New Mac Pro: Simultaneous Real-Time 4K Effect Rendering, +900MB/s Read/Write

[Snowshiro]

The mere fact you think the entire "creative industries" are "still hundred percent exclusively Mac" tells me you haven't seen much your whole life, apparently. So you've played around in your town's local studio and they've used Macs your entire life? That must be it since your statement is almost 100% false. Hey, I like Logic Pro and unlike video editing, it doesn't "need" to be updated constantly to be useful. Skilled musicians should be able to work with an analog tape multi-track to record something if necessary. High tech tools just make life easier. But video editing is a time issue. It's a whole different ball game. Apple USED to be popular in a lot of areas, but that was long ago when Windows was total garbage. Apple used to be known for its graphics. No longer. Now it's known for phones. Yes, there's still plenty of Macs out there. But it's nowhere NEAR 100%. That statement is absurd.

I totally agree with this. In the early days of computers making their way into studios there were quite a lot of particularly smaller studios, who were using Atari STs. I'm within a year of the age of the guy you're correcting, and my experience is nothing like his. There'a a real mixed bag of hardware floating around these days.

Same goes for the creative industries as a whole. Apple screwed the pooch in the professional market by virtually hanging a huge sign from their HQ saying: "PRO USERS - YOU ARE LITERALLY AT THE BOTTOM OF OUR LIST OF PRIORITIES". Steve Jobs achievement in turning around Apple's fortunes was amazing. But in turning the company into a mobile device vendor, he stuck his middle finger up at the industries that had basically kept Apple alive during the lean years.

I even wrote to him about it (and got one of his famous one line email replies).

 

[chirpie]

I have also built many computers over the years. I also worked for AMD in QA for a time.

Great, credentials established.

Is it an example of a great workstation? Absolutely not.

By any traditional metric you'd be right. But I don't think it's out of line to say Apple has an idea to attempt to re-write your definition.

If you weren't blinded by your fanboyism, you would step back and realize that the tiny formfactor is horrendous for the purpose. It isn't a laptop, it's a workstation. It should be designed for maximum customization, make it as easy as possible for users to get in and replace and repair and upgrade.

Sorry man, I for one am looking forward to the smaller form factor. Can't tell you how much I'd like to travel with shows with this thing, or not have to pay a fortune to ship computers back and forth to our offsite IT.

Instead, Apple decided to make it pretty. Why? Because people like you see it and start foaming at the mouth... not because of how impressive of a machine it is, but because it's Apple and it's "different" so of course it is the greatest thing ever created by man.

Yeah, not helping.

But it's Apple, so clearly I am wrong because Apple is perfect, and this machine will be the second coming.

But go on and continue telling me that I need to grow up because I lack the bias you have.

Still not helping.

Now you're going to tell me that I have a bias. You would be incorrect. I have no brand loyalty, but instead loyalty to whatever will give me the best bang for the buck. In the market the mac pro is in, the ability to upgrade a machine on your own is crucial. Simply throwing something out and buying a new one after a few years is out of the question and indescribably financially irresponsible. Sure, you can upgrade RAM (or spend an inexcusably disgusting premium to get more when you order it), but that's not the only thing people upgrade over the years.

If it turns out you can upgrade the processor, cards, ram, and hard drive for roughly the same effort as another machine, will this point be redacted? There's been a decent amount of evidence this may come to pass. Let's wait and see on this, because this really is 90% of the argument, right?

So, yes, I'm immature. Why? Because I'm more concerned with the total package of the product, instead of only being concerned with the logo.

This is why we can't have nice things.

 

[Konrad9]

Sorry man, I for one am looking forward to the smaller form factor. Can't tell you how much I'd like to travel with shows with this thing, or not have to pay a fortune to ship computers back and forth to our offsite IT.


If it turns out you can upgrade the processor, cards, ram, and hard drive for roughly the same effort as another machine, will this point be redacted? There's been a decent amount of evidence this may come to pass. Let's wait and see on this, because this really is 90% of the argument, right?

