MP 7,1 2019 Mac Pro now end of life

[theluggage]

I do have a serious concern about software support in all. OS X as a UNIX was a revelation to new unique software for Mac. Suddenly we had those strange little supporting softwares at our hands to do anything we wanted. For free.

Transitioning Mac Pro users to Apple Silicon is going to be Apple's biggest challenge, but I don't think free Unix/Linux software is going to be the problem. MacOS on Apple Silicon is still Unix and many - probably most - packages already build and run fine on Apple Silicon. Linux and Unix have supported ARM since the 1990s. (OK, ARM64 somewhat more recently...) and they've never been so completely dependent on x86 as Windows. It's mostly open source and mostly written in C or other high-level languages, so if the original developer isn't interested in supporting ARM someone else can step in. Support on Homebrew (package manager for open source packages) is looking pretty healthy: https://doesitarm.com/kind/formula

The more serious problems are going to come from the state of libraries/APIs like OpenCL and OpenGL when Apple Silicon really relies on software being optimised for Apple's own Metal etc. to get decent performance, and even if the standard libraries work they may have lacklustre performance. It's reassuring that what happened with Blender shows that Apple is prepared to pitch in to ensure that key apps get Metal support.

Apple's problem, though, is that as long as they're beholden to staying compatible with industry standards - which effectively means x86 + the GPU manufacturer de Jour, it's very hard for them to distinguish themselves from generic, cheaper and more diverse PC hardware. The Intel Mac Pro has some nice "flourishes" like somewhat more efficient SSDs and MPX slots that eliminate trailing wires and make multi-GPU cards neater, but ultimately it's just an implementation of the Xeon W platform and slightly re-packaged AMD GPUs - a battle over which is the fastest at running Avid (or suchlike) it's just going to be a slow, unwinnable war of attrition against cheaper, more customisable PC hardware - in an increasingly specialised market where moooar powwwwerrrrr!!! at any cost isn't necessarily key.

The current Mac Pro really isn't an economical choice for anybody who doesn't have a heavy, historical commitment to some bit of MacOS-only (or better-supported-on-MacOS) software. In the short term, such a commitment can easily justify the purchase of Mac Pro hardware - in the longer term, one by one, customers are going to switch, go out of business or retire unless Apple can encourage new people in with innovative hardware and well-optimised software that shows clear advantages on Mac.

Back at the 2019 Mac Pro launch it was telling that they didn't offer any performance comparisons with PC hardware - just older (and, by then, rather outdated) Macs. C.f. the Apple Silicon launches where they're dining out on the performance-per-watt stats vs. Intel - and say what you like about the Apple Silicon GPU, it runs circles around Intel's integrated graphics and has seriously raised the bar on what can be done with an "ultrabook" or mini PC.

The challenge is to translate that into clear advantages at the Mac Pro end of the market. The Mac Studio is a great product as a graphics/video/audio editing "appliance" with raw performance to rival the Mac Pro - but it ain't going to replace a big box 'o' slots stuffed with high-end discrete GPUs and insane amounts of RAM. We'll have to see what they come up with.

 

[OldMacPro2]

The issue is people buy the Mac Pro thinking it's a regular high, priced desktop to be pitted against regular desktop PCs. The 2019 Mac Pro is a workstation and should be treated as such.

It's for people and companies who depend on this kind of reliability and stability including down to the thoughtful design and killer silent performance of the engineered ventilation

As a true “crusty old U*is user”, who has worked for a RISC based workstation manufacture (8 years in ‘90s) and has owned several workstations since (both Apple and non-Apple), the points made above are so accurate.

The Pro (classic and current) are built to industrial standards, which explains the higher cost.

They also last a lot longer, even if poorly maintained. There is a strong user community for the Pro. And it’s almost certain that any Mac Pro currently “earning its keep” will continue to do so well beyond the period where it’s fully depreciated as a business tool.

 

[avro707]

I was upset when Apple decided to cut support for the 6,1 and thought against buying another Intel Mac, but I may still end up with a 7,1. I don’t want an AS Mac Pro if it’s a closed system like the Studio or can only accept proprietary GPUs like the 6,1.

