The Market for Expensive Cheese Graters

John Savard
John Savard Posts: 1,126
in Font Technology
As you may have guessed from the title of this post, at least if you've seen the news from the WWDC, its topic isn't culinary.
I don't want anyone to feel pressured to disclose personal information that might place them at risk for their house being robbed either.
But, given that FontLab continues to support the Macintosh with its products, given that the Macintosh had been, traditionally, the go-to machine for people using the industry-standard Adobe graphic arts software, and so on... although when I saw the price tag and specs of the latest Mac Pro tower computer, I wondered who on Earth would be interested in purchasing such a thing - perhaps some of the people who would are right here in this forum.
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Comments

  • Thomas Phinney
    Thomas Phinney Posts: 2,887
    I like the specs, sure. Price tag means it isn’t going to happen.

    The #1 thing for me would be that having a 32" 6K display as my primary monitor would be truly lovely. (I would still want at least one extra screen on the side, but maybe one instead of two as I have now.)

    But for any other reason, the latest MacBook would be a better choice for me. Plus: portability is a big bonus.
  • Mark Simonson
    Mark Simonson Posts: 1,734
    edited June 2019
    I don't think font developers is a target market for the new Mac Pro or the new display. Even the iMac Pro (which I own) is kind of overkill for this type of work. (Not that I would want to give it up.)
  • Mark Simonson
    Mark Simonson Posts: 1,734
    Yeah, it was basically spec'd by and for the very highest-end users. If you're buying cameras that start at $50k and reference monitors that are priced over $40k, the price is not the biggest factor. Type designers are not in that group.
  • Mark Simonson
    Mark Simonson Posts: 1,734
    edited June 2019
    To be fair, this is not the most expensive Mac ever. The IIfx started at $9000 in 1990 dollars (about $17.2k in current dollars). And I knew people who owned them. Of course, even normal computers were a lot more expensive back then.
  • Hrant Հրանդ Փափազեան Papazian
    Hrant Հրանդ Փափազեան Papazian Posts: 2,044
    edited June 2019

    Overkill (buying way more than we need) is how we're milked... and made complicit.
    Mark Simonson said:
    Of course, even normal computers were a lot more expensive back then.
    Mine was nothing remotely like that.
  • notdef
    notdef Posts: 168
    Haha. Rudnick is woke now. Get with the Times, sheeple.
  • Mark Simonson
    Mark Simonson Posts: 1,734
    Most Mac buyers didn't pay anywhere near that, either, although they were more expensive than PCs.

    My point was that a typical computer was relatively more expensive in 1990 than it is now. A typical desktop PC was around $1500 in 1990, or almost $3000 in 2019 dollars. A typical desktop PC (or even laptop) is much less than that now.
  • Adam Jagosz
    Adam Jagosz Posts: 689
    I love just how much dust this thing is going to collect.
  • Hrant Հրանդ Փափազեան Papazian
    Hrant Հրանդ Փափազեան Papazian Posts: 2,044
    edited June 2019
    Who cares about Rudnick (the source is moot).
    Adam Jagosz said:
    I love just how much dust this thing is going to collect.
    Next: iVacuum
  • James Puckett
    James Puckett Posts: 1,993
    Adam Jagosz said:
    I love just how much dust this thing is going to collect.
    I hadn't even thought about that. Especially if the fans are drawing air in from the front. These things are going to look gross after a year.
  • Hrant Հրանդ Փափազեան Papazian
    Hrant Հրանդ Փափազեան Papazian Posts: 2,044
    James Puckett said:
    These things are going to look gross after a year.
    Hmmm, in the spirit of:
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Planned_obsolescence
  • John Savard
    John Savard Posts: 1,126
    edited June 2019
    I checked the link, and indeed it was David Rudnick, and not someone who disagreed with him replying to him. Aside from not using such language, while I too am disappointed with Apple in deciding that if one wishes to have an open, upgradeable Mac, one must pay dearly for the privilege... the Macintosh platform has sufficiently declined in market share that I do not believe Apple is in a position to collect rents from it. The word desuetude comes to mind.
    I view the high price point of this computer as a sick joke (although I was kind of hoping people here would prove me wrong), and not something that will work for Apple in extracting more profits from the Macintosh. Instead, it may help the last of the die-hard Macintosh enthusiasts to throw in the towel.
    Which, of course, will leave Apple free to concentrate on collecting rents from the iPhone and iPad, which are in a position to yield them.
  • Bhikkhu Pesala
    Bhikkhu Pesala Posts: 210
    Apple making America grate again. 
  • Paul Miller
    Paul Miller Posts: 273
    Bhikkhu Pesala said:
    Apple making America grate again. 
    So thta's why Trump banned the sale of cheese unless it was in a large block. :D
  • Craig Eliason
    Craig Eliason Posts: 1,436
    "Wow, I'd never be able to afford a $45,000 computer. That's crazy. But you know, suddenly $1,449 for an iPhone doesn't seem so bad." 
  • Johannes Neumeier
    Johannes Neumeier Posts: 377
    Really the only announcement from Apple I am waiting for is universal support for their OS to run on any hardware. The only thing Apple computers do better than Unix or Windows is running Mac only applications.

