To be honest i dont see anythong wrong with the current chassis...
The aluminium is in keeping with apple's current design trend and it looks very sleek... even the handles look fine to me... without them it would look strange.
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When will the new MP come out!
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To be honest i dont see anythong wrong with the current chassis...
The aluminium is in keeping with apple's current design trend and it looks very sleek... even the handles look fine to me... without them it would look strange.
I'd love some black anodized "Cheese Grater". Maybe a tad shorter. Same thermal dynamics and some sort of $29.00 Apple Hair/Lint tray option (Gets sooo dusty with the cat). Is that asking the world?
Anytime Chief. Always happy to provide my insight based on my conversations with my friends in Cupertino...
Apple already did something similar to that. Perhaps you missed the Final Cut "Pro" X launch?? The writing is on the wall when it comes to Apple's plans for the pro market.
This sounds like a good estimate.
The Sandy Bridge for the Mac Pro will only come out in Q4, add delivery and assembly and it'll probably be Easter Rabbit, not Santa Claus, who delivers the first Mac Pros.
I'll happily fling my poo over the fence at the zoo guests...
The reasonable time frame we can expect the next Mac Pro machines is the Spring of 2012. Perhaps the late winter, Feb-March if the planets align. But the sticking point is the availability of the Xeon E5 Sandy-Bridge CPUs from Intel. Intel has already announced that the chips were delayed at least till 1Q2012. And there are, yes, SEVERAL threads on this very topic.
As for waits, if you look at the Buyers Guide, the last two Mac Pro updates were over a year and a half apart, and the gaps are lengthening. So this Fall for new MPs was wildly optimistic unless something damn spiffy happened at both Apple and Intel. And even if chips were available, Apple's been much more involved with Lion and those shiny new MacBook Airs, that they seem ridiculously proud of.
The MacBook Air is now Apple's new flagship machine. The Mac Pro hasn't been Apple's Mac Daddy for YEARS, much as that might gall professional users. But the days of the Mac G4 and G5 tower machines getting the shiny first are long gone.
And it's no surprise that most of the newer "iThing" generation of Mac users, many brought over from their experiences with iPods, iPhones and iPads... have no idea what a Mac Pro is. Most thinking that we're referring to MacBOOK Pros. Apple barely mentions the machines. I can't recall seeing a Mac Pro TV ad... Been in an Apple store recently? There is no huge wall graphic for the Mac Pro. No table or section full of Mac Pros humming away. No, there will be ONE, or perhaps two neglected MPs sitting in a corner with no one paying any attention to them, until a pro user customer hauls an Apple Associate away from the iPhones to ask about or buy one.
Since the default display on a MP is the 27" Apple LCD Display - now the Thunderbolt Display - it looks at a distance like an 27" iMac sitting next to a silver box. Both glossy anyway, another disappointment to the pros, but that's a whole 'nother rant.
So look for your next Mac Pro in the Spring of 2012. More than likely the same case, probably with the new Sandy Bridge Xeon E5 chips, equipped with Thunderbolt, probably an uptick in Graphics cards (wonder if any will have Thunderboldt compatible display ports?), and completely predictable configurations. Looks like Firewire will survive, since it's still on the MBPs and is on the ThunderBolt Display.
But will the next gen Mac Pros have optical drives? Apple is very obviously getting out of the disc business entirely.
Our mileage may vary.
The reasonable time frame we can expect the next Mac Pro machines is the Spring of 2012. Perhaps the late winter, Feb-March if the planets align. But the sticking point is the availability of the Xeon E5 Sandy-Bridge CPUs from Intel. Intel has already announced that the chips were delayed at least till 1Q2012. And there are, yes, SEVERAL threads on this very topic.
As for waits, if you look at the Buyers Guide, the last two Mac Pro updates were over a year and a half apart, and the gaps are lengthening. So this Fall for new MPs was wildly optimistic unless something damn spiffy happened at both Apple and Intel. And even if chips were available, Apple's been much more involved with Lion and those shiny new MacBook Airs, that they seem ridiculously proud of.
The MacBook Air is now Apple's new flagship machine. The Mac Pro hasn't been Apple's Mac Daddy for YEARS, much as that might gall professional users. But the days of the Mac G4 and G5 tower machines getting the shiny first are long gone.
And it's no surprise that most of the newer "iThing" generation of Mac users, many brought over from their experiences with iPods, iPhones and iPads... have no idea what a Mac Pro is. Most thinking that we're referring to MacBOOK Pros. Apple barely mentions the machines. I can't recall seeing a Mac Pro TV ad... Been in an Apple store recently? There is no huge wall graphic for the Mac Pro. No table or section full of Mac Pros humming away. No, there will be ONE, or perhaps two neglected MPs sitting in a corner with no one paying any attention to them, until a pro user customer hauls an Apple Associate away from the iPhones to ask about or buy one.
