Mac Pro too late for me

[Tesselator]

I am moved away because i do a lot of CG. As much as i hate windows i can no longer justify the costs of Apple anymore. I mean, back in the g4 days there where power macs on sale between 1250$ and 2000$. This means about 3k in Europe, more then ok for me. Now the 2,4 12 core(/witch by the way you can't get it any longer) it's a bit over 6k!!! This is too much, even for an Apple machine. At that costs i buy a 16 core HP with a state of the art Quadro witch blows apple out of the water. But boy, you get some value for your money on the power pc days! A rock solid operating system with features added for pros all the time and that machine was build to last. Nowadays the value isn't there anymore. I mean common! 2 years to update the core OpenGL ???? And all OS updates are 'facebook integration' and God knows what not. No freaking way. I admit that i am kinda want to go back Apple but they need to pull them self's together a bit and start to add real features for pros, like OpenGL on time(there is now need for major os change to update OpenGL, they can do it on usual upgrades like .1 or so), OpenCl(that is on par with others) and support for latest tech out there. When this will be the case i will return back to Apple in a hart beat, until then long torturing days on Windows.....

You sound like the perfect candidate for a dual-boot Hackintosh -

But just recently they were letting their 12-core go for something $2,400 tho it was the slowest one I think. I think I paid $2100 for my MP1,1 at 2.67GHz. The $6K+ prices are pretty much only when you max them out through Apple - which is a stupid move IMO.

There always seems to be a way to get into a decent MacPro for a reasonable cost. Like right now I think you can get 12-core at 3.4GHz or whatever it is for considerably under $3k by buying a used MP4,1 dual and upgrading it to a MP5,1 and swapping out the CPUs. etc. etc.

The GPU card driver release lag and omissions are a pretty big deal I agree but OpenGL isn't an issue IMO. I rendered for film and TV here in Japan on a small render-farm and never even needed a display card in those machines let alone care what version of OpenGL the OS supported. I think OpenGL is good for games and demos and that's about it. It doesn't help for anything else that I'm aware of. I need something between OpenGL 1.2 to 2.0 for modeling, set construction, rigging, and character animation but no more than that really. I realize that might sound blasphemous to a gamer but most CG artists and developers I know agree with that - almost unanimously once they understand what OpenGL actually is and how their applications are using it.

Anyway, again, I agree with your general sentiment tho. Especially the driver issue.

 

[Tesselator]

Yes, I agree. I just felt that would have been too far off-topic. But the keyboard/mouse/display paradigm has run its course and needs to go.

Maybe. I personally don't like the direction "they" are going to take here tho. I mean this was actually laid out to us almost 20 years ago. At that time I found it exciting to ponder. But as I grow to understand programming and conditioning (of people via media) more and more I want less casual intrusion - not more of it.

Oh well.

 

[pcd109]

You sound like the perfect candidate for a dual-boot Hackintosh -

But just recently they were letting their 12-core go for something $2,400 tho it was the slowest one I think. I think I paid $2100 for my MP1,1 at 2.67GHz. The $6K+ prices are pretty much only when you max them out through Apple - which is a stupid move IMO.

There always seems to be a way to get into a decent MacPro for a reasonable cost. Like right now I think you can get 12-core at 3.4GHz or whatever it is for considerably under $3k by buying a used MP4,1 dual and upgrading it to a MP5,1 and swapping out the CPUs. etc. etc.

The GPU card driver release lag and omissions are a pretty big deal I agree but OpenGL isn't an issue IMO. I rendered for film and TV here in Japan on a small render-farm and never even needed a display card in those machines let alone care what version of OpenGL the OS supported. I think OpenGL is good for games and demos and that's about it. It doesn't help for anything else that I'm aware of. I need something between OpenGL 1.2 to 2.0 for modeling, set construction, rigging, and character animation but no more than that really. I realize that might sound blasphemous to a gamer but most CG artists and developers I know agree with that - almost unanimously once they understand what OpenGL actually is and how their applications are using it.

Anyway, again, I agree with your general sentiment tho. Especially the driver issue.

