Are you really so hopeful that Apple, even after this admission, will really go back to a tower design with slots? Am I just being pessimist believing that nothing will actually change? They're mostly a design focused company now, and control freaks, so why on earth would they go to great lengths to do something out of their scope just to please those few % of "Pro" users that need (or keep complaining but don't actually "need" it)?
I don't believe Apple necessarily designs "form over function". They used some assumptions that lead to what they ended up with, but I don't think they choose to start with a cylinder and then worked backwards to pack everything in.
If start off targeting a literal desktop there are constraints on footprint. ( few folks want their whole desk taken over by a computer). Quiet leads to high diameter fan. ( if orienting around a fan a roundness shape flows from that function). Symmetric TDP of major components enable the triangle shape. Shared and/or sneaker net storage isn't internal. Thunderbolt basically implies an embedded GPU. etc. etc. All those constraints/requirements all largely lead lead up to what they got. ( there was some dubious placement of the Wifi. Concave version Convex protection of the fan output that is also dubious. The lack of some TDP slack that seems to be dubious given the initial top end GPU. )
The folks more "form over function" are the ones pushing for design totally around standards defined form factors. If the standard says it much be x inches tall , by y inches wide , and z inches in length that is a form first argument. That is not a function (what it does) that is a form ( what are the dimensions).
Apple may be control freaks, but they are Scrooge McDuck in some respects. If Apple isn't going to assign enough R&D resources to turn out a steady stream of GPU cards they needs a mechanism for 3rd parties to fill that gap. The whole notion that Apple can show up every 3-4 years, increment the Mac Pro, and then disappear down a rabbit hole again it not going to be a viable product. If Apple doesn't want to spend that kind of money keeping up then they need to enable someone to fill that vacuum. Can't be a control freak and also not want to do the work. They need to pick one or the other. Apple can control the primary GPU. It is far more work for them to do if that are going to require control of the second. I'm not sure Apple is really up for that if they are honest. They have not assigned that level of resources to the Mac Pro in probably around at least 8 years. I don't think they are willing to change that.
If the Apple primary and optional 2nd GPU both weight in around 310W then the power issues get big enough that could drift toward desk-side in order to hit quiet constraints. More volume may be necessary to keep sound down.
Basic, affordable modest Terabtye range, Thunderbolt storage really has not evolved all that well. Basic, just-a-bunch-of-disks, 2-4 bay stuff seems to be stuck. Whether it is the transitions from Tb v1 to v2 , and now a partial restart to v3 that is primary cause or the lack of volume update on the rest of the Windows PC world, it seems that Apple should take a second look at the capacity requirements. Apple's buying PCH chipsets with SATA capability that they are just discarding. The Mac Pro is more radical than the iMac. That is odd. So how much there revised internal storage capacity needs to be could tip the scales back to a desk-side (e.g., 2-3 HDDs plus 2 (maybe 3 ) M.2 like SSDs. ). If they can fit what they calculate as being a wide net with just ( 1 HDD plus 2 M.2. like SSDs ) then desktop. is still very tractable.
Desk-side then the standard rectangle is going to make sense because going to need feet/pedatal to keep it off the ground. Desktop doesn't necessarily need to be a classic tower. It will definitely have height since want to keep the desktop footprint limited ( that forces things vertical ). Or go back to old workstation "pizza box" from early Sun days where dual using monitor footprint with computer module ( built in VESA mount arm so you can make your own all-in-one with parts. ) . There are options there. Vertical Semi Oval.
One graphics and 1 optional compute card sounds great, but put yourself in Apple's shoes and imagine the support nightmare it would be. I don't think they want or ever will again, to have to work with all GPU vendors in developing specific Mac cards.
Here's the problem.... if gong to fully promote TBv3 that's essentially coming anyway. Now that Windows if fully on board with TB, Apple has need to ride that bronco if Windows becomes the major driver of expectations.
"... If you’re looking to truly experience the power of such a card with the MacBook Pro, however, you’ll need to step into the Windows world, and run a Boot Camp installation. ... "
https://9to5mac.com/2017/04/19/akitio-node-gtx-1080-ti-gpu-macbook-pro-gaming-egpu/
I understand short term Apple may be piling more resources into building out Metal than bringing their graphics stack into the current decade, but at some point.... Thunderbolt is about opening some options that Apple doesn't do. I do not think eGPU is going to be the major driver that the tech porn media is making it out to be. But it is the case that if is not doing x4 slots then they are pointing at Thunderbolt to fill that role. If folks follow that lead then non Apple stuff is going to come. It is.
The position that Apple wants no 3rd party devices is not supported at all. Apple has been pointing at Thunderbolt all along and Thunderbolt fundamentally enables these kinds of solutions from the macOS (software ) side. 3rd party PCI-e devices at the software level is a major component of what Thunderbolt is about.
As for working with GPU vendors, if they are not the boot GPU then Apple can just point users back to the GPU vendor when problems occur. Apple's answer will be "hook up to the TB ports, it works.". Support wise they probably need a tool to check if folks haven't screwed with the apple supplied drivers. Again (you screwed with our software... you own your own screw ups. Have a nice day. )
And even less so that people will put in any standard card. To me, that's a given. Might be wrong though.
