Who is the Mac Pro going to be for?

[th0masp]

Corporate doesn’t like parts swapping much either. Under Windows they are quite interested in signed drivers. For example we’re a Lenovo shop. When I quoted a machine that supported twin 1080tis they came back with a workstation that cost $18,000. It was laughable. Down the road Costco was selling an Alienware machine with twin 1080tis for under $3000, but the firmware was a big unknown. Our Windows admins have a Lenovo tool that can update firmware on the entire installed base

However, it was moot as we couldn’t get pytorch to run under Windows anyway. I recently spoke with some guys from nvidia’s rapids development team. They told me that trying to get data science GPU stuff to work under Windows was not worth the trouble.

Oh yeah I wasn't thinking DIY-PC either, just that if you have an investment in a pipeline including internally developed tools that rely e.g. on nVidia then Apple one day coming out with AMD-only solutions must .... suck.
I'd imagine Linux would be the go-to choice for those who don't want to rely on Windows but keep their options open.

Game developers?

• iPhones in 1B pockets
• Apple’s dominance in the tablet market
• Apple user’s disposable income
• Apple’s further push into gaming
• Apple’s continuous interest in AR

For a shop, grabbing several Mac Pros should be a no brainer. For individuals, probably not so much.

Last place I was at where a(nother) team was working on iPhone titles (chart-topping stuff at the time) simply had a Mac Mini as a secondary machine placed at each workstation to run previews. Development afaik all happened on Windows like over in Console-land. Mac-Pro-free company, too. I do recall seeing some iMacs though.

 

[ekwipt]

I think I could do most of work on the latest iMac i9 9900K, but I don't want to be stuck with crap video cards that I can't upgrade and a 27" monitor. I'll maybe get a base level MAcPro depending on the cost or keep going with my hackintoshes to be honest. At work (video editing) we get by with old Core i7s with 32Gb of RAM, Avid Media Composer doesn't need all that much to run TBH, we aren't doing any 4k work at all here

 

[09872738]

This shows why apple does not want to work with Nvidia.

Hardly. If Apple cared about that sort of stuff they‘d not at all act as they do (soldering RAM, SSDs, not allowing self repair / third party repari, etc, etc), so highly anti-competitive themselves. Whatever the reason for their feud with Nvidia is, for sure its not anti-competitive behavior

 

[PinkyMacGodess]

So I'm not trying to start a debate on Mac vs PC - I use both. It is an honest question, and I wonder if it's why Apple hasn't released a new Mac Pro in ages, but who is it for?

I can't think of a reason to buy a $10,000+ Mac nowadays. I'm sure I'm wrong, which is why I'm asking. What software that is either OSX only or runs way better on Mac could possibly justify spending that amount on hardware that will almost certainly be like a third of the cost on PC?

As I said before, I'm not trying to start a debate or bash Apple over pricing. I honestly would just like to know who would be interested in this and why?

I'm mainly asking because I see a lot of people asking if they should buy the new Mini or wait for the new Mac Pro.

If someone is considering a Mini, or a New New Mac Pro (if it ever ships) they should probably stay with the Mini. And who knows what the New New Mac pro will look like. Everyone was drooling over the trash can, and then it sank in what a lemon it was. Apple seemed to be caught off guard too by the eventual reaction. Stay tuned. The New New Mac Pro could be another high tech turd that no one will want.

I only want to know where they dig the hole to bury all the trash cans. It could end up like the Mac Cube, and be a collectors item...

 

[secretbum]

Hardly. If Apple cared about that sort of stuff they‘d not at all act as they do (soldering RAM, SSDs, not allowing self repair / third party repari, etc, etc), so highly anti-competitive themselves. Whatever the reason for their feud with Nvidia is, for sure its not anti-competitive behavior

Did you even watch the video?
Watch from 24:45-27:25 and 42:00-42:25

 

[thevault]

The latest MBP and Mini are both over priced pieces of #$%@ and if the newly released Mac Pro misses the mark on being upgradable, PCI slots, latest component design... I believe many will be done with Apple. Also, the wait for this MP has been ridiculous

If Tim Genius doesn't announce and release soon after the MP I am done.