You get it wrong. The base 2,4 12 core is 6000$ in Europe! This is because apple puts 3500$=3500EU + VAT and some add value for local store. Actually 1 Euro=1,3 US$ so there you go, Apple wants for the base 12 core 4550$ in Europe(before VAT and local store benefit)! This is rip off. The base mini is 1k, the middle mini model 1,3k and the base imac(21,5) it's 2k. So this is one reason for Apple do have such low sales on Europe. I only buy new machines, and don't mess up with cpu's and such. As for the OpenGL it's used extensively in fluid simulations(fire, smoke, water etc) and the OGL 4.3 has huge improvements in that areas. I know not all use them, but i do commercials for add agencies and i need to use fluids(thinks like water pouring etc, you know). So it's not only for screen preview, but it has some hardware rendering libraries as well. The render farm is used only for distributed CPU rendering, so you run usually with the integrated matrox 16Mb of VRAM or whatever your server has because you only use CPU power not video. For display driving even the casual gaming Nvidia are ok. For hard core use with computational and visual accuracy, not so. Anyway, i will not post anymore. I just want to say that i am waiting to see the new mac pro along side with osx 10.9. I also need to buy some license this year so i am looking to bundle. If Apple puts some effort toward professionals i will buy mac software versions along with apple tower, if not i go full Linux and that's it.

 

[JordanNZ]

Houdini FX, Maya and other applications that are available for OSX platform are all benefiting from the new rendering system and graphic libraries on OpenGL 4.3. To call your operating system 'the most advanced in the world' and be with more then one year behind with support for applications that are running on your machines, is whatever you may call it but not a move from a top class company. It's a slap in a face for your clients in the movie, tv, 3d and advertising industry. I don't know what type of work you do but i do extensive 3d stills and animations and professional cards aren't available on OSX with the latest features for more then one year. You asked for a feature in OpenGL 4.3 over the OGL3 on Apple OSX? What about hardware rendering quasi unavailable on OGL3? This is the reason why pyroFX, Houdini's super simulation system no longer works on Apple, and this for one year + just to give you one small sample. The simple truth is that Apple no longer cares about professional works-companies etc. All they care now is the casual internet surfer or maybe some office work. If you not into that target group screw your thousands of dollars invested in hardware, video cards, software, cameras etc. Apple don't give a squat about your company invested money, be it movie, tv, add, dtp, graphics or whatever. This is it. Well, i learned my lesson and i will never go back to apple no matter what. I will not spend one more penny on this pathetic firm.

Ummm.. I think you'll find that Houdini is using OpenGL 3.2 on Windows...

http://forums.odforce.net/index.php?/topic/17523-why-is-houdini-switching-to-opengl-32-but-not-43/

http://www.sidefx.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=2121&Itemid=360

As I said before, even the AMD Windows drivers don't support OpenGL 4.3 yet.

 

[sash]

I simply can't imagine switching back to something else from Mac OS. I did it shortly kind of 13-15 years ago, after a year or two on Mac, and I hated this windows thing every second I was using it. OK, I'm exaggerating, not every second, but still pretty much.

 

[pcd109]

Ummm.. I think you'll find that Houdini is using OpenGL 3.2 on Windows...

http://forums.odforce.net/index.php?/topic/17523-why-is-houdini-switching-to-opengl-32-but-not-43/

http://www.sidefx.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=2121&Itemid=360

As I said before, even the AMD Windows drivers don't support OpenGL 4.3 yet.

You may want to review that. That is the display engine number, so it's OGL 4,3. For OpenGl 3 the engine number is something like 2.1 or so. Excerpt from Side FX software:
"OpenGL 3.2 and OpenCL is not yet supported on OSX. It will be supported once Apple updates their drivers." I know what i am talking about, i am using those damm things all day.....
http://www.sidefx.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=415&Itemid=269 look at the OpenGl tab.....

 

[nanofrog]

I'm getting sleepy, so I hope you don't mind me cutting some of the fat there. Everything you said there was perfectly reasonable, but his cuts to the chase. You expect to see a 21-22% growth, that's not long term sustainable. The economy as a whole hasn't grown the at fast for decades. So, how are workstations to be expected to grow faster than the economy longer term? They can't. Nothing can. Everything either hits a saturation point, evolves into something different or dies. All you can really expect is something close to the overall growth of the economy, and workstations have beat that since the end of the recession.

Keep in mind, this is more than just the US economy. A lot of those sales would have been driven by the rapid growth seen in other nations such as China and India, hence it's not just the US GDP that drove it.

 

[JordanNZ]

You may want to review that. That is the display engine number, so it's OGL 4,3. For OpenGl 3 the engine number is something like 2.1 or so. Excerpt from Side FX software:
"OpenGL 3.2 and OpenCL is not yet supported on OSX. It will be supported once Apple updates their drivers." I know what i am talking about, i am using those damm things all day.....
http://www.sidefx.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=415&Itemid=269 look at the OpenGl tab.....

