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2016 nMP

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ManuelGomes

macrumors 68000
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Dec 4, 2014
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Here we go again...
Let's see if this time those who want nothing to do with the nMP will steer clear of this thread, only so to avoid being shut down again.
Please, let's keep it civil.
Those who don't like, hate, have no use for it, need something else, please create another thread if starting fights with other members is what you're looking for. Some people clearly just want that.
Everyone's opinion and wishes is valid of course, but when it gets to the point that threads get closed it's sad.
Is another thread needed for the nMP? Maybe not, but I, for one, like to keep up and talk about the news coming up that might relate to the hopefully coming nMP.
So, with that out of the way, let's see if we can hold this until the nMP comes :)

I'm kinda not so confident anymore on the close arrival of the nMP.
It seems the stars are not quite aligned yet, and this was no mention to Polaris.
if AMD delivers, and most will say they won't again, it looks to me it will be quite good. I'm quite curious as to how HDR will improve the experience.
Before anyone goes saying "AMD fanboy" I have never had an AMD GPU (or CPU for that matter), always NVidia.
But pure performance is not what I prefer right now, others will of course.
On the other hand, we should have had news from the Broadwell-EP already. We're almost a month into 1Q and apart from some leaks no hard info exists.
The DP1.3 and TB3 issue also has me wondering.
News/leaks on the TB3 display would be also nice.
Never loose hope though...
 
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Apple will update it when there are parts worth upgrading to.

And yes, i would not expect anything pre-Polaris. I also wouldn't expect anything super different from what we already have. CPU spec bump (and really, in terms of IPC there hasn't been much movement in CPUs lately; maybe option for more cores), new GPUs, thunderbolt 3 and that will be about it.

Until all those things in the Xeon chipset are available.... nothing much to upgrade to.
 
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DP 1.3 will come only with Polaris and Pascal, in a few months.

Yeah, upgrading only for the sake of it doesn't seem to be in Apple's plans. While this sounds reasonable, people complain that it takes forever for an update and we get old hardware and no price drop, and reasonably so as well. Everyone seems to have a point.
Not much will change indeed, I figure. Same form factor almost for sure, new (-ish) Xeons (Broadwell-EP), Polaris GPUs (HBM2 on the high end ones, GDDR5X possibly on the lower tier possibly), DDR4 2400, NVMe SSD, TB3 and USB3 with USB-C connectors all round I'd say. And hopefully a TB3D to go with it.
I wouldn't expect a lot more cores though, I don't see them going all the way up to 22 cores or near that, maybe 14 this time around.

If only Intel would do a chipset update à la C236, it would be awesome. 20 PCIe 3 lanes, configurable. At least make the ones on C610 PCIe and call it C620 or whatever. But they'll hardly take the effort and expense of redesigning it, when next year they'll have a new platform anyway.
 
ManuelGomes said:
If only Intel would do a chipset update à la C236, it would be awesome. 20 PCIe 3 lanes, configurable. At least make the ones on C610 PCIe and call it C620 or whatever. But they'll hardly take the effort and expense of redesigning it, when next year they'll have a new platform anyway.
Click to expand...

Well the MacPro has to have a new chipset anyway, it hardly makes sense to upgrade from the C602J to the C610 when they both offer the same 8 PCIE 2.0 lanes and Apple needs more for TB3 and USB-C. So maybe, just maybe we'll see a custom Intel chipset in the nMP.
 
Ideally it would have TB3 and DP 1.3, but I could see Apple going with just TB3 instead. It really depends on what Apple's 5K+ strategy is. I suspect the reason Intel's 5K strategy is TB3 is because their integrated graphics can do multiple 4K SST streams that can be turned into 5K MST by the TB3 controller. However, the USB-C port can be muxed between TB3 and DP 1.3, so a computer manufacturer can offer both options if they've got DP 1.3 GPUs. I can't really say which way Apple's going to go with this.
 
One problem with displayport 1.3 support is that only Polaris will support it at first. What would the graphics options look like on a new mac pro?

