As entangled as Apple is in laptops and phones and looking at the update rate of the desktops I believe that the Apple desktops in 2009 are the floppy disk of 1998. Apple (Steve?) decided that we do not need desktops anymore and we should hurry up and buy any mobile device Apple is offering us to keep our hardware up to date.
The mobile devices (laptops, iPhone, iPod) are the only ones that have a reasonable price/value(performance) ratio. The MacPro is also priced ok (spec-wise) but it is just for a few people and will sell in accordingly low numbers (compared to the mobile devices).
So say by-by to our beloved desktops. Steve'd in 2009.
Depends how power hungry the GPUs and their custom cooling systems are.
Are you saying that the current could be too much for that cable? A decent fan shouldn't take much power, but I don't know about the rest of the card.
As far as I know, the main PSU is plenty more than enough. It's rated for about 1kW, and as I recall, a stock Mac Pro doesn't draw 300W from the wall at max load.
We can throw stones at Windows OS, but the machines are more than competive on price. Any i7 desktop for half the price of the Mac Pro will smack its head in or serverly humble it at the least.
That's a bit disingenous. The benchmarks showing a Corei7 beating a SMP Penryn Xeon system are faulty from the standpoint that most applications shipping today or benchmarked don't see much beyond dual core. So you get some yokel that benchmarks his new Core i7 and it beats a Mac Pro yet show me an app that can leverage 8 cores and then test it on a quad Core i7 vs Penryn 8-core system. Nehalem is fast but it's not THAT fast people.
Quote:
Originally Posted by copeland
As entangled as Apple is in laptops and phones and looking at the update rate of the desktops I believe that the Apple desktops in 2009 are the floppy disk of 1998. Apple (Steve?) decided that we do not need desktops anymore and we should hurry up and buy any mobile device Apple is offering us to keep our hardware up to date.
The mobile devices (laptops, iPhone, iPod) are the only ones that have a reasonable price/value(performance) ratio. The MacPro is also priced ok (spec-wise) but it is just for a few people and will sell in accordingly low numbers (compared to the mobile devices).
So say by-by to our beloved desktops. Steve'd in 2009.
Apple's just being lazy. They've focused so much on the iPhone that frankly their other business has languished and they've made some poor design choices that are likely costing them now (making the iMac too thin and I expect the redesigned Macbooks will suffer as well when Nehalem mobile comes).
Are you saying that the current could be too much for that cable? A decent fan shouldn't take much power, but I don't know about the rest of the card.
As far as I know, the main PSU is plenty more than enough. It's rated for about 1kW, and as I recall, a stock Mac Pro doesn't draw 300W from the wall at max load.
It's not a real issue, IMO, I'm just discussing for the sake of discussing. The PSU on the Mac Pro is somewhere in the neighborhood of 1kw more than enough for a fully decked out Mac Pro.
Yeah, sure does. Apple's behind on updates to it's desktops. A year plus for the Mac Pro. Over half a year for the iMac. And a sucktacular how long(?!) has it been for the mini?
For a company that cares about leadership in the OS and Design dept, you'd think they'd care about parity with the specs on Windows based systems.
I thought the move to Intel would make Apple competitive on desktops. If anything, they've gotten worse! Slow to update, out-dated specs, laughable prices.
Sucky gpus in every desktop. No quad core in ANY consumer desktop whilst still charging prices that add to their 25 billion stash pile.
We can throw stones at Windows OS, but the machines are more than competive on price. Any i7 desktop for half the price of the Mac Pro will smack its head in or serverly humble it at the least.
Huh, I mean, paying "£1700" just to get a quad core with a GT with a stingy amount of ram and ridiculously small hd. PATHETIC.
Question: If Apple's dekstops ran only Windows...would you buy one? (I wouldn't. Lucky Apple has the 'X'.)
Lemon Bon Bon.
What people forget is that Apple is still Apple. While they will sometimes get new chips from Intel before the PC makers, while the general chip updates come out, they're less likely to bother with them.
Truthfully, we don't really need these incremental updates. There is rarely more than a few percent improvement in performance.
But, there is the marketing factor. People often want to see these small improvements throughout the year.
When I had my company, I had a schedule of computer upgrades. But since I retired, I'm being very patient, as I no longer need it, though I do want it.
So I'm waiting for the new Nehelam Xeons to appear. It's been years since I got myself a new machine.
