MP 7,1 Mac Pro 8.1 - WHAT IF...

[prefuse07]

Seriously, you people make it seem like apple is still that garage-based startup that is hungry for cash.... When that could be further from the truth.

The fact of the matter is -- apple has so much market share (let me remind you they are the most valuable company on earth, even as I type this the stock price is growing), and money stockpiled that they can literally afford to play around with developing whatever machine they want. Whether that means some gimmicky VR goggles that probably won't sell all that well or the Mac Pro itself.

These arguments are moot, because of the current situation that apple is in today -- it is not the apple of 1997.

They are no longer that garage-based startup that is hungry for cash, where every single decision they make impacts them significantly, nor are they anywhere near bankruptcy -- far from it.

At this point, they make so much money from iPads, iPhones, Macbooks, and they have so much more money stockpiled that they can afford to keep the Mac Pro around, even if they don't profit highly from it, but instead, as Zombie mentioned, it can continue to be their Halo product showcasing their ultimate potential.

I am tired of reading posts and articles from closed minded individuals who believe that, "because they're a business" apple absolutely cannot do anything daring....

Don't even get me started on the sad selfish individuals with the "I don't need it, so nobody else should either" mentality...

Please, wake up.

 

[mode11]

Apple absolutely could afford to keep the Mac Pro around as a no-compromise technical tour de force that they make little money on, or even lose money. I argued somewhere in this thread that perhaps Apple just need to take the hit on the Mac Pro, and see it as a trade off for the mountain of cash they (presumably) saved overall from porting macOS to their own chips.

Unlike Xeons, which are sold by the thousand for use in servers, Apple's big-ASi chip would only ever be used in a small number of workstations, and would consequently be very expensive. Ultimately, macOS can only command so much of a premium over Windows, so Apple would need to swallow the loss on the rest.

The question is whether Tim Cook sees it that way. My impression is that he expects every product to wash its own face, and preferably make 30% profit. At the very least, a product that exists purely on Apple's charity would be in a precarious position. It would go years without updates, with the sword of Damocles hanging over it, whilst we speculate on its fate in the Mac Pro forum. So basically... business as usual.

 

[mode11]

Their points are atop their heads.

Great example. They would sell ZERO. The reason people would buy the boring cars is because of the halo cars. See Porsche. Try again.

The metaphor is getting a bit mixed here, as no one buys an iPhone because they're impressed by the Mac Pro. The Mac Pro is likely invisible to the vast majority of Mac users as well. If anything, the iPhone is the halo, and iOS integration is partly what draws people to the Mac.

In my opinion, the true value of the Mac Pro is that it keeps the Mac as a somewhat viable platform for use in high-end media creation (video games and virtual production obviously excepted, probably ML too). If there's no suitable option at the high end, Windows PCs will take their place. The danger is then that it's possible for a company to standardise on Windows, but not on Mac. Though how significant that factor is will vary.

The other risk is that high end software like Maya and Nuke would stop being made for the Mac, or the Mac version will be a second-class citizen - released later, lacking features and/or just not as performant.

 

[fuchsdh]

Seriously, you people make it seem like apple is still that garage-based startup that is hungry for cash.... When that could be further from the truth.

The fact of the matter is -- apple has so much market share (let me remind you they are the most valuable company on earth, even as I type this the stock price is growing), and money stockpiled that they can literally afford to play around with developing whatever machine they want. Whether that means some gimmicky VR goggles that probably won't sell all that well or the Mac Pro itself.

These arguments are moot, because of the current situation that apple is in today -- it is not the apple of 1997.

They are no longer that garage-based startup that is hungry for cash, where every single decision they make impacts them significantly, nor are they anywhere near bankruptcy -- far from it.

At this point, they make so much money from iPads, iPhones, Macbooks, and they have so much more money stockpiled that they can afford to keep the Mac Pro around, even if they don't profit highly from it, but instead, as Zombie mentioned, it can continue to be their Halo product showcasing their ultimate potential.

I am tired of reading posts and articles from closed minded individuals who believe that, "because they're a business" apple absolutely cannot do anything daring....

Don't even get me started on the sad selfish individuals with the "I don't need it, so nobody else should either" mentality...

Please, wake up.

Yeah, but they're a publicly-traded company that's always looking for ways to grow. The workstation market could be one such growth sector, but Apple clearly doesn't see it that way. Of course they *could* afford to keep producing the Mac Pro, but what they can do, and what they should do, and what they will do, are all very different propositions.

