FB-DIMMs aren't that much worse than normal DDR2. If you are graphic card limited at higher resolutions the difference become negligible.
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Why is there a Mac truck sized hole in the Apple desktop product line?
- Thread starter kudukudu
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FB-DIMMs aren't that much worse than normal DDR2. If you are graphic card limited at higher resolutions the difference become negligible.
I don't get why people want a mid-range tower. Buy a Mac Pro. It will last years and blow you away. Save up. At least it's cheaper than the UK!
I bought a MacBook because I didn't need a MBP. I would love one though. I bought the ACD because I wanted a screen. I saved up and treated myself.
A midrange tower - there really is less demand for this than you think. The average person will want an iMac. They love them. The hardcore gamers should buy an Xbox...err... I mean Mac Pro (personally, I hate gaming on things I work on, I like gaming to be a separate thing to do away from my desk).
I bought a MacBook because I didn't need a MBP. I would love one though. I bought the ACD because I wanted a screen. I saved up and treated myself.
A midrange tower - there really is less demand for this than you think. The average person will want an iMac. They love them. The hardcore gamers should buy an Xbox...err... I mean Mac Pro (personally, I hate gaming on things I work on, I like gaming to be a separate thing to do away from my desk).
I don't do this for the same reason I don't buy a Peterbilt to commute to work in every day. Yeah, it's got tons of horsepower, and the torque. Wow! But it's not what I need.
I'll make it simple. Because a mac pro is overkill and consumer apps don't even take advantage for the most part. And because a midtower would probably cost 30-50% of a mac pro.
80% of the Mac Pro's cost ($2,000) is for the Processors and systemboard (if you bought them retail), most people really don't need that. You can get a 2.4GHz Quadcore and decent systemboard for $500. There is definate use for dual socket systems and the ability to use alot of memory, but even amongst professionals it isn't required for many jobs. With the likely hood Apple will move to an all dual socket quad core line, then many users will be forced to buy far more than they need for features like 30" display support, multiple displays, RAID, decent 3D capability to name but a few. Processor power is good, but not everyone needs masses of it.
I don't mind paying extra for the workstation-class CPUs and motherboard in the Mac Pro. That being said, if Apple offered a tower based on the Core 2 Duo/ Extreme CPUs I would buy that instead.
I also wish they gave us a midrange/high-end/workstation GPU option instead of low end/high end/workstation (GeForce7300/Radeon X1900XT/Quadro)...and I wish they updated their GPU line twice as often.
I also wish they gave us a midrange/high-end/workstation GPU option instead of low end/high end/workstation (GeForce7300/Radeon X1900XT/Quadro)...and I wish they updated their GPU line twice as often.
And for the 183rd time,that is the reason why apple doesnt want any mid-tower to compete with the Macpro.
Looking a the new reviews where the new q9650(?) harper beats 2x4 clovertowns (xeon5xxx?) on many occasions,why would apple create a setup that would undermine and show how bloody useless the macpro is for most applications? Even professional applications.
It is a sad truth that a 4core C2D can compete with a 8 core MP on most professional tasks at the moment. DTP,Photo,music. The few areas where the pro-programs scale well enough are video/scifi. About 10% of the MP userspace.And of the 10%,about 50% would choose the the MP Lite because of budget restraints.
That would leave a whopping 5% user base for the Macpro while everybody else would get the Macpro Lite. Is there enough profit in that area? Is it economically viable to have 2 different pro lineups?
And dont give the "boo,there would be so much more swithcers" thing..
Most of the switchers are going the MB/iMac way and getting a good AppleTM user experience now.
The remaining few percent are gamers/tinkers wich aint the apples prefered customers anyway.
So. No MP Lite.
Exept in a weird form (AV/TV rack type?) or in a extremely constricted form (no free pci slots, no extra sata slots for eSata/2nd HDD.).
