AniMill

The Mac Pro is a kludge. I’m betting they tried to punch a hole in the sky, but the sky punched back: no 3rd party video card support, and no extended RAM to 1.5TB (for serious math/design labs). An M3 Extreme isn’t likely because the niche audience will use PC’s with multiple AMD/nvidia cards or simply off-load to cloud render farms. The days of the Mac Pro are waning - very sad. But the rise of the Mac Studio is a happy compromise. And I agree - stacks of M2 Pro Mac Minis are a serious consideration for homegrown render farms.

“Monstrosity?” Actually it’s a Minstrosity. The design is so minimalist as to be invisible. There are many little design touches they could have added (glowing Apple, Space Grey, the circular base with color changing LEDs like the HomePod’s top…), but it’s a great little beast to use. That said, I’ve had terrible problems running After Effects - specifically the Rotobrush tools - that have nearly caused me to eBay it off, because my 14” MBP M1 MAX runs AE better.

An M2/3 ULTRA would be nice, but I’d rather see a mini-LED backlit Apple Display instead. VR/AR is a nonstarter for me - vertigo and nausea - but I’d sure like to see someone make a better product to move the range forward.

Agreed with many of you - periscope needs to be on both Pro’s. Would be a great disappointment because I just can’t stand the phablet size. I have the Mini and love it’s form factor - but I’ve discovered that it is a bit too small for a bunch of apps/sites that don’t optimize for it (buttons missing of juuuust off screen). The Max is just too large. Dealbreaker.

Either the Mac Pro is dead, or so delayed that it’s become superfluous in their product lineup. Perhaps it’s become such a niche that any further investment simply is not a viability for Apple anymore. Either way, if Apple does not at least preview a Mac Pro option at WWDC, I think it’s dead Jim. Though $3000 ski goggles are considered the “next” thing - but I believe AR/VR is already past the public interest inflection point. WWDC is going to be a very interesting show.

I have the SE1, and it does all I need. I can’t see where it’s even slow enough to justify a speed boost. However, a smaller CPU process that leads to better battery efficiency is the best reason for a speed boost…just don’t boost it and let the efficiency take hold.