This series of post talks about the numerous updates to Apple's software and hardware offerings and if you haven't checked out the previous parts, you can read the first part here and the second part here.

In the first part I talked about the new updates to tvOS, watchOS and iOS and in the second part I talked about the brand new iPadOS. In this post, I am going to be talking about the new macOS Catalina and Mac Pro that Apple announced at WWDC 2019.

So, let's dive right in.

Mac Pro

For years, Apple's pro customers had been asking them to refresh their Mac Pro lineup as the last update it received, was back in 2013, and at the WWDC keynote, the new Mac Pro was finally revealed.

The design is reminiscent of the first generation Mac Pro and of Apple's earlier design language during the Steve Jobs era. As was expected, this new machine is an absolute beast and can easily handle whatever the pro users can possibly throw at it.

It comes with a new Xeon processor with up to 28 cores. For comparison, our laptops usually come with dual or quad core CPUs. On the graphics side, it starts with an AMD Radeon Pro 580X but there are options up to Radeon Pro Vega II which provides 14 teraflops of graphics compute. Even this can be doubled for double performace.

The base model will come with an 8 core processor, 32GB memory and 256GB SSD storage and can be configured to higher specifications.

Apple has given the Mac Pro a 1.4KW power supply to be able to handle all that computing power and has a specialised cooling mechanism to keep it cool while at the same time being as silent as a standard iMac Pro. Along with the Mac Pro, Apple also introduced a 32-inch 6K display and they're calling it Pro Display XDR.

The new Mac Pro will start at $5999 and the Pro Display XDR will be available at $4999.

macOS Catalina

The first update to macOS is the breakup of the iTunes app into three apps - Apple Music, Apple Podcast and Apple TV apps. For many years, the iTunes bloat was really getting to a ridiculous level and finally Apple decides to do something about it.

This means that iPhone syncing has moved to Finder, which is where it makes the most sense anyways. In the podcast app, users can search with anything they remember in the podcast and the app will tell you which podcast that sentence is from.

A new feature called 'Sidecar' now allows users to use an iPad as a secondary display. Not only that, the iPad can be used for inputs as well using the Apple pencil. A new accessibility feature allows for macOS and iOS to be controlled entirely by voice.

With the new macOS, Apple is introducing a new app called "Find My" which is a combination of "Find My iPhone" and "Find My Friends". It will be available on iOS as well and will be able to find your Apple devices even if they are offline and not connected to the internet.

Activation Lock comes to the Mac after being available on iPhones for years which would make your laptop useless to a thief. Also, just like in iOS 13, the Reminders app gets a redesign as well.

Finally, Apple announced "Project Catalyst" which will allow developers create apps for macOS really easily and quickly based on their iPad apps. This is part of Apple's long term vision where developers will be able to ride a single code binary and it will work on all of the different software platforms.