2016 nMP

[Mago]

I think there is a reason why there may be development of CUDA 8 compatible applications for OSX.

External GPUs.

Maybe, at the moment the only gpu vendor supporting external gpu its... AMD, and actually Intel cross licensed some of its patent portfolio on this reason (both allowing Thunderbolt on amd chipsets and getting access to some tech required to connect to the external gpu).

Would be interesting having a external gpu doing the dirty work that don't require a mac pro.

 

[tuxon86]

Maybe, at the moment the only gpu vendor supporting external gpu its... AMD, and actually Intel cross licensed some of its patent portfolio on this reason (both allowing Thunderbolt on amd chipsets and getting access to some tech required to connect to the external gpu).

Would be interesting having a external gpu doing the dirty work that don't require a mac pro.

That isn't true... Both NVidia and AMD support external GPU, for example the Razer line of performance laptop:

GPU SUPPORT
Easily upgrade or customize your preferred level of performance with support for full-length, double-wide PCIe desktop graphics cards (sold separately) for a level of performance that fits your play style.

Graphics cards use varied designs based around a common graphics chip. Please ensure the GPU selected meets all size, power, and additional requirements.

 

[koyoot]

http://videocardz.com/59206/amds-official-gpu-roadmap-for-2016-2018

Interesting. Polaris 10 to replace Fiji?

 

[goMac]

We still at the same point, this only reinforced the rumours on nVidia comeback to the nMP.

I haven't seen any serious rumors of an Nvidia comeback on the Mac Pro. People are trying to read into Adobe's software plans like they matter or are an indicator of something. They aren't. They've repeatedly used CUDA before when Apple went AMD. They don't have any advance knowledge.

I think there is a serious chance AMD uses the Mac Pro to debut a higher end "custom" chip. Of course it may not ship for a few months, and by then it'll be only a few weeks behind the PC version... but still, if AMD wanted to make a splash on the high end, that would be a good way to do it. Debut on a new, energy efficient workstation with two cards standard, delivering better performance than most PC towers. Make for a heck of a demo.
[doublepost=1461188108][/doublepost]

http://videocardz.com/59206/amds-official-gpu-roadmap-for-2016-2018

Interesting. Polaris 10 to replace Fiji?

Totally believable. Fiji doesn't have much to offer at this point over Polaris.

 

[koyoot]

Fair enoguh, but do not blame me if you will be disappointed .

 

[goMac]

Fair enoguh, but do not blame me if you will be disappointed .

Disappointment always comes with Apple hardware announcements.

 

[Stacc]

http://videocardz.com/59206/amds-official-gpu-roadmap-for-2016-2018

Interesting. Polaris 10 to replace Fiji?

I am still skeptical Polaris can top Fiji, but if its close than they can certainly sell it for less money and replace Fiji. It will be interesting if Fiji totally disappears from the 400 series lineup. That will be the one of the most expensive and shortest lived GPUs to manufacture probably ever.

I think there is a serious chance AMD uses the Mac Pro to debut a higher end "custom" chip. Of course it may not ship for a few months, and by then it'll be only a few weeks behind the PC version... but still, if AMD wanted to make a splash on the high end, that would be a good way to do it. Debut on a new, energy efficient workstation with two cards standard, delivering better performance than most PC towers. Make for a heck of a demo.

Given all the rumors of Polaris 10 being a 100-150 W chip, it already seems perfect for the mac pro. Obviously it will have to be a custom board design because of the Mac Pro's proprietary graphics cards but I don't think they will perform any better than the consumer versions. The only difference may be a configuration with ridiculous amounts of VRAM. Its reasonable that we could see up to 16 GB of VRAM on the top end configuration.

Disappointment always comes with Apple hardware announcements.

If only because everyone expects Apple to release something with double the performance for half the cost

 

[hollyhillbilly]

Apple made a presentation at NAB during the FCPExchange presentation. All those who were there signed an NDA for apple. Apparently there was significant news regarding FCPX. To my knowledge nobody is breaking the NDA. My feeling is FCPX and nMP go hand in hand and there will be a significant refresh for both at WWDC. You can read a cryptic post from the meeting here, https://forums.creativecow.net/thread/335/88480

 

[antonis]

FWIW, nVidia already supports eGPUs. It was referenced in the release notes of one of their latest driver updates, although they mentioned it as a "pilot" feature for the moment. They officially support it even for their current consumer models.

 

[koyoot]

It looks like Nvidia Pascal is first Nvidia architecture that will properly handle Mainstream VR content, and provide low latency, on the same level as AMD GPUs.

Great job Nvidia.

 

[ManuelGomes]

OS X 10.11.5 Beta 2 out.

 

[koyoot]

Your types? Which of these will go into MP?

If there will be trash can Mac Mini, that is half the height of MP, it will most likely have low power quad core CPUs plus single GPU. So that would rid out Quad core model for base model Mac Pro.

But that is my wishful thinking .

 

[jonisign]

Where is this info from? I was hoping we might see some 10-12 core 16xx v4 models.

Found another source here:
http://sp.ts.fujitsu.com/dmsp/Publications/public/ds-CELSIUS-M740.pdf

I guess it would make sense to keep the 16xx v4's with 8 or less cores since that is the max that die configuration supports. The 10-14 core is another configuration. I was hopeful though because of the 6950X which will have 10 cores.

