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Apple Is Listening

marco.org

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Re: Apple Is Listening

#281

Post by sjwright »

belazeebub wrote: post #109

To give people a bit of perspective, the Macintosh IIfx was released in 1990 for US$8,969 which in inflation-adjusted dollars is ~$17,500 today. The PowerMacintosh 8100 released in 1994 for ~$4,250 which in today's prices is ~$7,300. The original 128kb Macintosh would be ~$6,100 in today's dollars. Those are all the bottom-end models. By contrast, a Chevy S-10 pickup truck was about $7,000 in 1990 (if my googling was…

> Those are all the bottom-end models.

I think you misspoke; the 128k, IIfx and 8100 were all unequivocally top-end models at the time of release.

Re: Apple Is Listening

#282

Post by kitsunesoba »

nl wrote: post #265
linguae wrote: post #162

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unfortunately Apple has no direct options for users of pre-2019 Mac Pros who were able to afford them at the previous entry level price of $2999 but not at the $5999 price point, which is the price of the new base model Mac Pro. Apple no longer sells any user-serviceable computers under $5999. And even if the iMac Pro met their needs, the iMac Pro would still be too expensive at $4999. These users will either have to…

The Mac Mini is a great substitute for the old Mac Pro is they really want user serviceability. You can configure it up to a 3.2GHz i7 with 64G RAM and 2TB SSD for around that $2999 price (I'm in Australia so I can't check, but it's AUD$3500 which is less than US$2999). The (non-Pro) iMac is a great substitute if they don't want user serviceability.

The problem with the mini and iMac (both varieties) is the GPU, which is too weak for many. External GPU via TB3 is a cool idea but it’s bottlenecked compared to raw PCI-E, which isn’t ideal.

I personally don’t even care if it’s AMD instead of Nvidia, I just want stronger card options. The fact that the GPU in the top config iMac Pro is just on par with my now-old 980Ti really sours it.

Note that I’m saying this as a long time Mac user and iOS dev using a hackintosh tower alongside a couple of MacBooks.

Re: Apple Is Listening

#283

Post by [deleted] »

_ph_ wrote: post #190
saagarjha wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What's wrong with Mac Mini or iMac Pro?

The Mac Mini got a nice refresh, but it is still limited in CPU, has no real GPU, doesn't have much drive space. So to turn it into a nice deskop machine, you have to get an external GPU enclosure and an external drive bay. At which point the whole desk is covered by computer parts stringed together. Makes any beige box look elegant in comparison. I really wonder when someone makes a box which has slots for a graphic…

[deleted]

Re: Apple Is Listening

#284

Post by nexensis »

ohiovr wrote: post #235
linguae wrote: post #28

I’m glad that Apple is finally updating their Macs again, but at the same time Apple has doubled-down on its refusal to sell user-serviceable, upgradeable, and expandable hardware at prices that are within reach for most customers. The laptops have soldered RAM and soldered storage. The Mac Mini and iMac Pro thankfully have DIMMs, but in order to keep the warranty, you have to visit an Apple-approved repair center to…

I got scared and fed up with Windows 10 and retreated to Mac OS for 5 years until I had a fiasco of a time trying to upgrade my mac pro to Mojave. During the time I used Mac OS I became familiar with Bash and some Unix ways of doing things. I found Bash to be really useful and powerful compared to the command interpreter in Windows. I had a big interest in virtualization and along the years of using the mac I tried a…

I was worried about all of the above when switching to Arch (Manjaro KDE) from Windows as a web developer/CGI artist/graphic designer, however it's been easier than expected and I've decided to stick with it. Maybe these programs are worth your time:

DaVinci Resolve for video/audio editing on Linux, which has a great free version and may be the best editing software on the market for any platform. I've done a few professional jobs with it and greatly preferred it to Adobe Premiere/After Effects/Audition. Highly recommended.

Krita is great for photo editing/digital painting and Inkscape does a good job of replacing Illustrator for most uses. GIMP is still unbearable for professional use. This is the biggest gap in quality software for me - nothing can truly replace Photoshop, Lightroom, Illustrator or InDesign yet.

Figma is perfect for UI design/wireframing/prototyping and has a fully featured web app.

Blender is insanely powerful for free software these days (see Next Gen on Netflix for a feature-length movie created entirely in Blender) and Octane/Redshift render engines are available for industry quality 3D images.

VSCode handles all of my web development and native Linux terminals are much, much faster than WSL when installing and running tools like Webpack, Gulp etc.

LibreOffice covers 99% of use cases and looks pretty slick with a good theme, however I use Google Docs or Office 365 to ensure compatibility with clients' machines.

Re: Apple Is Listening

#285

Post by kitsunesoba »

unicornfinder wrote: post #227
auggierose wrote: post #220

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Get a Mac-Mini, 8-core with 64GB Ram, and an eGPU. You will have no problem hitting that $3500 target, make it $4000 for a fantastic eGPU. Also, why are you refusing to look at the iMac Pro? Best machine I ever had.

The Mac mini caps out at a 6 core.