Disclaimer : Numbers and statistics are pulled out from my áss and represent my distorted view on reality. If you dont like them,sod off.
damn i totally missed this thread
point 1: i'll need a new Computer 1-2 years from now to repalce my current mac mini and normal PC (which i had to keep because of the lack of performance/compibility) if the current hole is still in the apple line i'll very likely say good bye to apple hardware and rather try my luck with a cracked copy or back to a windows/linux dual boot
point2: those comparing apple and car manufactures: especially higher priced ones: if you use that analogy apple would have been introducing an awefull lot of modells (look at the last years of BMW and porsche... and to make it worse mercedes)
Mercedes Benz Line Up:
A -class
B -class
C -class
E- class
S -class
G
GL
R
V
Vito/Viano
Vario
Sprinter
Actros
Atego
Econic
Axor
CapaCity
Citaro
Conecto
Unimog UGN
Unimog UHN
and fine selection of at least 15 different tractor models
also not counted the different cabriolets
point 3: what is the dominating form factor for computers the majority of people buy: mid sized towers ... if 80% of all people obviously like desktop computers being mid sized towers it's of course obvious NOT to have one in the line up
point 4: companies which don't happen to need photoshop prefer towers too
my idea: introduce a mid sized desktop model and make the mac pro a real workstation and increase it's price even more
point 1: i'll need a new Computer 1-2 years from now to repalce my current mac mini and normal PC (which i had to keep because of the lack of performance/compibility) if the current hole is still in the apple line i'll very likely say good bye to apple hardware and rather try my luck with a cracked copy or back to a windows/linux dual boot
point2: those comparing apple and car manufactures: especially higher priced ones: if you use that analogy apple would have been introducing an awefull lot of modells (look at the last years of BMW and porsche... and to make it worse mercedes)
Mercedes Benz Line Up:
A -class
B -class
C -class
E- class
S -class
G
GL
R
V
Vito/Viano
Vario
Sprinter
Actros
Atego
Econic
Axor
CapaCity
Citaro
Conecto
Unimog UGN
Unimog UHN
and fine selection of at least 15 different tractor models
also not counted the different cabriolets
point 3: what is the dominating form factor for computers the majority of people buy: mid sized towers ... if 80% of all people obviously like desktop computers being mid sized towers it's of course obvious NOT to have one in the line up
point 4: companies which don't happen to need photoshop prefer towers too
my idea: introduce a mid sized desktop model and make the mac pro a real workstation and increase it's price even more
Bingo. If apple wants to sell $4000 machines, just keep beefing them up. Make the whole line 8 core, then 16 on the top as soon as it's feasible. Add another separate firewire bus. Or two. Offer high end grafix cards as an option. I'm sure there are plenty of other "pro" features to differentiate they could think of.
That would make the truck sized gap even bigger, but allow them to ship a 2-4 core (ideally options for either) midrange mac that would still have a visible difference between it and the "pro".
It also wouldn't hurt for Apple to really optimize all their apps, especially the "pro" ones, for 4-8+ cores. And get some 64 bit builds out as well. People should buy the workstations because they run circles around other machines, not because they have no other choice.
I was purely explaining why people want a "mid-mac" as asked by the person I quoted, not exactly sure why even the concept of one bothers you so much to deserve such an angry diatribe. Personally I care not either way, but I'm not ignorant enough to think I know Apple inside-out and every move they will make for the future in an ever changing market.
A point that has been raised which I took note of was that mid towers are the best selling personal computers out there. The Mac Mini and iMac are basically laptops in terms of upgradability and graphics power.
I completely agree with the idea of making the Mac Pro more professional and a prosumer desktop to directly compete with high-end PCs such as Dell XPS and Alienware systems.
Mac Pro is to Dell Precision as Mac Pro Lite is to Dell XPS.
There is no use in arguing the point that a Mac Pro Lite will steal away Mac Pro customers as Mac Pro customers tend to be professionals that actually need the raw processing power and FB-DIMMS for apps such as Final Cut Studio and Shake. A 2.4GHz iMac may have similar processing power for rendering your family holiday in iMovie but it will be brought to its knees rendering your latest composition in Motion or Shake.
The Mac Pro Lite target audience would be the core of users that Apple is hitherto failed to lure away from Windows, namely Windows gaming users. Whilst Apple may be hacking away at Windows' market share in education and business use, the home gamer currently does not have an option to switch even if she had an incentive to.
