Apple's Mac Pro case, same as the old case (almost)

According to Apple Insider's latest information, it looks like Apple's upcoming Intel-based Mac Pro desktop is going to end up looking pretty much the same as the current Power Mac G5 that it's replacing, with only a couple of small modifications. The biggest change is the addition of a second optical drive slot (seen in an artist's rendition, above), which Apple Insider rightly speculates will probably ship empty in the initial units, giving users the choice to add a Blu-Ray or HD DVD drive as their wallet permits. The other change comes at the rear of the unit, where the power supply has been moved further to the top, bringing it more in line with Windows PC designs. Of course, this could just be a diversion to make it an even bigger surprise when Jobs unveils a radically redesigned system at a hastily arranged "special event", but we wouldn't bet on it.

[Thanks, Bababooie]

[mmr @ Jul 17th 2006 5:34PM]

Judging by the fact that the specs say that Bluetooth and Airport are optional I'm guessing this is really just a hoax. Why would they make these two things optional when they are stock in every other machine they make?

Not to mention that the only 2x Dual Core 2 machine is the "Best" option, where typically they would have the top two options be 2x Dual Core with the Best option being slightly faster. Using their numbers, I would assume that the "Good would be Dual Core 2 @ 2.33, Better would be 2x Dual Core 2 @ 2.33 and Best would be 2x Dual Core 2 @ 2.66."

Also, the fact that they would ship the computer with an empty second optical slot is somewhat fishy seeing is how they don't really want you upgrading your first optical drive (and I believe they locked you out of the ability to do that without 3rd party software last time I checked). Why they would promote this all of a sudden just raises a flag.

Take this info as you will, but I think I have made some good points.

[Joe V @ Jul 17th 2006 5:35PM]

Since when does "three-days-old news" count as the "latest information"?

[seth @ Jul 17th 2006 5:40PM]

I've noticed you guys link to AppleInsider a lot. What gives? Are you guys going to get married?

Cheers

[ChillyWilly @ Jul 17th 2006 5:45PM]

I think this is speculation, but the pics are cool looking.

I don't see the point of having WiFi or Bluetooth on the Mac Pro.

But I do agree that the name is a no brainer.

[Richard Garfinkel @ Jul 17th 2006 5:50PM]

mmr,

You're talking nonsense. The current middle-of-the-line Power Mac is only dual core; why would they change it to quad-core? As far as a second empty optical bay, the Quicksilver G4's shipped with second empty optical bay. The current G5s do not some standard with WiFi or Bluetooth, even though all other Macs have had them standard since before the latest G5's January revision. Most users who will buy this machine won't use a wireless network to connect it, and as it will likely see the most use in design studios, Bluetooth is also not in demand.

[YacozA @ Jul 17th 2006 5:55PM]

doesn't the xeon 5100 series use FB-dimm's an not just plain-ol' DDr2??

[Pfft @ Jul 17th 2006 5:56PM]

Speaking just of aesthetics, I hope they do a complete revamp on the case. Not that the G5 is bad looking it's just that it's a whole new paradigm with the Intel chips, and that calls for a new enclosure IMO.

[Richard @ Jul 17th 2006 6:20PM]

Why would they put the power socket at the top? That makes no sense at all.

[Mark @ Jul 17th 2006 6:24PM]

Mac Pros giving the option of HD-DVD? It would be nice, but I don't forsee it in the near future with Apple being on the board of directors of the Blu-ray Disc Association.

[hmurchison @ Jul 17th 2006 6:54PM]

Apple's membership in the DVD Forum(HD DVD) predates their inclusion amongst the BDA Board of Directors. In fact a third of the members of the BDA BoD are are supporting both platforms. Apple supports HD DVD authoring with DVD Studio Pro 4.

[Anthony @ Jul 17th 2006 7:05PM]

So just how do you plan on fitting an ADDITIONAL optical drive AND a power supply in the top of the machine?

[kelly @ Jul 17th 2006 7:17PM]

The DVD forum has nothing to do with HDDVD and DVD Studio Pro 4 supports HD on DVD authoring not HDDVD authoring. This doesn't mean apple won't support both just means they currently don't.

[Mike Ishi @ Jul 17th 2006 7:22PM]

I think you guys forgot to mention that these aren't official pictures, these are made by an Apple fan.

[sbb @ Jul 17th 2006 7:25PM]

Anthony,

Nice question, but you should know that on a Powermac G5 the powersupply is on the bottom of the case, not on its top...

This all looks like a new "MDD" lol, Hope it's not going to be as noisy...

