Apple WWDC

[Oliver Peters]

[Bill Davis] “A few years back I’d read 1000 times that a big desktop level machine was required to do serious daily editing for money.”

Obviously “pro” is hard to define, but in the John Gruber WWDC video, they pointed out that in terms of numbers among pro users, the machines used ranked 1- MacBook Pros, 2-iMacs, and 3-Mac Pros. What’s hard to judge, of course, is how much overlap there is. For example, a pro user who is alternating between a laptop and a desktop machine. The real reason to use a desktop isn’t necessarily power, but connectivity. If all you need is an external monitor and a drive, then a MBP is just fine. But many users need a lot more than that, which makes a desktop unit a more attractive option.

– Oliver

Oliver Peters Post Production Services, LLC
Orlando, FL
http://www.oliverpeters.com

[Bill Davis]

[Oliver Peters] “The real reason to use a desktop isn’t necessarily power, but connectivity. If all you need is an external monitor and a drive, then a MBP is just fine. But many users need a lot more than that, which makes a desktop unit a more attractive option.
“

So the next question obviously becomes has “connectivity” itself changed?

I’d argue it already has – massively.

Remember how “Video” used to pass only on specialized video connectors?

Now, when you plug in a Lumaforge Jellyfish via 10gig to enable a small workgroup of editors – all you’re really doing is plugging in a glorified telephone connector.

Your fancy 5k monitor – when you go to plug THAT in, you’re plugging in the same HDMI connector as you find on your living room Sony TV.

Half the “interim components” I used to have to string into my working topology – TBCs, Decks, PatchBays, etc, etc, etc – are GONE.

Input: Wireless
Output: Wireless
100% of the effect boxes I used to need to have “Connected” now live in computer resident silicon and code, not in metal boxes. They are either purchased code snippets or Apps (which are the same thing.)

The whole industry wide BET on USB C/Thunderbolt is to simplify connectivity – basically to make it dismissible.

I’m sorry, but I don’t think “connectivity as an issue” has much tail left.

Bob Zelin made the point in your Florida video. When there are hardly any “video specific” monitors left in the video solution vendors booths at NAB – it’s a pretty good indication that things have changed out from under a whole generation of classic practitioners.

Time to adapt again. Oh well. Business as usual today.

Creator of XinTwo – https://www.xintwo.com
The shortest path to FCP X mastery.

[Oliver Peters]

[Bill Davis] “So the next question obviously becomes has “connectivity” itself changed?”

I guess from my perspective the answer is yes and no. Certainly the need for tape decks, routers, and patch bays has gone away, however for many of us in the NLE world, that’s been true for going on 10 years already. As far as the other peripherals, that hasn’t changed – only the type of connectors and protocols.

[Bill Davis] “Now, when you plug in a Lumaforge Jellyfish via 10gig to enable a small workgroup of editors – all you’re really doing is plugging in a glorified telephone connector. “

Shared storage has been around for 20 years. It’s gotten easier, for sure, but essentially it’s still the same – network protocol, server, switch, drives. Lumaforge, QNAP, and others make that more self-contained than in the past, but it still requires a plug connected to the computer, regardless of whether that’s 1GigE, 10GigE, FibreChannel, SAS, or SCSI.

[Bill Davis] “The whole industry wide BET on USB C/Thunderbolt is to simplify connectivity – basically to make it dismissible. “

That’s certainly true, but Thunderbolt is still inadequate in many cases. These days I often run a 2013 Mac Pro. On it, nearly every spigot is used. It’s also connected to a dock and two monitors and the ports on the dock and both monitors are largely used up. Unfortunately Apple chose to give you 3 shared TB2 ports, so actual throughput is a bottleneck. Plus, the actual installation is more messy than on the Mac Pro tower it replaced. So your argument doesn’t change the equation. If I have a laptop with a few TB-C ports versus a desktop machine with more ports, I still need the desktop because it offer mores and better connectivity.

[Bill Davis] “Bob Zelin made the point in your Florida video. When there are hardly any “video specific” monitors left in the video solution vendors booths at NAB – it’s a pretty good indication that things have changed out from under a whole generation of classic practitioners. “

Of course Bob tends to talk in hyperbole ☺ And he started on that by referencing the room I described above. I would point out that I still need a decent video monitor and i/o for grading product. I need a video monitor that I can use with broadcast content. There were actually plenty of video monitors on the floor – Canon, Panasonic, Sony, etc. However, there were also hybrids, like HP’s DreamColor that gives you the best of both worlds. In my case, I started using HDMI to a flat panel for the majority of the time when I’m just editing, ONLY because FCPX is giving me such totally AWFUL performance when connected through the BMC UltraStudio Express. It just so happens that at 23.98 and 29.97, I can use HDMI “desktop video” from both FCPX and Premiere to send real video to an HDMI-connected third display. BUT, this doesn’t really work well for all frame rate standards nor interlaced sequences. So for those reasons and color correction, I still need an accurate video display.

So back to what I said before – if your peripheral needs are simple, then a laptop, display, and a couple of wires to externals are fine, but that’s not reality in most pro environments. There, desktops are still needed.

