply not space for 4 chips + 16 ram slots. Period. They couldn't fit two CPUs + 12 slots!
Given a 2600K beats a 8 "core" bulldozer, a 12 core, 24 thread SB-E would beat a 24+ core bulldozer machine sucking way less power.
Open up an Oracle or IBM Blade system (Or any company really), the effort they go through to squeeze so much heat out of the small space is tremendous. Much more efficient than Apple's design. The fact that Dell can squeeze a computer more powerful than the Mac Pro into a single rack computer is a testament to this.
The cooling system is more than just the size of the fins of the heatsink and the material its made of.
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And it probably sounds like a Tu-95 Bear doing a take-off roll. 
Seriously, the XServe should be proof enough Apple can develop adequate cooling for a low-profile, rack-mountable server-grade computer.
Seriously, the XServe should be proof enough Apple can develop adequate cooling for a low-profile, rack-mountable server-grade computer.
And how loud is it with those small 45mm fans in it?
Answer: Very.
And in terms of heat dissipation, it really is down to surface area, airflow and material...
As with everything engineering based, it's a optimisation/compromise.
Low noise means low fan speeds means low fan pressure meaning low fin density/air resistance = what Apple has...
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That is besides my point. My point was the inefficiency of the Mac Pros cooling.
Those aren't the only way to reduce noise. Another way is to have vortex resistant fans. Change the fan type all together. Change the heatsink material to copper.
A cooling system is more than just the heatsink and fan.
Define inefficient?
The temps the heatsink produces compared to my experience is very, very good.
And besides, they have obviously thought about this properly as the heatsink fan ramps up at 142.5% of the intake/exhaust fans, and I can only assume this is to maintain a uniform airflow rate.
Ridiculous how bad they need to update their Pro's!!
How long am I supposed to wait for a decent lineup at apple prices before I just say ****** it and switch to PC.
Seems like they are ditching us Pro's and becoming an appliance company
That happened several years ago - Apple computer became Apple.
And cooling system is also a lot more than just copper vs aluminum and being able to dissipate as much heat as possible.
You are comparing apples to oranges. A blade server is very different from workstation. For blade server, it's okay that the fans run at 100% all the time since nobody will be hearing them. However, workstation needs to be fairly quiet since you will be sitting next to it when using it. When you are designing the cooling system, your approaches are not the same. For blade, the main goal is to use as little space as possible and noise can be ignored, whereas workstation doesn't have to be as small as possible, but its noise level must be bearable.
Mac Pro's cooling system would be inefficient if 1) it was noisy 2) it caused high temps. However, Mac Pro is quiet and the temps are normal.
Compare the dimensions of Mac Pro to e.g. Dell Precision T5500 and they are almost the same. Mac Pro is slightly taller, but that is when including the handles. Take away the handles and they are the about the same.
You are just trying to bash Apple when there is no reason to. Mac Pro's cooling does its job well, which is the only thing that matters.
I agree.
Apple's approach on cooling is the high way to go: low noise, good cooling.
I don't care how big the Mac Pro is, but how well it cools, and how silent it is.
I hate computers who cut corners to boost specs. It's easy to reach high specs at any savings. What is great with the Mac Pros that they are well rounded workstations.
That said, their price could be rounded down for the single processor units. The $1800 that someone mentioned before should be about right.
long time reader and first time reply(er?)
Definitely disappointed. I've been ready to invest in a 12 core for the past couple of months but it doesn't make any sense to purchase one now. It's pretty insulting that apple would expect people to buy these machines when they haven't been updated in over a year. Thankfully Apple just gave me a brand new Macbook pro because they couldn't figure out what was wrong with my year old one.
Definitely disappointed. I've been ready to invest in a 12 core for the past couple of months but it doesn't make any sense to purchase one now. It's pretty insulting that apple would expect people to buy these machines when they haven't been updated in over a year. Thankfully Apple just gave me a brand new Macbook pro because they couldn't figure out what was wrong with my year old one.
Thunderbolt is a close relative to PCI Express, it should be possible to create a card that provides Thunderbolt ports even if it means not a full featured thunderbolt.
Hopefully we'll see a price drop at Mac Pro prices - at least with the single processor units.
