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Mac Pro design (2013) - Thanks Jony!

1

11201ny

macrumors member
Original poster
Feb 28, 2014
81
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I just wanted to take a moment to thank Jony Ive & the designers at apple for the design of the now ancient 2013 Mac Pro.

A year or so ago, both of my cats figured out that the 2013 Mac Pro was a great source of heat, and have made a little perch right next to it where they can put their two front legs on top of a Mac Pro, enjoying the hot air engulfing the front of their little bodies. I never really loved this situation, but I wasn't about to rearrange my desk to deter the two cats.

Anyway, just a day ago, after eating a hearty breakfast of raw turkey, Joan walked over to my desk, jumped up, and took her typical place on the Mac Pro. I guess she had eaten a little to quickly, because the next thing she did was to regurgitate about half of her meal directly into the top of the Mac Pro, almost immediately rendering it dead.

Repair: $1250

Who designs an expensive electronic device to be a receptacle for liquids, food, cat puke, etc.??
Well done guys. Almost as well designed as the Apple Pencil (that needs to be jammed into the iPad to charge). Or the Apple Magic Mouse (which needs to be flipped over to charge). Or the... the list goes on and on.

Can't innovate anymore my @ss!
 
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I searched for "Mac Pro Cat" and was not disappointed.

MacPro.jpg
 
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As cat owner who cleans up his share of partially digested cat food, I can sympathize with you. Still, I can't imagine most engineers would anticipate your particular scenario, though it does give me an idea about a possible new peripheral--the Mac Pro umbrella.

Didn't the G4 cube have a similar problem with animal hair?
 
Darmok N Jalad said:
As cat owner who cleans up his share of partially digested cat food, I can sympathize with you. Still, I can't imagine most engineers would anticipate your particular scenario, though it does give me an idea about a possible new peripheral--the Mac Pro umbrella.

Didn't the G4 cube have a similar problem with animal hair?
Click to expand...

The "Genius" @ Apple said that people spill all sorts of stuff into them. So yes, cat puke? Probably not so much.
 
Darmok N Jalad said:
I suppose laptop owners run a similar risk. I know Lenovo even has spill-proof keyboards on some models, complete with drain holes.

Is your MP is a total loss?
Click to expand...

Well we're in a spot... I can't drop $5k on a iMac Pro, and I'd rather not buy an iMac Retina for $3k. So today I agreed to pay Apple $1200 to fix the Mac Pro. It was an absurd decision for 5 year old technology, but I can always turn around and sell it used down the road. If it ends up being more than that, it will be a total loss.
 
11201ny said:
Well we're in a spot... I can't drop $5k on a iMac Pro, and I'd rather not buy an iMac Retina for $3k. So today I agreed to pay Apple $1200 to fix the Mac Pro. It was an absurd decision for 5 year old technology, but I can always turn around and sell it used down the road. If it ends up being more than that, it will be a total loss.
Click to expand...
Can you file a claim under your homeowners insurance?
 
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11201ny said:
I just wanted to take a moment to thank Jony Ive & the designers at apple for the design of the now ancient 2013 Mac Pro.

“I wasn't about to rearrange my desk to deter the two cats.”
Click to expand...

And yet somehow avoided by thousands, if not hundreds of thousands of others, cat vomit is now a Jony Ive problem.

When I stub my toe, I don’t curse my sofa manufacturer, nor do I curse Apple when my cat chews my MacBook charger cable.
 
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11201ny said:
I just wanted to take a moment to thank Jony Ive & the designers at apple for the design of the now ancient 2013 Mac Pro.
Click to expand...
Worst that I've had the cat do is to knock a full glass of white wine onto the keyboard - which made a whole bunch of the keys useless (Microsoft ergo keyboard).
.;l/ (cat walked on the keyboard)
I took the keyboard apart, and realized that it had an upper and lower plastic membrane - and the keys simply pushed the two membranes together so that copper traces on the two membranes made contact. Not copper-to-copper contact, but proximity sensing.

I separated the membranes and thoroughly washed them - sugary alcoholic liquid, wet or dry, messed up the sensors.

A thorough rinse with warm water for the entire keyboard, and letting it dry in a barely warm convection oven brought it back to life.'''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''' (cat walked on the keyboard again)

The "cat knocked liquid onto the keyboard" has happened a couple of more times - so I have two keyboards so that I can swap in a dry one after an accident,
 
11201ny said:
I just wanted to take a moment to thank Jony Ive & the designers at apple for the design of the now ancient 2013 Mac Pro.