[kelly @ Jul 17th 2006 7:26PM]

sorry but some proof for my statements.

a list of hddvdforum members:
notice the lack of sony, apple, disney, et al
http://www.hddvdprg.com/about/member.html

read carefully:
only says it supports HD on DVD and lists the supported media formats (no HD-DVD or BD)
http://www.apple.com/finalcutstudio/dvdstudiopro/author.html

[hmurchison @ Jul 17th 2006 7:34PM]

kelly you silly person.

http://www.dvdforum.org/forum.shtml

3rd link down on the left.

Next

http://www.apple.com/finalcutstudio/specs.html?dvdstudiopro

[b]DVD Standards[/b]
Author traditional DVDs using SD assets
Author HD DVDs using SD and HD assets
Burn discs containing both an SD and an HD project

http://www.apple.com/pr/library/2005/apr/17hd.html

"Apple is committed to both emerging high definition DVD standards—Blu-ray Disc and HD DVD. Apple is an active member of the DVD Forum which developed the HD DVD standard, and last month joined the Board of Directors of the Blu-ray Disc Association."

That's checkmate kelly. Thanks for playing

[roland @ Jul 17th 2006 7:48PM]

If you also check they will ship with a x1800 radeon. This is so CRAPple!

[Ypocaramel @ Jul 17th 2006 8:36PM]

One of the creature comforts of the desktop has always been having two cup holders. The G5 was always lacking in that way, which led to the multitude of coffee machine case mods for that cheese and coffee mix you had always (secretly) been craving...

[sputni @ Jul 17th 2006 8:50PM]

Yeah this is clearly fake. Somehow apple escaped lots of ridicule when they first released this mammoth behemoth. It's much larger than any PC I've ever seen yet was somehow quietly accepted by the Mac faithful.

The G5 has something on the order of 6 different internal fans to keep things cool with the very hot G5 processor.

There is no way that apple is going to maintain such a huge case when they no longer need 6 fans. Sadly it was quite common for one of the 6 fans to make strange freakish noises from time to time.

I think they will probably conform closely to Intels BTX form factor with a few modifications to make it even smaller...not larger than the average say Dell PC case.

[kelly @ Jul 17th 2006 9:34PM]

hmurchison:

If you read my post it says being a member of the DVDForum has nothing to do with support for HD-DVD, sony is on the Steering commitee, do you think they will ship VAIOs with HD-Drives?

I also said DVD Sudio doesn't support HD-DVDs. If you looked at the link you posted you would see:
Output Formats

* DVD-R, DVD-RW, DVD+R, DVD+RW, Double-layer media
* Double-layer media support
* DLT drive (required for DVD-9 projects)
* DDP 2.0 and 2.1
* CMF 1.0
* Disk Image
* Video_TS to hard drive
* HVDVD_TS to hard drive

I don't see HD-DVD do you?

No apple product currently supports HD-DVD or BluRay.

Sorry if you misunderstood, but i guess you were just excited to play chess with someone.

[Oscar Feliciano @ Jul 17th 2006 9:34PM]

hmurchison:
DVD Studio Pro does not support HD-DVD. It supports the somewhat confusing notion of burning HD content to a standard DVD disc, and it would only play that HD content on a Mac (since a standard DVD player would not know what to do with that data). Divx and Microsoft have been doing this for a while now. With Windows Media Player, you could play for example the Terminator 2 Special HD version disc since that disc contains a WMP-compressed HD version of the movie on the same DVD disc. The quality would not be equal to a true HD-DVD or Bluray disc, of course.

[hmurchison @ Jul 17th 2006 10:51PM]

kelly, Oscar--- DVD Studio Pro allows you to author Type 1 HD DVD discs which Apple DVD Player 4.6.1 supports the files. When a HD DVD recorder is available then you can record the discs. Apple hasn't been able to enable iHD nor VC-1 or AVC support so Compressor only supports MPEG2 for these "test" encodes. While it's not full on HD DVD it is within the specs that Apple had for HD DVD over a year ago. I expect the next version DVD Studio Pro 5 will have full iHD authoring and perhaps Blu-Ray authoring as well. To say that Apple that Apple doesn't support HD DVD is factually incorrect. Even they admit it

http://www.apple.com/pr/library/2005/apr/17fcstudio.html

"DVD Studio Pro 4 will be demonstrated at NAB with a prototype consumer HD DVD player from Toshiba set to debut later this year"

Again explain to me how cursory HD DVD support isn't available? I'm kinda seeing that Apple is stating it is. If you want to play semantics over what's incomplete well hell AACS the encryption is feature complete yet drives are still shipping.

again kelly checkmate. You were wrong about Apple being a member of the DVD Forum I debunked that with a link and relevant quote and you're wrong again about the HD DVD support. You were wrong about the HD DVD forum not having anything to do with HD DVD. I'm sensing a trend here. Is there anything you DO get right?