The metaphor is getting a bit mixed here, as no one buys an iPhone because they're impressed by the Mac Pro. The Mac Pro is likely invisible to the vast majority of Mac users as well. If anything, the iPhone is the halo, and iOS integration is partly what draws people to the Mac.

In my opinion, the true value of the Mac Pro is that it keeps the Mac as a somewhat viable platform for use in high-end media creation (video games and virtual production obviously excepted, probably ML too). If there's no suitable option at the high end, Windows PCs will take their place. The danger is then that it's possible for a company to standardise on Windows, but not on Mac. Though how significant that factor is will vary.

The other risk is that high end software like Maya and Nuke would stop being made for the Mac, or the Mac version will be a second-class citizen - released later, lacking features and/or just not as performant.

Yep. There's not really any indication that the "halo car" comparison has any empirical backing, especially because Apple's post-Jobs history has been the opposite—getting people into the ecosystem with items aimed squarely at the consumers, from the iMac on. Consumer hardware doesn't seem like it follows the car industry model at all.

As for the threat of Windows standardization, I feel like that's mostly already happened. Apple has ceded a ton of territory without a fight, and it's kind of comical when you consider small software upstarts have made more inroads fighting the giants like Adobe on Apple's own hardware than Apple has for nearly a decade.

The MacWorld article isn't really that wrong, except that it perhaps doesn't underline that a large portion of the blame for why the Mac Pro feels useless even to a Mac publication is the fact that Apple has neglected it and that's led to a feedback loop. Unless you're a Mac enthusiast, why would you get a Mac Pro for your work? Until Apple can act like it particularly cares about the market segment I don't blame people for thinking axing it is the better option.

I think Zombie and others are taking this entirely too personally. I'd love for them to have a Mac offering they loved. I want many of the same things they do. But I also ain't blind to history and realize it's a business with differing goals and motivations. Companies don't owe you anything, and users absolutely on't owe them, either.

 

[mode11]

As for the threat of Windows standardization, I feel like that's mostly already happened. Apple has ceded a ton of territory without a fight, and it's kind of comical when you consider small software upstarts have made more inroads fighting the giants like Adobe on Apple's own hardware than Apple has for nearly a decade.

Yeah, as I typed that I felt I was putting the situation in the best possible light for the Mac. That ship is over the horizon by now.

The MacWorld article isn't really that wrong, except that it perhaps doesn't underline that a large portion of the blame for why the Mac Pro feels useless even to a Mac publication is the fact that Apple has neglected it and that's led to a feedback loop. Unless you're a Mac enthusiast, why would you get a Mac Pro for your work? Until Apple can act like it particularly cares about the market segment I don't blame people for thinking axing it is the better option.

Realistically, a Mac Pro is a crazy choice for anyone involved in serious 3D modelling / animation. It's all downsides, other than the niceness of macOS itself. Objectively, Apple couldn't have put less effort into wooing this type of user over the past decade+. You pay a huge 'tax', not just financially but in terms of hardware choice and sometimes software, to keep the faith with macOS rather than just use Windows. And any slight productivity boost is more than wiped out wasting time in forums like this (fun though it is), trying to convince yourself and other enthusiasts the turning point is just around the corner.

 

[Joe The Dragon]

Unlike Xeons, which are sold by the thousand for use in servers, Apple's big-ASi chip would only ever be used in a small number of workstations, and would consequently be very expensive. Ultimately, macOS can only command so much of a premium over Windows, so Apple would need to swallow the loss on the rest.

Unless apple wants to make there own servers (even if just for in house needs) But then that may give will give the PRO's stuff like user hot swap storage.

 

[fuchsdh]

Yeah, as I typed that I felt I was putting the situation in the best possible light for the Mac. That ship is over the horizon by now.


Realistically, a Mac Pro is a crazy choice for anyone involved in serious 3D modelling / animation. It's all downsides, other than the niceness of macOS itself. Objectively, Apple couldn't have put less effort into wooing this type of user over the past decade+. You pay a huge 'tax', not just financially but in terms of hardware choice and sometimes software, to keep the faith with macOS rather than just use Windows. And any slight productivity boost is more than wiped out wasting time in forums like this (fun though it is), trying to convince yourself and other enthusiasts the turning point is just around the corner.

