One of the web mailing lists I that I read regularly is IMUG – a great resource for anyone involved in media production or post.
This morning, Paul Isbicki asked “…do any video pros REALLY believe that APPLE will make a turnaround move and release a new Mac Pro that will justify the inordinately long wait?”
I’ve gotten this a lot from my newsletter readers and wanted to take a few minutes to reflect on this.
BACKGROUND
I’ve written three blogs about the MacPro.
The issue of the life or death of the MacPro gained traction in April and May of 2012, when Lou Borella posted a Facebook page called “We Want a New MacPro.”
In it, Lou asked Apple for clarity on whether the MacPro was dead. In a response Tim Cook stated that a new MacPro was in the works for 2013. However, his wording was a bit squishy and, not surprisingly, a great debate ensued about “what Tim Cook really meant.”
Shortly thereafter, Apple PR clarified that Tim’s comments were correct, that a new MacPro was slated for release in “early 2013.” This was reported by David Pogue, Technology Editor for the New York Times. Read David’s entire post here. (I confirmed this with David in a series of private emails after his column.)
In early June, 2012, I then wrote in one of my blogs:
Here’s my guess on what’s going on. I think that Apple decided a couple of years ago not to update the MacPro – that was the word I was hearing on the street. Then, less than a year ago, they changed their minds and decided to update the machine. However, hardware update cycles are lengthy and it takes time to create all the parts, which is why the system won’t be available, according to Pogue, until next year.
WHAT I THINK
That’s the background. What about now?
For me, the answer is absolutely yes, Apple will release a MacPro, sometime in the first half of this year. (My guess is WWDC, but that’s just a guess.)
I have four reasons for this:
CAVEAT
I haven’t been privy to Apple’s hardware plans since Steve Jobs returned to the company. So, I am speaking theoretically, I do not have any inside knowledge of Apple’s hardware plans.
TIM COOK and APPLE PR
Tim Cook, CEO of Apple and someone I have never met, has a reputation for honesty and straight-talk. On June 2012, he issued an email in reference to the MacPro that “Apple was working on something great for 2013.”
That this comment was specifically related to the MacPro was confirmed by Apple PR to the New York Times, Forbes and MacWorld and reported in Ars Technica.
While I don’t have any experience with Mr. Cook, I have a LOT of experience with Apple PR. They don’t confirm ANYTHING about future Apple products. For Apple PR to confirm the relevance of Mr. Cook’s statements tells me that Mr. Cook’s statements were officially approved.
When Tim Cook made his comments in mid-2012, the professional media world was still in chaos after the launch of Final Cut Pro X. While Mr. Cook spoke almost nine months after the launch, feelings were still running very high.
It could be argued that it was in Apple’s best interest to calm their most important developers and professional users. But, promising new hardware is much harder and longer to implement than offering discounts on training, services, software — in other words, Apple could have chosen an easier way out.
But they didn’t. They promised a MacPro.
THE BUSINESS CASE
At first glance, there is no significant financial benefit for Apple to update the MacPro. In their world of $50 billion quarters, the revenue a MacPro brings in amounts to a few hundred million dollars. While, personally, I would not look askance at a product that generated a hundred million dollars, Apple uses different metrics.
Yet, when given an opportunity to kill off the MacPro – because the professional world was already angst-ridden and depressed – they didn’t. They promised something better.
Again, Apple did not take the easy way out. This, also, reassures me that a new MacPro is coming.
THE PROFESSIONAL CASE
In spite of the fact that the world is moving “post-PC,” and that consumers are flocking to tablets and smart-phones to consume content, someone still needs to create this stuff.
For developers and media creators, speed, power, flexibility, interconnectivity are still critical. While it is nice to create a home movie on an iPad, I would certainly not want to create Avatar on one.
As I’ve written, the new iMacs are fast and well-suited for most computer tasks. But not everything.
If Apple cedes the high-ground of computing power to Windows/Linux systems, they lose the ability to control what developers develop or media creators create. If a developer is creating media on a Windows system, they will naturally tend to want to make sure that content plays first on Windows devices. Same thing for Android.
It seems obvious to me that Apple’s long-term health requires it to provide developers and media creators with high-performance hardware tools that keeps them on Apple hardware.
As Paul Isbicki wrote in his posting: “What will the future bring for editing, Grfx, 3D, Photoshop, Illustrator, animation? How ’bout CAD and CNC, architecture, design, a thousand apps relying [on the power of a professional system.]?”
A COUNTER VIEW
On the other hand, I had a long series of emails with Tim Kolb last year about this very point. Tim argues that high-end Mac systems have not kept up with Windows systems since about 2005.
Tim summarizes comments I’ve heard from many others, pointing to the death of the XSERVE, XRAID, the huge performance issues of ProRes on Windows, the callous death of Final Cut Pro 7 — all pointing to Apple’s abandonment of the professional market in favor of becoming a consumer company. In this view, Apple is willing to relinquish the high-end in hopes that the size of their consumer market compels continued development and support for the platform.