 

[PinkyMacGodess]

The latest MBP and Mini are both over priced pieces of #$%@ and if the newly released Mac Pro misses the mark on being upgradable, PCI slots, latest component design... I believe many will be done with Apple. Also, the wait for this MP has been ridiculous

The New Mini was a needed upgrade, but at what cost. I naturally assume anything 'upgraded' by Apple will be a mixed bag of closed box, and throwaway over promoted tripe. Their closed mentality seems to be getting so much stronger in the past few years too. Maybe Tim shouldn't be paid quite so much?

How many people actually think the New New Mac Pro will be something good? I mean really... In Today's Apple, what are the chances it'll be a really open and upgradable machine that people in professional industries and niche markets will actually find useful?

I don't think many are holding out much hope from what I've been hearing, which surprisingly isn't much...

 

[sigmadog]

Yes and that's mainly Apple's target market and has been the vision of Steve Jobs. Steve Jobs wanted a computer that's equivalent to a toaster and he even took away the licensing of clone Macs so others can no longer make Mac clones. In the past, some licensed Mac clones had more powerful specs than the stock Apple Macs!! It was Steve Job's decision to turn Apple into a company that make computers, iPhones and iPads and even the Apple Watch for people who just want them to work like a toaster.

That explains the iMac thermal issues.

 

[09872738]

Did you even watch the video?
Watch from 24:45-27:25 and 42:00-42:25

well... for one a video/creator seriously claiming Nvidia must be bad because its name is based on the word "envy" does not seem overly trustworthy and/or unbiased from the get go.

Next, Nvidia denying responsibility for failed components? Wait a second, what does that remind me of? Hm. Maybe a certain manufacturer denying responsibility (or existence of) failing keyboards? "You are holding it wrong", "Throttlegate", etc. Apple is by no means innocent in that regard.

Don't get me wrong, I am not trying to defend Nvidia. Yes, they screwed up. But how is Nvidia any different to, say, Apple?

We don't know whats up between Apple and Nvidia. But having no problem of denying faulty components themselves I seriously doubt that is the reason. That would be the ultimate culmination of hypocrisy ....

The fact of the matter is: in the upper market segment there is no competitor to Nvidia. Period. More importantly, there is no competitor or substitute for CUDA. Yes, sad, but that's just how it is. Doing anything AI/ML or cloud computing related you're stuck with Nvidia for the moment, like it or not.

 

[SoyCapitanSoyCapitan]

Are you saying that people who don't want to build or upgrade a computer and people who don't know anything about specs are going to want to buy a upgradeable custom Mac computer?

Yes and that's mainly Apple's target market and has been the vision of Steve Jobs. Steve Jobs wanted a computer that's equivalent to a toaster and he even took away the licensing of clone Macs so others can no longer make Mac clones. In the past, some licensed Mac clones had more powerful specs than the stock Apple Macs!! It was Steve Job's decision to turn Apple into a company that make computers, iPhones and iPads and even the Apple Watch for people who just want them to work like a toaster.

Jobs didn't take away the licensing of clones. He raised the cost of the license and that cut clone makers profit.

The clones weren't that great tbh. Some of them shipped with quad processors but anyone who was smart knew that these extra processors were a waste of money scam because classic Mac OS wasn't very well multi threaded and didn't have decent SMP support. Some apps even ran slower on multi processor computers at the time. We should mention that those clones were UGLY. They were so UGLY it gave a very bad name to the Macintosh.

THAT brings us to this important point we must not forget.

Steve Jobs was a minimalist from his experience with Zen and appreciation of Deiter Rams. Nobody went to Rams and said 'No Deiter your 10 rules are wrong. We want you to design a chair with 7 legs and a cassette player with thirteen knobs'.

The original Macintosh designed by Jeff Raskin was based on these ideas and they are the core of what makes Apple Apple today and forever. If you take this away you end up with just another generic PC maker without a core philosophy. We can say that the design philosophy at Apple is the reason other companies are forced to innovate better too.

 

[InuNacho]

I mean I'm not complaining about apples price really. I'm complaining that they don't offer good computers for "creatives" anymore. The price is just adding insult to injury. I don't really get why anyone would pay over double for way less. Apple used to offer some of the best stuff so their price made sense, but as a professional who values his time I don't care what OS I'm running as long as it makes me spend less time doing my work. Windows 10 isn't as pretty as OSX, but it doesn't hinder me, so I didn't mind the switch.

