I'm not sure how people could have missed that! They where pretty clear onstage that this was an early reveal of what they have coming. Probably also a sign that Mac Pro sales suck right now.
The real introduction will be later this year and that is when Apple will present its position clearly. We will have to wait and see.
Well if you follow the rest of WWDC I think you will find their position is pretty clear, pro support isn't going away. In fact they are addressing long standing issues with OS/X. Mavericks is as big of a deal for professionals as is this new Mac Pro.
I'd like to side step the processor discussion a bit to question build costs. I'm really seeing this as an easy to produce machine. Extrusions certainly have their costs associated with them but that is offset somewhat by the chips needing cooling solutions anyways. The single fan and other features would cut parts costs but also assembly costs. I'm seeing a machine that Apple will be able to build very cost competitively maybe even at a significant advantage over traditional systems.
So even with the custom extrusion and other unique parts, I can see this machine being cheaper than some alternatives. You look at a standard PCI Express based GPU card these days and you see huge heat sinks and often multiple fans to try to keep the chips cool in traditional PC enclosures. All of this structure goes away. The same thing happens to the CPU cooling apparatus. Three sets of cooling hardware replaced with one heat sink and a fan. A piece that also takes on other structural duties. In the end I could see this machine impacting cost to produce by hundreds of dollars. The savings should be enough to allow Apple to price the machine very competitively while retaining nice margins.
This is why I'm optimistic about pricing. The Mac Pro won't be cheap but I see an opportunity here to surprise people. This machine could be more affordable than people think.
That is actually interesting, although Apple can still do anything with it in terms of market strategy. I mentioned component sharing because that is the only possible significant point of savings in using i7s, and it only really covers 1 cpu. The othe thing that always comes up is ECC ram. In 2003 ECC alone meant a much higher cost. I'm going to say the base configuration is likely to be 8GB as 4x 2GB dimms. I say that because it's the lowest feasible amount with quad channel ram. The Mac Pro is fairly conservative in terms of how many fans are employed. They are larger ones, which helps the machine quiet. In terms of margins, the margins on the lower models may have been higher than average even for Apple, just looking at what they used. They might have some amount of leverage to adjust price points around their overall strategy. Depending on their choices, I could see it starting as low as $2k. I couldn't see it lower than that. A major problem of the current machine was that it didn't offer enough in terms of performance to justify that initial gap. It offered some amount of customization in case users were already invested in accompanying solutions. It offered more hard drive bays internally. The dual versions were also much more cost effective if you needed a lot of memory. 4GB dimms weren't that cheap in 2009. 8GB dimms didn't become truly cheap until 2012.
I'm still curious about the overall product strategy. Using 2600s to get access to the higher core counts means added logic board costs and more expensive cpus. You would probably get higher performance per dollar with 2 lower core count cpus of the same class. I don't think we're going to see 12 core E5-1600s. They capped out at 6 cores with Sandy Bridge EP where 2600s (I often mistakenly quote 2400s which are ENs) capped at 8 cores. I'm still kind of waiting to see a complete picture. My prior mini - rant was mostly that I'm tired of seeing people scapegoat Xeons or $50 (retail) worth of ECC ram like they represent the crux of an overall pricing strategy.
I'm not sure how people could have missed that! They where pretty clear onstage that this was an early reveal of what they have coming. Probably also a sign that Mac Pro sales suck right now.
Probably lots of people were panicking, despite knowing that Tim said last year that one was coming later this year. They were pretty obviously waiting for TB2 so they didn't release it only to have it be out of date too soon.
Well if you follow the rest of WWDC I think you will find their position is pretty clear, pro support isn't going away. In fact they are addressing long standing issues with OS/X. Mavericks is as big of a deal for professionals as is this new Mac Pro.
Correct. I was only looking at the one device for sake of brevity... but Apple is more than just hardware. (understatement of the century, perhaps)
Mavericks looks awesome and might lead me to finally set up multiple displays. Now to find desk space....
