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Mac Pro Launching in December with Xeon Processors, Dual FirePro GPUs and PCIe Flash Storage

I think the kicker here for me might be that to replace my current MacPro running dual monitors, I'll either need messy adapters and external HD for either the RMBP or the new MacPro, and I'll be getting more memory and better video cards with the MacPro, for ~$400 more.

As mentioned by others, comparable PC Workstations or gaming rigs won't be any cheaper than $2500, and a hackintosh would be at least $2000 with comparable video, cpu, and SSD (assuming a motherboard with a good memory bus).

So.. for $400-$500 more.. unless I want to build my own.
 
Hmm... for my needs, there is one more option.. ditch the dual monitors, and get the 27" iMac, with the i7, 3TB fusion, 16GB ram, and the GTX780. for $3k.
 
I think they got me!

$3k buy in is a serious chunk of change, but they almost have me. The "other shoe" is a nice 4k display to go with it... where's that?
 
petsounds said:
I like how Apple's endorsement guy for audio recording said, "It's quiet!" Please. :rolleyes: I had hoped for an Open CL focused version of Logic, but it appears Apple doesn't care. I'm sad to say, I don't see much justification to buy this machine for audio work. They've left the FirePro cards completely useless with audio, and thus you're spending lots of money on something left unused.
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I run UA Apollo thunderbolt audio interface.
 
petsounds said:
I like how Apple's endorsement guy for audio recording said, "It's quiet!" Please. :rolleyes: I had hoped for an Open CL focused version of Logic, but it appears Apple doesn't care. I'm sad to say, I don't see much justification to buy this machine for audio work. They've left the FirePro cards completely useless with audio, and thus you're spending lots of money on something left unused.
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http://logicrumours.com/mac-pro-gpu-to-integrate-with-logic-x/

While I’d love it if VSTs would run on a GPU, the reality is that it just doesn’t work too well. There are only a tiny handful of CUDA plugins available, despite it being around for a few years.

GPUs offer massively parallel processing – that’s only suitable for certain types of task.
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Is that statement quoted and underlined even true? If so would that mean you'd have to use a new software like Motu Pro Tools or Ableton or something else?
 
Supa_Fly said:
http://logicrumours.com/mac-pro-gpu-to-integrate-with-logic-x/
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Interesting, but does that site have any previous cred calling rumors that proved to be true? Or are they just guessing like everyone else.

I don't see why OpenCL based plugins wouldn't be possible. I guess the big problem would be the bandwidth in and out of the GPUs, but I imagine Apple has paid attention to this on the Pro. I don't know enough about GPU programming (I've only done some shaders) to know how audio plugins would run. Might require processing the audio in a different way that is currently done. Also worth noting that the new MBP 15" intel gpu puts out decent OpenCL performance.

But I'll remain highly skeptical about that rumor until Apple drops an OpenCL-powered update of Logic.
 
Xerotech said:
Always thought that winter started earlier, but you're right.

The astronomical winter (Northern Hemisphere) 2013 begins on
Saturday, December 21
and ends on
Wednesday, March 19.

Watch pre-orders start December 20th.
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In Chinese / East Asian culture which observe the Chinese calendar, winter starts on a day called "Lidong (立冬)" which means "start of winter". The Lidong of 2013 is on 7 November 2013. December 21 is the Winter Solstice (Dongzhi, 冬至, "Winter's extreme"), which is the day which has the shortest day and longest night of the year. Usually on this day or within a month from this day it will be the coldest period in a year.
 
mxz said:
iMac Pro?

What about people who need a PCI expander box and 4x Nvidia GPUs to do work in Resolve/Adobe/Nuke/Cinema4D? I guess this Mac is not for them.
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I don't know man, I'm pretty stoked to tear through nuke/Ae/maya. I've done pretty dam well without a PCI box and 4 gpus. You may be a bit short sighted on this, especially considering NOONE HAS USED IT YET.
 