What happened was that Apple neglected their creative apps and Microsoft tried their best to make Windows 10 just as good as Mac OS. When I first took up art making as a hobby in the Mid 2000s I had inherited a then dated 500MHz AGP PowerMac G4. Sure it wasn't the fastest in the world, but running 10.3-10.4 and not having to suffer through XP sure made up for it. Things just worked and I could create and do whatever I wanted.
Nowadays the playing field is a bit more leveled.

 

[SoyCapitanSoyCapitan]

What happened was that Apple neglected their creative apps and Microsoft tried their best to make Windows 10 just as good as Mac OS. When I first took up art making as a hobby in the Mid 2000s I had inherited a then dated 500MHz AGP PowerMac G4. Sure it wasn't the fastest in the world, but running 10.3-10.4 and not having to suffer through XP sure made up for it. Things just worked and I could create and do whatever I wanted.
Nowadays the playing field is a bit more leveled.

Apple's creative apps sure have been good but some are not neglected. The best of their features were merged together into FCP and the worst features were abandoned because companies like Adobe were more competitive. There's always a limited department budget for software development and if you try to do too much the quality will go downhill.

Windows 10 is still miles behind tbh. As some here know I was the first to install Windows 10 in Boot Camp as I was a pre release beta tester and I wrote a lot about it on this forum.

I feel Windows 10 was an excellent release but since then there has been no progress. We thought they would make the Windows File Explorer more modern, but alas no still doesn't show file previews and meta data for so many popular file types. Still nothing comparable to Finder Color Labels. Still nothing comparable to Quick Look. HDR support is patchy and messy. You have to manually enable it to watch HDR content but then the color of everything else is messed up. Also Windows 10 version of Exposé was good two years ago and then they added the Timeline feature to it so now it looks quite bad. MS can't even decide if dark mode should be black or gray.

Just today Da Vinci Resolve crashed on the PC and for unknown reasons that crash made so many of my app shortcuts on the Start menu disappear and they won't even appear with Search. Had to reinstall these apps again.

 

[jeremiah256]

Last place I was at where a(nother) team was working on iPhone titles (chart-topping stuff at the time) simply had a Mac Mini as a secondary machine placed at each workstation to run previews. Development afaik all happened on Windows like over in Console-land. Mac-Pro-free company, too. I do recall seeing some iMacs though.

Admittedly, can’t completely tell by your description, but it seems you are talking about developers porting to iOS. I wasn’t clear, but I’m talking about iOS game developers.

 

[k2focus]

Admittedly, can’t completely tell by your description, but it seems you are talking about developers porting to iOS. I wasn’t clear, but I’m talking about iOS game developers.

You might be right, but I thought most 3d environment building software requires Quadro cards, like not recommends, but actually requires .

 

[jeremiah256]

You might be right, but I thought most 3d environment building software requires Quadro cards, like not recommends, but actually requires .

I’d guess the development environment is mixed and not only Macs. You’d probably need/want top of the line Macs and PCs.

 

[ssgbryan]

Jobs didn't take away the licensing of clones. He raised the cost of the license and that cut clone makers profit.

The clones weren't that great tbh. Some of them shipped with quad processors but anyone who was smart knew that these extra processors were a waste of money scam because classic Mac OS wasn't very well multi threaded and didn't have decent SMP support. Some apps even ran slower on multi processor computers at the time. We should mention that those clones were UGLY. They were so UGLY it gave a very bad name to the Macintosh.

THAT brings us to this important point we must not forget.

Steve Jobs was a minimalist from his experience with Zen and appreciation of Deiter Rams. Nobody went to Rams and said 'No Deiter your 10 rules are wrong. We want you to design a chair with 7 legs and a cassette player with thirteen knobs'.

The original Macintosh designed by Jeff Raskin was based on these ideas and they are the core of what makes Apple Apple today and forever. If you take this away you end up with just another generic PC maker without a core philosophy. We can say that the design philosophy at Apple is the reason other companies are forced to innovate better too.

You remember it very differently than me.

My clone was both faster than what apple shipped and had enough slots to hold all of my cards.

AFA looks, who cares? Looks don’t make it run faster. At the end of the day, a computer is just a tool, nothing more.

 

[SoyCapitanSoyCapitan]

You remember it very differently than me.

My clone was both faster than what apple shipped and had enough slots to hold all of my cards.

AFA looks, who cares? Looks don’t make it run faster. At the end of the day, a computer is just a tool, nothing more.

No doubt you had a 604e with higher clock speed but the multi processor clones were a waste of money.

