MP 7,1 Waiting for Mac Pro 7,1 A1991 (no more)

[ZombiePhysicist]

Apple wont please everybody, I'll keep this post

Apple has become rather adept at not pleasing large groups of people as of late. Maybe it should go back to the cheese grater-like design that had little difficulty pleasing most of its pro users rather than inventing solutions to non-existent problems serving no one.

Again, I don't get why this controversial or we're "haggling" over this idiot trash can design when we had a design that delighted users so much, that many are still clinging to them now! This is the biggest no brainer for apple in a long time. Remake the cheese grater minus optical drives, and gussy it up so it doesn't look identical and move on.

How much harder and more embarrassing a failure does apple need before it gets off this stupid cube/tube treadmill! Take the victory. Stop grabbing defeat from the Jaws of victory. This is just not that complicated imo.

As always, ymmv.

 

[shab]

Hey Apple, can I get a new Mac Pro 5,1 tower? Please??

It seems They listen!

 

[mattspace]

Disagree. Just slap a regular card and use the video out from the card. Thunderbolt has failed for this purpose outside of laptops.

Bingo, for pro workstations, all Thunderbolt provides when it comes to displays, is limitations. Thunderbolt was a typical passive-aggressive company politick manoeuvre (by Intel) - its function is to sideline the discreet GPU by making it harder, and more expensive to implement as a user-replacable item, which leads to making the cost of upgrading graphics the cost of an entire machine, which gets Intel another CPU sale, and since it's so expensive, why not save a bit of money and just get the integrated GPU, it's "good enough" for the short useful life of your computing appliance etc etc etc.

The fear, of course, is that Apple thinks the problem with the nMP is that people's complaints are about not being able to buy a whole new machine with upgraded parts every year, and they'll gaslight their customers again, the same way they twisted demands for better support for multiple GPUs (ie native SLI etc and more power connectors) to mean "make two non-replacable GPUs the only option"

 

[Jaho101]

Bingo, for pro workstations, all Thunderbolt provides when it comes to displays, is limitations. Thunderbolt was a typical passive-aggressive company politick manoeuvre - its function is to sideline the discreet GPU by making it harder, and more expensive to implement as a user-replacable item, which leads to making the cost of upgrading graphics the cost of an entire machine, which gets Intel another CPU sale, and since it's so expensive, why not save a bit of money and just get the integrated GPU, it's "good enough" for the short useful life of your computing appliance etc etc etc.

The fear, of course, is that Apple thinks the problem with the nMP is that people's complaints are about not being able to buy a whole new machine with upgraded parts every year, and they'll gaslight their customers again, the same way they twisted demands for better support for multiple GPUs (ie native SLI etc and more power connectors) to mean "make two non-replacable GPUs the only option"

To be honest, Apple could have gotten by doing that with the Mac Pro if they'd actually bothered upgrading it at all. I have no doubt that the modular aspect of the next one basically means: modular for us. That being said, if it's a full workstation running the latest GPUs the it should be a solid investment that's also got resale value, rather than being gimped and very specific hardware wise.

In my mind I'm seeing something akin to an all-black Powermac G4 shaped tower right now, something much shorter than any of their previous towers now that there's no CD drive or anything. But honestly, who knows. Let's hope they do decide to have PCI slots though.

 

[jeanlain]

My prediction for the next Mac Pro.
It won't take PCIe cards. Because these involve noise, size, internal cables (or you don't get video out of TB ports) and reduce differentiation with other PC makes, all off which are of most importance to Apple. (Us geeks who want to put PC cards in their Mac just don't count. At best, Apple don't even know we exist. As worst, we're an abomination for them.)
It will take up to two custom-shaped graphics cards, with special connectors that carry power, PCIe data, and video back to the TB controllers. These cards will be user-ugradable and cost several thousand dollars each (a couple of options for a Fire Pro and Quadro will be offered on the Apple store and updated every other year).
It will take up to two Xeons and have 4 to 8 ram slots.
It may have a coupe of SSD connectors. My bet is that the connectors won't be standard. I'm not sure internal storage will be upgradable at all.
If will have at least 6 USB-C ports, each capable of power a 5k monitor, perhaps some ethernet, and headphone jack.
It will me much smaller than a regular workstation. Cause apparently, Apple thinks size matters everywhere.
It will have a least some exotic feature that other workstations don't have, and that users don't care much about (like illuminated buttons).
It'll cost at least 3500-4000$ for the base config.