[QUOTE=hmurchison;1372416]That's a bit disingenous. The benchmarks showing a Corei7 beating a SMP Penryn Xeon system are faulty from the standpoint that most applications shipping today or benchmarked don't see much beyond dual core. So you get some yokel that benchmarks his new Core i7 and it beats a Mac Pro yet show me an app that can leverage 8 cores and then test it on a quad Core i7 vs Penryn 8-core system. Nehalem is fast but it's not THAT fast people. [/quote
I don't know about that.
I'm seeing between 20 and 40% increases in speed between the i7's and older chips from independent testing.
Also Nehelem is more effective as the number of cores, and separate cpus go up. The new point to point scheme, with new on-die controller, and cache scheme puts much less penalty on parallel processing apps, unlike current chips.
Also the return of hyperthreading, for apps that can use it, shows between 5 and 25% additional speedup. The penalty for using it with apps that can't use it is trivial now, though it was a major problem before (which is why it was discontinued).
Quote:
Apple's just being lazy. They've focused so much on the iPhone that frankly their other business has languished and they've made some poor design choices that are likely costing them now (making the iMac too thin and I expect the redesigned Macbooks will suffer as well when Nehalem mobile comes).
The desktops will return!!
To a certain extent, that's correct. Companies, and Apple's not an exception, can get extended too far. We saw that before the release of the first iPhone, and subsequent delay of 10.5
For memory intensive, multithreaded apps, the core i7 destroys all previous processors you can buy from a store.
A dual processor machine with 8 cores will beat a 4 core core i7 machine as long as it's not memory limited. If your job is memory limited (big photos, video, scientific computing) then the core i7 will destroy it. The memory bus is literally 3x faster.
These processors are a REALLY big deal for some of us. For email and web surfing, it's not going to make much difference.
I wouldn't despair over the Mac Pro. Apple needs to have it in the lineup. They'll update it.
I believe the current lack of an update reflects to some extent a shifting of engineering priority (the iPhone got the all-hands-on-deck treatment) but also the work involved in designing a whole new motherboard, which the new Intel chips will require, which is as powerful as they can make it under the circumstance (even now, hardly anyone offers anything in the Mac Pro's league except for CPU speed) and make its housing as quiet as possible.
Speaking of the housing, maybe it's due for a refresh. The current case is very well laid out, if huge, but it's also turning 4.
It wouldn't surprise me if the release is somewhere near Snow Leopard's release, since that OS has significantly revamped support for multiprocessing and multithreading.
Few percent? Try a 4870x2 vs the GT in teh Mac Pro. That's more than a few percent.
Try the Mini's cpu and gpu vs current Windows entry desktops. Waaay more than a few percent.
And try the iMac's gpu or even duo cpu vs quad core chips...
Waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay more than a few percent.
Really, if they're that good at design then those very same designs should be able to accomodate a 'revision' update on specs?
Lemon Bon Bon.
I'm talking about small incremental cpu upgrades, which is something Apple has done more than a few times, without making any other real change to the rest of the machine.
These look like great chips, but what will the new mac pros cost?
No offense but anyone
that said jobs wasn't feelnig well knew there would be new macs before June. They were ready before macworld. Second, there will be a new iphone, duh, as you have millions of users going on two years ownership
that said jobs wasn't feelnig well knew there would be new macs before June. They were ready before macworld. Second, there will be a new iphone, duh, as you have millions of users going on two years ownership
You KNOW these machines were ready before Macworld? How do you know that?
I would imagine that the machines are about ready, but that they are waiting for the chips.
Which ever is necessary to bring some new life to the desktop line!
OK, well, if you follow the other discussions here you will realize that the real problem is not the Mac Pro but the "grand public"-level machines (iMac and Mac mini). I am very curious to see what Apple will do while Intel progresses in CPU technology, as it has locked itself in the closet with its latest desktop designs (smaller and thinner).
OK, well, if you follow the other discussions here you will realize that the real problem is not the Mac Pro but the "grand public"-level machines (iMac and Mac mini). I am very curious to see what Apple will do while Intel progresses in CPU technology, as it has locked itself in the closet with its latest desktop designs (smaller and thinner).
Mostly, that's correct.
But I differ about the Mac Pro's.
When I had my lab, and we had out two and three year purchase plans for differing computers, we would simply not buy that year if there wasn't a significant upgrade to the models we had.
