Yeah, but it's yet another piece of long coin I either have to save, amortize or squeeze out of a bean counter.
I get the rest of your point, and if your numbers are correct (Judges?) it's not a world ender. It's not a non-issue either though.
At least it can be solved just by throwing money at it! To some that will be great relief. To others that's still going to be frustrating though, because it adds another expense to the cost of an already expensive device, on top of also having to buy new storage media.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Marvin
The Retina Macbook Pro lets you pick what resolution you prefer. If you like the UI big, drop to 1440x900, if you like more workspace, bump it to 1920x1200 or for a balance, go with 1680x1050.
How does it look at resolutions that aren't the exact multiple?
The first Mac in 1984 cost the equivalent of $5,000 in today's dollars. I suspect that lots of prosumers will consider the new Mac Pro at a $5K or below price point... I know I will.
In 1984 we really only had two choices: A Mac or a 286. The Mac did layout well with minimum fuss and cost a lot. The 286 did the same task but not as well and with more hassle but cost much less.
The new Mac Pro doesn't exist in a world in which there's only one other choice. We now have a whole spectrum of choices with varying degrees of capability, ease-of-use and price, so people won't necessarily line up in droves for an expensive device, even if it IS very, very powerful. Some will, but others will simply choose compromise alternatives because in 2013 the alternatives tend to pretty capable themselves.
Another way to look at the cost:
In Sept 1984 AAPL was selling for $26.50 -- so you'd have to sell ~100 shares of AAPL to buy that $2,500 Original Mac.
If you held those shares you would have 800 shares after 3 2:1 splits or stock worth $454.45 x 800 ~= $363.500.
I suspect you'll be able to buy a new Mac Pro by selling 10-20 shares of AAPL or using 2-4 quarters AAPL dividends @ $3.05 per share per quarter.
The thing that affects some people the most is lack of GPU upgrades. People who buy older/cheaper Mac Pros and then upgrade the GPUs to brand new ones or just extend the life of their machine by buying a GPU themselves can't do this any more. This is better from Apple's point of view because it means that people who want a new GPU have to buy a new Mac Pro instead of doing a DIY upgrade where they make no money at all.
I'm not sure what percentage of Mac Pro buyers ever upgrade their GPU, anyway.
Besides, with the resale value of Macs, it's just as easy to sell your old one and buy a new one in a few years - and having most of your storage external makes that even easier.
I wouldn't be surprised if this machine is less expansive than the old one, anyway. It could really surprise people when it comes out.
That's a commonly misunderstood statement, in my opinion.
Ford was right. His customers were not forward-thinking or imaginative enough to envision the automobile. They did express what they wanted though, and Ford listened.
Customers didn't care whether or not they used horses. The operative part of the phrase was "faster." They didn't say "cars" because there was no such thing. Ford came up with a way to give them "faster horses."
The quote is often presented as evidence that customers don't know what's good for them, but that's not the lesson I take away from it at all. The way I see it, Ford was saying the successful company will be the one that can listen to what its customers are saying, find the fundamental element that matters to them, then deliver it.
I disagree with the above emphasized part of your post.
I never mistook Ford's quote to mean anything like that. I have never even heard Ford's quote expressed as "...what's good for them." Where are you getting that from?
I think Ford's quote means exactly what he said... customers wouldn't have thought up the automobile. Or the first Mac. Or the first click-wheel iPod. Or the first iPhone. Or whatever Steve Jobs had in mind when he said he finally cracked TV.
I'm not sure what percentage of Mac Pro buyers ever upgrade their GPU, anyway.
Besides, with the resale value of Macs, it's just as easy to sell your old one and buy a new one in a few years - and having most of your storage external makes that even easier.
I wouldn't be surprised if this machine is less expansive than the old one, anyway. It could really surprise people when it comes out.
They would probably upgrade then entire box.
Yeah, having external storage and PCI chassis make it easier when upgrading the base system, plus people can only buy what they need and take forward the external devices to new boxes. There's always a trade off, I just think that some people are stuck in the traditional tower is better concept because that's what they are used to.
I have never even heard Ford's quote expressed as "...what's good for them." Where are you getting that from?
Apple Insider forums. Not you, but at least two other people.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Suddenly Newton
I think Ford's quote means exactly what he said... customers wouldn't have thought up the automobile. Or the first Mac. Or the first click-wheel iPod. Or the first iPhone. Or whatever Steve Jobs had in mind when he said he finally cracked TV.
