New MacPro predictions? Hopes? Fears?

[Jarek Zabczynski]

So WWDC is around the corner. There really hasn't been much noise on the MacPro front. Part of me is beyond the point of caring, but I guess a part of me still clings to the hope that Apple will reinstill my faith in their pro hardware. The Cylinder may not be a bad machine, but it is no way a replacement for the machines so many of us used and still use everyday.

The hardware is 3 years old, if they are making a revision, now would be the time, at least to announce it. All we really know is that it will be decked out in Thunderbolt 3. Other than that it's a mystery.

While in a perfect world I wish for a return to a traditional tower with dual sockets, drive bays and PCI slots, Apple is too full of themselves to go back on that me thinks.
I suppose the thing that has really kept me away has been the lack of a dual CPU option. I know Jeff mentioned the possibility of a second CPU being able to fit because of the die shrink, but that's it.

I'm still holding steady with my 2012 tower but I really don't know what my next machine will be.

Anyone else holding out hope for something great?

 

[Tom Dowler]

People are still really using Macs?? I mean for professional, image-making purposes?

 

[Bob Gundu]

People are still really using Macs?? I mean for professional, image-making purposes?

Come on. There's usually 5 posts before someone drags it down that rabbit hole.

 

[N_Villers]

I love my trashcan.

 

[Joel Voelker]

I'm sitting at an airport flying to do a color session. I have a trash can and an SSD Raid in my backpack. Sure I wish it could be upgraded but the mobility is delightful.

 

[Bob Gundu]

For the record. I love my trash can too.

 

[Nick Morrison]

I know a lot of people on trashcans and Apple laptops...doing professional work.

 

[M.Halsell]

MacPro

MacPro

15 macs in studio. All hardware flavors.

 

[jake blackstone]

TB3, single V4 CPU, Polaris GPUs, wires rat's nest with external enclosures, overpriced, instantly obsolete and still not upgradable...

 

[M.Halsell]

Generally I found Resolve is the single reason most need a super hero box. Other tasks perform up to par Avid, MacSmoke, MS Office, Adobe CS, FCX, archival, etc. Our workflow is 95% ProRes, rec 709, web delivery. Our freelance creatives dont like working on Windows. iMacs for the freelances, trashcans for the staff. Windows hero boxes for the 3D team. MBP for the sales and project management teams.

 

[Kazu Okuda]

i hate my trash can. it's maxed out, cost over 10k, and been replaced by apple 3 times in 3 years.
The PC i built around 3k runs way more faster and stable.
Still love the laptops.

 

[Bérenger Brillante]

Pretty much what Jake said. I would add overpriced a second time, because the same setup on PC would be half the price...

 

[Steve Sherrick]

Just like cameras, we are in an era now where the choices are plentiful and it really just comes down to what you will be using your camera or computer to produce. It's always great to have headroom in terms of specs so that you can scale up if and when you need to, but it has to make financial sense to do so. So, for many people a Mac Pro is overkill. A moderately priced PC or an iMac would serve the needs of a lot of people in the creative sphere.

However, there is a smaller niche of creative professionals who need as much horsepower as possible to accomplish the work they need to do and to make the actual tools disappear into the background and allow your ideas to materialize far more instantaneously. Assuming the horsepower is there, it then comes down to environment. What does the OS provide in terms of creating a space that makes the enduser confortable. This can be anything from visual layout to under the hood customization. And then you also have the physical hardware itself. What kind of connectivity, physical size, cooling, customization, upgradeability, aesthetics, etc.

When you put this all together, where does that leave the current Mac Pro? I think it is perfect for some and not the right choice for others. And I expect the same with whatever new computers Apple releases. I'll be watching carefully. Price, something I didn't mention earlier, is always a bit higher with Macs but for some the price tag will be warranted if it meets all of their needs, while others will find a better price/performance ratio with other products. Just like a RED camera is not the right choice for everyone same goes for the Mac Pro. But I do hope Apple is able to make a machine that continues to be competitive in that smaller niche of power users by offering machines that are innovative, yet reliable workhorses. And that their OS does not deviate so far from the needs of this power user base, that it makes it undeseriable, even for the most diehard Mac professionals.

 

[DJ Meyer]

It'll be interesting to see if they bother updating them or just let the line die off like the xserves and towers. Its a pretty inconsequential part of their business now.

Back in the early 2000's you'd hear all the time about people switching to OS X for pro work but all I seem to hear these days is the opposite.

 

[jake blackstone]

The only thread left, that is holding most of the power users in the Mac camp is Prores writing. If that wasn't the case, all, and I mean all power users would have already moved to Windows, which is pretty sad...

 

[Blair S. Paulsen]

Doubt it will happen, but I think there is a happy place between the old towers and the underpowered first gen trashcans.

The central cooling design with the larger, slower and therefore quieter fan is a winner. The portability rocks. The non-standard GPU form factor is BS. Better power efficiency is wonderful, but a 450W PSU is too small - even with process shrunk components hitting the market.

Make the cylinder tall enough for full length PCIe3 cards (another 4" or so), turn the internal triangle into a pentagon (I'd guess 3" more diameter) and up the PSU to 650W. Sure, it will be heavier and larger than the current trashcan - but still much smaller, lighter, quieter and energy efficient vs the old school towers.

For everyone that thinks Apple has abandoned the pro market - it's hard to disagree. That said, selling $10,000 computers in quantity seems like a nice piece of business to me...

Cheers - #19

 

[Blair S. Paulsen]

Agree with Jake about ProRes being the critical stickum for Apple hardware in our industry.

Perhaps the rollercoaster revenue of iPhone revs might get Apple to reengage with the pro market just to smooth out their balance sheet. Yes, I'm probably dreaming...

Cheers - #19

 

[Scot Yount]

For the record. I love my trash can too.

Same here.

 

[DJ Meyer]

That said, selling $10,000 computers in quantity seems like a nice piece of business to me...

Cheers - #19

It does sound good to an individual or a small business, but on the scale that Apple operates keeping even a $100 million business around is more of a charity than anything else. I once worked in product design for a large multinational that wouldn't even bother with a new category if it was projected less than $300 million a year. And thats for a company that was smaller than Apple. Someone like HP can likely more easily justify staying in the workstation business because the tech is so similar to what's in their server line. With Apple, their entire product line is using either ARM or mobile Intel chipsets, except for the Mac Pro. For a company that can't even hire enough engineers to work on both iOS and OS X at the same time, it wouldn't surprise me to find that the resources required to sustain the line is disproportionate to sales. But we shall see. interesting times.

 

[Blair S. Paulsen]

You're probably right DJ. If they could only sell 10,000 x $10,000 boxes for 100 million in gross revenue then it's a fail. If they could sell 100,000 x $10,000 then we're looking at 1 billion dollars - though that might still be of little interest to a $500 billion-ish entity...

Cheers - #19