Yep. The lack of regular hardware updates is the ultimate killer and why the platform has done so poorly, above and beyond stuff like the tube form factor. How could you recommend someone buy a Mac Pro when you have no clue when the next one will come out, or even if one will?

 

[AlphaCentauri]

I have a gut feeling that Apple will be aiming more at hi-end music and video production, rather than at 3D content production with new Mac Pro, they’ve lost that market to Windows and Linux already, sadly.

 

[deconstruct60]

Apple absolutely could afford to keep the Mac Pro around as a no-compromise technical tour de force that they make little money on, or even lose money. I argued somewhere in this thread that perhaps Apple just need to take the hit on the Mac Pro, and see it as a trade off for the mountain of cash they (presumably) saved overall from porting macOS to their own chips.

Saved money overall? How? There are two active versions of macOS. They had to invent Rosetta 2 . Apple is running around trying to help some app development stacks to re-optimize their GPU libraries around the new Apple GPU semantics and specifics. The costs might go down in several years when Apple permanently stops all macOS on Intel development and finishes sponsoring/enabling the transition over to extremely highly optimized Apple GPU stacks, but that is likely several years out.

Apple is about to ramp out yet another whole operating system on rOS/realityOS layered on the shared stack. The AR/VR products should be a new revenue source but still have an underlying OS on top of a functional skill matrix that is stretched over multiple OS objectives. The organizational overhead for keep the function matrix is likely just about as high. There has likely been no huge drop in headcount.


If this is suppose to be 'saved money' due to absorbing Intel's profit margins into Apple's, then that is likely not as high as most fans are spinning it to be. Apple has smaller scale of sales and have to stick to leading edge process nodes to stay competitive. Neither of those two is going to increase net profits. Apple additionally threw over $1B at insourcing the cellular modem that isn't paying huge returns right now either. Qualcomm isn't stumbling on making progress on better 5G modems so Apple isn't going to trivially blow past them anytime soon. The Silicon business as an aggregate whole has some substantive "return on investment" problems to the point it is not just a pure cash cow. The "mountain of cash" notion coming from that subdivision is likely overblown.

Long term a couple years after Apple completely dumps Qualcomm and Intel there might be an upswing in 'savings'. That hasn't happen yet though.

Unlike Xeons, which are sold by the thousand for use in servers, Apple's big-ASi chip would only ever be used in a small number of workstations, and would consequently be very expensive. Ultimately, macOS can only command so much of a premium over Windows, so Apple would need to swallow the loss on the rest.

Apple doesn't need to swallow the loss. It isn't a requirement. It is a 'wish' that some are trying to project onto Apple. However, it is not an actual requirement.

The workstation is very expensive. Less people buy it because it is so expensive. So charge more money to fewer people to keep it around . Rinse and repeat. That is basically a prototypical pricing death spiral. It doesn't work well long term.

There is a pretty good chance that Apple raised up the Mac Pro entry price floor to a level they think their base SoC will get covered for costs. Yes that shrank the number folks they sell Mac Pros to , but it is also an opportunity get off the spiral , by putting more value into the system to stop the bleed in base size. I think what several folks are overestimating is how much difference change in SoC that $6K floor actually is going to buy. It is not a "whole the bulk of the SoC out and start over" coverage.

And if substantively change the semantics of the SoC then have pragmatically re-forked the OS and app layer also. So no long term 'savings' there either. And that is no saving for both Apple AND the macOS developers. ( not all macOS developers have Apple like margins and "mountains of cash"). Impacts on the ecosystem as a whole is a relevant factor. Myopically pointing at Apple's money pile size is pragmatically mainly just misdirection.


Yes, some of the hypermodular folks are going to 'run away' , but all Apple has to do in enough replacements to fill the gaps. Frankly, Apple already ran off a decent fraction of the hypermodular folks, because they are also in the "not going to pay $6K" group also. It is the size of the non-intersection that actually matters.

The question is whether Tim Cook sees it that way. My impression is that he expects every product to wash its own face, and preferably make 30% profit.

Yeah, because that is pretty much the way can build up a mountain of cash. If have several products that are busy throwing cash away ... you don't accumulate much.

Not only does Tim Cook see it that way. Major stockholders like Warren Buffet see it that way also. jobs wasn't trying to give away money either ( The norm was that Apple didn't hand out dividends under Jobs. ) . "Tim Cook" this and "Tim Cook" that is largely just misdirection also. This isn't coming from just one person and not a recent leadership change either.


