Rumor: Apple to include new i7-980X in upcoming Mac Po

Could the recent Mac Pro update be a stop-gap before a much larger update? Intel's new six core CPU might be a good indication of just that. 12MB of L3 Cache per processor? Yes, please.<BR><BR><a href='http://meincmagazine.com/apple/news/2009/12/rumor-apple-to-include-new-i7-980x-in-upcoming-mac-po.ars'>Read the whole story</a>

 

[FrankDCat]

A week ago I got asked via email by Apple to fill out a survey for recent purchasers of MacPros. Extensive questions on what I liked and didn't, what ports I used, how many hard drives/what sizes, etc.<BR><BR>Hopefully this time there will be a machine that won't have a big negative (like dropping FW, glossy screens, etc.)

 

[Otis Wildflower]

Why wouldn't they just use the 6-core Xeon variant?<BR><BR>Presumably it would be a lot less involved..

 

[Spamizbad]

<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">The i7-980X would not only mean better performance for consumers, but also lower power consumption, allowing Apple to make further strides toward being a greener company. </div></BLOCKQUOTE><BR><BR>AFAIK the i7980X isn't lower but but offers better performance-per-watt as the processor it's replacing also has a 130watt TDP.

 

[Nevyn]

Has there been any further word anywhere about Apple, USB3, andor Light Peak?<BR><BR>I've seen motherboards with USB reported in Ars: CPU&Motherboard as not-insanely overpriced. The last word on Light Peak was in the vaporous "something by the end of 2010." marketingspeak.<BR><BR>If USB3 is eminent on Apple hardware, the Mac Pro should be leading the charge.... If it isn't there, then what?

 

[jwbaker]

Is this news? Whatever is Intel's flagship CPU, Apple will ship that in the Mac Pro. Subsequently people will claim that Apple is the only company to ship said CPU, even though you can also buy it in a Dell Precision -- View image here: http://episteme.meincmagazine.com/groupee_common/emoticons/icon_wink.gif --

 

[dagamer34]

<blockquote class="ip-ubbcode-quote">
<div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div>
<div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">Originally posted by FrankDCat:<br>A week ago I got asked via email by Apple to fill out a survey for recent purchasers of MacPros. Extensive questions on what I liked and didn't, what ports I used, how many hard drives/what sizes, etc.<br><br>Hopefully this time there will be a machine that won't have a big negative (like dropping FW, glossy screens, etc.) </div>
</blockquote>
<br><br>MacPros come with screens? <br><br>Lol, I know what you meant. -- View image here: http://episteme.meincmagazine.com/groupee_common/emoticons/icon_smile.gif --

 

[Hagen]

<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">Originally posted by Nevyn:<BR>Has there been any further word anywhere about Apple, USB3, andor Light Peak?<BR><BR>I've seen motherboards with USB reported in Ars: CPU&Motherboard as not-insanely overpriced. The last word on Light Peak was in the vaporous "something by the end of 2010." marketingspeak.<BR><BR>If USB3 is eminent on Apple hardware, the Mac Pro should be leading the charge.... If it isn't there, then what? </div></BLOCKQUOTE><BR><BR>Don't know about Light Peak, but USB3's official release by Intel was pushed to 2011. The USB3 support you are seeing already turn up is from other mobo manufacturer's producing their own workarounds. Apple won't jump on USB3 before Intel makes it official.

 

[xoa]

To be honest, the question of graphics seems to be way more interesting then that of the processors. Apple has been quite reliable (understandably, since that was one of the major points of the Intel transition) in updating the CPUs and using good ones. However the graphics options have been and continue to be pretty abysmal. Seeing improvements there, or good SSDs as BTO, or even more interesting custom features, would be much more compelling then the next standard bump. The only news there would be if Apple <em>didn't</em> update, which might indicate the line was really being abandoned at last.

 

[stmiller]

<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">Originally posted by FrankDCat:<BR>A week ago I got asked via email by Apple to fill out a survey for recent purchasers of MacPros. Extensive questions on what I liked and didn't, what ports I used, how many hard drives/what sizes, etc.<BR> </div></BLOCKQUOTE><BR><BR>I hope you mentioned that the default budget re-branded 9500GT video card in a $3k machine is ridiculous. I still don't know why video cards are so difficult to do in a Mac vs. PC.

 

[cbarrett]

There's zero incentive for Apple to add BluRay drives right now. It's not like there's a huge demand for BD drives and any BluRay movie sold is a sale taken away from the iTunes Store.

 

[mebeSajid]

Isn't Gulftown supposed to be priced in the $1500 range? How much are these machines going to cost if the processor is well over a thousand dollars?

