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Who's in the market for iMac pro?

Haswell said:
I don't see who the target market is the iMac Pro. Pros want easy user upgrade ability. For $4,999 it should be easily user gradable. It doesn't even have panel to access the memory.
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Pros who do their own support want that.

Larger operations would have dedicated staff and loaner machines to handle such work as they would be certified and authorized by Apple to perform the work and would have the spares on hand.

My friend works in Nike's IT department and they are a large Mac installation and they don't take the machines down to the Genius Bar when they have an issue. :D
 
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pat500000 said:
This imac pro spec is great but one of the problems pro users would have is upgradibility. This is one of those throw away product. If those motherboard or thermal issue cant be fixed, what good is it after three years with apple care? The cmp from 08-12, those cheese grater mac pro were able to upgrade and customize to their needs. i cant speak for anyone but me, however, i dont want to get stuck with one gpu or certain amount of rams or hd. Depending on what pro users do, those 18 cores might not be enough.
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Thanks for the reply, I understand what you mean now. On the other hand, I rely on AppleCare and typically purchase a new Mac every three years. By then there has been enough time passage for there to be a significant reason to upgrade, e.g. from 1st 5k to iMac Pro.
 
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Luba said:
I edit HD video, probably will with 4K in the future, so with 4K you recommend 64GB RAM? And you'll upgrade to the 16 HBM2 Vega GPU? If I stick with HD then the iMac Pro is overkill?
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By HD video, do you mean a single HD stream?

4K is quite taxing on my Mac - the files can barely playback. Video playback is dependent upon the bit depth of the footage. My 4K streams are all 100mb/s, which is still quite small. With the move to newer cameras, that bit depth may triple or quadruple as I move to shooting with log footage and adding effects.

HD video editing is fine on my MacBook Pro with 512MB VRAM. iMac Pro is way overkill - even for a single stream of 4K. You can edit 4K on any current iMac with dedicated GPU.

Things only get complicated when you're doing multi-cam edits of multiple cameras/audio devices and adding effects. If you're not doing anything that taxing, you'll be fine. The latest MacBook Pros with 16GB RAM are fine for 3 4K streams. I'm going 64GB for effects to be added and the increase in file quality as I move to better cameras in the future. E.g. Panasonic GH5 does up to 400 or 500mb/s footage - or will be doing when SD cards can record that quickly. These are the reasons I'll require the greater RAM and processing power which will help FCPX to run whilst editing that footage.

I have a G RAID Shuttle XL that I run my footage off - if you're not in this type of video editing realm, then you'll be grand with any Mac you choose - and you can also go to Proxy Media if it does ever run slowly for you.
 
driftless said:
I shoot 4K with usually 2 cameras and edit with FCPX. The minimum RAM that I will order for the iMac Pro will be 64GB.
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Are you tempted to bump up to 128GB? I'm in the same boat - thinking of going with 64GB and 16GB VRAM vs 8GB VRAM and 128GB RAM.
 
RuffDraft said:
Are you tempted to bump up to 128GB? I'm in the same boat - thinking of going with 64GB and 16GB VRAM vs 8GB VRAM and 128GB RAM.
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Yes, I am likely to bump RAM and the GPU to MAX. SSD to 2TB, I have a 1 TB SSD scratch drive already. Not sure about the CPU although it is unlikely to be 18 cores, I will wait to read some reviews first.
 
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Luba said:
Yeah, I'd save enough to get a MacBook too. Just making sure, the display in the 2017 27" iMac is the same as in the iMac Pro?
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If it's not the same, it will be similar. Perhaps it will be brighter or have better color. But bet on the same resolution.
 
I think the 10 core option with the highest GPU, 2TB SSD, and the 64gb ram will be hard to find.
It's powerful enough to be worth it and not excessively expensive as the 12 core option probably will be.
So everyone considering the iMac Pro is going to go for that.
I certainly am! Although like everyone else I'm considering 128GB.

The good thing is that we have plenty of time to decide that!
 
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phobos said:
I think the 10 core option with the highest GPU, 2TB SSD, and the 64gb ram will be hard to find.
It's powerful enough to be worth it and not excessively expensive as the 12 core option probably will be.
So everyone considering the iMac Pro is going to go for that.
I certainly am! Although like everyone else I'm considering 128GB.

The good thing is that we have plenty of time to decide that!
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Yes, that could well be the popular configuration.
 