In fact, most other Apple customers will likely see it that way too. Why should iPhone/MBA buyers subsidize Mac Pro buyers product purchases. It amounts on a tax on the much larger set of customers on the far lower end of product price scale subsidizing the the upper 1% so that the upper fringe can keep more money in their pockets. Doesn't sound like something that is going to over popular with the masses.

 

[deconstruct60]

Unless apple wants to make there own servers (even if just for in house needs) But then that may give will give the PRO's stuff like user hot swap storage.

Why? Vast majority of Apple's servers ( in their scale out datacenters ) run Linux, not macOS. For that workload, there is a perfectly viable off-the-shelf server Arm package Apple can buy from Ampere Computing. R&D costs about $0.00 or at least it is 5 or 6 orders of magnitude lower. And a larger fraction of Apple's 'scale out' footprint is outsourced to contractors (AWS , Cloudflare , etc. ) ... who also don't need any Apple pee on their Arm server packages at all either. In aggregate, they are already deploying them in the thousands. There is a large gap between number of servers that Apple web services 'touch' and the number of servers Apple actually owns and runs themselves.

For XCode Cloud they can throw Mini , Mini Pro , and Studios onto racks just like all the other macOS cloud hosting operators do.

Apple went the M-series path to build SoC packages that are specifically for the Mac product line. They don't really provide any technical support for booting anything else other than macOS. Are some folks going to throw money at hacking another OS onto the SoCs? Yes. Does that make it a viable platform target for a critical (24/7/365 5 nines ) $1+ billion dollar business element ? No.

Apple has completely dumped "macOS Server" as a product. If Apple was about to go 'whole hog' into the Server business why would they do that? Apple is out to be king of Linux server OS. Really? .... probably not.

And Apple's Rip van Winkle , treat it like a hobby project modus operandi over last decade.... that is going to win over hard core datacenter curmudgeon shot callers? Probably not. Apple datacenter soley eating their own dog food isn't really a viable market either. I suspect folks are trying to point at the total aggregate pile of servers that Apple runs. Apple isn't going to replace the vast majority of those every year. Nor are they on some frantic fast pace of building new centers. So an annual "eat dog food" sales rate isn't going to be that large at all.

If Apple services was the size of AWS then might be a very , very small chance. But Apple is not anywhere near that at all. AWS growth may be starting to stall out. Even they may run into problems with an "intneral only dog food" processor if growth completely disappears for a long time.

 

[goMac]

I have a gut feeling that Apple will be aiming more at hi-end music and video production, rather than at 3D content production with new Mac Pro, they’ve lost that market to Windows and Linux already, sadly.

The Apple headset may keep them in. They'll need workstations to create 3D content. Could artists do that on Windows and Linux? Sure. Would Apple like that? No.

 

[ZombiePhysicist]

The metaphor is getting a bit mixed here, as no one buys an iPhone because they're impressed by the Mac Pro. The Mac Pro is likely invisible to the vast majority of Mac users as well. If anything, the iPhone is the halo, and iOS integration is partly what draws people to the Mac.

In my opinion, the true value of the Mac Pro is that it keeps the Mac as a somewhat viable platform for use in high-end media creation (video games and virtual production obviously excepted, probably ML too). If there's no suitable option at the high end, Windows PCs will take their place. The danger is then that it's possible for a company to standardise on Windows, but not on Mac. Though how significant that factor is will vary.

The other risk is that high end software like Maya and Nuke would stop being made for the Mac, or the Mac version will be a second-class citizen - released later, lacking features and/or just not as performant.

Metaphors are always imperfect. Disagree. People buy iPhones because of the ecosystem of apple. Which includes big powerful computers that can save the earth from alien invasions by uploading viruses.

Few buy a Cayenne to get their groceries because they think a GT2RS is is great as a track weapon. The point is it acts as a halo to make their grocery shopping feel more special because it's by a company that CAN make a GT2RS. And yes, some of that does eventually trickle down to even their SUV.

 

[ZombiePhysicist]

Yeah, but they're a publicly-traded company that's always looking for ways to grow. The workstation market could be one such growth sector, but Apple clearly doesn't see it that way. Of course they *could* afford to keep producing the Mac Pro, but what they can do, and what they should do, and what they will do, are all very different propositions.