Not a machine I want. I want a regular tower with an i7 and a couple of PCIe slots.

 

[ZombiePhysicist]

My prediction for the next Mac Pro.
It won't take PCIe cards. Because these involve noise, size, internal cables (or you don't get video out of TB ports) and reduce differentiation with other PC makes, all off which are of most importance to Apple. (Us geeks who want to put PC cards in their Mac just don't count. At best, Apple don't even know we exist. As worst, we're an abomination for them.)
It will take up to two custom-shaped graphics cards, with special connectors that carry power, PCIe data, and video back to the TB controllers. These cards will be user-ugradable and cost several thousand dollars each (a couple of options for a Fire Pro and Quadro will be offered on the Apple store and updated every other year).
It will take up to two Xeons and have 4 to 8 ram slots.
It may have a coupe of SSD connectors. My bet is that the connectors won't be standard. I'm not sure internal storage will be upgradable at all.
If will have at least 6 USB-C ports, each capable of power a 5k monitor, perhaps some ethernet, and headphone jack.
It will me much smaller than a regular workstation. Cause apparently, Apple thinks size matters everywhere.
It will have a least some exotic feature that other workstations don't have, and that users don't care much about (like illuminated buttons).
It'll cost at least 3500-4000$ for the base config.

Not a machine I want. I want a regular tower with an i7 and a couple of PCIe slots.

If that is the case, pro market for Mac continues its flight from Apple. That's just the loser nMP in a different shape case.

If it doesn't have slots, and expandable ram and storage options, it's done, imo.

 

[jeanlain]

I'm not sure standard slots matter much for the "Pros" that Apple targets. These are people who are ready to spend many thousands $$ for a macOS workstation, pay 4000$ for a custome-made Quadro GPU... The cheap ones just don't count, as Apple have proven with the latest laptops update. They were fine to increase the cost by 500$ and remove all standard USB ports. The irony is that sales proved they were right. It means that it's us, not Apple, who don't understand the market.
The issues they outlined with the tube Mac Pro were the thermal design and the total lack of flexibility. But reverting to a standard tower isn't the only solution. Apple would rather displease geeks (I'm one of those) than make a Mac that looks just like any other PC. Yes, they will lose some customers, but these are customers that Apple don't want anyway. For them, we don't deserve Macs, we deserve hacks.

Want to use a GTX 1080Ti? Go make yourself a PC. Want macOS? Make it a hackintosh.

 

[iMcLovin]

That's a very narrow definition of what pros need. There are other pros for whom four GPUs is the minimum:
https://developer.nvidia.com/devbox
Apple Made Me Buy a Windows HP Workstation

Sorry, yes I meant the majority. Thought I don't have any numbers to back it up, I think a pro machine meant for "work" benefits from one powerful GPU rather than multiple gpus. At least all the programs I know about doesn't support SLI, none of the art programs 3d programs, sound programs, video editing programs etc etc. Of course I'm not saying that's all the Mac pro is being used for, so Apples future machine should let you choose. But supporting 3 and 4 GPUS then you are aiming for a very slim market, then you might as well support quadro cards with 20gb of VRAM and other seldom cases as well.

 

[jeanlain]

Clearly, the next Mac Pro will not compete against workstations that can take up to 4 GPUs.
Apple has always been making towers that all have a fixed number of PCI, memory and HDD slots at a given generation. There won't be several designs for the next Mac Pro. One with 4 slots, another with 6... They will only be one main design, and it won't take 4 GPUs, but two at most. The vast majority of pros don't need more than one.

 

[mattspace]

The irony is that sales proved they were right.

When the new macbook pro was announced, there was, allegedly, an unprecedented run on refurbs. The sales of the machine are in the absence of competition from a machine with more battery, more ram, better GPU etc. "Success" can hide a broader failure.

 

[antonis]

The irony is that sales proved they were right. It means that it's us, not Apple, who don't understand the market.

