Has Apple finally given up on the MP?

[pmau]

As long as Apple keeps the iMac form factor and does not build any updated desktop hardware, I'm not interested. They will always push the limits of the design with no headroom for cooling or power.
A MacBook is a fine mobile device, but "at work" for me still means a desktop with monitor, keyboard and mouse.
And the iMac does not classify because of the components related to its cost.
End of September will be the limit for me, I'm shopping for a small tower with 4k video output and decent SSD/HD options.

 

[maxsix]

Yeah, but it was at the time when they hadn't redesigned the product in years

They should have at least had some spec bumps every year, ie up the RAM, more SSD space, more cores, for lower price. They basically left it at a price that is immorally high for no reason and a terrible business practice. The CPUs have dropped in price so have the PCIe SSDs and the GPUs.

The astronomical price is ongoing proof of Apple's narcissistic attitude. Such nonsense.

 

[SDAVE]

I think Apple's biggest problem has always been that they come out with the latest and greatest (within their limitation of course, like the AMD GPUs in the nMP) then they just sit on it for a very long time.

Same happened with the MacBook Pros and same happened with many other products. The only ones that get fresh hardware bumps are their iOS devices, yearly.
[doublepost=1467206576][/doublepost]

The astronomical price is ongoing proof of Apple's narcissistic attitude. Such nonsense.

I wonder how the sales are on the nMP. Probably really really low.

 

[Mago]

Social Lab Thread.... Good Luck

 

[JimmyPainter]

I know there are dozens of threads about this, but really....has Apple given up on the MP and shut down U.S. manufacturing for the MP?

What's all this talk on here about Apple ending production on Mac Pro?

This is actually nothing but a Rumor based upon "Apple Speak" but Macbook, Macbook Pro, and iMacs are the only ones looking to survive. Yes Apple needs to sell computers. Just their own list of what people need or they want to build. They Just killed off their ONLY external Display (Thunderbolt). They will also discontinue anything requiring that external screen (Mac mini and Mac Pro). They also don't need 47 levels of notebooks so ... Macbook Air isn't needed either. Giving us ..

Macbook and Macbook Pro.
Imac and iMac Pro.

Macbook Pro already exist but, the iMac Pro will be a New Creature designed to fill gap where Mac Pro used to exist (Xeon Processors and ECC Ram). It will have a Higher end GPU than plain iMac but will depend upon 3rd Party Thunderbolt 3 Extender Boxes to allow for the return of using PCI based 3rd party cards for extra Specialized Processing as the whole computer industry is moving back to these. Look no further than nVidea's Tesla or Intel's Phi "CO-Processors". The same way PCI Extender boxes from Cubix" used to allow for up to 5 Titan cards to help push CUDA, the next "Big Loads" will have the ability to be processed under or beside the your desk or maybe even in another room. Need 4 Red Rockets for your 10k Raw Red Camera video to crunch it down to 8k for comercial sale. Need to purchase some old PCI Audio cards for your new Recording Studio. Thunderbolt 3 will bring it to your Macbook Pro or your iMac Pro just the same. Need Multi-screen Setups, look to your 3rd Party again. Remember Radius back in the old days?

Anyway ... this will allow Apple to Slim down the MAC line and focus on "Shaking their Money Makers" iPad and iPhone. Don't be sad though ... As soon as we have OLED Flexible screens we should see a Super powerful 17 or 19" iPAD PRO.
AGAIN .. this is just a my guess as to where Apple is taking us next.

As far as a Hackintosh or Dell Windows Workstation, If you just can't wait any longer you would be 10 times better off buying the current Mac Pro Refurbed for around $2300 and upgrading when parts (Video and CPU) gets cheaper or go on and get the current 27" 5k imac. As the the old Apple saying goes ... "Think Different". Think of what it is that you really want to do. Then Wait as long as you absolutly can to see who's predictions come true and choose the best Apple solution based upon your true needs (Example - Single Threaded nVidea Cuda Enabled App).

 

[pmau]

I wonder how the sales are on the nMP. Probably really really low.

My guess is they stopped producing them a long time ago. Given the late availability and the steep increase for any larger model, I don't think they sold many at all. Of course review sites and video editing firms bought them at a discount, but I personally have never seen one outside of cooperations.

 

[rockyromero]

If 2016 comes and goes, then yes, I agree with you, that Apple has given up on the Mac Pro. I think people are hoping (can't say expecting), that we'll see something this fall, but if that does not materialize then the writing is on the wall.

