iMac Pro arrives at Apple's retail stores
Customers who can afford its $4,999 pricetag may now be able to find the 8-core base model of the iMac Pro in some U.S. Apple stores, ready for pickup.
Apple had originally told the press that units could be on store shelves as soon as last week. Online orders began arriving Dec. 27.
Shoppers should check Apple's pickup availability before heading out, as some places still don't have the computer in stock. In those cases, outlets are typically quoting Jan. 11 as the next possible pickup date.
The default Pro also comes with 32 gigabytes of RAM, 1 terabyte of SSD storage, and AMD's 8-gigabyte Radeon Pro Vega 56 video card. Many upgrade options are available, such as a 10-core CPU, but 14- and 18-core machines aren't shipping until next month.
Aimed mainly at people doing tasks like 3D rendering, simulations, and video editing, the Pro is easily one of the more expensive products in Apple history. A top-end 18-core configuration will cost as much as $13,199.
Those looking to save on an iMac Pro purchase can also pick up the new desktop with no tax in most states. At press time, Abt Electronics is shipping the standard $4,999 configuration with no tax outside IL, IN, MI and WI, while B&H and Adorama have upgraded models in stock with no tax outside NY and NJ. For a full list of deals, please visit our iMac Pro Price Guide.
Apple had originally told the press that units could be on store shelves as soon as last week. Online orders began arriving Dec. 27.
Shoppers should check Apple's pickup availability before heading out, as some places still don't have the computer in stock. In those cases, outlets are typically quoting Jan. 11 as the next possible pickup date.
The default Pro also comes with 32 gigabytes of RAM, 1 terabyte of SSD storage, and AMD's 8-gigabyte Radeon Pro Vega 56 video card. Many upgrade options are available, such as a 10-core CPU, but 14- and 18-core machines aren't shipping until next month.
Aimed mainly at people doing tasks like 3D rendering, simulations, and video editing, the Pro is easily one of the more expensive products in Apple history. A top-end 18-core configuration will cost as much as $13,199.
Those looking to save on an iMac Pro purchase can also pick up the new desktop with no tax in most states. At press time, Abt Electronics is shipping the standard $4,999 configuration with no tax outside IL, IN, MI and WI, while B&H and Adorama have upgraded models in stock with no tax outside NY and NJ. For a full list of deals, please visit our iMac Pro Price Guide.
Comments
Mike
For example, the Vega 64 iMac Pro is outputting about the same TFLOPS as the off the shelf Vega 56. So it's not going to be a tit-for-tat comparison.
If you want to price out a DIY desktop, you can easily build a better one for less than the iMac Pro.
Pre-built computers become a bit more complicated, again, because of the availability of parts and the fact the iMac Pro is using weaker components.
There will always be fringe cases where building your own machines are cheaper, but if that the 1:10000000 slot a person falls into then they're foolish for even commenting on this thread.
Besides which, DIY pricing is a pointless excercise as I suspect the proportion of IT creatives who build their own machines is only slightly greater than the proportion of taxi drivers who build their own cabs.
As for easily building a better computer, well, here's a prebuilt to compare:
iMac Pro - $7999
Intel Xeon W-2150B (10 core) <-- Downclocked from regular W-2155
AMD Radeon Pro Vega 64 16 GB HBM2 (up to 4 displays) <-- Downclocked from regular Vega 64
64 GB DDR4-2666 ECC
2 TB PCIe M.2 SSD
10 Gb Ethernet
macOS
1 year warranty
GMT-W7/300 (source) - $5,639
Intel Xeon W-2155 (10 core)
AMD Radeon Pro Vega Frontier Edition 16 GB HBM2 (up to 6 displays)
64 GB DDR4-2666 ECC
2 TB PCIe M.2 SSD
2x 10 Gb Ethernet
Windows 10 Pro
1 year warranty
That leaves $2,360 for a monitor, keyboard and mouse. As for the display, something like the new 2018 5K LG Nano IPS display would be better than the iMac Pro's display (same as the LG UltraFine 5K). Or you can drop the resolution and go for a Dell UP2718K with local dimming (not edge-lit).
The end result is a desktop that's more powerful and won't suffer from throttling like the iMac Pro. It also has a better display (or options for different display configurations depending on the work required).
The DIY route would go with something like Threadripper which is even more powerful than the Xeon W-2155 and offers 64 PCIe lanes.
I also want to note, if ECC RAM is not needed, an i9-7900X is identical to the W-2155. So the cost savings and options grow considerably.
What are you talking about? Are you completely unable to comprehend what this machine is? Are you really that ignorant? Vanity buyers? Really? You actually think this machine is for general use and is targeted at the general public? Come back when you have actually found out who this machine is for. Otherwise just keep quiet so you don;t come off as a clueless fool.
I post facts, not fiction. You may not like what I have to say, but I'm not wrong.
Apple is on the cutting edge here. They aren't always but in this case they are. That's what is so frustrating about your continued insistence that an all-in-one should be compared to a regular desktop, which is what you are doing. The fact that a "regular" desktop is both cheaper and more powerful than an all-in-one is OBVIOUS. The fact you think people here need to be educated about this is ABSURD.
The question here, which you keep obstructing when you hijack these threads, is how many of these things is Apple going to sell? Is this basically a new market -- the HPC all-in-one? The market for DIY machines is tiny and completely irrelevant to the market for all-in-ones. Nor is the "regular" desktop workstation market especially helpful. The big questions are things like, will HP or Dell or one of the East Asian companies try to compete with this? Will Microsoft do anything?
to this
seriously?