My concern is support with macOS. The 7,1 hardware will stay relevant for a decade. Software support may not. I think Apple should stay with Intel for the Mac Pro or make it dual architecture. They should make an AS add-in card and leave it be.

The 6,1 is still a fast machine, but the 7,1 if you choose to buy one is an awesome machine. I've had mine for about 4 days now and it's just unbelievable how fast it is and also how extremely well built it is.

It's everything we loved about the old 5,1 without all the niggles we (or I at least) didn't like (such as lack of PCI-E expansion room). It's so well thought out inside and it runs silently, no matter what.

It will be supported on Ventura when that comes along, and hopefully it will keep going for as long as my old 5,1 did.

 

[throAU]

The Apple Silicon Mac Pro will have to be on par with 3 RTX 3090's, which they aren't capable of doing yet.

Says who?


Apple's machines so far have been playing with sub 200 watt power budgets for the entire system - cpu, gpu, ram, storage, display, etc. in a far smaller enclosure.

 

[maikerukun]

Not only are you absolutely SPOT ON about the hardware requirements, don't forget how limited ARM libraries currently are.

So even if Apple is able to somehow come up with a system that is close to as powerful as 3x RTX 3090's (HIGHLY HIGHLY HIGHLY doubtful, though I am definitely curious to see what they come up with), there is still the software side of things that is VERY lacking, and this is what the iSheep forget (as they are hypnotized by apple's doctored presentation "look how much more powerful and shiny it is", yada yada).

What's the point of having a supercar if the roads that you are going to drive it on are non existant? similarly: What's the point of having an EV if there are no electric charging stations? The supercar (or EV) stays in your garage at that point.

This is very much about software transitions/porting to ARM (which legacy software won't do), as it is about apple being able to develop a more powerful ARM SoC platform.

Hell, I am using a 13 year old machine, and yes i've hacked it quite a lot, but it still functions just fine under Big Sur, and I could even take it up to Monterey, if I wanted to punish myself.

What saddens me is it looks like the abomination known as Monterey will be the last OS for the cMP, but until we know for sure, I will definitely continue to use this machine while monitoring if the fantasyland prices drop for the 7,1, and if so, I will get one of those.

Until then, I'll continue to use this baby.

You can see my specs below

I haven't had as many issues with other folks on Monterey and I actually held off on updating until literally about a month or two ago "I'm always late to the game on updating to make sure all my plugins will transfer over...and you are right, it's definitely just as much about software as it is about hardware...and I have my thoughts on what's going to have to happen for AS to keep up with the 7.1 Mac Pro.

 

[maikerukun]

Says who?


Apple's machines so far have been playing with sub 200 watt power budgets for the entire system - cpu, gpu, ram, storage, display, etc. in a far smaller enclosure.

I don't disagree...and I'm DYING to see them truly unleash these things. I'll be honest, I was hoping for the Mac Studio to blow me away and was fully prepared to drop $10k on a maxed Studio to replace my 2019 iMac upstairs in the music studio, but alas, I chose to wait for the M1 Ultra Quad Mac Pro.

So my running theory is that the M1 Mac Pro is going to keep the SAME BODY as the 7.1 Mac Pro, and it's going to somehow allow for both the current MPX Modules to work while also encasing a Quad version of the M1 Ultra chip.

Because if they try to tackle this WITHOUT proper GPU's, it's not going to reach parity with even ONE RTX 3090. And let's not forget, the 4090 will be dropping around the same time, so quite frankly, it's not even the 3090 they have to compete against.

As for replacing the 2019 Mac Pro...PARITY AIN'T GONNA CUT IT. If you knew some of the movies and commercials being made on the 2019 Mac Pro, and not even the most updated version, the FIRST version, the OLD VEGA modules...this machine is an absolute rendering monster and quite frankly, in reality, the folks that would be buying it, mostly already have the 2019 Mac Pro, and it's going to need to BLOW THAT OUT OF THE WATER for those folks to just jump ship from the 7.1 Mac Pro to the M1 Mac Pro, and it honestly won't even come close to doing that...not for at least 4 years, UNLESS THEY FIND A WAY TO ALLOW THE CURRENT MPX MODULE GPU SETEUP TO STAY IN PLACE.

