Apple upgrades Mac Pros, signals radical new modular Mac Pros next year with Apple Displays

Many of us wondered whether the Mac Pro line was dead, but Apple has told Daring Fireball’s John Gruber that it is continuing development on its high-end desktop, and will next year be releasing a ‘completely rethought’ model with a modular design intended to make the machine more upgradable.

Apple is currently hard at work on a “completely rethought” Mac Pro, with a modular design that can accommodate high-end CPUs and big honking hot-running GPUs, and which should make it easier for Apple to update with new components on a regular basis. 

The company is also updating the existing Mac Pro today – and will be making new Apple Displays to go with next year’s model …

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Apple patent illustrates Touch Bar and Touch ID on Magic Keyboard

I wondered soon after the launch of the 2016 MacBook Pro whether Apple might have plans to bring the Touch Bar and Touch ID to a new Magic Keyboard. A new Apple patent application shows that the company is at least exploring the idea.

As ever, the language of the patent is dense, but the illustrations include a standalone keyboard as well as a laptop one.

In some embodiments, the device may also include a processing unit positioned within the housing, and a primary display positioned at least partially within the housing and configured to display a graphical-user interface executed by the processing unit. In some embodiments, the display is an organic light-emitting diode display. The electronic device may be a keyboard device.

As I noted previously, this would seem to address the greatest weakness of the Touch Bar …

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Filed under: Apple