Professional users can never be wrong, as they ask according to what they need. Apple already apologized for nearly every single one of their choices behind nMP. As far as the quoted text regarding MBP (from a MR front-page article):

Apparently, the negative response to the MacBook Pro with Touch Bar, which many complained was not oriented towards pro users, was a major factor. Apple saw a surge of orders for older MacBook Pros instead of the new model, and that, combined with the reaction to the LG 5K display and the "constant negativity" from professional users, led Apple to "double down on professional users."

All they have proved is that, lately, they are constantly wrong about reading the market. I mean, if a new product release's effect is the surging of the previous model's sales, you know you have dropped the ball.

 

[jeanlain]

Right from the horse's (Schiller) mouth:

Obviously, as you know, we just did a very major update to the MacBook Pro line. That’s going very well. Customers absolutely love it, we’ve had a lot of customers buying them. Big numbers, as I said, 20 percent growth year over year."

So it does seem the new MBP is doing very well.
Unless you suggest that he's deceiving us, and that the 20% growth refers to the older models.

 

[ManuelGomes]

I still get amazed at some people here that keep throwing rocks at Apple for their decisions.
I'm also amazed at their "apologizing" on the nMP but it will mean squat in the end.
This was just a "wait, we're still here" but you can bet your @$$ that you will not get whatever PCIe slot count in the new mMP. And where do they say it will come next year? You won't see it this year, that doesn't mean you'll see it next year either.
I'm still divided as to they had an upgraded model that has gone to the trash, or that they just woke up and started a new design now from scratch. The former seems likely but I don't see them dropping the ball just like that, if power/heat was the issue a solution would come up for sure. The latter also seems likely, after reading the apology.
So, whatever happened we're still far from a ready model.
I'm considering the 8core, and although the price came down, it's still a lot of money for a machine you don't know what kind of future support it will have. Will it work with 10.13 right out of the box? No GPU issues?
In the mean time no appropriate display for it as well. The new one to come is still far off and it will be TB3 for sure - or TB3.1 if Intel updates the specs to include DP1.4.
The new mMP will have to be 1S (still betting on SKL-W) and I wouldn't see them going back from the dual GPU solution, although they admitted that many people don't need it. I believe applications will be optimized for dual GPUs and by next year there might be gains finally.
But they still want to control the platform, forget PCIe cards. They won't do it. Too many things to consider, a support nightmare. They don't see the nMP as a machine for geeks and DIYs, much on the contrary. Those can go PC or Hack.
Being in the lower % digit (and although it still makes them a lot of money I'd guess) they can't afford or want to have a machine that gives them support issues.
Remember, we can solve most of our issues (drivers, whatever) but that's not the case for (most of) the other Mac buyers out there.
Now, the (i)MacPro could eat into the lower tier of the Pro lineup - Xeon E3, EC RAM. That would leave room only for a higher end machine. But that's not the way Apple has been going and I have a hard time seeing what will become of the MP.
I guess now they really have to re-design the nMP (too bad) but don't count on being expandable meaning user upgradeable standard cards - I very much doubt it.
They'll have a hard time coming up with a new solid design (after the nMP) that will be flexible enough so that you can choose to use 1 or 2 GPUs (I'm already not considering dual CPUs, that road is closed I guess). Major design overhaul required. And some guys will jump right at me but I don't think a tower like design is coming back.
I could see a come back of the NeXT Cube. Well, maybe not a cube but some sort of stylish box with a custom mobo that can take custom GPUs that you hook up (or not) according to your needs. But I wouldn't see more than 2 of those.
Forget ATX, DIY just plug in PCIe cards, even standard SSDs I doubt will be used. They still don't want you to tinker inside your Mac.
Am I just being pessimist? Maybe, but prepare to wait a long time and be disappointed if you want any of this.
Most won't like this comment but I believe they should have given the nMP another try this year, with SKL-W and new GPUs (even if power constrained) and TB3 with a new display. See how it would go. I believe geeks like us are going into oblivion and now people want a powerful enough machine that just works and offload tasks to other non-Apple stuff.
But that's just me drifting...