Because the reality is, the Mac Studio is a quarter of my Mac Pro's speed and power...which means a QUAD VERSION of the M1 ULTRA Chip, is what is required to reach parity...minimum, and since the Mac Studio was $10k with that Quad Chip...the M1 Mac Pro, will be $40 BASELINE for the version that MIGHT reach parity with the current 2019 Mac Pro...which again...isn't enough for people who already own that to leave.

It's going to have to literally be a 50% to 75% if not 100% FASTER AND MORE POWERFUL system because of the cost.

As for me? I'm gonna pick one up to upstairs in my music studio, but it'll be the cheap, $10k version with probably 1 or to M1 Ultra Cards in it. Since it'll be for the music studio, it won't need all the GPU power, as the 7.1 Mac Pro down here in the Production Studio ain't going nowhere. What OTOY has done with this system and their OctaneX Renderer...That has insured that I am GLUED to this system for the next 5 to 10 years from today...AND DON'T LET AMD RELEASE AN EVEN MORE POWERFUL GPU THAN THE W6800X DUO...If they release a 7.1 Mac Pro compatible card to rival the RTX 4090...even more reason not to leave. This machine paid for itself via clients in my first 2 months of owning it. It is a monster.

And it's going to admittedly be a whole lot of fun watching Apple try to make a bigger monster to take it on...but the point here...that timeline? That's a 5 to 10 year timeline.

The release of the first M2 chip has been disastrous...the M2 MacBook is throttling, overheating, and overall doing it's best impression of the 2020 MacBook Pro that got recalled for all of it's insane terrible throttling and overheating issues. The M2 MacBook Pro is going to have a lot of weight on it's shoulders to gain back the trust of M1 owners to upgrade and Intel MacBook Pro owners who haven't jumped the shark yet to not choose M1 instead. While Apple deals with that nightmare, 7.1 Mac Pro is just over here getting better and better day by day...optimized software, cold ice while it's running anything outside of pushing heavy renders, and a when it does need to push heavy renders and data...it heats up and eats up whatever you throw at it like smores over a campfire.

 

[maikerukun]

Transitioning Mac Pro users to Apple Silicon is going to be Apple's biggest challenge, but I don't think free Unix/Linux software is going to be the problem. MacOS on Apple Silicon is still Unix and many - probably most - packages already build and run fine on Apple Silicon. Linux and Unix have supported ARM since the 1990s. (OK, ARM64 somewhat more recently...) and they've never been so completely dependent on x86 as Windows. It's mostly open source and mostly written in C or other high-level languages, so if the original developer isn't interested in supporting ARM someone else can step in. Support on Homebrew (package manager for open source packages) is looking pretty healthy: https://doesitarm.com/kind/formula

The more serious problems are going to come from the state of libraries/APIs like OpenCL and OpenGL when Apple Silicon really relies on software being optimised for Apple's own Metal etc. to get decent performance, and even if the standard libraries work they may have lacklustre performance. It's reassuring that what happened with Blender shows that Apple is prepared to pitch in to ensure that key apps get Metal support.

Apple's problem, though, is that as long as they're beholden to staying compatible with industry standards - which effectively means x86 + the GPU manufacturer de Jour, it's very hard for them to distinguish themselves from generic, cheaper and more diverse PC hardware. The Intel Mac Pro has some nice "flourishes" like somewhat more efficient SSDs and MPX slots that eliminate trailing wires and make multi-GPU cards neater, but ultimately it's just an implementation of the Xeon W platform and slightly re-packaged AMD GPUs - a battle over which is the fastest at running Avid (or suchlike) it's just going to be a slow, unwinnable war of attrition against cheaper, more customisable PC hardware - in an increasingly specialised market where moooar powwwwerrrrr!!! at any cost isn't necessarily key.

The current Mac Pro really isn't an economical choice for anybody who doesn't have a heavy, historical commitment to some bit of MacOS-only (or better-supported-on-MacOS) software. In the short term, such a commitment can easily justify the purchase of Mac Pro hardware - in the longer term, one by one, customers are going to switch, go out of business or retire unless Apple can encourage new people in with innovative hardware and well-optimised software that shows clear advantages on Mac.