I'm willing to bet that Apple could have sold a large number more of the Mac Pro line the past year, more as the year went on of course, if they had made a good upgrade during that time. Since they did nothing, there was no reason to upgrade. Companies and people with models that were old enough would do so, but it cuts out many that upgrade on a regular schedule. Particularly during difficult economic times.
Comments
The mobile devices (laptops, iPhone, iPod) are the only ones that have a reasonable price/value(performance) ratio. The MacPro is also priced ok (spec-wise) but it is just for a few people and will sell in accordingly low numbers (compared to the mobile devices).
So say by-by to our beloved desktops. Steve'd in 2009.
Or you could just use a 4-pin to 6-pin adapter using the drive bay's power connectors. Very easy to do.
Depends how power hungry the GPUs and their custom cooling systems are.
Depends how power hungry the GPUs and their custom cooling systems are.
Are you saying that the current could be too much for that cable? A decent fan shouldn't take much power, but I don't know about the rest of the card.
As far as I know, the main PSU is plenty more than enough. It's rated for about 1kW, and as I recall, a stock Mac Pro doesn't draw 300W from the wall at max load.
We can throw stones at Windows OS, but the machines are more than competive on price. Any i7 desktop for half the price of the Mac Pro will smack its head in or serverly humble it at the least.
That's a bit disingenous. The benchmarks showing a Corei7 beating a SMP Penryn Xeon system are faulty from the standpoint that most applications shipping today or benchmarked don't see much beyond dual core. So you get some yokel that benchmarks his new Core i7 and it beats a Mac Pro yet show me an app that can leverage 8 cores and then test it on a quad Core i7 vs Penryn 8-core system. Nehalem is fast but it's not THAT fast people.
As entangled as Apple is in laptops and phones and looking at the update rate of the desktops I believe that the Apple desktops in 2009 are the floppy disk of 1998. Apple (Steve?) decided that we do not need desktops anymore and we should hurry up and buy any mobile device Apple is offering us to keep our hardware up to date.
The mobile devices (laptops, iPhone, iPod) are the only ones that have a reasonable price/value(performance) ratio. The MacPro is also priced ok (spec-wise) but it is just for a few people and will sell in accordingly low numbers (compared to the mobile devices).
So say by-by to our beloved desktops. Steve'd in 2009.
Apple's just being lazy. They've focused so much on the iPhone that frankly their other business has languished and they've made some poor design choices that are likely costing them now (making the iMac too thin and I expect the redesigned Macbooks will suffer as well when Nehalem mobile comes).
The desktops will return!!
Are you saying that the current could be too much for that cable? A decent fan shouldn't take much power, but I don't know about the rest of the card.
As far as I know, the main PSU is plenty more than enough. It's rated for about 1kW, and as I recall, a stock Mac Pro doesn't draw 300W from the wall at max load.
It's not a real issue, IMO, I'm just discussing for the sake of discussing. The PSU on the Mac Pro is somewhere in the neighborhood of 1kw more than enough for a fully decked out Mac Pro.
The desktops will return!!
Chant with me:
Modular Modular Modular Modular Modular Modular .....
Yeah, sure does. Apple's behind on updates to it's desktops. A year plus for the Mac Pro. Over half a year for the iMac. And a sucktacular how long(?!) has it been for the mini?
For a company that cares about leadership in the OS and Design dept, you'd think they'd care about parity with the specs on Windows based systems.
I thought the move to Intel would make Apple competitive on desktops. If anything, they've gotten worse! Slow to update, out-dated specs, laughable prices.
Sucky gpus in every desktop. No quad core in ANY consumer desktop whilst still charging prices that add to their 25 billion stash pile.
We can throw stones at Windows OS, but the machines are more than competive on price. Any i7 desktop for half the price of the Mac Pro will smack its head in or serverly humble it at the least.
Huh, I mean, paying "£1700" just to get a quad core with a GT with a stingy amount of ram and ridiculously small hd. PATHETIC.
Question: If Apple's dekstops ran only Windows...would you buy one? (I wouldn't. Lucky Apple has the 'X'.)
Lemon Bon Bon.
What people forget is that Apple is still Apple. While they will sometimes get new chips from Intel before the PC makers, while the general chip updates come out, they're less likely to bother with them.
Truthfully, we don't really need these incremental updates. There is rarely more than a few percent improvement in performance.
But, there is the marketing factor. People often want to see these small improvements throughout the year.
When I had my company, I had a schedule of computer upgrades. But since I retired, I'm being very patient, as I no longer need it, though I do want it.
