I agree. At least 1-2 for the backup drive and a primary storage. Personally, I use an external box (8) in RAID 10 as I have 11 drives, plus I can save energy when I use my Mac for personal reasons by switching off the box. However, everybody needs at least an HD for the backup, which is better if it's always available, particularly for Pro users.
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MP 7,1 Waiting for Mac Pro 7,1 A1991 (no more)
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I agree. At least 1-2 for the backup drive and a primary storage. Personally, I use an external box (8) in RAID 10 as I have 11 drives, plus I can save energy when I use my Mac for personal reasons by switching off the box. However, everybody needs at least an HD for the backup, which is better if it's always available, particularly for Pro users.
The cost is trivial. If you don't want drive bays then buy a MacBook Pro and use external storage. Problem solved. For those of us who like using internal storage a cMP type of design worked for us and had no detriment to users who prefer external solutions. It was a win-win situation and, thus far, you have not provided anything other than "I don't want it" as justification for eliminating it.
It sure doesn't seem that way to me. Supporting a bunch of internal drive bays is a large engineering commitment on many levels. It's certainly a much more involved featureset than a headphone jack. Drive bays take up a lot of physical space (relatively speaking) inside a case. That's space that could be used for m.2 slots, or PCIe slots, or better cooling, or better serviceability. If Apple do decide to support internal spinning disks, it will come at a cost and I can't see how you can call that trivial with no justification.
You can't respond to a statement I've made and in the same post complain that I have made no statements. It's silly. Of course I've provided things other than my own personal preferences. Hell, I haven't mentioned my personal preferences at all in any post. You disagree with what I've said, and that's fine, but at least acknowledge that.
If Apple offered a 12+ core MacBook Pro that could take 128gb of RAM and didn't thermally throttle I would consider it.
Supporting internal 3.5" drive bays is trivial unless you choose form over function. There are countless examples of systems supporting internal 3.5" drive bays. They range from the very low cost, low quality to high cost, high quality and everything in between. It's tried and true technology, very well understood, and trivial to implement.
If I could obtain similar M.2 storage capacities at similar pricing I'd be all for the removal of 3.5" drive bays. We're not there so 3.5" offers an acceptable compromise.
I do disagree with what you've said, I thought that was quite clear. Your objection to internal 3.5" drive bays is you don't need / want them. That's fine. I, and others do. Given having them doesn't negate your use of external storage I see no downside for you.
Wait, I thought saving space was the most important thing to you. Now you're saying you have other considerations? Say it isn't so
I have never said anything resembling this.
I have never said anything resembling this.
I am unsurprised you continue to be confused by others' perspectives on this issue since you seem to have a really difficult time with reading comprehension. I have no idea how you've come to decide that I am saying all these things that I have never said.
Perhaps you should step back from what you've said and read it from someone else's perspective. Perhaps then you'll realize just what it is you're really saying.
This is simply absurd. If you spent less time trying to tell me what my position is and more time reading what I've written, you wouldn't believe this.
They haven't been able to do that with a desktop since the cMP was retired.
There seem to be four separate use cases for 3.5" drives. Everybody seems to want 2 or 4 fast PCIe drives (my vote would be 4 with some sort of dynamic lane allocation so those who don't want 4 SSDs can recover the lanes).Opinions on spinners vary more widely...
1.) No internal spinning rust (itself divided between people whose data fits on the amount of PCIe storage they're willing to buy, those whose data lives on a NAS and those who need a large external RAID).
2.) 1-2 internal spinners - people who don't want to mess with RAID, but want a big, relatively slow data drive (and its Time Machine backup), and don't want to pay $50-100 extra or deal with external cases.
3.) 4-5 internal spinners - people who have somewhat modest RAID storage needs, and want it in the case (I'm guessing that most of these folks want some form of internal RAID 5, although that isn't explicit)
4.) 8 internal spinners - people who want their big RAID in the box (ONLY makes any sense if there's a capable RAID (5/6) controller - 8 way JBOD, RAID 0 or RAID 1 makes no sense).
