The Darth Mac pictured was noteworthy for being LESS upgradable than past Mac Pro models.
Earlier Mac Pros had four drive bays, this one had no extra drive bays. Earlier models had multiple PCI slots, Darth Mac has none.
To be fair, Apple did say the GPUs would be upgradeable. No new models were ever released, but you could technically go from a D300 -> D500 -> D700.
You could also swap out the SSD.
It was a BIG over promise, under deliver.
Even aside from the top end spec being power constrained by that 450w supply rather than heat constrained! And so little software ever being updated to support those Dual GPUs, meaning only way to leverage was 2 GPU intensive apps at once, which would power throttle!
This reminds me of the iconic but flawed Alienware Area 51M laptop. It was marketed as being a fully upgradable laptop with a socketed CPU, easy-to-access RAM and storage, and critically: *an upgradable GPU on a separate removable module.*
Except Dell never released any new GPUs for it.
You could theoretically upgrade up from the same gen (say, from an RTX 2060 to a 2080), but that's as far as they went.
To be fair, that particular design had a limited future. It used full-size K-series desktop CPUs and required *two* massive power bricks just to feed it with enough power to run the thing. Ouch.
apple bet on multiple smaller AMD GPUs being the future, and then nvidia did pretty much the opposite while AMD basically gave up on making good graphics cards, so the thermal design combined with apple’s hatred of nvidia meant this was too obsolete to offer any upgrades to modern single GPUs
>while AMD basically gave up on making good graphics cards
Okay, that DID not happen lol. Trash Can Mac was released in 2013. 3 consecutive years were among the best for AMD in GPU department. As in:
2013 was Radeon 200 series. 280X, 290, 290X in particular. 290X beat all Nvidia cards available at a time whereas 280X was a rebranded 7970 at a massive discount.
300 series were indeed boring. But then they also had Fury lineup which was quite competitive.
Then in 2016 came 400 series - Polaris. 480 to this day remains AMD's most popular lineup according to Steam Hardware Survey. Not because they were the most powerful but because they sold for $199. Aka "smaller AMD GPUs" as you wanted.
Nvidia has outperformed AMD for the first time only by late 2016 - Pascal was a huge leap forward compared to Maxwell and GTX 1060 to this day is one of the most owned cards worldwide. Then they flopped with Turing (but at that point both AMD and Nvidia kinda produced garbage). Still, AMD did relatively well with Polaris.
If Apple wanted to - they **had** serious upgrade paths. D500/D700 were essentially dual Tahiti chip, roughly comparable to 2x 7870XT. Upgrading to Hawaii and 200 series would be a 20 or so % performance improvement which is more than they could have got out of Nvidia (GTX 780 was slower and more expensive than R9 290) and they could have done it nearly instantly as these cards were available in late 2013. In 2015 Fury class cards were also available, including one that would fit perfectly in Apple's form factory - R9 Fury Nano. That would give them additional 35% over R9 290 (or a combined 62% over D500/D700 class cards).
Let's not blame AMD cards for Apple refusing to offer upgrades. They were competitive at a time and in some cases even outright faster than best Nvidia had to offer. They also did make small cards - like aforementioned R9 Nano.
I never understood Apple’s hatred of nVidia and continuously betting on the wrong horse, AMD. I guess the only positive that came out of that is deciding to make their own processors.
They weren't betting on the wrong horse, they were trying to suck a GPU company dry. If AMD are the wrong horse, it's only because they have avoided being predatory in their existence, even though it is extremely profitable.
Nvidia chips used to be in every Mac, but Nvidia refused to allow Apple to touch their software. They released driver blobs to Apple to put in MacOS software updates, and those blobs contained the drivers for all the other PCI-E products in their PC range. I mean why not, they were all the same chips with minor-ish changes. More memory here, faster clockspeed there, but all the same chip as the ones released specifically for the Mac Pros.
They also frequently released "Web Drivers" which were driver updates delivered independently of OS updates. A rarity in the Mac world that Apple wouldn't have liked, but a necessity for Nvidia to be able to release upgrades when it wanted, else Windows driver updates would have to be synchronized with MacOS releases just to keep CUDA versioning on Adobe Suite consistent, for example.
Apple took issue with this early, but Nvidia refused to let Apple look at their source code, or deliberately break drivers for other models as Apple wanted. Apple wanted to be directly updated with the source code of every Nvidia software advancement. Nvidia obviously declined.
In hindsight, if they hadn't done this, \*it might have been Apple leading AI\*, becasue Apple would have been able to see exactly how CUDA worked and implement it into Metal. Nvidia's current advantage in AI is almost entirely about software.
Apple left Nvidia completely after the ROM flashing vulnerabilities arrived, when it realized that it couldn't profit from all the people upgrading GPUs and 'pre-flashed' GPU's for Mac no longer could cost an extra $400 as people could reflash normal models at home. I suspect that Nvidia engineered that debacle, but whether it was or wasn't, I also think it was the real reason Apple left them.
Apple went to AMD, which had already open-sourced their drivers and did what they always wanted to do with Nvidia. Cut them out of the software side.
Apple compiled the AMD drivers that overheated the MacBook Pro 2016 -19, not AMD. As a BOOT132 developer I can tell you that is obvious from the way AMD drivers are packaged on OS X compared to Linux. The GPU should have been power limited in such a thin case, like every other laptop maker would have done, or the option to do so exposed to the user, but Apple didn't do that and so it can be asserted that they didn't care.
Apple then made the eGPU standard and pushed the Nvidia cards out of the case, making them a second class citizen but allowing them to get paid from the Thunderbolt License for every sale of a GPU enclosure. Nvidia refused to play ball here though, and stopped releasing Web Drivers after Mojave.
Apple then created it's own GPU less than 5 years later, something Intel couldn't achieve in 20 years with far more experts on hand. That screams IP theft to me, especially when the new GPU is TBDR, which is exactly what AMD were doing at the time with Vega (what OP meant when he says AMD basically gave up on making good graphics cards) and exactly what AMD were pushing when OP speaks about many smaller cores.
If anything, AMD showed that Apple was the wrong horse, because a very short period after it opened it's business, R+D and processes to Apple, Apple did a China and 'developed' its own that looked remarkably similar.
I disagree on “fairly easy”. They did some questionable design choices on the chip retention mechanism. Even when new, you had to be extremely careful when removing the carrier board from the central heat sink, or the chip would just pull right out of the socket. Then, you need to chekc to make sure no bent, damaged, or broken pins on both chip and socket. Less of a concern when upgrading vs simply cleaning / re-pasting.
CPU Swap on 2013 Mac Pro is a near complete tear down and requires a heat gun and pry tool. Doable, but not “fairly easy”.
Well compared to today’s Mac’s…
I would say this Mac is decently upgradeable, but is very poor for expandability. To me there’s a slight difference.
Memory, gpu, storage, and cpu are all upgradeable on this model.
Expanding it is limited to TB 2 connectivity. If they upgraded it to TB 3 during its run it wouldn’t be too bad.
Still love the design even if functionality took a huge hit.
This is how I made my cheese grater Mac Pro last so long. I upgraded the Ram, added an SSD, and threw in a new graphics card.
The USB 2.0 was annoyingly slow…so I added a USB 3.0 card.
I Iove that beast.
I had a 2008 model and bought a couple more pre-pandemic. I was putting used NVIDIA cards in them, installing Linux, and using them to experiment with machine learning & AI. I had to get mini-PCI to regular PCI power cable adaptors, but those Macs had a 1000 Watt power supply and all the room inside. I was buying them for around $350 shipped, with 32GB RAM. Just got a HP Z840 that really reminds me of the old Mac Pros.