A lot of Windows users I know acknowledge Apple's superior GUI and OS however due to this gap in the product lineup do not own a Mac as they perceive the Mac as a work computer and creative tool.
Apple can introduce a new Mac without compromising on the foundation that it is built on. A new tower with similar specifications to an XPS but with the added bonus of dual-boot to Mac OS and Windows seems to me to be a product yet to be unveiled. Thanks to the iPod, millions of Windows users are switching to Macs - why should gamers be excluded from this change when they for a formidable portion of the market share?
An example of where creativity meets Windows is that now gamers increasingly edit in game video footage and upload it to YouTube. I showed one guy I know how easy this was to do with iMovie '08 + FCP and he bought a MacBook the next day. Before his MacBook he would edit his footage in Sony Vegas or Windows Movie Maker and spend literally hours trying to perform basic tasks such as digital compositing and video compression.
To summarize, the gaming core is the last bastion of Windows that Apple will have to siege sooner or later if it wants to continue growth past it's current sectors. By looking at recently statistics it is clear that Macs are spreading at quite an alarming rate. Having said this I think it is safe to assume that this mid-tower derivative is what's holding people back. The Mac hardware range cannot currently provide what many users, including myself want or need and therefore Apple is losing out on many potential customers. Apple still has a long way to grow, so it may not see the need to expand into other markets before it has fully conquered what rightfully belongs to her.
In a side note, would it not be more appropriate to dub this Apple Mac Pro Lite simply the Apple Macintosh? That is after, what this product would be.
I completely agree with the idea of making the Mac Pro more professional and a prosumer desktop to directly compete with high-end PCs such as Dell XPS and Alienware systems.
Mac Pro is to Dell Precision as Mac Pro Lite is to Dell XPS.
There is no use in arguing the point that a Mac Pro Lite will steal away Mac Pro customers as Mac Pro customers tend to be professionals that actually need the raw processing power and FB-DIMMS for apps such as Final Cut Studio and Shake. A 2.4GHz iMac may have similar processing power for rendering your family holiday in iMovie but it will be brought to its knees rendering your latest composition in Motion or Shake.
The Mac Pro Lite target audience would be the core of users that Apple is hitherto failed to lure away from Windows, namely Windows gaming users. Whilst Apple may be hacking away at Windows' market share in education and business use, the home gamer currently does not have an option to switch even if she had an incentive to.
A lot of Windows users I know acknowledge Apple's superior GUI and OS however due to this gap in the product lineup do not own a Mac as they perceive the Mac as a work computer and creative tool.
Apple can introduce a new Mac without compromising on the foundation that it is built on. A new tower with similar specifications to an XPS but with the added bonus of dual-boot to Mac OS and Windows seems to me to be a product yet to be unveiled. Thanks to the iPod, millions of Windows users are switching to Macs - why should gamers be excluded from this change when they for a formidable portion of the market share?
An example of where creativity meets Windows is that now gamers increasingly edit in game video footage and upload it to YouTube. I showed one guy I know how easy this was to do with iMovie '08 + FCP and he bought a MacBook the next day. Before his MacBook he would edit his footage in Sony Vegas or Windows Movie Maker and spend literally hours trying to perform basic tasks such as digital compositing and video compression.
To summarize, the gaming core is the last bastion of Windows that Apple will have to siege sooner or later if it wants to continue growth past it's current sectors. By looking at recently statistics it is clear that Macs are spreading at quite an alarming rate. Having said this I think it is safe to assume that this mid-tower derivative is what's holding people back. The Mac hardware range cannot currently provide what many users, including myself want or need and therefore Apple is losing out on many potential customers. Apple still has a long way to grow, so it may not see the need to expand into other markets before it has fully conquered what rightfully belongs to her.
In a side note, would it not be more appropriate to dub this Apple Mac Pro Lite simply the Apple Macintosh? That is after, what this product would be.