Internal vs. external

It's pretty amazing to me, the animosity and vitriol being spilled over taking OLD components out of your OLD box to accommodate a next generation machine.

It's gonna be pretty hilarious when all these precious cards (that are probably 2 years old now anyway) are antiquated within the next year or two anyway.

Who knows, machines like this could get manufacturers to create cards that come in enclosures, look good on desks, stack neatly etc. Imagine that, technology adapting.
 
manghangson said:
It's pretty amazing to me, the animosity and vitriol being spilled over taking OLD components out of your OLD box to accommodate a next generation machine.

It's gonna be pretty hilarious when all these precious cards (that are probably 2 years old now anyway) are antiquated within the next year or two anyway.

Who knows, machines like this could get manufacturers to create cards that come in enclosures, look good on desks, stack neatly etc. Imagine that, technology adapting.
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Right, and in plenty of cases, it might allow even more powerful cards because they don't have to be crammed into a case and eat 2 or 3 of your expansion slots for the fans that are required, and leech power from your main power supply. Imagine the kind of video card "box" that could be attached to a future version of thunderbolt, without the thermal or space limitations of fitting inside of your main case.

As for the GPUs being non-upgradable, we don't know that- I wouldn't be surprised if Sapphire or someone could make a Mac Pro compatible GPU even if the connector were different- of course they'd charge 2-3x for it ;)
 
Supa_Fly said:
Is that statement quoted and underlined even true?
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Yes, it looks like there are probably only about two or three audio plugins that run on the GPU.

manghangson said:
Who knows, machines like this could get manufacturers to create cards that come in enclosures, look good on desks, stack neatly etc. Imagine that, technology adapting.
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It's starting to head that way already. UAD started out making audio DSP cards on pcie, now they have similar technology in a box connected via firewire, then added a thunderbolt option. People need certain kinds of functionality, and it doesn't necessarily need to come in a "card" as opposed to a box. And a big advantage of doing external version is that the product can also be sold to people using portables, minis, and iMacs instead of just those with big towers and open slots.

No question Apple is ahead of the market here, but cards and slots are already a niche market and that niche is only going to get smaller and might even completely go away in favor of external substitutes for it like TB.
 
This landed like a chunk of dog poo in the audio world. Bang for buck is missing and the peripheral mess this thing is bound to incur completely undercuts the cool form factor. It's just not right for pro audio, so I guess it's up to the video editing and rendering guys to keep the Mac "workstation" line alive now, although I don't consider this a workstation at all.
 
Philter said:
This landed like a chunk of dog poo in the audio world. Bang for buck is missing and the peripheral mess this thing is bound to incur completely undercuts the cool form factor. It's just not right for pro audio, so I guess it's up to the video editing and rendering guys to keep the Mac "workstation" line alive now, although I don't consider this a workstation at all.
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What peripheral mess? Just about every audio rig I've seen has stuff hanging out of the back of it, since there aren't many audio PCI cards that don't have some type of external device connected to them pretty much by definition (breakout boxes, connections to rack mount gear, etc). The new Mac Pro would just make it more convenient to add or replace devices that already had external components. There's definitely a downside if you have a huge investment in PCI based stuff and don't want to get an enclosure, but I still don't see the "mess" aspect in terms of what a pro audio setup already looks like.
 
With this coming out, it will be interesting to see what BlackMagic comes out with at NAB in the spring to pair with it.

Of course the folks complaining about being required to use external expansion were the ones complaining about the old MacPro not having enough slots, and not having "modern" interfaces.

Regarding the audio issue and the GPUs.. do you really think it's wise for Apple to chase the disjointed paths that the software developers are taking? Trying to design hardware to chase software seems like a very bad idea. Better the path Apple has chosen, to give plenty of ports (maybe not the ones you wanted, granted) and allow the hardware and software folks to develop external devices with the required capabilities.

