nah, dyson fans have used similar bases for years.
I kid, I kid.
Honestly though I do not care for an integrated "pro" machine. This is form over function. Fail a component and its off to the shop. Combined with, if I want to upgrade them I need to replace the unit.
If they are going to integrate everything then they need to drop the price. Integration implies lower costs as having all the support needed to drive user added cards and internal drives can be done away with.
Plus its not like I want to have an octopus of cables on my desk and moving storage to all external does that.
Benefits, perhaps driving the thunderbolt prices down and having new and interesting devices to connect to the system.
In the end integration means commodity, just expensive. Can't wait to see what they want for it, I figure on three thousand minimum, which would be a third too much for something so inflexible. Apple, meet Dyson
Exactly why I'm not taking it seriously. What does form do for a power desktop? Nothing. I put my desktop under my desk. I can't see it. I have to stoop to reach the power button.
I'm not going to say there's absolutely no use for form in any desktop, but IMO it's practically the number one least important feature of a power desktop/workhorse.
To me this looks like an example of Apple's craftsmanship in depth where quality and elegance can be seen at multiple levels, from the case to the internal hardware to the OS and its APIs.
Certainly one can find flaws, but compared to a typical Windows machine Apple has more craftsmanship (in my opinion). Windows exhibits more of the "just get it done" utilitarian idea.
A craftsperson can make the most beautiful, elegantly designed thing that is a joy to look at, use, and serves as a conversation piece... and still fail to meet the brief.
If someone needs a high stool for a high workbench, giving them an Aeron task chair is, while beautiful and well-made, missing the brief.
Don't get me wrong - I like everything about the Mac Pro but you pay for your thrills. I can't afford to lay out that kind of scratch unnecessarily. Apple has done a nice job with the design, no doubt. Meanwhile, I have a high end Windows PC for much less money. The speed thrills me, so I don't need a Mac to get a thrill.
The new design might bring some improvement on cooling a lot of powerful hardware stashed inside a small space while keeping the noise level to a minimum.
Dyson? You're so far off ... it's clearly Darth Vader.
I can't believe no one has recognized the classic Lucas handiwork. The helmet descending on the tangled mass of circuits. The signature triangular mouth piece is so clearly evident in the heat exchanger. I can just hear it cooling ...
Amazing retro-future design cues aside, it might be user-serviceable for all components - will wait for the teardown. It's gorgeous enough to be on the desktop and may be quieter because of the chimney. And it's finally a really powerful Mac.
If you need something more powerful than this, it seems maybe a server is more appropriate.
I buy AppleCare and leave the screwdrivers to the Genius Bar. They have copies of them on all of the continents I travel between; I frequently do not.
Furthermore, who wants to be in the laptop repair business? I push bits. For a few hundred bucks they'll fix anything that breaks and I can stop being the Maytag Man and get on with life.
I take it you do not visit Poland or Trinidad and Tobago often. Fair enough, to each for their own needs! But keep in mind the grandparent is not necessarily a high-flying high-paid bit-pusher like you, so your dismissal is still a little self-centered.
(Should I mention that it took two standard-size Phillips heads to replace my screen, the kind of sizes frequently found in a basic swappable-head screwdriver?)
I agree. Apple has used the geometry of the device to assist more with cooling, and shares the heat sink among components, and uses one large slow fan. This kind of thing really pushes my buttons.
It's 10" high, which is unexpectedly compact. It seems like the designers have chosen a shape to maximize use of space. I'm sure it isn't the only way to go but it's a wonderful next step.
Again Apple has shown us what we want when we thought we just wanted "more".
But at what cost? Everyone likes to bash big box PCs but the fact is that every single component of one can be swapped out for another. Something tells me that won't be the case for the Mac Pro, and when all it's going to do is sit under my desk, I can afford to have it be a little less compact.
You're not the target audience. Notice the demo apps for the Mac Pro during the keynote: Final Cut Pro. The Mac Pro is not, and will not, be a developer's machine (though it could be).
There's the overall computing market, which overwhelmingly favors laptops. A subset of this market desires powerful desktop computers. An even smaller subset desires a self-serviceable desktop computer.
For everyone else, particularly people who who use these machines to make a living and are not overly technical (and have no real reason to be), a Mac Pro with a good support contract attached is far more valuable than one they can open and tinker with.
I think this particular point is overblown. Everywhere I look developers have overwhelmingly switched to MacBooks to little ill effect - machines that are far less expandable and less maintainable than these Mac Pros. It turns out that, if you use these machines to make money, it makes a lot more sense to let Apple take care of problems than to roll up your shirt.
Doubly so if you can't tell the front of a DIMM from the back.
Developers will continue buying MacBook Pros in droves. The Mac Pro is overwhelmingly a media machine.
The air being heated naturally flows upwards, so blowing downwards in such a design is a very bad idea. Ideally (and for it to be truly a relevant design), the whole thing is silent at the very least while idle, using very little if any fan and relying on convection to do most of the cooling.
So how many cubic feet per minute will convection cause in this case? 1? 10? Fans will move a hundred cfm or more without much noise.
Both of my recent hardware failures have been caused by dust accumulating in heatsinks, so having something which contributes to that is also a "very bad idea". Especially since the air passes through a relatively confined space which you can't regularly clear out.
What constitutes much noise is subjective, I suppose, but any fan moving hundreds of cfm will be very loud. A 140mm fan moving 20 to 30 cfm is still audible, if you're in a quiet room.
A common approach is to have an intake filter that catches dust. Another is to elevate the case a few inches above the ground.
I love making fun of it but of course I'm just hiding my admiration. At one point I owned an iMac G4 lamp-shade and it seems to hearken back to that design - especially the bottom vents. Ive and co clearly felt they had to come out with something as unique as that lamp-shade design (although it was discontinued, probably because it was really easy to snap in half) and new to inspire excitement about Apple again. It's really sleek, and not nearly as unwieldy as the lampshade iMac. Apple and Tesla routinely set new standards for industrial design. I predict they will sell like hotcakes, not just among professionals but for home users as well.
I think it looks gorgeous. I can't wait to see one in person. My only hesitation about the design is that cylinders don't snuggle well with other computing equipment.
Well snap. Sorry man. It was more of a function of not knowing versus trying to be rude. I actually went out of my way to shorten it to be (what I thought was) courteous, but you make a valid point and I can see how that is actually quite sketchy. I can see how that would be taboo.
"everyone" might be an exaggeration but the adoption curve for iPad is ramping up a lot faster than for the iPhone. Apple has sold over 100 million iPads so far.
Am I the only one whose breath was taken away by this new design? Power desktop seriously revisited for the first time since the 80's, anyone?