1. Marco's pessimistic take that they are clearing through existing inventory in slightly reconfigured and cheaper machines.
2. grecy's comment here that they needed to keep people hooked while they get the real bump out the door.
If the answer is 2, then they really can't wait too long. A few people will be satisfied that they can get 12 cores for $3800, but it's only a stop gap.
My pessimistic gut says Marco is right (see FCPx/exFCP fiasco), but I keep hoping he's wrong. Right now I have too much invested in PCIe in my studio (audio hardware) and might get one of these new 12 core boxes and nurse it along for as long as I can.
If #2 is correct, wouldn't they tease a new release instead of introducing a new model? No sense making customers buy something only to release a new model out of schedule.
Osborne Computer announced a future product that would outperform the current line. People waited, rather than buying what was currently being offered. In the meantime, with the drop in sales they ran out of cash and went bankrupt.
Mountain Lion won't even be available for older MacPros, that speaks to answer 1
(my 2007 MacPro is still humming along nicely, I really can't see why Apple won't allow me to install their new OS on it, other than that they just want the whole line to disappear)
1. Marco's pessimistic take that they are clearing through existing inventory in slightly reconfigured and cheaper machines.
2. grecy's comment here that they needed to keep people hooked while they get the real bump out the door.
If the answer is 2, then they really can't wait too long. A few people will be satisfied that they can get 12 cores for $3800, but it's only a stop gap.
My pessimistic gut says Marco is right (see FCPx/exFCP fiasco), but I keep hoping he's wrong. Right now I have too much invested in PCIe in my studio (audio hardware) and might get one of these new 12 core boxes and nurse it along for as long as I can.
Geof