Hoping that what you mention is incorrect.

We are on Apple's financial timetable with a matured product and marketplace.

There still seems to be another 10 year span for an active server market.

➰

 

[pat500000]

If 2016 comes and goes, then yes, I agree with you, that Apple has given up on the Mac Pro. I think people are hoping (can't say expecting), that we'll see something this fall, but if that does not materialize then the writing is on the wall.


iMacs

Would Mac Pro buyer guide be removed if it doesn't show up? Because it's still gonna say "don't buy"

 

[ITguy2016]

Yes, but as I understand, he is in a transition period and he needs a system like his old beloved cMP, is the iMac the proper system for his needs?

I would think it would be better than a 2014 rMBP.
[doublepost=1467213802][/doublepost]

The iMac 5k's AMD GPU is terrible, I've used many in different jobs and get heavy artifacting once the GPU starts to heat up and throttle. Just terrible.

The iMacs GPU may not be ideal but I would think it is better than what is available in a 2014 rMBP.

I understand you'd prefer an updated Mac Pro. However that's not an option at the moment (and may never be). If that's the case if an rMBP can fill in temporarily I would think an iMac would be an option given you're getting by with something less capable.
[doublepost=1467214113][/doublepost]

Also the iMac GPUs are mobile versions of the same GPU

I'm hoping with the release of Polaris and the 14nm FinFET architecture, they can put in a full desktop GPU. The throttling is also an issue on the Retina MacBook Pro, but the only one that doesn't have throttling issues is the nMP and cMP

It sounds as if the nMP is afflicted by heat related issues which can result in failure.
[doublepost=1467214840][/doublepost]

I think Apple's biggest problem has always been that they come out with the latest and greatest (within their limitation of course, like the AMD GPUs in the nMP) then they just sit on it for a very long time.

This wasn't always the case. It hasn't been until the last six years where it has become an issue. Apple released the Mac Pro 1,1 in mid 2006. It was followed up with a slight update(the 2,1) within a year (April 2007). Following that came the king of Mac Pros (the 3,1) within a year (January 2008). IMO the 3,1 was the best bang / buck of any comparable workstation. It cost less and offered more. The 4,1 was released slightly over a year later (March 2009) but offered a substantial increase in performance over the previous generations. Apple released the 5,1, a tweaked version of the 4,1, over a year later (July 2010). A minor spec bumped 5,1 was released in 2012 (June 2012). Then came the nMP in over a year later (October 2013). It is now July (in two days) 2016 and not one single improvement has been offered. While the 2010 -> 2012 update may not have been viewed favorably (due to the lack of USB 3.0 / TB...available on other Apple offerings at the time) at least it was an update.
[doublepost=1467214933][/doublepost]

My guess is they stopped producing them a long time ago. Given the late availability and the steep increase for any larger model, I don't think they sold many at all. Of course review sites and video editing firms bought them at a discount, but I personally have never seen one outside of cooperations.

You know...this is a plausible explanation as to why the nMP hasn't seen an update for so long.

 

[JimGoshorn]

Their obsession with sleeker and thinner is going to cost them sooner or later. There comes a point where sleeker is going to cost too much functionality.

 

[ITguy2016]

Their obsession with sleeker and thinner is going to cost them sooner or later. There comes a point where sleeker is going to cost too much functionality.

I think it already has given the heat related failures they've had (in both the Mac Pro and other products). Sleek and thin is OK if it doesn't come at a cost of functionality / reliability. I'm surprised they're going to remove the 3.5" phone jack off the iPhone 7 (assuming rumors are true) in the interests of making it thinner. IMO the iPhone doesn't need to be thinner.

 

[deconstruct60]

I think Apple's biggest problem has always been that they come out with the latest and greatest (within their limitation of course, like the AMD GPUs in the nMP) then they just sit on it for a very long time.

It is an overstatement to say this is a completely one sided Apple thing; "sit on it for a long time".
A substantial part of this is what the buyers are doing also. If there is no high activity and the product is very mature .... then buyers aren't buying. So why would Apple iterate heavily?

Intel's pace on CPU updates for workstation/server market is slower. That is highly influenced by the buyers activity as much as what Intel unilaterally wants to do.

Same happened with the MacBook Pros and same happened with many other products. The only ones that get fresh hardware bumps are their iOS devices, yearly.