What am I missing exactly?


"The viewport is now based on OpenGL 3.2 It is a modern shader-based renderer for OpenGL 3 and 4 hardware, with additional features such as selection highlighting and geometry shaders. It has the ability to handle large data sets, and is now the default Scene Renderer. You can change the scene renderer in the Main Preferences."



And yes, the software doesn't currently support OpenGL 3.2 on OSX, because they don't want to re-write all of the OLD features to support core profile....


"
Quote:
I had thought that with 10.7 they had finally moved to 3.2, but I guess it was only partial.


They have moved to GL3.2. The problem is that Apple produced a separate OpenGL library for GL3, which only contains the GL3.2 core features. If you want to use the older GL1 and 2 features, you need to use their legacy GL2.1 driver. Since a vast amount of Houdini uses OpenGL, it wasn't feasible to convert all of the drawing code outside the viewport to GL3.2 for H12 (nor useful to do so outside the context of OSX).

We will continue to work on it, and see if it's possible to run an application with some windows running the legacy driver, and others running their new GL3.2 driver (the viewports). The alternative is a sweep through all drawing code to update it to GL3.2 (UI, MPlay, other viewports like IPR/COPs, animation editor, etc)."


You can find that thread here....

http://www.sidefx.com/index.php?opt...p=116996&sid=cdbc9130560576f723b1260ccf0eeb92


And while NVIDIA supports OpenGl 4.3 on their drivers in Windows, AMD does not.

Your driver may be capable of supporting OpenGL 4.3 if you're running a NVIDIA card, it doesn't mean the software you're running is using that context.

I'll also add that Pyrofx uses OpenCL for hardware acceleration, not OpenGL.

 

[wallysb01]

Keep in mind, this is more than just the US economy. A lot of those sales would have been driven by the rapid growth seen in other nations such as China and India, hence it's not just the US GDP that drove it.

Right, not just US, but what fraction of the world's rapidly growing GDP is really ready for workstations? I would argue nations seeing repeated 20% year-over-year growth are not adding jobs requiring workstations at similar rates. Those nations are still catching up 1963 tech, much less 2013.

 

[Tesselator]

Right, not just US, but what fraction of the world's rapidly growing GDP is really ready for workstations? I would argue nations seeing repeated 20% year-over-year growth are not adding jobs requiring workstations at similar rates. Those nations are still catching up 1963 tech, much less 2013.

Naw, their up to date and even ahead of the US. Certainly ahead of the UK. Ballywood and large industrial areas in various Indian cities are on the upswing of a bubble and spending is reflected with the purchasing of the latest gear. China is also experiencing similar booms. The days of 10 chinese all stuffed into a one-room house competing for US jobs using 5 to 7 year old PCs is long past. I live in Japan and have had a lot of dealing with those mentioned. They know very well the advantages of workstation over desktop grade machines and know what to purchase and how to deploy it.

 

[spaz8]

As of 10.7 OSX supports OpenGL 3.2.. the problem is apple made it a PITA for software devs to implement it. As mentioned above, (OSX) GL 3.2 is not backwards compatible. So only ADSK has really deployed it ( I thought Houdini did too but maybe not), forcing their users to move to 10.7+ to run their software. Thats not a bad thing, but considering how fragmented the OSX user base is, across 10.6, 10.7 and 10.8.. and I imagine a lot of the 10.6.8 stragglers are "pros".. most 3d software vendors have not seen the point in doing the PITA re-write of all their GL code while slashing their potential customer base. I really hope 10.9 is a great unifier of the osx install base and that there is solid GL 4+ support. I personally see limitations with the software I use with just 2.1 in the viewport, from features like transparency etc not supported, to software ports not happening or being delayed because of the ancient GL code.

 

[nanofrog]

Right, not just US, but what fraction of the world's rapidly growing GDP is really ready for workstations? I would argue nations seeing repeated 20% year-over-year growth are not adding jobs requiring workstations at similar rates. Those nations are still catching up 1963 tech, much less 2013.

You'd be surprised at the level of technology. Take a look at the overseas ODM market, and you'll see why. While engineering jobs are being shed in the West, they're being created in the East.

It's to the point in China for example, that they can produce their own Test & Measurement equipment instead of buying from companies such as Agilent or Tektronix as they once had to. They still buy some from the US, but not at the same rate. Take a look at Rigol for example, if you want to see what the Chinese are capable of (got a lot of design help from Agilent, when Agilent had Rigol producing their bottom end).

