Oculus Founder: Rift Will Come To Mac If Apple "Ever Releases a Good Computer" (arstechnica.com) 542
An anonymous reader writes: It's been almost a year now since Oculus announced that the consumer version of the Rift virtual-reality headset would only support Windows PCs at launch -- a turnaround from development kits that worked fine on Mac and Linux boxes. Now, according to Oculus co-founder Palmer Luckey, it "is up to Apple" to change that state of affairs. Specifically, "if they ever release a good computer, we will do it," he told Shacknews recently. Basically, Luckey continued, even the highest-end Mac you can buy would not provide an enjoyable experience on the final Rift hardware, which is significantly more powerful than early development kits. "It just boils down to the fact that Apple doesn't prioritize high-end GPUs," he said. "You can buy a $6,000 Mac Pro with the top-of-the-line AMD FirePro D700, and it still doesn't match our recommended specs."
It has been awhile (Score:2)
It has been awhile since I have been impressed with the performance of apple hardware
unimpressive goes both ways (Score:5, Funny)
Unfortunately, the same can be said about general boneheaded behavior of top company officers.
Re: unimpressive goes both ways (Score:3)
Maybe consider the comments in the context of the interview, i.e. "a good computer" for high-end VR specifically.
Consider also that headlines often use quotes out of context in order to deliberately provoke reactions like yours. The full story is usually more nuanced than that, if not the opposite of how the headline sounds.
Re:It has been awhile (Score:4, Insightful)
Re: It has been awhile (Score:2, Informative)
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Apple has pretty decisively broken ranks with Nvidia. This was shown by their use of AMD's aging Cape Verde GPU in the 2015 MacBook Pro, even though a Maxwell chip like GM107 would have provided better performance and efficiency. Partly this is because of legal battles between the two companies, and partly because Apple is going all-in on OpenCL (which AMD supports better).
If there's a Mac Pro refresh this year, expect Intel Broadwell-E CPUs and AMD Polaris GPUs.
Re: It has been awhile (Score:4, Informative)
"That one "chip" can be configured at purchase to be a 4, 6, 8, or 12-core Xeon."
That's disingenuous too, right the fuck back at you, when all of those same Xeons come with the same crippled amount of PCI-E lanes *AND* have an inherent architectural limitation that totally fucks the system over trying to do more than 2CPU/2GPU configurations.
Try again when you actually have to deal with the processor and architectural errata on a daily basis, instead of Macshilling, eh?
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Unfortunately, the desktop CPU's do not support multiple CPU configurations, so you either have a single desktop i7 or you have a multi xeon CPU.
The article is correct though about the choice of graphics hardware, which is unfortunately a limitation of their current hardware offerings.
Re: It has been awhile (Score:4, Informative)
False. Eons use exactly the same architecture as desktop CPUs, they just have additional support for (originally SMP), and more recently, NUMA. A 12 core Xeon is directly equivalent to a modern 4 core i7, just with 3 times as many cores.
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Go sell your derangement somewhere else. A 12-core Xeon E5-2697 v2 will pound whatever you've got into the dust, chump. 24 threads, 30 MB cache, 768 GB RAM accessability, 60 GBps of ECC RAM bandwidth, 40 PCIe 3.0 lanes of IO.
It's been nearly a year since we bought the 18 core Xeons, "chump".
Re:It has been awhile (Score:5, Informative)
Posting AC, just because. I bought a 2015 MBP... guess what, when doing anything serious with it, it overheats, and sometimes it might throttle back, othertimes, it just thermal-halts, or gives the pinwheel of death. I've had to grab an app someone wrote on GitHub to scale back my stuff when the thermal pressure of the Mac went above a certain level. Memory pressure, same... Run too much stuff, and Macs don't swap gracefully... they thrash, pretty much requiring a force-off with the power button. Genius support can't really do much because all fans are within parameters, and thermal shutdowns leave zero in the way of logs. Yes, I've done OS reloads, even booting the box from a Linux USB flash drive, typing in "blkdiscard -v /dev/sda" to ensure that the flash drive is absolutely clean, then reloading from that.
The ironic thing... my old MBP from ages ago, which is the same size... just keeps on ticking. It gets a new OS every year, but I've never had it just thermal suicide.
Now, lets look at Apple's other offerings.
The Mac Mini. What a joke. It was a four core machine until the last refresh two years ago... now it sports two cores + HT, slower, and less upgradable. Desperately needs some love.
The Mac Pro. The old Mac Pros used to have the ability to use RAID. This one? One SSD, and that's it? For a computer that will cost you $4000 for something with reasonable specs, this is just unacceptable. It also is a bitch to rack, requiring a third party kit.
The 2015 MacBook. WTF? These specs are good for a 2010 laptop, but with one expansion slot (which is used for power), and nothing else, this may be a great thing for a college students to write papers on, but this isn't a serious machine.
The iMac. It drives one screen OK... but most people run two or three heads these days, if only to play a game on one screen or VM while doing something on the other. Try that with an iMac, and you have a nice slideshow. Apple seems to use the absolute minimum it takes to drive a machine, GPU-wise.
Don't forget repairability. There isn't any.
Yes, Apple makes their money on the iPhone, but they really should not neglect their other product lines, and from what I've been seeing the past few years, the Mac offerings have been becoming more of toys at best, expensive paperweights at worst.