With the next generation of products though, it's going to be 8 core on the workstations and 4 on the higher end desktops. There are plenty of professional's who probably bought Mac Pros this generation who wouldn't buy them next if there was a quad core system supporting 8GB of memory and reasonable video card choices for less because they don't need that much raw processing power. Now of course that shouldn't matter to Apple if they can make the same sort of profit off the systems, but there are also many other issues, mostly relating to image and marketability (Apple's main concerns it appears).
You're right on other points, there is a market for them and they could put something out to cater to those who don't need the processing power of 8 cores at the moment as well as getting a good number of adopters. I'm sure Apple have done many studies in to this sort of thing, no matter what people say about Job's wanting only all in one solutions. Though he may be the sole reason such a mac never comes.
Really the iMac is the Apple Macintosh, the flagship product. It's what Apple is all about.
I haven't read through all the dozen pages on this thread, but I must say that there is a lot of demand for a mid-range tower.
Just look at what a 3 to 4 year old G5 sells for on eBay: about $1100. They're PowerPC, so they only have a real useful life of about 3 more years, yet people are willing to pay this kind of cash for them.
I have one, and they're still really useful machines. You can tinker with the graphics cards, add HD's, RAID cards, sound cards, swap multiple monitors etc.
I wish Apple made a mid-range machine for us hobbyists out there. $2800 CAD is really not a price I want to pay for a hobby machine.
Just look at what a 3 to 4 year old G5 sells for on eBay: about $1100. They're PowerPC, so they only have a real useful life of about 3 more years, yet people are willing to pay this kind of cash for them.
I have one, and they're still really useful machines. You can tinker with the graphics cards, add HD's, RAID cards, sound cards, swap multiple monitors etc.
I wish Apple made a mid-range machine for us hobbyists out there. $2800 CAD is really not a price I want to pay for a hobby machine.
Noo noo! Wasnt directing my monologue towards you in any way.
Pardon.
Just doing my weekly rant to people that adamantly refuses to se a possible logic in apples behiavour why there is no MP Lite.
Yes I suppose there is a thin line between those who need the workstation-class mac and those who buy it anyway but could do with something less powerful. By cutting down profit margins and really going all out with new specs for the MPL and MP I think they could claw away a big portion of Windows dominance. Trouble is they would probably have to limit the power of the MPL so, as you rightly say, it doesn't interfere with MP sales.
What this really boils down to is whether Apple is comfortable where it is, steadily growing until this becomes a real limiting factor OR whether it wants to act now and deliver a crushing blow to Microsoft 'while the iron is hot' and before any kind of Apple recession occurs. The latter aggressive tactic would undoubtably result in Apple having to decrease profit margins so the MPL was ahead of the competition in terms of specification and price. The hope would be that Apple could recuperate its losses by selling millions of the new MPL, something that I consider to be entirely feasible given what has been discussed here and my personal opinion.
If on the other hand, the MPL was overpriced then it would do nothing more than to fuel old stereotypes and ultimately I think would be detrimental regardless of how many Apple fans bought it.
I would be a huge decision to give this the go ahead or refuse it. Not quite make or break but it really has the possibility of being a complete failure like the Cube.
I think if they do it right, it would be well worth it however my experience with Apple has always taught me that there is always at least one catch to persuade me otherwise so if they do do it they ought to do it well. Not a stripped down MP but a proper, expandable, affordable Mac.
A system with less expensive components could make the same profit margin as a MacPro. Do you think the Nano should be dropped because we have a Shuffle and Video model of the iPod? It makes sense to give people options that fit their needs, rather than expecting them to buy what they don't want.
I would say it is not about profit-per-unit. It is more about the profit of the segment as whole.
MP Lite could be made profitable,without doubt. But the problem with the lite is that it would be too good at the moment.
The current state of the applications dont benefit from multiple cores.
At the moment,presenting MPL would be the deathblow to MP,as most programs would practically run as fast on it as on MP.
However, in the long run,if applications start to take real advantage of the multiple cores, the differenciation could be made.
But the unit would still have to be quite restricted.
It is not allways the best of business modells.
It might be better to create products and make the customers believe That is what they want/need.
That way you can create a product that has a lifespan of its own,and you can cut corners wherever you want and explain it´s shortcomings as "features".