- - - - -
Now if TB or TB would be able to link two Macs that are both booted from a start disk. At the moment, my workflow has me sending a job to a mini over wifi (just a simple file and audio), rendering HD video, shutting down, restarting in target mode and transferring the finished video back over TB. or even using a portable USB3 drive. Is there a different way that I have missed?
The new WiFi would possibly make this a bit easier, but all my machines are old.
There will be no mac pro server room with these goofy things...No reasonable shelving accommodations, cooling would be a nightmare and thats just the top two - in a real data center enviornment, everything that could be moved from OSX to Windows or Linux should be, and if something absolutely _MUST_ run on OSX Server, Minis would be a better option - and can do just about any server task fairly well...and if you want a render node/farm, you would be insane to buy these, you cant swap out the GPUs, you cant add Tesla (Hell you cant use any Nvidia parts) Give me $6000 at HP+Newegg and I will build you something far better than the Mac Pro sexy trash can edition...
Apple don't make enterprise servers any more - didn't you get the hint when they changed OS X Server from a fully standalone OS to just an app that you install on top of normal OS X? Steve Jobs even said (when they discontinued Xserve) "No one was buying them."
They only make SOHO servers in the form of the Mac mini, in fact in one of the developer talks this week they used exactly that as an example: discussing a small software business that had a Mac mini as their server, and how the new version of OS X Server app includes Xcode services to enable this.
Also note that OS X Mavericks changes the default file sharing protocol on the client from AFP to SMB2, in other words they expect OS X to be talking to Windows servers more than Apple ones.
For those that are Apple developers, the Foundry/Pixar lunchtime talk mentioned in the keynote, 'Painting the Future', is now up on the developers website…
Come see the new Mac Pro in action…!!!
Thanks for the heads up! A fun talk for people who like animation and want to see the new Mac Pro in action. You can really appreciate how small it is too. Unfortunately he starts with MARI already loaded so you can't get a feel for how fast the Flash is.
That is actually interesting, although Apple can still do anything with it in terms of market strategy. I mentioned component sharing because that is the only possible significant point of savings in using i7s, and it only really covers 1 cpu. The othe thing that always comes up is ECC ram. In 2003 ECC alone meant a much higher cost. I'm going to say the base configuration is likely to be 8GB as 4x 2GB dimms. I say that because it's the lowest feasible amount with quad channel ram. The Mac Pro is fairly conservative in terms of how many fans are employed. They are larger ones, which helps the machine quiet. In terms of margins, the margins on the lower models may have been higher than average even for Apple, just looking at what they used. They might have some amount of leverage to adjust price points around their overall strategy.
Well they have refactored products before. The Air is a perfect example here. The new product gives them the opportunity to restructure pricing.
Depending on their choices, I could see it starting as low as $2k. I couldn't see it lower than that. A major problem of the current machine was that it didn't offer enough in terms of performance to justify that initial gap. It offered some amount of customization in case users were already invested in accompanying solutions. It offered more hard drive bays internally. The dual versions were also much more cost effective if you needed a lot of memory. 4GB dimms weren't that cheap in 2009. 8GB dimms didn't become truly cheap until 2012.
I'm actually hoping the base machine implements 4GB DIMMS.
I'm still curious about the overall product strategy. Using 2600s to get access to the higher core counts means added logic board costs and more expensive cpus. You would probably get higher performance per dollar with 2 lower core count cpus of the same class.
Undoubtably however the design of this machine would lend itself to multiple motherboards. I could see a E3 based machine for example. Such a machine would allow for very competive pricing for an entry level machine when coupled with lower end GPUs.
I don't think we're going to see 12 core E5-1600s. They capped out at 6 cores with Sandy Bridge EP where 2600s (I often mistakenly quote 2400s which are ENs) capped at 8 cores. I'm still kind of waiting to see a complete picture.
Frankly I don't know what Intel is up to here. We probably won't get more cores until the next process shrink.