If you put no bays in the box, people who don't want any are happy, people who want 1-2 pay an extra $50-100, people who want 4-5 pay $300, and people who want 8 pay $1000 or so (but VERY few workstations will satisfy them - unless they are willing to use a server as a workstation).
If you put 1-2 bays in the box, people who want none don't waste much (a couple of bays isn't a huge sacrifice in space or power, and you don't put anything in them to preserve reliability), people who want 1-2 are happy, and people who want more than that pay exactly as they would if there were none.
If you put 4-5 bays in the box, people who want less than that are stuck with a big box that costs significantly more than they need to spend, with power and space allocated to something they don't need, the 4-5 bay users are happy (unless they need 5 but get 4, which is a big waste), and the 8 bay users have two big towers to accommodate and they spend a significant amount of money twice.
If you put 8 bays in the box, anybody who doesn't want internal RAID is stuck with a huge amount of space, power and money allocated to something they don't care about. The 4-5 bay users probably don't really mind, since they'll use the controller and a substantial fraction of the bays.
I wonder what percentage of users who want a slotbox with drive bays (and/or support for NVidia GPUs) have the words "game", "media server" or "Premiere" somewhere in their use cases. Those are all legitimate uses for a computer, but they are all uses that Apple doesn't support for the Mac Pro. Apple doesn't really support serious gaming on any Mac, preferring to keep their involvement with games to casual titles, mostly on iOS. They see home media serving as the role of the Apple TV with all cloud storage (no, that's not the only way to run a media center, but Apple doesn't always support all options). As for Premiere, their answer is "you should be using Final Cut, which prefers AMD GPUs". These aren't my views, but they are Apple's, and, for better or for worse, Apple is designing the Mac Pro.
1.) No internal spinning rust (itself divided between people whose data fits on the amount of PCIe storage they're willing to buy, those whose data lives on a NAS and those who need a large external RAID).
2.) 1-2 internal spinners - people who don't want to mess with RAID, but want a big, relatively slow data drive (and its Time Machine backup), and don't want to pay $50-100 extra or deal with external cases.
3.) 4-5 internal spinners - people who have somewhat modest RAID storage needs, and want it in the case (I'm guessing that most of these folks want some form of internal RAID 5, although that isn't explicit)
4.) 8 internal spinners - people who want their big RAID in the box (ONLY makes any sense if there's a capable RAID (5/6) controller - 8 way JBOD, RAID 0 or RAID 1 makes no sense).
If you put no bays in the box, people who don't want any are happy, people who want 1-2 pay an extra $50-100, people who want 4-5 pay $300, and people who want 8 pay $1000 or so (but VERY few workstations will satisfy them - unless they are willing to use a server as a workstation).
If you put 1-2 bays in the box, people who want none don't waste much (a couple of bays isn't a huge sacrifice in space or power, and you don't put anything in them to preserve reliability), people who want 1-2 are happy, and people who want more than that pay exactly as they would if there were none.
If you put 4-5 bays in the box, people who want less than that are stuck with a big box that costs significantly more than they need to spend, with power and space allocated to something they don't need, the 4-5 bay users are happy (unless they need 5 but get 4, which is a big waste), and the 8 bay users have two big towers to accommodate and they spend a significant amount of money twice.
If you put 8 bays in the box, anybody who doesn't want internal RAID is stuck with a huge amount of space, power and money allocated to something they don't care about. The 4-5 bay users probably don't really mind, since they'll use the controller and a substantial fraction of the bays.
I wonder what percentage of users who want a slotbox with drive bays (and/or support for NVidia GPUs) have the words "game", "media server" or "Premiere" somewhere in their use cases. Those are all legitimate uses for a computer, but they are all uses that Apple doesn't support for the Mac Pro. Apple doesn't really support serious gaming on any Mac, preferring to keep their involvement with games to casual titles, mostly on iOS. They see home media serving as the role of the Apple TV with all cloud storage (no, that's not the only way to run a media center, but Apple doesn't always support all options). As for Premiere, their answer is "you should be using Final Cut, which prefers AMD GPUs". These aren't my views, but they are Apple's, and, for better or for worse, Apple is designing the Mac Pro.