That's great that you like the smaller form factor, maybe you'd be more interested in a Shuttle PC or a laptop. If your offsite IT has a regular need for a machine, maybe you should do something crazy, like buy them a machine. If you cannot afford to do so with a $3,000 machine, buy two $1,500 machines. If you cannot afford to do that, you need to hire someone to budget your money for you.

Show me video proof of someone upgrading all of those components with the effort you claim. Do not play games with hypotheticals. If it WAS easy to replace every single component, why the hell wouldn't Apple be screaming about it from every mountain top? That tiny formfactor AND user upgradability/customization? Apple would have to be insane to not advertise that to the workstation market, it defies all logic.

And I'm sorry you disagree with my views on the fanboys here, but maybe if people stopped being blind fanboys I'd stop having to treat them that way?

 

[Renzatic]

That's great that you like the smaller form factor, maybe you'd be more interested in a Shuttle PC or a laptop.

Shuttle PCs? That's oldschool, man. These days they're called Mini-ITX computers, and they can be awesome if you get the right one.

 

[H2SO4]

Fyi, we have a teardown.......

 

[Nugget]

Hey, flat five, look! Heat sink paste! (I kid, I kid...)

 

[chirpie]

If you cannot afford to do that, you need to hire someone to budget your money for you.

...

And I'm sorry you disagree with my views on the fanboys here, but maybe if people stopped being blind fanboys I'd stop having to treat them that way?

"Dick, I've covered for you a lot of times cause I thought you were a little crazy. But you're not crazy, you're mean. And this is just radio."

Sorry man, this really is the machine for me. I use FCPX with multicam DSLR projects at conventions. I'll be able to throw this sucker in a pelican case just fine. As a minor aside, it will sometimes be tapped to do the occasional net render for some Cinema 4D work.

You're going to have to accept this machine meets my needs. I'm not sure what else to say. Just, you know, breath in, breath out. I'm worried about you over there. ;-)

EDIT: And only hours later... upgradeable CPU confirmed. So that's 3 out of 4. As if the pros ever had wonderful graphic card offerings. At least it doesn't ship completely behind anymore.

 

[Exhale]

I do understand...

No you don't, because the conversation was quite explicitly discussing the performance these cards would have while utilized in a gaming context. We know what the cards are designed for, but the question was how these cards would perform during recreational hours.

However when you do that the card is handicapped because the Pro card has different internal drivers that are meant for Pro applications not directX applications.

Nothing to do with drivers, has to do with the processing hardware and the type of compute units present at the GPU. GPUs thrive on parallelization, so different types of compute units can be readily added and removed to shape the performance profile of the card.
Most compute based applications tends to favor slightly different types of mathematical operations than whats typically used for rendering 3D worlds, so they'll have the hardware adjusted accordingly. The ability of each compute unit however is the same.

In addition, D3D and OGL are APIs. A command is given to these frameworks, which the system GPU driver then re-interprets into a format appropriate for the GPU hardware. A card is not 'designed' for any specific API, it just has checkboxes of which capabilities of different APIs it can and cannot handle. This is also why older cards can fully support API versions that were released after the card itself. Many OpenGL versions re-implement things from D3D, and vice-versa. Theres no difference between the two as far as the GPU is concerned.

On the topic, there are also other factors such as the presence/absence of ECC; notably in non-compute environments errors are virtually irrelevant - as previously performed calculations are completely thrown out after the frame buffer is flushed (wheras a compute based application would need to keep that result for potentially a very long time). These errors themselves only manifest as an on-screen artifact, and even then such artifacting is rarely visible.

You're bringing up a discussion in a topic that I, quite frankly, know far more than you on.

 

[MagnusVonMagnum]

I do understand... but when you get game junkies using a Pro card for gaming cause it has a fast GPU and wanting to see if it can go head to head with a gaming GPU. However when you do that the card is handicapped because the Pro card has different internal drivers that are meant for Pro applications not directX applications. The FirePro cards are heavy OpenCL, and OpenGL coded with very little directX support.