Apple itself has provided a lot of arguments that it is not deeply interested in the professional market.
UPDATE – Jan. 27, 2013
I woke up this morning with an insight. Apple is no longer focused on the professional market; the staggering numbers surrounding the iOS market makes that statement abundantly true. However, Apple does not need to focus on the professional market in order to create products for the professional market. It has thousands of staff engineers that need high-end power tools to create the magic that is in all Apple products. Apple knows what’s needed in a high-end product.
I think Apple has been constrained – first, internally, by deciding whether or not to continue developing the MacPro ; then, second, once the decision was made to go forward, with the availability of the right chips – in advancing the MacPro.
WHAT CAN WE EXPECT
No one doubts that Apple is working on new hardware. That’s what Apple does for a living. The key question is who is the target market for that hardware and what will it do?
I also don’t doubt that Apple will release a new MacPro. However, when ever Apple releases the new MacPro, it won’t look like a Windows system. It won’t use off-the-shelf components that you can buy at Fry’s. It definitely won’t be ugly and it won’t be like the MacPro we have now.
But it will be designed to maximize speed, power, and flexibility. It will heavily feature Thunderbolt for connectivity. And it may not even be called the “MacPro.”
Tim Cook said that “something really great” is coming from Apple in 2013. I tend to believe him.
As always, let me know your comments.
Larry
43 Responses to Will Apple Release a New MacPro?
Newer Comments →-
Tem says:
January 26, 2013 at 9:27 pm
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dr.no says:
January 27, 2013 at 1:59 am
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Larry says:
January 27, 2013 at 2:43 am
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Matt says:
January 27, 2013 at 7:04 am
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Bernhard says:
January 27, 2013 at 12:21 pm
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james katt says:
January 27, 2013 at 4:00 pm
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dr.no says:
January 27, 2013 at 10:46 pm
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Larry says:
January 27, 2013 at 11:03 pm
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Don says:
January 28, 2013 at 10:21 am
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Matt says:
January 28, 2013 at 11:39 am
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Bill says:
January 28, 2013 at 11:56 am
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Tim Kolb says:
January 28, 2013 at 12:15 pm
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Larry says:
January 28, 2013 at 12:19 pm
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Larry says:
January 28, 2013 at 12:21 pm
Newer Comments →(IF) when the new tower system arrives it will be compared to a range of other boxes with a huge array of specs and massive span of pricing as usual by every hardware troll head out there. Apple’s response will be interesting.
As an independent product designer my needs span from pixel and vector art creation, animation, video editing, and all the way to mid-level CAD and prototyping (3d printing). Yes, my forehead is sore from wearing so many hats simultaneously over the years.
My MacPros have served me well over the years, from the G5 to my current 2008 model (its still fast enough with 16gb and a pro-level nvidia quadro card in it to be waiting for me more often than I wait for it).
I agree that it will need to offer up flexibility for pro-level gpu’s, masses of RAM and gobbs of storage (inside and out). Persoanlly, thunderbolt is not that high on my list (the speed is nice) but not required for me, although the video guys would be happy for it no doubt. I am going to be approaching a system upgrade probably this year, so a new and more powerful Pro system is approaching. I look forward to a big leap in all of those areas you mentioned,”… speed, power, flexibility, interconnectivity are still critical…”.
But it has to be a big leap for me to budge, and it has to be that much better in all areas you mentioned. The price can’t shatter the glass ceiling either, so I wish them luck! And one last thing, it has to be as stable as a rock from the start. Loading and unloading my MacPro is an endeavor both physically, on the clock, and all that software too.
if it is Haswell then TDP will be half
35, 45, 65, 84, and ~100W+ (high end procs)
Apple can reduce the # of PCI slots or drive bays to shrink
the overall factor. basically use Thunderbolt for RAID third party
hard drives with just small ssd as boot partition in the machine.
may be go with 2-3 slots.
4K and H265 support.
New Mac OS X is also coming. It may have something.
Probably won’t show until fall because mobile haswell
is june time frame.
Dr. No:
Thanks for your comments. It would be REALLY helpful if you could translate the first sentence into something more English-like.
Larry
I very interested to see what Apple will do with the 2013 model and hope that the Mac Pro line has a long term future in some form.
Desktop PCs in general are on the decline and so I think long term it’s really only going to be high end workstations and hobbyist/gaming rigs that persist. Even Intel announced recently they plan to stop making desktop PC motherboards as laptops and all-in-one’s are taking over.
My 2009 Mac Pro is still coping well with 2012 software with just a video card upgraded and added storage, where as if I had purchased an iMac in 2009 I would have needed to upgrade the whole machine at least once.
Hard disk capacities increases seem to have stagnated at 4TB and as SSD drives are becoming more mainstream with capacity to cater to most peoples needs then keeping plenty of drive bays is important if you need say 10TB or more.
