WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:14.200 With Apple transitioning their Mac lineup to run on their own homegrown silicon, what 00:00:14.200 --> 00:00:17.720 we've seen is a substantial miniaturization of their lineup. 00:00:17.720 --> 00:00:23.240 Just look at the new iMac. It demonstrates just how far they are willing to slim things. 00:00:23.240 --> 00:00:27.040 It's a nice computer, but it calls into question the direction the company will take with 00:00:27.040 --> 00:00:32.640 their professional lineup. computers have been swirling, and they indicate that not even Apple's next hyper powerful 00:00:32.640 --> 00:00:36.880 Mac Pro will be spared from the shrinking, and I think it's worth exploring what that 00:00:36.880 --> 00:00:43.160 could mean. 00:00:43.160 --> 00:00:47.320 The story of the two compact professional Macs from the company's history is relevant 00:00:47.320 --> 00:00:51.920 to this discussion, because they weren't well received, and since the next Mac Pro 00:00:51.920 --> 00:00:55.720 will undoubtedly be smaller than the present one, it's possible that it could suffer the 00:00:55.720 --> 00:01:04.160 same pitfalls as those from the past. The two machines I'm speaking about are, of course, the G4 Cube and the 2013 Mac Pro. 00:01:04.160 --> 00:01:07.160 Remember those? Ugh. I do. 00:01:07.160 --> 00:01:11.800 They both had a lot in common, both introduced stunning visual designs unlike anything we 00:01:11.800 --> 00:01:17.880 expected from a computer before. And I'll never forget the retracting handle of the Cube, and just being mesmerized at 00:01:17.880 --> 00:01:27.320 a cylindrical computer, these compact designs had to reimagine how a computer can be cooled. 00:01:27.320 --> 00:01:30.960 The G4 Cube was designed to be passively cooled by convection. 00:01:30.960 --> 00:01:35.160 This means the hot air captured by the heatsink would rise up, and cold air would rush in 00:01:35.160 --> 00:01:38.360 from the bottom to replace it. A clever design. 00:01:38.360 --> 00:01:42.600 But the more expensive Cube still didn't perform as well as the large and loud Power 00:01:42.600 --> 00:01:49.640 Mac. 2013's Trashcan Pro met a similar fate with its unified triangular heatsink and single 00:01:49.640 --> 00:01:56.080 fan. It proved to not be enough to cool a CPU and two GPUs, and eventually Apple put the Mac 00:01:56.080 --> 00:02:01.920 Pro into a service program. The other thing that graded professionals was that it offered little in the way of expansion, 00:02:01.920 --> 00:02:05.560 unless you wanted to hang a cable octopus off the back. 00:02:05.560 --> 00:02:09.720 In a roundtable discussion with reporters in 2018, Apple explained that they recognized 00:02:09.720 --> 00:02:13.840 these past shortcomings, and a year later gave us this. 00:02:13.840 --> 00:02:24.480 The 2019 Mac Pro. 00:02:24.480 --> 00:02:29.560 Inverting back to the traditional tower form, it is a thermal beast and allows for a degree 00:02:29.560 --> 00:02:33.800 of expansion and upgrade ability not seen in Apple since the 90s. 00:02:33.800 --> 00:02:40.360 There are 12 DDR4 slots for up to 1.5 terabytes of RAM, an optional 2-disk hard drive cage, 00:02:40.360 --> 00:02:45.600 easy to access Thunderbolt ports on top, and 8 PCIe slots that you can fill to your heart's 00:02:45.600 --> 00:02:48.600 content. Want more NVMe storage? Slap that in there. 