mac pro
Latest
Apple reportedly readying numerous Retina display MacBooks and multiple accessories for WWDC
New MacBook Pros are practically a given for WWDC (or, let's just say tears will be shed if they elude us), but now, 9to5Mac is stepping up the expectations in a major way. The outlet is now reporting that we could see two different versions of a revised 15-incher, not to mention Retina display-equipped editions of the 11-inch and 13-inch MacBook Air. Less certain (but certainly believable) is an iMac refresh, which would again get served with a Retina display, and a fourth major Mac update is apt to see the practically forgotten Mac Pro or the Mac mini updated with bolstered internals. For those following Apple, you'd know that updating so many products at one event isn't a typical move for the company, but Tim Cook's been doing things slightly differently of late -- and honestly, there's no better way to enforce the importance of Retina than to blow it out across the portfolios. Finally, a whole host of new accessories are said to be on tap, with "refreshed keyboards, mice, trackpads and AirPorts" on the list. Hit the source link for the down and dirty, and go ahead and wipe your calendar for June 9th; we'll be liveblogging every last announcement direct from Moscone.
Best Buy Mac discounts hint at clearing inventory, Ivy Bridge revamp coming soon?
Cupertino is unsurprisingly tight-of-lip on when it plans to add Ivy Bridge to its desktop and laptop line, but we think that's not far off: we've even seen some benchmarks. Now, in a move that smacks of inventory clearing but could equally mean nothing, Best Buy has hacked between $20 and $200 from its Mac Mini, iMac, Mac Pro and MacBook Pro offerings. If you're into a bargain, then head down to your nearest big blue-and-yellow store -- and we'll let you know as soon as we see the yellow sticky-note.
OWC's Mercury Accelsior PCIe SSD is Mac bootable, strictly neutral
If you've ever tried to jam a regular SSD into your Mac, then you'll know that many off-the-shelf drives feel like they're tailored and tested for, ahem, someone else. Not so with OWC's Mercury Accelsior, which claims to be the only Mac bootable and Mac supported PCIe SSD on the market. Regardless of which platform you use it with, however, the dual-SandForce card promises some neat tricks with its 24nm Toshiba Toggle NAND. Sequential read and write speeds are around 50 percent higher than what you'd get from a regular SATA III drive, with the cheapest 120GB model ($360) offering 758MB/s reads and 743MB/s writes. Random performance is notched up too, with around 100K IOPS in both directions. The 960GB version costs a coldly precise $2,096, but still -- a potential side order for when the Mac Pro line finally gets another refresh?
You're the Pundit: Redesign Apple's High End Mac
When it comes to evaluating the next big thing, we turn to our secret weapon: the TUAW braintrust. We put the question to you and let you have your go at it. Today's topic is the Mac Pro. Recently we wondered whether Apple would gracefully retire its high end workhorse or if the old gal was good for at least one more refresh. In response, many of our readers wondered whether Apple could change the Pro instead of just burying it in history. So today, we are asking you this: if Apple does take the Mac Pro away, what is your dream high-end Mac product? You tell us. Place your vote in this poll and then join in the comments with all your suggestions. %Poll-74558%
You're the Pundit: Mac Pro refresh or graceful finale?
When it comes to forecasting the next big thing, we turn to our secret weapon: the TUAW braintrust. We put the question to you and let you have your go at it. Today's topic is the Mac Pro. As Apple moves briskly towards the post-PC future, does the tower Mac make the trip? We've covered the Mac Pro before in the Pundit series, but the question is really on the table now. This month, the server-class versions of the Sandy Bridge processors the hypothetical Mac Pro refresh depends on began shipping from Intel. With the multiprocessor Sandy Bridge/Xeon E5 chips hitting the market, Apple has a choice to make: revise the draft horse of its computer lineup, or put it gracefully out to pasture. (Not for nothing, those are some really expensive CPUs; the next iterations of Mac Pros, should they come to pass, will undoubtedly continue to carry premium price tags.) With well-equipped iMacs taking on some of the roles in business that Pros used to occupy, is it time for Apple to end-of-life its power machine? Is the Thunderbolt port a fair substitute for a full rack of slots and GPU options? Or are there still enough seats in animation, video production, scientific computing and high-end graphic design (where every cycle makes a difference and time is money) to keep the Mac Pro on the product list for another few years? You tell us. Place your vote in this poll and then join in the comments with all your insight. %Poll-74120%
PSA: Can your machine run Mountain Lion?
Ah, compatibility, she can be a cruel mistress, prone to leaving your favorite devices out in the cold and your wallet a few bills lighter. Apple's latest OS update, Mountain Lion, is no different. OS X 10.8 won't run on just any Mac, so, the question is, will it run on yours? Well, if you've got any machine from 2009 or newer the answer is yes. Older than that and things get a little bit shaky. iMacs are the most forgiving, with support starting on the mid-2007 models. Any Pro desktop from early 2008 on should be fine, while Xserves get cut off at early 2009 along with the Mac Mini. The original Air is already getting turned aside and you'll need a late 2008 model (or newer) for the update, while vanilla MacBooks are nearing total obsolescence as support starts with the aluminum models from 2008. Lastly, those of you rocking 15- or 17-inch MacBook Pros should be golden starting with late 2007 models. Oh, and any 13-inch Pro should be good to go.