Maybe Apple just should get off their ass and make the old school Mac Pros, or just make toys and spin off the Mac line to another company that can focus on making a quality product.
Re:It has been awhile (Score:4, Insightful)
The Mac Pro. The old Mac Pros used to have the ability to use RAID. This one? One SSD, and that's it? For a computer that will cost you $4000 for something with reasonable specs, this is just unacceptable. It also is a bitch to rack, requiring a third party kit.
You're supposed to be keeping your bulk storage on a NAS, not the local machine. That's the modern way of doing things. About the only task this isn't adequate for is video editing, so that may require an external RAID box. But why should everyone else need to buy a massive, bloated tower when only a handful of workstations actually need it?
And why would you want to rack-mount this system? It's a workstation, not a server.
Re:It has been awhile (Score:4, Insightful)
"That's the modern way of doing things."
Yep, let's make MORE POINTS OF FAILURE by having ANOTHER MACHINE TO MAINTAIN.
You modernists are fucking morons.
Re: (Score:3)
"That's the modern way of doing things."
Yep, let's make MORE POINTS OF FAILURE by having ANOTHER MACHINE TO MAINTAIN.
You modernists are fucking morons.
Actually I read this as having less to maintain. I prefer not to have to maintain multiple RAID systems, and multiple file synchronisation solutions between multiple machines when I can stick it all one one purpose built NAS.
Also if you have to capitalise the word "maintain" then you're doing your NAS very wrong. If anything "maintain" only needs to be capitalised if you DON'T have a NAS, and I'm an advocate for NAS solutions in everyone's personal home for their brain dead easy maintenance methods that mak
Re:It has been awhile (Score:5, Interesting)
> ...it seems to be the PC guys that are fussy about looks over performance.
No, it seems like the "PC guys" are fussy about choice, but you know that. It's tough to admit, surely. They can choose an external or an internal solution. You don't get that *choice* at all. It's cute that you try to get in some sort of perceived slight or negative remark but, really, we're not that dumb. Well, I'm not - I can't speak for the rest. I'm not sure how you define "PC guys" but I'll see if I can help you out.
Just because it works for you and is your preferred method (which it probably isn't but you're compelled to say it is because you need affirmation and you've tied your self-worth and identity to a brand) does not actually mean that it works for everyone or that it is their preferred method. Trying to claim it's about looks is just plain silly and I doubt anyone's dumb enough to fall for it.
No, I suspect the PC users care about being able to make choices. That's something you gave up when you decide to use an Apple. You decided to limit your other choices. That's fine but tying your identity to it, seeking affirmation, and attempting to claim some sort of superiority for having done so is just plain silly and childish. You've tied yourself and your identity to something you've no control over, did not contribute to, and have ceased to be rational about that choice. It is rather telling, unfortunately.
It's sad that you've got a frail ego, low self-worth, and few meaningful accomplishments in life. If those things were a bit different, a bit improved, you might not have to bolster yourself-image with a bunch of code you didn't write, a device you didn't create, and a brand you have no control over. Your choice of OS is not significant, important, or meaningful. I know that's rough to hear but the sooner you realize this the better off you'll be.
Get a dog, climb a mountain, run a race, lose a few pounds, brush your teeth, take a shower, get a real friend, go on a date with someone you think is cute, whatever... But do something, something meaningful and an accomplishment that makes you feel good about yourself. Relying on getting an ego boost from your computer is really kind of sad. Seriously, that's not a slight nor is my intent to be derogatory.
It really is kind of sad to see a grown adult tie so much of their identity to something they've no control over. It's like blind patriotism or being proud of accomplishments that you didn't contribute to. Life would be so much more meaningful for you if you actually accomplish something you can be proud about. I'm baffled as to why you might feel superior for having chosen to have fewer choices.
There are lots of reasons to like Apple but to tie your identity to it enough to cause delusions and irrational thinking is indicative of poor mental health and a frail ego. That you'd twist logic so far, just to make a perceived slight, really does demonstrate your unhealthy mental process and that sort of process doesn't happen without reason. There's almost always a cause, it could be as simple as a chemical imbalance. I don't know how old you are but if this sort of thing keeps up and you find that you're unable to control it then you might want to seek professional help.
It's like arguing over who is using the better programming language instead of using quantifiable metrics to determine which of you wrote the better program. It's like thinking that rooting for a certain sports team makes you a better person. It's like thinking that believing in a certain deity makes you a better person - even if that belief doesn't mean you've changed your behavior. Seriously, I wish you luck but get help with that.
Re:It has been awhile (Score:4, Insightful)
Shorter version of your post: "You're holding it wrong"
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I don't really need much more out of it. Never had it crash or hitch due to thermals or for any other reason (though the boys do occasionally get a bit toasty). Maybe GP got a bad apple? *ducks*
I guess if I cared about high-end
Re:It has been awhile (Score:5, Insightful)
Considering how much Microsoft is hell-bent on alienating their users with Win10, and considering what you've just described, where will the desktop computer market go from here?
Windows... you may think the issues are huge, but outside a handful of uber pissed of people, I find that most people either don't care, or aren't even aware of it.
I'm not saying it doesn't matter, I'm simply saying that it is number 417 on their give a crap list and it just doesn't register on their radar.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
My mind was blown at how places are actually turning to Linux for desktops. My last place I worked at used Ubuntu. My current place, I'm using RHEL. Outlook? In a VM accessed via RDP, or just using OWA outright.
