Eleven years ago, Apple unveiled one of its most debated and criticized designs - the cylindrical Mac Pro, which quickly earned the nickname "trashcan" among Mac users.
The distinctive machine, announced at WWDC 2013, represented a complete departure from the traditional tower design. Its polished aluminum cylinder housed components arranged around a central thermal core, cooled by a single, whisper-quiet fan that drew air from the bottom and expelled it through the top.
During the launch, Apple's Phil Schiller boldly declared "Can't innovate anymore, my ass," responding to critics who had questioned Apple's commitment to professional users. The new Mac Pro boasted impressive specs for its time - Intel Xeon processors paired with dual AMD FirePro GPUs, delivering seven teraflops of computing power in a package just one-eighth the size of its predecessor.
However, the innovative design proved problematic for many professional users. The lack of internal expansion slots for graphics cards and memory forced users to rely on external peripherals through Thunderbolt 2 ports. This limitation made it difficult for the machine to adapt to evolving hardware needs.
The design proved so challenging that Apple couldn't deliver any meaningful updates for six years. In a rare move, Apple acknowledged the product's shortcomings during a 2017 meeting with reporters, explaining why the device failed to meet expectations.
The "trashcan" era finally ended in 2019 when Apple introduced a new Mac Pro featuring a traditional tower design with extensive modularity. Interestingly, the original concept of a compact, powerful professional computer with external expansion lives on in today's Mac Studio, arguably executing the vision more successfully than its controversial predecessor.
The 2013 Mac Pro stands as a reminder that even ambitious innovation can sometimes miss the mark, particularly when form overtakes function in professional tools.
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