Holiday Gift Guide: Buying a Mac
The holiday season is fast approaching which means it's time to start thinking about your loved ones and the gifts they may want to receive. High on the list for some may be a new shiny Mac to replace their old, worn-out computer. It's an expensive gift and one that you'll want to research before you take the plunge. Here are some tips to help you get started with your Mac shopping. Think about usage first Before you even begin looking, you need to decide which Mac model you're going to buy. Apple only makes five products in the Mac line including the Mac mini, the iMac, the MacBook Pro, the MacBook Air and the Mac Pro. The underlying specs on many of these models may be similar, but they are very, very different machines and designed for very different purposes. When buying a Mac, the first thing you need to ask yourself is how is the person going to use their computer. Do they travel or stay at home? Do you they need a media server or a machine for browsing the web? Everybody is different and their needs for a computer will vary, so you should take the time to match the computer to the person who will receive it. Below you will find a description of each Mac product line and how each model is typically used. It should help you narrow down the model best suited for the recipient. If you are knowledgeable about Mac products already, you can skip ahead to our shopping tips which will help you save money on your Mac. Mac mini The Mac mini is a desktop Mac perfect for the person who doesn't need portability. The square, flat mini is slim and stylish which is great for those with a small workspace. It can connect to any monitor via Thunderbolt or HDMI, which makes it ideal for someone like a programmer or photo editor who needs a special display (there is an HDMI to DVI adapter included). The base model ships with a dual-core Intel Core i5 processor and OS X Lion, but there is a quad-core version of the mini with Lion server which is lets you use it as a media, web or file server. This latest version also includes support for Bluetooth 4.0 which will let it connect to a new line of low-power Bluetooth devices for fitness and remote control. The Mac mini still has a Firewire port, in case someone still uses it for storage or video cameras. Starting at $600, the mini is the cheapest Mac available. The Mac mini is a complicated purchase because it ships as a stand-alone unit and does not include an external monitor, external mouse or keyboard. If you are buying the Mac mini as a gift, you should make sure the recipient has these accessories already or buy them yourself in advance. Though the mini will work with any USB keyboard or mouse, Apple makes a wireless keyboard, a wireless Magic Mouse and a wireless Magic Trackpad that work perfectly with the mini. Once you've taken care of the smaller peripherals, you need to think about your choice of a monitor. The mini has a Thunderbolt port that allows it to connect to any Thunderbolt-enabled display. Apple sells a line of Thunderbolt displays which are gorgeous, but pricey. The mini can also connect to a TV via HDMI or a standard monitor using DVI or VGA. You'll need to purchase a cable to connect the Thunderbolt port to the display. The nice part about Thunderbolt is that it's compatible with Apple's older mini-display standard, so any old mini-display cable will work. If you can avoid it, don't buy your mini-display/Thunderbolt cables from a place like Best Buy as you will spend too much money. Monoprice is an excellent place to purchase cables. The online retailer carries a wide variety of cables and their prices can't be beat. Amazon also carries inexpensive cables and shipping is free for Prime members. iMac The iMac is another desktop model, but this Mac is an all-in-one that includes an integrated high-resolution monitor, a keyboard and your choice of a Magic Mouse or Magic Trackpad. With its 21.5-inch or larger edge-to-edge monitor, quad-core processor and FaceTime HD camera, the iMac is a great all-around machine that's perfect for a home setting. This latest iMac also includes several USB 2.0 ports, Firewire and support for Bluetooth 4.0 (like the mini). It has Thunderbolt to connect to high-speed peripherals and a mini-display port to connect to a second external monitor as well. Since everything is included in one package, it's an easy buy for someone who doesn't need portability. You basically open the box and have everything you need to get up and running in just a few minutes. It's available in a 21.5-inch size that starts at $1199 and a 27-inch that starts at $1699. MacBook Pro The MacBook Pro is the premier Mac notebook. It's portable, has excellent battery life and ships with a variety of high-end options including a quad-core processor, an integrated DVD-ROM and a high-resolution, anti-glare display. The larger 15-inch and 17-inch models are excellent desktop replacements, while the 13-inch model is a powerful travel companion. The 15- and 17-inch MacBook Pros also include a dedicated graphics card which is useful for photo and video professionals and gamers. The latest version also includes Thunderbolt and Firewire. Unlike the MacBook Air which includes support for Bluetooth 4.0, the MacBook Pro only includes Bluetooth 3.0. That's not a big deal right now as Bluetooth 4.0 is a new standard, but it could be important next year when these fitness and health monitors start hitting the market. The MacBook Pro is my computer choice as I don't travel very often, but want the flexibility of being able to use my computer at my desk, in front or the TV and sometimes on the porch. It