Why don't you state the fracking obvious? No, Apple is not making this for gamers, but how does that alone negate the need for a better gaming capable system in Apple's lineup? We have a lot more games available for OSX now, but very few models handle many of the newer games well at high resolutions. There is no technical reason Apple couldn't use the same case for the Mac Pro with a different motherboard and CPU/GPU to market to gamers starting at $1500-2000 or so. Or even a Mac Mini with a much better GPU option would do the trick and probably could be priced right around $1200 or so with a Quad i7 in it.

Frankly, I think the only way we are going to see gaming capable Macs is if/when Intel finally catches up with Nvidia and AMD in terms of on-chip GPUs. the Intel 4000HD, for example is about 5 years behind. The newest GPUs are about 3 years behind. In maybe two more generations, they might actually catch up to the mid-range separates, at least. This could then make a pretty decent casual to medium gaming Mac at the $800 range which wouldn't be too shabby. Right now the Mac Mini is fine for playing games that are 3+ years old and/or lightweight current games. The combination of Steam and the Mac App Store plus a reasonably priced gaming capable Mac could literally change the Mac gaming scene and experience like a paradigm shift. Sadly, it has always been a chicken/egg scenario between enough users, capable hardware + os support and gaming developers making games available.

In short, in recent years with the advent of the Intel platform, gaming developers have made a much better effort on the Mac. Apple should do its part too by offering more appropriate hardware options.

 

[Konrad9]

"Dick, I've covered for you a lot of times cause I thought you were a little crazy. But you're not crazy, you're mean. And this is just radio."

Sorry man, this really is the machine for me. I use FCPX with multicam DSLR projects at conventions. I'll be able to throw this sucker in a pelican case just fine. As a minor aside, it will sometimes be tapped to do the occasional net render for some Cinema 4D work.

You're going to have to accept this machine meets my needs. I'm not sure what else to say. Just, you know, breath in, breath out. I'm worried about you over there. ;-)

EDIT: And only hours later... upgradeable CPU confirmed. So that's 3 out of 4. As if the pros ever had wonderful graphic card offerings. At least it doesn't ship completely behind anymore.

Indeed, I was incorrect about the CPU. I still stand by the fact that it defies all logic for Apple to NOT have pointed it out.

Don't worry about me, I'm worried about people who care more about the logo on their machine than what's inside and what they pay for it.

 

[Phrygian]

hahaha. good one, mate. not a pro machine...just a toy. hahaha. you people never get old.

----------



you'd think a pro would know how to spell nvidia.
.

hahaha. good one, mate. you people never get old.

 

[chirpie]

Indeed, I was incorrect about the CPU. I still stand by the fact that it defies all logic for Apple to NOT have pointed it out.

Don't worry about me, I'm worried about people who care more about the logo on their machine than what's inside and what they pay for it.

I'll give you that. Out of all the computers that they sell, you'd think they'd know pros would appreciate the FYI.

 

[Nugget]

Don't worry about me, I'm worried about people who care more about the logo on their machine than what's inside and what they pay for it.

You should go find those people, then, and yell at them. I don't know why you're here yelling at us instead.

 

[BR3W]

I've never once seen a workstation upgraded piecemeal. Apple doesn't list the fact their Pro can be upgraded piece by piece because they realize the same thing those of us working in professional environments already know--no one cares and no one, not their customers and not dell/hp's customers either, will ever use such a "feature." It's wasted advert space on the lines of pointing out their workstations feature an on/off button or how many layers they use in the PCB.

 

[MagnusVonMagnum]

I've never once seen a workstation upgraded piecemeal. Apple doesn't list the fact their Pro can be upgraded piece by piece because they realize the same thing those of us working in professional environments already know--no one cares and no one, not their customers and not dell/hp's customers either, will ever use such a "feature." It's wasted advert space on the lines of pointing out their workstations feature an on/off button or how many layers they use in the PCB.

That's what Apple loves about people that are utterly ignorant about computers and how to upgrade them in any manner what-so-ever. They can sell these people $4000-10,000 in new equipment to improve a $300 part that any 14 year old nerd could figure out and save a boat load of cash that "Pros" just WASTE (and then justify the waste online by stating how much money they make in a week with a machine). Yes, these types are the type of people all types of sales people just LOVE. Hey, here's your new $50k car to fix the one that you just blew a tire on because you can't be bothered to get the tire fixed. Just tow it to the dealership and buy a new car instead Cha-ching!!!

