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Mac Pro presence in retail stores
- Thread starter Sin
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It seems Apple is far more profitable as a consumer mobile devices provider and media content distributor than they ever were as a PC company.
Just look at the Apples market cap. It was the iPod not the G5 (as good as that machine was) that started the complete transformation of the company. Apple like any publicly traded company is going to go where the money is. Ultimately how profitable is the Mac Pro to the company in comparison to iPod iPad iPhone Apps downloads etc.
Just look at the Apples market cap. It was the iPod not the G5 (as good as that machine was) that started the complete transformation of the company. Apple like any publicly traded company is going to go where the money is. Ultimately how profitable is the Mac Pro to the company in comparison to iPod iPad iPhone Apps downloads etc.
Not sure if you can read a lot into this. Who is walking into an Apple Store and carrying a Mac Pro home? I would always BTO and get it delivered home. I really believe they move way more "i" stuff and Laptops in the Stores.
The Mac Pro was never going to be the product that directly brought in huge profits. But Apple needs the pro developer community and killing the Mac Pro would eventually harm the iToy market.
There is a bunch of implicit content in "meaningless numbers". It isn't the numbers, but the content of the benchmark. User specific workload apps are always the optimal benchmark. However, their results are not generally useful. The trick in coming up with a good benchmark is trying to come up with results that are more broadly useful but specific enough. Loading a long timeline of very HD video may be meaningful to reeltoreel, but isn't so much to folks who aren't engaged in commercial broadcast work. So "being meaningful" is contextual.
Small, synthetic benchmarks which only sit in cache and primarily test CPUs will be faster as the GHz gets cranked up. If your business is moving 100's of GBs of data on/off disks quickly then it isn't a very informative benchmark. Likewise, if folks have an application that hits the network hard (some kind of NAS/SAN) they're not going to get a deep look at how well the machine does on their workload.
Geekbench measures integer, float , memory, stream performance with apparently some specifically target code fragments (opposed to SPEC which uses real world programs). For apps that load everything going to work on into memory and then mutate it, this is a reasonably informative benchmark.
If you throw more data than can comfortably be held inside of an iMac as your benchmark it isn't too hard to make it tail an Mac Pro with lots more money thrown at adding external I/O bandwidth (or internal capacity so it is all internal.)
Apple is far more profitable because have multiple major product categories that make money. IBM and GE make about 2 and 4 times (respectively) as much money as Apple does largely because they have more things that make money.
One problem that Apple had in the 90's was that they had a "one trick pony" major product line up. Any hiccup with that line and the amount of "gloom and doom" buzz around the company will swell up and make things worse ( just ask Dell at this point with the recent product quality flap they are going through. ) The "halo" effect is far more driven by having a giant stack of money in the bank, no debt, and profitable than cross product buying. Many people buy from successful companies just because they are successful. It is a herd effect.
The more historical iPods are shrinking right now and almost nobody cares because Apple has other product lines offsetting that drop. Likewise if Mac Pro sales temporarily drop for 3-5 months ... nobody cares because it has no significant impact on the balance sheet.
SO bottom line, what does all this mean for the mac pro?
Is it possible that Apple might not even update it this year?
What are the long term life expectancies for the Mac Pro? Is it doomed for future eol?
Is it possible that Apple might not even update it this year?
What are the long term life expectancies for the Mac Pro? Is it doomed for future eol?
I am not a pro but do a fair amount of aperture/photoshop work, VM Fusion for work, processing 7D files, some imovie editing and everyone once in awhile Garage Band. Im on a 2009 13" Macbook Pro and its really starting to show its age. I would love to get a Mac Pro for the power and the expandability.
i WOULD buy a Mac Pro from the apple store....have you seen the Fedex and UPS guys handle packages??
i WOULD buy a Mac Pro from the apple store....have you seen the Fedex and UPS guys handle packages??
Apple knows that for businesses, the Mac Pro is the only game in town, unless someone is crazy enough to buy an XServe, drop a video card in that and use that for a workstation. A rack form factor is a tad awkward for the desktop, but it would be adequate if someone had a musicians desk.
