Why no mid-size Mac Pro?

There are a lot of mysteries in this universe, not least of which is the way Apple builds their computers. They have computers like the Mac Pro which is wonderfully assembled and easily expandable. Then you have the iMac which is a sealed unit and a bitch to upgrade, other than memory. It seems some mental midget at Apple figured that memory was the only thing that customers would ever want to upgrade, replace, or that would go bad. Of course, if your hard disk goes bad you have one of two choices: bravery or a Mac shop. The former requires some digging on the network to find how to take apart an iMac and then the bravery to actually do what the steps entail. I’ve done that, and trust me it’s a pain. Taking it to a Mac shop is, in my opinion, stupid when all you want to do is replace a defective drive. Why didn’t Apple make it easy to replace the stupid drive? After all, it is a SATA drive so how hard would it have been to create a small door hidden in the back to easily swap out the drive.

It’s why I don’t understand why there’s isn’t a mid-size Mac Pro — a Mac Semi-Pro, if you will . It would be perfect for those of us who don’t need the oomph of the Mac Pro but do want some level of upgradability. A half-sized Mac Pro would be optimal. In fact, something like this Gateway FX. It has 2 spare drive bays with trays for inserting SATA drives. Has an i7, which is more than enough for my purposes, and a decent graphics card. It’s about 1/2 the size of a Mac Pro. Just perfect for my needs. But I’d rather have a Mac.

Unless I go through the hassle of making a Hackintosh, I’m screwed — and could be screwed if I go through and build a Hackintosh. Damned either way. So if anyone at Apple reads this, why not a Mac Semi-Pro that has a smaller case, a single i7, a choice of video card, and ample memory for those of us unwilling to shell out the bucks for the Mac Pro and who want something smaller, and able to hold multiple video cards for those of us who already have monitors yet the Mac Mini is just too lightweight a solution. As the Gateway shows, such a box would be a reasonable $1500 or so, maybe a bit more considering the quality of the case, etc. Even at $2,000 it would be a deal.