    Yes, I am quite sure this horse is truly dead already, but we can still take that $1000 monitor stand and beat it a little more :wink:
  • Hrant Հրանդ Փափազեան Papazian
    Hrant Հրանդ Փափազեան Papazian Posts: 2,044
    Bhikkhu Pesala said:
    Apple making America grate again. 
    The best cheesy joke of recent memory. Although these days mine is like a sieve.
    (Sorry × 2)
  • John Savard
    John Savard Posts: 1,126
    John Hudson said:
    This seems outrageous only if one assumes that this is a role replacement for the old, pre-iMac desktop machine. It's not. When the iMac was introduced, Apple split their desktop market, recognising that the great majority of users were not going to need the power of the Mac Pro. Since then, the computing needs of more and more professional users have been met or exceeded by the newer iMac, so it makes sense to further tailor the spec and price of the Mac Pro to professions doing extremely intensive motion graphics and similar work.

    Of course the Macintosh Pro is a very high-end machine.

    However, while the power of the iMac is sufficient for many people, that doesn't mean that many of those people wouldn't prefer a machine with that power - but with a box you could open up to add memory, change the video card, and so on and so forth. For Apple to reserve this kind of product to people at the very top end: that's what I object to.
  • Adam Jagosz
    Adam Jagosz Posts: 689
    I've read you can install up to 4 video cards in the new Mac Pro — does that not mean you can open that box? (Or rather that they'll do it for you in store).
  • Mark Simonson
    Mark Simonson Posts: 1,734
    It has 8 PCI Express slots. Practically everything in it is user-upgradable. https://www.apple.com/mac-pro/specs/
  • James Puckett
    James Puckett Posts: 1,993
    As I understand it the upgradability is the whole point. People on Twitter have already pointed out that you can buy a better PC than the $6,000 base model for $1,000. But you can’t get a PC with a comparable $40,000 worth of add-ons.
  • Hrant Հրանդ Փափազեան Papazian
    Hrant Հրանդ Փափազեան Papazian Posts: 2,044
    James Puckett said:
    But you can’t get a PC with a comparable $40,000 worth of add-ons.
    And if Oprah would not stand for that, should we?
    https://www.insideedition.com/entertainment/6807-oprah-and-the-38000-handbag
  • Scott-Martin Kosofsky
    Scott-Martin Kosofsky Posts: 422

    The Mac Pro was, from the start, intended as a business machine: a fully tax-deductible expense for business buyers who have the need for its capabilities. As the not-so-proud owner of a trash can Mac Pro that is coming to the end of its tax-deductible lifespan (such equipment is depreciated fully over five years in the U.S.), I’ll soon be ready for a new one.

    I thought I might be able to get away with a new iMac Pro, but it seems I won’t be able to, as my work in high-end image reproduction in CMYK offset printing requires a monitor that is fully color correctible. While there are some tools to make adjustments to iMac Pro screens, their P3 color space (and some other factors) makes it difficult to do so. It’s not necessarily a problem with P3, but rather that the current tools for making adjustments, both hardware and software, have not yet adjusted to it fully. An 85% solution is not good enough. Furthermore, one needs to be in synch with the monitors used by the printing companies, most of whom use Eizo monitors. So even without the need to have the competing power to work with hi-res video or 3-D rendering, it seems I will have no choice but to buy the cheese grater. If my only work was in type design, I would never need to consider it.

    Such is the problem of being a minority within a minority.


  • Hrant Հրանդ Փափազեան Papazian
    Hrant Հրանդ Փափազեան Papazian Posts: 2,044
    edited June 2019
    The tax-deduction ruse causes so much waste. Back when color printers used to come with fully-loaded ink (versus the euphemistically-termed "starter ink"), to avoid paying through the nose for new ink (over-priced because that's how they get you) people would donate their –essentially useless– out-of-ink printers to charity for a tax deduction, and just get a new one..
  • George Thomas
    George Thomas Posts: 645
    ... paying through the nose for new ink...

    Years ago someone calculated the cost of printer ink at around $10K a gallon.


  • Mark Simonson
    Mark Simonson Posts: 1,734
    @Scott-Martin Kosofsky
     You do realize you can connect an external monitor to an iMac Pro.
  • Vasil Stanev
    Vasil Stanev Posts: 775
    edited June 2019
    I always considered the whole Mac part of the computer business as a big, but besieged city. Outside, PCs, new technologies, all kinds of huckstery and good decisions, but ultimately a living, breathing ecosystem that allows for improvement despite many setbacks.

    Inside, a priestly class of infallible overlords, a cultish following, hidden infighting, expensive and sophisticated armor that is of actual use to no one because, outside the gates, the enemy has the numbers.

    Ultimately, the besieged started to ragequit the doomed thing, koste es was es wolle. Everybody has the Internet now and can see through the facade, except the willfully blind, of course.

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