 

[thekev]

As of 10.7 OSX supports OpenGL 3.2.. the problem is apple made it a PITA for software devs to implement it. As mentioned above, (OSX) GL 3.2 is not backwards compatible. So only ADSK has really deployed it ( I thought Houdini did too but maybe not), forcing their users to move to 10.7+ to run their software. Thats not a bad thing, but considering how fragmented the OSX user base is, across 10.6, 10.7 and 10.8.. and I imagine a lot of the 10.6.8 stragglers are "pros".. most 3d software vendors have not seen the point in doing the PITA re-write of all their GL code while slashing their potential customer base. I really hope 10.9 is a great unifier of the osx install base and that there is solid GL 4+ support. I personally see limitations with the software I use with just 2.1 in the viewport, from features like transparency etc not supported, to software ports not happening or being delayed because of the ancient GL code.

Viewport 2.0 has a lot of issues on OSX. If you deal with splines at all, you get dancing CVs on some cards. It's extremely annoying.

 

[wallysb01]

You'd be surprised at the level of technology. Take a look at the overseas ODM market, and you'll see why. While engineering jobs are being shed in the West, they're being created in the East.

It's to the point in China for example, that they can produce their own Test & Measurement equipment instead of buying from companies such as Agilent or Tektronix as they once had to. They still buy some from the US, but not at the same rate. Take a look at Rigol for example, if you want to see what the Chinese are capable of (got a lot of design help from Agilent, when Agilent had Rigol producing their bottom end).

China isn't growing anywhere near 20% though. They have been under 10% since about mid-2010. India is also in a similar situation. Countries that are experiencing ~20% growth simply aren't that modern. As they modernize, the more their GDP starts to look like western countries. And the reasons are very simple. You get ~20% growth by simply catching up to western countries, but once you're roughly there, your economy is now very similar to and dependent on other western country's that unsurprising, your GDP growth is also similar.

So, I think its still unrealistic to call ~20% growth from workstations a success. Slow, steady growth that more or less matches the economy as a whole should be considered good. This isn't a new product bursting into a new market. It requires growth of the economy for it to grow as well.

Then there is total size to think about too. As big as China is, its GDP is ~1/2 that of the US. US and the EU add up to about $30T, Japan and the UK add about another $9T. Indian and China add up to about $10T. If China and India are growing around 10%, while the US, EU, UK and Japan are growing at around 3%, that leaves the total growth for those nations at an average of about 4.5% total growth.

Maybe this even explains how the workstation market has grown faster than the US economy as a whole, but still not anything like the 20% of circa 2005-06. Maybe it is these Eastern countries that have helped push it above US growth, but to expect them to push it to pre-western-market satuartion growth levels is just unreasonable.

 

[nanofrog]

China isn't growing anywhere near 20% though. They have been under 10% since about mid-2010. India is also in a similar situation. Countries that are experiencing ~20% growth simply aren't that modern. As they modernize, the more their GDP starts to look like western countries. And the reasons are very simple. You get ~20% growth by simply catching up to western countries, but once you're roughly there, your economy is now very similar to and dependent on other western country's that unsurprising, your GDP growth is also similar.

So, I think its still unrealistic to call ~20% growth from workstations a success. Slow, steady growth that more or less matches the economy as a whole should be considered good. This isn't a new product bursting into a new market. It requires growth of the economy for it to grow as well.

Then there is total size to think about too. As big as China is, its GDP is ~1/2 that of the US. US and the EU add up to about $30T, Japan and the UK add about another $9T. Indian and China add up to about $10T. If China and India are growing around 10%, while the US, EU, UK and Japan are growing at around 3%, that leaves the total growth for those nations at an average of about 4.5% total growth.

Maybe this even explains how the workstation market has grown faster than the US economy as a whole, but still not anything like the 20% of circa 2005-06. Maybe it is these Eastern countries that have helped push it above US growth, but to expect them to push it to pre-western-market satuartion growth levels is just unreasonable.

In terms of globally, don't just look at it from a single national GDP, but rather add them all up.

Another point to mention, is I wasn't indicating that 20% or so is a constant or sustainable growth rate, but rather only what occurred during that particular time period.

Now consider that the growth has diminished globally (China and India for example have slowed down their buying binges as their internal growth is curtailing), so it makes sense that these figures have actually dropped. Add the economic conditions to technological changes/advances (can do more with less), future growth rates don't look good (shrink, then stabilize I suspect, making an even smaller niche market).

