Apple releases octo-core Mac Pro
Appearing this morning on Apple.com was the refresh of the company's most powerful desktop class computer, the Mac Pro. The new tower comes with either dual quad-core CPUs (for a total of eight cores) or dual, dual-core CPUs (for a total of four):
Opt for the 8-core Mac Pro and you get the power of two Quad-Core Intel Xeon "Clovertown" processors running at 3.0GHz. Or choose a quad-core Mac Pro featuring two Dual-Core Intel Xeon "Woodcrest" processors and decide how fast they fly: 2.0GHz, 2.66GHz, or 3.0GHz. At 3.0GHz, the quad-core Mac Pro runs up to 2x faster than the Power Mac G5 Quad.
In addition to the new silicon, the new Mac Pro features:
- Room for up to four drives and 3TB of storage
- Eight DIMM slots to fill with up to 16GB of RAM
- Up to two SuperDrives
- Four PCI Express slots
- Three graphics card options
A quick jaunt to the Apple online store reveals that the new beasts are shipping now. Pricing starts at US$2,499 (two 2.66GHz dual cores) and rockets to US$12,427 fully throttled with two 3.0GHz quad cores, 16GB RAM, 3TB, NVIDIA Quadro FX 4500 512MB, dual SuperDrives, Bluetooth, Airport Extreme, Wireless keyboard and Mighty Mouse and AppleCare.
Adding a pair of (newly lowered) 30-inch Apple Cinema HD Displays (for US$1799 a pop) bringing my new dream Mac to a princely US$16,025.
Is anyone else disappointed that they didn't update the enclosure?