Welcome to our community

Be a part of something great, join today!

Log in
  • Hey all, just changed over the backend after 15 years I figured time to give it a bit of an update, its probably gonna be a bit weird for most of you and i am sure there is a few bugs to work out but it should kinda work the same as before... hopefully :)

New MacPro predictions? Hopes? Fears?

People like Misha and myself have been using Apple for a long time. Speaking for myself, I have been on Mac's since the early days of AVID. So I have decades of experience with them. With that said, there is no question that current Win 10 PC systems are running wonderfully with assorted applications (including Adobe, Resolve) and allow the use of any hardware that the end user likes. Apple used to be JUST LIKE THIS ! The "old" Mac Pro's (the cheese graters thru 2012) allowed you to install NVidia graphics cards, your own RAM from any manufacturer, etc. Lots of expansion chassis products from Magma and Cubix came out. And MOST IMPORTANT - when Apple teamed with AJA for the AJA I/O box - the same year that AVID released the AVID Adrenaline for $25,000 (the AJA I/O was $2500) - that was the year that "everyone" switched to FCP. So WHAT HAPPENED? When did Apple decide to become closed, and not allow third party development (which is the very reason for the acceptance of Apple products from day 1 of AVID - using Truevision and ATTO products). Why did Apple change the policy that allowed third party developers to make a Mac into a "pro" product ? The whole thing is pretty sad. Of course, Apple has brilliant people working for them, that can do anything - so the only answer to my question is "money" - they are looking to increase their revenue, and if companies like NVidia (and everyone you see in your Mac at /Library/Extentions) doesn't want to "play ball" with them - well - Apple no longer wants their products to work.
Very sad.

Bob Zelin
 
Win 10 still sucks compared to OSX.

Win 10 still sucks compared to OSX.

From Apple's POV, perhaps genuine pro users are just too small of a cohort to expend effort/money/time on. Macs have been designed primarily for the mass market all along, but by offering viable expandability for specific use cases they also picked up sales in vertical markets like ours. They also used high profile Mac users to add cachet to their brand.

Then Apple struck (rose) gold with high margin iDevices that also generated revenue via accessories and the App Store. They even took the word computer out of their name. If only they had sold off the Mac division then, to someone who was fired up to make "Insanely Great" a goal - rather than a punchline...

From the outside, it's seems ridiculous that Apple can't continue to fight the smartphone wars, and, at the same time, make state of the art computers. Yes, Macs may never have the juicy margins that Apple reaps from iDevices - but even a 5-10% margin is still profit. If I sat on the Apple board, I'd also like the idea that if the maturing smart phone market were to hit some headwinds, the computer division could help prop up the balance sheet until things improved.

Bottom line - do it right, or sell the Mac division to someone who will. Please.

Cheers - #19
 
Bob Zelin said:
People like Misha and myself have been using Apple for a long time. Speaking for myself, I have been on Mac's since the early days of AVID. So I have decades of experience with them. With that said, there is no question that current Win 10 PC systems are running wonderfully with assorted applications (including Adobe, Resolve) and allow the use of any hardware that the end user likes. Apple used to be JUST LIKE THIS ! The "old" Mac Pro's (the cheese graters thru 2012) allowed you to install NVidia graphics cards, your own RAM from any manufacturer, etc. Lots of expansion chassis products from Magma and Cubix came out. And MOST IMPORTANT - when Apple teamed with AJA for the AJA I/O box - the same year that AVID released the AVID Adrenaline for $25,000 (the AJA I/O was $2500) - that was the year that "everyone" switched to FCP. So WHAT HAPPENED? When did Apple decide to become closed, and not allow third party development (which is the very reason for the acceptance of Apple products from day 1 of AVID - using Truevision and ATTO products). Why did Apple change the policy that allowed third party developers to make a Mac into a "pro" product ? The whole thing is pretty sad. Of course, Apple has brilliant people working for them, that can do anything - so the only answer to my question is "money" - they are looking to increase their revenue, and if companies like NVidia (and everyone you see in your Mac at /Library/Extentions) doesn't want to "play ball" with them - well - Apple no longer wants their products to work.
Very sad.