Haswell said:
I don't see who the target market is the iMac Pro. Pros want easy user upgrade ability. For $4,999 it should be easily user gradable. It doesn't even have panel to access the memory.
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Most pros i know buy a computer that will do them for 2-3 years, get the benefit of tax deductions/depreciation, then get a new one and sell the old ones [often to employees] when needed.
Need 64GB ram? Just get it now and do your work...
 
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driftless said:
Yes, I am likely to bump RAM and the GPU to MAX. SSD to 2TB, I have a 1 TB SSD scratch drive already. Not sure about the CPU although it is unlikely to be 18 cores, I will wait to read some reviews first.
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Shoot weddings, driftless? Noticed you shoot with the Panasonics - I do too - but haven't updated my kit to a GH5 yet - two GH4s and a GH3 still.

RAM and GPU to max sounds super-expensive. That'll be an enviable system! I'm more likely to opt for 64GB RAM and 16GB VRAM - doubt I'll be able to afford 128GB RAM. Just going to save up all year and see where I'm at come December.

Anyone else noticed that you no longer get the Magic Trackpad and Magic Mouse? Originally, the web page didn't say one or the other - I'm sure it said it came with both! These accessories must be sold separately - as people will want both.
 
Just ordered a new 4.2 iMac 27" to bide time until the iMac Pro comes out. Going to max that puppy out too. I think there is a good chance it could come close to $15k maxed out. Cool.
 
Looking forward to the iMac Pro , the base config for me is perfect - total 100000% overkill , but great bragging rights LOL

The spec to someone like me seems pretty mind blowing and really pretty good value compared to a a tricked out 27 5k
 
I am in the market for an iMac Pro. I wonder what the upgrade costs will be for going to 2Tb, or even 4 TB? Also, the Graphics would like the 16GB option over the 8 GB option but at what cost? I would opt for the 10 core but the jump to 18 core would be great but the upgrade price to that level is probably out of my price range.
 
I think the jump from 8GB to 16GB for the graphics card won't be that high. Maybe 200 euros or so. I hope! The price for an 18 core option though is a different story.
Searching on websites it looks like a 14 core intel CPU can cost somewhere around 2500 euros! Just the CPU alone! So I would say expect something around 3000 euros on top of the 5000 euros of the base model.

As I mentioned before I would definitely go for the 10 core option and everything else maxed out. I would love to get the 18 core version but I cannot for the life justify the price.

I collected some of my initial thoughts about the iMac Pro in a video. My main concern if you don't want to watch the video is this. How will they be able to keep the machine cool, silent and performing at 100% (no throttling). I kinda think that we might have similar issues to the 2013 Mac Pro. I guess we can only wait and see!

 
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ascender said:
I really don't need one for my work but I do really want one. Reality is that my current 5K iMac will do me just fine for years to come unfortunately!
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Looks sexy as hell, but if you're going to spend $5K, I think you'd want to be able to upgrade the thing.

It's already obnoxious spending $3K on a regular iMac gets you a non-upgradeable machine.

For $5K and above, you really should be able to swap components for many, many years.
 
WizardHunt said:
I am in the market for an iMac Pro. I wonder what the upgrade costs will be for going to 2Tb, or even 4 TB? Also, the Graphics would like the 16GB option over the 8 GB option but at what cost? I would opt for the 10 core but the jump to 18 core would be great but the upgrade price to that level is probably out of my price range.
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ZDNet hypothesized that a fully-configured iMac Pro would clear $17,000, but they used retail pricing and added a 75-80% "Apple Tax" on top of that to account for Apple's margins. I looked at 2013 Mac Pro upgrade pricing as a guide and I predict it will be closer to $12,000.

For RAM, I'm guessing 32GB to 64GB will be $1000 and 32GB to 128GB will be $2000-2500.

For the GPU, I am guessing $1000 from the Vega 56 to the Vega 64 mainly due to HBM2 RAM being expensive (the differences between the GPUs themselves is core clock, compute units and stream processors).

I'm guessing $1000 to go from 1TB SSD to 2TB and $2000-2500 from 1TB to 4TB.
 
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CWallace said:
ZDNet hypothesized that a fully-configured iMac Pro would clear $17,000, but they used retail pricing and added a 75-80% "Apple Tax" on top of that to account for Apple's margins. I looked at 2013 Mac Pro upgrade pricing as a guide and I predict it will be closer to $12,000.

For RAM, I'm guessing 32GB to 64GB will be $1000 and 32GB to 128GB will be $2000-2500.

For the GPU, I am guessing $1000 from the Vega 56 to the Vega 64 mainly due to HBM2 RAM being expensive (the differences between the GPUs themselves is core clock, computer units, and stream processors).

