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Mac Pro

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Re: Mac Pro

#231

Post by btown »

Copywriting and product-debate aside, that's some pretty impressive frontend presentation. From what I can tell from the minified JS, they're using Require.JS for code organization, their own jQuery-like utility toolkit they call Apple Core, fully pre-rendered text everywhere, and javascript that plays and pauses two copies of the HTML5 video, one backwards and one forwards, shuffling their opacities for seamless transitions.

Interestingly, they don't need separate videos for each transition, because the video is streamed rather than pre-buffered in its entirety. Not that Apple really cares about its bandwidth costs here, but it's an interesting strategy.

The minified JS: http://images.apple.com/v/mac-pro/home/a/scripts/macpro.rele...

And the raw video (download and play in QuickTime): http://movies.apple.com/media/us/mac-pro/2013/96614028-695e-...

Re: Mac Pro

#232

Post by SPSteinbeck »

philip1209 wrote: post #116

The product descriptions seem just horribly written: > Something that provides an extremely powerful argument against the status quo. > The new Mac Pro packs an unprecedented amount of power in an unthinkable amount of space. A big reason we were able to do that is the ingenious unified thermal core > Not only does it feature a state-of-the-art AMD FirePro workstation-class GPU with up to 6GB of dedicated VRAM — it f…

I thought that as well.

Re: Mac Pro

#233

Post by mark-r »

smackfu wrote: post #141
ansimionescu wrote: post #71

I love watching people moan about this yet unreleased product. I think the new Mac Pro episode will resemble the iPad one - lots of "ohemgee it's like just a bigger ipod, lol, how stupid do they think we are, kthx?" reactions, when in fact this product will probably push a new paradigm shift in the way workstations are built i.e. moving away from the plastic pieces of shit ubiquitously sold now. Seriously, I dare you…

This is going to be a $3000 workstation. Its processor will cost more than that "workstation" you linked to. They aren't even competing in the same space. The new "paradigm" this is pushing is that you don't need PCIe cards or internal storage. We'll see about that.

This is not the first time they've decided there are elements that don't need to be part of the base machine. Each time there were outcries but they were proven right in the end. When's the last time you needed an optical drive for example? And did you see the mention under Thunderbolt 2 of "add a PCI expansion chassis" - that's their answer for those who really really need expansion.

Re: Mac Pro

#235

Post by LekkoscPiwa »

danabramov wrote: post #106
glenra wrote: post #70

"Okay, we COULD just label the ports with regular high color contrast paint. Say, white paint on a black background or black paint on a white background. But that would be TOO EASY and the panel would then really 'pop' against our otherwise monolithic clean design. Which would be distracting." "But during actual use the ports are going to be on the BACK of the device (so you won't see it) and will have random stuff p…

Why would you want the backlight to stay on for a while, longer than default? Genuinely curious.

because you're in Siberia, it's 1:00 am, it's dark, you are drunk and need more time to plug that damn thing into the right whole.

Genuine answer as I see it.

Re: Mac Pro

#236

Post by rdl »

ericd wrote: post #186
rdl wrote: post #147

I'm a big fan of everything except less RAM capacity. Getting the disks out of the case makes a lot of sense -- 4 drives was never enough to be meaningful. A boot SSD and a big 8+ drive external RAID on TB2 seems a lot better (ideally with an SSD or more RAM to cache), and/or NAS/SAN. Curious where it will be priced; if it's $1999 or less for a usable base config, it could be a default. Mini never really made a lot o…

Unfortunately, I think the CAD cards and Xeons might make it impossible to price at that level, unless the base config is severely pared down.