00:02:48.600 --> 00:02:51.680 Need an HDX accelerator for Pro Tools? Just slide it in. 00:02:51.680 --> 00:02:55.160 Need a capture card or playback card? Slap that in. 00:02:55.160 --> 00:03:03.000 The sky's the limit. Unfortunately, the sky has also been the limit for the power consumption of Intel's high 00:03:03.000 --> 00:03:10.120 performance processors for the last several years. It's almost certain that the new desktop will use a larger, more powerful successor to the 00:03:10.120 --> 00:03:14.720 M1 SoC that launched inside every new Mac since the end of last year. 00:03:14.720 --> 00:03:20.040 Rumors suggest the upcoming Mac Pro's new chip will be called M1X and have up to 40 00:03:20.040 --> 00:03:24.800 CPU cores. And with their current focus on performance per watt and energy efficiency, there's little 00:03:24.800 --> 00:03:28.560 doubt that the ARM Mac Pro will be smaller than the current one. 00:03:28.560 --> 00:03:31.760 So what could that look like? 00:03:31.760 --> 00:03:36.960 Some unofficial renders show that it might channel the nostalgic feeling of the G4Cube, 00:03:36.960 --> 00:03:41.600 while others imagine it as a triple high Mac mini, which would be kind of boring. 00:03:41.600 --> 00:03:46.240 Or it might even maintain the appearance of this beauty, though I hope that it has a single 00:03:46.240 --> 00:03:49.920 centrally placed handle at the top, like a suitcase. 00:03:49.920 --> 00:03:54.200 None of these would be as interesting as if Apple were to give a completely new industrial 00:03:54.200 --> 00:03:58.040 design heralding their new era of homegrown silicon. 00:03:58.040 --> 00:04:02.520 Regardless, I worry that going with such a small form factor could limit the expansion 00:04:02.520 --> 00:04:06.160 that has earned them so much praise from professional users. 00:04:06.160 --> 00:04:09.200 But maybe it can be shrunk without upsetting the community. 00:04:09.200 --> 00:04:16.320 Let's take a crack at it. To integrate any computer into the workflow, many pros need at least a couple of PCIe slots, 00:04:16.320 --> 00:04:20.080 be it for a capture card, audio interface, or to add more storage. 00:04:20.080 --> 00:04:25.320 So in my opinion, the next Mac Pro still needs to have enough width and length to accommodate 00:04:25.320 --> 00:04:29.440 full size cards. We'll get more in depth on that in a minute. 00:04:29.440 --> 00:04:33.200 I also hope there remains easy access to the internals. 00:04:33.200 --> 00:04:38.400 Apple's Pro desktops have been always remarkably and ingeniously accessible, save for the now 00:04:38.400 --> 00:04:42.280 discontinued iMac Pro, which was a bit more of a nightmare. 00:04:42.280 --> 00:04:46.800 So it should remain here. What about CPU upgradeability though? 00:04:46.800 --> 00:04:51.160 Rumors point to a choice between a 20 core model or 40 core model. 00:04:51.160 --> 00:04:54.960 That sounds impressive today, but what about in another 6 years time? 00:04:54.960 --> 00:04:59.440 Back in the days of the early 2009 Mac Pro, it was not only possible to eBay a higher 00:04:59.440 --> 00:05:03.800 end chip later on down the road, but users found they could even flash the firmware, 00:05:03.800 --> 00:05:08.520 enabling support for the next generation of processors on their older machines. 00:05:08.520 --> 00:05:13.600 So could Apple possibly offer SoC upgrades in the years to come? 00:05:14.240 --> 00:05:17.680 No, probably not. 00:05:17.680 --> 00:05:23.080 On all M1 Macs, not only is the SoC soldered onto the logic board, but the system memory 00:05:23.080 --> 00:05:26.640 and even the storage are permanently installed in the same manner. 00:05:26.640 --> 00:05:30.360 So it's more likely we'll see more of the same, making it a good strategy to purchase 00:05:30.360 --> 00:05:35.280 the most powerful config you can afford so that your machine can keep pace with the ever-involving 00:05:35.280 --> 00:05:38.720 demands of your business for years to come. 00:05:38.720 --> 00:05:41.720 The issue of RAM brings up a more interesting question mark. 00:05:41.720 --> 00:05:46.640 The new Unified RAM system in the current M1 Macs come in two possible configurations, 00:05:46.640 --> 00:05:53.080 8 or 16GB. That's obviously not enough for many professional users, so the question is, how will Apple offer 00:05:53.080 --> 00:05:58.480 more? Or even crazier, whether there's space for a hybrid design with Unified RAM on the SoC 00:05:58.480 --> 00:06:04.760 and extra slots for DDR4 DIMMs. The integrated RAM is faster than anything you can plug in, but it's still nice to have 00:06:04.760 --> 00:06:08.120 the option to extend the lifespan of your machine. 