provides the perfect mix of power and portability for the person who isn't always traveling with their notebook. It's available in 13-inch, 15-inch and 17-inch models. Pricing starts at $1199 for the 13-inch, $1799 for the 15-inch and $2499 for the 17-inch. MacBook Air The MacBook Air shares similar specs as the MacBook Pro, but is lighter and significantly smaller. It has a razor-thin design that's simply gorgeous. It lacks a an optical drive of any kind (although Apple sells an external one separately) and has an SSD drive which makes the Air as small as possible, but also yields fast response times and better battery life. The latest version also includes Thunderbolt, Firewire and support for Bluetooth 4.0. It's highly portable and still powerful, two factors that make it one of the best selling Mac models. It's great for students, business people and anyone else who has to carry their Mac around with them on a regular basis. The MacBook Air is available in an 11-inch model that starts at $999 and a 13-inch model that starts at $1299. (Update: The MacBook Air can work with Firewire peripherals, but only through an intermediate device hooked up via the Thunderbolt port, such as Apple's Thunderbolt Display or Sonnet's forthcoming Echo ExpressCard/34 Thunderbolt adapter. --Ed) Mac Pro The Mac Pro is a desktop powerhouse designed for heavy duty computing. It's used by video and photo-editing professionals who run applications that can take advantage of the 6-, 8- and 12-core processor options. It hasn't received an update this year and, as a result, is getting a bit long in the tooth. The Mac Pro is the only Mac model in Apple's lineup without Thunderbolt. It's also the most expensive Mac around and has a price tag that starts at $2499. Places to shop Once you decide what Mac model to buy, you should do some comparison shopping. Unlike PCs which are often steeply discounted, Mac models rarely go on sale. They are a premium product and fetch a premium price, but with some savvy shopping you can save yourself a few hundred dollars. The first place you need to look is Apple's retail store which will give you an idea of the base price and configuration for each model. You can look at both brick and mortar Apple stores and the online store as their prices are comparable. Shopping in Apple's official stores may be the most expensive option, but you will get buying assistance from the store employees and you have the ability to add advanced options like a 7200 RPM hard drive or a high-resolution display. Sometimes, Apple also offers free printers and other bonuses not available at third-party retailers. In addition, Apple's online store has an outlet where you can purchase refurbished models at a discount. These refurbished machines are usually a few hundred dollars cheaper and come with Apple's standard one-year warranty. If you want to look outside of Apple's retail chain, there are several retailers that carry Apple products. Amazon, Best Buy, MacMall and MacConnection are four that come to mind. Best Buy even carries select models in their brick and mortar stores, so you can compare the quality of the Mac with their less expensive PC counterparts. If you have never used a Mac, you'll be amazed at their solid build quality and beautiful design. Most of these third-party retailers will offer Mac products with a slight discount. You'll lose out on any offers Apple has, but you can save yourself $50 to $150 by shopping at a these retailers. If you want to keep track of any discounts or special offers on Mac products, you should check out DealMac, an Apple-Oriented version of the popular DealNews website. Each day, Deal Mac lists new sales that include Mac models and all their accessories. What about used Macs? if you find the prices of regular retail Macs too expensive, you can turn to the resale market for your shopping needs. You can search for a reasonable deal on a used or older Mac at places like eBay and Craigslist. But I must warn you, Macs are well-made machines and they hold their value very well. Don't expect to find a recent MacBook Pro for $200. Nonetheless, you still can save yourself several hundred dollars by buying a used or older Mac. Sometimes, you can find an excellent deal. I recently picked up a fully-functional 2009 Core 2 Duo MacBook Pro for $350 on Craigslist. Shopping used does come with some risks. Most used machines don't include a warranty and you usually can't fully test them before you purchase. eBay does offer warranties through Square Trade and has a buyer protection policy, but Craigslist is like the wild west with little to no protection. You can still get a great deal on Craigslist, you just have to be a bit more selective and find a seller that'll let you fire up the machine before you hand over your money. If you want a safe bet, you can check out Apple's online outlet. As mention above, you can grab a refurbished Mac at a discount and it includes a one-year warranty, too. You'll also want to make sure the Mac you are buying is up-to-date. Back in 2006, Apple made the switch to the Intel platform and its latest OS X versions require this Intel hardware. Older Macs have PowerPC components that are no longer compatible with OS X Snow Leopard 10.6 and Lion 10.7. These PowerPC Macs may be super cheap, but they are obsolete. Thankfully, these models are old enough that you don't see too many of them listed for sale, but they are still out there and you need to be aware of them. Good luck finding the right Mac for whomever you're shopping for, even yourself. Stay tuned to TUAW for more gift guides in the weeks leading up to the holidays.