My prior mini - rant was mostly that I'm tired of seeing people scapegoat Xeons or $50 (retail) worth of ECC ram like they represent the crux of an overall pricing strategy.
The pricing strategy is something only Apple can address. I can see Apple maintaining good margins even with a lower pricing point. However good margins doesn't mean raping the customer like the old Mac Pros do.
Probably lots of people were panicking, despite knowing that Tim said last year that one was coming later this year. They were pretty obviously waiting for TB2 so they didn't release it only to have it be out of date too soon.
Well that and the obvious speed difference which can make or break a new machine like this. I'm really hoping the MBP delay is partially related to TB2 too.
Correct. I was only looking at the one device for sake of brevity... but Apple is more than just hardware. (understatement of the century, perhaps)
Mavericks looks awesome and might lead me to finally set up multiple displays. Now to find desk space.... :)
Mavericks looks like a huge update. It is so big i have to wonder how many revs after release will be required to delete the bugs.
- - - - -
Now if TB or TB would be able to link two Macs that are both booted from a start disk. At the moment, my workflow has me sending a job to a mini over wifi (just a simple file and audio), rendering HD video, shutting down, restarting in target mode and transferring the finished video back over TB. or even using a portable USB3 drive. Is there a different way that I have missed?
There are multiple ways. You could setup shared directories, mount them and copy files that way. You could setup an FTP server and use that to transfer files. You could use SSH File Transfer Protocol
It is safe to say I'm not an expert on any of these, you might want to post in the software forums for better ideas. In any event you should be able to transfer files back and forth with little effort. WiFi may be slow though
The new WiFi would possibly make this a bit easier, but all my machines are old.
Real old fashion Ethernet would do wonders too. Much faster and far more reliable.
I'm actually hoping the base machine implements 4GB DIMMS.
That could happen too. It's usually the least memory that will fill all channels for testing and make the thing boot. If 16 is cto, it might not cost that much.
Quote:
Undoubtably however the design of this machine would lend itself to multiple motherboards. I could see a E3 based machine for example. Such a machine would allow for very competive pricing for an entry level machine when coupled with lower end GPUs.
That is the one case where an i5/i7 strategy might work, if they wanted to do a direct transplant of an imac board due to a larger volume discount on those parts than I would realistically anticipate. The only potential cost savings would be sharing parts. Otherwise it's not as big a savings as you think. There are $300 cpu options on either, especially if they are using that daughterboard design again to restrict the use of expensive parts to the higher end models. In that scenario it shouldn't cost more than E3s at all to produce that model. If you were on newegg putting something together, it would be along the lines of a $300 cpu and a $250 motherboard. Thunderbolt might add to that, but I can't see them dropping it. E3s would probably get 1 thunderbolt port. They are basically i5/i7s models with 20 lanes instead of 16 and a few other things adjusted. I guess my point is I don't see a lot of difference between high end E3 and low end E5 in price unless it somehow adds to a volume discount on one thing without detracting from the economy of scale on another.
Quote:
Frankly I don't know what Intel is up to here. We probably won't get more cores until the next process shrink.
They're more conservative on core count. with the single types. Like Apple they go for little overlap. The gaff with westmere might have been that they counted on E3s to make up the difference. They might go as high as 8 on 1600s. I couldn't see them going higher. It's definitely less cost effective to go for one really high core chip than 2 lower ones. Assuming a similar pricing model to what we have with Sandy EPs, you would reach 16-20 cores with 2 cpus for less than 12 on one. It's possible that thunderbolt was more difficult to implement on a dual model, and that seems like it was a priority. It gets too much credit though. It's not the only way to daisy chain displays or add a usb hub to a display.
Quote:
The pricing strategy is something only Apple can address. I can see Apple maintaining good margins even with a lower pricing point. However good margins doesn't mean raping the customer like the old Mac Pros do.
Well yeah. I think it's important to realize that rather than sift through the case for things that cost $2 more than some of their alternatives.