One low-end xeon (and one ati) is pretty low end. Xeons are not that much of a premium at the lower levels. ECC RAM is worth it to me. (the question is where the low end is vs. Mac Mini; I'd consider a low end one as a HT box vs. a Mac Mini, even)

Re: Mac Pro

#237

Post by voltagex_ »

meerita wrote: post #72
gamache wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't see it that way at all. The Mac Pro has always been about the top 1% power users. The appeal was twofold: it was a bitchin'-fast machine you could stuff with as many cards and drives as you want, and it ran OS X. This new design removes the former selling point. 12 core max (same as current)?? Four RAM slots (down from eight)?? 1/6th the volume (i.e. space to plug stuff in)?? This offers almost no advantage o…

Welcome to the era where you process all in the cloud. You don't need 30 HD on your machine anymore or 200gb ram. I was a bit shocked at the beginning but then I realized most of the studios are using cloud solutions to make intensive renders or local hardware farms with plenty of processing power. I think the Mac Pro still exceeds on power, but you know you will always find someone else more hungry of power :)

Heh, I bet you're somewhere with high bandwidth, no data caps and very low latency.

Here, I'm 30-60ms away from the big datacentres, and 200-400ms away from the US. Data is capped at ~500gb per month on the high end plans, and that's both upload and download. I'm lucky to get 10 megabits down, 1 megabit up on a good day.

Coupled with the fact our country's going to head back to the 1950s with the inevitable change of government next election, screw the cloud.

Re: Mac Pro

#238

Post by ttcbj »

gamache wrote: post #58
jmduke wrote: post #19

Apple is doubling down on their segmentation here. They're clearly abandoning (I don't mean this in a pejorative sense) a mass appeal with this new iteration and targeting it specifically to 'actual' professionals: graphic designers, video editors, etc.

I don't see it that way at all. The Mac Pro has always been about the top 1% power users. The appeal was twofold: it was a bitchin'-fast machine you could stuff with as many cards and drives as you want, and it ran OS X. This new design removes the former selling point. 12 core max (same as current)?? Four RAM slots (down from eight)?? 1/6th the volume (i.e. space to plug stuff in)?? This offers almost no advantage o…

I mostly agree with this. I have owned three mac pros. I use them for development work. I like them because they are fast, well-built, run OS X (which I like), I can put lots of RAM in them, and put a few extra hard drives in with software RAID.

There isn't much about this announcement that excites me. I don't think I need two graphics cards (though maybe 4K will be nicer than I realize). I don't need it to be smaller and I don't really care what it looks like, as long as it is well built. But:

* I have had really good experiences with past mac pros, and poor experiences with hardware from other vendors, so I am reluctant to switch.

* The cost differential of a mac pro vs. an imac is not that great, relative to the cost of development time, so I am likely to give the mac pro the benefit of the doubt. If the benchmarks show it is significantly faster, I will probably just go with it.

I do wonder who is excited about this machine. I think another commenter is right - it is the video editors and high end graphics types this machine is truly built for.

Re: Mac Pro

#239

Post by bilbo0s »

mbell wrote: post #208

Personally I couldn't care less about the design, it would be sitting behind several large screens anyway and the thermal ideas sound interesting.... That said.... 4 ram slots???? Really? 12 cores, 2 GPUs and I get 32GB of ram? Maybe 64GB if 16GB dimms in standard sizes become a thing? That kills it completely in my book.

That paucity of slots is what got me to thinking...

I was wondering if the idea would be to daisy chain these together via TB 2 and see one workstation with... say ...36 cores or whatever.

I'm trying to determine if that would be a possibility. In essence, is the Mac Pro a Thunderbolt 2 "processing" device? Or could it be made to be one?

If it were...

Man...

put me down for a couple of them. I mean you could potentially get a 48 core "workstation" in 1/2 the volume of the current Mac Pro.

Re: Mac Pro

#240

Post by kryten »

[deleted] wrote: post #217
kryten wrote: post #131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We reserve our right to moan at consumer junk with the workstation label glued on. Innovation is not something I really want in the workstation market. I want something utterly reliable that works flawlessly for several years and if something goes wrong I can swap the bits out in minutes. If I need more disks, just throw them inside it without playing around with half knackered frayed cables, external enclosures, pow…

[deleted]

Yes.

If you could stick an engine from a MAN Support Vehicle[1] in a Toyota Prius, it doesn't make it a MAN Support Vehicle...

[1] http://www.flickr.com/photos/billkatygemma/6281032897/

Edit: in context the cowardly parent poster suggested that because it has a Xeon E5 in it, it isn't consumer junk.

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