Apple is reportedly considering discontinuing its flagship Mac Pro line due to low demand and poor returns.

Apple execs reportedly discussed killing off the workstation business earlier this year and it appears they don’t believe additional resources should be poured into Mac Pro development. The move would mark the end of the line for Apple’s high-end desktops and it probably won’t go down well with fans and professionals alike.

Unlike most Apple gear today, Mac Pros were used by people who actually used them to make a living. If you happened to wander into a studio of some sort, chances are you would see Apple’s aluminium towers rendering video, making politicians look less evil on covers of magazines or making Rebecca Black sound a bit more like Susan Boyle.

The harsh reality is that Apple is no longer making a lot of money on professional computing. Not that long ago, Apple gear was synonymous with high-end workstations, PowerPC beasts that could wipe the floor with feeble Intel systems. This is no longer the case. On the inside, Macs are not that different from Windows machines and there is little incentive to go for a pricey $2,500 Mac Pro when you can put together a much more powerful system on your own.

It seems the real money is in shiny toys, not brushed aluminium workstations. The next time you walk into a studio you could see nondescript towers standing in place of stylish Mac Pros. Whether they will be running Windows 8, 9, 10 or some incarnation of OSX remains to be seen.

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