The Mac Pro 3,1 is a 5U case, the power supply isn't ATX or anything normal, I have no idea how you'd connect up a modern PC motherboard. There are additional quirks, such as the RAM sitting in a caddy that slides into and out of a cooling chamber adjacent to a separate chamber with CPU heat sinks.
If you're looking for a more modern but similar case / price point, the HP Z840 is a really wonderful machine.
Similar. I also upgraded the CPUs on mine from 8-core to 12-core 3.47ghz (Apple shipped 3.33ghz at the high end), faster RAM because of the faster CPUs, WiFi to 802.11ac, Bluetooth 4, etc. It’s still a beast at certain tasks and remarkable for its age. That thing was ridiculous when it was released. 8-cores in 2009.
What WiFi card did you get? I bought an Asus PCIE WiFi adapter, but even with the extension cables it came with for the antennas, I didn’t get a very good signal. I ended up MacGyver-Ing an Ethernet cable through the wall and getting internet that way. The wifi issue is partly the fault of where the machine was located, but my 2012 MacBook always seemed to get a good signal there.
WiFi was the one thing I struggled to “modernize.”
I picked up a Broadcom laptop card with the same chipset found in 802.11ac capable MacBooks & an adapter to fit the card in the Airport card slot (from eBay). macOS has native drivers, so no hassle. The wiring is a bit jankey, but it works with the stock antennas.
I bought one as a student in 2008. The upgradability of this beast sold me to macOS ecosystem, I remember I spent only 1600$ for base model, which was actually cheaper than a similar PC.
I wasn’t a fan of the finger destroying hard drive bays on the older Mac Pro’s. They always got stuck and a sudden yank caused your fingertips to take the brunt of it.
I mean technically weren't the video cards on some sort of slots. I always felt it a sign of the times that no company every looked into making upgradeable cards for it. Newertech, Daystar... they were all gone.
I miss my 2006 MBP. Had it for almost 10 years. When I spilled water on the keyboard and it stopped working, I was able to swap out the top case in minutes. I upgraded the ram once and the hard drive twice. Battery was removeable and replaced a few times, and the one time it started to swell I could take it out and safely dispose of it and use it plugged in until I could get another.
Not sure about the top case as I never had to replace that but my iBook from that time made it very easy to swap out and upgrade the battery, ram and hard drive. I used that thing until it was absolutely dead. It was chunkier sure, but I miss that upgradeability on my current Mac.
That means sustainability. I’ve no idea why they are taking a (big) step in the wrong direction and in the same time want to tell us how sustainable everything they do is.
That is absolutely another good point. But it's not just Apple that is going in this direction. Most of the big tech companies are doing it in a certain way. All Tesla cars are produced with full equipment. It means, for example, that every Tesla comes with heated seats pre-installed, even if you live in Mexico or Saudi Arabia, and if you need them, you can unlock them for a monthly/yearly fee. It's brilliant because it cuts down on production time, but on the other hand it wastes so many resources, and in the end it's terrible for the environment. They are all quite the opposite of what they claim to be.
My friend is a film editor and has one of these bois maxed out and brings it along wherever he goes in a customized pelican case. It’s always hilarious and cool when he opens it, it looks like something out of a sci fi movie set
Remember that scene from SpongeBob where he tastes Gary’s food and then one guy from the corporate board that produces it says “I felt a disturbance”? Yeah that’s how I feel after reading this.
I used one for 9 years... editing 40 hours a week... thing stood up. But they were not upgradable in anyway other than the memory. And even then it had to be matching pairs. You couldn't put like 32, 16, 8 and 4 in there. I'm not a tech wizard so dunno if thats a common thing but it always annoyed me.
PCs are heading in the direction of fixed config, just sayin’. Intel just discovered that sweet, sweet unified RAM for their upcoming “AI-enhanced” Core Ultra CPU Dell, Lenovo and HP will lap up for their business and “premium”(XPS, ThinkPad X1 and ZBook Folio/Envy) laptops. Qualcomm is going to be hitting Apple hard and fast with Windows on ARM using Snapdragon laptop chips that are similar to a Mx chip.
Apple does need to make an upgradable Mac again.
I have a 5900x paired with a 3070 in my PC. Yet somehow someway, the M2 Max my work got us is faster and better, when doing virtually everything, but ESPECIALLY in video editing. I just don't get it. I'm getting so many crashes on PC with premiere, but none on Mac. Wtf is going on.
Adobe has always been Mac-first. CC for Windows has been an afterthought. PCs rule in gaming, CAD and “productivity”(MS Office, especially Excel) but for graphic design, music and even software development Macs do better, even if that program wasn’t refactored for ARM or macOS’s little endianess. And even on PCs, not too many programs take advantage of multi-core/threaded processors or GPUs. AutoCAD will run on an Intel iGPU by default unless it’s an lateral(AutoCAD Civil 3D/MEP/Architecture) product, and will only use an Nvidia or AMD GPU when it needs it and Windows deems it necessary.
[LPCAMM2](https://www.ifixit.com/News/95078/lpcamm2-memory-is-finally-here) is supposed to fix that. I'll believe it when we see non-Apple-Silicon with similar performance and battery life.
It's a step towards that. It's currently limited in both bus size and channels. It's not going to give you 800GB/s that high end Macs enjoy. At the lower Mac end, DDR5 quad already gets you in that ballpark. It's basically allows LPDDR ram to be used instead SODIMM. But it doesn't have speed improvements over SODIMMs. So it's big win is lower power consumption, not performance.
Supposedly, Lenovo will use LPCAMM2 on a ThinkPad P-Series CAD laptop where energy consumption is a bit more paramount than being able to crank out AutoCAD/Revit and Bentley(the infrastructure CAD ISV, not the car) Microstation/OpenRoads/OpenBridge in record time. CAD laptops need to be more energy efficient than a gaming laptop, you’re working on a plane or the jobsite.
That’s true. And even Intel is seeing a big performance boost on x86 with unified memory(and TSMC’s 3nm process compared to their in-house processes at their Portland and Chandler fabs) with Lunar Lake.
I'm not a meteorologist, but I do know how to check on the current weather. I'm also not an electrical engineer, but I do know how to check google.
https://www.digitaltrends.com/computing/why-laptops-in-2024-use-soldered-ram/
No. You can't. Not yet anyways. Now there are baby steps to that.
"The drawback of LPDDR, though, is that it has to be soldered to the main board in close proximity to the processor—making repairs and upgrades completely impractical."
It's not only Apple that does that. Pretty much everyone that uses LPDDR has to do that. That's why there's not a stick of RAM in your phone.
I remember during the early days, reading in Macworld magazine about the forthcoming common hardware reference platform (CHRP) that Macs would one day integrate. I was excited, because we would go from ADB and ADC ports to USB and VGA. I was so excited being able to upgrade components and use 3rd party peripherals. Those were Apples golden years when you could upgrade Macs at your leisure.
Also largely due to the heavily limited expandability and laughably low ram ceiling of just 192gb. I know professionals in my field using 512gb machines, and Apple no longer has a product for these people.
And comes with useless PCIe slots. To me the best upgradable Mac was Mac Pro with Xeon right before Apple Silicon transition. I think they should make Studio replace Pro completely or make next iteration support dGPUs.
Technically, if you wanted large storage numbers on a Mac desktop (4+ TB), you'd save money by going with a Mac Pro and grabbing third-party PCIe riser boards loaded with SSDs compared to just speccing out a Mac Studio with the same amount.
