I may be in the minority, but I believe the Mac Studio is arguably a better long term solution than the higher end iMac 27” and iMac Pro. Of course this doesn’t apply across the board because the 27” iMac was a relative bargain and the iMac Pro and higher end iMacs had discrete graphics. But nothing pained me more than seeing the iMac’s wonderful monitor go to waste because the computer guts were no longer up to snuff.
That said, the Mac Studio is in my mind the ultimate Mac mini with much better thermals and processor flexibility. That’s not a negative take on the Studio because the Mac mini is still an outstanding computer. But comparing the Studio to the Pro or considering it as a temporary stand-in for the Pro is rather silly in my opinion. The Studio is much closer to the mini than what will ultimately be the Apple Silicon Mac Pro. It fills a gap between the mini and Pro, which more people will come to appreciate once they see the price tag on the next Pro.
100%! Exactly! I'm not sure why some are so fixed on an iMac Pro. The Mac Studio is so much better of a higher end Mac. Much more flexibility and it's the same price if not cheaper depending on what display you go with. You can even pair it with Apple's 27" Studio display and it's still the same price as an iMac Pro. Then when you upgrade to a newer model you're not buying the display all over again. IMO, this will actually save you money long term.
I have to laugh at the references to the Mac Studio as a "stopgap product." The R&D for an all-new product like the Mac Studio likely started at least a few and more likely several years before it hit the market. Then there's the thorough testing that has to happen. And figuring out the production technicalities to properly manufacture it. And securing the supply chain for all the parts they'll need to mass produce it.
So let me get this straight: you think the Apple R&D team was sitting around one day at the beginning of this process and thought... "Hey! We've got some extra time on our hands! Nuthin' much to do around here. So let's throw together a stopgap desktop computer! You know, in case there's like a global pandemic or something and we need to bang out a new desktop quickly, we'll have this! Oh, and by the way. let's not just riff on something we already have, let's create something all-new. But remember, we don't actually want this product, we're just going to devote gazillions in time and resources for a stopgap in case we need it in a few years from now."
Will Apple have an answer to the nVidia juggernaut?
Obviously no. They are not in the business of providing dGPUs for gaming, workstation, or server markets. They aren't in the business of maximizing GPU performance at all costs, only constrained by residential and office electric circuits. The server GPU requirements? Sheesh, those server boxes with 4 GPUs must need 220V 30A circuits going into them. That's what I use to run my dryer, oven or my car.
The Mac Studio, and Mac Pro if it ever is released, are mid-end media production machines, for Youtubers, or smaller media production uses. They are going to have a minimalistic power consumption for a GPU, like 120 W in the Studio and maybe 250 W in a Mac Pro. If they match the performance of 250 to 350 W dGPUs, it's a big win for what they are trying to do. Sell a small or quiet and cool machine to prosumer content creation users. I think that is their goal, and it's not to enter new markets with these boxes, unless creation tools for the XR goggles gives them a new Mac market.
Mid-range dGPUs from AMD and Nvidia basically start at 250 W, and the high end ones are at 350 to 450 W. My 15yo wants a new dGPU. I am thinking I will turn it into a ducting project for him too.
You need to watch Nvidia CEO Jason Huang commencement speech at National Taiwan University. He is predicting PCs will be replaced by AI powered computers. Apple may be missing the boat if it fails to take action.
Will Apple have an answer to the nVidia juggernaut?
Obviously no. They are not in the business of providing dGPUs for gaming, workstation, or server markets. They aren't in the business of maximizing GPU performance at all costs, only constrained by residential and office electric circuits. The server GPU requirements? Sheesh, those server boxes with 4 GPUs must need 220V 30A circuits going into them. That's what I use to run my dryer, oven or my car.
The Mac Studio, and Mac Pro if it ever is released, are mid-end media production machines, for Youtubers, or smaller media production uses. They are going to have a minimalistic power consumption for a GPU, like 120 W in the Studio and maybe 250 W in a Mac Pro. If they match the performance of 250 to 350 W dGPUs, it's a big win for what they are trying to do. Sell a small or quiet and cool machine to prosumer content creation users. I think that is their goal, and it's not to enter new markets with these boxes, unless creation tools for the XR goggles gives them a new Mac market.