I am seeing it more from Apple's complete Mac lineup perspective, irregardless of particular use-cases:
1) If a Pro version of Mac Mini is to be realized, it will likely have some attributes of the tcMP, where there is no SATA presence and rely sole on TB for additional storage;
2) even on an iMac Pro this is the same, only one (logical volume of) internal PCI SSD; in terms of internal storage potential, the regular 5k iMac ironically is higher than the iMac Pro since there is a 3.5" SATA bay inside, but Apple felt fine leaving that out of the Pro variant;
3) both iMac Pro and MBP2018 have their one and only internal drive controlled through the T2 chip, whether it be about manufacturing cost/ease, APFS, DRM, conspiracy theories or what have you does not matter.
Considering these points I find it hard to see full 3.5" SATA bays having any presence in the mMP. The machine is quite likely having one T chip in close proximity to an onboard boot partition PCI SSD (or an array of it like iMac Pro). I can see some likelihood of M.2 style slot/bays for a few blade type SSDs, but very unlikely to be SATA 2.5" let alone 3.5", and this logic has a premise of Apple wanting to leave some room for differentiation between the Mini Pro and mMP.
1) If a Pro version of Mac Mini is to be realized, it will likely have some attributes of the tcMP, where there is no SATA presence and rely sole on TB for additional storage;
2) even on an iMac Pro this is the same, only one (logical volume of) internal PCI SSD; in terms of internal storage potential, the regular 5k iMac ironically is higher than the iMac Pro since there is a 3.5" SATA bay inside, but Apple felt fine leaving that out of the Pro variant;
3) both iMac Pro and MBP2018 have their one and only internal drive controlled through the T2 chip, whether it be about manufacturing cost/ease, APFS, DRM, conspiracy theories or what have you does not matter.
Considering these points I find it hard to see full 3.5" SATA bays having any presence in the mMP. The machine is quite likely having one T chip in close proximity to an onboard boot partition PCI SSD (or an array of it like iMac Pro). I can see some likelihood of M.2 style slot/bays for a few blade type SSDs, but very unlikely to be SATA 2.5" let alone 3.5", and this logic has a premise of Apple wanting to leave some room for differentiation between the Mini Pro and mMP.
At this point somebody should just make a motherboard that fits inside the cMP based on the Intel C602J chipset (Mac Pro 6,1) with TB3. They would sell like hotcakes.
You know what your position is, I know what your position is. You just don't want to acknowledge it.
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I haven't looked in a couple of years so maybe this question is outdated but where can I find a Thunderbolt four disk enclosure for $50 - $100?
Those people who are concerned about space they can just purchase a MacBook Pro.
We're all aware of this but that doesn't mean we can't have our preferences.
I agree with most of what you've written and just highlighted some of the differences. I'm in the 2-4 drive bay camp. I have a 1,1, a 3,1, a 5,1, and a 6,1 Mac Pro. The 6,1 sees very little use whereas the 5,1 sees continuous use. The 5,1 sees so much use because it has internal 3.5" storage where I keep my working files. I thought about buying an external Thunderbolt drive bay for my 6,1 and using it more but such a solution doesn't fit well. The additional space, cabling, and power required makes it a nuisance. Not to mention the all the USB ports are on the back. This is my way of working, others will be different.
I'd love to substitute NVMe based storage for the 3.5" solutions but such solutions are expensive. 1TB of NVMe costs roughly $200. Step up to a 2TB NVMe SSD and the price shoots up to $650. A 1TB traditional HD costs $40.00 or I can purchase 8TB for the cost of the 1TB NVMe drive. Since the 3.5" drives offer acceptable performance I can't justify NVMe replacement unless performance becomes an issue (unlikely for my tasks) or cost/GB come more in line with the 3.5" drives.
IMO it's premature to remove 3.5" HD support from workstation class systems. At some point we'll reach that point but I don't believe we're there just yet.