On the Mac Pro's future
The Mac Pro is a strange outlier among Apple's products. It's insanely powerful, but it's priced out of the reach of most mortals. It's by far Apple's most "traditional" computer; the Mac Pro is a tower you can crack open and customize quite easily, far different from its sealed-up cousins the iMac, Mac mini, and the MacBook line. The Mac Pro's design is positively ancient by Apple's standards, with only minor cosmetic alterations since its predecessor, the Power Mac G5, debuted in 2003. It's also a neglected product, last updated in July of 2010, and currently the only Mac Apple sells which has no Thunderbolt connectivity. All of this led us to ask awhile back whether the Mac Pro has much of a future left. According to AppleInsider, people at Apple itself are asking that very same question. Citing "people familiar with the matter," AppleInsider says that back in May of 2011 management was "in limbo" on whether or not to discontinue the Mac Pro in the face of faltering sales. Predicting what Apple will do with regards to its products is a dangerous game. We learned that the hard way when a source we trusted told us the iPod classic and iPod shuffle were getting the axe this year. Apple apparently decided both products were still profitable enough to keep around, and that's really the bottom line for the future of any product in Apple's pipeline: if it still makes money, Apple will keep making a product until it has something better to replace it. When a product doesn't make Apple money, it's unsentimental about dropping the guillotine. There are arguments both for and against discontinuing the Mac Pro, and I've outlined a few of them below. Ultimately Apple's going to do what's in its own best interests, so bear that in mind as we wade through a puddle of speculation sauce. Why Apple might keep the Mac Pro around Power: Although the iMac is an extremely powerful machine in its own right, the Mac Pro's performance still kicks the iMac's butt all the way up and down the block. Benchmark performance in Geekbench shows the 12-core 2.93 GHz Mac Pro coming in with an astounding score of 21,789. That's nearly twice the 11,581 score earned by the most powerful iMac, a quad-core 3.4 GHz model. Benchmarks only tell part of the story, however. A Mac Pro that's been maxed-out on Apple's online store with as much RAM and hard disk capacity as you can shove into it is a Godzilla of a machine: Two 2.93 GHz 6-Core Intel Xeon processors (for a total of 12 cores) 8 TB of internal storage 64 GB of RAM Two ATI Radeon HD 5770 with 1 GB of video RAM -- each. The best you can do with an iMac via Apple's configuration options? 3.4GHz Quad-Core Intel Core i7 2 TB HDD + 256 GB SSD 16 GB RAM AMD Radeon HD 6970M with 2 GB of video RAM The top-end iMac is an incredibly powerful machine by consumer and even professional standards, but a fully-upgraded Mac Pro is practically ostentatious in the amount of raw processing power it can wield. Professional consumers in areas like 3D rendering, video editing, and other extremely processor-intensive applications surely appreciate the much greater power the Mac Pro can afford them. Customization: The Mac Pro stomps the iMac in the customization department. Folding down the Mac Pro's side door gives you easy and almost instant access to its innards, and virtually every component is simple to swap out. Hard drives in particular are extraordinarily easy to swap in the Mac Pro. Contrast that with the iMac, where the RAM is essentially the only user-serviceable component. Swapping out the hard drive on an iMac is a harrowing procedure that requires removing the entire front display -- not something you're going to want to do more than once, if ever. You could argue that the iMac's Thunderbolt capability vastly expands its customization options (and I will, later on), but it still doesn't quite measure up to the amount of customization available to a Mac Pro. Server applications: Since the discontinuation of the Xserve, the Mac Pro is Apple's only high-end server option. The Mac mini server simply doesn't measure up to the performance you can get out of a Mac Pro server -- it's not even close. The Mac mini server is a decent choice for low- to medium-demand applications, but if you need powerful servers (and want to stick with OS X Server), the Mac Pro is the only game in town. Bottom line: While it hasn't been updated in over a year, the Mac Pro is still by far Apple's most powerful and most customizable Mac. Though the iMac's performance and much lower price are driving the Mac Pro out of the consumer market and increasingly pigeonholing it into the "pro" niche, the fact remains that for some applications and some customers the Mac Pro is still the best choice. Why Apple might discontinue the Mac Pro The niche: Outside of a very few specific applications, a vast number of customers who might have bought a Mac Pro now opt for an iMac instead. Many high-end media shops have decided the iMac affords them enough power for their needs and at a much more comfortable price than the Mac Pro. We've been told that even Apple's own developers have largely moved to the iMac. When it was first introduced, and for much of the last decade, the iMac was unquestionably a consumer-grade product. But recent advances have put it within throwing distance of the Mac Pro's performance, and the most powerful iMacs afford users enough processing power that for many applications a Mac Pro is simply no longer necessary. In years past the iMac may not have been "enough machine" for professional photographers or other media types, but that's no longer the case in all but an increasingly smaller set of circumstances. With the rising power of the iMac and Apple's portables, the list of applications where the Mac Pro is the optimal Mac for the job is getting shorter and shorter every year. It's become a niche product compared to Apple's other Macs, and Apple isn't known for keeping niche products around forever. The ones Apple does keep around wind up being neglected, sometimes for years. Witness the Xserve, a product even more niche than the Mac Pro, now discontinued. The iPod classic is a niche product too, without even a minor update in more than two years and blogosphere calls of "dead iPod walking" every September. Over the past decade