It’s been so long since Apple refreshed the Mac Pro that a number of reports have speculated the machine is set to be killed off. But it’s still available from the Apple store, and according to a new report, it’s going nowhere. In fact, it’ll soon to get a refresh that will introduce Intel’s Ivy Bridge processor and the new Kepler GPU from NVIDIA.
According to sources for M.I.C. Gadget, overheating issues that Apple previously had with the desktop have now been resolved thanks to Intel’s new Ivy Bridge chip which is set to make its debut in April:
Well, we have some good news, Intel will be moving to its Ivy Bridge platform in April, and this will solve heating issues. How does it do that? Well, with its 22nm (extremely efficient) manufacturing process, it is very efficient in operation in comparison to the previous Sandy Bridge. More importantly, the old transistor types are gone, and replaced by “tri-gate” transistors. According to our sources, those transistors are 30%+ more efficient with heat dissipation.
Thanks to Apple’s partnership with Intel, the company has already received engineering samples of the new processors, according to sources, which boast 8 cores and 20MB of cache.
Additionally, the Mac Pro’s GPU will also be updated to NVIDIA’s new Kepler platform which is due out around the same time. Apple is said to have been “burned” by the Mac Pro’s existing ATI graphics, which are prone to flickering, overheating, and other failures.
… our sources within the company indicate that they have chosen to have Nvidia lead the charge so to speak on the graphics front. This is good for all our compatriots who want to use the special graphics engine in Adobe products, as it supports Nvidia only, or for those who wish to do CUDA based programs as well, again only supported by Nvidia.
M.I.C. Gadget reports that we should see the new Mac Pro near the end of the third quarter, when Apple has “ironed out all the bugs with the newly released hardware.”