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Speaking of security, isn't a Mac's T2 internal disk controller completely bypass-able via using a bootable external USB device? An external USB-C or USB 3.0 adapter cable connected SSD, running an independent operating system, can function nearly as speedily as an internally connected SSD.
Anything above 4 is absolutely out. And its definitely justifiable that arrays >4 drives should live outside the main machine. I don't really understand why they can't go the route of something like Dell's Flexbay though. 4 drives basically becomes about a 4x8x6 inch block. That's really not that much space. IMO, a high end workstation should have room for that. If you don't want it, just don't configure it with one in the first place. I realize Apple really doesn't like empty volume in their computers, but with the amount of heat workstation CPUs and GPUs create, that extra empty space would not be a bad thing anyway.
At the very least, I'd like to see 2 3.5 bays, with 10+ TB HDDs becoming common, that's represents a lot of space these days. Ideally, in that case, they would be stacked on top of each other, not horizontal, so that they could be configured to 3x2.5 bays for high-ish capacity SATA SSDs, which could be striped into a very fast scratch space. I believe that would represent a lot of added value to the machine with a still relatively small footprint in the machine (about 4x4x6) and trivial cost for those that don't want it (especially if the default it to not even include the mounts/connections).
I highly suspect Apple won't do this though, and the eGPU is the precedent. Modular to them, is sounding like its going to mean lots of peripherals strung together by TB. Why sell an additional $50 SATA bay solution and optional drives, when you can sell an absurdly overpriced 2-4 bay TB enclosure for like $1K?
It is only bypass-able if the rest of the T2 allows it. The nominal mode for "external boot" is off for Apple Secure Boot. So far T2 systems have only had one and only one internal drive so "external" was the only other option. If there are other slots perhaps they will treat the others as safe if the case is locked. However, that may extend to non-Apple SSD if there are more than one internal drives.
Only if both internal/external SSDs are both SATA based.
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Neither the Mac Pro 2013 , iMac Pro , nor a couple of the MBP 15" have using the PCH as the mount point for the Thunderbolt controllers. The MBP 13' have even less need for a PCH attachment for the TB controller. There is no DMI limit at all there. There are more than few Windows PC vendors that have put the TB controller on the PCH. In general though, Apple has avoided that. There is about zero rational reason to think they'd back pedal on a new Mac Pro given the increased CPU PCI-e lanes available since their 2013 efforts.
Apple pouring lots of effort into the T-series points to otherwise. Apple's SSD controller business is merging into being integrated with other functions both on Mac and on iOS. That is a reduction of board chip count for the nominal system configuration. However, that 100% does not point to Apple getting deeper into the detached, aftermarket SSD business at all. Most of the T2 implementation are 100% soldered on ( in mobile solutions). The desktops so far have just placed the NAND on to removable cards. ( Mac Pro likely would get that also. Mini might get pressed for space, but would only have one card if used . )
Apple probably doesn't want to sell "loose" (deatched) SSDs. None of their currently Apple branded SSDs are sold that way. That is probably not going to change.
The opening to empty SSD slots would simply be an acknowledgement of fact many folks don't buy SSDs from Apple. Thunderbolt means they'll (via macOS) have to interact with those SSDs anyway. it isn't not like Apple can put their fingers in their ears and simply wish them away completely. They don't make alot of noise, consumer alot of power , or consume tons of space. Even if they are shooting for a reduced footprint system from full sized deskside workstation it still isn't going to bust the noise, power, or space budget to go past one internal drive.
How much noise , power , and space budget they have is known to them, but anything Mac Pro 2013 sized or bigger has more room than just one drive. ( the Computer GPU on the MP 2013 had a empty pad where a SSD blade connector could go since it was the relative mirror of the other card. )
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Nominal, primary storage being some random 3rd party drive? I think your not paying attention to all the neon light bright signals being sent out by Apple. A secondary bay that you could optionally designate as being your primary boot drive, perhaps. But Apple shipping $2+ K pro Mac systems with HDD spinner as the default boot configurations.... that's extremely likely dead. One SSD is going to get soaked into the price of every configuration.
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The bolded part is simply untrue .