 

[Aldaris]

I took it as 20% growth on the Mac side, if I remember right he was talking prior about how Macs continued to sell and grow while the rest of the pc market has been struggling. I could very well be wrong but with the admission of the prior model selling out and refurbs being snatched up is at the very least a mixed bag for the 2016 MacBook Pro.

 

[antonis]

Right from the horse's (Schiller) mouth:


So it does seem the new MBP is doing very well.
Unless you suggest that he's deceiving us, and that the 20% growth refers to the older models.

It's hard to say. Either Phill "My a$$" Schiller is using the marketing template again (the one that uses the words "great" and "people love it") and forgets to count the # of returns for the new mbp or the MR article is deceiving. The increase in 2015 mbp sales indicates the former, but still hard to say.

IMHO, however, I could never believe that this dumb touchbar and the lack of ports made the new MBP sales increase 20% .

 

[ManuelGomes]

I guess a lot of folks were waiting on it and jumped right in when it came out.

 

[ZombiePhysicist]

I'm not sure standard slots matter much for the "Pros" that Apple targets. These are people who are ready to spend many thousands $$ for a macOS workstation, pay 4000$ for a custome-made Quadro GPU... The cheap ones just don't count, as Apple have proven with the latest laptops update. They were fine to increase the cost by 500$ and remove all standard USB ports. The irony is that sales proved they were right. It means that it's us, not Apple, who don't understand the market.
The issues they outlined with the tube Mac Pro were the thermal design and the total lack of flexibility. But reverting to a standard tower isn't the only solution. Apple would rather displease geeks (I'm one of those) than make a Mac that looks just like any other PC. Yes, they will lose some customers, but these are customers that Apple don't want anyway. For them, we don't deserve Macs, we deserve hacks.

Want to use a GTX 1080Ti? Go make yourself a PC. Want macOS? Make it a hackintosh.

Disagree. Slots are important. Go back and read Schiller description of pros they target. It is much wider than what you are making out. It includes scientists who DEFINATElY use custom cards. Graphics artists. Video production. CAD. And more. This meme in this forum that the only pros are those working at Pixar is dead, and eve Apple has acknowledged it is wrong and pros are a much more diversified group.
[doublepost=1491757048][/doublepost]

I still get amazed at some people here that keep throwing rocks at Apple for their decisions.
I'm also amazed at their "apologizing" on the nMP but it will mean squat in the end.
This was just a "wait, we're still here" but you can bet your @$$ that you will not get whatever PCIe slot count in the new mMP. And where do they say it will come next year? You won't see it this year, that doesn't mean you'll see it next year either.
I'm still divided as to they had an upgraded model that has gone to the trash, or that they just woke up and started a new design now from scratch. The former seems likely but I don't see them dropping the ball just like that, if power/heat was the issue a solution would come up for sure. The latter also seems likely, after reading the apology.
So, whatever happened we're still far from a ready model.
I'm considering the 8core, and although the price came down, it's still a lot of money for a machine you don't know what kind of future support it will have. Will it work with 10.13 right out of the box? No GPU issues?
In the mean time no appropriate display for it as well. The new one to come is still far off and it will be TB3 for sure - or TB3.1 if Intel updates the specs to include DP1.4.
The new mMP will have to be 1S (still betting on SKL-W) and I wouldn't see them going back from the dual GPU solution, although they admitted that many people don't need it. I believe applications will be optimized for dual GPUs and by next year there might be gains finally.
But they still want to control the platform, forget PCIe cards. They won't do it. Too many things to consider, a support nightmare. They don't see the nMP as a machine for geeks and DIYs, much on the contrary. Those can go PC or Hack.
Being in the lower % digit (and although it still makes them a lot of money I'd guess) they can't afford or want to have a machine that gives them support issues.
Remember, we can solve most of our issues (drivers, whatever) but that's not the case for (most of) the other Mac buyers out there.
Now, the (i)MacPro could eat into the lower tier of the Pro lineup - Xeon E3, EC RAM. That would leave room only for a higher end machine. But that's not the way Apple has been going and I have a hard time seeing what will become of the MP.
I guess now they really have to re-design the nMP (too bad) but don't count on being expandable meaning user upgradeable standard cards - I very much doubt it.
They'll have a hard time coming up with a new solid design (after the nMP) that will be flexible enough so that you can choose to use 1 or 2 GPUs (I'm already not considering dual CPUs, that road is closed I guess). Major design overhaul required. And some guys will jump right at me but I don't think a tower like design is coming back.
I could see a come back of the NeXT Cube. Well, maybe not a cube but some sort of stylish box with a custom mobo that can take custom GPUs that you hook up (or not) according to your needs. But I wouldn't see more than 2 of those.
Forget ATX, DIY just plug in PCIe cards, even standard SSDs I doubt will be used. They still don't want you to tinker inside your Mac.
Am I just being pessimist? Maybe, but prepare to wait a long time and be disappointed if you want any of this.
Most won't like this comment but I believe they should have given the nMP another try this year, with SKL-W and new GPUs (even if power constrained) and TB3 with a new display. See how it would go. I believe geeks like us are going into oblivion and now people want a powerful enough machine that just works and offload tasks to other non-Apple stuff.
But that's just me drifting...