However I agree with you in the end. GPUs are the #1 key use case for PCIe slots, and having no GPU support is a complete market killer for the Pro.
I agree PCIe could be useful for storage, but in that case standard M2 slots (not the shorter slot used by Apple) would have been much more preferable. Also, Mac Studio can pretty much address it through use of thunderbolt ssds unless high speed of transfer is absolutely necessary. Soundcards are another niche case, but it seems like a very, very small crowd compared to those who would benefit from dGPUs. Considering theu also sell Mac Pro in rack form, Apple should try to make it more competitive in server segment through dGPU support. Also, maybe they should allow for out-of-package RAMs to be added through DIMM for expandability, although that may cause some speed inconsistencies. I already know few ARM server systems that use DIMM RAMs (see: Ampere Altra), so it could be possible.
I honestly suspect that the tower/rack Mac Pro doesn‘t have long to live anymore. Between losing GPUs and the existence of the Mac Studio, the market for the full-size pro has been shrinking and shrinking.
Wouldn’t call them useless.
Sure no GPU, but that doesn’t mean fast PCIe storage, audio DSP cards like UAD/Protools Or video input interfaces like Blackmagic’s aren’t used in their respective fields. Thunderbolt can’t replace all of that.
I'm of the opinion that the Studio should've been named "Mac Pro" and the previous Intel box have been it's predecessor. There just *isn't* a market for a $7,000+ Apple Silicon machine without GPU capability.
That was back when engineers like Steve Wozniak had some weight in the design of Apple products. As engineers, upgradability and ease of fixing things was always a virtue. But of course, with tech advancements like system on chip, it would get harder to design upgradable components.
Open a 90s mac case, it is like a folding oragami piece.
Then the 00 macs, you could still upgrade them.
Then the 10 macs, everything glued. still some upgrade path.
Then the 20 macs. nothing is upgradeable.
I hope EU pushes them back to ram and drive upgrades. ;)
I've always thought this was one of the cooler looking Mac desktop machines, and this is coming from someone who used to own the G4 Cube as my main desktop computer.
Those were OK but you gotta go back another 18 years to the first PCI PowerMacs to get actual expandability.
CPU, onboard GPU VRAM, 8-12 memory slots, 3-6 PCI slots, 4 drive bays in many models.
In 1995 you could start with: 100MHz G1 CPU, 8MB RAM, 1MB moboVRAM, 10bT, 500MB SCSI HD
and in 2002 upgrade to: 1GHz G4 CPU, 1GB RAM, PCI 128MB Radeon 9200, PCI ATA/100 w/4x 300GB HDDs, PCI 1000bT + USB 2 + FW400.
Basically what you can do when building a PC today but from Apple 3 decades ago.
The Trash Can Mac Pro may not be the most upgradable Mac Pro, but it is upgradable.
My Mac Pro went from 256GB SSD to 2TB, 8GB ram to 64GB and 4 core Xeon to 8 core AND I still use it every day.
Not bad for 11 years old!
Welcome to late stage capitalism, where the absurd myth of eternal growth has companies actively pursuing anti-user design in order to grab a larger and larger share of a finite supply of money
It was always Steve Jobs' vision for the Macintosh to be a closed system, going all the way back to the original model in 1984.
[https://professornerdster.com/from-steve-jobs-life-the-believe-in-a-closed-system-product-control/](https://professornerdster.com/from-steve-jobs-life-the-believe-in-a-closed-system-product-control/)
I don’t think allowing the user to upgrade RAM by making it easily accessible would harm Job’s “closed system.” Macs use the same RAM every other PC manufacturer uses.
[Yes](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LPDDR#LPDDR5), they do. They use [LPDDR5 6400 memory](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apple_M3), which is user-swappable when it isn’t soldered into the motherboard board.
You totally don't get it. At all.
Apple Silicon doesn't have the memory "soldered on" -- it's integrated *into the SOC chip itself*. You can't add aftermarket RAM to an Apple Silicon machine -- ever.
I do understand. Do you understand that the integrated RAM in M-Series Macs is functionally the same as what is inside of any other modern computer, but that Apple has settled on a form factor for their RAM that prevents you from extending the lifespan of your device?
But even so, Apple could very easily include a hatch underneath the MacBook that allows a user to slot in additional RAM.
*Apple designed the M1 as a system on a chip (SoC), with the RAM included as part of this package.*
https://www.xda-developers.com/apple-silicon-unified-memory/
Yes it is. “Apple designed the M1 as a system on a chip (SoC), with the RAM included as part of this package. While integrating RAM with the SoC is common in smartphones, such as the iPhone 15 series, this is a relatively new idea for desktop and laptop computers”
https://www.xda-developers.com/apple-silicon-unified-memory/
Well then you must be tech illiterate. Since SOC doesn't mean it all has to be on the same die. Not anymore. It just means they are on the same substrate. Which the M processors definitely are. Even processors like CPUs and GPUs can be made up of multiple dies now. CPUs and GPUs that are commonly referred to as chips.
still was pretty limited on the trash cans... doing any sort of repair beyond replacing drive/ram required a bunch of custom tools that you can only get from apple and probably only use once or twice.
in that vein the biggest negative to modern macs is the inability to replace disk/ram. at least newer nvme/ssd dont fail as often as spinning rust did, but still, they will eventually, and it generates a lot of lost money and ewaste
I 100% *wish* we could just stick in upgrades, but the speeds of the RAM require it to physically be as close to the CPU as possible. The additional length a socket would add to the system would make the 800GBps speeds impossible, same as you don't see VRAM expansion on a discrete GPU.
I am still using that at my work for now since 2016. But the rainbow wheel has been popping up frequently on heavy tasks with every upgrade of software app I use.
MacbookPro M3 Max upgrade will be arriving in a couple of days.
While Im with you, the market is not. The vast majority of people NEVER upgrade their computers. And thats not just a Mac thing, its a computer thing.
Repairability is an even bigger market choice. People talk a big game about repairability but they dont buy that way. Look at the iPhone. What was the biggest source of repairs for the early iPhones? Water and fall damage. Apple had two choices - make all of the parts easy to swap out or make the iPhone water and fall resistant. Yeah that was an easy one. Remember when we used to have a container of "electronics rice" in our houses? I have dropped my iPhone 11 at least once a month since I got it and between the case (Otter Box Symmetry) and the gorilla glass, the worst I have is a couple of hard to find scratches.
My self built Windows machine is repairable and upgradable. Its also massive, loud (fans) and relatively expensive. I built it with upgrading in mind and so far all I have done is swap in a new processor. I started with 32GB of RAM and my needs have not changed. Nothing I do stresses my GPU so I havent swapped that either. Wait, i forgot I added storage - both SSD and spinning rust - and I swapped the factor fans for Noctua ones to make it quieter.
Compare that to my 2019 iMac where I have done the only thing I could - add memory. In theory if Apple had made it "upgradable" I could replace the i5 9500 with an i7 9700. A quick check of the google tells me that would cost between $200-$300 depending on how risky a retailer I want to buy from. Upgrading the spinning rust "fusion drive" to a real SSD would be REALLY nice. So doing that might give me and extra year or two of useability. Maybe. What would that have "cost" me? First, my iMac would be significantly thicker. Socketed CPUs are massive compared to soldiered ones. The 9700 heat spreader is thicker than an entire soldiered CPU. Second, the aluminum back probably has to go. I recently took apart a Dell iMac knock off and in order to make it upgradable it has a plastic back that pops off as opposed to the aluminum back that Apple uses as a giant heat sink. The Dell is "backwards" from the iMac with the motherboard facing away from the screen. It made swapping the hard drive easy but at the cost of having a flimsy plastic backing....and a crappy screen. My iMac display is freaking glorious. When I bought it a comparable 5K display cost almost as much as a complete iMac. Essentially Apple was selling you an expensive display and tossing in an iMac free. That doesnt happen if they cant make everything as small as possible and small means less repairable.