The cost of drive bays is added space, that is obviously correct - power requirements are lowish, the extra engineering and design effort for drive bays is indeed trivial , so are hardware costs .
It's a complete redesign after all, so that's small potatoes .
No need to lose other features or increase the price either due to a few added drive slots .
Besides - if Apple use your kind of approach, we will not just lose drive bays, your PCIe slots will be lost too .
It's the kind of attitude that gave us the tcMP .
Imagine a cMP like design without the optical bays, smart packaging and cooling, and a case using a more weight efficient structure and materials . No handles either, those must go ...
Hell, make the power supply external, how's that for redundancy ?
That could be quite a bit smaller than the cMP, a lot lighter and just as expandable .
Apple can make great computers, they just have to find their way back to form and function .
In the past though, Apple has done Apple labeled drives to go with their systems. Certifying drives costs money and so does long term contracts to buy specific models There is a bit more costs here than you are pointing out. I agree it isn't a huge cost, just higher than you are making it out to be.
There is also the problem if the the Mac Pro is the last Apple device using a 3.5" drive. If there is a "buy/certify 3.5 drive " spot in the personnel line it sticks out much more than when Airports , iMacs , Mac Pro , and XRaid were using them. ( and iPods , laptops , and mini used smaller ones. )
If the mainstream iMac gets revised to drop the 3.5" drive ( for more cooling) then Mac Pro is going to be out there on a limb. If all Apple is still buying in bulk is 2.5" drives then those may be what they go with because it is cheaper (costs less), because there is volume and work to spread costs over more systems sold. 3.5" drives are not likely at all going to be part of the standard configuration. So this is BTO drives for folks who may / may not buy them. They fewer 3.5" drives Apple sells the higher the price goes until get to negative feedback loop because most of the buyers are off buying "as cheap as possible" stuff off the third party market. There is probably going to have to be some kind of floor of volume for Apple to jump in.
PCI-e external boxes ( often used for eGPU solutions ) means Apple will probably be dealing with GPU cards whether they are placed in a Mac Pro or not. Not down to the last reminding sole system. The "Computational" GPGPU is a real thing. It didn't work as the entry configuration requirement for the Mac Pro, but it is deployed often enough that Apple will have to keep up with it to some extent. it isn't going to drop down to zero across most of the Mac product line.
That wasn't the baseline requirement though that moved the MP 2013 into the space it went. Apple's drive to do a literal desktop solution. If they are stuck on that then won't see four bays at all. It is only when the footprint constraints are loosen back to older deskside system where "enough volume, no problem" starts to creep back in.
Apple is very unlikely to let go of Al-lu-min-um . The whole rest of the is aluminum. Plastic isn't very "Green". So 3.5" bay height probably does make a weight difference. If it is floor standing don't be surprised that some handles are still there ( Apple's symmetry OCD ). If they shrink it some the additional handle height won't be standard rack hostile.
You have left off quieter which is probably coupled to the cooling, which likely will be a constraint. It has been before, nothing indicates they are doing a 180 on that. ( it may not have to limbo down to the MP 2013 levels )
I think it is more about loosening up a bit about letting people put stuff they don't buy from Apple in the box. Apple doesn't want to be just a container builder. However, there is an intersection on just how far back they can retreat on that. Mac Pro has to integrate in with other stuff that folks bought that may cost more than the Mac Pro itself. Apple can't turn it into a "tag wags dog" context.
However, the opposite is also true, highly inexpensive 3.5" drives being the primary driver of a system requirement is a "tag wags dog" context.
I'm not aware of 4 bay external cases for $100 anywhere, and if they existed, it would be a super-cheap option that would be a very poor match for the Mac Pro. What I wrote (or meant to write, entirely possible that I screwed up) is that 1-2 bays only cost $50-$100. I'm thinking of high-end single external drives from the likes of Glyph and G-tech compared to the cost of the 7200 RPM "enterprise" (probably actually NAS grade, not the highest end IronWolf and UltraStar drives) mechanisms they contain, which is about $50 per drive.
