Apple rumored to be revealing ‘something really different’ for its new Mac Pro

This story is part of our complete Apple WWDC coverage

WWDC is only a few days away (June 10), and though all the talk has been focused on MacBooks (both Air and Pro), OS X, and iOS 7, another product may make an appearance at the annual conference as well. According to MacRumors, a “video professional” named Andrew Baird says he spoke with Mac Pro product manager Douglas Brooks after sending an email to Tim Cook about the lack of a “recent professional desktop.” In the phone call, though Brooks didn’t divulge information regarding the price, specifications, or design of the proposed tower, he did reveal that it would be released later this year and that it will be “worth the wait.”

Apple’s tablets, phones, and MacBooks have dominated the consumer tech space for a while now, but at Monday’s WWDC, it’ll be a year to the day since we’ve seen a new tower computer from Apple. During the call, Brooks asked Baird what he’d like to see in the new Mac Pro. At the top of his list is “expandability for extra graphics cards support, and memory expansion,” among other things. According to Baird, Brooks responded by saying: “You are going to be really glad that you waited [to buy a new tower]. We are doing something really different here and I think you’re going to be very excited when you see what we’ve been up to. I can’t wait to show this off.”

Although we can’t confirm any of this as true, and again have to remind you that these are just rumors, Mac Pro fan resource, the We Want a New Macpro Facebook group, seems to have acquired some additional information regarding a pending release. A recent post by Lou Borella, the group’s admin, suggests that the new Mac Pro would be “heavily reliant on Thunderbolt,” and have no “internal expandability.” Borella also hints that it would drop FireWire and optical drives, but would have room for dual-GPUs.

It is highly possible that we will see a Mac Pro refresh at WWDC 2013, specifically due to the fact that Brooks said the product would be available by the end of the current year (and that it’s already been a year since we’ve seen a new Mac Pro). With the event just days away, hopefully we will have some solid information to share with you then.

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