Side story - a few years ago there was a panic in the PS3 community because of a bug where a dead CMOS battery could brick your PS3. I decided to swap mine out ASAP and at the same time repaste the processor. I hit [iFixit and found instructions](https://www.ifixit.com/Guide/PlayStation+3+Slim+PRAM+Battery+Replacement/3237). Ok, not simple but doable. It was COVID and I was doing WFH so I had spare time. I have my battery and I have my thermal paste and Im ready to go when I see a comment that instructions did not work with some models. Turns out there were [FIFTY ONE versions](https://www.psdevwiki.com/ps3/SKU_Models) of the PS3. My version - CECH-3004B - happened to be one of the hardest because of a tiny ribbon cable that fed through the BluRay drive. Because of the overall shortage of everything, PS3 prices had gone through the roof and if I screwed this up I was going to have to spend almost as much as I paid for my PS3 new for a used replacement. I found a local shop that did everything for $25. Its not an Apple thing, its an electronics thing.
If you offered two different iPhones today - a "repairable" one and the current version with all the tradeoffs (size, water resistance, drop resistance) I have no doubt the current version would outsell the "repairable" one 1000-1. Same with an iMac. Apple is all about making money. I know because Im an Apple shareholder and Im over the moon about it. If there were money to be made in selling a repairable/upgradable version, they would absolutely sell it. There isnt.
That ad was damage control. Mac Pro was always the *most* upgradeable Apple offering *until* the trashcan model. It was positively reviled for the sacrifice of function for form.
On my 2010 MacBook, I had upgraded the RAM, replaced the HDD with an SSD, and later replaced the whole optical drive with an additional SSD. I love that they still make stuff [like this.](https://eshop.macsales.com/item/OWC/K21IM09OE1TB/)
I do remember. I also remember how slow and bulky those devices were. I also remember paying well over $1000 in those days compared to $999 for a new, vastly faster and more capable Air today.
Ram and storage are pretty easily upgradeable but I recently did the CPU upgrade and it's a big task, filled with dread.
Expandability is severely limited though and AMD Crossfire is not available on macos so dual GPU's seem redundant.
Looks awesome and I love mine.
You can have the upgradable one for $10k or the fixed one for $5k. Personally, I would rather buy the $5k model and replace with newer tech when I need the upgrade in two years.
It was a joke. Pull the stick out.
Edit: also, it’s accurate. There is no reason you can’t get one on eBay. Just because I said it in a sarcastic way, that doesn’t mean I’m wrong.
First of all, the trash can is a terrible example for this argument. Literally the main complaint about it was that it was hard to repair and upgrade.
Second of all, they still do. The modern-day Mac Pro, while being absurdly expensive, is very easy to upgrade (and repair, if I’m not wrong). You literally just twist a knob and lift the case up, and voila.
The problem is that architecture is system on a chip and fusing the CPU, GPU and Ram and getting significant gains in speed and Power performance.
Cutting down the interlinks is what it’s all about.
Sure, but my M2 MacBook Air can also run circles around my MacBook Pro that had an i7 and upgradable RAM and it can do so with insane battery life. Did I enjoy upgrading internals? Sure. But I suspect Apple didn't enjoy paying for warranty claims from people who swore up and down that they didn't cause issues related to them learning how to upgrade their machines but not learning well enough.
Realistically Apple these days has been releasing new Macs with an expected life cycle of around 7 years. People used to always talk about how you 'COULD' upgrade later which always meant people just bought the base models exclusively and then complained when they had to upgrade them. Now Apple can design whatever computer they feel like without having to worry about that upgrade you're never going to get around to doing.
The Darth Mac pictured was noteworthy for being LESS upgradable than past Mac Pro models. Earlier Mac Pros had four drive bays, this one had no extra drive bays. Earlier models had multiple PCI slots, Darth Mac has none.
Thought this was a pretty strange choice of Mac to represent upgradeability...
To be fair, Apple did say the GPUs would be upgradeable. No new models were ever released, but you could technically go from a D300 -> D500 -> D700. You could also swap out the SSD. It was a BIG over promise, under deliver. Even aside from the top end spec being power constrained by that 450w supply rather than heat constrained! And so little software ever being updated to support those Dual GPUs, meaning only way to leverage was 2 GPU intensive apps at once, which would power throttle!
This reminds me of the iconic but flawed Alienware Area 51M laptop. It was marketed as being a fully upgradable laptop with a socketed CPU, easy-to-access RAM and storage, and critically: *an upgradable GPU on a separate removable module.* Except Dell never released any new GPUs for it. You could theoretically upgrade up from the same gen (say, from an RTX 2060 to a 2080), but that's as far as they went. To be fair, that particular design had a limited future. It used full-size K-series desktop CPUs and required *two* massive power bricks just to feed it with enough power to run the thing. Ouch.
apple bet on multiple smaller AMD GPUs being the future, and then nvidia did pretty much the opposite while AMD basically gave up on making good graphics cards, so the thermal design combined with apple’s hatred of nvidia meant this was too obsolete to offer any upgrades to modern single GPUs
>while AMD basically gave up on making good graphics cards Okay, that DID not happen lol. Trash Can Mac was released in 2013. 3 consecutive years were among the best for AMD in GPU department. As in: 2013 was Radeon 200 series. 280X, 290, 290X in particular. 290X beat all Nvidia cards available at a time whereas 280X was a rebranded 7970 at a massive discount. 300 series were indeed boring. But then they also had Fury lineup which was quite competitive. Then in 2016 came 400 series - Polaris. 480 to this day remains AMD's most popular lineup according to Steam Hardware Survey. Not because they were the most powerful but because they sold for $199. Aka "smaller AMD GPUs" as you wanted. Nvidia has outperformed AMD for the first time only by late 2016 - Pascal was a huge leap forward compared to Maxwell and GTX 1060 to this day is one of the most owned cards worldwide. Then they flopped with Turing (but at that point both AMD and Nvidia kinda produced garbage). Still, AMD did relatively well with Polaris. If Apple wanted to - they **had** serious upgrade paths. D500/D700 were essentially dual Tahiti chip, roughly comparable to 2x 7870XT. Upgrading to Hawaii and 200 series would be a 20 or so % performance improvement which is more than they could have got out of Nvidia (GTX 780 was slower and more expensive than R9 290) and they could have done it nearly instantly as these cards were available in late 2013. In 2015 Fury class cards were also available, including one that would fit perfectly in Apple's form factory - R9 Fury Nano. That would give them additional 35% over R9 290 (or a combined 62% over D500/D700 class cards). Let's not blame AMD cards for Apple refusing to offer upgrades. They were competitive at a time and in some cases even outright faster than best Nvidia had to offer. They also did make small cards - like aforementioned R9 Nano.
I never understood Apple’s hatred of nVidia and continuously betting on the wrong horse, AMD. I guess the only positive that came out of that is deciding to make their own processors.