 

[FrankDCat]

<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">Originally posted by stmiller:<BR><BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">Originally posted by FrankDCat:<BR>A week ago I got asked via email by Apple to fill out a survey for recent purchasers of MacPros. Extensive questions on what I liked and didn't, what ports I used, how many hard drives/what sizes, etc.<BR> </div></BLOCKQUOTE><BR><BR>I hope you mentioned that the default budget re-branded 9500GT video card in a $3k machine is ridiculous. I still don't know why video cards are so difficult to do in a Mac vs. PC. </div></BLOCKQUOTE><BR>Oh, I let them know that my Radeon 4870 wasn't good enough and that one of the things I really didn't like was the poor video card offerings.

 

[Resophonic]

<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">Originally posted by cbarrett:<BR>There's zero incentive for Apple to add BluRay drives right now. It's not like there's a huge demand for BD drives and any BluRay movie sold is a sale taken away from the iTunes Store. </div></BLOCKQUOTE><BR><BR>I don't think that this is strictly true... Many/Most Blu-Rays that I buy come with the digital copy from iTunes. Surely Apple gets some bucks there for minimal effort/overhead that makes it worth their while. I try to buy these disks exclusively since I can watch it on my computer (where I watch most stuff) or on my 50" 1080p screen with surround sound. I see this as Apple milking all opportunities to make a buck

 

[shomann]

Just a word on Blu-ray, at least from MHO. Though Blu-ray movies aren't exactly setting the world on fire in sales, the format is seeing more and more use professionally as storage. At least in the video world (of which there is a HIGH uptake of professional Macs), Blu-ray's cost per gigabyte takes a backseat to the perceived durability of the media.<BR><BR>In other words, it would be a good thing to see as an option on all Mac Pros, and included by default on the high-end model.

 

[bfstev]

<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">Originally posted by Nevyn:<BR>Has there been any further word anywhere about Apple, USB3, andor Light Peak?<BR><BR>I've seen motherboards with USB reported in Ars: CPU&Motherboard as not-insanely overpriced. The last word on Light Peak was in the vaporous "something by the end of 2010." marketingspeak.<BR><BR>If USB3 is eminent on Apple hardware, the Mac Pro should be leading the charge.... If it isn't there, then what? </div></BLOCKQUOTE><BR><BR>http://www.newegg.com/Product/...=usb+3.0+motherboard<BR><BR>usb3 is pretty available now (for the i5/i7 and now AM3 as well), at least from gigabyte and ASUS. I expect The MacPro will most likely have it.<BR><BR>Lightpeak probably wont even see the light of day the way news on that sounds. Probably had the same intel development team as larrabee.

 

[Count Sessine]

<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">Originally posted by bfstev:<BR><BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">Originally posted by Nevyn:<BR>Has there been any further word anywhere about Apple, USB3, andor Light Peak?<BR><BR>I've seen motherboards with USB reported in Ars: CPU&Motherboard as not-insanely overpriced. The last word on Light Peak was in the vaporous "something by the end of 2010." marketingspeak.<BR><BR>If USB3 is eminent on Apple hardware, the Mac Pro should be leading the charge.... If it isn't there, then what? </div></BLOCKQUOTE><BR><BR>http://www.newegg.com/Product/...=usb+3.0+motherboard<BR><BR>usb3 is pretty available now (for the i5/i7 and now AM3 as well), at least from gigabyte and ASUS. I expect The MacPro will most likely have it.<BR><BR>Lightpeak probably wont even see the light of day the way news on that sounds. Probably had the same intel development team as larrabee. </div></BLOCKQUOTE><BR><BR>Right now USB3 looks a lot like USB1 did before Apple took to it. <BR><BR>It was available, but software/driver support was sketchy and peripherals were hard to find. USB was available on high-end machines but because only those high-end machines had it, no one wanted to make peripherals for it. None of the budget system/mobo manufacturers wanted Intel to include USB in the chipset because it meant the price of the chipset would go up by about $20. None of the high-end system/mobo manufacturers wanted Intel to include USB in the chipset because they spent the extra money to put a specific USB chip on their mobos and the word 'USB' on their spec sheets and in their marketing was one of the things they used to distinguish themselves from cheap budget computers that only had RS232 ports. No one really cared about adoption of the standard or whether or not you could actually find peripherals for it.<BR><BR><BR><I>This comment was edited by Count Sessine on December 18, 2009 00:53</I>

 

[itendo]

<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content"><BR>Oh, I let them know that my Radeon 4870 wasn't good enough and that one of the things I really didn't like was the poor video card offerings. </div></BLOCKQUOTE><BR><BR>-sarcasm noted, appreciated. nonetheless, i built a $1500 i7 rig with a 4870 (1 gig) last christmas. for a $2-3k system, yeah a 4870x1 (512m) is a bit underwhelming @ +$200; so are the 4 nV (512m) 120s @ +$450. <BR><BR>i think its a valid point to shoot down mac GPUs considering they are the "definitive" creators machine, yet nonetheless stress CPU to the point of neglecting the GPU bottleneck. as a gamer its not like im ILM or living breathing 3dstudiomax or whatever; but nonetheless, the pro's dont hit the enthusiast market all that hard due to that obvious lack of option.