I think a lot of people overlook the value-added that professional hardware and software offers for the consumer level. As an aspirational brand, Apple's consumer level products have a boost when the professionals use Apple products. The perception that professional designers, photographers, animators, filmmakers and creative professionals relied on Apple products I think certainly helped maintain consumer sales, especially in the learner, pre-iPod years.
[SIZE=24px]13.6" x 9.6" x 10.9" 9.9" x .6.6" 9.9" x 7.7" x 7.3"[/SIZE]
Not quite to scale... but close enough!
That last one is a RAID enclosure, not a workstation though, if this was an IQ quiz, you'd need to ask which of these aren't the same type of machine.
I was attempting to match the sizes of things that I might have on my desktop. There is no way I'd have a current Mac Pro on my desktop or even on the back bar -- but the new Mac Pro is something else.,
So a $2500 pro computer is way expensive and only a very small niche market purchases it, resulting in a product with little profits, while a $600 phone is so cheap, cheap, cheap, that it sells better than toilet paper.
It's obvious what it makes it a niche isn't the price. Otherwise the iPhone would have a niche market.
The iPhone is subsidised and still 1/5th of the price of the entry Mac Pro, which doesn't come with a display. It's not the only factor because if a lot of people needed the power, they'd pay more for it. Fewer and fewer people need the extra power and aren't willing to pay more for something they don't need. That's why this design makes sense because inevitably, people will gradually migrate down the products the more that the cheaper machines satisfy people's power needs and this gives people an easy jumping off point because once you have the external peripherals, they can be switched out easily for a MBP, iMac etc. It means people don't have any obligation to hold onto hardware for long periods of time.
We now have a whole spectrum of choices with varying degrees of capability, ease-of-use and price, so people won't necessarily line up in droves for an expensive device, even if it IS very, very powerful. Some will, but others will simply choose compromise alternatives because in 2013 the alternatives tend to pretty capable themselves.
Some people did that with FCP and once they went to Premiere decided they weren't stuck to the Mac platform. For people who still prefer the Mac platform, there's not a suitable hardware alternative. I feel that OS X works far better for dealing with media than Windows.
At least it can be solved just by throwing money at it! To some that will be great relief. To others that's still going to be frustrating though, because it adds another expense to the cost of an already expensive device, on top of also having to buy new storage media.
I suspect there's going to be a 4K IGZO Thunderbolt display so I imagine people will have a lot of things to spend money on. The people who will suffer most are the people who typically buy the cheapest entry models in order to put expansion cards in because if the entry point is the same, they are down $600-1000 (the two full length card Sonnet box is $800), assuming there are no cheaper TB alternatives for their PCIe cards. I don't think storage is as big of a deal because there are USB 3 RAID boxes for $200 that will house 5 HDDs. Higher-end Thunderbolt storage has hardware RAID and drives included so selling the old Mac Pro and drives will recoup some of the expense.
It can't be too far off now before it's clear what the pricing is. IDF is about 4 weeks away:
"We hope, and fully expect, Intel TV (or whatever it's called) to be laid on the table during IDF. In announcing the service, Huggers said the group working on it was comprised of people from Apple, Netflix and Google. Add Intel's own tech savvy to the mix, and this sounds like a product with a lot of potential."
Thunderbolt 2 should be showcased, which means nothing left to wait for on the rest of the Apple lineup. Ivy Bridge EP Xeons should be on show.
I wouldn't be surprised if this machine is less expansive than the old one, anyway. It could really surprise people when it comes out.
I think it could be less expensive, some think less expansive . The entry price might not be lower but the highest 12-core that exceeds the performance of the current 12-core has a processor that will be over $1000 less. That may be offset by the extra GPU but it depends on how they do the BTO options. They could for example do the highest 12-core with dual W5000 for about $5k.
For people who still prefer the Mac platform, there's not a suitable hardware alternative.
I meant some people may choose an alternative Mac, not another platform.
For example, I run one machine as a headless render/transcoding box. Instead of a new ProTube, an i7 quad mini might be "good enough" for that task when the speed vs. cost comparison is done.
I meant some people may choose an alternative Mac, not another platform.
For example, I run one machine as a headless render/transcoding box. Instead of a new ProTube, an i7 quad mini might be "good enough" for that task when the speed vs. cost comparison is done.
Yeah, that could be the case. If people aren't bothered about the GPU and have to get Thunderbolt peripherals anyway, a quad-core Mini could work out well enough. That would mean having a machine without a "Pro" label though and that would just too much for some people to cope with. The fans are also noisier on the Mini so for a quiet working environment, the iMac and Mac Pro would be better options.
