Five years ago I spent $5000 on trashcan Mac Pro, it was expensive but was the right move
for me at the time.
Fast forward to today when Apple just announced the next Mac Pro, a machine that so many Mac
fans have been waiting for, and the overall consensus is that they missed the mark.
Since the release of the trashcan Mac Pro my video business has grown at least 4x so
I could definitely afford a new Mac Pro, but there's no way that I’m going to buy one,
and I’ll explain exactly why.
Before you dislike this video and leave a nasty comment hear me out until the end and
I think you’ll end up agreeing with me, and if you don’t the go ahead and comment
all you want.
Apple made a key mistake with the new Mac Pro, and like many pro’s flooding to the
comments sections of Youtube videos and Mac websites, now that apple cards have revealed,
I’ve decided not going to buy this stainless steel and aluminum beauty.
What is a Professional anyways, well, the definition comes up as a person “engaged
in a specified activity as one's main paid occupation, rather than as a pastime.”
As many Apple apologists are pointing out, that's who Apple targeting with the Mac Pro.
Not prosumers, hobbyists, or people who just want a Mac Pro for the cool factor.
Real working Pro’s.
And the working pro market, “those who are engaged in an specific activity as their main
paid occupation” has been absolutely exploding even since the original Mac pro was released.
From about 7 million to in 2006 to an expected 42 million by next year.
A huge number of those working Pro’s as creatives like web developers, photographers,
videographers, graphics artists, animators, and yes, full-time Youtubers.
What is Apple doing to capture this new market that's in its prime to invest in a solid computer
that can be expanded long term?
Well, charging $6000 for a weak base configuration that will likely need to be specced up closer
to $8 or $10 thousand dollars to offer decent performance for the money.
Please don’t get me wrong, I am not an Apple hater, far from it actually.
My family practically lives on expensive Apple devices, and a lot of these are excellent
and worth the money, but with the new Mac Pro Apple is still out touch.
In the past, it was with their slow upgrade cycles and trying to make everything sealed
or proprietary, or just trying to be too “courageous” or “innovative”, but this time its the
price points.
Sure there are still pro’s that will end up using these, most of which are employees
for corporations or large production houses that have huge profits and need the write-offs,
but from what I’ve seen working in this industry those positions are slowly shrinking
as many go off to pursue a creative profession themselves where they can afford a $3 to $5000
Mac like I could 5 years ago but can’t afford an $8,000 model.
The Mac Pro used to be great for this market which is now roughly 3-4x larger than before.
Every previous Mac Pro has started at around $3000 when adjusted for inflation, a good
entry level price point for a base level pro computer that can be upgraded when needed
and when budget allows.
I think everyone would agree that Apple made the right move going back to a modular Mac
Pro, but what is the point if the base system is out of reach for most of the working pro’s,
and even then the specs are weak.
I don’t mind it starting with 8 core CPU which is no longer a high core count or impressive
in terms of performance, a 3 year old graphics card that launched at $230, or a measly 256GB
of SSD that's slower than a MacBook Pro’sm, is the same base config that was offered 6
years ago, being 4x smaller than the iMac Pro’s.
Or even 32GB of RAM which is not bad in and of itself, until you realize that those Xeons
are designed to be used with 6 channel memory, and Apple is shipping it with 4...
All of that could be excusable for the base model, since the previous base models were
also typically somewhat slow for the time, but those Mac Pro’s cost $3000, not $6000.
I understand the need to offer a $40,000 computer for large companies, but why not also give
lower budget working pros the chance to get in the door like they have with every past
Mac pro.
Well, for a few reasons, first off they are going back to a modular system which means
they have less control on how much they can make since you can upgrade parts yourself,
so they need to have a good profit from the very beginning.
Second is the iMac Pro.
When Apple admitted the trashcan as a failure in 2017 they promised a modular mac in a few
years but announced the iMac Pro in the time being which made it almost seem like a stop
gap.
Since Apple priced the Pro at $6000 it seems like the iMac Pro it's definitely here to
stay long term, and the only way to guarantee not cannibalizing this high end all in one
is by pricing the Mac Pro higher with lower specs.
Apple profits have been going down recently, and to combat it they are trying to compensate
by raising the average sales price of their products.
In the past, they would replace parts with latest and greatest, like making new more
powerful and efficient graphics like the Vega 16 and 20 standard in new MacBooks, but now
it's a paid $250 or $350 upgrade and the base is a GPU that launched 3 years ago.
If they can raise the base price they will, like the new MacMini’s, Macbook Air’s
and even iPhones.
For products that need to stay at an entry-level price, they keep it outdated, like the base
13” Macbook Pro that still ships with the faulty 2nd gen butterfly keyboard instead
of being updated to the 4th revision, and dual-core processors where the whole industry
has moved to quadcore.
Apples been saying that the PC market is shrinking and their trashcan Mac Pro sales were single
digits of their overall sales, but maybe that's not because there's no market.
Maybe that’s because the trashcan couldn’t be upgraded which forced people to look elsewhere,
and many those that stuck around waiting are now outpriced from the new Mac Pro.
With this price point, Apple is clearly targeting corporations and high-profit studios, but
that market is much smaller than the millions of Pro’s and Mac fans that have side hustles
or just those love and can afford $3000 desktop Mac.
Nope, the Mac Pro is no longer for them, only for the elites.
Some will reluctantly end up sealed iMacs that they’ve been trying to avoid, but judging
by the comments on Apple-centric website and Youtube channels, for many this will be the
final straw that will force them away for Apple.
This isn’t a bad machine, honestly I love how it looks and what Apple is doing with
it, but along with many other I would have preferred a lower cost base price even if
it meant not having that premium aluminum and stainless enclosure that probably costs
a fortune to make, or that 1.4 KW power supply in even the base model.
I think that would make more sense sales wise, and as a thank you to the hardcore mac fanbase
that has been holding on for years, but hey, only time will tell.
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iPadOS, which is actually an awesome move from Apple.