Rack Mount Mac Pro Now Available for Purchase Starting at $6,499

I need this to make my web browsing and email a smoother experience.

No reason for the rack mounted version to have a GPU in it by default. Could remove it and cut the price a little, though even without cutting the price, having the internal space cleared out of the factory might even be nice to some costumers.

The GPU is a super-powerful processing unit tapped in for more than video output. It can be used for advanced numeric calculations, server-side rendering farms, etc.

Same overpriced computer. Now even more overpriced!

And then there is what happened to OS X Server. Why not offer an Apple distro of linux?

Let's clear up some confusion.

macOS is a true UNIX operating system (of which Linux was derived). OS X Server was just a set of tools for managing "server apps". Those server apps can be installed on any Mac running macOS. There was nothing that OS X Server enabled to make it a server. Every Mac can be a server.

I do my full-stack web development on my 6-year old MacBook Air, and it runs *exactly* the same software as my 20+ Ubuntu Linux servers set up at 6 different hosting providers around the world.

The true power of a Mac is not in the user interface, but at the command line, same as Linux. A whole world of software is available for installation easily via package managers, just like in the Linux world. Homebrew (brew.sh) and MacPorts (www.macports.org ('http://www.macports.org')) are the two most popular sources of such software.

Dear Apple, please expedite the addition of W5700X BTO options.

Hmmm. Tasty. I kinda prefer the rack mount version. I could save a lot of space on my desk and keep a lot of gear cool with a mini rack.

Forgive me please, but I’m struggling to see why Apple are charging a thousand dollars extra for a different case? Can anyone enlighten me as to the reason?

You mean $500 more? I would guess because they expect to sell fewer machines in this configuration, so recovering the design cost will cover part of the price difference and the inclusion of rails, covers the rest.

And then there is what happened to OS X Server. Why not offer an Apple distro of linux?

Because no one would pay for a Mac to run Linux. The benefit of these machines is the ecosystem. If one is not interested in that, then these are not the right machines.