I'd like to bring my own experiences with building a "Mac Pro Lite" to the table, if I may. Feel free to skip past the backstory, it's long and kinda boring.
[Backstory]
I was very unhappy about the Apple situation. I refused to go Apple because they made nothing for me - the pro machine was way too much, I didn't want the iMac for various reasons outlined here, and I had delusions of incompatibility with OSX. I had always loved the mini, but it just didn't have enough oomph for me.
My father constantly complained about his old Compaq. It was a PIII w/ 256 ram, integrated graphics. He had lost the hard disk a number of times and it just wasn't performing for him. At this stage I harboured a secret desire for Apple products but I had neither the money nor the courage to buy my own. I rather cunningly pushed him towards getting a 1.5Ghz G4 Mini - we went to the local Apple retailer, he got his educational discount (he's a part time lecturer) and was very happy with his purchase.
I helped him set it up and he instantly commented on how much better the video display was - this had nothing to do with graphical bling, the actual hardware was far superior to the old computer, which left the screen streaked and washed out. He spent a while with his Mini and started to feel the pinch of the integrated graphics while manipulating large images in iPhoto, Photoshop and Osyrix (an X-Ray manipulation program he uses for work). I suggested he have a look at the (then) new Intel iMacs because they had superior graphics. We picked up a 2.0 GHz 17" iMac, and he's absolutely loved it.
About 6 months after he got his Mini a friend of mine asked me if I wanted her old iMac which "wouldn't work." I had no idea what to expect, but I came to possess a 400Mhz G3 slot loading (DV) with 128mb ram. It was easy to fix, but I couldn't really do much with 9.2 on it.
My grandmother had seen iMacs on display in the store, and when I explained to her that the whole computer was in the screen she immediately wanted one. Her Dell was cluttering up the desk like no-bodies business, so had to go. I passed it on down to my nephew after doing a few upgrades and it suits him fine. My grandmother got her shiney new 17" with the GMA950 (I used my educational discount), and I instantly installed windows XP via bootcamp for her. She uses it to manage her photos, her emails and browse the web. I'm slowly trying to wheen her off windows and on to OSX.
As a reward for being nice and setting up the computer for her, she agreed to buy me OSX 10.4.6 when we ordered her iMac (we bought it online). I greedily installed the firmware update on the G3 iMac, popped in another 256mb, swapped the hard disk for a 120gb model and installed Tiger. I was blown away! After I'd ditched all the Apple-supplied programs and installed all of my own (Firefox, VLC, Adium etc) as well as Microsoft Office for Mac, all the misgivings I had about the operating system vanished. It was FAST. It was compatible enough that I didn't have to screw around too much to integrate it into my windows-based home network. It was QUITE! I instantly fell in love, and the little G3 that could became my main computer.
Over the next few months I began to notice little things that niggled at me. Some were integral to OSX (it's such a pain to automatically mount network drives!) but a lot were due to the poor old thing's age. If the mac was busy, I could type a whole sentence before it appeared in Word. The USB 1.1 was a pain - and only 2 ports. Clearly I needed to upgrade the hardware.
If I bought an Intel Mini, I'd have a lackluster video card, laptop components and very limited expandibility. If I bought a Mac Pro it would be this behemoth sitting on or under my desk, costing me far more then I could afford. The iMac was attractive, but it still used a laptop CPU on a slower bus with more expensive memory, and would be a pain to get in to upgrade anything. I really wanted a Intel Cube to come along. To that end, I started looking around for REAL Intel Cubes. I found a few sites that put PC components inside a Cube, and a few more that put OSX on to PC's. Looking deeper into the PC components I would need I was able to spec out I found a beautiful case and I decided to forego modding a Cube (which I felt was a little disrespectful, anyway).
The parts I chose were:
CPU: Intel e6700 (2.66Ghz, 1033Mhz FSB)
RAM: 2x 1GB (800Mhz)
Motherboard: Commell LV-674E
Video: NVidia 7950GT (a nice version from EVGA)
Case: Hoojum Cubit 3 in "Pure White"
Hard Disk: 500GB SATA w/ 8 MB cache
Optical Disk: CD-(everything)/DVD-(everything) reader/burner
These parts and various others to make it all work together cost me nealy AUD3.5k - so much for cheap! Luckily I bought things over time. I added a 23" ACD, wireless keyboard and mouse, etc to really complete the "Apple" feel.