Now if TB or TB would be able to link two Macs that are both booted from a start disk. At the moment, my workflow has me sending a job to a mini over wifi (just a simple file and audio), rendering HD video, shutting down, restarting in target mode and transferring the finished video back over TB. or even using a portable USB3 drive. Is there a different way that I have missed?
The new WiFi would possibly make this a bit easier, but all my machines are old.
Yes, but it would be mildly expensive.
You would want the following:
One TB RAID (call it $1000)
Two TB to 10GbE adapter (call it $1000)
One Mini running XSAN or XTenSAN (free if you buy the ATTO Thunderlink 10GbE adapter)
One 10GbE switch ($500 for a cheapo one)
Then XSAN to the mini host via 10GbE from the iMac. I think you can just use GigE for the other mini's to save on money on the TB to 10GbE adapter at the expense of slower disk access on those mini's. On the plus side, the iMac to XSAN host Mini has a dedicated 10GbE link. Not as good as a native thunderbolt connection because of the network overhead but none too shabby.
I'm thinking it's not worth $3000 to you to do this. Maybe when TB2 comes out folks will sell their TB1 gear and you can get used TB to 10GbE adapters for $250-$300 that might be more viable.
It might be worth your while to try the Seagate GoFlex Thunderbolt route so you can sneakernet drives easier. Stock USB3 (or FW500 if the Minis are that old) 3TB GoFlex drives on the Minis ($119 amazon) and a TB GoFlex base ($149) on the iMac for a little more speed on the transfers. Beats having to shut down the mini and going into target disk mode every time.
If you're feeling rich you can buy 1TB SSDs ($600 each) to some of the HDDs in the GoFlex drives for more performance. I don't recall if the GoFlex chassis were hard to open.
[...] This machine could easily become one of Apples best selling machines in history.
The sales numbers for this model, unless really low, will be all but meaningless. It's been so long since Apple updated the Pro that people will be buying them just to have SOMETHING. They'll have to really hate it (or the price) to NOT buy it. There's a backlog of demand for a powerful Mac.
To confirm: Apple's web site states quite explicitly that it will use Xeons. End of conjecture.
Moving on...
That response had nothing to do with what they would use, just the fallacy that a $300 i7 costs less than a $300 Xeon. Typically the fabricated costs in these assumptions place an excessive value on logic board costs, ram, and implementation. That is why I find them irritating. Anyway if the model sells well in relative terms, it could be around for some time.
Well they have refactored products before. The Air is a perfect example here. The new product gives them the opportunity to restructure pricing.
Restructure pricing for the whole desktop line I hope.
Taking out the Mini, the price of entry for Apple products has definitely risen since '08. The desktop line should be much cheaper. I think the new Air looks far better value than a Mini. How can an entry iMac be more expensive? It didn't used to be this way.
I'd like to see an entry iMac brought back under 1k...starting at £795 with the next at £995 with the 27 incher starting at £1195 top model no more than £1495...WITH the i7 and top GPU included. Not going to happen though.
...and I'd like to see the Mac Pro start at £1295 with them dropping margins for that model for marketing purposes and getting people onto the Pro ladder. That isn't 'cheap' compared to many PC towers. Apple doesn't do 'cheap.'
'Money isn't everything.' Steve Jobs. Maybe so. But many who want Apple kit and as we sit in the bowels of a world depression...and can't afford it, they save harder, longer...it's swings and rounds abouts. They don't have to be dirt cheap. (That won't happen...though they did £399 the iPad when many thought it would be £1000...hell 'can' freeze over...) They can 'Cube' the pricing with obvious results or(!) learn from that.
It's time they brought 'Pro' pricing back to 'Earth' so that mortals can buy it. It's not like they'll be able to afford the 'top end' model. That's going to be wayyyy over £2k. We get that. It's always been that way for the top model. But they could go some way to democratizing the Mac Pro market once more with the entry model. I'd like to see at least two models below £2k. And two models above 2K.
[...] This machine could easily become one of Apples best selling machines in history.
How many it sells is up to Apple.