I think it will have standard pci slots. How many? Between 2 and 4. If it doesn't, they will continue to lose pros.

I don't get why after the 5,1 you think they wouldn't make something like it again. After the cube failure they went back to another tower like design. So there is certainly precident for it.

Further, now is the time here to constantly DEMAND pci slots. They are still working on it. Now is the time your voice and needs for the new design might most be heard.

Demand slots and you just might get them.

 

[flat five]

Disagree. Slots are important. Go back and read Schiller description of pros they target. It is much wider than what you are making out. It includes scientists who DEFINATElY use custom cards. Graphics artists. Video production. CAD. And more. This meme in this forum that the only pros are those working at Pixar is dead, and eve Apple has acknowledged it is wrong and pros are a much more diversified group.

when they (or, Federighi at least) started naming of specific use cases, it was the iMac being talked about.

That is a pretty incredible evolution that we’ve seen over the last decade. The original iMac, you never would’ve thought as remotely touching pro uses. And now you look at today’s 5K iMac, top configs, it’s incredibly powerful, and a huge fraction of what would’ve traditionally — whether it’s audio editing, video editing, graphics, arts and so forth — that would’ve previously absolutely required the Mac Pros of old, are being well-addressed by iMac
​

they recognize the pro group is hugely diversified and also recognize most of them are well suited with an imac.. and they're going to make the top end imac even better in order to suit an even larger percentage of pro users.. (things like ECC memory, probably):

But there’s still even further we can take iMac as a high performance, pro system, and we think that form factor can address even more of the pro market.​

----

like, the imac is the computer most pro users are on (which is what i believe to be the case regardless of hearing apple execs saying it).. this newnew mac pro is just throwing a bone to the traditionalists.. i think most of the pro community will remain on iMacs even after yet another mac pro is released.

 

[ventricle]

There will be no third chance for those who find the mMP doesn’t suit their needs. There’s a well worn trail of others who capitulated earlier or could wait no more.

 

[ZombiePhysicist]

when they (or, Federighi at least) started naming of specific use cases, it was the iMac being talked about.

Good to see your posts are still consistently wrong. Hope you enjoy the full diet of crow. It was Phil:

Phil Schiller: Yeah, yeah. First of all, when we talk about pro customers, it’s important to be clear that there isn’t one prototypical pro customer. Pro is such a broad term, and it covers many many categories of customers. And we care about all of these categories, and there’s a variety of different products those customers want.

There’s music creators, there’s video editors, there’s graphic designers — a really great segment with the Mac. There’s scientists, engineers, architects, software programmers — increasingly growing, particularly our App development in the app store. So there are many, many things and people called pros, pro workflows, so we should be careful not to over simplify and say ‘pros want this’ or ‘don’t want that’; it’s much more complex than that.

https://www.google.com/amp/s/techcr...n-ternus-on-the-state-of-apples-pro-macs/amp/​

 

[flat five]

I'm considering the 8core, and although the price came down, it's still a lot of money for a machine you don't know what kind of future support it will have. Will it work with 10.13 right out of the box? No GPU issues?

just based off what we've seen in the past..
if the last nmp is sold in mid 2018, the machine will be supported until ~2024 or so.

