Let's rev up some excitement for the 2014 Mac Pro!

[Lesser Evets]

... But I'm not sure if I'm going to buy a Mac Pro again. My next main machine may just be a MacBook Pro ... as I am starting to need portability more and would be better off putting more money into a more powerful laptop than spreading my money between a desktop and a laptop.

I'm in the same mindset. There might be a lot of mobile usage in the future, but I love the dual processors of the Mac Pro. Might buy both in 2015. The MacPro is just a better experience than any of the other computers Apple has at this time, but they might do dual processor iMacs in a few years.

I'm also looking down the line at the iPads. Those will speed up; they will probably be quite fast in 3 or 4 years and then take over larger market due to larger application capability. They'll never be as fast as the larger portables until the processors and memory reduce far down and batteries can run fast iPads like MacBooks. Apple will most likely keep iPads as they are for 3 or 4 years, but the market will eventually force them to be more expandable and capable.

 

[xgman]

but they might do dual processor iMacs in a few years.

I.

Maybe more likely single with more cores for the imacs.

 

[Lesser Evets]

Maybe more likely single with more cores for the imacs.

Undoubtably. While they do speed processing, they don't provide the fluid workaround of a dual processor system. I'm surprised they haven't made a top-end dual-processor iMac. Even with just two portable processors.

 

[blackwoodfx]

We were running the 2009 5,1 Mac Pros with a mash of graphics cards and as many RED Rockets or Quadro cards as could be safely equipped. We had a MP dedicated to CUDA performance within Adobe apps, another dedicated just to DaVinci Resolve, and one just for REDCINE-X. We were landlocked with the MP's because our clients and some of our own projects demanded the ProRes codec and our in-house editors were all FCP/FCP-X preferential. We supplemented those MP's with iMacs for light-lifting.

Finally in August, after the fallout from the "not really a new Mac Pro" release, we threw our hands up, took in a number of MAINGEAR custom PC's and made a hard effort to switch things over. Our post VFX guys were thrilled with the major boost in performance and the COA for me was dollar for dollar, much better than what I'd been getting with Apple.

But as our work creeped into more and more RED-exclusive footage (Epic 5K and 4K REDCODE RAW), we began to miss the ProRes codec and the much better process-to-finish workflow we had been accustomed to.

Finally, in November, Apple released the FCP-X update that allowed R3D+RMD REDCODE RAW editing and RED updated their Apple installer plus RED Rocket debayer drivers. We took in a new 12-core 2012 MP 5,1 and swapped the single TB drive it shipped with for 4 SSD's. We then added a USB 3 graphics card, eSATA card, a RED Rocket, and tested the 7970 and 7970 GHz Radeon's. We were blown away with the performance. Absolutely top-notch and certainly comparable to our MAINGEAR's.

We built a render hive out of the MAINGEAR's and we switched back to MP's completely. We've never been happier.

A new Mac Pro would be great -- particularly one with thunderbolt support and USB 3 -- but the top-end 2012 MP's are being undervalued at the moment and it's a shame.

 

[diane143]

I still have my G4 dual 1.42, so I'm good with infrequent upgrades. My main machine is a late 2008 unibody MacBook. I'm cringing with the thought of them both going out at the same time.

 

[Umbongo]

Undoubtably. While they do speed processing, they don't provide the fluid workaround of a dual processor system. I'm surprised they haven't made a top-end dual-processor iMac. Even with just two portable processors.

They have to use Intel Xeon processors, the power and cooling requirements aren't viable for an all in one.

 

[makaveli559m]

Anything that says Pro in it I would expect it to still have a lot of ports not to mention any tower I still expect it to have a optical drive, please dont give me no crap on why yourself dont need one in a tower. When you buy a tower or a workstation its common sense any huge machine like that would still have an optical drive especially for the huge price you pay for it.

 

[xgman]

Anything that says Pro in it I would expect it to still have a lot of ports n.

Except Apple is famous for skimping on ports of all kinds.

 

[michael_aos]

I recently switched from a 2006 Mac Pro 1,1 (2x dual-core 2.66Ghz) 2x256GB SSD's, Mountain Lion, ATI Radeon 5770HD, 16GB, etc to a Late 2012 Mac Mini 2.6Ghz Core i7, 16GB, 1.12TB Fusion.

I don't really notice much difference either way.
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