Mid-range dGPUs from AMD and Nvidia basically start at 250 W, and the high end ones are at 350 to 450 W. My 15yo wants a new dGPU. I am thinking I will turn it into a ducting project for him too.
You need to watch Nvidia CEO Jason Huang commencement speech at National Taiwan University. He is predicting PCs will be replaced by AI powered computers. Apple may be missing the boat if it fails to take action.
Does Jason have an in-house OS to make that future happen? Maybe he’s hoping for Microsoft to give them a hand? The only thing Apple missing the boat on is not releasing the full range of different computer form factors to the public for sale.
I think too many people get caught up in benchmarks and not real world performance. Benchmarks are only part of the story.
why I asked about real world experience... I might guess an M2 Ultra might push 250k, although for a few $$$ putting a 6800XT in an eGPU is a tempting upgrade for any intel based on those numbers...
Will Apple have an answer to the nVidia juggernaut?
Obviously no. They are not in the business of providing dGPUs for gaming, workstation, or server markets. They aren't in the business of maximizing GPU performance at all costs, only constrained by residential and office electric circuits. The server GPU requirements? Sheesh, those server boxes with 4 GPUs must need 220V 30A circuits going into them. That's what I use to run my dryer, oven or my car.
The Mac Studio, and Mac Pro if it ever is released, are mid-end media production machines, for Youtubers, or smaller media production uses. They are going to have a minimalistic power consumption for a GPU, like 120 W in the Studio and maybe 250 W in a Mac Pro. If they match the performance of 250 to 350 W dGPUs, it's a big win for what they are trying to do. Sell a small or quiet and cool machine to prosumer content creation users. I think that is their goal, and it's not to enter new markets with these boxes, unless creation tools for the XR goggles gives them a new Mac market.
Mid-range dGPUs from AMD and Nvidia basically start at 250 W, and the high end ones are at 350 to 450 W. My 15yo wants a new dGPU. I am thinking I will turn it into a ducting project for him too.
You need to watch Nvidia CEO Jason Huang commencement speech at National Taiwan University. He is predicting PCs will be replaced by AI powered computers. Apple may be missing the boat if it fails to take action.
Does Jason have an in-house OS to make that future happen? Maybe he’s hoping for Microsoft to give them a hand? The only thing Apple missing the boat on is not releasing the full range of different computer form factors to the public for sale.
I heard that Microsoft will release next Windows OS to support OpenAI.
The Mac Studio is a design monstrosity and should never have been produced by Apple. I agree that it was probably an interim product before the Apple Silicon Mac Pro could be released. Even so, it was a terrible mistake, tarnishing the design credentials of a design-focussed brand.
A 15" MacBook Air, if true, would be a further dilution of the brand. The MBA is a small and light laptop that fits in an envelope.
Since Sir Jony Ive left, Apple appears to have lost its way.
There is a momentum from previous successes but any more crap from Apple will start to impact.
There is and will ever be only one Jony Ive.
Why Cook didn’t do more to keep him, I’ll never know. Outside of jobs, Ive was THE soul of Apple.
It’s definitely a different Apple now and not for the better. But… Jobs and Ive were so amazing, influential and competent at passing down their ethos that Apple is still and will continue to be far and away ahead of everyone else. Just wish it had the same level of care.
I may be in the minority, but I believe the Mac Studio is arguably a better long term solution than the higher end iMac 27” and iMac Pro. Of course this doesn’t apply across the board because the 27” iMac was a relative bargain and the iMac Pro and higher end iMacs had discrete graphics. But nothing pained me more than seeing the iMac’s wonderful monitor go to waste because the computer guts were no longer up to snuff.
That said, the Mac Studio is in my mind the ultimate Mac mini with much better thermals and processor flexibility. That’s not a negative take on the Studio because the Mac mini is still an outstanding computer. But comparing the Studio to the Pro or considering it as a temporary stand-in for the Pro is rather silly in my opinion. The Studio is much closer to the mini than what will ultimately be the Apple Silicon Mac Pro. It fills a gap between the mini and Pro, which more people will come to appreciate once they see the price tag on the next Pro.