I'm guessing $1000 to go from 1TB SSD to 2TB and $2000-2500 from 1TB to 4TB.
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Wow, I may have to rethink my thinking about maybe switching over to the New Mac Pro as it should still be configurable which is important to me as I would not be able to afford $12,000-$17000 that's for sure. Max I would go is maybe $8500 and for that, I doubt I would get what I wanted. The Mac Pro is looking better and better now.. hmm....what to do?
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Glockworkorange said:
Looks sexy as hell, but if you're going to spend $5K, I think you'd want to be able to upgrade the thing.

It's already obnoxious spending $3K on a regular iMac gets you a non-upgradeable machine.

For $5K and above, you really should be able to swap components for many, many years.
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I fully agree with you. They hide the ram this time deep inside so we would have no choice but to buy the highest ram we could afford at the time of purchase. And we all know that Apple charges nearly double for the ram to help with profits. This may backfire on them though as some like me may not go through with buying an iMac Pro and wait for next year when the new Mac Pro comes out. But if they close that system then they will kill that line as well.
 
CWallace said:
ZDNet hypothesized that a fully-configured iMac Pro would clear $17,000, but they used retail pricing and added a 75-80% "Apple Tax" on top of that to account for Apple's margins. I looked at 2013 Mac Pro upgrade pricing as a guide and I predict it will be closer to $12,000.

For RAM, I'm guessing 32GB to 64GB will be $1000 and 32GB to 128GB will be $2000-2500.

For the GPU, I am guessing $1000 from the Vega 56 to the Vega 64 mainly due to HBM2 RAM being expensive (the differences between the GPUs themselves is core clock, compute units and stream processors).

I'm guessing $1000 to go from 1TB SSD to 2TB and $2000-2500 from 1TB to 4TB.
Click to expand...

ZDNet went a little bit crazy with their estimation. I don't think its even remotely possible they would charge $17000 for any of the iMac Pro models.
I think it's going to be closer to your estimation. Somewhere around $11000-$12000.

In general though I don't think the 18 core option will be that great of a deal. With that many cores it's always a compromise when it comes to clock per core. They need to drop down the clock to 2.2GHz or something like that which will hinder a lot single thread operations.
So in some cases people will see a performance drop rather than an increase.
Of course multicore operations will be really good.

I think the 10 core is a nice compromise between clock speed, number of cores and price.
 
The 8-core base option looks good. Will likely have the fastest single core speeds and a 25% increase of speed to the 10 core isn't that great of an increase particularly if single core speeds drop. I am worried about cooling and fan speed and fan noise. We don't know yet how hard things will be to upgrade. They might make the case easy to open instead of gluing it shut, trivial to do if they want to. Even then opening a glued case is not too hard and it looks like at least memory and SSDs will be in sockets. An end user opening the case may get Apple to get testy about warranty so upgrades might need to be done by an authorized service provider to avoid warranty and AppleCare issues.
 
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Well I have to believe if you buy an iMac Pro, it is because the significant majority of your work benefits not just from more cores, but all the cores you can give it.

As to servicing, I expect the majority will be placed at facilities with dedicated Apple-certified IT staff who will be able to service them on-site so the "ease of repairability/upgradeability" factor won't really matter. I also expect Apple and Apple authorized service centers to offer a component upgrade service covering CPUs, GPUs, RAM and SSDs so you don't have to buy it maxed out to begin with.
 
CWallace said:
Well I have to believe if you buy an iMac Pro, it is because the significant majority of your work benefits not just from more cores, but all the cores you can give it.
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Writing a process to be multithreaded can be more tricky than one would imagine. So there are a lot of cases in pro apps where things are still single threaded.
Cinema 4d for example in most of the cases is multi-threaded and can use every single bit of processing power you can give it. But there are processes that are still single threaded. For example Dynamics. In these cases you will benefit the most from a really fast single core rather than multiple slower cores.

The same applies for other applications.



jerwin said:
all these model numbers can be a bit confusing, but look here.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_...kylake-SP.22_.2814_nm.29_Scalable_Performance

There are quite a few 18 core chips in the Xeon Gold series

6154 @ 3 Ghz
6150 @ 2.7 Ghz
6140 @ 2.0 Ghz
6136 @ 3 Ghz

I think Intel intends to use TurboBoost in situations where single threaded performance is critical.
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I think you are correct in your assumption. I have the feeling though in order for Apple to keep everything cool in there we will get the lower clock speeds (2GHz or 2,7 GHz) rather than then faster clock speeds. But even if we get the 3GHz variance we will still be off by 1.2GHz which is what the processors in the new iMacs can output (4.2GHz).
 
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