Back at the 2019 Mac Pro launch it was telling that they didn't offer any performance comparisons with PC hardware - just older (and, by then, rather outdated) Macs. C.f. the Apple Silicon launches where they're dining out on the performance-per-watt stats vs. Intel - and say what you like about the Apple Silicon GPU, it runs circles around Intel's integrated graphics and has seriously raised the bar on what can be done with an "ultrabook" or mini PC.

The challenge is to translate that into clear advantages at the Mac Pro end of the market. The Mac Studio is a great product as a graphics/video/audio editing "appliance" with raw performance to rival the Mac Pro - but it ain't going to replace a big box 'o' slots stuffed with high-end discrete GPUs and insane amounts of RAM. We'll have to see what they come up with.

While. Iagreew with you Transitioning Mac Pro users to Apple Silicon being the biggest challenge, I would disagree about why they compared only to older Macs.

To give a little clarity, I own Glowstick Bay Studios, which is a post production company here in Los Angeles, Ca. My most recent client was Lionsgate. My studio, along with Buffalo 8 Studios, handled all the VFX for the upcoming Mel Gibson film, Hot Seat. Buffalo 8 Studios runs on custom Puget Systems workstations, and my studio runs 100% on 7.1 Mac Pros and 2019 iMacs.

Another studio that is 100% Mac based is Lunar Animation...whom handled the animation credits for Jumanji 2. They also run 100% on 2 7.1 Mac Pros and 12 2019 iMacs "and interestingly, they have a render farm built out of 30 Mac minis for the iMacs, very cool"...

And this is just for our little studios.

EVERY MAJOR STUDIO IN HOLLYWOOD is running PURELY on 7.1 Mac Pro's, iMacs, and MacBook Pros...the ONLY rooms not running on those systems, are the 3D Rendering departments...and over the last year, I've seen that start to change with the introduction of OctaneX and the Arnold Renderer and Pixar's own Renderman reaching Parity on the 7.1 Mac Pros.

Now Pixar, 20th Century Studios, and Disney, all have 3D Render Rooms that are transitioning to Mac. They (the 3D Departments) are of course are still dominated by Puget Systems, but they are starting to explore what's possible on the 7.1 Mac Pros simply due to those 3 bits of software reaching parity on the Mac Pro.

As for me, my studios "both my production company and my music studio" are heavily rooted in Apple and will forever be Apple houses. revenue is up around 30% over 2019 "Covid numbers were decent but not useful for this conversation", and is absolutely the economical choice for me. My Oreo Cookie campaign alone "a 3 week long project" paid off the Mac Pro, alongside the damn thing being a write-off anyway lol", and again, the ONLY thing that could get me to leave my Mac Pro, is an Apple Silicon Mac Pro that at least DOUBLES the capabilities of my current machine, which...as I mentioned previously, you can't even do that with a $25k puget system.

Also, I did a comparison of the Mac Studio (I purchased it but returned it and decided to wait for the AS Mac Pro, but had time to do a comparison of the two)...it's about a quarter of the power of my Mac Pro. The raw performance doesn't come close to my Mac Pro. To be specific, the M1 Ultra Mac Studio maxed out was about a quarter of speed and power while running HEAVY renders and animation in Cinema 4D, Houdini, and Maya when compared to my Mac Pro with 2 Radeon Pro w6800x Duo's in it and several hundred gigs of ram. It just was basically a slaughterhouse.

WHAT'S INTERESTING THOUGH...is when it came to EDITING in FINAL CUT PRO...the Mac Studio was at parity with or FASTER than my Mac Pro...and that's where Apple runs into a problem, because...My M1 Max MacBook Pro is already the ultimate speed demon for FINAL CUT PRO, AVID, and PREMIERE while editing, and RESOLVE while coloring...and as such, the Mac Studio simply didn't have a place in my studio.

I fear that will be the case for most folks that own a small to medium sized production company. the 2019 Mac Pro's take care of all things Render Heavy, and the M1 Max MacBook Pro's take care of everything else. Currently, for me anyways, the question is do I replace the MacBook Pro with a Mac Studio...and that's a weird question to be asking lol, and one I don't think Apple anticipated.

 

[maikerukun]

The 6,1 is still a fast machine, but the 7,1 if you choose to buy one is an awesome machine. I've had mine for about 4 days now and it's just unbelievable how fast it is and also how extremely well built it is.