The current mac pro is:

Pitcairn, 2 GB VRAM
Tahiti cut down, 3 GB VRAM
Tahiti full, 6 GB VRAM

Potential future mac pro

Tonga/Fiji 4 GB VRAM, DP 1.2
Polaris 11 cut down, 8 GB VRAM, DP 1.3
Polaris 11 full, 16 GB VRAM, DP 1.3

Apple can't change displayport support depending on the configuration. The other alternative is that the low end option would be the low powered Polaris chip that is rumored, just clocked higher. That would be a pretty weak GPU on the low end though. It could look like this though:

Polaris 10 4 GB GDDR5 VRAM, DP 1.3
Polaris 11 cut down, 8 GB HBM VRAM, DP 1.3
Polaris 11 full, 16 GB HBM VRAM, DP 1.3
 
You do not have to include Tonga as low end GPU. Polaris 11 is 2048 GCN4 core GPU with 75W of TDP.
We should look more into Vega 10 cut down parts as the lineup of the Mac Pro.

3072, 4096, 6144 GCN cores. Thats how most probably will look the core count on single GPUs of next Mac Pro.

All GPUs with HDMI2.0 and DP1.3 :)

P.S. Vega 10 is different architecture than Polaris/Vega 11. Do not expect that Polaris 11 will behave anything else than "normal" Tonga with MUCH lower power consumption.
 
koyoot said:
You do not have to include Tonga as low end GPU. Polaris 11 is 2048 GCN4 core GPU with 75W of TDP.
We should look more into Vega 10 cut down parts as the lineup of the Mac Pro.

3072, 4096, 6144 GCN cores. Thats how most probably will look the core count on single GPUs of next Mac Pro.

All GPUs with HDMI2.0 and DP1.3 :)

P.S. Vega 10 is different architecture than Polaris/Vega 11. Do not expect that Polaris 11 will behave anything else than "normal" Tonga with MUCH lower power consumption.
Click to expand...

Core counts are just speculation unless you have some insider information. All we know for sure is that there are two GPUs that are supposed to come out this year. One is low power, likely targeted for laptops and the other is higher power, likely for high end desktops.
 
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I can tell you that both GPUs shown to press at GDC were cut down parts, exactly by 50% from initial ASICs ;).

Small one had 1024 GCN cores, and the bigger one had 3072 GCN cores.
 
koyoot said:
I can tell you that both GPUs shown to press at GDC were cut down parts, exactly by 50% from initial ASICs ;).

Small one had 1024 GCN cores, and the bigger one had 3072 GCN cores.
Click to expand...

Do you have a source for these numbers?
 
Sorry Koyoot, but until you disclose any better sources than random links to another message board, I am inclined to believe that your specs for future AMD GPUs are at best guesses.
 
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I was already missing this topic, glad you brought it back ManuelGomes. :)

Because AMD wont (can't) most likely bring the whole Polaris repertoire at the same time, I presume that Apple could go this direction:

Dual
- Tonga XT 2Gb
- Fiji (or Polaris if Koyoot sources are up to date) 4GB
- Polaris 8GB

And as a new feature, they'll enable the DSP in the chips. iTunes, Garageband and the Pro Apps will utilize it directly, and there will be a new API for that.

Maybe Apple includes dedicated DP 1.3 beside USB type-c, TB2 and USB 3 ports.

Broadwell EP 1600 series is of course included. Starting from either 6-core model, or cheaper 4-core version.

And new display's are introduced:
- current model with lower price USD 699
- 5k dual TB2/USB type-c/DP1.3 model USD 1499
 
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Zarniwoop said:
- Tonga XT 2Gb
Click to expand...

It would be a bummer if Apple shipped a new mac pro with 2 GB of VRAM. I bet we see 4/8/16 GB options for the 3 video cards. Remember, 6 GB of VRAM was a ton for a consumer card when the mac pro was released in 2013. Now its common for high end cards to come with 6 and 8 GB of VRAM.

Zarniwoop said:
And new display's are introduced:
- current model with lower price USD 699
- 5k dual TB2/USB type-c/DP1.3 model USD 1499
Click to expand...

I imagine a new retina display is coming. The specs for it are probably more dependent on the macbook pro though. The integrated graphics in Skylake can't do DP 1.3 so it will likely be two DP 1.2 streams over a single Thunderbolt 3 connection. If thats the case then maybe the new mac pro (or at least every mac pro configuration) won't need to support DP 1.3.
 