Here is what a Linux desktop gives you:
1: Ease of reimaging... PXE boot, kickstart... done. If LDAP is used for authorization, that can be tossed in the .ks file. Same with ansible [1].
2: No telemetry data sucked to MS, no privacy invasions, no scanning of documents. Stuff stays put on Linux
Re:It has been awhile (Score:5, Interesting)
Both your comment and his are rough! I mean rough! True, but rough.
Then again, let's be clear... In my opinion:
They make fine hardware. I'm just not impressed with it. It's definitely good for what it is. I'm pretty sure that they could do better, especially at their prices and volume. By better, I mean higher specs with regards to speed and storage capacity. The OS is fairly capable, I've no complaints there and I've used it enough to know that I'm pretty sure that they're more than just appliances. The thing is, the vast majority of people use them like appliances and that's okay too. It's what they want, it's what they want to do, and it's probably good that they have the freedom to decide that sort of thing. Having OS X is good in that it gives people options.
Due to extenuating circumstances, I've purchased a whole lot of Apple hardware. I'm not even a fan of Apple! However, I've probably purchased more Apple devices than anyone here unless they're in charge of provisioning a large company and doing the purchase orders for them. But, where it comes to spending my own money on Apple devices, I'm pretty sure I've exceeded the number purchased by anyone in this entire thread - maybe even combined.
But...
Here's the thing? I go through a lot of hardware. I have my reasons! It's not an addiction! Err... Anyhow, I go through a lot of hardware and I'm really not able to recall the last time I was well and truly impressed. It hasn't been for a while. I think the last time I was impressed was when I jumped to a quad-core system that was 64 bit and had 8 GB of RAM. Other than that, the jump to an SSD was a meaningful moment.
Other than that? I can't really think of anything recent that has impressed me. I don't notice much of a difference between this year and last year's computers. I don't even notice much of a difference between this year's and the ones from four years ago. I don't even notice much of a difference after I get past 16 GB of RAM. I really don't? I'm not a gamer so that's not something I'd notice. I don't even bother buying bleeding edge anymore. At least not most of the time. Frankly, for what I do, I've got ample hardware that is good enough. I've not had anything impress me for quite a while now.
Maybe that's part of the problem? I bought a really, really nice mobile workstation from a company called Titan Computers. It's the X4K with everything maxed out except for the OS, I provided that on my own. I paid a small fortune for it - I'd not spent that much on a laptop in years. Given that my previous laptops lower specs than the new one, I'm a bit impressed with it but not overly so. I'm impressed that it is in a laptop but I'm not impressed in the nature of the beast - I can get (and have) that in desktops. I'm not sure that I'm expressing that well. It is impressive but only because it's in a laptop - and it's not that impressive because I could have bought the same damned thing (pretty much) a few years ago and just opted to not bother - because it's not that much more impressive.
So, we're not seeing anything impressive because we're acclimated to the scene. If we could see today's hardware back in, say, 2000 (or 1995) we'd be pretty damned impressed. They're good computers, they're excellent computers. We're desensitized, so to speak, so we're not thinking of them as good computers but, really, they're fantastic machines.
And yes, that goes for Apple. They do make good computers. They make fine computers. We're just not impressed because there haven't been any great leaps forward in what seems like a long time and many of us were there for the days when we'd refresh every single year and we were impressed with how much change had occurred during that cycle. I dunno? That's kind of what it seems like to me. I'd go on to try to explain it a bit better but I'm actually a bit time constrained.
Re: It has been awhile (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3)
Thanks for coming a long to tell me this.
Re: It has been awhile (Score:5, Funny)
Re: (Score:2)
Did you mean losers? /me ducks
Re: (Score:2)
Oh I just realized the big whoosh.
It was a good one, kudos.
Re: (Score:2)
Re:It has been awhile (Score:5, Informative)
Merriam-Webster begs to differ:
http://www.merriam-webster.com... [merriam-webster.com]
Re: (Score:2)
"Awhile" has been in common usage as a single word for over 700 years.
If you wanted to get on his case about using it as the object of a preposition, you'd have some firmer ground to stand on, but he didn't use it that way.
Re: (Score:2)
-1, Wrong
Re: (Score:2)
'It's two words, mkay?'
Originally two words, but in about the thirteenth century usage split between 'a while' and 'awhile'. Both mean much the same thing, but note -
awhile (adverb) = for a short time (e.g. he rested awhile)
a while (noun) = for some time (e.g. once in a while)
Prepare for hipster onslaught in 3..2.. (Score:5, Funny)
I can hear them typing away furiously on their Macbooks from here.
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The punchline response is "No, I live next to a bowling alley. The coffee shop is on the other side."
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I can hear them typing away furiously on their Macbooks from here.
Dear Macbook users; please send your complaints to Apple, and also go to their stores to complain.
Demand a product that has a VR-suitable GPU.... that's the only way to make progress.
Prepare for hipster onslaught in 3..2.. (Score:3)
... hipster ...
The1960s called, they want their vocabulary back...
A problem that will solve itself before too long (Score:2)
GPUs and CPUs keep getting faster and faster. It won't be long before phones come with better silicon than a PS4/Xbox One. Two refreshes of iMac or Macbook and they'll be good enough for VR. Luckey's right that there's no point doing anything before then of course.