And can you imagine the Apple of today allowing you to insert a graphics card in a Mac Pro (or any Mac for that matter) with flashing LEDs, or funny blowers, or VGA, DVI or even HDMI ports? You can even comment on HDMI but I'll bet you that even that will go away in the next iteration of the MP.
If Apple provides and edge doesn't really matter what is on the card edge.
It may move the solution off the desktop due to volume expansion to handle the arbitrary stuff. And they will need to add more slack to the power supply. But Apple has done it. If they don't want to do it then they need to sign up for more work. Similar in attachable aspects to this ( not necessarily this liquid implementation).
http://www.anandtech.com/show/11274/nzxt-releases-kraken-g12-gpu-kit
Apple could say "take off your disco solution off and add ours. That is what fits.".
Or doing their own adjustments to reference card designs. The track record there though is lame. There are not Polaris updates for the current Mac Pro. There is no thermal problem there to get them to fit. They are inside the boundaries of the original cards Apple went with. Look at the
AMD Radeon RX 580 Specification Comparison here The R9 280 is well above where the RX 580 and 480 are sitting at in terms of TDP. And Apple still didn't manage to do anything. Apple's slacker effort is what is driving the requirement here. If Apple fixes that, fine. But there are zero indications that they do want that. One slot is a "get out of jail free" card for Apple when they get bogged down with higher priority R&D tasks on much more overall revenue critical systems.
One slot is still going to be a minor aid in driving the expansion of the Thunderbolt solution market. Going back to 3-4 slots would put the Mac Pro on a very counter productive ecosystem path with the rest of the Mac market. There are sunk costs PCI-e cards out there that some people have that will need more than one slot. Those folks match what is the baseline case in the rest of the Mac ecosystem.
They want a clean back (and front) with nice looking layout, not a PC-like colored multi-port mesh that looks unprofessional at best. they will minimize the number of different ports, until they can do away with a single one for everything. And that might be TB3. And maybe the new display will hold the rest of the ports like the TBD.
But this is my view, again, I might be wrong.
PCI-e Edges connectors often don't have the standard PC color coded ports that are standard and permanently attached to the motherboard. The Thunderbolt Display was a docking station. Again docking stations are entirely different than PCi-e card edges or fixed motherboard connector color schemes.
Apple's compute card could have a clean edge ( or just a fan output edge which is just as clean other fan outputs the system would have). Nothing is going o be "apple" clean after the customers start adding stuff to it. Even with Thunderbolt or USB.
I have some doubts it will come next year. If it indeed does, I'm still holding on to the Basin Falls (C620?/X299) and SKL-W , again 2 GPUs (more options this time around, easier to exchange - hence modular) and 2 SSDs (2nd BTO) and 6 TB3 ports. I'd even bet USB-A gone. That would be a clean design, 48 PCIe CPU lanes fully used, 2nd SSD on PCH as well as all else that will still exist.
I don't think 2 GPUs is going to be the default. That will allow them to knock several hundred off the price. Perhaps drop back to $2,399-2,499 if have some skimp RAM and just barely enough to drive the 6 (or so) video output ports GPU. A working system but pretty close to bare bones.
6 general I/O ports total. No. That's insane, even for Apple. The current Mac Pro has 10. The 2009-2012 era had 9 ( 4 FW , 5 USB ). To backslide backwards into just a sign the inmates are running the asylum.
Some thing more like
4 TBv3 , 6 USB 3 gen 1 Type A (the PCH chipset will easily support that) , one HDMI and probably two mini DP.
2 1GbE ( or perhaps 10GbE is no internal bulk storage device or at least something that supports 2.5-5GbE).
both SSDs on the CPU PCI-e feed. Leaves an option for a future Optane drive without having to remove original SSD.
leave the PCH to 10GbE , USB 3 and maybe SATA ( or perhaps a 3rd-4th , definitely M.2, SSD )
10GbE removes a ton of $/port pressure on adding it via Thunderbolt. if Apple is sticking to the "groups on SAN" approach then making 10GbE standard (while bumping up base price) will better enable that growth. it is cheaper and cleaner approach to growing that mini-ecosystem. The Intel X550 is suppose to do 2.5-5GbE also. So not even a ton of new wiring roll out is needed in many contexts.
More SSDs takes substantive pressure off the capacitance issue in a wide variety of circumstances. Standard M.2 ones that users can replace/buy on open market even more so.
[doublepost=1492682908][/doublepost]dec, I was saying there are still the 2 base models to choose from, only the higher one doesn't have the Buy button. You can still BTO the other one, which you would anyway for a higher capacity SSD.
The other standard appears to be just out of stock so there is no buy. You can use BTO to put one into the queue, but that just likely means they contract manufacturer just hasn't built enough of them for them to tag standard and available yet. After the BTO order flow settles down and there is more "free" Apple will probably build out enough higher end standard configurations to keep in stock. It makes no sense at all to build a sizable number of those in advance. Apple only wants to build what people with likely buy. Just order the parts necessary to cover that. The bottom most configuration simply will generate a viable demand because some folks are even stretching to get to even that price point. They aren't going to choose any of the options.