Putting OSX on it was a chore, but I insisted (to myself) that I do it the "proper" way and not just download some image of the internet. I went through with dumping the image from my purchased 10.4.6 disks, modifying them manually, rebuilding the image and booting that. I feel that although I violated the apple EULA I did it in the spirit of fair use and inter-operability. In the end I needed to hunt down sound driver kexts and some video kexts, but I was incredibly happy with my brand new OSX machine. It was everything I expected it to be. However, I still fight with it on a weekly basis due to heat and compatibility and noise issues.
[/Backstory]
The bottom line is that the specialised components needed to make my very own Mac ended up costing far more then I expected. The special motherboard was nearly AUD500, the PSU was close to 300 and the case was as well. I would have saved more and ended up with a more powerful system had I bought a Mac Pro.
Just because you can buy PC components for $800 and give yourself Mac Pro performance, you will not have the equivilent of a "Mac Pro Lite." Even with OSX it's still just another PC. I don't see how a new machine would make sense to Apple. They would have to invest in designing a completely new motherboard architecture, new case, have to deal with support of the new line. YOU may be able to design and build a low budget killer rig, Apple won't. Coupled with their past failures in this arena and Job's desire for a completely closed system, I see absolutely no reason for Apple to enter this market.
[Backstory]
I was very unhappy about the Apple situation. I refused to go Apple because they made nothing for me - the pro machine was way too much, I didn't want the iMac for various reasons outlined here, and I had delusions of incompatibility with OSX. I had always loved the mini, but it just didn't have enough oomph for me.
My father constantly complained about his old Compaq. It was a PIII w/ 256 ram, integrated graphics. He had lost the hard disk a number of times and it just wasn't performing for him. At this stage I harboured a secret desire for Apple products but I had neither the money nor the courage to buy my own. I rather cunningly pushed him towards getting a 1.5Ghz G4 Mini - we went to the local Apple retailer, he got his educational discount (he's a part time lecturer) and was very happy with his purchase.
I helped him set it up and he instantly commented on how much better the video display was - this had nothing to do with graphical bling, the actual hardware was far superior to the old computer, which left the screen streaked and washed out. He spent a while with his Mini and started to feel the pinch of the integrated graphics while manipulating large images in iPhoto, Photoshop and Osyrix (an X-Ray manipulation program he uses for work). I suggested he have a look at the (then) new Intel iMacs because they had superior graphics. We picked up a 2.0 GHz 17" iMac, and he's absolutely loved it.
About 6 months after he got his Mini a friend of mine asked me if I wanted her old iMac which "wouldn't work." I had no idea what to expect, but I came to possess a 400Mhz G3 slot loading (DV) with 128mb ram. It was easy to fix, but I couldn't really do much with 9.2 on it.
My grandmother had seen iMacs on display in the store, and when I explained to her that the whole computer was in the screen she immediately wanted one. Her Dell was cluttering up the desk like no-bodies business, so had to go. I passed it on down to my nephew after doing a few upgrades and it suits him fine. My grandmother got her shiney new 17" with the GMA950 (I used my educational discount), and I instantly installed windows XP via bootcamp for her. She uses it to manage her photos, her emails and browse the web. I'm slowly trying to wheen her off windows and on to OSX.
As a reward for being nice and setting up the computer for her, she agreed to buy me OSX 10.4.6 when we ordered her iMac (we bought it online). I greedily installed the firmware update on the G3 iMac, popped in another 256mb, swapped the hard disk for a 120gb model and installed Tiger. I was blown away! After I'd ditched all the Apple-supplied programs and installed all of my own (Firefox, VLC, Adium etc) as well as Microsoft Office for Mac, all the misgivings I had about the operating system vanished. It was FAST. It was compatible enough that I didn't have to screw around too much to integrate it into my windows-based home network. It was QUITE! I instantly fell in love, and the little G3 that could became my main computer.
