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New Mac Pro rumor – is this a joke?
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IMO a modular approach could in theory work. We just don’t have the technology for that yet. Thunderbolt is to slow to fully replace PCIe, given it’s adaquate for a lot of things. Even it’s main use today – storage – has it’s limitations with the standard.
I could see a “MacPro” where you can buy “2015 GPU option” or “2015 network upgrade” or similar. I even think there was a patent found from 2009 or 2010 showing this type of machine. But we’re just not there yet and I don’t see this being a very practical way of building a “pro” system.
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What Apple should have, they never will, but what they should have is a MacPro desktop that scales from the highend 4- and 6-core i7’s all the way up the dual core Xeons. This would also scale RAM from 32GB up to a possible 512GB. It would also place the machines from a $1500 dollar price-tag.
Regarding PCIe-slots that varies a lot from user to user, but having at least one desktop-class, user-upgradeable GPU is the bare minimum on the low-end. I think a lot of users would manage with this and TB + USB-3. On the high-end however we need more, way more.
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Why doesn’t Apple do what I’ve heard a lot of high-end consumer users ask them to do – introduce a mid-level tower in addition to a Mac Pro?
I’ve heard the talk about cannibalizing iMac sales…but would that really be the case?
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For me that’s sort of “so what?”. If Apple sells 10 iMacs or 10 MacDesktops what’s the difference? In theory they could sell more “extras” attached to the MacDesktop.
I however think the idéa Apple has is selling an “experience”. The iMac is a nice “experience” in a lot of situations (less so when you actually try to use it as a MacPro).
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[Erik Lindahl] “Thunderbolt is to slow to fully replace PCIe,”
I’d qualify generalizations like that. It can replace 4x PCIe. It can not replace 8x or 16x PCIe. The number of 8x and 16x cards used by most people (“pros”) is limited… but mission critical. I can’t see a viable professional box without a couple of 16x PCIe slots. The MacPro is already a niche box. I can’t see how narrowing that niche, especially to markets with the deepest pockets, helps sales.
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I hear you here and I think a lot of people could / would be content with 3 PCIe slots all at 16X. This primarily is for GPU’s but also i/o cards (SAS for example), 10GbE. ProTools systems and alike are still as far as I understand it dependent on PCIe. Some higher end setups like Resolve might need more than 3 slots but I think these systems work quite well with a PCIe expansion unit. I’d imagine with PCIe 3.0 at 16X that limitations of such a unit would be even less.
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[Jeremy Garchow] “Do they offer a loyalty buyout program?
I’d much rather spend 100 times the price to keep dead hardware around for a few more years past its useful life.”
Thank you. You have changed the course of my morning. I now believe in humanity again.
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Keep in mind that if one GPU is on the motherboard only one additional 16x slot is needed to have a 2 GPU machine with one being user replaceable. Of course there are situations where you need more than one additional 16x slot. I think an 8x RedRocket might be one but there are others. I’m not sure how many people would need three 16x PCIe slots though given one GPU is on the motherboard.
In other words, Resolve using 2 GPUs, would likely need only one 16x slot since the other GPU is on the motherboard. One might then need one more 16x slot for any other card that might need more than 4x.
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What GPU would you have on the motherboard? The integrated chips are sadly still quite crap, especially in a workstation class machine. Even Haswell’s up-coming GPU’s are sniffing on a GTX 650M which is an 18 months old mobile chip. Adding something like a mobile chip might work but I’d imagine you just pay way more for much less GPU power then.
Resolve having two GPU’s would need at least 2 16X slots unless you’re talking about welding a GTX 780M or similar on the motherboard. To me that seems like a very odd design though, a side from the fact you might be able to produce a relatively fast system with less thermal footprint. I’d still think it would be easier to go the desktop GPU route anyway. The new GTX 780M (not 680MX) is sniffing the 660TI / 670 desktop model depending on clock speeds.
The third slot could be 4X or 8X but my idéa of having all three 16X would open up more possibilities for those that need it.
All this said – I presume avaliable lanes vary depending on plattform.
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After giving some thought to the “ability to expand internal hardware” mentioned in the article, it makes sense to me that the whole Apple approach to their portable devices has always been “no user serviceable parts inside”.
Could this just be the logical extension of that approach, where to get a phone case open you need a special tool, or a small explosive device?
Joe Bourke
Owner/Creative Director
Bourke Media
http://www.bourkemedia.com
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