Is more aimed at the studio, that buys a 100 - 1000,
dumps them in 3 years. Buys 100 - 1000 of the next iMac Pro
It will be much faster than any nMP.
For a freelancer/consumer out of warrenty/applecare ... if one thing breaks It will probaly cost lots.
A lot of Imacs die in 5 years ... Mac Pro's less so ...
Macbook pro's some can also die a lot faster, the soldered battery,
My 15" G4 will probably outlive any soldered battery mac.
My Macbook Pro fried ... something Nvidea and thermal paste or something.
( It was the model that looked like the G4 ).
The G4 is now pretty useless, exept it has the best apple notebook keyboard for me.
For writing novels, It's still good machine.
My cMP 1,1 is still very capable. It has been running for over 10 years.
My cMP 3,1 has some annoyances, 4K solo boot, USB 3 ...
It crushes my faster air, in PS, medium format, ram and scratch drives.
Even if my maxed out Air, on the processor side is faster at least in single core ( PS ).
My nMP is pretty new, but I guess It won't fry itself.
My Maxed out Macbook Air that I love, one day battery will kill It.
Imac's, usually don't have a very long life if you are a power user.
You can clean a mac pro or a new mac pro.
Harder to get dust, and fluff out of an Imac.
If you are lucky It could work for twenty years, but the newer macs ... glued etc ...
are less likely to work 20 years later I guess.
For the long run, Mac Pro's are probably a better choise,
if you can find a use for it ... home theater pc, server, whatever ...
Imacs, I know a lot of people with Imacs that are broken ... mobo ... graphics ... I dno
Imac Pro ... would not be surprised if they die faster, but some do live on and on and on ...
My Unibody Macbook, had to endure severe torture, It still works perfect.
The same use killed my Macbook Pro, lot of power use, fans were always on etc ...
Some have more luck, I have friends, less heavy users, and half of their macs died within 7 years.
Except for the macbook pro ... none of my macs ever died.
Maybe It's just because I always work on more than one.
A mac pro and a macbook pro/macbook air.
But my Mac Pro's have been on, not sleep mode for times surpassing weeks or months ...
If you have a 2012 Mac Pro showing It's age, put a pci express SSD in it.
Unless you have 4TB of PCIe SSD.
Or a SATA SSD, is already another world. If you have a spinner, my 3.1 feels probably a lot snappier.
Mac Pro 2012 is the most future proof macs,
It can take the better graphic cards
You can put 6 spinners in it, PCIe SSD.
eSata. USB 3.0.
If your mobo fails or something, just buy an ebay deal, no hdd, low ram, low graphics,
just the xeons you need want, dual trace ...
and put all the upgrades in that machine.
It can be made faster than the 2013 I guess ... I have a nMP but don't know how far you can take that, It is more expensive anyway to make a monster out of a nMP than a 2012.
I only bought the nMP, for "silence" and "mobility", normal USB, normal 4K
If I were to spend on a tower, It would be Z.
Or a bargain 5.1 ... but there are less bargains atm ...