So I'm waiting for the new Nehelam Xeons to appear. It's been years since I got myself a new machine.
I don't know about that.
I'm seeing between 20 and 40% increases in speed between the i7's and older chips from independent testing.
Also Nehelem is more effective as the number of cores, and separate cpus go up. The new point to point scheme, with new on-die controller, and cache scheme puts much less penalty on parallel processing apps, unlike current chips.
Also the return of hyperthreading, for apps that can use it, shows between 5 and 25% additional speedup. The penalty for using it with apps that can't use it is trivial now, though it was a major problem before (which is why it was discontinued).
Apple's just being lazy. They've focused so much on the iPhone that frankly their other business has languished and they've made some poor design choices that are likely costing them now (making the iMac too thin and I expect the redesigned Macbooks will suffer as well when Nehalem mobile comes).
The desktops will return!!
To a certain extent, that's correct. Companies, and Apple's not an exception, can get extended too far. We saw that before the release of the first iPhone, and subsequent delay of 10.5
The desktops will return!!
May your words find their way into god's (Steve's?) ear canal!!
May your words find their way into god's (Steve's?) ear canal!!
Hope it is the ear, not the rear one.
A dual processor machine with 8 cores will beat a 4 core core i7 machine as long as it's not memory limited. If your job is memory limited (big photos, video, scientific computing) then the core i7 will destroy it. The memory bus is literally 3x faster.
These processors are a REALLY big deal for some of us. For email and web surfing, it's not going to make much difference.
I believe the current lack of an update reflects to some extent a shifting of engineering priority (the iPhone got the all-hands-on-deck treatment) but also the work involved in designing a whole new motherboard, which the new Intel chips will require, which is as powerful as they can make it under the circumstance (even now, hardly anyone offers anything in the Mac Pro's league except for CPU speed) and make its housing as quiet as possible.
Speaking of the housing, maybe it's due for a refresh. The current case is very well laid out, if huge, but it's also turning 4.
It wouldn't surprise me if the release is somewhere near Snow Leopard's release, since that OS has significantly revamped support for multiprocessing and multithreading.
Truthfully, we don't really need these incremental updates. There is rarely more than a few percent improvement in performance.
'You're not getting away with that.'
Few percent? Try a 4870x2 vs the GT in teh Mac Pro. That's more than a few percent.
Try the Mini's cpu and gpu vs current Windows entry desktops. Waaay more than a few percent.
And try the iMac's gpu or even duo cpu vs quad core chips...
Waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay more than a few percent.
Really, if they're that good at design then those very same designs should be able to accomodate a 'revision' update on specs?
Lemon Bon Bon.
'You're not getting away with that.'
Few percent? Try a 4870x2 vs the GT in teh Mac Pro. That's more than a few percent.
Try the Mini's cpu and gpu vs current Windows entry desktops. Waaay more than a few percent.
And try the iMac's gpu or even duo cpu vs quad core chips...
Waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay more than a few percent.
Really, if they're that good at design then those very same designs should be able to accomodate a 'revision' update on specs?
Lemon Bon Bon.
I'm talking about small incremental cpu upgrades, which is something Apple has done more than a few times, without making any other real change to the rest of the machine.
I'm not talking about the changes you show.
These look like great chips, but what will the new mac pros cost?
No offense but anyone
that said jobs wasn't feelnig well knew there would be new macs before June. They were ready before macworld. Second, there will be a new iphone, duh, as you have millions of users going on two years ownership
No offense but anyone
that said jobs wasn't feelnig well knew there would be new macs before June. They were ready before macworld. Second, there will be a new iphone, duh, as you have millions of users going on two years ownership
You KNOW these machines were ready before Macworld? How do you know that?
I would imagine that the machines are about ready, but that they are waiting for the chips.
Hope it is the ear, not the rear one.
Which ever is necessary to bring some new life to the desktop line!
Which ever is necessary to bring some new life to the desktop line!
Mostly, that's correct.
But I differ about the Mac Pro's.
When I had my lab, and we had out two and three year purchase plans for differing computers, we would simply not buy that year if there wasn't a significant upgrade to the models we had.
I'm willing to bet that Apple could have sold a large number more of the Mac Pro line the past year, more as the year went on of course, if they had made a good upgrade during that time. Since they did nothing, there was no reason to upgrade. Companies and people with models that were old enough would do so, but it cuts out many that upgrade on a regular schedule. Particularly during difficult economic times.