New Mac Pro rumor – is this a joke?

[Timothy Auld]

They’ve already shot themselves in both feet and both knees. If this rumored MacPro is actually true the temple could be next.

Tim

[Marcus Moore]

Well, iMacs were announced in October and weren’t available until December/January really. I think Apple stands to loose relatively few sales with a pre announcement vs the goodwill of a announcement and a sale date.

Even if it’s not the machine some people want, at least they’ll know for sure what they’re options are.

[Marcus Moore]

I don’t think it’s “a lot” of people asking for the mythical MacMiniTower (xMac)- just a vocal minority. And really, it would just be splitting an increasingly small slice of Apple’s computer market. Apple isn’t going to have 2 products in this space, and I think there would be way more people upset with a ONLY a xMac available than a more substantial MacPro.

There’s no meaningful market for a machine between a high-end iMac and a base model MacPro.

[Marcus Moore]

Or, you know… wait for the machine to ACTUALLY be announced so you know what it really is.

[Erik Lindahl]

There most defiantly is. But it’s a machine that would be comparable to a windows machine a lot more 1:1. The high-end iMac is a very pricey machine for the hardware you get, the MacPro even more so.

[Erik Lindahl]

The 2012 iMac release was a fiasco. Announced in October to be released in November – most people had to wait 2 or more months for their systems even when they ordered them after the new year.

Announcing early isn’t a bad thing though. You just have to keep your schedule and you shouldn’t remove the excisting product from the market beforehand.

[Ronny Courtens]

Agreed. As a professional I always try to base an opinion on personal experience and facts, not on hearsay or rumors. But hey, this is the facebook age after all…

All we know Apple may not be announcing anything at all at WWDC. Will this have any influence on my business? Will our current machines suddenly stop working? Will our clients suddenly stay away? I don’t think so. Still it’s quite fun to read all this ((-:

[Marcus Moore]

Absolutely it was. I’m just saying Apple has set the precedent. And I think there would be much less impact to taking the existing MacPro off the market for 2-3 months than there was for the much higher volume iMac. I mean, who’s buying the existing MacPros at this stage anyway?

[Marcus Moore]

While I’d agree that the MacPro is probably one of the worst deals in computing today (2 year old hardware at unreduced price); I’ve yet to see anyone prove that any given iMac is that far out of line with a comparably spec’d PC [not including build your own, which is always cheaper, but it not within everyone’s ability to execute or maintain]. $200 to $500 on a multi-thousand dollar machine is usually where I see these comparisons end up. And I’ll happily pay that every 2-3 years for OSX, the Mac’s build quality, reliability, and resale value.

All I’m saying is that at this stage it makes no sense for Apple to be expanding it’s professional offerings, as the use-case for those products continues to shrink. As the chipsets improve, more and more of the market is served very well by what an iMac offers [I’m using one now, and will be until I can evaluate whether the MacPro is worth the investment]. If Apple is going to have one “Pro” desktop, it’s not going to be a machine that’s half a MacPro. MacPro users want what the MacPro offers [CPU and expandability-wise], otherwise those customers wouldn’t be on that product.

[Marcus Moore]

The only thing that bothers me now is that the 4K oriented Thunderbolt2 is not scheduled for later this year. Either that may add weight to a later time-frame for the MacPro launch.