Looks do matter though especially when paired with functionality. We have seen the successful results of that so many times. Even PC industry made a comeback because those who build their own computer want it to look great.

 

[barmann]

THAT brings us to this important point we must not forget.

Steve Jobs was a minimalist from his experience with Zen and appreciation of Deiter Rams. Nobody went to Rams and said 'No Deiter your 10 rules are wrong. We want you to design a chair with 7 legs and a cassette player with thirteen knobs'.

The original Macintosh designed by Jeff Raskin was based on these ideas and they are the core of what makes Apple Apple today and forever. If you take this away you end up with just another generic PC maker without a core philosophy. We can say that the design philosophy at Apple is the reason other companies are forced to innovate better too.

Just when you think you've heard it all ...

Zen and Dieter Rams, and then you look at what Apple has become .
Function over form, longevity, adaptability - not exactly Apple's core values these days , are they ?
A trend started by Jobs , by the way .

 

[k2focus]

Sort of seems like this computer is going to be for absolutely no one outside of a few niche users.

 

[PianoPro]

Sort of seems like this computer is going to be for absolutely no one outside of a few niche users.

Seems like you may be overthinking your question. The new "modular" Mac Pro is going to be for anyone that wants or needs Mac OS and doesn't want a desktop computer with a built-in display (individual reasons vary), and wants something more powerful or more modular (we hope) than the new Mac mini. Pretty simple and obvious isn't it?

No one buys a desktop Mac for CPU/GPU performance, form, or price. (I used to buy them in part for hardware quality, but that went out after the cMP.) It's about the benefits of Mac OS as perceived by the customer (which includes what software it runs, familiarity, ease of maintainability, and eco-system it provides), whether those benefits are factually real or imagined. And ironically, for some (including me) the ability to run Windows (absolutely necessary in my Electronic Design Engineering profession) along with Mac OS without having a 2nd computer with its peripherals and an additional set of multiple monitors on my desk at the same time.

I don't see that as a niche product at all. It's a very general purpose product with a market size determined by price and modularity (versatility of use). Unless the new Mac Pro was resurrected from their prior decision to abandon the "pro" market simply to serve as a new flagship Mac image product (and that seems less likely the longer they work on it), I'm expecting something with much wider appeal than than the 2013 trashcan niche product. Whether it's a hit or miss depends on how wide an appeal that will be.

 

[jeremiah256]

Sort of seems like this computer is going to be for absolutely no one outside of a few niche users.

Of course. This should not be a surprise.

The percentage of even professionals who would actually need a iMac Pro or Mac Pro is extremely small.

Higher level game developers for iOS. Watching official tutorials on the new DaVinci Resolve Studio 16, I see many of them with iMac Pros plus eGPUs, so add some hard core video editors. A few others.

Spending time on sites like this warps the perception of what the vast majority of people actually need. If you’ve been on this site for a while, you’ve see plenty of threads with “Hello! I’m someone who barely uses app X, I’m upgrading from a Raspberry Pi, and this will be my first Mac. What should I get?” And the answer from too many here will be “The i7 with 32GBs RAM, a GPU with 4 GBs VRAM, and 1TB of SSD.” Massive overkill.

A MacBook, MacBook Air, or lower spec’d MBP, iMac, or Mac Mini would fulfill the computing needs of the vast majority of individual needs. A suped up Mac for almost everyone else. The iMac Pro and Mac Pros are for either professional shops or high level individual gun slingers. A wedding photographer that makes high 5 or even 6 figures annually could need one and easily justify the expense. A wedding photographer with less volume and/or clients with less disposable income would be better served by a different machine.

 

[pl1984]

So, Apple "simply" needs to combine a Mac Mini style case, swappable motherboards (could be tricky to be easily upgradable but doable), user installable solid state storage and RAM, graphics card flexibility and some really decent 2019 monitors. Change the design every 5 years, and allow for low end systems for smaller studios and artists by being $5000 up to $15000 for more high end video houses....and at least, AT LEAST, Apple has a chance to get back some its lost business. If it doesn't do this, the iMac Pro will never be the number one machine in my opinion...people still love Macs, OS X and nicely designed gear...my studio computer is STILL the 2008 Mac Pro running 10.6.8 (I love a whole bunch of older plugins that aren't available on newer systems!). In London, practically every music studio I visit has the cheese grater tower, and I believe that reasonable price pointed systems that can run ProTools would be VERY popular!