Bob Zelin
Click to expand...

I can understand You and Misha's dilemma among other high end pros.
This situation won't fix itself but I DO NOT believe it's an unwinnable situation.

Apple has been making some decisions that negatively affect high end Pros using their platform.

Apple admitted to those mistakes and vowed to fix them and win back the trust of pro users.

Apple sought the guidance of high end pros (particularly in the film/video production area) to understand their use
of the products and workflow. God knows who they talked to and exactly what workflow they use.

Like I stated in an earlier post I think you might take the time to let YOUR voice be heard and send in a feedback form
laying out the problem as YOU see it.

I'm a FCP X user and have frequently sent feedback to Apple. I occasionally got an email back from them to help troubleshoot an issue or potential bug.
They DO listen. I have heard from people who attend the FCP X Creative Summit (now held at Apple) speak with some of the Apple engineers and they state that Apple does actively read the user feedback. There were even a few situations where an engineer remembered reading feedback from a user they later met. This is feedback regarding everything from feature request to bugs or even gripes. Granted, Apple won't comment on a request but they have confirmed reading feedback and taking it seriously.

Waving the white flag won't win anything. Give them a piece of your mind. Tell them your specific issues.

https://www.apple.com/feedback/mac-pro.html

Brian Timmons
BRITIM/MEDIA
 
Blair S. Paulsen said:
From Apple's POV, perhaps genuine pro users are just too small of a cohort to expend effort/money/time on. Macs have been designed primarily for the mass market all along, but by offering viable expandability for specific use cases they also picked up sales in vertical markets like ours. They also used high profile Mac users to add cachet to their brand.

Then Apple struck (rose) gold with high margin iDevices that also generated revenue via accessories and the App Store. They even took the word computer out of their name. If only they had sold off the Mac division then, to someone who was fired up to make "Insanely Great" a goal - rather than a punchline...

From the outside, it's seems ridiculous that Apple can't continue to fight the smartphone wars, and, at the same time, make state of the art computers. Yes, Macs may never have the juicy margins that Apple reaps from iDevices - but even a 5-10% margin is still profit. If I sat on the Apple board, I'd also like the idea that if the maturing smart phone market were to hit some headwinds, the computer division could help prop up the balance sheet until things improved.

Bottom line - do it right, or sell the Mac division to someone who will. Please.

Cheers - #19
Click to expand...

I doubt Apple would sell off their computer or any division. They would kill it before they did that.

I also think it would be a big mistake similar to Lucas selling Star Wars to Disney (controversial statement in its own right but that really didn't turn out well). Hard to think of any other manufacturer outside of Apple that would further develop the ideas and philosophy that embody what we understand as a Macintosh computer. Most people outside of Macs are oriented on the PC or LINUX approach. Turning a Mac into either of those platforms would be nothing short of tragic for the majority of users though PCs and LINUX systems DO have some approaches that Apple might consider integrating.

Down the line, Apple might consider supporting and licensing OS X to select hardware partners to fully service the very specialized industries (science, medical, Film, CGI, etc) that might have needs that a standard Mac might not cover. Given the likely price of such systems, I doubt it would greatly affect sales of standard Macs.

Brian Timmons
BRITIM/MEDIA
 
Just chiming in...Apple is in a weird spot...they are probably needing to rewrite the code for OS X and fcpx/logic/itunes...to start using there custom A chip. As rumors go...they appear to be dropping intel...at least for laptops...and would be curious how well received the new Mac Pro with dual custom A10 chips vs dual Xeons. Do they use the Mac Pro as the usecase? I’m guessing no.... as there probably a few years away....something to think about. GPU agnostic is what I’m hoping for.
 
Apple's are great when you want to work with FCPX and/or ProResRAW (because you have no other option) same as with Ferrari's, Ferrari's are great when you want to drive a Ferrari.