It's everything we loved about the old 5,1 with all the niggles we (or I at least) didn't like (such as lack of PCI-E expansion room). It's so well thought out inside and it runs silently, no matter what.

It will be supported on Ventura when that comes along, and hopefully it will keep going for as long as my old 5,1 did.

It's an incredible machine. I have exactly ONE PC, My custom Puget System that I had built to run the virtual studio I'm currently building in Unreal Engine 5. I will say this; It's going to take a LOT for me to ever want to move away from my Mac Pro being my daily work driver. It just handles everything, and easily. I mean, it's damn near overkill and that's saying alot considering how heavy some of my work projects an get. I'm happy you're enjoying it and welcome to the family

 

[avro707]

It's an incredible machine. I have exactly ONE PC, My custom Puget System that I had built to run the virtual studio I'm currently building in Unreal Engine 5. I will say this; It's going to take a LOT for me to ever want to move away from my Mac Pro being my daily work driver. It just handles everything, and easily. I mean, it's damn near overkill and that's saying alot considering how heavy some of my work projects an get. I'm happy you're enjoying it and welcome to the family

That machine in your signature has unreal specifications.

I can remember over 10 years ago trying to do video production on an iMac. It was well specified for its time and had lots of ram, but it took ages to render stuff with all the overlays and effects we were putting on the videos. And you couldn't do anything else at the time. Worse still they had a nasty habit of overheating (red boxes over the screen) so we quickly learned to put fan control software on them to keep the fans sped up and that stopped it. We got more efficient with our editing to get the same results that were less heavy on the computers.

The kind of powerful machines we have now just eat up that. That's why we have them, if something massive comes along the machine will just handle it and won't leave you stuck.

 

[theluggage]

Now Pixar, 20th Century Studios, and Disney, all have 3D Render Rooms that are transitioning to Mac. They (the 3D Departments) are of course are still dominated by Puget Systems, but they are starting to explore what's possible on the 7.1 Mac Pros simply due to those 3 bits of software reaching parity on the Mac Pro.

If Macs are sufficiently entrenched that software simply reaching parity is enough for studios to consider switching remaining PCs to Macs, that's interesting - and I'm not going to question your experience. Is this parity being achieved by adopting MacOS frameworks (which should transfer frictionlessly to Apple Silicon), or does it still rely on standard crossplatform APIs?

WHAT'S INTERESTING THOUGH...is when it came to EDITING in FINAL CUT PRO...the Mac Studio was at parity with or FASTER than my Mac Pro...and that's where Apple runs into a problem, because...My M1 Max MacBook Pro is already the ultimate speed demon for FINAL CUT PRO, AVID, and PREMIERE while editing, and RESOLVE while coloring...and as such, the Mac Studio simply didn't have a place in my studio.

Not really surprising - that'll be the Apple Silicon "media engines" doing their job, and one would rather hope that FCPx was ahead of the game in terms of being optimised for Apple Silicon. If you were speccing up a Mac Pro specifically for FCPX rather than 3D rendering you might well choose a different CPU, RAM and GPU config and spend more on, say, Afterburner cards.

I don't think it's a problem for Apple if people buy MacBook Pros rather than Studio Max for their video editing - with Apple Silicon it's 90% down to which form factor you prefer - and I suspect that the Studio Ultra is still waiting for better-optimised software to actually make use of those extra cores.

However, it does make you wonder whether the rumoured "M1/M2 extreme" with 4x Max chips stitched together is going to be viable as a Mac Pro successor - if the M1 Ultra is already seeing diminishing returns.

 

[Seiko4169]

It's an incredible machine. I have exactly ONE PC, My custom Puget System that I had built to run the virtual studio I'm currently building in Unreal Engine 5. I will say this; It's going to take a LOT for me to ever want to move away from my Mac Pro being my daily work driver. It just handles everything, and easily. I mean, it's damn near overkill and that's saying alot considering how heavy some of my work projects an get. I'm happy you're enjoying it and welcome to the family

Genuinely wondering whether you’ve been able to compare your Mac Pro to say a Studio Ultra? My hardware journey has been 6’1 + egpu, iMac Pro’s, Intel MacBook Pro’s and it’s time for the next step soon. Torn between a 7’1 and a Studio. Game code compilation will be heavily involved, Unreal engine, unity and Gamemaker studio etc but I’m no longer a slave to windows. Have a few dedicated PC’s for that purpose.