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Stacc said:
It would be a bummer if Apple shipped a new mac pro with 2 GB of VRAM. I bet we see 4/8/16 GB options for the 3 video cards. Remember, 6 GB of VRAM was a ton for a consumer card when the mac pro was released in 2013. Now its common for high end cards to come with 6 and 8 GB of VRAM.



I imagine a new retina display is coming. The specs for it are probably more dependent on the macbook pro though. The integrated graphics in Skylake can't do DP 1.3 so it will likely be two DP 1.2 streams over a single Thunderbolt 3 connection. If thats the case then maybe the new mac pro (or at least every mac pro configuration) won't need to support DP 1.3.
Click to expand...

I hope you're right. But it is Apple, so... they usually start the offering from where you just want / have to upgrade. 2GB Tonga could do it perfectly.

Direct DP 1.3 should save some IO for nMP, right? (But true, that current Tonga/Fiji doesn't support it.. but AMD has tweaked their offerings before.. maybe..)
 
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Going with Tonga at this time would be a step back. I'm hoping they're all Polaris based.
Maybe a "hack" will provide DP1.3 with TB3. At the moment only dual DP1.2 are supported, but in terms of bandwidth there's no problem. Intel could make it TB3.1 with DP1.3 support, or Apple find a way to make it happen, unofficially. Either of them is unlikely though.
Alternate mode gives some flexibility here, just maybe...
One issue when we're talking about this kind of bandwidth would be the use of active cables instead of passive, DP1.3 should require it. Maybe not a problem for the TB3D.
 
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ManuelGomes said:
Going with Tonga at this time would be a step back. I'm hoping they're all Polaris based.
Maybe a "hack" will provide DP1.3 with TB3. At the moment only dual DP1.2 are supported, but in terms of bandwidth there's no problem. Intel could make it TB3.1 with DP1.3 support, or Apple find a way to make it happen, unofficially. Either of them is unlikely though.
Alternate mode gives some flexibility here, just maybe...
One issue when we're talking about this kind of bandwidth would be the use of active cables instead of passive, DP1.3 should require it. Maybe not a problem for the TB3D.
Click to expand...

Really hard to say, USB-C gives lots of options:

upload_2016-1-24_14-24-50.png


Intel stretches it when they say TB3 does it all, since USB-C can do DP1.3 while TB3 cannot, but the point is a manufacturer could put a little lighting bolt and a DP logo on either side of the USB-C port and allow it to do TB3 and DP1.3. That said, I'm reasonably sure that Apple will just do TB3 with DP1.2.
 
throAU said:
Apple will update it when there are parts worth upgrading to.

And yes, i would not expect anything pre-Polaris. I also wouldn't expect anything super different from what we already have. CPU spec bump (and really, in terms of IPC there hasn't been much movement in CPUs lately; maybe option for more cores), new GPUs, thunderbolt 3 and that will be about it.

Until all those things in the Xeon chipset are available.... nothing much to upgrade to.
Click to expand...


When there are parts worth upgrading to? The Xeon v3 E5 chips were released over a year ago (the current Mac Pro is still using v2 Ivy Bridge chips). In addition to the clock-for-clock performance boost the v3 chips provide, they also have more cores (e.g. 14 cores in the E5-2697 v3 as opposed to the 12 core E5-2697 v2 in the current Mac Pro).

The Samsung SM951 SSDs have been out for quite some time now, and are twice as fast as the XP941 in the current Mac Pro (even the MacBook Pros are using the SM951s now, while the Mac Pro falls behind with the slower XP941).

Point being, the Mac Pro was last updated over two years ago, and there are plenty of significant upgrades Apple could have made to it. They're simply exploiting the fact that they have no real competition, and can charge whatever they want / use all the outdated hardware they want, and people are stuck with it if they want / need OS X.

Look at the 15" MacBook Pro. They "updated" it a couple weeks before Broadwell chips were released (which not only would have provided a nice boost to processing performance, but an even more significant boost to the performance of the integrated Intel graphics). Now Skylake chips are out, and the $2000+ 15" MacBook is 2 generations back, still using Haswell (the same thing they've been using for the last 3 years).

Heck, they could probably release a downgrade to the MacBook Pro line (e.g. revert back to Ivy / Sandy Bridge), and the majority of users wouldn't think twice before purchasing one.
 
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