In recent years, Apple’s Macs have been in not one but two journeys. The first is clear. It’s the company’s shift away from using Intel chips toward ARM-based Apple Silicon. And with the announcement of the new Mac Pro this week, that transition is complete. Intel chips have been written off from Apple computers.
But Apple was also on a second journey: to build high-end machines for power users that those power users actually want. It’s been nearly a decade since Apple launched the now-famous trash Mac Pro, which the company failed to update with the latest and greatest due to its compact and inflexible design. It’s been a tough era for professional Mac users who work in production environments where every ounce of speed counts.
“We made something bold that we thought would be great for the majority of Mac Pro users. And what we found out is that it was great for some but not for others. It’s enough that we need to take another path,” said Apple’s senior vice president of Worldwide Marketing Phil Schiller, Mac Pro Recycle Bin During a roundtable interview in 2017.
Apple took a big step toward repairing its relationship with these customers with the 2019 Mac Pro, which ditched the built-in drum and redesigned the bulky cheese grater tower. But this model was dated almost immediately after Apple revealed that its Intel processors would be deadlocked. With the 2023 Mac Pro, Apple finally combines the two essentials — chassis and chips — and could have everything it needs to leave trash complaints in the trash.
One of the fundamental problems with the 2013-era Mac Pro was that it was designed for a future of computing that never arrived and wasn’t equipped to handle the hardware that did. “I think we’ve built ourselves into a little thermal corner, if you will,” Apple senior vice president of software engineering Craig Federighi described it in 2017 after the Mac Pro went three years without updating specs. “Over time, architecture has proven to be less flexible to take us where we want to go to address that audience,” he said.
Specifically, Apple assumed that power users would use many smaller GPUs instead of single large cards. For certain classes, a larger GPU might make more sense. But that [2013 Mac Pro] “The architecture doesn’t really support that,” said Apple’s senior vice president of hardware engineering John Ternus. “And we haven’t seen as much interest in dual-GPUs as we had expected.” GPUs are really starting to go in the wrong direction for that, getting bigger and more power hungry.
Another assumption is that power users will rely more on Thunderbolt-enabled external devices for the type of modules that internal PCIe slots typically provide. It’s not unlike the direction Apple assumed laptops were going when it stripped out all of its useful ports in favor of Thunderbolt.
For both desktop and laptop computers, Apple’s vision was similar: outsource bulky ports and modular components to external hardware like docks, monitors, and eGPUs, leaving the basic laptop or desktop computer free to be as sleek and compact as Apple’s industrial design team can make it. . He. She.
“I think we’ve built ourselves into a little thermal corner, if you will.”
This future never ended. Apple had to change course, and in 2019 we saw it revert to an old-fashioned design for the Mac Pro. It was big and powerful, it was full of PCIe expansion slots, and it worked “shock” quietly. It may not have been as sleek and compact as its predecessor, but its utilitarian design was graceful in its own way.
But it also, arguably, suffered from a software ecosystem that wasn’t able to take full advantage of the horsepower on offer, at least when we reviewed it the following year. Nilay Patel said at the show Video review. “So if you live in Apple’s professional apps and use their formats, it’s faster. But that’s not the case for everything else.”
While Apple’s own software like Final Cut Pro worked great, we found that third-party software often struggled to take full advantage of the 2019 Mac Pro’s hardware. Whether it’s Pro Tools, InDesign, Photoshop, or Premiere Pro, none of them seem to work. Software we’ve tried It delivers the kind of performance you’d expect from a PC starting at $5,999. Our review noted at the time: “Ultimately, we realized none of our programs were really driving multithreaded CPU performance, and we weren’t really lighting up GPUs at all.”
This all changed with the move to Apple Silicon, which was announced just half a year after the Intel-based Mac Pro Shipping to customers has begun. Regardless of whether it was the raw power of the hardware, the way Apple managed to rally developers to support it, or, more likely, a combination of the two, we found that industry-standard third-party software absolutely flies on Apple’s new chips.