Over the next few months I began to notice little things that niggled at me. Some were integral to OSX (it's such a pain to automatically mount network drives!) but a lot were due to the poor old thing's age. If the mac was busy, I could type a whole sentence before it appeared in Word. The USB 1.1 was a pain - and only 2 ports. Clearly I needed to upgrade the hardware.
If I bought an Intel Mini, I'd have a lackluster video card, laptop components and very limited expandibility. If I bought a Mac Pro it would be this behemoth sitting on or under my desk, costing me far more then I could afford. The iMac was attractive, but it still used a laptop CPU on a slower bus with more expensive memory, and would be a pain to get in to upgrade anything. I really wanted a Intel Cube to come along. To that end, I started looking around for REAL Intel Cubes. I found a few sites that put PC components inside a Cube, and a few more that put OSX on to PC's. Looking deeper into the PC components I would need I was able to spec out I found a beautiful case and I decided to forego modding a Cube (which I felt was a little disrespectful, anyway).
The parts I chose were:
CPU: Intel e6700 (2.66Ghz, 1033Mhz FSB)
RAM: 2x 1GB (800Mhz)
Motherboard: Commell LV-674E
Video: NVidia 7950GT (a nice version from EVGA)
Case: Hoojum Cubit 3 in "Pure White"
Hard Disk: 500GB SATA w/ 8 MB cache
Optical Disk: CD-(everything)/DVD-(everything) reader/burner
These parts and various others to make it all work together cost me nealy AUD3.5k - so much for cheap! Luckily I bought things over time. I added a 23" ACD, wireless keyboard and mouse, etc to really complete the "Apple" feel.
Putting OSX on it was a chore, but I insisted (to myself) that I do it the "proper" way and not just download some image of the internet. I went through with dumping the image from my purchased 10.4.6 disks, modifying them manually, rebuilding the image and booting that. I feel that although I violated the apple EULA I did it in the spirit of fair use and inter-operability. In the end I needed to hunt down sound driver kexts and some video kexts, but I was incredibly happy with my brand new OSX machine. It was everything I expected it to be. However, I still fight with it on a weekly basis due to heat and compatibility and noise issues.
[/Backstory]
The bottom line is that the specialised components needed to make my very own Mac ended up costing far more then I expected. The special motherboard was nearly AUD500, the PSU was close to 300 and the case was as well. I would have saved more and ended up with a more powerful system had I bought a Mac Pro.
Just because you can buy PC components for $800 and give yourself Mac Pro performance, you will not have the equivilent of a "Mac Pro Lite." Even with OSX it's still just another PC. I don't see how a new machine would make sense to Apple. They would have to invest in designing a completely new motherboard architecture, new case, have to deal with support of the new line. YOU may be able to design and build a low budget killer rig, Apple won't. Coupled with their past failures in this arena and Job's desire for a completely closed system, I see absolutely no reason for Apple to enter this market.
let me guess: the case and the 23" ACD accounted for more than half of the price
(in the last days i searched a little bit around on the prices andgot nowhere near such a price )
The ACD isn't included in that price >_<
If you really want to know, check this out:
That was my notes, the sources column was links to the manufacturers. Things have improved a lot since then - it was pretty high-end when I built it. You'd be able to get the ram, hard disk and cpu for cheaper - probably the video card, too. Keep in mind those prices are AUD. There's a few other things that aren't on there for one reason or another, but they're mostly pretty small apart from the fan controller (something like AUD50)
If you really want to know, check this out:
Code:
Part Price Shipping Source
Case $175.93 $125.66 Qform
Motherboard - - Portwell
Hard Disk $335.00 $15.90 Gamedude
Soundcard $199.00 (with above) Gamedude
Optical Disk $121.13 $0.65 DFW Depot
Sata Adaptor $26.00 (with above) DFW Depot
Cables - - -
Processor $825.00 $0.00 UMart
RAM $495.00 (with above) UMart
Heatsink/Fan $60.00 (with above) UMart
Northbridge $9.00 (with above) UMart
Case fan $23.20 $24.62 PCSilent
Silencing $4.40 (with above) PCSilent
Graphics card $521.00 - EVGA
WIFI - - Belkin
bluetooth - - Belkin
Keyboard/mouse $192.90 $0.00 Apple
Display $1,406.90 (with above) Apple
Power Supply $240.00 $56.60 Vendur
Silencing $9.55 (with above) Vendur
Total $4,655.01 $223.43
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Grand Total $4,878.44That was my notes, the sources column was links to the manufacturers. Things have improved a lot since then - it was pretty high-end when I built it. You'd be able to get the ram, hard disk and cpu for cheaper - probably the video card, too. Keep in mind those prices are AUD. There's a few other things that aren't on there for one reason or another, but they're mostly pretty small apart from the fan controller (something like AUD50)
It's ironic the two products I want are a Mac tower at home, but not made out of server parts. And an ultra portable laptop for on the road, instead of 13" wide thing with integrated graphics. My 12" G4 is showing it's age, but is easily the best machine I've ever had. Light and small enough to take and tow anywhere without getting in the way, yet always had the power to do whatever I wanted.
