Apple has just announced that its new Mac Pro computer, featuring that signature ‘Darth Vader’ design, will be available for sale starting Thursday Dec. 19 beginning at $2,999. There’s another version with better specs for $3,999, and a number of custom order options that will vary the prices upwards from there. Orders kick off Thursday online through Apple’s official web-based store, as well as in retail stores and at authorized resellers, according to Apple’s official announcement, so conceivably we could see the first customers actually take theirs home on Thursday, though it’s much more likely that orders will kick off first with stock arriving at locations gradually over the next few days. The $2,999 configuration of the Mac Pro features a 3.7GHz quad-core Intel Xeon E5 processor, not one but two AMD FirePro D500 workstation GPUs with 2GB of dedicated RAM per unit, 12GB of system RAM and a 256 flash storage module.