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Both systems offer poor value at the lower spec though because they are Xeon based and everything is more expensive. You'd be better of with a higher end i7/i9 system in that range.

The Xeon chips make much more sense in the higher configurations though where you can get crazy core counts, although the clock speeds on the mac pro takes a nosedive, which I don't know how that will work for pro audio.

I still think the imac pro might end up outperforming the base level mac pro here for less money and with a screen attached. In the higher configurations the mac pro will come into its own but the price at that point will only really be an option for bigger businesses who have the money to fill it full of GPU's.

I still think there's a big gap in Apple's line-up here, people who want power and expansion possibilities in a desktop format but aren't going to drop 6-10k or more on a computer.

From what I've seen most of this market has switched to a PC, are they going to return to Apple for an 8-core, 32Gb RAM, 256GB of storage machine that costs 6 grand?
The only problem with the Core chips would be the lack of PCIe lanes. 16 lanes is just enough for a GPU and two NVMe drives, really. Unless you’re ok with 1x or 2x.
 
Both systems offer poor value at the lower spec though because they are Xeon based and everything is more expensive. You'd be better of with a higher end i7/i9 system in that range.

The Xeon chips make much more sense in the higher configurations though where you can get crazy core counts, although the clock speeds on the mac pro takes a nosedive, which I don't know how that will work for pro audio.

I still think the imac pro might end up outperforming the base level mac pro here for less money and with a screen attached. In the higher configurations the mac pro will come into its own but the price at that point will only really be an option for bigger businesses who have the money to fill it full of GPU's.

I still think there's a big gap in Apple's line-up here, people who want power and expansion possibilities in a desktop format but aren't going to drop 6-10k or more on a computer.

From what I've seen most of this market has switched to a PC, are they going to return to Apple for an 8-core, 32Gb RAM, 256GB of storage machine that costs 6 grand?

agree... but i think the i7/i9 type of builds are mostly geared towards gamers and beat music production. (large scale overview, no orchestral) so apple decided to skip that and offer two solutions... the very high end like HP w crazy xeon cpu and for gamers... not xbox type gaming but getting iPhone casual games for the mac w that new project catalyst. so even a mac mini, mac book airs etc can play them.
but yes, something like photoshop, guitarists/beat music and others dont really need the mac pro. and even imac pro is still a bit pricey, mac mini kind of fills that space as well as laptops. defintly there are plenty of other options and alternatives that couldbe made but their road map is not intended for that imo. and no reason to compete in a crowded market.
plus what i mentioned earlier, they seem to be really pushing pro res and pro res rendering since apple will be doing their own content, disney used pro res for their own content and netflix uses pro res for their own content. so even if the mac pro is only used for pros, there are several facilities in LA who will be buying dozens of these new mac pros. and apple be pushing it on the back end of the film industry.
 
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The new MacPro has slow Cpu's with many cores. It will support many track counts, but its going to struggle a bit with the same problem as my 5,1 MacPro in terms of playing live into omnispheres or any other CPU hungry synth. The i7/i9 can achieve much higher single core performance which is needed for playing cpu intensive instruments, especially at low latency. The high multicore scores are great for large track counts...but mainly the video world they can easily make use of that, they don't care as much about low latency performance like musicians do.

the i7/i9 is probably a better platform for music.

But more importantly, whatever they are doing on the new MacPro is just way overkill, and the base $6k model will be horribly underpowered for music production IMHO. Apple needs a mid tier model and one with high single core scores..like they did with the iMac's and Mini's and MBP's...but with Friggin PCI slots already... and internal bays to put my SSD's
 
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The new MacPro has slow Cpu's with many cores. It will support many track counts, but its going to struggle a bit with the same problem as my 5,1 MacPro in terms of playing live into omnispheres or any other CPU hungry synth. The i7/i9 can achieve much higher single core performance which is needed for playing cpu intensive instruments, especially at low latency. The high multicore scores are great for large track counts...but mainly the video world they can easily make use of that, they don't care as much about low latency performance like musicians do.

the i7/i9 is probably a better platform for music.

But more importantly, whatever they are doing on the new MacPro is just way overkill, and the base $6k model will be horribly underpowered for music production IMHO. Apple needs a mid tier model and one with high single core scores..like they did with the iMac's and Mini's and MBP's...but with Friggin PCI slots already... and internal bays to put my SSD's

You're right. If you're not using Logic there is very little reason to even consider this, unless you are that married to OSX. If you are in the US and anywhere close to a Fry's or Micro Center you have support that easily rivals an Apple Store, too.
 
agree... but i think the i7/i9 type of builds are mostly geared towards gamers and beat music production. (large scale overview, no orchestral)

I'd disagree here, I can't see anything suggesting that i7 and i9 CPU's are geared towards gamers and "beat makers", CPU's really aren't that picky. If anything i7/9's are better for music making in general, in that they tend to have better clock speeds than Xeons, which is very important for VI's and Plug-ins.

The biggest area of focus for Apple with the Mac Pro seems to be video work, the standout features like afterburner etc are all geared towards video. All the other specs and features you can get elsewhere and for much less money.
 
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its going to struggle a bit with the same problem as my 5,1 MacPro in terms of playing live into omnispheres or any other CPU hungry synth

Why am I not having problems playing live into Omnispheres or any other CPU-hungry synths on my 5,1? What's wrong with me?
 
Must be because you're such a nice guy

I'm not pissing in your Wheaties, I'm actually asking a serious question in a silly way.