 

[prefuse07]

Genuinely wondering whether you’ve been able to compare your Mac Pro to say a Studio Ultra? My hardware journey has been 6’1 + egpu, iMac Pro’s, Intel MacBook Pro’s and it’s time for the next step soon. Torn between a 7’1 and a Studio. Game code compilation will be heavily involved, Unreal engine, unity and Gamemaker studio etc but I’m no longer a slave to windows. Have a few dedicated PC’s for that purpose.

I would not waste my money on a Mac Studio

 

[Seiko4169]

I would not waste my money on a Mac Studio

Any insight into why? I’m wary of the apparent reports of ‘coil whine’ but other than that a high performance sleek design seems a decent prospect?

 

[prefuse07]

Genuinely wondering whether you’ve been able to compare your Mac Pro to say a Studio Ultra? My hardware journey has been 6’1 + egpu, iMac Pro’s, Intel MacBook Pro’s and it’s time for the next step soon. Torn between a 7’1 and a Studio. Game code compilation will be heavily involved, Unreal engine, unity and Gamemaker studio etc but I’m no longer a slave to windows. Have a few dedicated PC’s for that purpose.

If you read his posts above you would have seen that he mentioned he purchased a Studio Ultra and compared it, and then decided to return the Studio Ultra, start on post# 56.

 

[Apple Knowledge Navigator]

why would Apple even release this computer knowing that they were moving away from Intel, clearly they have been working on this transition for a few years. Very annoyed.

The 7,1 Mac Pro was released late 2019. Apple's transition to their own silicon was likely conceived around 2017, perhaps earlier.

Did you really expect Apple to stop shipping new products just because they were working on a new architecture?

 

[Moonlight]

EOL? LOL

You do know that even EOL products (which the mac pro is not even close to being one) still work the same as the day before the EOL.

 

[Seiko4169]

If you read his posts above you would have seen that he mentioned he purchased a Studio Ultra and compared it, and then decided to return the Studio Ultra, start on post# 56.

I must be tired, I reread that post and saw in #57 a brief mention about a quarter of the speed on heavy renders. Makes sense for that use case as GPU is clearly unevenly matched. Still for game development, compile times etc I wonder how even the two machines are?

 

[kvic]

EVERY MAJOR STUDIO IN HOLLYWOOD is running PURELY on 7.1 Mac Pro's, iMacs, and MacBook Pros...the ONLY rooms not running on those systems, are the 3D Rendering departments...and over the last year, I've seen that start to change with the introduction of OctaneX and the Arnold Renderer and Pixar's own Renderman reaching Parity on the 7.1 Mac Pros.

Now Pixar, 20th Century Studios, and Disney, all have 3D Render Rooms that are transitioning to Mac. They (the 3D Departments) are of course are still dominated by Puget Systems, but they are starting to explore what's possible on the 7.1 Mac Pros simply due to those 3 bits of software reaching parity on the Mac Pro.

I'm a bit puzzled about this portion.

I assume rendering farms in your industry are similar to other industries. Render farms consist of computers sitting in a server room away from work desks. The computers could be discrete workstations or rack mounted machines. In such case, what would be the advantage of moving from PC to Mac?

And then in terms of migration timing. These studios should know (and perhaps know much better than the general public) about Apple's plan on AS Mac Pro. Knowing Apple is going to discontinue Mac Pro 2019, what have encouraged these studio to migrate to Mac Pro 2019 in 2021/22? Rather than not holding on to PC workstations (with intermittent PC hardware upgrade if needed) a little longer. And do the migration to Mac when AS Mac Pros are released? I meant Mac Pro 2019 is great, and a great PC too. That means non-user interactive machines could be served by PCs not made by Apple.

Lastly, what's so special about Puget Systems to these studios? I meant PugetSystems must have done something great to receive contracts from these big guys. But PugetSystems aren't without competitors in workstations. HP, Lenovo and Dell all three have some fantastic and well designed workstations, powerful rack mount computers. I would think they would fight hard to win big studios to be their customers.