 

[robains]

Oh this is too funny, so Apple finally announce the MacPro ... even put it on their web site and then say "coming later this year". I guess Apple are desperately "Trying" to keep people interested.

It does look "cool" but it's processor choice (12 core only) and GPU choices are not going to win over anyone serious about rendering video/animation. I guess it's aimed at "Photoshop" users? Doesn't seem very flexible (aka upgradable).

It is amazingly small at 6.6" x 9.9", and it does look really cool, but I can't see it being a good high end workstation.

The New MacPro ... well sorta

So, I guess everyone will have to wait 8 years (2021) for the next New MacPro (if they continue to double the release cycle 2 years, now 4 years, so next one will be 8 years away)

Computing ... it never advances anyway

Anyway, for you die hard MacPro fans (the few that remain) ... you can be assured you will have a new MacPro sometime later this year.

 

[SimeoneSergio]

12 cores for Photoshop? How can you even say it?

It's clearly FCP X, with that config (SSDs and 2x ATI Fire GPUs, aka OpenCL aka FCP X aka video editing).

 

[robains]

12 cores for Photoshop? How can you even say it?

It's clearly FCP X, with that config (SSDs and 2x ATI Fire GPUs, aka OpenCL aka FCP X aka video editing).

But I'm currently using 16 core workstations for Adobe PP and 64 core workstations for Cinema 4D ... and if I could have more cores I would ... they still take considerable time to render. I don't see how a 12 core (fixed) design is going to keep up with the hardware I have today, let alone what might come by year end??

And why announce a product and then say "sometime later this year?"

I hope this card fits inside the "new" MacPro

 

[deconstruct60]

It does look "cool" but it's processor choice (12 core only)

The Mac Pro page at apples site currently says.

".... With configurations offering up to 12 cores of processing power, ... "
http://www.apple.com/mac-pro/

which means your "only" is bogus.

and GPU choices are not going to win over anyone serious about rendering video/animation.

You mean the ones that are using these types of set ups.

"... On an NVIDIA Maximus system the Tesla GPU companion processor performs the heavy lifting of photorealistic rendering or engineering simulation computation. ... "
http://www.nvidia.com/object/maximus.html

aren't really serious about rendering. Funny how Nvidia doesn't think so.

I guess it's aimed at "Photoshop" users? Doesn't seem very flexible (aka upgradable).

What about Photoshop necessarily implies upgradable ( unless tracking versions over a long period of time.... at which point, time, not Photoshop is the issue).

So, I guess everyone will have to wait 8 years (2021) for the next New MacPro (if they continue to double the release cycle 2 years, now 4 years, so next one will be 8 years away)

Other than "continue to double release cycles" out of your butt is indicative that Apple is going to do that?

If Apple is going to "bet the farm" with the Mac Pro on dual GPUs and PCI-e SSD storage, it quite likely they will update those as newer ones become available.

 

[robains]

The Mac Pro page at apples site currently says.

".... With configurations offering up to 12 cores of processing power, ... "
http://www.apple.com/mac-pro/

which means your "only" is bogus.



You mean the ones that are using these types of set ups.

"... On an NVIDIA Maximus system the Tesla GPU companion processor performs the heavy lifting of photorealistic rendering or engineering simulation computation. ... "
http://www.nvidia.com/object/maximus.html

aren't really serious about rendering. Funny how Nvidia doesn't think so.





What about Photoshop necessarily implies upgradable ( unless tracking versions over a long period of time.... at which point, time, not Photoshop is the issue).




Other than "continue to double release cycles" out of your butt is indicative that Apple is going to do that?

If Apple is going to "bet the farm" with the Mac Pro on dual GPUs and PCI-e SSD storage, it quite likely they will update those as newer ones become available.

You are a die hard fan aren't you?

12 core only ... as in "limit" aka "up to"

History isn't my butt, but if you want to ignore Apples release history as indicative of their future release cycle then eternal optimism will see you thru the day.

Dual GPUs ... well, just in case you didn't know, dual GPU isn't "new" technology ... dual, tri, quad GPUs have been around for many years now. But it looks like the biggest problem/limit with this "new" MacPro is going to be power and heat. I've got 1500 WATT PSUs that are almost as large as the entire MacPro (6.6" x 9.9") ... but again I like my "Pro" level workstations to perform at the limit 24/7 ... good luck adding anything power hungry to this MacPro ... but who knows, maybe Apple have the PowerSupply separate from the case and run a big fat cable to the unit.

It is cute, lets see if Apple price themselves out of the market with it ... yet again.