Apple has increasingly focused on products with wider appeal while slowly paring away the "pro" market. Apple offers far fewer "pro" software applications now than it did in the past, and even the ones it's kept around have been tweaked to give them broader appeal to the "prosumer" market -- Final Cut Pro X is a good example of this, and it's also a potential harbinger of Apple's true disposition toward the "pro" market. When I hear that even internally at Apple developers are moving to iMacs, I can't help but hear an ominously tolling bell for the Mac Pro. Thunderbolt: Every Mac now offers Thunderbolt connectivity, even the MacBook Air -- every Mac except the Mac Pro, that is. Thunderbolt offers extraordinary I/O capabilities and vastly expands the customization options for every Mac that supports it. An iMac may not offer much internal storage compared to what a Mac Pro can support, but once you plug in a RAID array via Thunderbolt that gap closes very quickly. The power of Thunderbolt doesn't stop at external storage; it can drive multiple external displays, provide fast connections to peripherals, and even connect to rigs that accept PCI cards, basically replicating many of the capabilities of the Mac Pro. Thunderbolt doesn't completely close the gap between an iMac and a Mac Pro, but it makes that gap less relevant for many consumers and drives the Mac Pro even farther into its niche status. The money: More than anything else, this is what's going to determine the Mac Pro's future. All the arguments for keeping the Mac Pro on the market simply melt away if Apple isn't making any money on it. The numbers are not especially encouraging. In Q4 2010, Apple sold 1.24 million desktop Macs for a total of US$1.68 billion in revenue. A year later, sales amounted to 1.28 million desktop Macs for $1.69 billion in revenue. The year-over-year change amounted to a scant 3 percent rise in unit sales and a 1 percent increase in revenue. Apple doesn't break these sales down by model, but with the Mac Pro competing for sales with both the iMac and Mac mini, it's unlikely that it amounts to a large proportion of Apple's overall desktop sales. In fact, with the Mac Pro an increasingly niche product and effectively stagnating (and unlikely to receive any upgrades until early 2012), it's very likely that Mac Pro sales have steeply declined year-over-year, with increased sales of 2011-model iMacs and Mac minis just barely pushing the desktop lineup back into profitability. If the Mac Pro is indeed losing money for Apple, you could make a strong argument that some of the blame falls on Apple itself. Since March of 2009, the Mac Pro has received only two major updates. During the same period, the iMac and Mac mini have both been updated four times. Some of the Mac Pro's stagnation may be due to limited availability of pro-class processors -- delays in Intel's production of next-gen Sandy Bridge processors are reportedly one root cause behind the Mac Pro's lack of updates. No matter where the blame falls, it's getting harder to recommend a Mac Pro to anyone at this point, even to professional customers who need the extra power the machine affords. Bottom line: Apple's focus has clearly shifted away from the professional market that was once its bread and butter. Power Macs once made up the majority of Apple's unit sales and profits, but that hasn't been true for years. Take a look at the current numbers: Unit sales of portable Macs outnumber desktop Mac sales by nearly three to one. iTunes Store and iPod accessory revenues almost equal revenues from desktop sales. iPhone unit sales exceed desktop Mac sales by over 13 to one. iPad unit sales exceed desktop Mac sales by nearly nine to one. Revenues from desktop Mac sales account for only six percent of Apple's overall revenues. Keep in mind that those comparisons are for all Mac desktops, which includes the Mac mini, iMac, and the Mac Pro. If we want to be extremely generous and say the Mac Pro accounts for a full third of desktop sales, it still means Mac portables outsell it nine to one, iPhones by 39 to one, and iPads by 27 to one, with revenues from sales of the most expensive Mac making up perhaps three percent of Apple's overall revenues (I gave the Mac Pro an extra percentage point since it's that much more expensive than the iMac). If Mac Pros account for much less than a third of desktop sales (and I don't think anyone could convincingly argue otherwise), the Mac Pro's future gets even grimmer. All of the arguments for the iMac's unsuitability for high-end applications blow away like leaves in the wind if Apple isn't making money selling the Mac Pro. Prognosis: There are certainly arguments for keeping the Mac Pro around -- despite over a year of neglect, it remains Apple's most powerful Mac, and for certain applications Apple simply offers no substitute for the power it affords. At the same time, the arguments for keeping the Mac Pro around sound ominously similar to the arguments that sprang up around this time last year when news of the Xserve's impending demise became public. Obviously some consumers actually do need what the Mac Pro offers, but are there enough of them to justify keeping it on the market? Only Apple knows for sure, but the numbers aren't looking good. Apple has already shown that it won't hesitate to exit from market segments that don't drive profitability, and if it turns out the Mac Pro isn't contributing to Apple's balance sheet, expect the axe to fall swiftly.
Apple Store now features social sharing
Apparently "net issues" weren't the only reason the Apple Store was down this morning; MacRumors notes that social features have been added to the Mac Pro configuration page, allowing you to share any of the various Mac builds on Twitter or Facebook. I'm not especially convinced that this is absolutely new, but we don't seem to have mentioned it before, so there you go. If you've been itching to tell your social network about the Mac you're planning on buying, Apple's made it easy to do so. Apple seems to be pretty friendly with the social networks lately, seeing as it's also set to include some major social integration in the upcoming iOS 5 release. And why not? This kind of stuff is easy to implement, and it lets users share and talk about the brand without much effort on Apple's part.