What are you doing with Omnisphere that's leading you to obsess over your computer so much? Obviously it's not working for you, but I don't understand how it's possible to bring a 12-core 5,1 to its knees. I've tried, and I simply haven't been able to.

And that's running Logic at a 128K buffer, including using Omnisphere and whatever else strikes my fancy.

Now, if I loaded multiple mic positions of every orchestral instrument in my template, okay, but without that I haven't even been able to run out of 64GB of memory, let alone spike the CPU.
 
It'd all depend how elaborate the Omnisphere patch is. Is it a single patch or a multi, how many FX are loaded, how is Harmonia used or if at all, etc.
 
@nik: I didn't say anything about bringing anything to its knees, you are nit picking for the sake of creating an argument and yes you are deliberately pissing in my wheaties as usual..

Just making a general comment about single core vs multicore performance. We generally need decent single core performance in order to have low latency without dropouts with some plugins; and some instruments are tougher then others. Some people have complained recently about Omnispheres, its the only reason I mentioned it as an example, but there are many others...and in the future there will undoubtedly be other instruments that are even more cpu intensive.... In that case a machine with higher clock frequency will be better for musical work. The large core counts come into play for mixing large track counts. This is very well understood, why would you argue this basic fact that everyone except perhaps you understands?

The new MacPro is using a slow clock speed with many cores. Will be great for mixing 1000 tracks apparently, but will probably not be any better then you're 5,1 MacPro for playing cpu intensive instruments at low latency. But since you don't have any problems ever I guess you shouldn't worry about it.
 
I'd disagree here, I can't see anything suggesting that i7 and i9 CPU's are geared towards gamers and "beat makers", CPU's really aren't that picky. If anything i7/9's are better for music making in general, in that they tend to have better clock speeds than Xeons, which is very important for VI's and Plug-ins.

The biggest area of focus for Apple with the Mac Pro seems to be video work, the standout features like afterburner etc are all geared towards video. All the other specs and features you can get elsewhere and for much less money.

we might be sayign the same thing... thats what i was saying but i might focused too much on the cpu. the main goal with the mac pro is for high end video work and high end rendering etc. and post audio. basically competing against the HP they mentioned in the presentation. no one is arguming the HP Z station is too expensive for gamers and beat makers. almost no one knows about it. Or that the builds that poeple do for music and gaming is at a much lower price point and also usable for composing. those builds are made with the idea in mind that they will sell ten times more and this lower prices.
 
I'm not pissing in your Wheaties, I'm actually asking a serious question in a silly way.

What are you doing with Omnisphere that's leading you to obsess over your computer so much? Obviously it's not working for you, but I don't understand how it's possible to bring a 12-core 5,1 to its knees. I've tried, and I simply haven't been able to.

And that's running Logic at a 128K buffer, including using Omnisphere and whatever else strikes my fancy.

Now, if I loaded multiple mic positions of every orchestral instrument in my template, okay, but without that I haven't even been able to run out of 64GB of memory, let alone spike the CPU.

how many omnisphere can you load? i have also the same system
 
I think we've reached the point where the "established wisdom" about high core count CPUs is becoming dated. When Xeons with 56 threads can still turbo boost up to 4.4 GHz, how much are you really leaving on the table to "enthusiast/gaming" CPUs in single-threaded scenarios? The answer is "not much."
 
Only one core (+its hyperthreaded twin) turbo boosts to 4.4 GHz on that Xeon! Maximum all-core turbo-boost is 3.8 GHz. Not a small difference, actually - especially in the case where you run a lot of heavy synths. They WILL want those extra clocks.
 
But how long can it sustain a turbo boost of 4.4 GHz? Many recent Macs have had severe thermal issues w/ sustained workloads. Also, is that a single core or multi-core boost? My 9900k for example can hit 5ghz on all cores. As @EvilDragon said, you need high speeds on multiple cores or else you will get pops and clicks.
 
I think this will probably end up being a good-to-great machine in spite of the valid potential shortcomings that others have pointed out. But the price point really gets me. The baseline spec of the previous Mac Pro was $3000 USD. They have doubled that. And by the time those of us who require it add a terabyte of storage (or even 500GB) and 64GB or more of RAM it will probably be in the $7000-$8000 range.

Many people who use Macs and who enjoy using Macs (and I consider myself in that number) have waited a long time for them to come out with a computer that fits their needs. One that is expandable, can handle the heat generated by pro workloads, that doesn't come with an attached screen, etc. etc. Apple fucked these users over by taking 6-7 years to update their pro line. They should've had this new design, which is nothing groundbreaking, for sale in 2015-16 after it became clear the trash bin was a flop. In my opinion they have amends to make, especially given their huge cash pile and the fact that they don't even need to make money off this thing. And despite the fact that they've designed something that likely will meet a lot of those criteria, the cost of entry just seems like another "fuck you" to those loyal customers who, for example, want a great DAW computer that happens to be a Mac.

I'm sure there are many who would say Apple has always been an arrogant company, and that's probably true, but to me this really seems like new heights.
 
how many omnisphere can you load? i have also the same system

Man, I have no idea, but I've never needed to load more than a few.

The subtext is that the days my running out of computer as soon as I get into a project are ancient history.

I'm still trying to understand why that's not true with other people who have the same machine.
 
It'd all depend how elaborate the Omnisphere patch is. Is it a single patch or a multi, how many FX are loaded, how is Harmonia used or if at all, etc.

What's Harmonia? Is that in v.2? I still have the old one.

But yeah, I don't stuff it full of fx or use lots of multis. Too much synth makes Jack a dull boy.
 
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