Technically, the iPod is an iOS device. It has gone through non yearly updates. Sales (and competition) are way down and Apple's allocation of resources are also way down.

The iPad Air/"Mainstream" has peaked and is off yearly updates ( if iPad Pro is going to be a permanent new category ). iPad Mini 2 to 3 was basically an addition of just TouchID button. [ If Apple put fingerprint sensor on the Mac Pro's power button I doubt folks would call that a substantive upgrade. ]

I wonder how the sales are on the nMP. Probably really really low.

Relative to the top Mac models in terms of unit numbers? Yes. I wouldn't be surprised if Apple sold more classic MBP 13" units than Mac Pro. ( which is even older ).


The reality is that for many customers the computers are "fast enough". That is exactly why the Mac Pro 1,1-1,4 are mentioned far more in today's top 10 active topics in this "Mac Pro" forum on this site. Customers sitting and squatting has influence on whether Apple tries to put out something every year. If average customer keeps Mac Pro 6-8 years then why do yearly updates? [ Yes, everyone is not synced up to the same pipeline/lifecycle sequence. There are folks coming out at the end of their 6-8 year cycles but if the trend has been moving from 5-6 cycles to 6-8 cycles by the customers ..... the customers are slowing down. That is going to get a slow down on Apple part also. ]

 

[ITguy2016]

The reality is that for many customers the computers are "fast enough". That is exactly why the Mac Pro 1,1-1,4 are mentioned far more in today's top 10 active topics in this "Mac Pro" forum on this site. Customers sitting and squatting has influence on whether Apple tries to put out something every year. If average customer keeps Mac Pro 6-8 years then why do yearly updates? [ Yes, everyone is not synced up to the same pipeline/lifecycle sequence. There are folks coming out at the end of their 6-8 year cycles but if the trend has been moving from 5-6 cycles to 6-8 cycles by the customers ..... the customers are slowing down. That is going to get a slow down on Apple part also. ]

For others they are not. A lot of them are pro users who can benefit even from a 10% increase in performance.

However it's my opinion the lack of performance is a symptom of a larger issue. That issue being Apple's lack of commitment to a product many here use to earn their living. In the past there were some updates (see my previous post). However in the past six years the Mac Pro has seen a total of three updates. That might be acceptable if Apple has communicated to their users their intentions. But they haven't...leaving these people to speculate. Some cannot take that risk and are moving away. Others can wait but know they'll eventually have to make the move if Apple should fail to deliver on an update. Others will continue until they have no choice. What they all would like is to know what Apple's intention is. That seems quite reasonable for a product so many use to make their living with.

 

[linuxcooldude]

It is an overstatement to say this is a completely one sided Apple thing; "sit on it for a long time".
A substantial part of this is what the buyers are doing also. If there is no high activity and the product is very mature .... then buyers aren't buying. So why would Apple iterate heavily?

Intel's pace on CPU updates for workstation/server market is slower. That is highly influenced by the buyers activity as much as what Intel unilaterally wants to do.




Technically, the iPod is an iOS device. It has gone through non yearly updates. Sales (and competition) are way down and Apple's allocation of resources are also way down.

The iPad Air/"Mainstream" has peaked and is off yearly updates ( if iPad Pro is going to be a permanent new category ). iPad Mini 2 to 3 was basically an addition of just TouchID button. [ If Apple put fingerprint sensor on the Mac Pro's power button I doubt folks would call that a substantive upgrade. ]




Relative to the top Mac models in terms of unit numbers? Yes. I wouldn't be surprised if Apple sold more classic MBP 13" units than Mac Pro. ( which is even older ).


The reality is that for many customers the computers are "fast enough". That is exactly why the Mac Pro 1,1-1,4 are mentioned far more in today's top 10 active topics in this "Mac Pro" forum on this site. Customers sitting and squatting has influence on whether Apple tries to put out something every year. If average customer keeps Mac Pro 6-8 years then why do yearly updates? [ Yes, everyone is not synced up to the same pipeline/lifecycle sequence. There are folks coming out at the end of their 6-8 year cycles but if the trend has been moving from 5-6 cycles to 6-8 cycles by the customers ..... the customers are slowing down. That is going to get a slow down on Apple part also. ]

Not only that, but how often are the majority of workstation users really upgrading their computers? Once they configure their initial purchase for their needs, do they upgrade it to further their current model or by that time consider that workstation at the end of its lifecycle and time for a new one? I'm talking real pro's and not the enthusiast or power user BTW.

