We wondered how the new Mac Studio compared in price to previous incarnations of the most popular Apple Macs used in studios. We used the fantastic resource Everymac to find the information and also have accounted for inflation in final pricing comparisons.
Apple Power Macintosh G5 "Quad Core" (2.5) Specs - Late 2005
A staple of both music and post studios, the original Apple Mac ‘cheese grater’ shipped in late 2005 as the Apple Power Mac G5 Quad Core.
This is what Everymac say about the original machine;
“The Power Macintosh G5 "Quad Core" (2.5) is powered by two "dual core" 2.5 GHz PowerPC 970MP (G5) processors with four optimized AltiVec "Velocity Engine" vector processing units (one per core), eight double-precision FPUs (two per core), 1 MB of on-chip level 2 cache on each core, and dual bidirectional 1.25 GHz frontside system buses (one for each processor). It shipped configured with 512 MB or 1 GB of 533 MHz PC2-4200 DDR2 SDRAM, a 250 GB (7200 RPM) Serial ATA hard drive, a reported "16X" dual-layer "SuperDrive", and a NVIDIA GeForce 6600 video card with 256 MB of GDDR SDRAM.”
Shipping Specification
Ram: 512MB
HDD: 250GB
USB ports: 4 x USB2
FireWire: 2 x FW400, 1 x FW800
Price when first shipped. US$3299 (with inflation $4,749.14)
Mac Pro "Quad Core" 3.0 (Original)3.0 GHz D. Core Xeon 5160 x2 - August 2006
The follow up machine to the original G5, the first time the Mac Pro moniker was used by Apple. The externals were largely unchanged which made identification between this and the previous model hard at first glance.
This is what Everymac say about the orginal Mac Pro;
The Mac Pro "Quad Core" 3.0 is powered by two3.0 GHz dual core Intel Xeon 5160 processors with 4 MB of shared level 2 cache per processor, a 128-bit SSE3 vector engine, and 1.33 GHz "64-bit dual independent frontside buses."
By default, it was configured with 1.0 GB of 667 MHz DDR2 ECC "fully-buffered" FB-DIMM memory (with a heatsink design that is a bit different from generic FB-DIMMs), a 250 GB (7200 RPM) 3 Gb/s Serial ATA hard drive, a double-layer 16X "SuperDrive", and a NVIDIA GeForce 7300 GT video card with 256 MB of GDDR2 SDRAM, one dual-link DVI port and one single-link DVI port.
Shipping Specification
Ram: 1GB
HDD: 512GB
USB ports: 5 x USB2
FireWire: 2 x FW400, 1 x FW800
Price when first shipped. US$3299 (with inflation $4,473.32)
Mac Pro "Quad Core" 3.7 (Late 2013)
Loved and hated in equal measure, in 2013 Apple departed from their much loved aluminium cheese grater design and presented the world with a completely new Mac Pro which soon became known as the ‘trash can’ because of it’s similarity to a trash can.
This is what Everymac say about the Mac Pro Late 2013;
There is no mistaking the "Late 2013" Mac Pro models for earlier ones as they present an Apple described "radical" departure from the large, highly expandable tower case design of yore and instead feature a compact dark gray, glossy cylinder design that is approximately one eighth of the mass but has limited internal expansion.
Apple explained that these "Space Gray" cylinder Mac Pro models are "designed around an innovative unified thermal core" and have not only faster processors than earlier models but also dual workstation class graphics processors, faster memory, and faster PCIe 2.0 x4 flash storage. Instead of internal expansion, the system provides extensive high speed ports for external connectivity options.
Specifically, this model -- the Mac Pro "Quad Core" 3.7 (Late 2013) -- is powered by a single 3.7 GHz Quad Core 22-nm Xeon E5-1620v2 processor with a dedicated 256k of level 2 cache for each core and 10 MB of level 3 "Smart Cache." By default, it was configured with 12 GB of 1866 MHz DDR3 ECC SDRAM, a 256 GB SSD, and dual AMD FirePro D300 graphics processors with 2 GB of GDDR5 memory each.
Shipping Specification
Ram: 12GB
HDD: 256SSD
Thunderbolt ports: 6 X TB2
USB ports: 4 x USB3
Price when first shipped. US$2999 (with inflation $3,619.39)
Mac Pro "Eight Core" 3.5 (2019)
Regarded as the ultimate Mac Pro, Apple returned to the more conventional aluminium tower designed, albeit modernised and with the addition of a rack version.
This is what Everymac say about the Mac Pro Late 2019;
The 2019 Mac Pro represents Apple's triumphant return to a truly expandable, professional caliber Mac after the ill-fated cylinder design that preceded it. In many respects, the 2019 Mac Pro line is among the most expandable Macs that Apple ever has released. With twelve RAM slots and eight PCIe slots, it promises amazing potential for professional users.
Specifically, this model -- the Mac Pro "Eight Core" 3.5 (2019) -- is powered by a single 3.5 GHz Eight Core Xeon W (3223) processor with Turbo Boost up to 4.0 GHz and 24.5 MB of cache and originally was equipped with 32 GB of RAM, a 256 GB SSD, and AMD Radeon Pro 580X graphics with 8 GB of GDDR5 memory (on March 8, 2022, Apple changed the default configuration to a 512 GB SSD and an AMD Radeon Pro W5500X with 8 GB of GDDR6 memory).
Shipping Specification
Ram: 32GB
HDD: 256SSD
Thunderbolt ports: 4 X TB3
USB ports: 2 x USB3
Price when first shipped. US$5999
Mac Studio Ultra (2022)
The new Mac Studio is smaller than all the above designs, based on the footprint of the Mac mini but almost twice the height to aid cooling.
The higher spec model is based on the new Apple Silicon M1 Ultra chip.
This is what Apple say;
“Built from two M1 Max chips, M1 Ultra lets you power through workflows on an unprecedented scale. So you can run complex particle simulations or work with massive 3D environments that were previously impossible to render. And with twice the media engine resources, M1 Ultra can support up to 18 streams of 8K ProRes 422 video playback — something no other personal computer can do.”
The new Apple M1 Ultra chip is effectively 2 M1 Max chips joined together using a die called UltraFusion, it offers 2.5tbs bandwidth. Although it is effectively two chips it behaves like one chip.
Shipping specification
Ram: 64GB
HDD: 1TB
Thunderbolt ports: 6 X TB4
USB ports: 2 x USB3
Price when first shipped. US$3999
If you need to use PCIe devices in your system then add around $500 to your budget. It’s worth noting this this would also be the case when using a Mac Pro Late 2013 trash can.
Summary
Given that the machines in this article span nearly 20 years it’s interesting to see the performance gains versus price. In some ways the current Mac Pro is a replacement for previous models, however, many professionals took a gulp when the 2019 Mac Pro 7,1 was released and started to add up the cost. Given the pro spec and pricing one could argue the new Mac Studio is a more comparable replacement.
Taking into account inflation, the cost of the new Mac Studio shows outstanding value for money given the huge performance gains. There’s never been a better time to buy a computer for audio production.
How many of these Macs have you owned? Let us know what you loved and hated about them.