The Mac Studio is ok. Nothing wrong with it. It’s indeed a high end desktop Mac Mini with ports on the front. The Mac mini also fills that spot with the Pro chip.
But the Mac mini never was and the Studio never will be a replacement for a 27”,32” etc. iMac anymore than a base Mac mini is a substitute for the 24” iMac.
A sleek, all in one statement piece with high end horsepower is what the 27” iMac was. It is the evolution of the original Mac and is the quintessential Apple computer.
The studio does nothing more than the iMac other than separate the monitor from the computer in order to charge more. Unfortunately, it also makes it less of an integrated product and more like a PC, even though you can’t upgrade it, so you get none of the design benefit of an integrated product like sn iMac and also none of the benefit of upgradability like A PC. So it’s actually less of both.
The Mac Studio has its merits as a Mac mini with horsepower. But it’s no replacement t for an iMac with design that makes it compelling to use, easier to move around (since you don’t have to take different components everywhere), and has a more efficient footprint.
The large iMac can do everything a Mac Studio can do, only with less of s footprint, less of a hassle, and look better doing it.
It’s a win in every way. The only hurdle is that it’s s better DEAL than the Mac Studio, since it will be harder for Apple to hide the price gouging.
... can anyone comment on the veracity of these benchmarks in real use terms ...?
browser.geekbench.com/metal-benchmarks
Here are some real world results from something that actually stresses the GPU to the max for a considerable amount of time; raytraced rendering. You can see that the M2 Max is only bested by AMD top two cards when it comes to Metal inside Blender. Even the M1 Ultra doesn’t stand up to the M2 Max when doing real world jobs like raytraced rendering.
Neither AMD nor AS GPUs get even close to Nvidia for raytraced tasked as Nvidia has those RT cores which are designed specifically for ray tracing jobs.
I'm in awe with the power of my M1 MacBook Air. It's hard to wrap my head around the subset of users who use the Studio and maybe a future AS Pro. Just sayin'...
Reading these comments I am surprised by some of the comments.
That Apple is worse without Jonny Ive???
That the iMac is “win in every way”
In recent years, 5-10 or so. Jonny Ive had clearly taken things too far. Often making compromises on machines for design that simply made the machine worse at doing what it was meant to do.
The 2016 to 2020 MacBook Pros to mention just one line that was hampered during this period.
Since he has gone Apple have been releasing really good machines. MacBook Pro’s, M2 MacBook Air etc
Apple are in a far better place now than they were then.
As for the iMac being everything better than a Studio. Hard disagree on nearly every level except the visual appearance. Loud, noisy, clogged with dust. Screen issues over time the list goes on.
Choice is a good thing. I’m hoping we see an incremental update to the Studio to take the M2 line of chips. Would be lovely if the Studio Display could be tweaked but I can’t see that happening. If we get a larger iMac again with M series chips I think that’s a good thing. Certainly the M1 versions need an update now.
Keep updating Apple. Long gone are the stagnant later years of Jonny Ive.
The large iMac can do everything a Mac Studio can do, only with less of s footprint, less of a hassle, and look better doing it.
It’s a win in every way. The only hurdle is that it’s s better DEAL than the Mac Studio, since it will be harder for Apple to hide the price gouging.
So you're thinking that Tim called a meeting and it went something like this: "I've been looking at sales of the iMac Pro 27" and they're off-the-charts. An incredibly successful product for us. We're making inroads with creatives in corporations that haven't bought from us in this kind of volume before. SO... let's kill it. We really can't price gouge on this the way we'd like, so let's EOL the iMac Pro and move on to a much more expensive 2-piece system that delivers the profit we want."
You really think that's Apple's calculation? Please. I don't know if the iMac Pro or even an iMac 27" is ever coming back. I tend to think not given that we don't even hear rumors of it. And if the iMac Pro doesn't come back in some form, I have no doubt that a lack of sufficient sales of its previous iteration is the reason. Yes, there will be people clamoring for a new pro-performance, bigger screen all-in-one... just not enough of them. People also seem to forget that the current M-driven iMac 24" is already a very powerful machine--this wasn't just a speed bump of an Intel chip--and will only get more so as the M-chip evolves. Personally, I had been an iMac 27" buyer from the day it was first available and I had real concerns when I switched to the 24" that it would feel cramped. Well, that thought has never crossed my mind once in the two years that I've owned it.