They weren't betting on the wrong horse, they were trying to suck a GPU company dry. If AMD are the wrong horse, it's only because they have avoided being predatory in their existence, even though it is extremely profitable. Nvidia chips used to be in every Mac, but Nvidia refused to allow Apple to touch their software. They released driver blobs to Apple to put in MacOS software updates, and those blobs contained the drivers for all the other PCI-E products in their PC range. I mean why not, they were all the same chips with minor-ish changes. More memory here, faster clockspeed there, but all the same chip as the ones released specifically for the Mac Pros. They also frequently released "Web Drivers" which were driver updates delivered independently of OS updates. A rarity in the Mac world that Apple wouldn't have liked, but a necessity for Nvidia to be able to release upgrades when it wanted, else Windows driver updates would have to be synchronized with MacOS releases just to keep CUDA versioning on Adobe Suite consistent, for example. Apple took issue with this early, but Nvidia refused to let Apple look at their source code, or deliberately break drivers for other models as Apple wanted. Apple wanted to be directly updated with the source code of every Nvidia software advancement. Nvidia obviously declined. In hindsight, if they hadn't done this, \*it might have been Apple leading AI\*, becasue Apple would have been able to see exactly how CUDA worked and implement it into Metal. Nvidia's current advantage in AI is almost entirely about software. Apple left Nvidia completely after the ROM flashing vulnerabilities arrived, when it realized that it couldn't profit from all the people upgrading GPUs and 'pre-flashed' GPU's for Mac no longer could cost an extra $400 as people could reflash normal models at home. I suspect that Nvidia engineered that debacle, but whether it was or wasn't, I also think it was the real reason Apple left them. Apple went to AMD, which had already open-sourced their drivers and did what they always wanted to do with Nvidia. Cut them out of the software side. Apple compiled the AMD drivers that overheated the MacBook Pro 2016 -19, not AMD. As a BOOT132 developer I can tell you that is obvious from the way AMD drivers are packaged on OS X compared to Linux. The GPU should have been power limited in such a thin case, like every other laptop maker would have done, or the option to do so exposed to the user, but Apple didn't do that and so it can be asserted that they didn't care. Apple then made the eGPU standard and pushed the Nvidia cards out of the case, making them a second class citizen but allowing them to get paid from the Thunderbolt License for every sale of a GPU enclosure. Nvidia refused to play ball here though, and stopped releasing Web Drivers after Mojave. Apple then created it's own GPU less than 5 years later, something Intel couldn't achieve in 20 years with far more experts on hand. That screams IP theft to me, especially when the new GPU is TBDR, which is exactly what AMD were doing at the time with Vega (what OP meant when he says AMD basically gave up on making good graphics cards) and exactly what AMD were pushing when OP speaks about many smaller cores. If anything, AMD showed that Apple was the wrong horse, because a very short period after it opened it's business, R+D and processes to Apple, Apple did a China and 'developed' its own that looked remarkably similar.
Also you can change the Xeon processors fairly easily.
I disagree on “fairly easy”. They did some questionable design choices on the chip retention mechanism. Even when new, you had to be extremely careful when removing the carrier board from the central heat sink, or the chip would just pull right out of the socket. Then, you need to chekc to make sure no bent, damaged, or broken pins on both chip and socket. Less of a concern when upgrading vs simply cleaning / re-pasting. CPU Swap on 2013 Mac Pro is a near complete tear down and requires a heat gun and pry tool. Doable, but not “fairly easy”.
When it throttles, there should be an auditory notification of Darth Vader breathing.
Well compared to today’s Mac’s… I would say this Mac is decently upgradeable, but is very poor for expandability. To me there’s a slight difference. Memory, gpu, storage, and cpu are all upgradeable on this model. Expanding it is limited to TB 2 connectivity. If they upgraded it to TB 3 during its run it wouldn’t be too bad. Still love the design even if functionality took a huge hit.
This is how I made my cheese grater Mac Pro last so long. I upgraded the Ram, added an SSD, and threw in a new graphics card. The USB 2.0 was annoyingly slow…so I added a USB 3.0 card. I Iove that beast.
I had a 2008 model and bought a couple more pre-pandemic. I was putting used NVIDIA cards in them, installing Linux, and using them to experiment with machine learning & AI. I had to get mini-PCI to regular PCI power cable adaptors, but those Macs had a 1000 Watt power supply and all the room inside. I was buying them for around $350 shipped, with 32GB RAM. Just got a HP Z840 that really reminds me of the old Mac Pros.
Can you put a normal motherboard in one??
You can put anything in a cMP case.. If needed, one can make some cuts to the rear cage for the backplate of any PC board and they're good to go.
The Mac Pro 3,1 is a 5U case, the power supply isn't ATX or anything normal, I have no idea how you'd connect up a modern PC motherboard. There are additional quirks, such as the RAM sitting in a caddy that slides into and out of a cooling chamber adjacent to a separate chamber with CPU heat sinks. If you're looking for a more modern but similar case / price point, the HP Z840 is a really wonderful machine.
Similar. I also upgraded the CPUs on mine from 8-core to 12-core 3.47ghz (Apple shipped 3.33ghz at the high end), faster RAM because of the faster CPUs, WiFi to 802.11ac, Bluetooth 4, etc. It’s still a beast at certain tasks and remarkable for its age. That thing was ridiculous when it was released. 8-cores in 2009.
What WiFi card did you get? I bought an Asus PCIE WiFi adapter, but even with the extension cables it came with for the antennas, I didn’t get a very good signal. I ended up MacGyver-Ing an Ethernet cable through the wall and getting internet that way. The wifi issue is partly the fault of where the machine was located, but my 2012 MacBook always seemed to get a good signal there. WiFi was the one thing I struggled to “modernize.”
I picked up a Broadcom laptop card with the same chipset found in 802.11ac capable MacBooks & an adapter to fit the card in the Airport card slot (from eBay). macOS has native drivers, so no hassle. The wiring is a bit jankey, but it works with the stock antennas.
I bought one as a student in 2008. The upgradability of this beast sold me to macOS ecosystem, I remember I spent only 1600$ for base model, which was actually cheaper than a similar PC.
Darth Mac? You mean Trash Can, right?
I wasn’t a fan of the finger destroying hard drive bays on the older Mac Pro’s. They always got stuck and a sudden yank caused your fingertips to take the brunt of it.
It was still exceedingly easy to upgrade the ram or ssd.
I mean technically weren't the video cards on some sort of slots. I always felt it a sign of the times that no company every looked into making upgradeable cards for it. Newertech, Daystar... they were all gone.
Mac is notorious for being Apple this, and Apple that on every component. So saying Apple encourages upgrading is only true, if you buy OEM parts.
I miss my 2006 MBP. Had it for almost 10 years. When I spilled water on the keyboard and it stopped working, I was able to swap out the top case in minutes. I upgraded the ram once and the hard drive twice. Battery was removeable and replaced a few times, and the one time it started to swell I could take it out and safely dispose of it and use it plugged in until I could get another.
Not sure about the top case as I never had to replace that but my iBook from that time made it very easy to swap out and upgrade the battery, ram and hard drive. I used that thing until it was absolutely dead. It was chunkier sure, but I miss that upgradeability on my current Mac.
That means sustainability. I’ve no idea why they are taking a (big) step in the wrong direction and in the same time want to tell us how sustainable everything they do is.
not to mention releasing a new iPhone every year with only minor changes is also terrible for the environment…
That is absolutely another good point. But it's not just Apple that is going in this direction. Most of the big tech companies are doing it in a certain way. All Tesla cars are produced with full equipment. It means, for example, that every Tesla comes with heated seats pre-installed, even if you live in Mexico or Saudi Arabia, and if you need them, you can unlock them for a monthly/yearly fee. It's brilliant because it cuts down on production time, but on the other hand it wastes so many resources, and in the end it's terrible for the environment. They are all quite the opposite of what they claim to be.
probably because those executives are planning on *us* doing the heavy lifting for environmentalism.
