New Mac Pro Announced at WWDC! - It's OFFICIAL!

[Peter Majtan]

I have just noticed something... ...watch the animation at the Mac Pro page on http://www.apple.com/mac-pro/
Pay notice between the FAN and EXPANSION sections (use the buttons on the right side)...

There is a "traditional" lock button for sliding of the external cover. That means user-friendly access. At the very least you will be able to upgrade / change the RAM and storage...
Hopefully this would also mean that the other components have a possibility to be upgraded...

:sifone: Peter

 

[Steve Sherrick]

My guess is that:
- Xeon-branded CPU
- custom-designed graphics PCBs with workstation-branded GPUs
- ECC RAM (that nobody needs)
- custom SSD

Will be more expensive than:
- i7-branded CPU (that's probably the same speed or faster for less $)
- mass-produced PCIe "gaming" GPU (again probably same speed or faster for less $)
- non-ECC RAM (that costs less and makes no difference)
- off-the-shelf, upgradeable SATA SSDs or PCIe SSD storage

So yeah, probably you will be able to build a faster Hackintosh for a lot less. And you'll be able to upgrade the GPUs by just buying newer ones when they come out. And upgrade the SSDs. Etc.

Bruce Allen
www.boacinema.com

But let's not forget that Hackintoshes also have their own quirks. Not saying they won't be the better option, but they also have had some limitations in the past in terms of compatibility with OS versions, drivers, etc. I know the newest implementations have improved and I think there's a good chance that for a lot of the high end power users that want to stay on mac OS the Hackintosh may indeed end up being the better option. I just need to see these new Mac Pros in action to come to any conclusions.

 

[shashbugu]

Hackintoshes are hacks, real hacks

 

[Liam Hall]

Hmm, looks like MacProX.

Still, it will look nice next to my fridge.

 

[Bruce Allen]

But let's not forget that Hackintoshes also have their own quirks. Not saying they won't be the better option, but they also have had some limitations in the past in terms of compatibility with OS versions, drivers, etc. I know the newest implementations have improved and I think there's a good chance that for a lot of the high end power users that want to stay on mac OS the Hackintosh may indeed end up being the better option. I just need to see these new Mac Pros in action to come to any conclusions.

Totally agree. I don't use Hackintosh myself.

All I'm saying is that it's pretty easy to predict the rough price and performance based on the components used.

The people saying "hold on! you don't know anything yet!" are being a bit silly.

I have just noticed something... ...watch the animation at the Mac Pro page on http://www.apple.com/mac-pro/
Pay notice between the FAN and EXPANSION sections (use the buttons on the right side)...

There is a "traditional" lock button for sliding of the external cover. That means user-friendly access. At the very least you will be able to upgrade / change the RAM and storage...
Hopefully this would also mean that the other components have a possibility to be upgraded...

:sifone: Peter

That looks good. However, I fear that a limited-market custom-designed graphics PCB will cost a little more than just buying an equivalent speed PCIe graphics card that is mass-produced.

Still... nice one spotting that!

BTW... how much RAM will fit into those slots at current densities? And any news on whether is supports dual CPUs?

Bruce Allen
www.boacinema.com

 

[Peter Majtan]

The people saying "hold on! you don't know anything yet!" are being a bit silly.www.boacinema.com

Nowhere near enough as those making up their mind and making statements based on assumptions...

I will give you an example - the new PCIe flash storage. The only reason that current SSDs look like old HDDs is because they needed to be compatible in order to secure adoption, and in the process they limited themselves to the SATA architecture in both speed and latency. Apple being able to discard the HDD-style shell of the storage and build simple solid-state chip storage may result in reasonable saving. Especially at the quantity that Apple can afford. Then you need to acknowledge the speed of this storage - 2.5x faster then any current SATA based SSD out there. You will need a rather expensive solution in your hackintosh to come anywhere near that performance - and at that point what would be the cost? We all know that the OS storage which holds the apps as well is one of the major bottlenecks in current real-world workflow speeds, which is why adding a 2-8 SSD raid as your system drive does wonders to the speed of your workstation...

So call people silly all you want...

:sifone: Peter

 

[N_Villers]

It is so extremely small. I love it. It certainly shows that a lot of real thought has been made about the future of workstation level computing and confirms Apple's commitment to the content provider and pro user. The idea that because Apple sells so many consumer oriented products that they will not support the high end is now officially dead. They might not ever be the fastest systems in the world but they never were. There are great other options if the ultimate high end is what you need. Try to remember how innovative the first g3 towers were and how they represented a radical design shift paradigm that offered a turn-key high-endish alternative to the vanilla box PC stuck in Microsoft NT 4 hell and eventually evolved to become the aluminum towers we love to hate. This is a radical new starting point that will have many refinements to come. I think it is great the core is as small and dense as it can be with external expandability. A brain with modules. Sound familiar?