If you only want it for Time Machine, inexpensive external drives from Seagate or Western Digital actually have even less of a premium over their 5400 RPM consumer mechanisms. Occasionally, they have a reverse premium where the external is $10 cheaper than the drive it contains. BackBlaze and other high-volume drive users have been known to buy huge numbers of external drives on sale and crack them open. There was one point a few years ago when there was a shortage of certain internal drives while the external equivalents were on good sales. You couldn't find an external within 100 miles of BackBlaze HQ - their employees were walking into every Best Buy and Fry's they could find, buying the cheap externals and cracking them open - they even had customers buying drives for them and sending them in for reimbursement plus a couple of months of free service...
One possibility for quad enclosures is longtime Mac accessory vendor Other World Computing, who have high-quality boxes starting at $249 for USB 3.1 (even 4 spinners would have a very hard time saturating USB 3.1), and going up to $400 for Thunderbolt 3. There are plenty of other possibilities on Newegg, starting around $150, but the Other World stuff has always been excellent.
Once you start getting up to 8 bays, the choices are a little different, ranging from less-expensive hardware RAID enclosures from companies like HighPoint and Areca (~$1000) through high-end enclosures that are sold pre-configured with enterprise-level drives such as the G-Speed Shuttle XL that can cost $8000 if full of 12 TB drives. The other option to consider at 8 bays is using a 10 Gb Ethernet NAS from Synology or QNAP. Gigabit Ethernet isn't fast enough to feel like it's directly attached (with Ethernet overhead, it's about as fast as USB 3.0), but 10 Gb is fast enough to handle any set of spinners . There is almost no question the Mac Pro will come with at least one 10 Gb Ethernet port, and the other advantage of putting the spinners on the network is that other computers can access them easily, although at 1 Gb speeds (unless you have an iMac Pro, a Windows box with 10 Gb, or something using a Thunderbolt to 10 Gb adapter).
I agree wholeheartedly with Deconstruct60's point at the end of the previous post.
Apple will be trying to let people use expensive and exotic hardware while not building a slotbox. We'll see some increased ability to use things like compute accelerators and high-end A/V interfaces, while keeping people locked into buying Apple storage and Apple-provided AMD graphics...
If you only want it for Time Machine, inexpensive external drives from Seagate or Western Digital actually have even less of a premium over their 5400 RPM consumer mechanisms. Occasionally, they have a reverse premium where the external is $10 cheaper than the drive it contains. BackBlaze and other high-volume drive users have been known to buy huge numbers of external drives on sale and crack them open. There was one point a few years ago when there was a shortage of certain internal drives while the external equivalents were on good sales. You couldn't find an external within 100 miles of BackBlaze HQ - their employees were walking into every Best Buy and Fry's they could find, buying the cheap externals and cracking them open - they even had customers buying drives for them and sending them in for reimbursement plus a couple of months of free service...
One possibility for quad enclosures is longtime Mac accessory vendor Other World Computing, who have high-quality boxes starting at $249 for USB 3.1 (even 4 spinners would have a very hard time saturating USB 3.1), and going up to $400 for Thunderbolt 3. There are plenty of other possibilities on Newegg, starting around $150, but the Other World stuff has always been excellent.
Once you start getting up to 8 bays, the choices are a little different, ranging from less-expensive hardware RAID enclosures from companies like HighPoint and Areca (~$1000) through high-end enclosures that are sold pre-configured with enterprise-level drives such as the G-Speed Shuttle XL that can cost $8000 if full of 12 TB drives. The other option to consider at 8 bays is using a 10 Gb Ethernet NAS from Synology or QNAP. Gigabit Ethernet isn't fast enough to feel like it's directly attached (with Ethernet overhead, it's about as fast as USB 3.0), but 10 Gb is fast enough to handle any set of spinners . There is almost no question the Mac Pro will come with at least one 10 Gb Ethernet port, and the other advantage of putting the spinners on the network is that other computers can access them easily, although at 1 Gb speeds (unless you have an iMac Pro, a Windows box with 10 Gb, or something using a Thunderbolt to 10 Gb adapter).