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no they arent. CPU's and GPUs have not been getting faster and faster. Just more efficient. But the days of guaranteed CPU growth in terms of speed is long gone.
Half true, but GPU's and CPU's are dedicating more space to specialized instruction sets. Meaning they're becoming more efficient because of higher clockspeeds and better extension support. They are getting faster though. Hell, ~18 years ago your GPU memory speed was 200Mhz at the very high end and GPU speeds were in the 150Mhz range. These days it's 1Ghz GPU speeds and 1500Mhz memory speeds. Same with CPUs, you're seeing more cores in the same die area as ~10 years ago where you had single cores. Say
If (Score:3, Insightful)
As it is now, Lucky is just another redneck at the corner gas, spitting his baccy on the woodturner and arguing with the others about "Ferds and Chivvies". If you don't want to release it for Mac, don't. Don't be a fucking asshole about it. Oops - too late.
Sure, but why no Linux build? (Score:5, Interesting)
Re: (Score:2, Interesting)
If anyone has been pushing games on Linux it's Steam. They're afraid of a resurgence of the Windows monopoly so that makes sense.
So lets look at the numbers:
http://store.steampowered.com/hwsurvey
Yep. Less than 1%.
More people use Windows Phone than want to game on Linux. Let that sink in...
Why would a company invest real money where there just is no return?
Re: (Score:3)
While I got a chuckle out of the burn against Apple, it does just seem in general like they aren't working on cross-platform support at all anymore.
Yeah, is the problem really that Apple makes crappy computers or that Oculus makes bloated and inefficient hardware/software? A colleague of mine is nuts about this thing and pre-ordered one for a somewhat higher amount of money than I spent on a Zeiss rifle scope and a set of quality quick release attachments (and I thought I was being frivolous about spending but at least that scope will last me for life) because he not only did he have to fork over wad of cash for the Rift, he also had to upgrade his com
Re:100,000 people (Score:4, Insightful)
Is a mere 110,000 potential customers actually worth the capital investment costs? Is it worth the ongoing support? Out of that group, how many are likely to purchase and what is it going to cost go get them to make those purchases? Compound that with how much is it going to cost to develop the product, divide it by the projected number, and does it make sense for any reasons other than idealism?
Those are questions, not assertions. I really have no idea. I do not have the domain knowledge to even begin to speculate authoritatively.
Re: (Score:3)
I do not have the domain knowledge to even begin to speculate authoritatively.
Well, that leaves you in the ideal position to make strident, angry comments. This is slashdot, afterall.
However (Score:2)
They don't mention their own piece of hardware as being poorly priced (almost the same price as a PC capable of driving it) and that the applications are quite limited.
I've been an early adopter for Leap Motion. Never again. I'll just wait for Oculus/Vive V3, if they ever make it there.
Let the customer decide ... (Score:2)
Why do they sell Cadillacs to old people? Geezers crawling around town in your cars make them look ridiculous.
Re: (Score:2)
... what an "enjoyable experience" is.
For some products, that's a good approach, but for VR..... there is, as they say, a history there. The '90s VR market dried up very quickly when people realized that 5 minutes of VR made you nauseous and miserable.
The 2010's VR industry is very anxious not to repeat that debacle, so they are being very careful not to leave it up to the customers to decide what an "enjoyable experience" is. If/when the customers decide that puking is not enjoyable, it will already be too late, and VR will go back onto the
Apple and Games (Score:3)
I've been using nothing but Macs around my house for many years, and I'm on a Mac Pro right now. I guess I'm what you might call a die-hard Mac user. However. . . I'm not going to fight reality on this one. I've already ordered a gaming PC with Windows to power a Vive. The Mac will continue to do everything else for me, but when it comes to games and VR, I knew it just didn't make good sense.
Mac users have griped for years and years about Apple never producing a reasonably specified mini-tower suitable for gaming. Sad fact is, Apple as a company has no gaming in their DNA or their corporate culture. Steve Jobs didn't get games, didn't like games, and his attitude filtered down through the ranks. To the extent that gaming is viable on the Mac today at all, it's almost entirely due to Valve and Steam, not Apple.
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Well, there is always the possibility of hooking up an external GPU via Thunderbolt [arstechnica.com] -- in principle, anyway, dunno if it will be well-supported or practical.
Wow, this is different (Score:5, Interesting)
After years, decades perhaps, of people calling Apple computers "toys" we have someone complaining that Apple no longer makes a "toy" computer.
I remember in college someone telling me that while Macs were good for graphics they sucked for doing "real" math. This was at a time before 3D accelerator cards existed. I pointed out to him that graphics to a computer was nothing more than a series of mathematical computations, so I asked him how exactly a computer capable of such a feat of performing such complex computations was incapable of performing "real" math? He was struck silent.
Now I have someone telling me that while high end Macs might be good number crunchers they suck at graphics. Okay then, but what makes the Windows computers so good at graphics? It's not the OS. It's not the processor. The difference is the GPU, which is available as an add-on.
