New Mac Pro's, iMacs and Apple Displays

[Stork]

Probably one of the better articles on the subject of Apple building graphics chipset/capability in house > https://www.fool.com/investing/2017/04/04/why-apple-inc-wants-to-build-its-own-graphics-proc.aspx

 

[zakklol]

I ask him what Apple’s philosophy on external GPUs is.
“I think they have a place,” he says, and leaves it at that.

Interesting....

 

[UtterDisbelief]

Yes, Apple acquiring AMD will probably never happen. But it just seems like a more logical thing to do than to blow their cash hoard on a media company. I'd just like to see them concentrate more on that they know than to venture in to business that have little to nothing to do with their core competencies.

Yes, I'd read a little bit about the Imagination Tech situation. Some have speculated that it's a tactic by Apple to bring the acquisition price down. I disagreed with that theory and the Motley Fool article backs it. It will be interesting to see what Apple has up their sleeves.

I did see Craig Federighi's admission that engineered themselves in to a corner with the cylindrical Mac Pros. I've seen some people speculate that by "modular", Apple may employ a Lego like concept of stacking pieces to upgrade components. While even this would probably be an improvement over what we have now, I sincerely hope that they just return to a traditional tower form factor. Sometimes, change for the sake of change is not good.

Yes, it's already been shown that "modular" is potentially another dead-end. In the mobile-phone business Google is big enough to recognize it and has pulled the plug on its project.

As I read it the Mac Pro problem seems to hinge on the fact that Apple were gambling on multi GPUs getting more efficient, using less power and running cooler, whereas they have remained single monoliths, dispersing more heat. Admittedly more efficiently as designs improve, but perhaps not in the direction Apple was expecting.

People talk about external graphics cards ... Interesting idea but surely not. Who wants a string of three or four different-size boxes strewn across their workstation, all connected by clips and wires?

And besides "modular" is what Hackintoshes could be called already (except those brave enough to tackle laptops).

 

[benvigil]

Windows has been an option for decades. Building a Windows box has pretty much always been a far less expensive option than buying a Mac. Adobe has always had Windows versions of their software. There's nothing new here.

What it boils down to is how comfortable each individual is with the operating systems of their choice. Personally, I like macOS. macOS makes sense to me. I enjoy using macOS. I don't want to use any other operating system. Switching to Windows was never an option for me.

Windows hasn't been an option for me either since OSX was released. The point I was making was that having used Windows 10 a bit now, I don't feel the same way. There are plenty of business and practical reasons why it will not be my main OS for a long time to come... but it might be if different cards were on the table.

You could be forgiven for not totally believing it due to Schiller's regular comments over the past year or two about having amazing stuff in the pipeline etc. But the unusual way this has been made public makes me think that it is absolutely true and that Apple have finally begun to realise what we have all known for some time now; that is the pro users have felt left out, almost to the point of abandonment

Agreed. And the fact that they'd resort to this style of damage control tells me they have nothing immediate in the pipeline and need to buy themselves some time.

I hardly think this is a publicity stunt. My guess is that sales figures must have shown some pretty damning numbers. That plus all the articles, blogs, and users complaining every which way we turned.

Exactly.

 

[benvigil]

I did see Craig Federighi's admission that engineered themselves in to a corner with the cylindrical Mac Pros. I've seen some people speculate that by "modular", Apple may employ a Lego like concept of stacking pieces to upgrade components. While even this would probably be an improvement over what we have now, I sincerely hope that they just return to a traditional tower form factor. Sometimes, change for the sake of change is not good.

It'll be interesting to see where they go with this modularity concept. It's hard to know if they mean physical modularity or component-level modularity.... i.e. openness.

Remember the G4 Cube? You'da thought Apple would have learned their lesson. Nobody wanted to buy into a dead end in 2000 and nobody wanted to buy into one in 2013. That may work for the consumer market and mobile phones, but not for pros spending $4k on a business tool.

I ask him what Apple’s philosophy on external GPUs is.
“I think they have a place,” he says, and leaves it at that.

Interesting....

I though the same thing.

 

[WonkeyDonkey]

Modular to us may not be the same as modular to Apple. Im sure lots of folks would like a whole rack of PCI-E slots and suchlike; I have doubts that Apple will see it in quite the same way though.

 

[benvigil]

Modular to us may not be the same as modular to Apple. Im sure lots of folks would like a whole rack of PCI-E slots and suchlike; I have doubts that Apple will see it in quite the same way though.

You can say that again.

 

[Abe Frohman]

I hope modular means at least one PCI slot. But I truly hope for a return to the G3/G4 tower days where the logic board was on the opening door. So simple to work on!

 

[telepati]

Did you see the message Pike's posted today?

https://pikeralpha.wordpress.com/2017/04/05/imac181-with-xeon-e3-1280-v6-processor/

 

[ekwipt]

Did you see the message Pike's posted today?

https://pikeralpha.wordpress.com/2017/04/05/imac181-with-xeon-e3-1280-v6-processor/

yep saw that, i've been eyeing off a new board