[Fancypants @ Jul 17th 2006 11:15PM]

Wow hmurchison, you really are good at this arguing thing. You even managed to defeat yourself in a debate:

"it's not full on HD DVD ... I expect the next version DVD Studio Pro 5 will have full iHD authoring"

Good job, very clever.

[Chris @ Jul 17th 2006 11:22PM]

sbb,

Nice answer, but if you had RTFA you would know that the AI rumor is that the power supply was moved to the top. Take a look at the pictures.

[Radu Dutzan @ Jul 17th 2006 11:40PM]

Yep, they seem to support HD-DVD, but still:

http://www.blu-raydisc.com/

They're on with both. Yeah, they're doing more to support HD-DVD, but their logo is the very first one on the Blu-ray Disc Supporting Companies. Maybe the next version of DVD Studio Pro will support Blu-ray also. That's great, cause you have all the ability to choose and you don't have to stick with Apple's decision, had they picked just one of them.

[kelly @ Jul 18th 2006 12:04AM]

hmurchison:

I pale in comparison to your massive knowledge please let submit my humblist of apologies...

i can't believe you said checkmate again, what flippin dork.

Let me repeat myself: I never said apple wasn't a member of the DVD Forum. I said being a member of the DVD Forum doesn't equate to support for the HD-DVD standard. I checked the apple store and wasn't able to find an HD-DVD burner to go with some unreleased version of DVD Studio Pro. As of July 17 2006 apple has no comercially available product that supports either BluRay or HD-DVD.

Please stop making-up some argument that isn't there. and most of all please stop making chess references. also if you get a chance could you post some link to a PR document that makes some reference to future support for something that isn't supported today.

King Me.

[hmurchison @ Jul 18th 2006 12:32AM]

Kelly I'm glad you wisely chose to acquiesce in the presence of such supreme superiority. Your humility does you well. In all seriousness though I'm glad you got that. I'm ok with a bit of miscommunication. My post wasn't intended to make a connection between DVD Forum and HD DVD support but rather illustrate that Apple is a member of both governing bodies.

My definition of HD DVD support is once that breaks the format up into a physical layer and logical layer. When you image a CD ROM to a hard drive it doesn't mean you no longer have a CD you just don't have they physical aspect of the format . Its structure is still intact. With DVD SP 4 you have the ability to create a 15GB image which corresponds to a single layer HD DVD. HD on DVD would be limited to 8.5GB I'm actually anxiously awaiting the next FCS upgrade so that we can see what support we have for both HD upgrades.

[Oscar Feliciano @ Jul 18th 2006 1:08AM]

hmurchison:
Where are you pulling this misinformation? DVD Studio Pro 4 allows you to author and burn these "HD" discs for playback in Tiger. You don't need to wait until an HD-DVD recorder is "available" to burn them. These are just your standard off-the-shelf DVD-R discs with HD video compressed using H.264. No special recorder is required. The DVD burner built into your Mac will do. Again, these discs will only play on a Mac running Tiger and with a fast (G5 or Core Duo) processor. They will not play in any of the standard consumer HD-DVD players out there, as few as they are. :) The HD/SD hybrid, or combo, discs that DVD Studio can burn should play in a standard DVD player in SD-quality, however.
Our argument here is that DVD Studio Pro does not yet support true HD DVD since a) there are no HD DVD burners supported on the Mac, b) HD-DVD is not a supported output format and c) these HD discs that it does produce (and burn) are standard DVD discs with some software-playable HD content on them. Again, Microsoft did this years ago with Terminator 2: Judgment Day (Extreme Edition) using WMP 9.

[Thom @ Jul 18th 2006 1:32AM]

Hey guys... You guys are dorks. How much longer do you plan to keep arguing with the same information over and over again?

That said, I personally expect Apple to support both formats, if not immediately, sometime not far down the road. One of their big niches is content creators, i.e. indie filmmakers, videographers, etc., and those people are going to want the option of authoring in both formats. To forsake one format would be to forsake a lot of business.

[hmurchison @ Jul 18th 2006 1:39AM]

LOL Thom. It's classic case of miscommunication. We're all right in our ways but each of us add information that that wasn't really requested in the first place. I'm sure Apple will support both. The path to HD DVD is already lit.

[realhawker @ Jul 18th 2006 12:15PM]

MAC Pro's should use this processor...

Dual Core Intel® Xeon® Processor 5160 3.00Ghz,2.66Ghz, etc...

These are what is available(VERY SOON) in Dell Precision Workstations.