I agree wholeheartedly with Deconstruct60's point at the end of the previous post.
Apple will be trying to let people use expensive and exotic hardware while not building a slotbox. We'll see some increased ability to use things like compute accelerators and high-end A/V interfaces, while keeping people locked into buying Apple storage and Apple-provided AMD graphics...
I generally agree as well, however, I see several downsides to pushing too much external that I hope, but am by no means counting on, Apple are considering a compromise for. Those downsides being: they are generally noisier, they consume more power, they require more cabling, they are less reliable, lower cost versions have speed limitations (once putting several SSDs in them), they are ugly on a desk, the list could go on. In general, it is extremely costly to truly match the performance and other aspects (sound, power consumption), of internal bays. This is something that is effectively free internally at small drive counts (thinking <4).
For your average time machine backup, by all means, get that hulking 10TB external that's like $200 somehow. Set it to click on every night, or maybe once during the day too, and live with the bad performance and clicking drives. But, then do I also need my 8 TB RAID0 externally? Uh, please. For the love of god, don't make us do that.
This doesn't mean Apple should make one computer to rule over every possible use case, but they do need to find that middle ground between the nMP and cMP. This why I think ~2 3.5 stacked slots are ideal. Yes, Apple likes its efficiencies and economies of scale, but at a certain point, if you are going to make this type of machine, you have to do it right or just not do it at all. Its minimal foot print in the machine and given the increasing capacity and performance of HDDs and SSDs, it would give tremendous flexibility and increased utility to the machine. For the truly big data, yes, get that off the local computer. That's the way things are going, no need to fit it. The medium-ish sized data though still needs the option to be local.
External USB drives do not depend on whatever controller is used for the Mac or PC's internal drives.
External drives which are connected via USB-C or USB 2.0/3.0/3.1 can be any drive type: USB thumb drive, SATA, NVMe or even IDE drives.
Or even 1.44 Mb floppy drives & optical drives can be connected via USB.
All can be made bootable. At least on PC's/Hackintoshes.
With Macs that have the T2 controller chip for the boot drive, the internal Mac boot drive may become completely inaccessible, due to encryption or maybe lack of device driver. No idea if there's some kind of work-around when the Mac (with a T2 controller) is booted from an external USB drive.
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10g-E switching is $$$ and may even new new cabling in some cases.
and some settings to you really want to kill the local network to just work on big files vs just copying them to an local disk??
anyways what is better $800 to go from 1TB to 2TB pci-e apple priceing VS $800 HIGH END VIDEO CARD??
Now 1TB pci-e base is high.
Even at pro workstation pricing HP (full price)
2TB HDD $185.00
1 TB 7200 RPM SATA 3.5" HDD $125
1 TB 7200 RPM SATA Enterprise $289
240 GB SATA Enterprise SSD $491
512 GB SATA 2.5" SSD $525
1 TB SATA 2.5" SSD $920
256 GB HP Z Turbo Drive M.2 NVMe SSD $309
512 GB HP Z Turbo Drive M.2 NVMe SSD $519
256 GB HP Z Turbo Drive Quad Pro SSD $579 (Quad pro card has 4 m.2 slots) $3686 for the card + 4 1TB disk (shows up as 4 disks)
and some settings to you really want to kill the local network to just work on big files vs just copying them to an local disk??
anyways what is better $800 to go from 1TB to 2TB pci-e apple priceing VS $800 HIGH END VIDEO CARD??
Now 1TB pci-e base is high.
Even at pro workstation pricing HP (full price)
2TB HDD $185.00
1 TB 7200 RPM SATA 3.5" HDD $125
1 TB 7200 RPM SATA Enterprise $289
240 GB SATA Enterprise SSD $491
512 GB SATA 2.5" SSD $525
1 TB SATA 2.5" SSD $920
256 GB HP Z Turbo Drive M.2 NVMe SSD $309
512 GB HP Z Turbo Drive M.2 NVMe SSD $519
256 GB HP Z Turbo Drive Quad Pro SSD $579 (Quad pro card has 4 m.2 slots) $3686 for the card + 4 1TB disk (shows up as 4 disks)
I'm not sure HP has ever sold one of those things at full price? I've never bought one of their desktop workstations, but I have owned a ZBook, and they're at least 30% off the base web configurator price even if you buy one of them. I'm sure they're closer to 50% off for volume customers.