Apple granted touchscreen, voicemail, and several other patents
Patently Apple reports that Apple has been granted almost 20 patents covering various software and hardware implementations. The site has singled out three of these patents as the most intriguing of the bunch. The first patent, Integrated Touch Screen, "relates to touch sensing circuitry integrated into the display pixel stackup (i.e., the stacked material layers forming the display pixels) of a display, such as an LCD display," according to Apple's description. The upshot of this patent is thinner and brighter displays that require less power to drive them; additionally, the displays will require fewer parts and manufacturing steps, potentially bringing down both their cost and the difficulty of manufacture. It's unclear if the technology described in this patent has been implemented in Apple's products already or not. The iPhone 4's touchscreen is remarkably brighter, thinner, and more "integrated" than that on the iPhone 3GS, so it's possible Apple has already started using the technology described in this patent. Of interest, diagrams from the patent show a touchscreen implementation on a notebook computer, indicating that Apple has at least explored the possibility of a touchscreen Mac. The second granted patent, Voicemail Manager for Portable Multifunction Device, essentially describes the iPhone's Visual Voicemail feature. As Patently Apple points out, this function which iPhone users take for granted today replaces the cumbersome hierarchical menu-style interfaces of preceding phones, which often made checking voicemail a frustrating experience. Apple filed for this patent over four years ago, almost at the same time as the original iPhone's launch. The third patent, Component Retention Mechanism for a Tower Computer, sounds awfully similar to the modular hard drive bays in the Mac Pro. The patent expands upon this modularity by describing retention mechanisms for PCI cards. Most Macs aren't well-known for being easily customized, but the Mac Pro is definitely an exception to that rule. The remaining recently-granted patents are far more esoteric than the three described above, but if you can wrap your head around them, Patently Apple has handy links to all of them.
OS X Lion rumors: Do we want to believe 'em or not?
I don't know if you've noticed a trend, but at TUAW we've been trying to downplay a lot of the Mac OS X 10.7 Lion / MacBook Air refresh rumors that have been flooding a lot of other sites lately. The occasional one squeaks in, but for the most part we're trying to stay away from the daily "IT'S COMING TOMORROW!!!!" posts that have been so common over the last few weeks on some other Apple sites. Why? Frankly, it's because we're bored to death by the same rumors that have been coming out day after day after day. Not to say that we're not wondering ourselves about Lion and those new MacBook Airs, but let's face it: is it really necessary to post rumors every day? That being said, there are some indications that Wednesday may finally be the day that Cupertino blesses us with new hardware and operating system software. We received an anonymous email from an Apple Store employee who told us about new marketing materials (see photo above) that were sent to the store last week in a "Visual Merchandising" container, filled with materials used to market a new notebook computer. MacBook Air? MacBook? Who knows. There are also persistent rumors of Mac mini and Mac Pro updates, which our source didn't see in the marketing bin. The same source noted that his/her Apple Store was down to "less than two dozen MacBook Airs, with no shipments on the horizon." Yes, we believe that there are new MacBook Airs coming out. As for the exact day? We have no clue. Until or unless a helpful (possibly disgruntled) Apple Store employee sends us a photo of the specs from a new MBA, we're as much in the dark as the rest of the world. Our compatriots at MacRumors and AppleInsider are venturing that all of the new hardware and OS X Lion are going to arrive at 8:30 AM EDT on Wednesday, July 20. Will it happen? I guess we'll have to wait until Wednesday morning to be sure. MacRumors has reported that Apple Retail Stores are receiving copies of Lion on hard disks that have been sent to the stores for distribution onto the Macs in each store. Fortunately, the wise Arnold Kim at MacRumors is hedging his bets by stating that "This, of course, doesn't guarantee a specific launch date, but brings Apple one step closer to launch." The TUAW response to all of this? We're preparing for launch, and we'll push the button when we actually see something new. Are we playing it safe? Yes. But we're also trying to avoid the repetition of "It's coming out TOMORROW!!!" rumors that have been bouncing around for the last three weeks. When Lion and refreshed Macs get here, then we'll let you know. Cheers!
Bare Feats finds iMacs compare to Mac Pros running Final Cut Pro X
Final Cut Pro X users might want consider an iMac instead of a Mac Pro, according to some recent benchmarks run by Bare Feats. The graphics and speed testing site recently tested FCP X on three different Macs to see which current model was able to tame the power-hungry app the best. The contestants were a 2011 iMac 3.4 GHz Quad Core i7 with 16 GB of RAM and a Radeon HD 6970M GPU with 2 GB of VRAM, a 2011 MacBook Pro 2.3 GHz Quad Core i7 with 8 GB of RAM and a Radeon HD 6750M with 1 GB of VRAM, and a 2010 Mac Pro 3.33 GHz 6-core Westmere with 24 GB of RAM and a Radeon HD 5870 GPU with 1 GB of VRAM. The team ran four different tests using the same 32-second HQ video clip. The first test (above) was to apply the Directional Blur effect to the clip, and in this test the iMac beat both the Mac Pro and MacBook Pro by over 3 seconds. The next test applied the Sharpen Blur effect, and once again the iMac was victorious, beating the MacBook Pro by 4.3 second and thoroughly schooling the Mac Pro which came in a full 5.7 seconds behind. Two more benchmarks measured exporting and streaming speeds. Here the Mac Pro squeaked ahead of the iMac, coming in .4 second faster on a H.264 export. When the project was loaded into Compressor 4 and exported as an H.264 stream, the Mac Pro was a full 2.6 seconds ahead of the iMac, really showing off the power of the 6-core processor. The results show two things -- that the new iMacs are surprisingly capable machines for the price, and that Apple really needs to release a new Mac Pro. The latter is widely expected to happen sometime this summer. One comment about these benchmarks, though -- Final Cut Pro X has full symmetric multicore support and renders in the background, so it no longer really matters how fast rendering is done. You can continue working while your multicore Mac is crunching away on rendering. For further details on the testing, be sure to visit the Bare Feats site.