 

[deconstruct60]

No they haven't, unless I was flat out lied to by an Apple engineer at WWDC. The team he was on runs them headless with Xcode server for CI of their apps. They run 24/7.

Mac Pro's they bought deliberately or flushed out given the need to find something for the ones with flakey GPUs to do after they have been returned ?

Dual GPUs for a compile/linkage server is a pretty big mismatch. I wouldn't bet the survival of a product on that use case as being the primary driver. All the more so if look at the presentation about what is new in LLVM..... ( an incremental whole program linker that can be up to 10x faster than what Apple has been using. )

An internal headless hackintosh or even the return of the 4 core mini with a higher memory capacity top end ( and more distribution of workload across a bigger grid. ). Again on very thin ice.

I don't think Apple wants to stop selling the Mac Pro. But if external customers don't buy them there is no absolutely internal critical need for them that will force Apple to keep making them. That is extremely likely just highly wishful thinking.

I don't think it's direct proof that a new one will be on it's way or that the team who makes the MP even talks to the teams that use them for dev work, but to me it shows at least a strong internal need for a workstation.

I suspect the dev team is using them that way because they are "free" ( or almost free). Apple is building their ET spaceship campus. They can afford to deploy a couple hundred GPUs doing nothing and not really blink. They are probably blowing more money than that on chauffeuring Ive's back and forth to SF everyday and paying for his trips on private jets to go to MOMA parties in NYC.

All the more so if can somehow take "written down" returns, take the tax write off, and still use them for devs. That would be Scrooge McDuck nirvana for Apple.

There would be a better fit if there was a Mini or Mac Pro that could better fit the headless server role...., but that isn't really a Macintosh role ( no user sitting at a GUI. ).

 

[filmak]

I'm talking real pro's and not the enthusiast or power user BTW.

Do you mean only about pros in large companies/corporations?

Because I thnk the pros in smaller companies or shops or any small sized form of business are trying to get the most of their investment.

Just check the threads here about the USB 3.0 and GPU cards, or the threads about the needs of audio/music pros, these people are certainly not hobbyists.

 

[DesertSurfer]

Yeah, but it was at the time when they hadn't redesigned the product in years

They should have at least had some spec bumps every year, ie up the RAM, more SSD space, more cores, for lower price. They basically left it at a price that is immorally high for no reason and a terrible business practice. The CPUs have dropped in price so have the PCIe SSDs and the GPUs.

I wonder if Apple has made the calculation that it is better to take an ever higher profit margin on ever decreasing sales than to keep it updated to sell a few more but take a lower margin.

 

[deconstruct60]

Then they'd have to break their own rules and either make hacks or port cocoa & cocoa touch to linux, neither of which I think will ever happen. It just doesn't fee like the Apple way of things.

They don't need to port cocoa. For a headless macOS server all Apple would need is a hackintosh. [ Apple kept an Intel PC board spun up as a OS X target for years while PowerPC was the primary target. Doing a sanctioned, internal only, hackintosh would be even easier. Especially, if don't have to validate the full GUI stack. ]

For more generic cloud/web services back end server stuff all they need is a Swift port to Linux ( or BSD or whatever their back end primarily runs). Which they already have (at least for Linux).

I think when the time is right (CPUs, GPUs, etc.) a new Mac Pro will be released.

Time is right for who? The substantive problem that Apple has is that it is highly skewed to the "timing for us" rather than the timing for the customers. Apple can put part-timers and release Mac Pro updates as a part-time hobby project, but there is a deep mismatch between what a number of customers need and that approach.

I do think they put themselves in a tough spot with the switch to FCPX for video pros. They seemed to have abandon their workflow in the years following the release of FCPX.

Periodically Apple likes to do a Crazy Ivan [ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crazy_Ivan ]. Over a period of time Apple tends to attract a number of folks who want stable , stability, and 'same stuff just more affordable". The periodic Crazy Ivan move shakes off a number of those folks. The FCPX transition was more abrupt then it needed to be, but is down to a smaller group that is more willing to try a different approach. FCPX is slowly picking up more adopters.

Folks couch things as though Apple's primary objective is capture 90% of classic PC market. It isn't. 90% of the video production market. It isn't. 90% of the Smartphone and/or Tablet market .... It isn't. 90% of the tinker with add-in-boards and hardware ..... not even remotely close.