It took me a matter of minutes to find that people have been adding GPUs to Macs on a Thunderbolt port for years. I happened to click on a link that showed me that this same feat has been done on Windows computers as well. Running Windows on an Apple is a trivial feat so therefore I can only assume that Apple computers are fully capable of functioning with Oculus Rift hardware to those willing to go through the minor inconvenience of installing Windows on their computer and purchasing what is likely to be a video card that they'd have to buy anyway if they bought a computer that had Windows installed out of the box.
Sounds to me that the guy doesn't want to bother servicing Apple owners out of laziness more than anything.
Perhaps I missed something important here. I'm not much of a gamer and I don't follow the changes in hardware like I used to, my current job doesn't require me to recommend hardware purchases like previous jobs did.
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It took me a matter of minutes to find that people have been adding GPUs to Macs on a Thunderbolt port for years.
You are right, it is possible to use an external enclosure connected via Thunderbolt to add a GPU to a Mac. But those enclosures are expensive, and Thunderbolt isn't exactly designed with this task in mind. The performance you get out of this solution won't be as good as a regular old PC, and you going to spend 3X the cash for worse performance.
Consider that current Macs have Thunderbolt 2, which will give you 20 Gbit/sec of max bandwidth. Compare this to the 8 Gbit/sec per lane on PCIe 3.0 X 16 lanes =
The Mac pro was the perfect target (Score:2)
The Mac Pro his dismissed because the "market is too small"
Hey, you know what else is really expensive and has a small market? The Rift.
If you think about it, targeting the Mac Pro would have been a perfect combo, that would have driven sales of BOTH the Rift and the Mac Pro. I might have even considered buying a Mac Pro to go with the Rift I'm getting, but Oculus has made it clear that's not going to happen soon so I've given up on the Rift for my own use much less development.
what about linux? (Score:2)
I have really powerful GPUs on my Linux desktop. Why doesn't OR support that? I think they are just making lame excuses for bloated inefficient software.
Rescued PC (Score:2)
Stick a fork in it.... (Score:5, Interesting)
I'm about to unleash a harsh opinion. I worked for Apple from 1995 until 2001.
It's over honestly. I own no current Apple equipment, and I'm not interested in any. (more below)
Steve Jobs was the savior of the company to be sure- but he also pulled Apple out of the computer market in a big way. During my time you could by a Mac that would run circles around anything you could obtain on a PC. Heck going back to NuBus there was astounding graphics capability on Macs. When the company rolled out the G3/G4/G5 processors- they were stepping all over Intel based machines in big ways. And you could get aftermarket GPUs which were the equals of their PC counterparts.
Then came the start of what I consider to be the "dumbing down" of these computers. One of the first things I noticed was that Apple was making machines that were a generation behind in memory architecture. Then they moved off of RISC and starting using Intel chips. Then the logic boards were reportedly "Asus compatible".
What has happened since the glory days? Well- they stopped focusing on computing. It appears to be an afterthought. It's iPods... iPhones.... iWatches. The Mac is essentially a PC architecture with an alternative operating system. Anyone who knows that buys a PC, unless they think that Mac OS has something really compelling.
It is sad that this is happening. Apple had a compelling reason to be in the marketplace, and many firsts ion new and killer technology. Now I'm looking at artsy fartsy foo foo machines with no guts. I don't mind foo foo design- I might even like it. But I've got 8 x86 cores, watercooled,16gb of RAM, and a GTX 980 sitting next to me which cost me $1400.00 to build. And you could buy the machine assembled for not much more.
Rift isn't going to support VR on the Mac. And I certainly do not blame them. The platform is not not being maintained well or growing. From my perspective Apple is sucking the marrow out of the Macintosh until the bone is dry.
If in fact VR is the "next killer app" on the desktop- Apple appears to have not prepared for it at all.
So once in a while I pull out my old G3/604 machines. Load up Rhapsody Dev release from 1998- and enjoy the wave of nostalgia. Then I go back to my PC and do some work, with multiple virtual machines, running multiple OS's, with a movie playing on my third monitor....
This is of course my opinion. Apple isn't in the computer market anymore....
Re:Stick a fork in it.... (Score:4, Interesting)
Interesting perspective. Let me give myself as a counter example.
I came to Apple after the switch to Intel. I use any operating system that I need to (VAX/VMS was my favorite, I used to own a VAX cluster, then I got married). The main machine for email was a Linux box. My wife had a Windows computer, and I got sick of having to do technical support for it. It was my fault every time the scanner didn't work properly, or an update ran adn broke something, or the virus scanner went crazy. So, I bought wifey a MacBook. After setting it up and showing her how to access email and use the web browser, my amount of home technical support dropped by an order of magnitude.
When playing around with MacOS in a terminal, to my surprise it was all Unix underneath - up until then, I didn't know.
Since then I bought a number of other Macs. I have a big silver older generation MacPro, which was good for video editing at the time, but works well as a workstation with multiple screens. I have a Macbook Pro for when I go on site. Almost everything I do is via the terminal. I don't use the gui that much when I'm working. I used to use Linux laptops for work, but I never had luck with the sleep/wake functions, where I don't have problems with my Macbook.
Now, having said that, I don't use my Macs as my main machines. My currently biggest machine has 192GB ram, 17T HDD (inc a couple of SSDs), dual socket Xeon 6-core CPUs, running Linux. I don't know if the Mac Pro offerings can match that, but I'm sure that it if they did it would be way too expensive.