Apple iCloud to halt backups, MobileMe email, when storage limit is reached?
Hey there, future iCloud power user, take a gander at the MobileMe email from MacRumors above -- that's what to expect when you approach the 5GB storage limit. Apparently, automatic backups and your MobileMe account's email traffic will pause until you delete some files or purchase more space via your iDevice or a computer -- for an undisclosed cost. That's one sliver of info which Apple's remaining tight-lipped about despite unveiling the mostly free cloud service weeks ago. Also worth noting, as TUAW points out, is that content purchased within the iTunes ecosystem won't impact your quota. Hey, those app downloads can sure make it easy to fill up a drive, ya know.
Rumor: New Mac Pros and Mac minis in August, CNet says
CNet's Brian Tong announced via Twitter that Apple is preparing to debut new Mac Pros and Mac minis in August. Tong added that both models are expected to have Thunderbolt and Sandy Bridge processors, urging people to wait before buying new machines. As MacRumors points out, Tong was spot on when he said new iMacs would arrive around the first week of May. Considering he is drawing upon the same sources, and current stocks of Mac Pros and Mac minis are being depleted, we're willing to place our bets in his corner as well. A Mac Pro and Mac mini refresh, along with expected updates to the MacBook Air and AirPort/Time Capsule product lines, would make a very nice back-to-school press event in August.
Low Mac Pro, Mac mini server supplies suggest pending refresh
Supplies of Apple's Mac Pro and Mac mini server lines are reportedly constrained, indicating a refresh is likely in the near future. According to 9to5 Mac, a source indicates these two product lines should see updates within the next month or so. 9to5 Mac doesn't give any info on the current supply status of the non-server versions of these two Mac models, but it's a safe bet that the standard and server lines will see updates at around the same time. We already expect to see a refresh of the MacBook Air line relatively soon, and the Mac Pro and Mac mini are due as well, having last been refreshed nearly a year ago. It's a given that all of the forthcoming Mac model refreshes will include Apple's new Thunderbolt I/O port, and the Mac Pro and Mac mini are also likely to have their CPUs updated to Intel's Sandy Bridge architecture. 9to5 Mac also notes that Apple's AirPort equipment supplies are still constrained, which may indicate that those products are still due for the refresh that many (including us at TUAW) expected to see at WWDC. With Mac OS X Lion due for release next month and a bevy of product refreshes expected soon, it's shaping up to be a busy couple of months for the Mac.
Next-generation Mac Pro rumored to feature rack mount, stackable drives
If a rumor posted on 9 to 5 Mac has any validity, the Mac Pro may be the next member of the Apple family to receive an updated design. The top-of-the-line Mac Pro has been somewhat neglected in the design department, as the current design debuted with the Power Mac G5 in June of 2003. Since then, the Mac Pro has received processor, RAM and storage updates, but the exterior design is basically the same. 9 to 5 Mac is reporting that a Mac Pro prototype is now in testing that features a narrower (just about 5 inches wide) and shorter (about 19 inches) design that could fit into a standard server rack. This makes sense in that a rack-mountable Mac Pro could easily replace the gaping hole in the product line left by the discontinued Xserve. If the rumored design could be placed vertically for "under desk" use or horizontally rack-mounted as a server, the power of the Mac Pro could be harnessed for high-end professional work as well as for organization-wide applications. The rumor says that the new Mac Pro features stacked drives with two drives per sled for a higher storage density than is currently available. The sleds can be configured either with SSDs or conventional hard drives. It's expected that the Mac Pro would be a 3U (5.25 inch) thick device in the rack-mounted configuration. We think 9 to 5 Mac has another good point -- a new Mac Pro with Thunderbolt, Blu-ray and a new design would be a perfect complement to the new version of Final Cut Pro that's arriving in June.
Does Thunderbolt fortell the end of the line for the Mac Pro as we know it?