I generally never buy first generation Apple products but here I think I will finally be able to upgrade my poor 2008 8-core that I have been lugging around so long. These days I use a Magma with the RedRocket and SAS card mostly and love that it can be so portable but miss any real power. I can already picture how it will fit my custom mobile cart.

This should also really give a kick in the pants for peripheral manufactures to start really jumping on the Thunderbolt wagon. I can't wait for the 4k Retina Cinema Displays that I bet will follow shortly.

-noel

 

[Nick Pasquariello]

My guess is that:
- Xeon-branded CPU
- custom-designed graphics PCBs with workstation-branded GPUs
- ECC RAM (that nobody needs)
- custom SSD

Will be more expensive than:
- i7-branded CPU (that's probably the same speed or faster for less $)
- mass-produced PCIe "gaming" GPU (again probably same speed or faster for less $)
- non-ECC RAM (that costs less and makes no difference)
- off-the-shelf, upgradeable SATA SSDs or PCIe SSD storage

So yeah, probably you will be able to build a faster Hackintosh for a lot less. No inside info needed for that guess.

And you'll be able to upgrade the GPUs by just buying newer ones when they come out. And upgrade the SSDs. Etc.

Bruce Allen
www.boacinema.com

You're comparing Apples to Oranges, no pun intended. GigaHert for GigaHert, you can't compare an i7 to a Xeon; they don't work the same and thus this is not a good comparison. You also can't compare a fully, 100% integrated system to a system that has as many swappable parts. This is true both for Hardware (a system like the new Mac Pro can have components wired together, better, closer, based specifically on spec) and Software (because there are less possible configurations, the configurations can be specifically crafted for when writing the software).

Note: I'm not stating that the Mac Pro is definitively faster. Because we just won't know until someone gets their hands on it and benchmarks the damn thing properly. But your comparison isn't a fair comparison, because the things you're listing don't have directly correlated performance.

Also, seen this mentioned a few times, so I'll add this: the new Mac Pro *is* Dual Core capable. It has 2 6-core Xeons (listed as "up to 12 cores" on the website).

 

[Jarek Zabczynski]

Little bird told me GPUs can be upgraded/replaced.

 

[Jeff Kilgroe]

We've seen this before... Let's hope Apple has a better long term business plan.

Hehe.. The O2 wasn't a bad concept, and it was fairly successful considering the downturn of SGI at the time. It fared far better than their Intel based offerings, but SGI killed those intentionally once they realized they outdid their own MIPS based workstations. Too bad, those were some of the nicest PC systems ever made, both at the time and for a handful of years after. Unfortunate they never just jumped in and ran with it, actually enabled all the hardware features like the video I/O.

I still have an O2 around here somewhere. The last SGI workstation I bought myself was an Octane MXE... My favorite of all of them was still my old purple R10K based Indigo^2 Max Impact. Loved that system, it and my two Mac G5 Quad towers are the 3 most reliable systems I've ever owned.

 

[Rob Anderson]

Perfect for throwing on our DIT cart. Looking forward to that. For everything else... I'm not seeing a reason to pop over from loaded 2012 MP's. Particularly when that means sacrificing our screaming RAID 50 SAS arrays. TB2 doesn't seem to cut it.

 

[Jeff Kilgroe]

Little bird told me GPUs can be upgraded/replaced.

This bodes well if true.

I understand why some people are frustrated over this. And we don't have any pricing yet. Part of me still really wants a couple expansion slots in there. OTOH, when it comes to expansion slots, the only card I want to use that can't be served by Thunderbolt is the Rocket-X. I think I'll just keep the Rocket X in a PC then.

Other than that, the internal storage and direct route RAM at 1866MHz quad-channel is going to be an eye-opener for everyone. The current 12-core Mac Pro is a nice system, this new one coming up is going to smoke it with about double the throughput for internal bus I/O and memory performance. It's no slouch of a system. I just hope Apple keeps it priced reasonable compared to other dual Xeon systems coming from HP, etc..

@Rob, with what you have invested in your current RAID hardware, you're probably best to keep using that with the current Mac Pro systems. At least for now.... Who knows what will happen in the future. The current Mac Pro is no slouch of a system though.