The 17" is typically described as a desktop replacement whereas the 15" isn't but when they are next to each other, there's very little practical difference:
Hm, around our house we think the difference is considerable and obvious. For years we've had one of each, and we both find the 17 much nicer to work on. That size at that resolution seems to hit a really nice UI scale, and because of the higher resolution the extra size provides more than just an extra inch of width.
I've never met a pro, only posers claiming to pros. And posers abound on web forums. Real pros don't have the time.
That's simply not true. Professional web designers, graphic artists, film editors, CAD users, 3D animators, etc. spend an exuberant amount of time in forums. This is how we learn new techniques, get solutions to problems, copy code, get ideas from existing code so we can finish projects quicker and learn to do things better. Do you think we just read a book or sit threw a class and are then all knowing. This forum might be a breeding ground for posers because it is for entertainment purposes but all you need to do is pick one of my listed professions above and do a simple search to see that there are 1,000's of forums that cater to them. Places where real professionals gather to seek each others council. Every time I write a program I always have a bunch of tabs populated with sites that are helpful to my project. So if I run into a problem in which I can't fix in a proper allotted amount of time, I do what ever other professional does, I go to a forum on the subject and ask.
I think it could be less expensive, some think less expansive . The entry price might not be lower but the highest 12-core that exceeds the performance of the current 12-core has a processor that will be over $1000 less. That may be offset by the extra GPU but it depends on how they do the BTO options. They could for example do the highest 12-core with dual W5000 for about $5k.
I"m going to go out on a limb and say that I think the entry price will be lower, as well. MP chips and motherboards are expensive - and this one doesn't need them. No more heavy machined aluminum case. Much smaller power supply. Elimination of a bunch of fans. Removal of all those trays for hard drives. I'll be surprised if it's not at least a couple hundred dollars less than the current lowest Mac Pro.
LOL. No. And I'm laughing at the naked ridiculousness of above argument.
You're kidding, right? The 17" MBP was the largest, heaviest, and most expensive MBP SKU available.
Has it never occurred to you that most people think the price, weight, battery-life, and screen-size trade-off sweet spot is not the 17" model?
Has it ever occurred to you that something doesn't have to be "the sweet spot" in order to be useful? While I am sure that 17" is not the sweet spot, that doesn't mean that it's useless. Or should car makers only make one one type of car - since the others are not in the sweet spot? And maybe there should only be one size of cell phone because that's the sweet spot. And there's certainly no need for restaurants in different price ranges because most of them aren't in the sweet spot.
While the 17" is not mainstream, that doesn't mean that it isn't useful. Just that not enough people bought it to make it a viable product. Those of us who prefer the 17" can still wish for one.
The return of the 17" MacBook Pro would be great. 4k screen, 16x10 aspect ratio, and the ability to have 2 PCI-e disks. If they can get 12 hours of runtime out of it, even better. I hope they are working on it. My current 2009 17" needs to last until they release something that can replace it.
Comments
Quote:
Originally Posted by Marvin
Avid Pro Tools and other Avid products work on Thunderbolt as Avid themselves have been demonstrating.
http://www.magma.com/blog/avid-approves-magma-eb3t-eb7-pro-tools
Yeah, but it's yet another piece of long coin I either have to save, amortize or squeeze out of a bean counter.
I get the rest of your point, and if your numbers are correct (Judges?) it's not a world ender. It's not a non-issue either though.
At least it can be solved just by throwing money at it! To some that will be great relief. To others that's still going to be frustrating though, because it adds another expense to the cost of an already expensive device, on top of also having to buy new storage media.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Marvin
The Retina Macbook Pro lets you pick what resolution you prefer. If you like the UI big, drop to 1440x900, if you like more workspace, bump it to 1920x1200 or for a balance, go with 1680x1050.
How does it look at resolutions that aren't the exact multiple?
Another way to look at the cost:
In Sept 1984 AAPL was selling for $26.50 -- so you'd have to sell ~100 shares of AAPL to buy that $2,500 Original Mac.
If you held those shares you would have 800 shares after 3 2:1 splits or stock worth $454.45 x 800 ~= $363.500.
I suspect you'll be able to buy a new Mac Pro by selling 10-20 shares of AAPL or using 2-4 quarters AAPL dividends @ $3.05 per share per quarter.
I'm not sure what percentage of Mac Pro buyers ever upgrade their GPU, anyway.
Besides, with the resale value of Macs, it's just as easy to sell your old one and buy a new one in a few years - and having most of your storage external makes that even easier.
I wouldn't be surprised if this machine is less expansive than the old one, anyway. It could really surprise people when it comes out.
Quote:
Originally Posted by v5v
That's a commonly misunderstood statement, in my opinion.