Xsan integrator Meta Media has an interesting series of posts on its Empowering Creativity blog about what it sees as the future -- or rather the lack of a future -- for Apple's Mac Pro line. The arrival of the Thunderbolt interface, Meta Media says, will allow Apple to return to its beloved sealed-box model of computer production with no user-serviceable parts inside, just like the original Macintosh. No expansion cards, no hard disk upgrades, just Thunderbolt (aka Light Peak) interfaces to connect ... well, to connect anything you like really. "The new Mac Pro will probably look something akin to the current Mac Mini, except slightly taller, more powerful, and with Thunderbolt ports," the thinking goes. "In fact, all of us need to grapple with the prospect of a Mac product line without any capability of expansion beyond USB, Firewire and Thunderbolt." The latest MacBook Pros were the first to sport Thunderbolt connectors, and Meta Media argues that the rest of the Mac lineup will follow. The post points to the arrival of devices such as Promise's SANLink Thunderbolt to dual-port, 4 Gigabit Fiber Channel adapter as heralding this change; the post forecasts that this is just the start. "This means that at any time now, Apple can pull the plug on the current Mac Pro and not shock an entire industry. Add to that the near-production offerings of Thunderbolt-driven capture devices from AJA, Blackmagic Design, Matrox and MOTU, and we have our new-age video workstation clearly in sight," Meta Media says. You'll find the blog posts here, here, here and here -- have a read and let us know what you think. Would you be sad to see the Mac Pro range disappear into a giant Mac mini case? Will you be happy just plugging everything into Thunderbolt ports? Let us know in the comments.
New MacBook Pro benchmarks show marked improvement
Primate Labs snagged the latest Geekbench 2 results for the new MacBook Pros and compared the benchmarks to previous generation models. Good news for those planning to grab a latest generation model. The results show a big jump in performance for the MacBook Pros with the new quad-core Sandy Bridge processors. These latest generation machines are scoring between 8,000 to 10,000, a marked increase over the 5,000 to 6,000 recorded by the 2010 MacBook Pro models. In this test, the bigger the resulting number, the better the performance. These scores from the quad-core MacBook Pro models are 80% better than the 2010 models and competitive with the latest Mac Pro desktops. As expected, the latest 13-inch models now sport the dual-core Core i5 and Core i7 processors which boosts their performance to the same level as last year's 15-inch models. When looking at these results, remember that Geekbench 2 only measures CPU and memory performance; it does not take into account GPU or SSD contribution to performance. Sometimes a tricked out 2010 model may score higher than an entry-level 2011 model. Overall though, these early results suggest 2011 MacBook Pro owners will be happy with the performance from their shiny, new machines. They may also tempt more than a handful of 2010 owners to jump ship and grab the latest generation machines. [Via Macrumors]
USB 3.0 for Mac review and benchmarks (with a LaCie 2big USB 3.0)
It took LaCie nearly a full year to ship the 2big USB 3.0 RAID drive -- a device that was announced in the fall of 2009 -- but now that it's here, it's being accompanied by a concept that actually far outshines the unit itself: USB 3.0 on a Mac. For whatever reason, Apple has refused to offer SuperSpeed USB on any of its machines, even a fully specced-out Mac Pro costing well north of $10,000. We've seen purported emails from Steve Jobs noting that USB 3.0 just isn't mainstream enough to sweat just yet, but coming from the guy who's still bearish on Blu-ray, we get the feeling that it'll be quite some time far too long before Apple finally caves and upgrades from USB 2.0. We're obviously no fans of the holdout -- after all, even a few sub-$500 netbooks are enjoying the SuperSpeed spoils already -- so we couldn't have possibly been more excited to hear that a longstanding storage vendor was about to fill the void that Cupertino continues to ignore. We were able to pick up a LaCie USB 3.0 PCIe expansion card as well as a 4TB (2 x 2TB) 2big USB 3.0 drive and put the whole setup through its paces on our in-house Mac Pro. Care to see how it stacked up against USB 2.0, FireWire 400 and FireWire 800? Head on past the break for the grisly details. %Gallery-111542%
TUAW's Holiday Gift Guide: Which Mac should you buy?
Welcome to the TUAW Holiday Gift Guide! We've sorted the treasure from the junk and are serving up suggestions to make your holiday gift-giving a little easier. When you're an alpha Mac geek, you can expect a common Christmas greeting from friends and relatives each and every year. It goes something like this: "My son/daughter/mom/dad/wife wants a new Mac for Christmas -- what should I get them?" When I hear this question, if I'm lucky, the person asking the question has given me some other hints. For example, a client asked me last week about a new Mac for her kids, and she gave me several criteria -- it would be nice if it was fairly inexpensive, lasted about 4 years and worked for her son, who dabbles with Adobe Creative Suite and GarageBand. My solution, in that case, was to recommend a base 21.5" iMac, which at US$1199, comes with 4GB of RAM, a 3.06 GHz Intel Core i3 dual-core processor and a 500GB hard drive. That should last for more than 4 years of good service. It also has enough RAM to make Adobe CS at least slightly happy and a big enough hard drive to store a lot of songs. But often I don't get that extra information from friends or clients who are asking about which Mac to buy. For those folks, I have a set of guidelines that I update annually based on the type of recipient. To see my 2010 edition of the "Which Mac should you buy?" guide, click the Read More link below and get ready to run to the Apple Store to buy your gift.