When you edit, color grade, VFX, etc... on multi platform software there are not many(I can't think of one to be honest) practical reasons to go for apple over the others and many reasons to go for the others over Apple.

When you edit, color grade, VFX, render for a living, time is money and you can buy time with a speedy workstation.
The highest specced Apple computer cost $ 13.199, for that money you can build a Windows/Linux workstation that has oftened more than twice the speed + a 10 bits 8k monitor.

And that doesn't just count for 8k, 4k can also be very taxing on a workstation.

pic_disp.php


pic_disp.php


The reason I picked Ferrari is: It's expensive and has the highest profit margin, for the rest the anology sucks because Ferrari's are fast and the profit remains in Italy
 
Misha Engel said:
The highest specced Apple computer cost $ 13.199, for that money you can build a Windows/Linux workstation that has oftened more than twice the speed + a 10 bits 8k monitor.
Click to expand...

...I just want the info this supposed 10bit 8K monitor. Please do tell. Need one yesterday.
 
Sorry guys, it's the $3.850 dell "consumer 8k" 7680x4320, not the DCI one 8192x4320, it's just for editing with a lot of workspace.
 
Apple has reinvented itself more than once. They went from maverick outsider to joining Intel's x86 party, they brought back Steve Jobs, etc. So let's hope they are serious about making proper content creation hardware again.

Ironically, it might be the A series chips Apple developed for iDevices that might be the foundation of "what's next". No idea just how steep the climb might be, but if Apple is able to make the shift from x86 CPUs to banks of A series chips... For starters, an OS rewrite that put all Apple products on iOS has to be attractive to Apple. While the short term costs of all that coding might be significant, it should have serious long term benefits. A ground up rewrite that exploits the strengths of newer chip architecture should yield another order of magnitude of efficiency, not to mention freeing themselves of legacy kludges.

One of Apple's core strengths has always been a deeper level of hardware/software integration vs the Wintel platform that has to play nice with hundreds of third party parts. Its a key reason that Macs often perform far better than their component hardware would suggest. I say, go all in. Hang your hat on the A series chips and leverage their strengths by coding specifically for them. It might take a while, and some truly buggy alphas to get there, but the potential...

Cheers - #19
 
Misha Engel said:
Sorry guys, it's the $3.850 dell "consumer 8k" 7680x4320, not the DCI one 8192x4320, it's just for editing with a lot of workspace.
Click to expand...

I was guessing that... Already own one of those. Total piece of shit. WORST-DELL-MONITOR-EVER. But I still appreciate all the pixels. Is $3850 the current price? Ouch. I didn’t pay that much,.
 
Jeff Kilgroe said:
I was guessing that... Already own one of those. Total piece of shit. WORST-DELL-MONITOR-EVER. But I still appreciate all the pixels. Is $3850 the current price? Ouch. I didn’t pay that much,.
Click to expand...

Don't own it my self, but a friend of mine has one and from what i've seen of it, it's is freaking amazing for stills. He bought is for $ 3.350, prices must have gone up.
 
I guess it’s still better than some of the Dell super-cheap “business class” monitors. As much as I would like to use it for 8K playback, and I have a bit, it struggles with the multi-input and sync/shearing. The blacks are murky and gamut is terrible compared to other 4K~5K monitor offerings out there. Most every review of these displays I have seen reports light leaking in the corners... Mine has that too. I actually sent my first one back since I had a light leak all along the right side that started near the top right corner and became progressively bigger as it went down. These were $3300 or $3500 when first launched, then they were out of stock for a while and Dell kept taking orders at $2995. That’s when I bought and I used a 15% off coupon on top of that.

When the next major DisplayPort version arrives to support true 8K over a single interface, monitors like this will make a lot more sense. And while this monitor is driven by an LG panel, it’s pretty lacking compared to LG’s other offerings. The 5K panel they’re using in the iMac Pro is freaking amazing by comparison.