Ford was right. His customers were not forward-thinking or imaginative enough to envision the automobile. They did express what they wanted though, and Ford listened.
Customers didn't care whether or not they used horses. The operative part of the phrase was "faster." They didn't say "cars" because there was no such thing. Ford came up with a way to give them "faster horses."
The quote is often presented as evidence that customers don't know what's good for them, but that's not the lesson I take away from it at all. The way I see it, Ford was saying the successful company will be the one that can listen to what its customers are saying, find the fundamental element that matters to them, then deliver it.
I disagree with the above emphasized part of your post.
I never mistook Ford's quote to mean anything like that. I have never even heard Ford's quote expressed as "...what's good for them." Where are you getting that from?
I think Ford's quote means exactly what he said... customers wouldn't have thought up the automobile. Or the first Mac. Or the first click-wheel iPod. Or the first iPhone. Or whatever Steve Jobs had in mind when he said he finally cracked TV.
Quote:
Originally Posted by jragosta
I'm not sure what percentage of Mac Pro buyers ever upgrade their GPU, anyway.
Besides, with the resale value of Macs, it's just as easy to sell your old one and buy a new one in a few years - and having most of your storage external makes that even easier.
I wouldn't be surprised if this machine is less expansive than the old one, anyway. It could really surprise people when it comes out.
They would probably upgrade then entire box.
Yeah, having external storage and PCI chassis make it easier when upgrading the base system, plus people can only buy what they need and take forward the external devices to new boxes. There's always a trade off, I just think that some people are stuck in the traditional tower is better concept because that's what they are used to.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Suddenly Newton
I have never even heard Ford's quote expressed as "...what's good for them." Where are you getting that from?
Apple Insider forums. Not you, but at least two other people.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Suddenly Newton
I think Ford's quote means exactly what he said... customers wouldn't have thought up the automobile. Or the first Mac. Or the first click-wheel iPod. Or the first iPhone. Or whatever Steve Jobs had in mind when he said he finally cracked TV.
I agree with you.
Quote:
Originally Posted by MBP17Developer
NEW CUSTOMERS CAN'T VISUALLY SEE THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN 17"MBP and 15"MPB,
HENCE, NEW CUSTOMERS DON'T EVEN KNOW 17" MBP EXISTS
By the way, one of the reason why the 17" didn't sell well is because you can't visually see the difference between a 15"MBP and 17"MBP.
If you stand at the front door of an Apple Store when they had the 17", could you easily see where the 17"MBP's where located?
Even if you were standing next to the table with 15" and 17" MBPs, could you easily see the difference?
Only when it's directly side by side could you see the difference.
How can you sell the 17"MBP when NEW CONSUMERS don't even know it exists in the first place?
Could NEW CONSUMER of APPLE see at a coffee shop if a professional had a 17"MBP?
Most likely, no, they cannot.
Hence, how can a new customer confidently purchase a 17"MBP if they don't see others using a 17"MBP?
Can new customers even ask someone at a coffee shop about a 17"MBP on whether it's worth the price or value
if they can't see WHO at the coffee shop to ask in the first place?
LOL. No. And I'm laughing at the naked ridiculousness of above argument.
You're kidding, right? The 17" MBP was the largest, heaviest, and most expensive MBP SKU available.
Has it never occurred to you that most people think the price, weight, battery-life, and screen-size trade-off sweet spot is not the 17" model?
Quote:
Originally Posted by Dick Applebaum
13.6" x 9.6" x 10.9" 9.9" x .6.6" 9.9" x 7.7" x 7.3"
Not quite to scale... but close enough!
That last one is a RAID enclosure, not a workstation though, if this was an IQ quiz, you'd need to ask which of these aren't the same type of machine.
I was attempting to match the sizes of things that I might have on my desktop. There is no way I'd have a current Mac Pro on my desktop or even on the back bar -- but the new Mac Pro is something else.,
The iPhone is subsidised and still 1/5th of the price of the entry Mac Pro, which doesn't come with a display. It's not the only factor because if a lot of people needed the power, they'd pay more for it. Fewer and fewer people need the extra power and aren't willing to pay more for something they don't need. That's why this design makes sense because inevitably, people will gradually migrate down the products the more that the cheaper machines satisfy people's power needs and this gives people an easy jumping off point because once you have the external peripherals, they can be switched out easily for a MBP, iMac etc. It means people don't have any obligation to hold onto hardware for long periods of time.
Some people did that with FCP and once they went to Premiere decided they weren't stuck to the Mac platform. For people who still prefer the Mac platform, there's not a suitable hardware alternative. I feel that OS X works far better for dealing with media than Windows.