IMO all Apple needs to do is return to the cMP form factor / design with updated internals. Nothing else need be done and most would be happy.

 

[iluvmacs99]

Professionals who make a living in digital media and development can justify the high cost of the Mac Pro. It's just the cost of doing business. Most of the time though you can even use it as a tax write-off, so there limits further losses.

While these are niche players in the market, the used market for Mac Pros and the people who continue to use them even if they are 10 year old machines are simply remarkable. Basically, people gravitate towards the Mac Pro because of the software and the ease of use for most of the creative side people. And the majority of creative people aren't filthy rich, but that shouldn't deter the ability for these individuals to create using an older Mac Pro either. It's hard to buy a 10 year PC and expect it to work that easily well compared to the same vintage Mac or Mac Pro and the creative software; usually the professional calibre ones at discounted prices. I still use Final Cut Express 4 in conjunction with the latest iMovie and love both. I still use the older version of Photoshop CS 5 and that will work even with the older Mac Pro with lots of horsepower.

The problem I see with some people is that, some of these people NEED to own the very latest and keeping up with the Joneses. That you have to own the very latest top of the line machines. That might sing your tune, but don't assume everyone of us work and think the same way. The majority of people who use computers are basically treating them as tools to accomplish a particular task. Most of the time, those tasks like word processing, facebook and web browsing can be done with a low powered Mac (used macs) which don't require 8 core or 12 cores or even a mighty GPU. It seemed that some of us seemed to ignore these people as though they don't exist. They do with older hardware and they are so very happy with it. In fact, when I go to many local computer shops in my town (except Apple Store and Best Buy), I see folks from all walks of life who just simply can't afford the very latest, but are so delighted and happy when they see parts from people who donate them as though they are so free. I mean, I just see some stuff that they are perfectly mint and in new condition being sold by the store, after being donated or bought at low dirt cheap prices, to these low income people to help them. A lot of people aren't making high income but still need a working computer to get a job, do the casual job that's required for a Mac or PC or maintain some social connection. Some of that can be done with an older Mac Pro because of its expansion and the really low entry point. The newer Mac Pros are more expensive, but then after a few years, those Pros will become cheap. So in a way, Mac Pros eventually become affordable to the masses who want them, so they are not necessarily niches. Same with the older PC workstations.

 

[PianoPro]

IMO all Apple needs to do is return to the cMP form factor / design with updated internals. Nothing else need be done and most would be happy.

I agree. That's what makes this so interesting. If that is what they are doing it would be shipping by now. So it seems obvious they have something much more complex in mind. It's hard to believe they would make a big deal about modularity and acknowledge that specific problem with the trashcan, and then design another dead-end product. Or that they would design a me-too product after making us wait so long to get it. So I think this is going to be something ambitious and probably somehow go against logical expectations. Whether we will like it or not is another question.

 

[yurc]

Mostly younger colleagues on my workplace not even know about Mac Pro, both cheese grater and trashcan. Only people from motion division who clicks when we talking about cheese grater.

On UI/UX division if I'm say Mac Pro they always mistaken as MacBook Pro. The only desktop Mac they approved is just iMac. Not sure they know about Mini or not, I'm don't ask.

For 2019 Mac Pro, my wishlist might be contrary for most people needs, but can it bigger than current cheese grater? So we have bigger and larger box which can :

• Accommodate more PCIE slots
• Sophisticated airflow / cooling to keep silent operation
• Introducing cutting edge gigantic enterprise SSD 2〜10 TB SATA disk as full SSD storage (might be cost arm and leg though, but welcome as additional BTO)
• Support off shelf NVMe blades (for booting purpose)
• 8 DIMM slots or more
• Dual 10 GBE ports
• New Apple pro display with superb color gamut (please make it less glare / reflection, adjustable and rotatable, our neck is pain with fixed stand from ACD Era / iMac without VESA mount )
• Backlit Magic Keyboard when? (no need touch bar strip thanks)

So basically this HP Z8 with Apple aesthetic, cheese grater clad. Add Space Gray as cosmetics. Big box yielding this machine will be weight a ton

At this point, I'm pretty worry about upcoming 2019 Mac Pro because Apple was too obsessed with 'modular' words. It might be swappable, but not sure about kind / type connection used. I assume Apple want to make them proprietary.

Well, my wishlist above is just my own fantasy and unlikely came true with current Apple to build HPC OS X.