Starting at £2045 inc Vat. That's not going to generate volume to broaden this model. Upping the price of the entry Pro has no doubt pushed people to the mid to upper tier iMac. (Maybe that was there intention or not.) Or they just go PC. Or did.
Back when Apple kickstarted their design revolution, the iMac hovered over £1000inc vat. It went on to have about 3 models below £1k!!!
There was a time when you had a 'tower' from Apple under 2k. At least two models under £2k.
And yes. That was under Jobs.
I do think their desktop model pricing has got out of whack in the last 4 years.
The glass ceiling on growth vs Windows has definitely slowed. Partly recession, partly pricing, partly pads...and phones etc.
I'd like to see them throw the rule book out on pricing the next Pro.
Let's get two iMacs below £1k. Let's get two Pro's under £2k. Let's get the Mini under £500 were it belongs for something without a goddamn k/b, mouse and screen.
There was a time when you had a 'tower' from Apple under 2k. At least two models under £2k.
And yes. That was under Jobs.
But it was also a different time. These days if you want a basic email and web browsing experience, get a tablet. Computers are for pros and so their prices (and specs!) are going up.
Comments
Well if you follow the rest of WWDC I think you will find their position is pretty clear, pro support isn't going away. In fact they are addressing long standing issues with OS/X. Mavericks is as big of a deal for professionals as is this new Mac Pro.
Quote:
Originally Posted by wizard69
I'd like to side step the processor discussion a bit to question build costs. I'm really seeing this as an easy to produce machine. Extrusions certainly have their costs associated with them but that is offset somewhat by the chips needing cooling solutions anyways. The single fan and other features would cut parts costs but also assembly costs. I'm seeing a machine that Apple will be able to build very cost competitively maybe even at a significant advantage over traditional systems.
So even with the custom extrusion and other unique parts, I can see this machine being cheaper than some alternatives. You look at a standard PCI Express based GPU card these days and you see huge heat sinks and often multiple fans to try to keep the chips cool in traditional PC enclosures. All of this structure goes away. The same thing happens to the CPU cooling apparatus. Three sets of cooling hardware replaced with one heat sink and a fan. A piece that also takes on other structural duties. In the end I could see this machine impacting cost to produce by hundreds of dollars. The savings should be enough to allow Apple to price the machine very competitively while retaining nice margins.
This is why I'm optimistic about pricing. The Mac Pro won't be cheap but I see an opportunity here to surprise people. This machine could be more affordable than people think.
That is actually interesting, although Apple can still do anything with it in terms of market strategy. I mentioned component sharing because that is the only possible significant point of savings in using i7s, and it only really covers 1 cpu. The othe thing that always comes up is ECC ram. In 2003 ECC alone meant a much higher cost. I'm going to say the base configuration is likely to be 8GB as 4x 2GB dimms. I say that because it's the lowest feasible amount with quad channel ram. The Mac Pro is fairly conservative in terms of how many fans are employed. They are larger ones, which helps the machine quiet. In terms of margins, the margins on the lower models may have been higher than average even for Apple, just looking at what they used. They might have some amount of leverage to adjust price points around their overall strategy. Depending on their choices, I could see it starting as low as $2k. I couldn't see it lower than that. A major problem of the current machine was that it didn't offer enough in terms of performance to justify that initial gap. It offered some amount of customization in case users were already invested in accompanying solutions. It offered more hard drive bays internally. The dual versions were also much more cost effective if you needed a lot of memory. 4GB dimms weren't that cheap in 2009. 8GB dimms didn't become truly cheap until 2012.
I'm still curious about the overall product strategy. Using 2600s to get access to the higher core counts means added logic board costs and more expensive cpus. You would probably get higher performance per dollar with 2 lower core count cpus of the same class. I don't think we're going to see 12 core E5-1600s. They capped out at 6 cores with Sandy Bridge EP where 2600s (I often mistakenly quote 2400s which are ENs) capped at 8 cores. I'm still kind of waiting to see a complete picture. My prior mini - rant was mostly that I'm tired of seeing people scapegoat Xeons or $50 (retail) worth of ECC ram like they represent the crux of an overall pricing strategy.