I suspect there's going to be a 4K IGZO Thunderbolt display so I imagine people will have a lot of things to spend money on. The people who will suffer most are the people who typically buy the cheapest entry models in order to put expansion cards in because if the entry point is the same, they are down $600-1000 (the two full length card Sonnet box is $800), assuming there are no cheaper TB alternatives for their PCIe cards. I don't think storage is as big of a deal because there are USB 3 RAID boxes for $200 that will house 5 HDDs. Higher-end Thunderbolt storage has hardware RAID and drives included so selling the old Mac Pro and drives will recoup some of the expense.
It can't be too far off now before it's clear what the pricing is. IDF is about 4 weeks away:
http://www.techradar.com/news/computing/idf-2013-what-to-expect-from-this-year-s-conference-1171689
"We hope, and fully expect, Intel TV (or whatever it's called) to be laid on the table during IDF. In announcing the service, Huggers said the group working on it was comprised of people from Apple, Netflix and Google. Add Intel's own tech savvy to the mix, and this sounds like a product with a lot of potential."
Thunderbolt 2 should be showcased, which means nothing left to wait for on the rest of the Apple lineup. Ivy Bridge EP Xeons should be on show.
Apparently not as good as the exact multiples as you'd expect but people say it's better than native 1680x1050:
http://forums.macrumors.com/showthread.php?t=1387779
It'll be like watching 1080p resized to 720p on a 1080p display except with very small pixels vs 720p on a 720p display.
I think it could be less expensive, some think less expansive
Quote:
Originally Posted by Marvin
For people who still prefer the Mac platform, there's not a suitable hardware alternative.
I meant some people may choose an alternative Mac, not another platform.
For example, I run one machine as a headless render/transcoding box. Instead of a new ProTube, an i7 quad mini might be "good enough" for that task when the speed vs. cost comparison is done.
Yeah, that could be the case. If people aren't bothered about the GPU and have to get Thunderbolt peripherals anyway, a quad-core Mini could work out well enough. That would mean having a machine without a "Pro" label though and that would just too much for some people to cope with. The fans are also noisier on the Mini so for a quiet working environment, the iMac and Mac Pro would be better options.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Marvin
The 17" is typically described as a desktop replacement whereas the 15" isn't but when they are next to each other, there's very little practical difference:
Hm, around our house we think the difference is considerable and obvious. For years we've had one of each, and we both find the 17 much nicer to work on. That size at that resolution seems to hit a really nice UI scale, and because of the higher resolution the extra size provides more than just an extra inch of width.
We haven't tried a retina at 1650 yet though.
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Quote:
Originally Posted by lkrupp
I've never met a pro, only posers claiming to pros. And posers abound on web forums. Real pros don't have the time.
That's simply not true. Professional web designers, graphic artists, film editors, CAD users, 3D animators, etc. spend an exuberant amount of time in forums. This is how we learn new techniques, get solutions to problems, copy code, get ideas from existing code so we can finish projects quicker and learn to do things better. Do you think we just read a book or sit threw a class and are then all knowing. This forum might be a breeding ground for posers because it is for entertainment purposes but all you need to do is pick one of my listed professions above and do a simple search to see that there are 1,000's of forums that cater to them. Places where real professionals gather to seek each others council. Every time I write a program I always have a bunch of tabs populated with sites that are helpful to my project. So if I run into a problem in which I can't fix in a proper allotted amount of time, I do what ever other professional does, I go to a forum on the subject and ask.
I"m going to go out on a limb and say that I think the entry price will be lower, as well. MP chips and motherboards are expensive - and this one doesn't need them. No more heavy machined aluminum case. Much smaller power supply. Elimination of a bunch of fans. Removal of all those trays for hard drives. I'll be surprised if it's not at least a couple hundred dollars less than the current lowest Mac Pro.
Has it ever occurred to you that something doesn't have to be "the sweet spot" in order to be useful? While I am sure that 17" is not the sweet spot, that doesn't mean that it's useless. Or should car makers only make one one type of car - since the others are not in the sweet spot? And maybe there should only be one size of cell phone because that's the sweet spot. And there's certainly no need for restaurants in different price ranges because most of them aren't in the sweet spot.
While the 17" is not mainstream, that doesn't mean that it isn't useful. Just that not enough people bought it to make it a viable product. Those of us who prefer the 17" can still wish for one.
Great? Define great.
Sell well? No.
Purposeful? No.
Target market? Miniscule.
Cost? Extreme
Define "Great"