As for the guys who always squawk about Apple being too expensive and they can build a better PC cheaper. Sure, that's one way to look at it. You can also build a better PC cheaper than buying an HP or Dell, so what's your point?

The primary downside I see to this Mac Pro system is that in about a year from now or about 8 months after it launches, we'll see a spec bump with HDMI 2.0 and better 4K/UHD monitor support. Of course that's always going to happen, but that's an upgrade most of us will want to make. Hopefully that can also be achieved through a GPU update.

 

[Jett He]

Everything looks good except the upgradeability of the graphics card. Can't wait to see how things will turn out once it's released. Now it's time to request Open CL acceleration from Adobe unless they have options for nvidia chips.

 

[Rob Anderson]

Jeff,

I'd like to have a RR-X and an ATTO R680. Those two cards stuffed in this box would make me very happy.

Great point about HDMI 1.4... So if Apple really does drop a 4K+ monitor (which is strongly indicated with this OS X Mavericks screen background they uploaded: http://images.apple.com/home/images/osx_hero_2x.jpg @ 5120x2880), should we reasonably expect flickery 4K from this box?

EDIT: Nevermind. I guess they would be using TB2 for the 4K+ Apple monitor.

 

[Bruce Allen]

As for the guys who always squawk about Apple being too expensive and they can build a better PC cheaper. Sure, that's one way to look at it. You can also build a better PC cheaper than buying an HP or Dell, so what's your point?

That's the point right there: it's a free market.

Apple is free to only offer expensive desktops using overpriced Xeons (Mac Pro)... or i7s plus laptop GPUs (iMac).

Other people are free to make squawking noises and buy a fast PC that combines cheap very fast i7 desktop plus a cheap very fast GPU.

Considering how much marketing and squawking Apple does about how you need their computers to do creative work... those indie guys are surely allowed to squawk too, right?

Folks are also allowed to squawk that it would be nice if Apple offered an i7 + fast GPU option too.

In opposition to Apple / Intel's giant marketing barrage saying you need a Xeon... that squawking seems pretty quiet!

Bruce Allen
www.boacinema.com

 

[Nick Pasquariello]

I just re-looked over the new Mac Pro page on apple.com. If you watch through everything, it appears that there are 3 main boards. One is the CPU board. To the side of the CPU board is the Ram, 2 sticks on each side. Then there are 2 GPU boards. In front of the GPU boards sit the PCIe storage, AKA your hard drives.

Point being, it doesn't look like the GPUs are soldiered to the CPU in any way. Not sure exactly how it's connected electronically, but the GPU boards are screwed into place mechanically.

Which bodes well for replacing them. With what, I dunno. Seem pretty custom. And Apple hasn't sold parts for upgrading in a long, long time.

 

[Mike 'Fireman' Ross]

Brilliant. RED introduce Rocket X, Apple introduce a server with no slots to put it in. Talk about joined-up development.

All show and no go. All talk and no trousers. That's not a server or a workstation, it's an art form. I don't need an art from.

Windows or Hackintosh here I come. #notbuyingit

Mike

 

[Rob Anderson]

Anyone notice Apple snapped a close up of Steve Wozniak during the reveal of the PCI memory? Do you think that was a hint that this thing is packing Fusion-IO boards or could that have been a slight rib?

 

[Tehben Dean]

Perfect for throwing on our DIT cart. Looking forward to that. For everything else... I'm not seeing a reason to pop over from loaded 2012 MP's. Particularly when that means sacrificing our screaming RAID 50 SAS arrays. TB2 doesn't seem to cut it.

What sort of speeds do you have right now?

 

[Bruce Allen]

I just re-looked over the new Mac Pro page on apple.com. If you watch through everything, it appears that there are 3 main boards. One is the CPU board. To the side of the CPU board is the Ram, 2 sticks on each side. Then there are 2 GPU boards. In front of the GPU boards sit the PCIe storage, AKA your hard drives.

Point being, it doesn't look like the GPUs are soldiered to the CPU in any way. Not sure exactly how it's connected electronically, but the GPU boards are screwed into place mechanically.

Which bodes well for replacing them. With what, I dunno. Seem pretty custom. And Apple hasn't sold parts for upgrading in a long, long time.

Also... if you upgrade from a nVidia GTX 680 to a nVidia TITAN, you can sell the GTX 680 used.

There won't be as much of a market in re-selling a graphics card that only plugs into a Mac Pro and is now a generation behind!

Bruce Allen
www.boacinema.com