On another note, incoming litigation against trash can manufacturers
http://kotaku.com/garbage-can-that-looks-like-the-mac-pro-is-a-hot-item-i-513060072
Don't read into this. It just made me laugh.
Originally Posted by wizard69
I'm not sure how people could have missed that! They where pretty clear onstage that this was an early reveal of what they have coming. Probably also a sign that Mac Pro sales suck right now.
Probably lots of people were panicking, despite knowing that Tim said last year that one was coming later this year. They were pretty obviously waiting for TB2 so they didn't release it only to have it be out of date too soon.
Well if you follow the rest of WWDC I think you will find their position is pretty clear, pro support isn't going away. In fact they are addressing long standing issues with OS/X. Mavericks is as big of a deal for professionals as is this new Mac Pro.
Correct. I was only looking at the one device for sake of brevity... but Apple is more than just hardware. (understatement of the century, perhaps)
Mavericks looks awesome and might lead me to finally set up multiple displays. Now to find desk space....
- - - - -
Now if TB or TB would be able to link two Macs that are both booted from a start disk. At the moment, my workflow has me sending a job to a mini over wifi (just a simple file and audio), rendering HD video, shutting down, restarting in target mode and transferring the finished video back over TB. or even using a portable USB3 drive. Is there a different way that I have missed?
The new WiFi would possibly make this a bit easier, but all my machines are old.
Quote:
Originally Posted by a_greer
There will be no mac pro server room with these goofy things...No reasonable shelving accommodations, cooling would be a nightmare and thats just the top two - in a real data center enviornment, everything that could be moved from OSX to Windows or Linux should be, and if something absolutely _MUST_ run on OSX Server, Minis would be a better option - and can do just about any server task fairly well...and if you want a render node/farm, you would be insane to buy these, you cant swap out the GPUs, you cant add Tesla (Hell you cant use any Nvidia parts) Give me $6000 at HP+Newegg and I will build you something far better than the Mac Pro sexy trash can edition...
Apple don't make enterprise servers any more - didn't you get the hint when they changed OS X Server from a fully standalone OS to just an app that you install on top of normal OS X? Steve Jobs even said (when they discontinued Xserve) "No one was buying them."
They only make SOHO servers in the form of the Mac mini, in fact in one of the developer talks this week they used exactly that as an example: discussing a small software business that had a Mac mini as their server, and how the new version of OS X Server app includes Xcode services to enable this.
Also note that OS X Mavericks changes the default file sharing protocol on the client from AFP to SMB2, in other words they expect OS X to be talking to Windows servers more than Apple ones.
Quote:
Originally Posted by MacRonin
For those that are Apple developers, the Foundry/Pixar lunchtime talk mentioned in the keynote, 'Painting the Future', is now up on the developers website…
Come see the new Mac Pro in action…!!!
Thanks for the heads up! A fun talk for people who like animation and want to see the new Mac Pro in action. You can really appreciate how small it is too. Unfortunately he starts with MARI already loaded so you can't get a feel for how fast the Flash is.
It is safe to say I'm not an expert on any of these, you might want to post in the software forums for better ideas. In any event you should be able to transfer files back and forth with little effort. WiFi may be slow though Real old fashion Ethernet would do wonders too. Much faster and far more reliable.
Quote:
Originally Posted by wizard69
I'm actually hoping the base machine implements 4GB DIMMS.
That could happen too. It's usually the least memory that will fill all channels for testing and make the thing boot. If 16 is cto, it might not cost that much.
Quote:
Undoubtably however the design of this machine would lend itself to multiple motherboards. I could see a E3 based machine for example. Such a machine would allow for very competive pricing for an entry level machine when coupled with lower end GPUs.