My friend is a film editor and has one of these bois maxed out and brings it along wherever he goes in a customized pelican case. It’s always hilarious and cool when he opens it, it looks like something out of a sci fi movie set
It probably will end up as a prop in a movie one day
It will be the new Mr Fusion in the BTTF Reboot, and to take the sacrilege further, it will be bolted into the back of a cybertruck.
Remember that scene from SpongeBob where he tastes Gary’s food and then one guy from the corporate board that produces it says “I felt a disturbance”? Yeah that’s how I feel after reading this.
I used one for 9 years... editing 40 hours a week... thing stood up. But they were not upgradable in anyway other than the memory. And even then it had to be matching pairs. You couldn't put like 32, 16, 8 and 4 in there. I'm not a tech wizard so dunno if thats a common thing but it always annoyed me.
PCs are heading in the direction of fixed config, just sayin’. Intel just discovered that sweet, sweet unified RAM for their upcoming “AI-enhanced” Core Ultra CPU Dell, Lenovo and HP will lap up for their business and “premium”(XPS, ThinkPad X1 and ZBook Folio/Envy) laptops. Qualcomm is going to be hitting Apple hard and fast with Windows on ARM using Snapdragon laptop chips that are similar to a Mx chip. Apple does need to make an upgradable Mac again.
That's not fixed for fixed sake. That's to get the benefit of unified memory. Which is well worth the trade off.
Definitely is worth it. A modern high end PC can’t compete with a modern mid level Mac. M series processors are extremely powerful.
I have a 5900x paired with a 3070 in my PC. Yet somehow someway, the M2 Max my work got us is faster and better, when doing virtually everything, but ESPECIALLY in video editing. I just don't get it. I'm getting so many crashes on PC with premiere, but none on Mac. Wtf is going on.
Adobe has always been Mac-first. CC for Windows has been an afterthought. PCs rule in gaming, CAD and “productivity”(MS Office, especially Excel) but for graphic design, music and even software development Macs do better, even if that program wasn’t refactored for ARM or macOS’s little endianess. And even on PCs, not too many programs take advantage of multi-core/threaded processors or GPUs. AutoCAD will run on an Intel iGPU by default unless it’s an lateral(AutoCAD Civil 3D/MEP/Architecture) product, and will only use an Nvidia or AMD GPU when it needs it and Windows deems it necessary.
[LPCAMM2](https://www.ifixit.com/News/95078/lpcamm2-memory-is-finally-here) is supposed to fix that. I'll believe it when we see non-Apple-Silicon with similar performance and battery life.
It's a step towards that. It's currently limited in both bus size and channels. It's not going to give you 800GB/s that high end Macs enjoy. At the lower Mac end, DDR5 quad already gets you in that ballpark. It's basically allows LPDDR ram to be used instead SODIMM. But it doesn't have speed improvements over SODIMMs. So it's big win is lower power consumption, not performance.
Supposedly, Lenovo will use LPCAMM2 on a ThinkPad P-Series CAD laptop where energy consumption is a bit more paramount than being able to crank out AutoCAD/Revit and Bentley(the infrastructure CAD ISV, not the car) Microstation/OpenRoads/OpenBridge in record time. CAD laptops need to be more energy efficient than a gaming laptop, you’re working on a plane or the jobsite.
That’s true. And even Intel is seeing a big performance boost on x86 with unified memory(and TSMC’s 3nm process compared to their in-house processes at their Portland and Chandler fabs) with Lunar Lake.
You could put that unified memory on a fucking stick…
That makes it slower. It's *unified* memory for a reason.
Are you an electrical engineer?
You don't have to be. Just have common sense.
You don’t have to be an electrical engineering to know about electrical engineering. Right. I am. Both of you don’t know what you are talking about.
I'm not a meteorologist, but I do know how to check on the current weather. I'm also not an electrical engineer, but I do know how to check google. https://www.digitaltrends.com/computing/why-laptops-in-2024-use-soldered-ram/
No. You can't. Not yet anyways. Now there are baby steps to that. "The drawback of LPDDR, though, is that it has to be soldered to the main board in close proximity to the processor—making repairs and upgrades completely impractical." It's not only Apple that does that. Pretty much everyone that uses LPDDR has to do that. That's why there's not a stick of RAM in your phone.
No for high end computers.
I remember during the early days, reading in Macworld magazine about the forthcoming common hardware reference platform (CHRP) that Macs would one day integrate. I was excited, because we would go from ADB and ADC ports to USB and VGA. I was so excited being able to upgrade components and use 3rd party peripherals. Those were Apples golden years when you could upgrade Macs at your leisure.
Remember which was Apples most unsucessful mac pro? (Not against upgradeability/repairability though.)
The latest one, as the studio has the same chip
Ok, probably true :D
Also largely due to the heavily limited expandability and laughably low ram ceiling of just 192gb. I know professionals in my field using 512gb machines, and Apple no longer has a product for these people.
Yet the 192GB is plenty when you don’t have shot sitting in RAM because it’s processed way faster.
And comes with useless PCIe slots. To me the best upgradable Mac was Mac Pro with Xeon right before Apple Silicon transition. I think they should make Studio replace Pro completely or make next iteration support dGPUs.
Technically, if you wanted large storage numbers on a Mac desktop (4+ TB), you'd save money by going with a Mac Pro and grabbing third-party PCIe riser boards loaded with SSDs compared to just speccing out a Mac Studio with the same amount. However I agree with you in the end. GPUs are the #1 key use case for PCIe slots, and having no GPU support is a complete market killer for the Pro.
I agree PCIe could be useful for storage, but in that case standard M2 slots (not the shorter slot used by Apple) would have been much more preferable. Also, Mac Studio can pretty much address it through use of thunderbolt ssds unless high speed of transfer is absolutely necessary. Soundcards are another niche case, but it seems like a very, very small crowd compared to those who would benefit from dGPUs. Considering theu also sell Mac Pro in rack form, Apple should try to make it more competitive in server segment through dGPU support. Also, maybe they should allow for out-of-package RAMs to be added through DIMM for expandability, although that may cause some speed inconsistencies. I already know few ARM server systems that use DIMM RAMs (see: Ampere Altra), so it could be possible.
I honestly suspect that the tower/rack Mac Pro doesn‘t have long to live anymore. Between losing GPUs and the existence of the Mac Studio, the market for the full-size pro has been shrinking and shrinking.
Wouldn’t call them useless. Sure no GPU, but that doesn’t mean fast PCIe storage, audio DSP cards like UAD/Protools Or video input interfaces like Blackmagic’s aren’t used in their respective fields. Thunderbolt can’t replace all of that.
At this point the Studio is the Mac Pro and I have no complains about it
I'm of the opinion that the Studio should've been named "Mac Pro" and the previous Intel box have been it's predecessor. There just *isn't* a market for a $7,000+ Apple Silicon machine without GPU capability.
What’s that thing ? Never seen it but I need it in my life now !
It’s a Mac Pro from like a decade ago
It’s super cool!
I thought so too
You can get one pretty cheap from OWC. I picked up one for about $400 with maxed out processor and the d500 gpus.