The iMac is appealing, sure it looks pretty, but let's be honest I'm buying a laptop I can't take with me and that bothers me. I want a desktop at home. And the annoying thing is there is some really fantastic hardware out there at the moment,
Q6600 from Intel? 8800GT from Nvidia? Come on Apple sort it out. Oh and everyone keeps ranting on about drivers are the issues with graphics cards, which is why they support so few. Well why is that one driver supports all the range of nvidia and ati cards, forceware and catalyst respectively for PC. I'm sure someone has an answer for me.
I also don't really buy into the whole, if you make this product, you cannabalise sales of this product la la la. I'm still buying Apple. They're still the winner.
The iMac is appealing, sure it looks pretty, but let's be honest I'm buying a laptop I can't take with me and that bothers me. I want a desktop at home. And the annoying thing is there is some really fantastic hardware out there at the moment,
Q6600 from Intel? 8800GT from Nvidia? Come on Apple sort it out. Oh and everyone keeps ranting on about drivers are the issues with graphics cards, which is why they support so few. Well why is that one driver supports all the range of nvidia and ati cards, forceware and catalyst respectively for PC. I'm sure someone has an answer for me.
I also don't really buy into the whole, if you make this product, you cannabalise sales of this product la la la. I'm still buying Apple. They're still the winner.
I´m afraid that is the heart of the issue. Apple could do it. They just don´t want to. And that´s their decision to make of course.
Isn´t this the really sad part? Why the hell does Apple even need to have the Xeon-Mac Pros? Is it prestige? They could entirely switch to cheaper quad-Core 2s which are still extremely fast in their top range models. Maybe some "real" Pros would complain but in the end, as you said, the machines would be pretty much as fast at lower prices. They would have one product that appeals to "prosumers" in it´s lowest configurations and to professionals in it´s highest configuration.
Everybody would be happy, no?
As long as it had similar profit margin, taking some of those sales wouldn't hurt apple. You don't think such a new model would add ANY new sales?
I agree that apps not taking advantage of more cores hurts sales of Mac Pro. But the solution to that isn't crippling lower end machines, it's getting apps to use the cores. Apple can't fix all of them, but they definitely could optimize all their own apps to take full advantage of their best machines. This would be optimizing the hell out of those apps for multicores, and updating to 64 bit to allow using more RAM. They don't seem to have done any of that yet.
That "completely new mobo architecture" would be a standard and very easily designed one. They could just reuse the mini or iMac mobo and make some minor tweaks, or even use one of the standard intel reference designs and do a little bit to make it more "mac". But it's a case of reinventing the wheel, the work has already been done. Cases are easy, especially a midtower, and support shouldn't be much different than any other mac they sell, since it would offer no features that aren't already available in other macs, just in different combinations.
The key word in your post is WON'T. It's not that apple can't do this, it would be a piece of cake - this is completely a marketing call (not to mention Jobs's personal preferences and ego), not a technical one. And there are no "past failures" in this market, apple has never shipped a budget midtower (definitely not the cube).