So, Apple may be more of a gadget shop these days, but as long as they keep putting out Unix based MacOS, then for me they are still making nice little workstations, but not workhorses.
You would think by now someone could say something (Score:4, Insightful)
This "lets tell everyone how bad Apple is" has been going on for as long as there has been an Apple computer. For years the punch line was "Apple is about to go out of business". Now it is Apple sucks at game.
Uh, Apple is not just here, it is on and off the most successful company in the history of the world. You know why? Because PEOPLE LIKE APPLE PRODUCTS AND SUPPORT. Geeks don't need or want it - fine. But this may come as a surprise to a few here, but Apple is not and never has been in business to make geeks happy. They are in business to make money, and they are very good at that.
Tell me again how wonderful Samsung phones are, and then lets compare profitability - you see that is why corporations exist, not so you can shove a memory card in your phone, but to make a profit. Apple makes money - because the average person likes their product and their support.
Not everyone likes Apple - DUH, does everyone like Ford or Chevy? DUH. To constantly for decades bring up these lame dog whistles about how Apple won't do this, or my home built is better is just proving you do not have a clue.
Bicycles make lousy snowboards, I think we should all boycott Canondale.
Re:So what type of Windows PC do you need. (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:So what type of Windows PC do you need. (Score:5, Insightful)
They have builds to meet the recommended spec on the specs page... It currently takes $1100. You can reach the minimum with $800 just barely.
That's a pretty damn high end machine.
But yes, ultimately the issue is not that apple didn't "release a good computer", it's that apple's computers aren't targeted at gaming, and hence don't have gaming GPUs in them.
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No, they have high-end professional GPUs which are tuned for different behaviors, like much more memory for textures, raytracing, particle systems, and higher poly counts, which comes at the expense of lower FPS and other shader-specific differences.
The Mac Pros are using GPUs designed for the people who are creating content, rather than those consuming the content. This stuff goes back decades. I remember buying specific more-expensive GPUs from NVidia sepcifically because they had enhancements and feature
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The Mac Pros are using GPUs designed for the people who are creating content
And the Mac Pros were designed to be impossible to upgrade. Want to put in a "gaming" GPU? So sorry, you can't.
And the Mac Pros don't have a model that ships with a "gaming" GPU. Are you shouting "hey Apple, take my money?" They aren't taking it.
The weird thing is that the Mac Pro is really getting long in the tooth. Seriously overdue for an upgrade. According to an article [macworld.co.uk] I just found, Apple is likely to either update in 201
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"Instead of an upgraded Mac Pro, Apple might come out with a model that actually has internal bays for things like drives, and actually has upgradeable video cards."
You mean like the previous several generations of Mac Pro?
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they had enhancements and features that 3DStudio and Maya would use
You mean like a resistor placed in a different place on the main board and the Quattro driver installed?
Or was there every actually any GPU that had specific hardware that made it different? From what I recall at least on the NVIDIA side for a good 10 years their pro/CAD GPU range was identical to their consumer range just with some software causing the difference. Mind you I haven't looked into it for a long time.
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well PC's have always been seen as glorified game computers...and Macs for more professiona work...
Well, maybe for gaming AND spelling and grammar checking...
Re:So what type of Windows PC do you need. (Score:5, Insightful)
I see them pretty commonly in tech. Some people go all-out and run Linux or a BSD on their laptop, but for those who don't want to deal with the hardware-support issues, OSX is often the next choice.
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I never ran into any bigger hardware support issues with Linux, except printers. Yes, gfx cards have shitty drivers, that probably counts too.
Re:So what type of Windows PC do you need. (Score:4, Informative)
And wireless, and touch-pads, and extra keyboard functions, and back-lighting controls, and more...
Unless I'm reading you wrong and your post is sarcasm then I'm gonna have to guess you're either really new to Linux or don't actually use Linux. Visit any of the forums, visit any of the support pages. There are hardware support issues aplenty. You might say the pages abound with hardware support issues.
Visit AskUbuntu, the Linux Mint forum, Linux Questions, Arch forums, etc etc etc... Subscribe to the mailing lists, read their archives, etc...
No, there are plenty of issues with hardware and Linux. It's usually resolvable but the problems do exist. I say this as a Linux user. It's not like I'm just making it up.
At the same time, today, I hardly ever have hardware issues that I can't just figure out with a quick Google. More often than not, I don't have any hardware issues at all. That's a matter of selecting certain components and being willing to accept that things like sleep don't work when I close my laptop lid. I didn't really like (or use) that feature anyhow so it's no big deal to me.
I don't need to use the buttons on the keyboard to control the monitor's brightness. If it doesn't work and I need it then I'll just find the command, alias it, and make adjustments via the terminal.
I'm not a gamer, I don't care if I have the most FPS. I'll just use the open source drivers for my GPU - thanks. I don't need the proprietary stuff because the most graphics intensive thing I'm going to do is watch a documentary. Maybe, just maybe, I might open GIMP. Probably not though - I'm good for stick figures.
I don't worry about one of those pen and tablet things to draw on. I've never actually found a printer that didn't work, eventually. I don't buy the three-in-one nor do I print things that need exact colors for the purpose of photography. So, I'm good there too.