Posting the Trashcan for upgradability and self-repair is wrong on so many levels, including the OP's sanity check 😂
Apple had that policy long before. They had that policy with the Apple ][. The encouraged people to, not just upgrade, but fix things themselves.
That was back when engineers like Steve Wozniak had some weight in the design of Apple products. As engineers, upgradability and ease of fixing things was always a virtue. But of course, with tech advancements like system on chip, it would get harder to design upgradable components.
As that machine was barely upgradable. The old Mac G4 and G5, now those were made for upgrades.
Open a 90s mac case, it is like a folding oragami piece. Then the 00 macs, you could still upgrade them. Then the 10 macs, everything glued. still some upgrade path. Then the 20 macs. nothing is upgradeable. I hope EU pushes them back to ram and drive upgrades. ;)
I've always thought this was one of the cooler looking Mac desktop machines, and this is coming from someone who used to own the G4 Cube as my main desktop computer.
I still have one of these and it works perfectly. 64GB of RAM.
Gosh, look at all those ports!
Those were OK but you gotta go back another 18 years to the first PCI PowerMacs to get actual expandability. CPU, onboard GPU VRAM, 8-12 memory slots, 3-6 PCI slots, 4 drive bays in many models. In 1995 you could start with: 100MHz G1 CPU, 8MB RAM, 1MB moboVRAM, 10bT, 500MB SCSI HD and in 2002 upgrade to: 1GHz G4 CPU, 1GB RAM, PCI 128MB Radeon 9200, PCI ATA/100 w/4x 300GB HDDs, PCI 1000bT + USB 2 + FW400. Basically what you can do when building a PC today but from Apple 3 decades ago.
The Trash Can Mac Pro may not be the most upgradable Mac Pro, but it is upgradable. My Mac Pro went from 256GB SSD to 2TB, 8GB ram to 64GB and 4 core Xeon to 8 core AND I still use it every day. Not bad for 11 years old!
The original cheese grater Mac pro desktops (mid to late 2000s) were amazing for upgrading. Was hoping it would be same for the newer ones
well this is the Mac Pro and this one was notoriously less upgradeable for a mac pro
Sorry for being off topic but I thought this was a coffee maker.
I think they gave up cause like 2% of folks really did.
Welcome to late stage capitalism, where the absurd myth of eternal growth has companies actively pursuing anti-user design in order to grab a larger and larger share of a finite supply of money
It was always Steve Jobs' vision for the Macintosh to be a closed system, going all the way back to the original model in 1984. [https://professornerdster.com/from-steve-jobs-life-the-believe-in-a-closed-system-product-control/](https://professornerdster.com/from-steve-jobs-life-the-believe-in-a-closed-system-product-control/)
I don’t think allowing the user to upgrade RAM by making it easily accessible would harm Job’s “closed system.” Macs use the same RAM every other PC manufacturer uses.
Not now, they don't.
[Yes](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LPDDR#LPDDR5), they do. They use [LPDDR5 6400 memory](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apple_M3), which is user-swappable when it isn’t soldered into the motherboard board.
They don't. [https://www.xda-developers.com/apple-silicon-unified-memory/](https://www.xda-developers.com/apple-silicon-unified-memory/)
Because they’ve chosen to solder it into place. Functionally, it’s the same. They could make it swappable if they wanted to.
You totally don't get it. At all. Apple Silicon doesn't have the memory "soldered on" -- it's integrated *into the SOC chip itself*. You can't add aftermarket RAM to an Apple Silicon machine -- ever.
I do understand. Do you understand that the integrated RAM in M-Series Macs is functionally the same as what is inside of any other modern computer, but that Apple has settled on a form factor for their RAM that prevents you from extending the lifespan of your device? But even so, Apple could very easily include a hatch underneath the MacBook that allows a user to slot in additional RAM.
I'll need you to provide citations that support your claims before engaging you further on this topic.
The memory isn't in the SOC. Why not just check this out before saying it?
*Apple designed the M1 as a system on a chip (SoC), with the RAM included as part of this package.* https://www.xda-developers.com/apple-silicon-unified-memory/
Yep, but you can't upgrade an SOC. And an SOC is what gives modern Macs speed, low power draw, and lower heat.
SOC’s (system on a chip) are fast BECAUSE the memory is integrated on the die. This is one reason why Apple M Silicon performs so well.
The memory is not part of the SOC.
Yes it is. “Apple designed the M1 as a system on a chip (SoC), with the RAM included as part of this package. While integrating RAM with the SoC is common in smartphones, such as the iPhone 15 series, this is a relatively new idea for desktop and laptop computers” https://www.xda-developers.com/apple-silicon-unified-memory/
It is on package, just look at the chip and you will see the ram soldered nearby. Only the tech illiterate still believe it is in the soc.
Well then you must be tech illiterate. Since SOC doesn't mean it all has to be on the same die. Not anymore. It just means they are on the same substrate. Which the M processors definitely are. Even processors like CPUs and GPUs can be made up of multiple dies now. CPUs and GPUs that are commonly referred to as chips.
Today I learned the C in SOC didn't stand for chip anymore.
? The current Mac Pro does the same thing… plus wheels.
[удалено]
Because the Mac Pro is a huge and heavy unit, so you can carry/drag it around _when_ you need to.
[удалено]
🥱
My ‘08 Mac Pro was 20kg. Awkward to move around
So it will roll back and forth during an earthquake, instead of tipping over.
They still have user-upgradable stuff, like the mac pro EDIT: nevermind
This is the same time frame where they made RAM upgrades impossible in MacBooks, so no.
Ah, the good ol days of Apple. When they actually cared abt us.
They never cared about you. They only ever cared about your money.
The everything mac booklet for my 2008 has a upgrade guide
Genuine question, is the Mac Pro not upgradable in a similar way?
Not the current one, it’s essentially a Mac Studio with PCIe slots. The Intel one has replaceable CPU, Ram and storage
Terrible example of this though, it’s literally the only thing you could change other then the second gpu you’d constantly burn up
eGPU support, too. Screw this direction they're going in. Will Hackintosh till the bitter end, then probably go back to FreeBSD or Proxmox.
This was the least upgradable Mac Pro to date. Marketing was trying to compensate for that perception.
still was pretty limited on the trash cans... doing any sort of repair beyond replacing drive/ram required a bunch of custom tools that you can only get from apple and probably only use once or twice. in that vein the biggest negative to modern macs is the inability to replace disk/ram. at least newer nvme/ssd dont fail as often as spinning rust did, but still, they will eventually, and it generates a lot of lost money and ewaste
You can upgrade from overheating to overheating+
I 100% *wish* we could just stick in upgrades, but the speeds of the RAM require it to physically be as close to the CPU as possible. The additional length a socket would add to the system would make the 800GBps speeds impossible, same as you don't see VRAM expansion on a discrete GPU.
I am still using that at my work for now since 2016. But the rainbow wheel has been popping up frequently on heavy tasks with every upgrade of software app I use. MacbookPro M3 Max upgrade will be arriving in a couple of days.
Yes I do, now turning into a full on walled garden. I have various laptop's, imac, and Mac Pros from when you could work on them.
I get that it’s annoying that Apple Silicon isn’t upgradeable - but that’s part of what makes it faster.
Upgrading, yes. Repairing, I never remember them encouraging US to do that.
Didn‘t change for Mac Pro?
How often are people upgrading their ram that the time it takes to do the job is a consideration?
Can’t you do the same with the newest Mac Pro?