Monitor-tech evolves much more slowly than computer-tech, giving monitors a much longer useful lifespan before becoming outdated. Clearly, for large volumes of buyers. a monitor/computer set-up makes more sense. Keep the monitor and upgrade your computer as necessary. (And I say that as someone who has always preferred an all-in-one.) Apple could have killed off the Mac Mini, and many people thought they would... instead, they gave it a top-to-bottom rebuild in its last iteration, and you don't make that kind of investment in a product that's not selling. More to be revealed about Apple's commitment to the Mac Studio future at WWDC.
It’s definitely a different Apple now and not for the better. But… Jobs and Ive were so amazing, influential and competent at passing down their ethos that Apple is still and will continue to be far and away ahead of everyone else. Just wish it had the same level of care.
"It’s definitely a different Apple now and not for the better." quickly self contradicted by "influential and competent at passing down their ethos that Apple is still and will continue to be far and away ahead of everyone else" LOL
Yes, the 'passing down their ethos' aka Apple University created by Jobs was the icing on the cake for his love of Apple.
The Mac Studio is a design monstrosity and should never have been produced by Apple. I agree that it was probably an interim product before the Apple Silicon Mac Pro could be released. Even so, it was a terrible mistake, tarnishing the design credentials of a design-focussed brand.
A 15" MacBook Air, if true, would be a further dilution of the brand. The MBA is a small and light laptop that fits in an envelope.
Since Sir Jony Ive left, Apple appears to have lost its way.
There is a momentum from previous successes but any more crap from Apple will start to impact.
Respectfully, I completely disagree. I’ve found it to be a very functional machine with just about enough I/O. It does make me think of two Mac Minis stacked on top of each other, and I have no problem with that. It made a fantastic sequel to my 2020 iMac, which was a good machine, but it’s so noisy, and left in the dust by my M1 MacBook Air. The studio is as much faster than my MacBook Air as the MacBook Air was faster than the 2020 iMac. Also, quite frankly, my Mac Studio is hidden in the holder under my desk so I don’t even see it and it doesn’t take up precious desk space which is certainly at a premium. I’ll be curious to see what they offer as trade in pricing.
I've been using macs since they exist, and my Studio is the best mac to date. It's on my desk, but I don't notice it or hear it, a huge improvement to all it's predecessors.
The Mac Studio is a design monstrosity and should never have been produced by Apple. I agree that it was probably an interim product before the Apple Silicon Mac Pro could be released. Even so, it was a terrible mistake, tarnishing the design credentials of a design-focussed brand.
A 15" MacBook Air, if true, would be a further dilution of the brand. The MBA is a small and light laptop that fits in an envelope.
Since Sir Jony Ive left, Apple appears to have lost its way.
There is a momentum from previous successes but any more crap from Apple will start to impact.
There is and will ever be only one Jony Ive.
Why Cook didn’t do more to keep him, I’ll never know. Outside of jobs, Ive was THE soul of Apple.
It’s definitely a different Apple now and not for the better. But… Jobs and Ive were so amazing, influential and competent at passing down their ethos that Apple is still and will continue to be far and away ahead of everyone else. Just wish it had the same level of care.
Maybe because we don't need another iOS7 or butterfly keyboard, or missing ports failure, to name some? Ive's done great work, but there's also a few nasty stinkers.
The large iMac can do everything a Mac Studio can do, only with less of s footprint, less of a hassle, and look better doing it.
It’s a win in every way. The only hurdle is that it’s s better DEAL than the Mac Studio, since it will be harder for Apple to hide the price gouging.
So you're thinking that Tim called a meeting and it went something like this: "I've been looking at sales of the iMac Pro 27" and they're off-the-charts. An incredibly successful product for us. We're making inroads with creatives in corporations that haven't bought from us in this kind of volume before. SO... let's kill it. We really can't price gouge on this the way we'd like, so let's EOL the iMac Pro and move on to a much more expensive 2-piece system that delivers the profit we want."