Mac Mini also uses a laptop CPU, which takes a notable performance hit compared desktop CPUs.

Re: Apple Is Listening

#286

Post by kurtisc »

piokoch wrote: post #217
Angostura wrote: post #182

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Actually, I'm in the middle of writing an e-mail to the Tim address at Apple, saying that if it takes the environment seriously (and I commend them on what they have done so far) they really need to take the next step, be truly 'courageous' and prioritise repairability and expandability in their forthcoming products. Apple in the last 20 pushed the boundaries in terms of sleek and slim, but I argue those are last cen…

Tim from Apple is paying money to its PR department that gives away money to "green" organizations exactly to be able not to do anything that would really matter for our planet (and would hurt Apple income). Imagine Tim from Apple shows up on the stage and tells people that there is no good reason to switch to the new phone model every 2 years. It will not happen. I have many "progressive", "pro-eco" friends who just…

>I am trying to explain them that cars are not growing on trees and producing a new one is not really that environment friendly and that during past 10 years cars were not improved so much in terms of CO2 emission to justify the change

If anyone else is wondering, I think you're right about this. I've looked into it and there are a few people who've tried to tackle the question of what's better but I find they all have some problem with the assumptions they make, largely because it's just a difficult problem with a lot of variables. Mileage, age of each vehicle, expected life of each vehicle, what emissions can be attributed to production, whether to include emissions of the inefficiencies of recycling one but not the other, etc.

I decided that a new eco-friendly car and a similar old used car were close enough in emissions - i.e. within the same magnitude - that it wasn't worth it if it's your only reason for spending the money on a new car. What's far more effective is reducing mileage done in a car.

Re: Apple Is Listening

#287

Post by scarface74 »

holy_city wrote: post #135
scarface74 wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because Intel hasn’t created a consumer processor that is significantly faster than what they did in 2013 that means Apple isn’t listening? What hardware (besides a reliable keyboard) could Apple ship in a laptop in 2019 that would make it a worthy upgrade?

9th gen Intel processors perform significantly better in benchmarks than 4th gen Intels that were available in 2013. Not to mention, benchmarks are half the story - modern Intel mobile processors are significantly more efficient. As to what Apple could do with the hardware, the 2019 MBP outperforms 2018 MBPs in real world benchmarks due to its better cooling and some under the hood stuff in Mojave that is unclear. Th…

I’m not saying they aren’t “better”. The point is they aren’t “better enough” to be worth the upgrade for the original poster. If the iMac I described doesn’t give him enough of a speed boost to make it worthwhile to upgrade, neither would the newest MacBook Pro.

Re: Apple Is Listening

#288

Post by oldgradstudent »

root_axis wrote: post #103
RickSanchez2600 wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

With Apple making the Mac Pro so expensive it opens up the grey market for Hackintosh PCs to run MacOS at a fraction of the cost. If Apple wants to beat the Hackintosh they need an ATX based Mac that doesn't cost $5999 but more like $999 that can be upgraded with a better graphics card and etc.

Hackintosh is fun for a tinkerer but not really practical for someone that just needs to get work done. I say this as someone who dislikes macOS and has tried the hackintosh approach in an attempt to build iOS apps without having to buy a mac. You can make it work, but it's a big pain and all bets are off when an update comes down the line.

I know a few people who work from home as freelancers in the visual effects industry around here. They are all rabid Apple fanboys/fangirls, owned pre-trashcan Mac Pros, but just couldn't stomach the trashcan version. They all switched to Hackintosh or Windows in the last few years.

Even for technically challenged artists, it is not difficult because there are several technicians around here that install Hackintosh machines for this industry and update them from time to time. Their names are passed by word-of-mouth.

The bigger production houses will probably buy the new Mac Pros, but the entire freelance sector will keep their Hackintoshes or move to Windows. The pricing is just crazy.

Re: Apple Is Listening

#289

Post by mark_l_watson »

Nice rig! In a way I guess I am happy that they don’t have CUDA/deep learning support so I am not tempted to buy one.

It pays for Apple to provide very fast dev machines to support iOS and macOS platforms, and my Dad has been waiting for a new release to support 3D animation and video production.

Re: Apple Is Listening

#290

Post by whywhywhywhy »

secstate wrote: post #6

I think I might just be done with Apple. That culture of saying nothing and the surprising customers with things is like betting in Vegas. And unfortunately for Apple, the house always wins. They can repair the damage of the Mac Pro debacle with a new Mac Pro, but they haven't owned the train wreck of a keyboard on the Macbook Pro. Sure, they might be ready to hit it big on a double down on black, but in the meantime…

Thing is with the keyboard, they've had several opportunities to fix it but it would be very expensive to do so, would require the machine being almost entirely re-engineered because the design hinges so much on that specific keyboard clearance.

It's clear now that they're unwilling redesign their machine ahead of schedule and are happy to ship a below standard and still very expensive device for the 3-4 years spec'd out for this design rather than swallow the cost a redesign would take.

They know Mac users will live with it, what choice do they have?

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