One place you can see this is that HP lists the top Xeon Platinum 8180 processor as a $20,000 option on the Z8. That's a well-known $10,000 processor that googling "Xeon Platinum 8180 price" will immediately reveal as a $10,000 processor. Who'd pay HP $10,000 to pop it in its socket? Maybe the Pentagon, but outside of that?
One place you can see this is that HP lists the top Xeon Platinum 8180 processor as a $20,000 option on the Z8. That's a well-known $10,000 processor that googling "Xeon Platinum 8180 price" will immediately reveal as a $10,000 processor. Who'd pay HP $10,000 to pop it in its socket? Maybe the Pentagon, but outside of that?
No. I simply am not talking about a boot HD. I referred to a "primary storage", in addition to a backup drive, where to store big files one needs to work on... It's different than a boot drive, which is used to load the OS. Since we are explaining the basics, I return the favour
Good stuff .
As for alumin-i-um
, no need to get rid of it ; just a more weight consious case design might be preferable, instead of the massive slabs the cMP is using . Granted, the cMP is pretty tough, so there's that to consider as well .Handles could be integrated in a less obtrusive fashion to save space, and make them rack freindly, as you mentioned .
True, noise is always a big one .
I agree that Hdds add to possible cooling/noise issues, if the design has to allow for them .
Fully agreed.
I'm not necessarily married to having 3.5" bays in the next MP, even though I personally would very much like to have a couple , and I believe Apple would do itsself and a lot of users a big favor if they were available .
Where I think a line should be drawn re. storage is the deletion of (several) SATA bays , as they did with the tcMP .
M.2 is the current stuff, so that needs to be provided for , but SATA has the edge in TB/bucks, and funny enough money matters to some people still .
Rumor has it even companies care about expenses, who would have thought ...
As you mentioned in an earlier posting, prices in this area adjust a lot more slowly than some people want to have you believe .
Also, 2.5" spinners have become a more viable option than they were some years ago , with higher capacities and lower prices .
Wouldn't it be neat to have a few SATA bays that can each take 1x 3.5 HDD or 2x 2.5 drives (14+mm) ?
That would be so Apple in a good way
.I don't. I'll start by stating I've never heard the saying "Tag wags dog" so my response assumes it is the equivalent of "Tail wags the dog". Such a context assumes those desiring 3.5" drive support are prioritizing that above all else. I'm not and, I do not get the impression others are either.
It is also built on the premise a system can only include 3.5" drive support and little else. That may be the case if small size is one of the key driving factors in the design (as it appears to have been with the 6,1 Mac Pro). That, too, is simply untrue.
If you examine the specs of HP's Z8 system you'll find it supports all of the technology demanded by the "no internal 3.5" drive support" advocates and then some. It offers seven generation 3 PCIe slots, multiple USB 3.1 (gen 1 and gen 2, both A and C type ports), Thunderbolt 3 (via expansion card), and they even, by some miracle of engineering design prowess, managed to include a serial port and two PS/2 ports (keyboard and mouse). Did I mention it supports four internal 3.5" drive bays? All in a case which is 3" longer and 2.6" less height than the cMP enclosure.
If you want a smaller foot print then the Z6 is available. You lose a couple of the 3.5" drive bays (but gain dual M.2 slots), a PCIe slot, and the serial port (I'm sure there are other differences but I'm not going to do an in-depth comparison). All in a chassis that is shorter and slimmer than the cMP (the depth is almost identical).
Given the above I cannot see why so many are objecting to the inclusion of 3.5" drive support. The only thing that makes sense is that they prioritize small size over 3.5" support. Which is fine but they need to realize that's their preference. Others, like myself, are fine with the dimensions of these systems. They're not unusually large and, when compared with a 6,1 Mac Pro and an external disk enclosure, do not consume much more space.
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