The choices of the newest Mac Studio M4 Max or M3 Ultra a strange choice

So Apple updated the Mac Studio for the first time since the M2 version, but they certainly made a strange choice with the base model being an M4 Max, but the high end being an M3 Ultra. Making the lower end model actually faster than the high end model for single core operations. And the M3 Ultra is upgraded from the M3 Max with Thunderbolt 5, and GPU numbers that match the m4 max at least in core count.

It seems that Apple is going to skip the Ultra connector in some series, but then maybe they should think about skipping every other generation so they can match Max and Ultra to the same generation so the higher end chip isn’t slower in single processor operations. Nor have less possible memory or memory bandwidth.

I run video and with memory and videos sharing RAM I need as much as I can get, and $1600 for 256 GB is about all I could swing, as $4000 for 512 GB is insane. Damn Apple charges allot for RAM. And $4600 for 16 TB’s of hard drive space, OMG!

My last Mac Studio was over 7K and the next one will likely be more, just hope it lasts over 7 years!

Apple brings it’s Pro Apps Final Cut Pro and Logic Pro to the iPad, but makes it subscription

Apple will soon be releasing touch based Final Cut Pro and Logic Pro for high end iPads, but as subscriptions at $4.99 a month or $49 a year.

Logic will work on any iPad with an A12 Bionic or later and Final Cut will only work 5th or 6th gen 12.9 inch iPad Pro, 3rd or 4th gen 11 in iPad Pro or 5th generation iPad Air.

I love that Apple is finally treating the iPad as pro as other companies, but I hate that it is subscription. I would rather pay $99 for a lifetime than have a monthly fee.

The month free is great, but if I had the program I might use it, but paying monthly for it, unless i am making a living off of it. And sure it is cheap monthly, but I just don’t see any subscription that I am not making a living off of.

9to5Mac on the Mac Pro being dead on arrival

Honestly I was thinking about writing a post like this article, but Ben Lovejoy at 9to5Mac has beat me too it.

The recent pate of articles from Gurman and their bad news on the Mac Pro has really had me thinking. No Quad Apple Silicon means no performance boost over the Studio. No memory upgrades makes sense, but no external graphics card, means a decided lack of expansion, and a need to spend more upfront, without the possibility of later upgrades.

As for PCI Expansion, sure a video i/o card from black magic would be cheaper than external, and you could put in a fast ssd pci card, but those are damn expensive. Maybe an Apple Accelerator, but like the one in the current, you know it would be quickly added to the next chips, so why bother.

And having more options for storage, I would love that. I so miss my 4 internal slots for spinning hard drives, but more likely I see room for more proprietary Apple SSDs, which would be too expensive and likely not user upgrade-able.

The one thing no articles I have seen talk about would be more Thunderbolt ports, which would be great. I already use two Thunderbolt 4 Hubs, and still lack for ports, but is that and better cooling and maybe room for a second hard drive worth thousands more?

The answer is no. There needs to be a realistic reason for a Mac Pro to exist.

So maybe Apple waits till the M3, when they can do a quad chip design and really do an insane machine, and they go for an iMac Pro right now. I would be dissapointed, but not surprised. Mainly disappointment because I would love to move to 32 inch monitors for my next machine.