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Apple Is Listening

marco.org

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Re: Apple Is Listening

#321

Post by imagetic »

auggierose wrote: post #220
imagetic wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't work in Hollywood, but I work heavily in production engineering for television productions that work on A LOT of 8K RAW video and multicam where time is critical, we have days to edit where hollywood has months and multicam is pretty damn taxing vs how a lot of movies operate. Our budgets are a fraction of a hollywood production though. The base model Mac Pro isn't going to be doing much at all. The higher en…

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.

Serviceability of an iMac in a short deadline environment that is running close to 24/7 with sustained graphic and 8K renders / conversions. It's just not the right tool for the job. If I worked on single track edit with long deadline client work, like at an agency, I think it would be fine for most basic media stuff.

I'm fairly positive the iMac Pro would melt though. Even if it didn't melt at first, the load it lived under would greatly reduce the lifespan of the machine.

Re: Apple Is Listening

#322

Post by sigjuice »

jarjoura wrote: post #69

I think Apple released this Mac Pro & Display at the wrong event. From every indication, it was designed for Hollywood. Developers don't need expansion, but Audio and Video producers do! Announcing at an LA event for producers and artists would have cleared any confusion. It wasn't designed for AI or ML either, because Apple is having a war with NVidia now, probably over component pricing, but who knows. Developers d…

Apple announces whatever they want whenever they please. e.g. Apple Music was announced at WWDC 2015, which has nothing at all to do with developers.

Re: Apple Is Listening

#323

Post by imagetic »

auggierose wrote: post #220
imagetic wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't work in Hollywood, but I work heavily in production engineering for television productions that work on A LOT of 8K RAW video and multicam where time is critical, we have days to edit where hollywood has months and multicam is pretty damn taxing vs how a lot of movies operate. Our budgets are a fraction of a hollywood production though. The base model Mac Pro isn't going to be doing much at all. The higher en…

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.

eGPU isn't an option. Nvidia if you're working with RAW becomes pretty critical and the support for that was greatly reduced with Mojave. RTX cards have been a gamechanger for most of the work we do.

Re: Apple Is Listening

#324

Post by scarface74 »

analognoise wrote: post #316
scarface74 wrote: post #272

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well seeing that - none of the upgrades have been announced. - he didn’t say anything about specs besides the memory and processor - you can get third party RAM for the iMac Pro. So the question remains - what point was he trying to make? Unless he like the other poster was bundling the cost of the monitor with the Mac Pro as if you have to buy both.

The 6k config comes with dual Xeons? That might not be a bad deal. I thought that was the base configuration, with dual processors available as an upgrade. It says "up to 28 cores".

The base just says “8 core”. How many cores are per per processor?

But the point remains - with the specs that he quoted, unless he thinks that upgrading to 96GB of RAM and matching the core count is going to be more than $4000. What point is he trying to prove?

Re: Apple Is Listening

#325

Post by nl »

kitsunesoba wrote: post #282
nl wrote: post #265

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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…

The EGPUs do give pretty decent real world performance (although they are expensive).

https://www.google.com/amp/s/arstechnica.com/gadgets/2019/04...

Re: Apple Is Listening

#326

Post by scarface74 »

root_axis wrote: post #106
nixgeek wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

$5k in two weeks is $130k a year, you make ~$104k a year with some currency conversion. They’re not incredibly far apart.

In a world where you pay no taxes sure, in the real world it's closer to $160k a year and almost certainly more for someone living in Europe. Even if your math was correct, 30k a year at that income level is massive , that's an extra $1000 per pay period, definitely a brow-raising sum the first time you see that boost.

I mentioned how many hours a low paid 1099 contractor in Atlanta would have to work to pay for this. If I were a 1099 contractor, this would be a business expense - therefore pretax.

Re: Apple Is Listening

#327

Post by imagetic »

scarface74 wrote: post #320
imagetic wrote: post #121

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If they had done an 8-core i9'ish option with 64gb of RAM and an RTX card equivalent for $3500...I would hit the speed dial to my Apple sales rep.

The Core I9 versus the workstation class processors wouldn’t use the same motherboard. It’s not just a configurable option. I understand the desire for such an option. But that wasn’t the market they we’re designing for.

This is true, it's a hard comparison / wish because it's actually a different motherboard. But if Apple wants something, they can typically figure out how to get it.

Based on my years working in media, there is a much larger market for a well priced mid-range Mac Pro than the "you're only a pro if you can afford it" level workstation.

Re: Apple Is Listening

#328

Post by root_axis »

oldgradstudent wrote: post #288
root_axis wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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 m…

> 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.

Like I said, it can work, but relying on "word of mouth technicians" isn't very practical. There are also times when, after an update, things just break, and the "technician" may not even be able to fix the issue in a timely fashion, especially issues related to sound or QE/CI. I've done enough digging around and tinkering with kext files and video drivers to know that it can sometimes take days of concerted effort to fix these issues. I'm sure mileage varies depending on one's needs or the particular hardware configuration but you're rolling the dice every time you update.

Re: Apple Is Listening

#329

Post by Balgair »

jasonkester wrote: post #147
colmvp wrote: post #10

Back in 2012, I bought the original rMBP. It fit everything I needed: it was thinner than my previous laptop as it had no optical drive, it was lightweight, it had a gorgeous screen, good enough keyboard, and seemed like a reasonable price for a higher end laptop work computer. I've used it everyday since 2012, and aside from the battery which I eventually replaced, it's been functioning without a hitch. From the 90s…

The worrying part is that in order to keep using the good MacBooks from the past, you need to keep them on the OS version that they shipped with. I have a 2012 MacBook Air that was crazy fast, weighed four grams, and even ran windows 7. Sure, the drive was small, but it was perfect. But some time in 2015 or so I made the terrible strategic blunder of upgrading to the latest OS version. Performance immediately dropped…

For other HNers, Apple intentionally slows down their older versions via updates. They've been fined for this in a variety of countries and courts in the last few years.

From Oct 2018: https://www.cnet.com/news/apple-and-samsung-fined-for-slowin...

It's straightforward to find other sources and examples.

Generally, you are correct, try to avoid updates after the first few months of purchase.

Re: Apple Is Listening

#330

Post by jammygit »

PascLeRasc wrote: post #295
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…

You can protest by using a Hackintosh. I'm sure Apple's aware of how big the Hackintosh community has become and I think it's part of the reason we're seeing niceties like upgradable RAM on the new Mini and iMacs.

Or Ubuntu
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