Since the default display on a MP is the 27" Apple LCD Display - now the Thunderbolt Display - it looks at a distance like an 27" iMac sitting next to a silver box. Both glossy anyway, another disappointment to the pros, but that's a whole 'nother rant.
So look for your next Mac Pro in the Spring of 2012. More than likely the same case, probably with the new Sandy Bridge Xeon E5 chips, equipped with Thunderbolt, probably an uptick in Graphics cards (wonder if any will have Thunderboldt compatible display ports?), and completely predictable configurations. Looks like Firewire will survive, since it's still on the MBPs and is on the ThunderBolt Display.
But will the next gen Mac Pros have optical drives? Apple is very obviously getting out of the disc business entirely.
Our mileage may vary.
I don't think that Apple hates us, or is trying to chase us over to Windows machines. But they don't particularly care about us, either. They're also telling us that except for the very high end user we should be buying one of their cooler, shiner machines, a 27" iMac or a MacBook Pro. The price/performance point of them gives one pause versus the MP with Display; unless you need the specific features of the tower form factor.
Still, I'm with MovieCutter on this one. The Final Cut Pro update - loudly shouted elsewhere - give you a sense of Apple's thinking different on the Pro Market.
Might be relentlessly forward leaning on bringing the future today, but it can be a serious disconnect for those of us who have deadlines this week.
B4NZ41!
Yes, the 27" "cinema" display is a mess. Not usable for serious work.
Hopefully in a not so distant future we'll see more serious products that you can actually use as a discerning/pro user.
Noticed that there wasn't a non-glare "in the Air"s?
But the Mac Pros always turn out as great machines. I would just hope Apple would lower the entry level price to $3000 and skip the $2500 lame duck single processor version entirely.
Hopefully in a not so distant future we'll see more serious products that you can actually use as a discerning/pro user.
Noticed that there wasn't a non-glare "in the Air"s?
But the Mac Pros always turn out as great machines. I would just hope Apple would lower the entry level price to $3000 and skip the $2500 lame duck single processor version entirely.
I don't. The lame duck is what you should buy and the UPGRADE yourself to the better version to have an amazing machine at low cost.
Two processor not sure. But 2.8 4 core to 3.2 quad core is around $600, even throwing in the cost of a new daughter board and heat-sinks and fans I doubt it is anywhere what apple charges, given that they want about $1200 to upgrade a 2.8 quad to a 3.33 hex and right now the price for 3.2 and 3.33 are almost identical.
Ram undoubtedly is far cheaper to get on your as well.
And these costs are without counting resale of what you bought in the first place
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It's all about the profits. Hard to blame them as a company goes. Hopefully the Pro line can remain at least somewhat profitable for a while longer, or split off OSX+ to the PC market and let IOS/OSX continue into the future with Apple.
Honestly, it looks like Apple is headed the other way. They'll continue to make "big trucks" for pro users, but pro isn't where they pour their R&D dollars into these days. Apple knows no pro user has use for a glossy screen and that other companies pick up the pro monitor slack. It's not a biz they need now.
Good grief. Yeah, several threads where it is point out that it is not the Socket 1356 (B2) E5 2400 (or the Socket 1155 ) that are likely to be used in the Mac Pro.
1600/2600 are the more likely choice and all indicators primarily point to Q4.
http://www.cpu-world.com/news_2011/2011020803_Details_on_Intel_Xeon_E5_product_families.html
There are a bunch of confused folks because they keep pointing to i7 extreme rumors and complexities which may/may not be applicable to Apple's likely choices for chipset (don't need fancy RAID) and CPU package (Socket 2011 (R)) are just fine.
Funny how the Pres. of Super Micro is anticipating E5's in Q4
and has boards queued up to go alongside the production volume availability of the chip packages.
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2011/08/02/super_micro_q4_f2011/
All of this Spring talk is super conservative estimates ( that can't possibly be "early") and part " doom and gloom" .
Furthermore, these Q4/Q1 dates for the different E5 segments are already a slide from Intel's projections of Q3/Q4. Many of the problems that folks are waving their hands about are already incorporated into the Q4/Q1 projections.
The buyers guide is cruft at this point. Intel has moved the schedule release of the Xeon chips to 1-2 quarters later in the year. That had impact last year and this year. That sends the "predictive" average into the crapper as far as being indicative of some plan largely driven by Apple's motives/desires.