Yep. There's not really any indication that the "halo car" comparison has any empirical backing, especially because Apple's post-Jobs history has been the opposite—getting people into the ecosystem with items aimed squarely at the consumers, from the iMac on. Consumer hardware doesn't seem like it follows the car industry model at all.

As for the threat of Windows standardization, I feel like that's mostly already happened. Apple has ceded a ton of territory without a fight, and it's kind of comical when you consider small software upstarts have made more inroads fighting the giants like Adobe on Apple's own hardware than Apple has for nearly a decade.

The MacWorld article isn't really that wrong, except that it perhaps doesn't underline that a large portion of the blame for why the Mac Pro feels useless even to a Mac publication is the fact that Apple has neglected it and that's led to a feedback loop. Unless you're a Mac enthusiast, why would you get a Mac Pro for your work? Until Apple can act like it particularly cares about the market segment I don't blame people for thinking axing it is the better option.

I think Zombie and others are taking this entirely too personally. I'd love for them to have a Mac offering they loved. I want many of the same things they do. But I also ain't blind to history and realize it's a business with differing goals and motivations. Companies don't owe you anything, and users absolutely on't owe them, either.

You guys don't get it. Once the halo goes, so do the 'think different' people. Once they go, wherever that is, it will be the new "it" thing. It won't happen over night, apple is huge, but it would represent a shift. And not a positive one for apple.

And yes, the Macworld article is wrong on many levels, not least of which is "since I dont need it or want it, you shouldn't be able to get one" mentality behind it. Lack of imagination and intellect behind it also don't help.

 

[ZombiePhysicist]

Why? Vast majority of Apple's servers ( in their scale out datacenters ) run Linux, not macOS. For that workload, there is a perfectly viable off-the-shelf server Arm package Apple can buy from Ampere Computing. R&D costs about $0.00 or at least it is 5 or 6 orders of magnitude lower. And a larger fraction of Apple's 'scale out' footprint is outsources to contractors (AWS , Cloudflare , etc. ) ... who also don't need any Apple pee on their Arm server packages at all either. In aggregate, they are already deploying them in the thousands. There is a large gap between number of servers that Apple web services 'touch' and the number of servers Apple actually owns and runs themselves.

For XCode Cloud they can throw Mini , Mini Pro , and Studios onto racks just like all the other macOS cloud hosting operators do.

Apple went the M-series path to build SoC packages that are specifically for the Mac product line. They don't really provide any technical support for booting anything else other than macOS. Are some folks going to throw money at hacking another OS onto the SoCs? Yes. Does that make it a viable platform target for a critical (24/7/365 5 nines ) $1+ billion dollar business element ? No.

Apple has completely dumped "macOS Server" as a product. If Apple was about to go 'whole hog' into the Server business why would they do that? Apple is out to be king of Linux server OS. Really? .... probably not.

And Apple's Rip van Winkle , treat it like a hobby project modus operandi over last decade.... that is going to win over hard core datacenter curmudgeon shot callers? Probably not. Apple datacenter soley eating their own dog food isn't really a viable market either. I suspect folks are trying to point at the total aggregate pile of servers that Apple runs. Apple isn't going to replace the vast majority of those every year. Nor are they on some frantic fast pace of building new centers. So an annual "eat dog food" sales rate isn't going to be that large at all.

If Apple services was the size of AWS then might be a very , very small chance. But Apple is not where near that at all. AWS growth may be starting to stall out. Even they may run into problems with an "intneral only dog food" processor if growth completely disappears for a long time.

Sadly agree with all of this. Also, apple's seriousness with the enterprise can be summarized with this one scene:

No one would take them seriously and they've earned the derision of the enterprise, rather justly.

 

[mode11]

Metaphors are always imperfect. Disagree. People buy iPhones because of the ecosystem of apple. Which includes big powerful computers that can save the earth from alien invasions by uploading viruses.

Few buy a Cayenne to get their groceries because they think a GT2RS is is great as a track weapon. The point is it acts as a halo to make their grocery shopping feel more special because it's by a company that CAN make a GT2RS. And yes, some of that does eventually trickle down to even their SUV.

What % of iPhone buyers know the Mac Pro exists? They’re not even on show in most Apple Stores. Most iPhone users use PCs, but in general, iOS, AirPods, MacBooks and macOS are what create the rosy Apple glow.

