Re: Working Over the weekend...

[Walter Soyka] "Even if they aren't going to update the processors (which wouldn't require much re-engineering at all), they limit GPU options and have strangely ignored technologies like Blu-ray, USB 3.0, SATA 6 Gb/s, and Thunderbolt (so far) on their top-of-the-line machines."

Yep.

Apple has never favored the most blazing performance or hottest connection (unless they have helped design it). Usb2 took a good while to standardize on macs if I remember correctly, and that was probably from all the windows iPod users not having FireWire, especially 6pin FireWire.

[Walter Soyka] "There are plenty of things Apple could have improved in a 2011 Mac Pro besides Sandy Bridge, so I don't think that Intel's road map should bear all the blame for stasis on the platform."

But it's not really Apple's style to do a refresh, then six months later the next generation comes out. If Sandy Bridge was supposed come out in 2011, knowing Apple's history, they would have waited. It's taking a bit longer than expected, and yeah, restless is right.

Usb3 and 6gb Sata would require new chips/motherboards. BluRay is most famously "a bag of hurt" and is supported by third party these days anyway, and thunderbolt is stuck with the rest of it, but has made it across the other lines who have functioning processor lines. Let's not forget Apple's supply chain is rather solid. They have relatively limited product fragmentation.

I have no idea what's up on the GPU situation, though. I have thoughts on it, but it's even more conjecture than what I just spewed above.