The monitor is great for stills and compositing work, all things print... Incredibly useful for layout and simulation of mobile apps as I can fit multiple iPad/ Android tablet displays at 1:1 pixels on screen with room to move about and pixels close to the same size as on the device. I know I’m bashing the monitor’s quality, but at the same time I’m glad I bought it. Love/hate scenario. It’s the monitor we need, only crippled by available tech. Wish it was truly 8192 pixels wide. Or better yet, the 7.8K pixel resolution would be even more awesome if it were 28” instead of 32”. 32 is getting a bit too big and falls into that transition area of “hey I need this on my desk, but it’s too big” vs. “8K monitor would be great on my wall, but 32” isn’t big enough”. Not bad once you get used to it. Feels a whole lot bigger than a 2.5K 30” display. Mine is usually a secondary display and more often in portrait position for still image and apps and non-video tasks.
 
That Iiyama monitor is using LG panel and guts, not the latest gen, but still good. Yeah, this monitor is a bargain especially since it was one of the first to hit the market with DP 1.4.

The LG OLEDs are great for color work. So are the Samsung QLED. While not OLED or Micro LED/ Quantum Dot, the Sony 9xxE models are also really good for grading for TV delivery as they’re a great representation of just having a good yet common TV display. All of them are easy to calibrate. LG OLEDs are a bit too punchy and saturated out of the box, they especially have reds pushed too hard. Samsung is the same way, but the colors are more balanced. I like the QLEDs better between the two overall, they have less color bleed and render yellow/oranges better. They’re not without issues and have the annoying screen door effect with their sharply defined pixels.
 
Jeff Kilgroe said:
That Iiyama monitor is using LG panel and guts, not the latest gen, but still good. Yeah, this monitor is a bargain especially since it was one of the first to hit the market with DP 1.4.

The LG OLEDs are great for color work. So are the Samsung QLED. While not OLED or Micro LED/ Quantum Dot, the Sony 9xxE models are also really good for grading for TV delivery as they’re a great representation of just having a good yet common TV display. All of them are easy to calibrate. LG OLEDs are a bit too punchy and saturated out of the box, they especially have reds pushed too hard. Samsung is the same way, but the colors are more balanced. I like the QLEDs better between the two overall, they have less color bleed and render yellow/oranges better. They’re not without issues and have the annoying screen door effect with their sharply defined pixels.
Click to expand...

We just use the X-rite on all our panels every 2 months.
 
Barry Bishop said:
Just chiming in...Apple is in a weird spot...they are probably needing to rewrite the code for OS X and fcpx/logic/itunes...to start using there custom A chip. As rumors go...they appear to be dropping intel...at least for laptops...and would be curious how well received the new Mac Pro with dual custom A10 chips vs dual Xeons. Do they use the Mac Pro as the usecase? I’m guessing no.... as there probably a few years away....something to think about. GPU agnostic is what I’m hoping for.
Click to expand...

I forgot about those rumors. That does add a bit of uncertainty.
A transition to A series chips would likely be gradual and start at the low end and work up.
While it may be a while before A series chips begin to truly compete with Intel or AMD it does
illustrate Apple's desire for complete autonomy. Hopefully not at the user's expense.

Brian Timmons
BRITIM/MEDIA
 
We already live in a world where the latest CPU and GPU advances appear on PC ahead of Mac. Switching to more custom hardware will only exacerbate that. One of Apple's critical failings has always been its desire to control the whole ecosystem, the hardware innovation that occurs outside Apple will always exceed what they can do with their own silicon. Switching seems like a huge mistake.
 
Apple has recently been sending out surveys to customers who purchased an iMac Pro, asking them about which features drew them to the pro-level machine and what they like or dislike about the iMac Pro. . . Apple executives have said that Apple is committed to making the machine the highest-end desktop system able to handle VR and high-end cinema production.
Click to expand...

https://www.macrumors.com/2018/09/10/apple-imac-pro-customer-survey/
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top