I've come across a few distros that, for whatever reason, don't like certain hardware - that's okay, I'm flexible. I'll find another OS on there. Back home I have, for example, one particular desktop (not much different from another - with the exact same GPU) that doesn't like Mint. For some reason, the screen tears a couple of times and it drops me into TTY. To top it off, it won't restart Xorg or whatever it was. So, that one went into the bit bucket and I tossed another distro on and, sure enough, it was good to go.
Then, I could go back through my own history... The above is just today, right now, that I can think of - and limited by how much effort I'm willing to put into thought. I've seen loads of complaints. I don't really have any problems because I'm not actually usually impacted by it. It's just that it would be dishonest to say that Linux doesn't have some device driver shortcomings. I've even come across a USB drive that would not, for the life of me, work with any of the distros that I had installed - while it worked fine in any non-Linux OS that I had access to, as well as working just fine with BSD. (It was some iOmega device, as I recall.)
It's not as bad as it used to be. Not at all. It is usually something that can be fixed but it's not always peachy and fine right from the go. If you've never had any "bigger hardware support issues" with Linux then perhaps you're fairly new to the OS or you're just not trying hard enough. Then again, it might be the other way around and you're a true guru who doesn't have problems because you're really, really good at writing your own drivers or the likes.
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I hate this argument. "I've never had problems, so nobody has problems". Every laptop I've ever tried to put linux on has had some part of it just flat out not work, or work poorly.
Re: So what type of Windows PC do you need. (Score:2)
but for those who don't want to deal with the hardware-support issues, OSX is often the next choice.
Apparently you haven't installed Linux in ten or fifteen years...
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True, that's not far off. I think I last installed Linux in 2008. At the time, suspend/resume was very flaky, which was kind of a dealbreaker for a laptop. (It would often appear to work, but then various things would be broken in mysterious ways after resume.) It could well be reliable by now. But still, lots of Unixy people use OSX on their laptops, even when their preferred work environment on a VPS or remote server is Linux.
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There was a point when music and video applications didn't run very well on Windows, and Linux was too difficult to use. However this hasn't really been true for decades now. The problem is these people have done nothing to update their knowledge since their first brush with it, and when the newbies ask what they should use they all point at their macs.
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Re:So what type of Windows PC do you need. (Score:5, Informative)
If a high end Mac won't support it. You will need a higher end PC which will be beyond most people's budgets.
Not even slightly. Because iMacs have basically shit graphics and aren't upgradeable due to being all in one.
And the mac pros have specialist workstation graphics cards certified for CAD etc; which are extremely expensive, and very good for CAD, but not so great for games; and they also ship with Xeons etc which push the price way up.
Meanwhile a basic PC tower with a decent i5/i7 and a highend video card can be had for $1500 or less.
Re:So what type of Windows PC do you need. (Score:5, Insightful)
The most expensive Mac has a GPU that is useless for high-end gaming. Intel integrated graphics are not even close to being OK for this purpose, and an expensive AMD card that is specialized for CAD and graphic design simply isn't capable of working for VR. There's no reason for Oculus or HTC/Valve to invest a single second of time trying to support those systems.
Processing power isn't the bottle neck. I have a system built on a 2600K processor, which is fairly old, but it's clocked to over 3.5 ghz, and it's not a problem. My system still crushes Valves VR capability test rather handily, because I have a GTX980 as the graphics card.
A gaming box can be built that would be adequate for VR for around $1000. There isn't a single Mac that is capable, no matter how much money you throw at Apple. Even if you could throw, say a Geforce GTX980ti in one, the drivers don't exist. Apple maintains complete driver control on their platform, and even when they DID provide options that included then-equivalent hardware, the performance was abysmal.
Re:So what type of Windows PC do you need. (Score:4, Informative)
There isn't a single Mac that is capable, no matter how much money you throw at Apple. Even if you could throw, say a Geforce GTX980ti in one, the drivers don't exist. Apple maintains complete driver control on their platform, and even when they DID provide options that included then-equivalent hardware, the performance was abysmal.
[looks at computer. Yep, it still exists. Phew!]
simon% system_profiler SPDisplaysDataType
Graphics/Displays:
Intel HD Graphics 4000:
Chipset Model: Intel HD Graphics 4000
Type: GPU
Bus: Built-In
VRAM (Dynamic, Max): 1536 MB
Vendor: Intel (0x8086)
Device ID: 0x0166
Revision ID: 0x0009
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 980 Ti:
Chipset Model: NVIDIA GeForce GTX 980 Ti
Type: GPU
Bus: PCIe
PCIe Lane Width: x8
VRAM (Total): 6143 MB
Vendor: NVIDIA (0x10de)
Device ID: 0x17c8
Revision ID: 0x00a1
ROM Revision: VBIOS 84.00.36.00.90
Displays:
Cinema HD:
Display Type: LCD
Resolution: 2560 x 1600
Pixel Depth: 32-Bit Color (ARGB8888)
Display Serial Number: CY7350KMXMP
Main Display: Yes
Mirror: Off
Online: Yes
Rotation: Supported
Cinema HD Display:
Display Type: LCD
Resolution: 1200 x 1920
Pixel Depth: 32-Bit Color (ARGB8888)
Mirror: Off
Online: Yes
Rotation: 270
Cinema HD Display:
Display Type: LCD
Resolution: 1200 x 1920
Pixel Depth: 30-Bit Color (ARGB2101010)
Mirror: Off
Online: Yes
Rotation: 270
You were saying ?