 

[prefuse07]

Still for game development, compile times etc I wonder how even the two machines are?

Yeah, for that one, you might be better off just starting a thread on that subject within the Mac Studio forum. I still wouldn't touch one with a 10 foot pole, especially as we get closer to September

 

[TobiasT]

One must be crazy to buy a Mac Pro 7.1 now :-(

 

[BeatCrazy]

One must be crazy to buy a Mac Pro 7.1 now :-(

I still kinda crave one, purely for the industrial design. Although it's still on the big side, I'd probably find a way to cram a Mac Studio or Mini inside just for fun

I dunno what the used prices are, but if I came across one in perfect cosmetic condition for <$1K, I'd be tempted.

 

[OldMacPro2]

There is something about the "cheese grater" esthetic....Apple hit a home run with that design

 

[kvic]

I still kinda crave one, purely for the industrial design. Although it's still on the big side, I'd probably find a way to cram a Mac Studio or Mini inside just for fun

De-gutting MacPro7,1 destroys 90% of the design's elegance. Leave you with 10% of superficial appearance.

If you manage to package a Mac mini motherboard into a MPX form factor, and make it run off the MPX slot. That'll be an elegant MOD IMHO.

 

[darkus]

One must be crazy to buy a Mac Pro 7.1 now :-(

Not really, I just bought one.

Don't get distracted by the extreme amount of noise out there, ie. people talking about what some movie studios are doing, or how something has extreme performance gain of 20% for rendering blah blah.

In most situations, people will ultimately buy based on what they need (workflow, compatibility with peripherals) and whats compelling (looks cool, fits in their work environment).

The majority of people (excluding company/business purchases) who buy a Mac Pro are not sitting around rendering videos all day. I think most buy them for quality, looks and in some smaller cases as a hobby. In this situations it might be the right choice.

For example, some of us still need bootcamp. So if you want a high quality, fast, dual apple/windows machine that you'd like to purchase new, you really only have one choice.

Now if you want to argue the Prosumer market is dead or has atleast near-completly moved to laptops like the MacBook Pro. Thereby eliminating alot of the harware tinkering mentality, which then Apple has used to successfully convert prosumers to Apple Silicon, I would totally agree.

And really that refers to people buying new computers.

I still regularly use a 2012 MBP with bootcamp on it heavily on windows, and the machine has been reliable as day 1 and absolutely flies. Thats why I buy "Pro" systems, if you take care of them, they will last.

MacOS EOL Intel Macs is the real problem here. So if you buy something like the Mac Pro, the real issue is that you have to accept that there wont be many more MacOS updates going forward. Especially applies to those who are Apple software dependent, such as App developers who will need to keep XCode up to date. We shall see where things go on that front

 

[Matty_TypeR]

I don't think you will see mac pro 7.1's at 1k$ or £ for a good long while yet, they are still very strong machines, and with the right GFX card can beat the studio Max and MBP M2 quite well. any new Mac pro has got to have up grades and so far Apple seem focused on locking in everyone with M chips in the Apple iron curtain, no bootcamp with M chips. also no GFX up grades, no CPU or Ram upgrades and so far with studio or MB pro's, they cant even run EGpu's. With thunderbolt 5 early 2023 offering 80gbs double speed of TB 3 or 4. external GFX upgrades being possible via Egpu's. but not so far on anything that contains an M chip.

As stated above it will be Mac OSX that moves away from intel but not for a good few years yet the replacement Mac pro 8.1 will have to be something really special in all departments not just the Apple chosen apps that suit the M chips to get Pro user's on board the Apple titanic. RDNA 3 launches soon and will obliterate M chips, as will the Nvidia offering. Yet you might be able to fit one to your Mac pro 7.1 if Apple allow it of course. Nvidia cards i doubt very much but AMD cards they should allow user's to upgrade the 7.1 machines.

But in bootcamp it will work and people have spent 10's of thousands on high end Mac pro 7.1's in 2020 it would be some kick in the nether regions if in 2022 Apple announce EOL for intel and upgrades for the mac pro 7.1.

I think personally if Apple drop intel and move OSX and IOS in together more closely it will put alot of pro user's off. the only up grade path being new Apple machines as upgrades.