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blackcrayon said:
What peripheral mess? Just about every audio rig I've seen has stuff hanging out of the back of it, since there aren't many audio PCI cards that don't have some type of external device connected to them pretty much by definition (breakout boxes, connections to rack mount gear, etc). The new Mac Pro would just make it more convenient to add or replace devices that already had external components. There's definitely a downside if you have a huge investment in PCI based stuff and don't want to get an enclosure, but I still don't see the "mess" aspect in terms of what a pro audio setup already looks like.
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And you likely get a lot better access to those devices, rather than not enough room on the back of existing MacPros.
 
In general there's a lot of potential issues with pcie slots. Cards that block open slots, only having a couple x16 slots, cards that don't get enough power from the pcie slot and need a power hookup as well, etc. With external, there aren't size constraints, power can be external if needed, x16 isn't a consideration as long as there's enough total bandwidth. Not to mention that the computer itself doesn't have to be designed to handle the greatest possible power draw and heat output that can potentially come from cards. I have a 2009 MP and I've used the internal drive bays because they are there and because the internal interface was faster than the external ones. With fast external busses (yes, including usb3) having external drives doesn't bother me.

Audio folks aren't upset about this, guys who spent $$$ on pcie cards are upset. Plenty of audio folks moved to FW and USB audio interfaces years ago and more recently external DSP. For us the only real objection to the new box is that there isn't an option to get it with just one GPU and save some cash. But if they release a logic update that uses the GPU even that beef goes away.
 
DrFreeman said:
I am a bit surprised, the CUDA by NVIDIA is something that is being used widely in the industry and I am a bit baffled that they went for ATI ........
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They went for ATI because their own GPU acceleration on their own software is done via OpenCL, not CUDA and the development community has been moving towards OpenCL/OpenGL vs. CUDA and/or Direct X for the last few years.

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The major problem I have with this so far is the fact that the CPU solution is so underwhelming, I doubt you would even be able to add another CPU in that case without heat problems and then they won't tell you what exact GPUs are in there and the memory is DDR3 and not DDR5. I'm not sure there's an advantage to Xeon processors over i7 processors without multi procs. either. I'll definitely wait until at least the second revision on this and go PC in the meantime. To avoid cable clutter madness Apple should at least offer 1 tower like Thunderbolt case.
 
Imhotep397 said:
I'll definitely wait until at least the second revision on this and go PC in the meantime.
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Not all of us have that luxury...

Back to the choice of a 27" iMac, 15" RMBP, or the new MacPro, all within $400 of each other. The MacPro is probably going to last the longest, but will also take the most work to convert to. It will also have the most horsepower by far.

Really need some real world specs from the new graphics cards.
 
Imhotep397 said:
I'm not sure there's an advantage to Xeon processors over i7 processors without multi procs. either.
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Not much difference for the 4 and 6 core, but they make xeons in 8/10/12 core but not i7. At this point i7 doesn't matter much for a box like this since the xeons are about the same price as the equivalent i7 anyway.
 
milo said:
Not much difference for the 4 and 6 core, but they make xeons in 8/10/12 core but not i7. At this point i7 doesn't matter much for a box like this since the xeons are about the same price as the equivalent i7 anyway.
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Fair point.. it's really more about the GPU and the memory bus than it is the cpu.

So you have a GT750M vs GTX775M vs FirePro D300.

Big difference there for gaming, rendering, or other graphics. What it comes down to is that pro video cards (even older ones) smoke the mobile chipsets.

http://www.barefeats.com/haswel1.html
 
iPhil said:
So far it's ASUS 32.5" 4K @ $3,300 (US) or Seiki 39" 4K @$699.00

Just google 4k display
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Thnx... that's quite a price disparity.... 39" is actually TOO big... 32.5 is about right, but too much dough.. I guess I could use my 27" iMac as the display...
 
iBug2 said:
In Turkey they are even more expensive than that. So whenever I buy Macs, I fly to USA, buy them and get back, even with the plane ticket and 2 days of hotel fees, it's cheaper. And it's a weekend getaway to Manhattan. :)
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Come to sunny Florida this time of year, Tampa has great Apple Store and near the beaches of Siesta Key :)
 
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