Performance seems pretty darn good to me. This is a Mac mini, by the way. It's driving 2x23" monitors (sideways on, for coding on) and one 30" monitor (main display, in the c
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Serious question: The FirePro D700 that comes in the Mac retails for $3000. What is the prupose of using such an expensive GPU if it is inferior to a $300 R9 290? WTF?
I can't speak to that card in particular but you do know that there are stupid-expensive Quadro cards, right? They tend to have shitloads of RAM, and are meant to do lots of double-precision math. They're just not optimized for gaming. But you're right, they are overpriced.
Re:So what type of Windows PC do you need. (Score:4, Insightful)
The Quadros have some crazy features, like antialiasing and polycounts in wireframe mode that result in FPS in CAD or 3D Studio/Maya at levels that a gaming card can't even touch.
The tradeoff however is that these card suck at DirectX and gaming-oriented shader techniques.
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Workstation GPUs work a bit differently. They are optimized for professional stuff like 3D modeling or raster graphics editing... but when it comes to gaming, they will not outperform a much cheaper desktop GPU.
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The problem with a Mac is that they are over expensive yet only have what is essentially a low end mobile GPU in them. For the price of a Mac, you can build a PC that will work with the rift. (And outperform the Mac completely)
Re:So what type of Windows PC do you need. (Score:4, Insightful)
Yeah... no.
See for the work I do (service Scientific instruments) I use a Mac, because I am more productive on the Mac , and when I am charging customers $200/hr they don't want to pay for me to piss about with a high end gaming rig.
The price difference is irrelevant, make up a couple of hours in increased productivity and that difference is gone. And that would be just in the first month, after 4+ years the Mac turns out to be profitable as I have probably saved 40-60 hours and more (i.e. about $8000-$12,000 plus of billable hours)
Your needs are not mine, you may be more productive in Windows/Linux, so go for it, use what best for you. It is a tool and I choose the best ones that work well and "feel right", be it a computer, oscilloscope, logic analyser, socket set or screw driver.
So, if Apple does not make what you want, who cares, buy what you need elsewhere, they are under no obligation to build anything they don't want to.
The trouble is the Video Chip (Score:5, Informative)
The rest of Apple's range ships with Intel Graphics, which they swapped back to as soon as they were good enough to do 4k+ light 3D (think Bioshock Infinite levels).
Apple can sell you a $2000 laptop with $400 worth of hardware. There's no way they're going to bite into that profit margin for the sake of a few early adopters and drop $300 worth of graphics in there. They only do that on the workstation because the computers would be basically worthless otherwise, and there they crank the price up to 6k to compensate...
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It's a serious waste.
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And yet I work with Chemists, Physicists, Microbiologists,Mathematicians, statisticians, bioinformaticians,vets, engineers, etc etc who use Macs.
Those same groups also use Windows and Linux too because they are smart enough to use the tool that works best for them.
Increased productivity, by giving people the right tools quickly pays for its self, the more productive these people are, the more papers they can produce, which helps them get research grants, which attracts quality PhD students, which brings in
Re:Apple is about user experience (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Apple is about user experience (Score:4, Insightful)
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Apple tends to choose under powered systems because they protect users from short battery life.
In an imac or desktop computer?
They are protecting regular users from having a cord to a tower under their desk were all the high performance parts are, and giving them a laptop built into a screen instead.
Mac Pros cost a wild bundle because they are "workstations" with xeons and CAD certified graphics cards marketed to people with those specific needs or just too much money. In any case they are a great way to spend a LOT of money on all the wrong specs for an optimal gaming system.
You can get a good gamin
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Also I still see a lot of crashes but then again I see a lot of computers and have a lot of people complain to me when they go wrong, so I don't hear anything from however many people who never see crashes.
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bioinformaticians
What flavor is the company KoolAid this week? Purple?
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Are you sure you belong here on slashdot? A Mac Pro is worthless as a gaming machine. I have a top end top spec macbook pro, and it too is worthless for gaming. Not even remotely close to a good experience. Its better at other things if that makes you feel any better. However buying a mac pro then expecting to have it be useful for high end gaming and (VR) which easily doubles the demands is an error on behalf of the consumer not Oculus. Double screens with wide FOV at a nausea reducing fast refresh rate
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WoW and minecraft are games too. I don't know what WoW needs now but it used to run on not very high end Macs.
That said, of course Oculus needs a serious amount of GPU grunt.
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Ummm - http://www.dell.com/us/p/alien... [dell.com]
Don't think there is too much that wont play.....
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How is it not a workstation? It's beefy and overpriced, that's pretty much the definition.
Re:educational user here (Score:5, Insightful)
the base spec at academic is more in line with the lack of power. recently we bought the 5k 27" imacs at a base price of £1245 I think. overpriced but compared tro the arse fucking that dell indulges in with its 'partners', not shocking.
It might be overpriced if you're only looking at the CPU, GPU, and RAM. But don't forget that the 27" iMac includes a 5K panel that supports wide gamut and is by all accounts excellent in calibration and color reproduction. A Dell 27" 5K monitor by itself is over $1,500 - compared to that, getting an equivalent monitor plus a whole computer for about $1770 US (based on the British price you listed above) seems like a bargain.
And if the university is full of creative types running the Adobe apps, then they probably really do need quality monitors.