That is the one case where an i5/i7 strategy might work, if they wanted to do a direct transplant of an imac board due to a larger volume discount on those parts than I would realistically anticipate. The only potential cost savings would be sharing parts. Otherwise it's not as big a savings as you think. There are $300 cpu options on either, especially if they are using that daughterboard design again to restrict the use of expensive parts to the higher end models. In that scenario it shouldn't cost more than E3s at all to produce that model. If you were on newegg putting something together, it would be along the lines of a $300 cpu and a $250 motherboard. Thunderbolt might add to that, but I can't see them dropping it. E3s would probably get 1 thunderbolt port. They are basically i5/i7s models with 20 lanes instead of 16 and a few other things adjusted. I guess my point is I don't see a lot of difference between high end E3 and low end E5 in price unless it somehow adds to a volume discount on one thing without detracting from the economy of scale on another.
Quote:
Frankly I don't know what Intel is up to here. We probably won't get more cores until the next process shrink.
They're more conservative on core count. with the single types. Like Apple they go for little overlap. The gaff with westmere might have been that they counted on E3s to make up the difference. They might go as high as 8 on 1600s. I couldn't see them going higher. It's definitely less cost effective to go for one really high core chip than 2 lower ones. Assuming a similar pricing model to what we have with Sandy EPs, you would reach 16-20 cores with 2 cpus for less than 12 on one. It's possible that thunderbolt was more difficult to implement on a dual model, and that seems like it was a priority. It gets too much credit though. It's not the only way to daisy chain displays or add a usb hub to a display.
Quote:
The pricing strategy is something only Apple can address. I can see Apple maintaining good margins even with a lower pricing point. However good margins doesn't mean raping the customer like the old Mac Pros do.
Well yeah. I think it's important to realize that rather than sift through the case for things that cost $2 more than some of their alternatives.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Bergermeister
Now if TB or TB would be able to link two Macs that are both booted from a start disk. At the moment, my workflow has me sending a job to a mini over wifi (just a simple file and audio), rendering HD video, shutting down, restarting in target mode and transferring the finished video back over TB. or even using a portable USB3 drive. Is there a different way that I have missed?
The new WiFi would possibly make this a bit easier, but all my machines are old.
Yes, but it would be mildly expensive.
You would want the following:
One TB RAID (call it $1000)
Two TB to 10GbE adapter (call it $1000)
One Mini running XSAN or XTenSAN (free if you buy the ATTO Thunderlink 10GbE adapter)
One 10GbE switch ($500 for a cheapo one)
Then XSAN to the mini host via 10GbE from the iMac. I think you can just use GigE for the other mini's to save on money on the TB to 10GbE adapter at the expense of slower disk access on those mini's. On the plus side, the iMac to XSAN host Mini has a dedicated 10GbE link. Not as good as a native thunderbolt connection because of the network overhead but none too shabby.
I'm thinking it's not worth $3000 to you to do this. Maybe when TB2 comes out folks will sell their TB1 gear and you can get used TB to 10GbE adapters for $250-$300 that might be more viable.
It might be worth your while to try the Seagate GoFlex Thunderbolt route so you can sneakernet drives easier. Stock USB3 (or FW500 if the Minis are that old) 3TB GoFlex drives on the Minis ($119 amazon) and a TB GoFlex base ($149) on the iMac for a little more speed on the transfers. Beats having to shut down the mini and going into target disk mode every time.
If you're feeling rich you can buy 1TB SSDs ($600 each) to some of the HDDs in the GoFlex drives for more performance. I don't recall if the GoFlex chassis were hard to open.
I think I'll stay with what I have for now!
So many decisions for later, though.
Quote:
Originally Posted by hmm
You really are clueless with this repeated i7 nonsense.
To confirm: Apple's web site states quite explicitly that it will use Xeons. End of conjecture.
Moving on...
Quote:
Originally Posted by wizard69
[...] This machine could easily become one of Apples best selling machines in history.
The sales numbers for this model, unless really low, will be all but meaningless. It's been so long since Apple updated the Pro that people will be buying them just to have SOMETHING. They'll have to really hate it (or the price) to NOT buy it. There's a backlog of demand for a powerful Mac.
