Getting a New 2013 Mac Pro in 2017
Waiting isn’t really an option, with my 2008 machine not supported by Sierra.
I think my needs, for development and especially for video work (Motion and Wirecast, mainly) are best served by the Mac Pro. Even the pathetic, three-year-old Mac Pro, because what I want is lots of cores, silent operation, and expandability of RAM and storage, something the iMac and MacBook Pro can’t offer.
[…]
If Marco’s right, then the choice is either today’s Mac Pro, or no Mac Pro.
[…]
I’m honestly not sure Apple is even a consumer electronics company anymore. I’m starting to think they’re more a fashion and luxury goods company instead. […] The whole reason I bought AAPL in the first place was from reading Motley Fool back in the day (on AOL even! yes, I’m old!), whose emphasis on buying single stocks came from knowing what a company did and how it could be profitable doing that. I understood Apple in the 90s and believed that if they kept doing the right thing, they would succeed. They did, and I was rewarded handsomely for believing in them. But now, what the heck am I supposed to think when they’re maybe making a car, or making $300 coffee table books to celebrate how great they are? This makes no damn sense to me, so it’s time for me to be out.
I’m always amazed at just how small the Mac Pro looks in photos.
Previously: How Apple Alienated Mac Loyalists.
Update (2017-01-11): See also: The Talk Show.
5 Comments RSS · Twitter
Frankly the only surprise is that Apple hasn't killed the Mac Pro already. It's an architectural dinosaur, a Mac II in a newer frock. A high-end iMac with a fat data pipe to a plain old server rack, allowing front-end Mac apps to farm out CPU-crunching to the back-end boxen would be a far more sensible and future-proofed computing model. The only problem there being that Apple has never really grokked networks, so can't do distributed systems for squat either.
Mind you, sounds like the OP has sold his 90s Apple stocks at a princely profit, so while he may have been a rotten Apple customer at only ~1 purchase per-decade - and an even worse analyst of why Apple doesn't want to sell stuff to him any more - at least he's some smarts as an investor. (Assuming, that is, the IRS doesn't eat half his profit due to him dumping all the stock at once.)
Personally I'd have said "sell" a couple years sooner when it was already clear Apple had peaked; but then I spent my mid-90s money on ridiculously overpriced PowerMac 7500 POS landfill instead of bargain-basement Apple stock, so what do I know...
I have been an Apple fanboy since 1980 (!). While I thought it could never happen, I find myself recently looking into alternate operating systems as well as hackintoshes. The problem is, most medical software only runs on Windows (we use Fusion VM). We also have a deep investment in a custom FileMaker Pro database, which does not run on any of the Linux variations, as far as I have been able to find out. So what am I to do? I am extremely angry at, and disappointed in, Apple. Thus, at this time I cannot recommend ANYTHING of theirs.
I am really starting to believe that Apple doesn't understand (or is too arrogant to care) how critical the multiplier effect is, to a commercial product's growth curve. Since 1980 I have been directly responsible for converting several hundreds of individuals and some companies to the Apple ecosystem. And some of these converts certainly influenced the conversion of others. Its effect is geometric (as opposed to exponential, I think).
While I do not have formal economics training, I suspect that this personal reinforcement is the most critical component of a company's long term success.
dentaldoc: "So what am I to do?"
I'm guessing you work for and/or own a limited company, in which case you *must* act in the business's best interests, not your own. Save your personal biases and fandom issues for home. It never ceases to amaze how unprofessional so-called "professional Mac users" can be.
Given your specialized software requirements, your company should already be running Windows. Stop faffing about with Linux (totally inappropriate for your business) and Apple licensing violations (totally illegal for your business!), and start learning how to set up and run a robust and secure Windows-based shop. And FFS, stop whining and get your priorities straight! Computers are just tools, a means to an end - in your case supporting a successful healthcare company - not the end in themselves.
[…] It doesn’t seem like there was that sense of urgency about the Mac Pro. Maybe there was a second radical design that also didn’t pan out, but my guess is that Cook thought the future was iMacs or simply didn’t give it much thought. If the plight of Apple’s Pro customers kept him up at night, they wouldn’t be in the situation they’re in. […]