 

[thefredelement]

They don't need to port cocoa. For a headless macOS server all Apple would need is a hackintosh. [ Apple kept an Intel PC board spun up as a OS X target for years while PowerPC was the primary target. Doing a sanctioned, internal only, hackintosh would be even easier. Especially, if don't have to validate the full GUI stack. ]

For more generic cloud/web services back end server stuff all they need is a Swift port to Linux ( or BSD or whatever their back end primarily runs). Which they already have (at least for Linux).




Time is right for who? The substantive problem that Apple has is that it is highly skewed to the "timing for us" rather than the timing for the customers. Apple can put part-timers and release Mac Pro updates as a part-time hobby project, but there is a deep mismatch between what a number of customers need and that approach.




Periodically Apple likes to do a Crazy Ivan [ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crazy_Ivan ]. Over a period of time Apple tends to attract a number of folks who want stable , stability, and 'same stuff just more affordable". The periodic Crazy Ivan move shakes off a number of those folks. The FCPX transition was more abrupt then it needed to be, but is down to a smaller group that is more willing to try a different approach. FCPX is slowly picking up more adopters.

Folks couch things as though Apple's primary objective is capture 90% of classic PC market. It isn't. 90% of the video production market. It isn't. 90% of the Smartphone and/or Tablet market .... It isn't. 90% of the tinker with add-in-boards and hardware ..... not even remotely close.

I just don't see Apple testing millions of lines of code continuously on a Hack. It may be a waste of GPU resource but the 2013 MP is the only Mac with a decent number of cores. Now that you mention it though, I have no idea how the simulator is powered when an app uses Metal and how that translates through to the macOS. Maybe it's not such a waste?

It's not just about Swift either, if they wanted to test on any other platform, they'd need to port anything they use for testing to that platform, including all their proprietary libs, even the simulator, not to mention iOS device support. This isn't just compiling, this is continuous integration with bots (probably in the hundreds) testing more scenarios that either of us can probably come up with on our own.

Apple makes A LOT of software, with literally millions of users. I just don't see how they'd continue to do so without professional grade workstations in use at some point throughout the development cycle.

 

[nigelbb]

This wasn't always the case. It hasn't been until the last six years where it has become an issue. Apple released the Mac Pro 1,1 in mid 2006. It was followed up with a slight update(the 2,1) within a year (April 2007). Following that came the king of Mac Pros (the 3,1) within a year (January 2008). IMO the 3,1 was the best bang / buck of any comparable workstation. It cost less and offered more. The 4,1 was released slightly over a year later (March 2009) but offered a substantial increase in performance over the previous generations. Apple released the 5,1, a tweaked version of the 4,1, over a year later (July 2010). A minor spec bumped 5,1 was released in 2012 (June 2012).

The 2008 Mac Pro 3,1 was very good value especially the 2.8GHz dual CPU model. I bought one in 2008 for under £2000 which is still going strong with upgraded RAM, graphics & SSD. The 2009 Mac Pro 4,1 wasn't a vast improvement in performance in fact there were complaints at the time that the entry level systems were lower performance than the equivalent 3,1 models. The eventual top of the range 5,1 with a 6-core 3.33GHz CPU was a vast improvement on a quad core 2.66GHz 4,1.

 

[deconstruct60]

I just don't see Apple testing millions of lines of code continuously on a Hack.

What are you talking about? You initial statement was that these are XCode servers for CI. (I presumed that CI is continuous integration/improvement https://developer.apple.com/library...onceptual/xcode_guide-continuous_integration/ ). There are two parts to testing continuously. One, is building something new to test. Second, there is doing the actual testing. Those don't have to be the same machines. In fact, there are lots of good reasons why they shouldn't be. Separating the compile/build from testing is same class as why the source code repository ( Git , Subversion) is a separate set of servers (and services ).


Testing what Apple is building every day should not be done on homogenous machines (one single product) . Even more so should not be done on machines the over whelming vast majority of Apple users do not have. Apple should be testing on the machines the users use, since that is where the software is primarily going to be used.

The "headless" machine can do the source merge , compile , link, build sequence to compose the various builds Apple needs to ship out to the machines to actually do the tests on. Testing a GUI app on a headless server is more than a little odd.

I have no idea how the simulator is powered when an app uses Metal and how that translates through to the macOS. Maybe it's not such a waste?

screw some "Simulator" Apple should be testing on real stuff. Millions of folks are not using simulators. It would to go explain Apple's declining software quality levels if they are primarily targeting simulators for testing.