00:06:08.120 --> 00:06:12.680 The other big unknown is whether adding graphics cards will be supported, even if there is 00:06:12.680 --> 00:06:19.400 space to slot one in. Because right now, Apple Silicon can't even talk to external GPUs, and all of the graphics 00:06:19.400 --> 00:06:22.760 processing happens on cores integrated in the SoC. 00:06:22.760 --> 00:06:26.400 Apple has supported dual GPU setups before, either switching between them or using them 00:06:26.400 --> 00:06:31.080 in tandem for compatible workloads, but the latter has only been possible with two similar 00:06:31.080 --> 00:06:36.120 cards, like an onboard Radeon GPU and a second one in a PCIe slot or Thunderbolt enclosure. 00:06:36.480 --> 00:06:40.320 Even if we assume it's going to have support for an adding graphics card, I'll eat my 00:06:40.320 --> 00:06:43.640 hat if it uses MPX. 00:06:43.640 --> 00:06:48.280 Of course, we also don't know whether we'll even need a graphics card. 00:06:48.280 --> 00:06:54.360 The rumors claim Apple is working on some huge integrated GPUs with 64 or even 128 cores 00:06:54.360 --> 00:06:58.560 that could be multiple times faster than the current AMD cards that are available with 00:06:58.560 --> 00:07:04.840 the 2019 Mac Pro. Still, I'd love to have the option to upgrade or supplement in the future, whether it's 00:07:04.880 --> 00:07:08.520 with a Radeon or some kind of Apple-designed accelerator. 00:07:08.520 --> 00:07:14.520 Could look like something like the afterburner card. Which, like, who is it for? 00:07:14.520 --> 00:07:21.320 It just does ProRes decoding. I work at LMG and I can't even take advantage of it without really trying. 00:07:21.320 --> 00:07:25.200 Finally, let's talk about Apple's approach to I.O. 00:07:25.200 --> 00:07:31.000 The current M1 line, particularly the iMac, has fewer ports and supports fewer external 00:07:31.000 --> 00:07:34.040 displays compared to Apple's Intel-powered machines. 00:07:34.040 --> 00:07:38.960 I hope their new Mac Pro gets at least the same ports from the 2017 iMac Pro. 00:07:38.960 --> 00:07:45.680 Four USB-C, four USB-A, one 10-gig Ethernet, one SD card reader, and support for more than 00:07:45.680 --> 00:07:52.080 two monitors. Apple has demonstrated with this big boy that they do care about integrating into professionals 00:07:52.080 --> 00:07:58.840 workflows more flexibly. But by golly, this new ARM Silicon leaves so many questions open about how they plan 00:07:58.840 --> 00:08:07.520 on scaling the technology for those workloads. We still haven't even seen what a larger, more powerful MacBook Pro and iMac looks like. 00:08:07.520 --> 00:08:15.120 But those are pretty straightforward to imagine. With the Mac Pro, though, Apple's history of veering between two very opposite extremes 00:08:15.120 --> 00:08:21.720 makes me very interested to see if the company will be able to balance them. 00:08:21.720 --> 00:08:28.280 Thanks for tuning into this Mac Address. Now, I am aware there is a very fresh rumor that says that this Mac Pro is actually going 00:08:28.280 --> 00:08:31.120 to get a spec bump. Which is interesting. 00:08:31.480 --> 00:08:37.960 Imagine what we're going to actually see is kind of a transition period with a bit of overlap between the ARM Mac Pro and the Intel Mac Pro. 00:08:37.960 --> 00:08:41.640 But I'm curious what you think. Make sure to like, subscribe, and comment below.