 

[deconstruct60]

... I have a gut feeling that Apple will be aiming more at hi-end music and video production, ...

The Apple headset may keep them in. They'll need workstations to create 3D content. Could artists do that on Windows and Linux? Sure. Would Apple like that? No.

Do the headsets really solely need as large and bulky 3D objects as possible to get statically bound into apps created? Probably not. How much storage are they going to carry? RAM capacity? The issue more so is just how narrow of the high end really talking about here. 100% of all the video production isn't giong to get won by the Mac ecosystem. Neither is 100% of the 3D creation work going to get won by Windows/Linux.

[ Similar to some of the memes back in the 2015-2018 gulf of time where it "Mac/iphone applications development will be dramatically impaired if there is no Mac Pro, as if the vast majority of developers absolutely required Mac Pro to produce a decent application. Wasn't true then and even less true now. ]

Even inside of music and video production there are likely going to be narrow corner cases where some is doing something way , way out there that a single Mac Pro isn't going to cover.

For dynamically created content the abilities of the headset can't be complete detached from the 3D content design constraints. Some dynamic content created application that is mired more than eyeball deep in proprietary Nvidia GPU code. That isn't coming to headset either (unless streamed).

And streamed to the headset content. .... ' nobody on the internet knows you are dog ' . Lots of stuff is streamed to Macs that didn't come from a Mac.

I think the headset can keep Apple focused on the task of trying to push the envelope of how much GPU 'performance' can evolved into the future headset versions. The back and forth synergy between folding larger groups of building blocks into Macs and better large system apps creating better headset . Over time to be a driver for better performance.

The race to build the hottest GPUs... 300W ... top that with 400W ... top that with 500W ... top that with 600W software chasing that evolutionary cycle isn't going to have much synergy at all going on with where tether-less headsets are going next 4-5 years.

 

[prefuse07]

What % of iPhone buyers know the Mac Pro exists? They’re not even on show in most Apple Stores. Most iPhone users use PCs, but in general, iOS, AirPods, MacBooks and macOS are what create the rosy Apple glow.

^he has a good point here.

Most likely all use Macbooks or don't even have computers and just use their iPhone or iPad -- don't even know the Mac Pro exists. Just go in some of the threads that are posted on the front page and you'll see what kind of IQ is out there...

Also, a lot of younger people these days don't even have computers either.

But what about Pixar, Lucasfilm, Avid and the other audio/visual studios? -- I feel like these are the folks that the Mac Pro now caters to, or this is what apple has been trying to pivot towards.

 

[goMac]

And streamed to the headset content. .... ' nobody on the internet knows you are dog ' . Lots of stuff is streamed to Macs that didn't come from a Mac.

I'm gonna snip out the rest and respond to just this because I think this gets to the core of the issue.

Lots of stuff is streamed to Macs that didn't come from Macs. That's not a reality Apple likes, even if they have been kind of flailing.

Apple wants the entire production chain for their content to be created on Macs. Are they doing a horrible job at that? Yes. But they still have dreams of the Mac being a premier 3D content creation platform which is why they are doing the headset and pouring money into 3D graphics software.

They're doing a horrible job != they won't keep investing in it.

Apple wants a future where all content consumed by Apple devices is created on Apple devices and distributed by Apple services. Even if they're having a lot of trouble making that happen.

Could the Mac Studio be the Mac for 3D content creation? Maybe. Like you said, it's all targeting a lower end headset. But Apple isn't going to just pull out of the space completely.

 

[ZombiePhysicist]

What % of iPhone buyers know the Mac Pro exists? They’re not even on show in most Apple Stores. Most iPhone users use PCs, but in general, iOS, AirPods, MacBooks and macOS are what create the rosy Apple glow.

What percentage of Cayenne buyers know what a GT2RS is? What percentage of Honda buyers know what an NSX is. By asking that question, you're showing that you do not get how halo's work.

 

[mattspace]

Lots of stuff is streamed to Macs that didn't come from Macs. That's not a reality Apple likes, even if they have been kind of flailing.

Better yet, lots of stuff gets deployed on iOS devices, that didn't come from Macs. Apple Arcade, for example - pretty much everything there is developed on Windows, even the stuff Apple commissions from studios as Apple Arcade exclusives.