See article on Apple lowering prices here: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/24/t...prices-are-all-part-of-the-plan.html?_r=1&hpw
I started a discussion about this in the general forum here:
https://forums.macrumors.com/showthread.php?p=13713041#post13713041
See article on Apple lowering prices here: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/24/t...prices-are-all-part-of-the-plan.html?_r=1&hpw
I started a discussion about this in the general forum here:
https://forums.macrumors.com/showthread.php?p=13713041#post13713041
Apple may be ending the Mac Pro
I find it hard to believe Apple might end this machine, simply because they have no real immediate substitute for this unit with the other parts of their lineup. No, it won't be the iPhone 5, either. Seriously, with H-P deciding to stay in the game with desktops for a while longer, it would seem to me to be premature for Apple to bail on the tower. For one thing, I ask myself what my office would be like to change over to an iMac, since I have a 27" monitor now on a tower, and wouldn't want to be smaller on the monitor. So lets start with the 27" iMac. O.K., about two weeks ago, I had a power supply fail in one of my old G5's. I was up and running in less than 10 minutes, without any tools, by moving the hard drive into another backup machine. Now, if that was an iMac...10 minutes? Nope. Again, I wanted to do a disk copy, drive to drive. Hmmm, just open that second iMac tray and pop in a disk.... maybe not. Sure, get a peripheral for that. It seems to me the Apple engineers designed themselves into a corner with expandibility on the iMac. All that clutter comes right back onto your desk - an external optical drive, an external hard drive, and an external USB hub for sure. Apple has always starved us for USB ports. Finally the Mac Mini had five, then they promptly subtracted one for a nearly useless card reader you could fumble around for on the back of the latest model. I'd rather plug in the one you can buy from Hong Kong for $5.00 that can read five different cards into the port they took away. You pay $2,500 for an iMac and get how many USB ports? Lets see, I have two printers, an inkjet and a laser workhorse. One scanner, one external backup drive and boot drive, a cable that sits on my desk with a mini-USB end for my camera, my five and one card reader, and I'd like a second free port on the front of my machine for my USB thumb drives and my iPhone when I charge and sync. Hmmm, a couple ports short here. It seems that Apple engineers would rather cut their own throats before they put one in front of you that you can see for easy access. It's more fun to fumble and lean and search. So Apple, if you are going to take away the tower, please do this for us for all the money you charge: Add three more USB ports, add one eSATA port, and consider making the iMac another 3/4" thicker to accomodate a way to slide in 2.5" drives, one SS and one optical. give us at least ONE forward facing USB port. They don't look that bad. How about a couple maybe on the base of the machine if not on the video frame? That might begin to cover what we lose in a tower.
I find it hard to believe Apple might end this machine, simply because they have no real immediate substitute for this unit with the other parts of their lineup. No, it won't be the iPhone 5, either. Seriously, with H-P deciding to stay in the game with desktops for a while longer, it would seem to me to be premature for Apple to bail on the tower. For one thing, I ask myself what my office would be like to change over to an iMac, since I have a 27" monitor now on a tower, and wouldn't want to be smaller on the monitor. So lets start with the 27" iMac. O.K., about two weeks ago, I had a power supply fail in one of my old G5's. I was up and running in less than 10 minutes, without any tools, by moving the hard drive into another backup machine. Now, if that was an iMac...10 minutes? Nope. Again, I wanted to do a disk copy, drive to drive. Hmmm, just open that second iMac tray and pop in a disk.... maybe not. Sure, get a peripheral for that. It seems to me the Apple engineers designed themselves into a corner with expandibility on the iMac. All that clutter comes right back onto your desk - an external optical drive, an external hard drive, and an external USB hub for sure. Apple has always starved us for USB ports. Finally the Mac Mini had five, then they promptly subtracted one for a nearly useless card reader you could fumble around for on the back of the latest model. I'd rather plug in the one you can buy from Hong Kong for $5.00 that can read five different cards into the port they took away. You pay $2,500 for an iMac and get how many USB ports? Lets see, I have two printers, an inkjet and a laser workhorse. One scanner, one external backup drive and boot drive, a cable that sits on my desk with a mini-USB end for my camera, my five and one card reader, and I'd like a second free port on the front of my machine for my USB thumb drives and my iPhone when I charge and sync. Hmmm, a couple ports short here. It seems that Apple engineers would rather cut their own throats before they put one in front of you that you can see for easy access. It's more fun to fumble and lean and search. So Apple, if you are going to take away the tower, please do this for us for all the money you charge: Add three more USB ports, add one eSATA port, and consider making the iMac another 3/4" thicker to accomodate a way to slide in 2.5" drives, one SS and one optical. give us at least ONE forward facing USB port. They don't look that bad. How about a couple maybe on the base of the machine if not on the video frame? That might begin to cover what we lose in a tower.
Just ordered a new Pro and then cancelled
Well I am a convert or should I say future convert. I ordered the Pro last night and then realized that they were going to come out with a new version as soon as Intel gets the chips rolling. So I had to call this morning and cancel the order. I guess I will have to be patient and continue using my home grown PC for my pictures.
The only thing I can hope for is it will be soon; although, that does mean that I don't have to worry about waiting for Photoshop CS6 and Lightroom 4 now. With a little luck they will all be released together. Maybe if we are all lucky... Apple will feel sorry for us and add some new sweet things into the Pro that were not going to go in!!! Well we can hope can't we!!!
I also didn't know that the thunderbolt display communicated with the CPU through the Thunderbolt cable. So when I placed my order, I was not told that. So does that mean I was getting the older Cinema Display or did they send me the Thunderbolt display with no way to connect the display to the tower??
Kinda' makes you wonder if Mr. Jobs has figured out a way to contact Apple yet so he can keep everything in order. RIP Steve
Well I am a convert or should I say future convert. I ordered the Pro last night and then realized that they were going to come out with a new version as soon as Intel gets the chips rolling. So I had to call this morning and cancel the order. I guess I will have to be patient and continue using my home grown PC for my pictures.
The only thing I can hope for is it will be soon; although, that does mean that I don't have to worry about waiting for Photoshop CS6 and Lightroom 4 now. With a little luck they will all be released together. Maybe if we are all lucky... Apple will feel sorry for us and add some new sweet things into the Pro that were not going to go in!!! Well we can hope can't we!!!
I also didn't know that the thunderbolt display communicated with the CPU through the Thunderbolt cable. So when I placed my order, I was not told that. So does that mean I was getting the older Cinema Display or did they send me the Thunderbolt display with no way to connect the display to the tower??
Kinda' makes you wonder if Mr. Jobs has figured out a way to contact Apple yet so he can keep everything in order. RIP Steve