There are no Mac ads period. Other than sibling rival envy ( "boo hoo, the iPad has a billboard and I don't" ), that isn't particularly significant or relevant. Funny how with no ads whatsoever the sales Mac have increased year over year. ....... maybe that "free" advertising that Apple leverages is working?
Relatively few folks buy them. A very simple explanation. They are so expensive most Mac users can't afford them. No conspiracy.
Additionally, if you have actually looked at the set-up in the store, typically the Mac Pro has been hooked to the largest display that Apple sells. That makes a "whole table" of Mac Pros a rather awkward set-up. Why blow away limited store display space on the largest objects. One reason the smaller display objects are more numerous is because ....... they are smaller.
A decent fraction of the folks in an Apple store are surfing the web and/or playing games anyway. Again some 27"-30" display is a complete waste for those activities if not looking to draw attention. Want to show the whole store your facebook stream... probably not.
Thunderbolt .... more sibling envy ??? .... the MP has already had PCI-e expansion for its entire existence.
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No.
Whats the point of having their top of the line Mac have CPUs that are slower than in the rest of the line-up?
New Mac Pro will have SB-E OR a close derivative. Period.
Outside chance of AMD chips but they are still Q4 2011/Q1 2012
I'm waiting for it too!
Sit back and relax.
Put it this way:
Would you pay £2k/$2.8k for a 3.33Ghz quad that is slower than the bottom end MacBook Pro, or iMac?
Yeah because I can't get any work done because of the design of the case. :roll eyes:
I'm surprised they don't make more of an effort when it comes to keeping the Mac Pro up to date. They are now selling at a base price of 2499 a system that comes with no display, and specs that have not been updated in a year. I think someone is right..people who buy it need the dual xeons, 4 HDs, etc..its truly a pro machine not really seem to be geared towards enthusiasts
That's the whole point. It is a workstation computer. It uses server chips.
That means you've got to wait for the server cpus to come out.
I'd love to see Apple bring out a headless computer for the enthusiast but I seriously, seriously doubt it will happen.
Your choice is get an iMac which, imo, is fairly worthless when it comes to games.
or
Get an enthusiast PC computer
or
If you've got the patience and money, wait for the next Mac Pro.
.
The quick update cycles of the iMac often mean rather small upgrades.
Nobody cares about tiny upgrades to workstations. Everybody wants to see a real upgrade: new chips, maybe an SSD start-up drive that comes standard, and some internal changes that barely aren't even advertised with iProducts.
We have seen the iMac close in on the Mac Pro a bit, but it really hits its limits now with all the heat it generates with its 4-core chips.
I think the Mac Pro will again be a more viable option in the future.
Nobody cares about tiny upgrades to workstations. Everybody wants to see a real upgrade: new chips, maybe an SSD start-up drive that comes standard, and some internal changes that barely aren't even advertised with iProducts.
We have seen the iMac close in on the Mac Pro a bit, but it really hits its limits now with all the heat it generates with its 4-core chips.
I think the Mac Pro will again be a more viable option in the future.
I think you should pay more attention to be honest:
Apple would update it if THEY HAD CHIPS to update to.
I keep getting the feeling of Deja-Vu in these threads
I think you should pay more attention to be honest:
Apple would update it if THEY HAD CHIPS to update to.
I keep getting the feeling of Deja-Vu in these threads
It's just an outlet for the wait frustration. I think most people get the Intel chips wait thing. It's hard to see technology advance around us and have to be last in line for reasons out of Apple's control. It's not just Apple cusomers waiting, Super Micro and it's server customers are also ready and impatiently waiting for these chips. On the Apple side, I guess that's why people keep hoping for a "bridge" product to fill the gap. I doubt that will ever come. Not enough demand. Consumer desktops are on the decline.
At this stage in the new release cycle you would be throwing away your money to buy a new MP.
However used ones on UK Ebay etc are IMO good value at the moment being almost half price.
That said the best 6 cores are extremely rare on UK Ebay.
Let's hope the new ones have whizzo CPUs and top graphics cards
However used ones on UK Ebay etc are IMO good value at the moment being almost half price.
That said the best 6 cores are extremely rare on UK Ebay.
Let's hope the new ones have whizzo CPUs and top graphics cards
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So what are we to make of the "late July/early August" rumors from a few weeks back? Aside from the fact that rumors are only that, they seemed to come from two different sources, and maybe its only wishful thinking, but I thought they may have pointed to a mid-cycle bump with TB and some spec tweaks to tide things over until SB was released. Is the consensus that those were just wrong or will the remaining few days of "early August" hold a surprise?