There are only two mainstream Apple products that don't get revised just to shave a couple millimeters off a side, and those are the Mac Pro, and the XServe. These machines are high dollar, and I'm sure Apple makes a healthy profit from them, even with the server grade components.
This is one of my fears -- Apple losing sight of its roots, and becoming "just" a toy maker. Businesses buy lots of Mac Pros, and making them more attractive in the enterprise just might add a healthy chunk of change to Apple's revenue books.
I do things 5 times more intensive than what you are describing with an older mbp and it works fine. How much RAM you have in it? Are you working off your 5200RPM drive your OS is on? There is no reason your machine couldnt smoke anything you are describing. Either something is wrong with your machine or you are exaggerating.
Well I don't know if I completely agree but you could be right. The bottom line though is that Apple has completely transformed their business model.
Before the whole idevice media content distribution model unfolded I never understood why Apple didn't just sell the Mac OS ala Microsoft and let other people make hardware. Apple could still offer a premium hardware package with integrated support that I'm sure many professionals would still utilize but Power users and companies that have IT personnel could develop their own custom OSX rigs to suit their needs.
Didn't MS make a ton of money with that business model; and in the late 80s Apple was far ahead of MS in providing a competent GUI platform for the PC.
Why not rethink their whole OSX offering and use the idevice market to further leverage Apple Computer. I mean as things are now OSX seems to be playing second fiddle to IOS 4. How it all pans out remains to be seen.
Yep, the writing says that nobody here understands who MacPro customers really are. As the MacPro name suggests, professionals don't usually need/want to visit a fancy store with lots of bright colors, simple words and cheerful salesmen. They know what they want and they buy it.
Very true. However, a Mac Pro may be what a lot of home users may be needing. I've pitched Mac Pros over iMacs in some cases because they have the following features:
1: Server grade components -- yes, the machine is expensive, but it should last 5-10 years without issue.
2: Upgradable -- RAM, video, hard disks, hard disk interfaces, essentially everything but the CPU.
3: Reliable -- Hardware RAID turns what could be a disastrous loss of information into a dialog box that pops up saying that you need to replace one of the hard disks ASAP.
4: Adaptable -- if someone wanted to, they can just disconnect a PC they have sitting nearby, connect the Mac Pro via a VGA adapter, and continue working. Same with the keyboard and mouse (provided they are USB).
For a home user, yes, a Mac Pro is overkill. However for someone who is going to be using the machine on a daily basis for years on end, having something made to be sturdy and reliable (as opposed to cool looking) is important.
Explain that one to me. The spinning wheels were from the i/o bottleneck, not the processor speed.
So, yes, to me, those numbers are meaningless.
I see exactly what you're saying, but just a note: I'm guessing by "commercial broadcast work" you mean shorter durations, as in ad's? In my experience, these can be far more intense than long-form because there's so much going on. You might have 50 layers of media for the finished piece if there's a lot of fx work, blending, etc. So I still wouldn't want to try any of that on an iMac.
Short-films for film fests or online? The iMac would be more than enough, I'm sure.
I see your point, though, and am not disagreeing. Just clarifying my point of view.
Do they have any other single processor configs in the retail Apple Store other than the 2.66GHz that you could just walk-in and buy? Like the 2.93GHz or the 3.33GHz? Or do you have to get these configured from the Apple Store online and have them shipped to you?
Cpu?
2. Upgradable -- Ram, video, hard disk interfaces, essentially BUT THE CPU
I beg to differ.. the cpus are indeed upgradable.. they are intel parts.. now, the duals are a special basketcase since Apple decided to use lidless processors thus making upgrading those cpus hard(anandtech), however the 5-600 dollar w3580 I just bought was an easy upgrade for my single-quad core mac pro and also an i7-975 can also be used as well, though one needs non-ecc memory to be installed.. so, the processor is easy to upgrade.. if one has done pc processor upgrades, then that one in the single-quad cores shouldn't pose any problem.. I can't vouch for the 2008-2007-2006 models as I wouldn't touch those with a 10 foot pole with so much to remove just to get to the sockets!
But, the quad-core single 2009 is easy to upgrade. SO THERE IS SOME FALACY TO YOUR ARGUMENT THERE.