I believe geeks like us are going into oblivion and now people want a powerful enough machine that just works and offload tasks to other non-Apple stuff.
But that's just me drifting...

heh, i think that's pretty much me you describe..
i do offload the real heavy lifting to non apple services but at the same time, my workflow has changed so much in the past five years, for the better, and it's directly because of apple-stuff (macOS)..
my file organization, backup, and syncing between multiple devices has seen the most noticeable improvements and it's strictly due to features and changes added to the OS.

so yeah, i offload the heavy lifting to AutoDesk but also 'offload' my past paradigms of file management to macOS..
the latter being the most beneficial to me on a daily basis.

but point is-- none of these improvements are really hardware related.. all cloud & service based..
software and service improvements have benefitted my work much much more in the past 5 years than any chunk of physical 'pro' computer could have done.. and for A LOT less money to boot.


[doublepost=1491757848][/doublepost]

Good to see your posts are still consistently wrong. Hope you enjoy the full diet of crow. It was Phil:

sigh.
ok.. i'm eating your crow.
federighi didn't say those things and i just made up those quotes to try to fool you.
my bad.

 

[ZombiePhysicist]

[doublepost=1491757848][/doublepost]
sigh.
ok.. i'm eating your crow.
federighi didn't say those things and i just made up those quotes to try to fool you.
my bad.

Don't think I didn't notice you change the goal posts to fedetighi from what I said about schiller.

That's it. Dance dancer dance. Dance your funny dance. Enjoy the crow. You have a fine tradition of it and I'm thrrilled you're here to continue it.

 

[jeanlain]

Disagree. Slots are important. Go back and read Schiller description of pros they target. It is much wider than what you are making out. It includes scientists who DEFINATElY use custom cards. Graphics artists. Video production. CAD. And more. This meme in this forum that the only pros are those working at Pixar is dead, and eve Apple has acknowledged it is wrong and pros are a much more diversified group.

I'm not sure scientists need custom cards. I do my research in genomics and send all work jobs to remote compute clusters. All my data is stored there. These days, scientists (at least the ones I'm familiar with), don't do computations on their workstations.
Graphics artists need powerful GPUs, but these don't have to come on standard PCIe cards. There are two big problems with standard graphics cards. They are noisy and they don't output video through thunderbolt ports. These issues can be solved by custom connectors and cooling systems, which I believe Apple will use.

 

[flat five]

Don't think I didn't notice you change the goal posts to fedetighi from what I said about schiller.

That's it. Dance dancer dance. Dance your funny dance. Enjoy the crow. You have a fine tradition of it and I'm thrrilled you're here to continue it.

lol.
i don't even know what you're trying to say i'm wrong about and you're right about.. what am i dancing my funny dance over? what's my funny dance anyway?


are we talking about the future of mac? or something else?

 

[edanuff]

I think it will have standard pci slots. How many? Between 2 and 4.

I think the number of slots is going to be defined by the supportability strategy. I'd guess probably 1 slot, maybe 2, and occupied by Apple approved GPUs with AppleCare voided and no Apple support available at any price if you put your own cards in there. Apple will not ever support again a device that can't be returned to factory condition in 30 minutes at a Genius bar without opening the case. A chassis full of third-party PCIe cards and drives doesn't fit that bill, with the customer arguing with the Genius technician that the third-part RAID controller isn't why it's not booting up. This is the real reason why they love Thunderbolt, not because of some industrial design conspiracy theory - with Thunderbolt the support strategy is to just unplug it and see if the computer works, if so, it's your problem, not Apple's. Even if Apple decided to go back to the 5,1 as an appeasement strategy for PR purposes, they don't magically transform their service organization into a that of a PC system builder, they don't magically transform their QA team into Microsoft's Windows Hardware Quality Labs testing third-party stuff. Beyond the fact that this is consistent with the way Apple runs it's business, I've personally experienced this first-hand with all my support interactions with my nMP at the Genius Bar. Each time, the nMP was treated no differently than if I brought in a MBP, with a checklist of reinstalling the OS, testing it with a known good set of Apple-approved peripherals, and returning it to me if it passed, regardless of the customer-reported issues. Further, I've seen that they do minimal testing with even third party 4K monitors, which are far more standardized that PCIe cards.