 

[blackcrayon]

That's what Apple loves about people that are utterly ignorant about computers and how to upgrade them. They can sell you $4000 in new equipment to improve a $300 part that any 14 year old nerd could figure out and save a boat load of cash that "Pros" just WASTE. Yes, you guys are the type of people all types of sales people just LOVE. Hey, here's your new $50k car to fix the one that you just blew a tire on! Cha-ching!!!

Could be the ignorant person is the one that doesn't know the latest parts will often require a new motherboard to even support. Knowing "how" to upgrade is different than knowing whether or not it's practical, or even whether it's financially applicable with how a lot of pros depreciate their equipment over time, etc.

Your analogy is even worse- as the "tires" on this Mac Pro should be easily upgradeable (mundane stuff like the internal storage and RAM), and it's now established you can even replace the "engine".

 

[Renzatic]

Could be the ignorant person is the one that doesn't know the latest parts will often require a new motherboard to even support. Knowing "how" to upgrade is different than knowing whether or not it's practical, or even whether it's financially applicable with how a lot of pros depreciate their equipment over time, etc.

Your analogy is even worse- as the "tires" on this Mac Pro should be easily upgradeable (mundane stuff like the internal storage and RAM), and it's now established you can even replace the "engine".

It's for this reason I've always advocated welding the hoods on cars shut.

I mean comeon. The average person doesn't know anything about timing belts and spark plugs. They don't care that Ford doesn't allow them access to all that stuff.

 

[MagnusVonMagnum]

Could be the ignorant person is the one that doesn't know the latest parts will often require a new motherboard to even support. Knowing "how" to upgrade is different than knowing whether or not it's practical, or even whether it's financially applicable with how a lot of pros depreciate their equipment over time, etc.

Your analogy is even worse- as the "tires" on this Mac Pro should be easily upgradeable (mundane stuff like the internal storage and RAM), and it's now established you can even replace the "engine".

I think you utterly missed the point and apparently missed the QUOTE I included where BL4zD said he's never seen a workstation upgraded piecemeal. I am not saying the Mac Pro can't be upgraded (certainly past versions and even PowerMacs could be upgraded in almost every way if there was a product made to upgrade it), but rather addressing the claim BL4zD seemed to be making that professionals don't upgrade any part of workstations, but rather just replace them with a newer/faster/better version.

Personally, I find that a questionable claim, but my comments were directed at the potential waste involved in replacing an entire (expensive) workstation when perhaps the performance improvement needed may be something as simple as adding a USB3 card or newer hard drive controller card. Ironically for me, those were precisely two of the upgrades I added to my own PowerMac in addition to a newer graphics card and eventually even a CPU upgrade from dual-500MHz to a single 1.8GHz chip. Obviously, I'm not a professional or I would have just bought a new computer any any single one of those steps....

It's for this reason I've always advocated welding the hoods on cars shut.

I mean comeon. The average person doesn't know anything about timing belts and spark plugs. They don't care that Ford doesn't allow them access to all that stuff.

What is Ford doing to prevent them from accessing a timing belt or a spark plug? It's not rocket science for god's sake. And how would welding a hood shut benefit Ford or any other garage? They would have to unweld the thing to work on the car and that would be absurd. You and everyone else are SUPPOSED to check your fluids under the hood as well for that matter. Frankly, anyone who can't check their own oil or add windshield washer fluid shouldn't be allowed behind the wheel EVER, IMO.

 

[yoak]

That's what Apple loves about people that are utterly ignorant about computers and how to upgrade them in any manner what-so-ever. They can sell these people $4000-10,000 in new equipment to improve a $300 part that any 14 year old nerd could figure out and save a boat load of cash that "Pros" just WASTE (and then justify the waste online by stating how much money they make in a week with a machine). Yes, these types are the type of people all types of sales people just LOVE. Hey, here's your new $50k car to fix the one that you just blew a tire on because you can't be bothered to get the tire fixed. Just tow it to the dealership and buy a new car instead Cha-ching!!!