You really think that's Apple's calculation? Please. I don't know if the iMac Pro or even an iMac 27" is ever coming back. I tend to think not given that we don't even hear rumors of it. And if the iMac Pro doesn't come back in some form, I have no doubt that a lack of sufficient sales of its previous iteration is the reason. Yes, there will be people clamoring for a new pro-performance, bigger screen all-in-one... just not enough of them. People also seem to forget that the current M-driven iMac 24" is already a very powerful machine--this wasn't just a speed bump of an Intel chip--and will only get more so as the M-chip evolves. Personally, I had been an iMac 27" buyer from the day it was first available and I had real concerns when I switched to the 24" that it would feel cramped. Well, that thought has never crossed my mind once in the two years that I've owned it.
Monitor-tech evolves much more slowly than computer-tech, giving monitors a much longer useful lifespan before becoming outdated. Clearly, for large volumes of buyers. a monitor/computer set-up makes more sense. Keep the monitor and upgrade your computer as necessary. (And I say that as someone who has always preferred an all-in-one.) Apple could have killed off the Mac Mini, and many people thought they would... instead, they gave it a top-to-bottom rebuild in its last iteration, and you don't make that kind of investment in a product that's not selling. More to be revealed about Apple's commitment to the Mac Studio future at WWDC.
The death of the butterfly keyboard, MagSafe coming back, and the drop in Mac sales says otherwise, Apple will need to do something to address the drop in Mac desktop sales.
The mini Studio is a slap in the face to those who bought 27 inch iMac’s, hopefully they will rectify that at WWDC and they need to, or Mac desktop sales will remain stagnant through the end of 2023, and since they can’t seem to get the Pro Mac out the door, it’s now come down to one or the other, a new Pro Mac or a new big screen iMac before the end of the year.
Will Apple have an answer to the nVidia juggernaut?
Obviously no. They are not in the business of providing dGPUs for gaming, workstation, or server markets. They aren't in the business of maximizing GPU performance at all costs, only constrained by residential and office electric circuits. The server GPU requirements? Sheesh, those server boxes with 4 GPUs must need 220V 30A circuits going into them. That's what I use to run my dryer, oven or my car.
The Mac Studio, and Mac Pro if it ever is released, are mid-end media production machines, for Youtubers, or smaller media production uses. They are going to have a minimalistic power consumption for a GPU, like 120 W in the Studio and maybe 250 W in a Mac Pro. If they match the performance of 250 to 350 W dGPUs, it's a big win for what they are trying to do. Sell a small or quiet and cool machine to prosumer content creation users. I think that is their goal, and it's not to enter new markets with these boxes, unless creation tools for the XR goggles gives them a new Mac market.
Mid-range dGPUs from AMD and Nvidia basically start at 250 W, and the high end ones are at 350 to 450 W. My 15yo wants a new dGPU. I am thinking I will turn it into a ducting project for him too.
You need to watch Nvidia CEO Jason Huang commencement speech at National Taiwan University. He is predicting PCs will be replaced by AI powered computers. Apple may be missing the boat if it fails to take action.
Don't understand what you are saying. The mundane interpretation is that PCs running Microsoft Windows will have a lot of machine learning powered features, and Nvidia hardware in those PCs will be power them. That doesn't sound like a differentiator. PCs running Apple operating systems will also have a lot of machine learning powered features, and Apple's hardware will power them. Have to be more specific about what "AI features" that only Nvidia can provide and others can't.
A more fanciful interpretation is that the server + thin clients will become a thing again, and there will be a lot machine learning power features powered by Nvidia's hardware, everyone's stuff will be in the cloud, the primary interface will be through browsers (with audio etc), and that's how everyone will use computers. Nvidia hardware is powering everything on the server side. Apple will be fine with this too. They sell a lot of high priced thin clients with their phones, tablets, and PCs.
The Mac Studio is a design monstrosity and should never have been produced by Apple. I agree that it was probably an interim product before the Apple Silicon Mac Pro could be released. Even so, it was a terrible mistake, tarnishing the design credentials of a design-focussed brand.
