After more than two years, Apple have finally upgraded their top-o-the-range Mac Pro desktops. I must admit I was getting a little worried that desktops were a thing of the past, not something content creators were feeling all that comfortable about. The extra PCI slots, memory and disk bays are just not available in any other form factor. Though having said that its not the most overwhelming of updates, in fact I would call it distinctly underwhelming.

No USB 3.0, and no Thunderbolt? What are they thinking? I guess we'll be able to buy some sort of PCI based Thunderbolt IO, but its not really all that satisfactory. One would hope for the latest connectivity on the top of the range desktop surely?

Processors continue to be the Intel XEON, with a speed bump up to a maximum of 3.2gHz. Graphics get a little bit of love with the ATI Radeon 5770 and 5780 cards available which will allow connection of up to three monitors simultaneously - previously this has been difficult and costly to achieve.

Audio IO has been retained with both analog and TOSlink ports, separately addressable - we run digital IO into our studio system via some cost effective TOS link to SPDIF convertors, keeping the path all digital.

So if you have been delaying updating your desktop system, your options are listed above.

Not wanting to start a whole Mac/PC/Linux flame war, but what do you think?

More Information

• Apple.com

 

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