Or, it just works...
The computer I mean. For some it just makes more sense to change than upgrade. It's just a tool

 

[Renzatic]

What is Ford doing to prevent them from accessing a timing belt or a spark plug? It's not rocket science for god's sake. And how would welding a hood shut benefit Ford or any other garage? They would have to unweld the thing to work on the car and that would be absurd. You and everyone else are SUPPOSED to check your fluids under the hood as well for that matter. Frankly, anyone who can't check their own oil or add windshield washer fluid shouldn't be allowed behind the wheel EVER, IMO.

I'm using roughly the same excuses with Fords and welded hoods that were used to explain why the iMacs don't have a user serviceable HDD from back in the day.

For me, Apple makes excellent computers, but there's always one kick-in-the-nuts caveat that keeps me from loving them 100%. With the new Mac Pro, it's user upgradeable GPUs. As much as I don't like that, it's almost understandable, considering what they're trying achieve with the new design. But having to take the entire front out of an iMac and void the warranty in the process of upgrading or replacing an HDD? There's no excuse for that.

But that won't stop people from trying to excuse it anyway. Usually with the "most people don't do X" spiel.

 

[Konrad9]

You should go find those people, then, and yell at them. I don't know why you're here yelling at us instead.

Because most of the people here *are* those people.

 

[Nugget]

Because most of the people here *are* those people.

That's simply not true. An an exercise, count up how many times you've received a reply from someone here complaining that they didn't say what you claim they said or don't think what you claim they think.

 

[BR3W]

I think you utterly missed the point and apparently missed the QUOTE I included where BL4zD said he's never seen a workstation upgraded piecemeal. I am not saying the Mac Pro can't be upgraded (certainly past versions and even PowerMacs could be upgraded in almost every way if there was a product made to upgrade it), but rather addressing the claim BL4zD seemed to be making that professionals don't upgrade any part of workstations, but rather just replace them with a newer/faster/better version.

Personally, I find that a questionable claim, but my comments were directed at the potential waste involved in replacing an entire (expensive) workstation when perhaps the performance improvement needed may be something as simple as adding a USB3 card or newer hard drive controller card. Ironically for me, those were precisely two of the upgrades I added to my own PowerMac in addition to a newer graphics card and eventually even a CPU upgrade from dual-500MHz to a single 1.8GHz chip. Obviously, I'm not a professional or I would have just bought a new computer any any single one of those steps....

I don't know of any large scale operation that *buys* their hardware so it's not a question of buying > replacing vs. upgrading.

There are engineers and techs at Google, Broadcom, University of California, or any other large corporation that have the know-how to upgrade their workstations but they won't do it. They are not going to upgrade thousands of workstations en masse and they certainly aren't going to be buying workstations with such a "feature" in mind.

I'm a professor at an R1 and we don't keep our workstations regardless of whether they are adequate for the tasks. When the lease period is over the units are replaced.

 

[Konrad9]

That's simply not true. An an exercise, count up how many times you've received a reply from someone here complaining that they didn't say what you claim they said or don't think what you claim they think.

I've received many comments like that. People don't like when I point out their hypocrisy and go to great lengths to deny it? SHOCKING!

I'm sorry you disagree, but you're wrong. Look at the story about Chromebooks selling better than an Apple product. Almost every single one of the top rated posts is blindly bashing the devices without any consideration of why people might actually prefer a non-Apple device. These people are physically unable to comprehend why someone might want to purchase a cheap device for browsing the web.

Most of the comments are simply attacking and insulting the intelligence of anyone who would even consider buying something that isn't Apple. It's astounding.

As an exercise, count up the comments you've seen or posted that attack something non-Apple that would have been praising comments if the story had been about Apple.

But you won't, because it would destroy your illusion that you are not a fanboy. Actually, I'm sure you could come up with reasons why it wouldn't matter, because oh Apple must have secretly invented that first and the evil Samsung stole it, and consumers are just idiots that's why Android has good sales, and etc etc.

 

[flat five]

Hey, flat five, look! Heat sink paste! (I kid, I kid...)

lol.. just saw this