A 15" MacBook Air, if true, would be a further dilution of the brand. The MBA is a small and light laptop that fits in an envelope.
Since Sir Jony Ive left, Apple appears to have lost its way.
There is a momentum from previous successes but any more crap from Apple will start to impact.
As Cicero put it, "De gustibus non disputandum est," or as some pithier Roman had it, "Suum quique."
Design monstrosity to you, best looking Mac ever to me. There's something about the effective fusion of form and function, particularly the thermal design, that represents beauty to me. For some applications, a notebook that fits in an envelope is just right; for others, a monster of a machine that fits in a breadbox is the thing. And some would say that since Sir Jony left, Apple figured out a middle path between extreme design and pure performance that leads the way in design.
Comments
So let me get this straight: you think the Apple R&D team was sitting around one day at the beginning of this process and thought... "Hey! We've got some extra time on our hands! Nuthin' much to do around here. So let's throw together a stopgap desktop computer! You know, in case there's like a global pandemic or something and we need to bang out a new desktop quickly, we'll have this! Oh, and by the way. let's not just riff on something we already have, let's create something all-new. But remember, we don't actually want this product, we're just going to devote gazillions in time and resources for a stopgap in case we need it in a few years from now."
Yeah, right.
browser.geekbench.com/metal-benchmarks
As for the iMac being everything better than a Studio. Hard disagree on nearly every level except the visual appearance. Loud, noisy, clogged with dust. Screen issues over time the list goes on.
You really think that's Apple's calculation? Please. I don't know if the iMac Pro or even an iMac 27" is ever coming back. I tend to think not given that we don't even hear rumors of it. And if the iMac Pro doesn't come back in some form, I have no doubt that a lack of sufficient sales of its previous iteration is the reason. Yes, there will be people clamoring for a new pro-performance, bigger screen all-in-one... just not enough of them. People also seem to forget that the current M-driven iMac 24" is already a very powerful machine--this wasn't just a speed bump of an Intel chip--and will only get more so as the M-chip evolves. Personally, I had been an iMac 27" buyer from the day it was first available and I had real concerns when I switched to the 24" that it would feel cramped. Well, that thought has never crossed my mind once in the two years that I've owned it.
Monitor-tech evolves much more slowly than computer-tech, giving monitors a much longer useful lifespan before becoming outdated. Clearly, for large volumes of buyers. a monitor/computer set-up makes more sense. Keep the monitor and upgrade your computer as necessary. (And I say that as someone who has always preferred an all-in-one.) Apple could have killed off the Mac Mini, and many people thought they would... instead, they gave it a top-to-bottom rebuild in its last iteration, and you don't make that kind of investment in a product that's not selling. More to be revealed about Apple's commitment to the Mac Studio future at WWDC.
"It’s definitely a different Apple now and not for the better." quickly self contradicted by "influential and competent at passing down their ethos that Apple is still and will continue to be far and away ahead of everyone else" LOL
Yes, the 'passing down their ethos' aka Apple University created by Jobs was the icing on the cake for his love of Apple.
The mini Studio is a slap in the face to those who bought 27 inch iMac’s, hopefully they will rectify that at WWDC and they need to, or Mac desktop sales will remain stagnant through the end of 2023, and since they can’t seem to get the Pro Mac out the door, it’s now come down to one or the other, a new Pro Mac or a new big screen iMac before the end of the year.
A more fanciful interpretation is that the server + thin clients will become a thing again, and there will be a lot machine learning power features powered by Nvidia's hardware, everyone's stuff will be in the cloud, the primary interface will be through browsers (with audio etc), and that's how everyone will use computers. Nvidia hardware is powering everything on the server side. Apple will be fine with this too. They sell a lot of high priced thin clients with their phones, tablets, and PCs.
Design monstrosity to you, best looking Mac ever to me. There's something about the effective fusion of form and function, particularly the thermal design, that represents beauty to me. For some applications, a notebook that fits in an envelope is just right; for others, a monster of a machine that fits in a breadbox is the thing. And some would say that since Sir Jony left, Apple figured out a middle path between extreme design and pure performance that leads the way in design.