“Mac Studio is the computer everyone wanted the Mac Pro to be,” my colleague Monica Chen wrote in our review of Mac Studio last year. “I haven’t seen anything crash or not work the way it was supposed to. What I saw is a group of professionals were shocked at how much they could accomplish on this machine. They were using the same software they use every day, but they were doing things with it.” They couldn’t do it before.” Whether it’s Adobe Photoshop, Premiere Pro, or Avid Pro Tools, all signs point to an app ecosystem that has evolved to take advantage of Apple hardware.
Mac Studio’s strengths do not guarantee success for the new Mac Pro because the latter needs to deliver more than just raw performance. In fact, in terms of performance alone, the new Mac Pro may be very similar to the Mac Studio that was announced alongside it. Both devices can be configured with the new M2 Ultra chip, with up to a 24-core CPU, 76-core GPU, and 192GB of unified memory. (Interestingly, Apple had plans for a higher performance chip for the Mac Pro, however bloomberg reports He ruled it out due to cost and complexity concerns.) If raw performance is all you need, chances are you’ll be able to save some money and choose Studio over Pro.
Instead, what Apple hopes the Mac Pro will offer is expandability. For users who need the versatility of internal expansion, Mac Pro combines the most powerful PCIe slots [M2 Ultra] chip,” Ternus said a permit next to the computer ad. That means more external ports and PCIe slots than you can shake.
For users who need the versatility of internal expansion, Mac Pro combines PCIe slots with our most powerful chip.
The Mac Pro is equipped with seven PCle expansion slots in total, six of which are open with PCIe Gen 4 support. Apple examines digital signal processing (DSP) and serial digital interface (SDI) I/O cards for connecting cameras, monitors, network add-ons and storage cards like sorts of things. that users may wish to connect to these slots.
External ports include eight Thunderbolt 4 ports (six in the back, two on the top), three USB-A ports, two 8K HDMI ports, and two 10Gbps Ethernet ports. Oh, and there’s also a 3.5mm headphone jack that, while annoying, is still placed on the back of the device.
However, the Mac Pro’s modularity only seems to go so far. Apple’s announcement does not indicate that it will be able to upgrade its memory (which was Enabled on 2019 Mac Pro), and there was no mention of the ability to plug standard graphics cards into PCIe slots As we have seen in previous models. The Mac Pro 2019’s CPU wasn’t officially user upgradeable, but it used a socket design. Users reported The ability to swap out different Intel processors with relative ease.
But the reason for Apple’s new limitations is almost certainly the same thing that unlocked so much performance on Mac Studio last year: Apple Silicon. Apple chips use an integrated design that combines the CPU, GPU, and memory into a single chipset that is not designed to be removed from the motherboard. While we won’t know for sure until people get the final retail units, it’s very likely that these core components of the 2023 Mac Pro won’t be user upgradeable.
Apple Silicon has made it a double-edged sword for power users, unlocking more performance but at the cost of modularity.
So no, we probably won’t see users switching their M2 Ultra processors to M3s in a couple of years. But that doesn’t necessarily mean that Apple has another trash can. Many of the problems with the 2013 Mac Pro stemmed from the fact that Apple itself struggled to release spec upgrades over time, having to rely on both Intel for CPUs and AMD for graphics. Settling into a regular update cadence for its M-series chips, Apple has laid the foundation for a smoother upgrade cycle this time around.
While it seems like a sure thing in retrospect, it’s worth taking a moment to reflect on how successful Apple’s transition to Apple Silicon was. Before Apple’s big announcement, ARM-based processors were only really successful in smartphones. A couple of manufacturers have tried to get Windows laptops to work on Arm (perhaps most notably with the Surface Pro X), but none delivered on design promises without major compromises.
Not only did Apple convert entry-level MacBooks to Arm, where the battery life benefits of the architecture were the biggest appeal, but it also upended our perception of Arm performance for both laptops and desktops. Not only has Apple ported its own operating system and apps, but it has also convinced major third-party developers to do the same.
The iPhone manufacturer is known for its love of control. It controls how people use their smartphones and what apps they can install. It controls how the repair system works around them. And with its move to Apple Silicon, it has an unprecedented amount of control over how its Macs are made. You don’t need to wait for Intel and AMD to release new chipsets to upgrade their PC hardware or rebuild a relationship with Nvidia. Now, as it embarks on its next journey, Apple can march to the beat of its own drum.
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