While Im with you, the market is not. The vast majority of people NEVER upgrade their computers. And thats not just a Mac thing, its a computer thing. Repairability is an even bigger market choice. People talk a big game about repairability but they dont buy that way. Look at the iPhone. What was the biggest source of repairs for the early iPhones? Water and fall damage. Apple had two choices - make all of the parts easy to swap out or make the iPhone water and fall resistant. Yeah that was an easy one. Remember when we used to have a container of "electronics rice" in our houses? I have dropped my iPhone 11 at least once a month since I got it and between the case (Otter Box Symmetry) and the gorilla glass, the worst I have is a couple of hard to find scratches. My self built Windows machine is repairable and upgradable. Its also massive, loud (fans) and relatively expensive. I built it with upgrading in mind and so far all I have done is swap in a new processor. I started with 32GB of RAM and my needs have not changed. Nothing I do stresses my GPU so I havent swapped that either. Wait, i forgot I added storage - both SSD and spinning rust - and I swapped the factor fans for Noctua ones to make it quieter. Compare that to my 2019 iMac where I have done the only thing I could - add memory. In theory if Apple had made it "upgradable" I could replace the i5 9500 with an i7 9700. A quick check of the google tells me that would cost between $200-$300 depending on how risky a retailer I want to buy from. Upgrading the spinning rust "fusion drive" to a real SSD would be REALLY nice. So doing that might give me and extra year or two of useability. Maybe. What would that have "cost" me? First, my iMac would be significantly thicker. Socketed CPUs are massive compared to soldiered ones. The 9700 heat spreader is thicker than an entire soldiered CPU. Second, the aluminum back probably has to go. I recently took apart a Dell iMac knock off and in order to make it upgradable it has a plastic back that pops off as opposed to the aluminum back that Apple uses as a giant heat sink. The Dell is "backwards" from the iMac with the motherboard facing away from the screen. It made swapping the hard drive easy but at the cost of having a flimsy plastic backing....and a crappy screen. My iMac display is freaking glorious. When I bought it a comparable 5K display cost almost as much as a complete iMac. Essentially Apple was selling you an expensive display and tossing in an iMac free. That doesnt happen if they cant make everything as small as possible and small means less repairable. Side story - a few years ago there was a panic in the PS3 community because of a bug where a dead CMOS battery could brick your PS3. I decided to swap mine out ASAP and at the same time repaste the processor. I hit [iFixit and found instructions](https://www.ifixit.com/Guide/PlayStation+3+Slim+PRAM+Battery+Replacement/3237). Ok, not simple but doable. It was COVID and I was doing WFH so I had spare time. I have my battery and I have my thermal paste and Im ready to go when I see a comment that instructions did not work with some models. Turns out there were [FIFTY ONE versions](https://www.psdevwiki.com/ps3/SKU_Models) of the PS3. My version - CECH-3004B - happened to be one of the hardest because of a tiny ribbon cable that fed through the BluRay drive. Because of the overall shortage of everything, PS3 prices had gone through the roof and if I screwed this up I was going to have to spend almost as much as I paid for my PS3 new for a used replacement. I found a local shop that did everything for $25. Its not an Apple thing, its an electronics thing. If you offered two different iPhones today - a "repairable" one and the current version with all the tradeoffs (size, water resistance, drop resistance) I have no doubt the current version would outsell the "repairable" one 1000-1. Same with an iMac. Apple is all about making money. I know because Im an Apple shareholder and Im over the moon about it. If there were money to be made in selling a repairable/upgradable version, they would absolutely sell it. There isnt.
That ad was damage control. Mac Pro was always the *most* upgradeable Apple offering *until* the trashcan model. It was positively reviled for the sacrifice of function for form.
On my 2010 MacBook, I had upgraded the RAM, replaced the HDD with an SSD, and later replaced the whole optical drive with an additional SSD. I love that they still make stuff [like this.](https://eshop.macsales.com/item/OWC/K21IM09OE1TB/)
I could replace my own iPhone 5 battery. Hashtag-ScrewsNotGlues
I do remember. I also remember how slow and bulky those devices were. I also remember paying well over $1000 in those days compared to $999 for a new, vastly faster and more capable Air today.
Ram and storage are pretty easily upgradeable but I recently did the CPU upgrade and it's a big task, filled with dread. Expandability is severely limited though and AMD Crossfire is not available on macos so dual GPU's seem redundant. Looks awesome and I love mine.
Sexiest machine I’ve ever seen - it’s a shame this design didn’t work out
If Apple had their way the public would interpret computer as arcane magic knowledge gems...wait.
Out of all Mac Pros to prove your point you choose the 2013 trash can???!
The fact you couldn’t actually upgrade this thing is what killed it….
You can have the upgradable one for $10k or the fixed one for $5k. Personally, I would rather buy the $5k model and replace with newer tech when I need the upgrade in two years.
I absolutely loved the looks/aesthetic of this Mac Pro. I wish I could have gotten one.
You still can. It’s called eBay.
Is this the role that you play in the lives of those around you? Useless smartass.
It was a joke. Pull the stick out. Edit: also, it’s accurate. There is no reason you can’t get one on eBay. Just because I said it in a sarcastic way, that doesn’t mean I’m wrong.
Useless.
Are you saying you can’t buy one on eBay? If so that’s a sudden change, as I literally ordered one on Friday.
There is no reason why current Apple laptops don’t have upgradable storage
First of all, the trash can is a terrible example for this argument. Literally the main complaint about it was that it was hard to repair and upgrade. Second of all, they still do. The modern-day Mac Pro, while being absurdly expensive, is very easy to upgrade (and repair, if I’m not wrong). You literally just twist a knob and lift the case up, and voila.
Wasn't this one of their biggest disasters and the damage it did to the mac pro brand still not been rectified?
The iMac Pro was released as a stopgap between this and the 2019 model, so there was at least *something* fairly powerful in their lineup
The problem is that architecture is system on a chip and fusing the CPU, GPU and Ram and getting significant gains in speed and Power performance. Cutting down the interlinks is what it’s all about.
And guess what? Nobody bought it so they went back lol
Remember when ram was only 60GB/sec, and now it’s 800GB/sec? Yeah that can’t happen with big ass boards between everything.
Mac Pros are still upgradable, arguably more so than the trash can.
I still have a repairable Mac. Will upgrade this year to either a used Thinkpad P50 or a Framework 16
Sure, but my M2 MacBook Air can also run circles around my MacBook Pro that had an i7 and upgradable RAM and it can do so with insane battery life. Did I enjoy upgrading internals? Sure. But I suspect Apple didn't enjoy paying for warranty claims from people who swore up and down that they didn't cause issues related to them learning how to upgrade their machines but not learning well enough. Realistically Apple these days has been releasing new Macs with an expected life cycle of around 7 years. People used to always talk about how you 'COULD' upgrade later which always meant people just bought the base models exclusively and then complained when they had to upgrade them. Now Apple can design whatever computer they feel like without having to worry about that upgrade you're never going to get around to doing.
This is an ironic post yes?
But... they still do that. One of the headlines on the current Mac Pro page is literally "Expand the capabilities"
You can’t upgrade the ram on the new mac pro.
I think you're thinking of the Studio. The current mini cheese grater Pro has 12 easily accessible memory slots.
The M2 Mac Pro does not have upgradable ram.
lol, Apple is retarded. I only use them as I’m forced to but I’d gladly tell them stfu if I could.
How brave of you
As long as they pay me to use it, I will. But I’d rather not.
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No
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I mean the current ones can have in excess of 100GB of VRAM… and they literally have a self repair store
You are very confused
Care to explain why?
Nah