Apple's New, Super-Fast Mac Pro Costs Up to $20,000
Need a heavyweight Mac to do some serious computing in a stylish form factor? The Mac Pro has always been the go-to box for just that purpose, and now it's even faster, offering two 3.2-gigaherz quad-core CPUs from Intel. And, with four slots for hard disks, you can configure up to a whopping four terabytes of storage, as well as up to 32 gigabytes of RAM.
When using the right applications, users of the new Mac Pro could find upwards of twice the performance of the last generation, thanks to the quad-core CPUs, which in some cases can do many times the work of a traditional CPU or even multi-core CPUs. Graphics and 3-D rendering applications in particular should see a serious improvement with this new beast.
The new Pro is available today starting at $2,799 if you want two CPUs, or $2,299 if you can get by with one. But you should know this: If you configure it to the max and with the fastest chips and the most memory, you'll be looking at a figure closer just shy of $20,000. Yes, that's the right number of zeros.
So, maybe you can get by with that iMac for awhile longer after all, but if you have the bank, check out the Apple Store to configure your own.
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
rattyuk @ Jan 8th 2008 1:02PM
Yeah, like people buy Apple's RAM. Most users buy aftermarket RAM at better prices...
But hey, let's not spoil your windows driven FUD, make the price what you will. But any chance you could pop over to the Dell site and spec up something from them first?
pondhopper @ Jan 8th 2008 3:30PM
yeah, otherwise it is totally useless right of the box eh?
I am certain this article was written by a gatezoid fanboy.
Michael @ Jan 8th 2008 5:13PM
The Mac Pro starts at $2,299 not $2,799.
Ben @ Jan 8th 2008 5:15PM
I saw this post and have to vent about a recent experience with Apple. As a fan of OS X, right now I'm sick of apple and their condescending ads. Dad was in need of a new computer last november, so we visited the mac store and I showed him their line. He was sold, liked the idea of mac how it was easier than the MS world, and the damn thing just looked really nice. SO far, I can honestly say that this thing hasn't been easier than a comparable Vista PC. Every time I see one of those damn ads from their website I wanna punch the little girl on the right. First, the store didn't install 10.5 after advertising it, we had to do that ourselves, and the punk didn't even inform him. Fine for me who's been doing this for awhile, others need a little more hand holding. Second, I've never had so much trouble getting a printer to work, even back in the days of DOS an lpt ports. All the print options he had on his PC weren't on OS X. He tried calling the store for tech support and what a freaking joke. By the time he got a human, they told him to call apple's main number. He called apple waited for 20 minutes to get some call center that didn't speak english and you could hear about 20 people talking in the background, like some telemarketing firm. We gave up on this route and looked into it myself, turns out you had to install extra drivers off the CD. Fine, but nothing I expect from Apple. After we do this, printing on his fairly new HP still isn't working right. HP says we're using the latest drivers, but still can't utilize all the options on his printer that were readily available on his older PC running XP! No options for color quality, B&W, tray type, paper type, printing photos on the 4"x6" paper was a nightmare. This is still unresolved. Isn't anything graphics related supposed to be easier on a mac? That's what all the artsy people tell me. He gets a new scanner last weekend, and what a surprise, after installing the software and reboot (pretty lame for all your windows bashing), HP devices still don't list the scanner as installed. He called the store again and was talking to someone who had the nerve to say "there are no driver issues with lepord." Then what are all these posts on apple's own forums about then? Retard... Not only that but started to get angry with him. After more research, I see a driver update that fixed it for someone else. Going to install that tonight and see how it goes. Not against driver updates, but as long as you play these ads and tell people how much better it is over Vista, do your homework first.
Shitty tech support, lack of drivers well after release from hardware vendors, and a staff that doesn't seem to care about doing whatever it takes to ensure their customers are satisfied.
I'm calling the store tomorrow and speaking with a manager about returning this well after the 30 days. I've had enough, he didn't spend $400 more than a PC to get the same quality.
Kevin @ Jan 9th 2008 1:55AM
I read this article and then headed over to the Dell website to configure a machine comparable to the standard Mac Pro (the one with 8 2.8 gigahertz cores). The machine I came up with cost $5,125. And the Dell still didn;t have the dual gigabit ethernet ports the Mac Pro comes standard with or 2 Firewire 800 (which come standard on the Mac Pro) and has no optical digital audio TOSLINK ports. Adding those would probably boost it close to $6,000. I could configure a $20,000 dollar Dell as easily as I could a Mac Pro but it wouldn't have as much on it as for the money as the Mac Pro. Once again a journalist didn't do research. It only takes a few minutes on the internet to come up with truthful articles. But I guess if all you want is hits it doesn't really matter how truthful something is.