And the reason it's developed on Windows, is all the things that Apple refuses to allow the Mac to do - post-purchase hardware upgrades, GPU choice, customisable hardware and the ability to make "unbalanced" (in Apple's NewSpeak) configurations. The PC paradigm is at the heart of why gamedev happens on Windows, and as long as the Mac is a sealed appliance there is literally nothing Apple can do to change that.

And, where Gamedev happens, is where Cinema will be happening, because Cinema is increasingly made with the Gamedev toolchain.

 

[goMac]

Better yet, lots of stuff gets deployed on iOS devices, that didn't come from Macs. Apple Arcade, for example - pretty much everything there is developed on Windows, even the stuff Apple commissions from studios as Apple Arcade exclusives.

That's... iffier. It's really difficult to deploy to iOS from Windows. Apple is shipping a Metal shader compiler for Windows at least... But Unreal for example will only deploy and test on iOS devices from a Mac.

Could a bulk of the dev for a game be going on from Windows? Sure. But tooling limitations mean the iOS version is almost always developed and debugged on a Mac.

 

[mattspace]

That's... iffier. It's really difficult to deploy to iOS from Windows. Apple is shipping a Metal shader compiler for Windows at least... But Unreal for example will only deploy and test on iOS devices from a Mac.

Not really. Unreal can use a Mac as a dumb remote compiling appliance via SSH.

Which is why game studios Develop on Windows, and have Mac Minis that no one interacts with as build & deploy servers. Unreal operators plug the iPhones into their Windows machines and deploy test builds onto them directly. The Unreal operator has no experience that a Mac is part of the process.

It's a turnkey setup where the Mac is no more visible to the people making the content and operating Unreal, than the network switch, which is also in the server cabinet.

Could a bulk of the dev for a game be going on from Windows? Sure. But tooling limitations mean the iOS version is almost always developed and debugged on a Mac.

Literally no one in a game studio has any reason to actually interact with a Mac in order to make a game for iOS, apart from the IT person who sets up the build server.

 

[innerproduct]

Seriously, when the mac pro finally arrives, there will be no point in getting one since all work involving creativity and content creation by humans have gone the way if the dodo…. Don’t you follow the insane AI dev that is happening parallel to this? Runway gen2, kaiber, gpt4 with plugins, glimpses of actual AGI… all white collar jobs decline, the economic system implodes, no one has money for anything, mass unemployment, mass demonstrations, unrest and finally collapse of society. Also maybe nuclear war… gaaaaah!

 

[fuchsdh]

You guys don't get it. Once the halo goes, so do the 'think different' people. Once they go, wherever that is, it will be the new "it" thing. It won't happen over night, apple is huge, but it would represent a shift. And not a positive one for apple.

[citation needed]

Please present anything approaching a quantitive source. Repeating this and screaming at other people who say differently is what got you rightly sent to the timeout corner before.

I get that you and Siracusa seem to believe ardently as a matter of faith in the Halo car idea, but a) the Halo car idea itself is extrapolating out from the Halo effect, and I've yet to see any real research demonstrating how much Halo cars actually impact sales, and b) a consumer tech company is not a luxury car company, and expecting them to operate by similar rules is asinine. Again, consumer entry level products are what has pushed Apple's Halo effect, not a Mac Pro. You've got it absolutely backwards.

The "shift" you're talking about happened two decades ago. Creative professionals are simply not the major focus or priority for Apple, and the wide variety of pros have different products they actually want. Screaming at the people who actually are satisfied with a Mac Studio, again, does nothing but show you cannot conceive of an alternate viewpoint from your own.

 

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What percentage of Cayenne buyers know what a GT2RS is?

100% know what a 911 is. Why do you think the Cayenne, like every other Porsche, is styled like a 911, only on stilts, stretched etc.

What percentage of Honda buyers know what an NSX is.

Not many, though I expect plenty of Civic buyers know what a Type-R is.

By asking that question, you're showing that you do not get how halo's work.

I think you've got a fixed concept of what a halo is. It's not simply the fastest / most powerful / most expensive product a company has ever made. Also, the iPhone market is largely orthogonal to the Mac market, as evidenced by the huge disparity in their share of their respective markets. Even many MBP owners are likely oblivious to the Mac Pro.

Let's face it, if the Mac Pro really was a serious phone / laptop seller, Apple would be in the sh*t. Thankfully - in this respect - it's not on most people's radar.