The iMac really isn’t ideal for this as even with Thunderbolt it isn’t as good as multiple fast internal SATA connections.
The other thing is graphics – an area that is still improving. The Radeon 5870 card I have has only just been surpassed by the very top end iMac with its GeForce GTX 680MX and the entry level iMac models all have weaker video cards. It’s far better to buy a video card than a new iMac every couple of years. The high end card are all physically very large so you need a something like a Mac Pro to accommodate them.
Hello,
using FCP-X, I always felt that the Event / Project distinction
is preparing for something server-like ought to be released.
Now with Adobe Anywhere coming and it’s interesting concept,
together with the rumors about an Apple iTV, I could imagine well,
that Apple prepares a machine for the ‘backend’ that also fits on the desk.
Perhaps utilizing ARM and GPU processors,
stackable, 19” rack-mountable, cluster-able via Thunderbolt and Gb-E,
connectable to Thunderbolt RAIDs.
Leading us to edit FCP-X on an iPad,
displaying the GUI/Preview on an Apple iTV in 4K,
processing on the ‘MacPro’ backend machine that sits on/under the desk,
but could also be connected via Gb-E to other machines,
machines that are sitting in the server-room, interconnected via TB,
assembling a private cloud.
This is something, that at the first glance no one of us would expect from Apple.
Therefor I expect nothing less deviant than this!
Best regards,
Bernhard
As Steve Jobs said, there will be always a need for trucks – like the Mac Pro. But not everyone will need one.
Thus, Apple will still make a Mac Pro – for the power users who need it. This includes their own programmers and designers. They certainly can’t create OS X or iOS or other apps on an iPad or iPhone.
Larry,
TDP is Thermal design power
Current Mac Pro is 3565 which has 130 Watt TDP.
If Apple choose the reduced TDP of Haswell Processor
than it can reduce the giant heat sink, the fan, the power supply.
a typical Pro Laptop usually has 45W TDP Processors.
So for Apple to innovate something have to be taken away or power reduced in order to have a different chassis.
If you just want maximum power than you get the same Mac Pro. It is simple as that.
Thanks! This makes it much clearer. Part of the reason for the size of the current MacPro is heat dissipation from the processors.
Larry
No one’s hoping for a new Mac Pro more than me. But, haven’t we learned?
– beware when an Apple exec says something is going to be ‘great’ without giving details (code for, ‘great for us’)
– beware when Apple touts something as being ‘re-imagined’ (code for, ‘customers don’t know what they want’)
– Apple’s ‘DNA’ say, ‘go smaller’
– Apple defines ‘pro’ as ‘not Hollywood, wants advanced features’ — that is, ‘pro-sumer’ is the new ‘pro.’
– Apple’s vision is to ‘milk the Macintosh for all it’s worth — and get busy on the next big thing’
Well, mobile is the next big thing. Mac Pro’s are just ‘big’ — and that’s the problem. My hope? We get a new Mac Pro that can handle the 4K, RAW, 12-bit workflows that ARE the future. However, ‘re-imagined’ and ‘great’ tell me that whatever Apple calls ‘pro’ this time will also have to fit their ongoing strategy for blending and consumer-izing iOS and Mac OS — err, OS X (forgot, they dropped ‘Mac’ from that, didn’t they? … )
I gave up on Apple a while back, so I rolled my own Premiere Edit bay.
We still use FCP7 at the office, but for anything I work on for myself I’m using Adobe. I had high hopes for the last roll out of Mac Pros, but they sure did disappoint.
Is Thunderbolt nice? Yes, but the 10Gb it offers can’t match the 80Gb of PCIe v2 – 16 lane. In making the Pro smaller, I think Apple will get rid of the PCIe lanes and say the Thunderbolt replaces it. That’s not good!
Bill
Just to preempt any push-back on Larry’s mention in the blog entry…I was a Mac-only guy for a long, long time.
I do think that the present long-term prospects of Mac’s involvement in post production (at least in areas like feature film, episodic television, etc, where mixed platform ecosystems are becoming quite common due, at least in part, to board slot limitations in MacPros) will be affected as much by the problem of QuickTime on Windows being left behind completely as any other factor.
ProRes is a great video format…high quality, easy to run on Mac…but its performance on Windows is nowhere near what it could be because 32 bit QT 7.x is an incredible bottleneck relative to the most recent Apple developments on the Mac side…
The reality of the heavy-lift post production world is that facilities with a mix of OS platforms have become very common for very legitimate reasons, and it seems that Apple’s OSX/Media Foundation ecosystem is, at least for the moment, more isolated than ever. No matter what editing application you use, that will give anyone making workstation choices for complex, mixed OS workflows a moment of pause at the very least…
What happens if Apple goes with Thunderbolt v2 at 100 Gbps?
Larry
Thanks for the comment, Tim. I have respected your opinions for a long time.
Larry