– Oliver

Oliver Peters Post Production Services, LLC
Orlando, FL
http://www.oliverpeters.com

[Erik Lindahl]

I think TB-limit on the nMP wasn’t really a choice by Apple, rather a limitation of the given hardware. Think Anandtech had a very good breakdown at release of the machine.

That said I really hope the iMac Pro (and coming MacPro) doesn’t have this limitation to the highest possible way. Apple tends to be pretty good in this area compared to a lot of PC’s. I also beilive the iMac Pro will be based on a yet-to-be-released Xeon with general Core i parity in terms of hardware accelerated features. Or potentially they can achieve similar performance with the new AVX-instructions or through the GPU.

Time will tell for sure!

[Oliver Peters]

[Oliver Peters] “So back to what I said before – if your peripheral needs are simple, then a laptop, display, and a couple of wires to externals are fine, but that’s not reality in most pro environments. There, desktops are still needed.”

Just to expand on this, here’s a list of the connectivity on the aforementioned Mac Pro in that edit suite

2 external displays (each takes a TB port and a USB port)
Broadcast monitor (fed via SDI)
USB-connected extended keyboard
Wireless mouse (requires USB key, which can be plugged into keyboard)
Resolve Studio dongle (can be plugged into one of the displays)
Ethernet connection
BMD UltraStudio Express for SDI video to video display (this also supplies audio to a small mixer)
Small Mackie audio mixer
Powered audio speakers (connected to the mixer)
TB-connected local Pegasus RAID
TimeMachine drive (loops off of the TB on the CD dock)
Camera card reader (connected to USB on one of the displays)
CalDigit dock (connected via TB)
Raw drive dock (connected to the CD dock)
HMDI to the flat panel display (which is also the third Mac display device – connected via the CD dock – Mac itself won’t support 3 displays)
TB-to-10GigE adapter for the QNAP NAS connection (connects via TB)
CD dock is also used to connect various external USB/USB3.0 transfer drives
Printer (connected wirelessly)

So as you can see, a laptop – even with an external dock – would run out of spigots. ☺

– Oliver

Oliver Peters Post Production Services, LLC
Orlando, FL
http://www.oliverpeters.com

[Bill Davis]

[Oliver Peters] “2 external displays (each takes a TB port and a USB port)
Broadcast monitor (fed via SDI)
USB-connected extended keyboard
Wireless mouse (requires USB key, which can be plugged into keyboard)
Resolve Studio dongle (can be plugged into one of the displays)
Ethernet connection
BMD UltraStudio Express for SDI video to video display (this also supplies audio to a small mixer)
Small Mackie audio mixer
Powered audio speakers (connected to the mixer)
TB-connected local Pegasus RAID
TimeMachine drive (loops off of the TB on the CD dock)
Camera card reader (connected to USB on one of the displays)
CalDigit dock (connected via TB)
Raw drive dock (connected to the CD dock)
HMDI to the flat panel display (which is also the third Mac display device – connected via the CD dock – Mac itself won’t support 3 displays)
TB-to-10GigE adapter for the QNAP NAS connection (connects via TB)
CD dock is also used to connect various external USB/USB3.0 transfer drives
Printer (connected wirelessly)

So as you can see, a laptop – even with an external dock – would run out of spigots. ☺

– Oliver”

I guess my response would be to put a red check next to the ones that are necessary rather than merely for convenience. There are LOTS of preference choice/options there. And a HUGE reflection of a production process that was necessary years ago, but entirely optional today.

I totally get the path that got you there. It did the same for me up until 2011. That was when I started migrating to simpler setups leading to closing down my haybarn suite a couple of years ago. (I wrote a couple of times about how shocked I was to find I had something like 130 edison outlets in use surrounding my desk.)

That was then, this is now.

I’ve cut that to about 30 – and of those, only FIVE are day-to-day mission critical: one computer, left and right powered speakers, one wall wart for the recorder for my VO Stuff – plus an AC connected backup Time Machine drive inside my firesafe.

Actually, thinking about it, the powered speakers don’t go on the road, and the H4n does fine with batteries – so I really can sustain my entire editing operation off one AC Outlet for battery charging.

So many of the things I needed discrete powered devices for are now simply done either in software or via a powered buss where the computer AC is rectified and passed to the tool.

This is part of the heart of the digital signal revolution. The deck motors and pullys and huge transformers I once had to drive all day are largely gone now.

The fact that USB 3 carries robust (100w) power on ALL the ports using it – suggests to me I’ll need fewer and fewer wall warts, power plugs and power exclusive connections as time goes on.

But we’ll see.

Creator of XinTwo – https://www.xintwo.com
The shortest path to FCP X mastery.

[Oliver Peters]

[Bill Davis] “I guess my response would be to put a red check next to the ones that are necessary rather than merely for convenience. “

Convenience = necessary when clients are waiting on you doing these things fast. The alternative is unplugging and replugging various devices. Trust me, I’ve done the minimalist, ‘laptop+a few items’ route, and it’s a PITA. In this case, it’s the “hero” room in the facility and does finishing, as well as regular editing. We also do a lot of things like media transfers in there. So the short answer is that it is all essential.

– Oliver

Oliver Peters Post Production Services, LLC
Orlando, FL
http://www.oliverpeters.com