Quote:
Originally Posted by v5v
To confirm: Apple's web site states quite explicitly that it will use Xeons. End of conjecture.
Moving on...
That response had nothing to do with what they would use, just the fallacy that a $300 i7 costs less than a $300 Xeon. Typically the fabricated costs in these assumptions place an excessive value on logic board costs, ram, and implementation. That is why I find them irritating. Anyway if the model sells well in relative terms, it could be around for some time.
Try spending over 3 grand for the beginning model newest mac pro.Worth it to you or not?
Quote:
Originally Posted by marvfox
Try spending over 3 grand for the beginning model newest mac pro.Worth it to you or not?
Yep.
My current iMac was $2949 without AppleCare. It is worth every penny because of the time saved working and the joy it brought over my older model.
The Mac Pro would be the same. A lot faster, a lot smoother, more enjoyable.
Quote:
Well they have refactored products before. The Air is a perfect example here. The new product gives them the opportunity to restructure pricing.
Restructure pricing for the whole desktop line I hope.
Taking out the Mini, the price of entry for Apple products has definitely risen since '08. The desktop line should be much cheaper. I think the new Air looks far better value than a Mini. How can an entry iMac be more expensive? It didn't used to be this way.
I'd like to see an entry iMac brought back under 1k...starting at £795 with the next at £995 with the 27 incher starting at £1195 top model no more than £1495...WITH the i7 and top GPU included. Not going to happen though.
...and I'd like to see the Mac Pro start at £1295 with them dropping margins for that model for marketing purposes and getting people onto the Pro ladder. That isn't 'cheap' compared to many PC towers. Apple doesn't do 'cheap.'
'Money isn't everything.' Steve Jobs. Maybe so. But many who want Apple kit and as we sit in the bowels of a world depression...and can't afford it, they save harder, longer...it's swings and rounds abouts. They don't have to be dirt cheap. (That won't happen...though they did £399 the iPad when many thought it would be £1000...hell 'can' freeze over...) They can 'Cube' the pricing with obvious results or(!) learn from that.
It's time they brought 'Pro' pricing back to 'Earth' so that mortals can buy it. It's not like they'll be able to afford the 'top end' model. That's going to be wayyyy over £2k. We get that. It's always been that way for the top model. But they could go some way to democratizing the Mac Pro market once more with the entry model. I'd like to see at least two models below £2k. And two models above 2K.
Lemon Bon Bon.
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[...] This machine could easily become one of Apples best selling machines in history.
How many it sells is up to Apple.
Starting at £2045 inc Vat. That's not going to generate volume to broaden this model. Upping the price of the entry Pro has no doubt pushed people to the mid to upper tier iMac. (Maybe that was there intention or not.) Or they just go PC. Or did.
Back when Apple kickstarted their design revolution, the iMac hovered over £1000inc vat. It went on to have about 3 models below £1k!!!
There was a time when you had a 'tower' from Apple under 2k. At least two models under £2k.
And yes. That was under Jobs.
I do think their desktop model pricing has got out of whack in the last 4 years.
The glass ceiling on growth vs Windows has definitely slowed. Partly recession, partly pricing, partly pads...and phones etc.
I'd like to see them throw the rule book out on pricing the next Pro.
Let's get two iMacs below £1k. Let's get two Pro's under £2k. Let's get the Mini under £500 were it belongs for something without a goddamn k/b, mouse and screen.
Lemon Bon Bon.
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The Mac Pro would be the same. A lot faster, a lot smoother, more enjoyable.
Ah, the joy of Vader Pro Mac sex...
Lemon Bon Bon.
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Originally Posted by Lemon Bon Bon.
There was a time when you had a 'tower' from Apple under 2k. At least two models under £2k.
And yes. That was under Jobs.
But it was also a different time. These days if you want a basic email and web browsing experience, get a tablet. Computers are for pros and so their prices (and specs!) are going up.