2. Upgradable -- Ram, video, hard disk interfaces, essentially BUT THE CPU
I beg to differ.. the cpus are indeed upgradable.. they are intel parts.. now, the duals are a special basketcase since Apple decided to use lidless processors thus making upgrading those cpus hard(anandtech), however the 5-600 dollar w3580 I just bought was an easy upgrade for my single-quad core mac pro and also an i7-975 can also be used as well, though one needs non-ecc memory to be installed.. so, the processor is easy to upgrade.. if one has done pc processor upgrades, then that one in the single-quad cores shouldn't pose any problem.. I can't vouch for the 2008-2007-2006 models as I wouldn't touch those with a 10 foot pole with so much to remove just to get to the sockets!
But, the quad-core single 2009 is easy to upgrade. SO THERE IS SOME FALACY TO YOUR ARGUMENT THERE.
In my Towson, MD Apple store..
All they sell there is the 2.66 - the 2.93 and 3.33 need to be custom ordered.. however, if one has 500 dollars, just skip the w3540 and get the processor w3580 - voila! your upgrade is done!! and you did it less than what it would cost for you to have gotten it from Apple!
from 2.66 to 2.93 - add about 500 for that.
from 2.66 to 3.33 - add 1200-1500 for that
from 2.93 to 3.33 - possibly a 1000 or a little less..
As you can see.. the single w3580 processor I have in my system only cost 603 - 599 with shipping of 3 bucks.. Thats a far better deal than buying the system at 12-1500 dollars from 2.66, don't u think?
However, with the duals, the price is not the same as the dual processors alone you can't get from anywhere other than apple service providers and they won't sell them separate at all.. make matters worse, you can't get them anywhere.. all the processors intel make have IHS on them.
All they sell there is the 2.66 - the 2.93 and 3.33 need to be custom ordered.. however, if one has 500 dollars, just skip the w3540 and get the processor w3580 - voila! your upgrade is done!! and you did it less than what it would cost for you to have gotten it from Apple!
from 2.66 to 2.93 - add about 500 for that.
from 2.66 to 3.33 - add 1200-1500 for that
from 2.93 to 3.33 - possibly a 1000 or a little less..
As you can see.. the single w3580 processor I have in my system only cost 603 - 599 with shipping of 3 bucks.. Thats a far better deal than buying the system at 12-1500 dollars from 2.66, don't u think?
However, with the duals, the price is not the same as the dual processors alone you can't get from anywhere other than apple service providers and they won't sell them separate at all.. make matters worse, you can't get them anywhere.. all the processors intel make have IHS on them.
Um, I'm one such person (who bought a Mac Pro from an Apple retails store). Why on earth would anyone pay Apple's inflated prices for HDs and RAM? Even high end video cards can be had for a lot less than Apple's BTO "discount" if you are willing/able to tinker with ones made for PC.
Yeah, me too.. It used to be that you had to purchase your mac from a retail store if you wanted to get it serviced there for free (!!). Plus you get it TODAY (with educational discount, if you want).
Plus, like akadmon said: Who pays Apple's prices for RAM/HDs?
So true that Apple's prices for HDDs and RAM are outrageous. One big reason to order a BTO Mac Pro is to get an upgraded processor though.
True ^^^
I purchased my Mac Pro as a walk in at one of their retail stores which was quite a funny experience in itself as all the i-people (90% of the people in the store) were gawking at this huge box on a dolley being rolled through from the back to the front.
One thing I can say my the exterior of the box looked untouched or handled as it had no dirt marks on it all, it was clean and white. Looks like when retail stores receive them they come in skids carefully wrapped with lots of plastic. Apple probably demands that the goods they receive are in perfect condition and they get them without these boxes being randomly thrown around.
Yeah I am glad I went to a retail store to buy my Mac Pro.
This is exactly what I've been doing the last few times I've been in Vancouver - playing with the same Aperture 3 file on each of the MBP 17", iMac i7 and MP trying to get a feel for how each of them run AP3. You can't tell that online! It's been a large help to me and I now realize I won't be happy with any of the laptops or lower end iMacs.