It's not just about Swift either, if they wanted to test on any other platform, they'd need to port anything they use for testing to that platform,

server side web services ... that is where Apple is going. There is all kinds of bright, flashing neon signs that indicate this.

Again this is primarily the context of "headless" server zone context. You want to move the goal posts out of that context fine, but that target Apple does not have a "no option than to keep making the Mac Pro" constraint at all.

Apple makes A LOT of software, with literally millions of users. I just don't see how they'd continue to do so without professional grade workstations in use at some point throughout the development cycle.

Which should be tested on the machines that those millions of user actually use.

A Mac Pro is not absolutely necessary to write/develop code.

Once again the Apple Design award winners "behind the scene" photos have not a single Mac Pro visible.

https://developer.apple.com/design/awards/


It is nice, but it isn't absolutely necessary. Apple software ecosystem development would not immediately crumble if there was no Mac Pro. The Mac Pro has huge systemic problems if it is a one-trick pony. It isn't a viable product in that case.

 

[thefredelement]

What are you talking about? You initial statement was that these are XCode servers for CI. (I presumed that CI is continuous integration/improvement https://developer.apple.com/library...onceptual/xcode_guide-continuous_integration/ ). There are two parts to testing continuously. One, is building something new to test. Second, there is doing the actual testing. Those don't have to be the same machines. In fact, there are lots of good reasons why they shouldn't be. Separating the compile/build from testing is same class as why the source code repository ( Git , Subversion) is a separate set of servers (and services ).


Testing what Apple is building every day should not be done on homogenous machines (one single product) . Even more so should not be done on machines the over whelming vast majority of Apple users do not have. Apple should be testing on the machines the users use, since that is where the software is primarily going to be used.

The "headless" machine can do the source merge , compile , link, build sequence to compose the various builds Apple needs to ship out to the machines to actually do the tests on.




screw some "Simulator" Apple should be testing on real stuff. Millions of folks are not using simulators. It would to go explain Apple's declining software quality levels if they are primarily targeting simulators for testing.




server side web services ... that is where Apple is going. There is all kinds of bright, flashing neon signs that indicate this.

Again this is primarily the context of "headless" server zone context. You want to move the goal posts out of that context fine, but that target Apple does not have a "no option than to keep making the Mac Pro" constraint at all.





Which should be tested on the machines that those millions of user actually use.

A Mac Pro is not absolutely necessary to write/develop code.

Once again the Apple Design award winners "behind the scene" photos have not a single Mac Pro visible.

https://developer.apple.com/design/awards/


It is nice, but it isn't absolutely necessary. Apple software ecosystem development would not immediately crumble if there was no Mac Pro. The Mac Pro has huge systemic problems if it is a one-trick pony. It isn't a viable product in that case.

There are so many different levels of testing, and CI doesn't necessarily test a whole anything, in many cases it will run the test associated with a new or existing branch on repo when a commit has taken place. That's not really a use case to test against any real anything, but it's def. a use case for having a powerful computer that can itself host or simulate an env. where the new code will run (like in an iOS simulator, or on a 32bit or 64bit ARM platform).

I would say there is a HUGE difference between testing a single iOS or single Mac app, compared to running test on millions of lines of code like Apple would have to do. There's just no way any non pro machine could continuously run bots on that type of code base without melting at some point.

 

[Miguel Cunha]

the MP is almost 4 years old

Almost 3 years old.
It was released in December, the 19th, 2013.

 

[Derpage]

Not only that, but how often are the majority of workstation users really upgrading their computers? Once they configure their initial purchase for their needs, do they upgrade it to further their current model or by that time consider that workstation at the end of its lifecycle and time for a new one? I'm talking real pro's and not the enthusiast or power user BTW.

So that's why this forum has turned into a "how can I upgrade/resuscitate this MacPro" forum. Because people rarely update? Right? Basically, the forum you are posting on proves your point wrong. Which makes me wonder if you're paying attention. Look around you. Stop with the ad hoc regurgitated lines.

 

[briloronmacrumo]

I think it's ridiculous that the MP is almost 4 years

Almost 3 years old.
It was released in December, the 19th, 2013.

Correct. However, I suspect SDAVE is referring to the age of the technology inside the nMP which was almost a year old when it was announced in 2013.