A year or so ago, both of my cats figured out that the 2013 Mac Pro was a great source of heat, and have made a little perch right next to it where they can put their two front legs on top of a Mac Pro, enjoying the hot air engulfing the front of their little bodies. I never really loved this situation, but I wasn't about to rearrange my desk to deter the two cats.

Anyway, just a day ago, after eating a hearty breakfast of raw turkey, Joan walked over to my desk, jumped up, and took her typical place on the Mac Pro. I guess she had eaten a little to quickly, because the next thing she did was to regurgitate about half of her meal directly into the top of the Mac Pro, almost immediately rendering it dead.

Repair: $1250

Who designs an expensive electronic device to be a receptacle for liquids, food, cat puke, etc.??
Well done guys. Almost as well designed as the Apple Pencil (that needs to be jammed into the iPad to charge). Or the Apple Magic Mouse (which needs to be flipped over to charge). Or the... the list goes on and on.

Can't innovate anymore my @ss!
Click to expand...


I don't know man, I mean I am sorry this happened, but just imagine how pissed off your cat was for giving her all that raw turkey. I mean obviously she was pissed because she puked in your computer. But you need to let her know that it is the turkey people's fault, or maybe the grocery store. I don't know.
 
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Wonder if a cat has ever "sprayed" into an open face cheese grater to claim it's dominance. It too blew out hot air.

Just saying, no device is impervious to gross negligence. That's on you, op. I think Alf eats them, you could always let him at the feline.
 
Now that I've seen pictures of your cat, I've changed my mind and I don't think you have a case against Joan. The root cause of the problem is that you shave your cats. The lack of fur increases their need to warm up, hence the location of the incident is largely your fault.
 
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Not cat puke but a problem with the design of the 2013 Mac Pro: A cooling system which exhausts heat from the top. Setting something on top of the unit and forgetting to remove it may cause overheating. Seem unreasonable? It just happened to me while running some Handbrake benchmarks for the iMac thread. I had set something on the top of the unit (it is usually off) and forgot to remove it. Thankfully I was sitting next to it and heard the fan spin up and was able to remove the item blocking the exhaust.
 
ActionableMango said:
If Joan doesn't pay up, which seems likely for a cat, you might have to take her to small claws court.
Click to expand...

Ftfy.

As amusing as this thread is, I'm interested in the logistics. Was it the liquid nature of the vomit that shorted then fried the logic board of the Mac Pro? (Or, rather, a logic board, as they are cut up and spread around the triangular heat sink.)

Or is Apple simply charging an extortionate amount for a clogged fan? Which is what completely circles the top of the tube, under the lip. Pity the Mac Pro wasn't at max load - the airflow might have overcome gravity and blown it back up.

Either way, it's a case of "The vomit hitting the fan."

(Boom, tish. Thank you, thank you. I'll be here all week. Try the turkey, I hear it's good.)

Someone mentioned the Cube, which although it had a similar chimney design, also had a soft-touch power switch so a cat's presence would unexpectedly turn it off, probably saving it from a fate like this.

I dunno. As unlikely scenarios go, it's hard to blame the Mac Pro 2013 design on this one. A pet knocking a coffee into an open MacBook Pro must be a far more common occurrence. No one is making "innovate my ass" comments against 1980s era laptop designs though.

From the GoFundMe picture, the ass is what the Eneloops are getting!
 
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Bradleyone said:
Ftfy.

As amusing as this thread is, I'm interested in the logistics. Was it the liquid nature of the vomit that shorted then fried the logic board of the Mac Pro?
Click to expand...

Or was it the heat from the logic board that fried the vomit?
[doublepost=1515557160][/doublepost]
pl1984 said:
Not cat puke but a problem with the design of the 2013 Mac Pro: A cooling system which exhausts heat from the top. Setting something on top of the unit and forgetting to remove it may cause overheating. Seem unreasonable? It just happened to me while running some Handbrake benchmarks for the iMac thread. I had set something on the top of the unit (it is usually off) and forgot to remove it. Thankfully I was sitting next to it and heard the fan spin up and was able to remove the item blocking the exhaust.
Click to expand...

I mean, if I put something on the edge of the toilet seat and it fell in, I wouldn't blame the toilet design. You *know* how the Mac Pro works.
 
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“Well done guys. Almost as well designed as the Apple Pencil (that needs to be jammed into the iPad to charge). Or the Apple Magic Mouse (which needs to be flipped over to charge). Or the... the list goes on and on.”

FWIW they do provide a female-female adapter with the Apple Pencil so you can charge it with any lightning cable.

And for the Magic Mouse 2, a couple of minutes has it last the whole day, or leave it charging overnight and it’ll last weeks. And, also uses a lightning cable to charge. I don’t understand the outrage here.
 
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