 

[Mago]

Your types? Which of these will go into MP?

If there will be trash can Mac Mini, that is half the height of MP, it will most likely have low power quad core CPUs plus single GPU. So that would rid out Quad core model for base model Mac Pro.

But that is my wishful thinking .

This year the cheapest core i5 it's a 250$ 45w socket FCBGA1440 i5-6440HQ with Iris Pro 530, the same time it's the cheapest Skylake mobile it shares socket and chipset with the "skull canyon" I7-6970HQ a 623$ cpu with Iris Pro 580, as powerful as the cpu-dgpu combo on the current rMBP 15, and both are quad core, no nags the next mini either a pizza-box or mini trashcan-like sure will be quad core.

Also shares socket with the mobile Xeon, not sure if they can share mobo, apple also could sell a mini Mac Pro.

 

[Mago]

This year the cheapest core i5 it's a 250$ 45w socket FCBGA1440 i5-6440HQ with Iris Pro 530, the same time it's the cheapest Skylake mobile it shares socket and chipset with the "skull canyon" I7-6970HQ a 623$ cpu with Iris Pro 580, as powerful as the cpu-dgpu combo on the current rMBP 15, and both are quad core, no nags the next mini either a pizza-box or mini trashcan-like sure will be quad core.

Also shares socket with the mobile Xeon, not sure if they can share mobo, apple also could sell a mini Mac Pro.

Also given all the 16 pcie lines from the cpu are available, a Skylake Mac mini could have both pcie NVMe and 4 Thunderbolt 3 ports w/o pcie bridge.

 

[koyoot]

This year the cheapest core i5 it's a 250$ 45w socket FCBGA1440 i5-6440HQ with Iris Pro 530, the same time it's the cheapest Skylake mobile it shares socket and chipset with the "skull canyon" I7-6970HQ a 623$ cpu with Iris Pro 580, as powerful as the cpu-dgpu combo on the current rMBP 15, and both are quad core, no nags the next mini either a pizza-box or mini trashcan-like sure will be quad core.

Also shares socket with the mobile Xeon, not sure if they can share mobo, apple also could sell a mini Mac Pro.

Are you sure? Core i5 6600T, i7 6700T. Have you heard of them? 35W desktop CPU . And they are less than 200$

Where is this info from? I was hoping we might see some 10-12 core 16xx v4 models.

Found another source here:
http://sp.ts.fujitsu.com/dmsp/Publications/public/ds-CELSIUS-M740.pdf

I guess it would make sense to keep the 16xx v4's with 8 or less cores since that is the max that die configuration supports. The 10-14 core is another configuration. I was hopeful though because of the 6950X which will have 10 cores.

6950X is 12 core CPU with 2 cores disabled. It is the same CPU as is 12 core Xeon E5v4 26XX model.

 

[Mago]

Are you sure? Core i5 6600T, i7 6700T. Have you heard of them? 35W desktop CPU . And they are less than 200$

6950X is 12 core CPU with 2 cores disabled. It is the same CPU as is 12 core Xeon E5v4 26XX model.

This is a socket LGA1151 part Apple don't sell upgradeable mini s.

 

[ManuelGomes]

It's gonna be funny to see if they'll go in the lower end with the 4 core still, and even more so if they use the 1620 CPU, which is rated slower (clock speed wise , maybe not performance due to IPC improvements), but it's still a dialed down version when you look at the numbers. I'm pretty sure they will though, the price point matches the old one.
I'd go for the 1660 myself, looks good enough.
Still, they might use the 2600 series again for even the 8 core option, maybe they get to 14 cores this time around.
What really bothers me here is being stuck on the legacy C610 PCH.

 

[Synchro3]

Your types? Which of these will go into MP?

If there will be trash can Mac Mini, that is half the height of MP, it will most likely have low power quad core CPUs plus single GPU. So that would rid out Quad core model for base model Mac Pro.

But that is my wishful thinking .

-> https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/2016-nmp.1952250/page-69#post-22814961

It would prefer for a Quad core: http://ark.intel.com/products/88174/Intel-Xeon-Processor-E3-1270-v5-8M-Cache-3_60-GHz

 

[Mago]

It's gonna be funny to see if they'll go in the lower end with the 4 core still, and even more so if they use the 1620 CPU, which is rated slower (clock speed wise , maybe not performance due to IPC improvements), but it's still a dialed down version when you look at the numbers. I'm pretty sure they will though, the price point matches the old one.
I'd go for the 1660 myself, looks good enough.
Still, they might use the 2600 series again for even the 8 core option, maybe they get to 14 cores this time around.
What really bothers me here is being stuck on the legacy C610 PCH.

C610 isn't legacy it's the corresponding chipset for E5v3 and E5v4, as the C602J is the current nMP chipset. (this one it's much older)

 

[ManuelGomes]

Mago, I was saying that despite being the latest chipset for BDW-EP and HSW-EP, it's still old news when it comes to current tech, the most important being PCIe3 support. That's why I called it legacy, not because it isn't the latest available but because it's not up to current standards. Too bad C620 is not yet available.

 

[Mago]

Mago, I was saying that despite being the latest chipset for BDW-EP and HSW-EP, it's still old news when it comes to current tech, the most important being PCIe3 support. That's why I called it legacy, not because it isn't the latest available but because it's not up to current standards. Too bad C620 is not yet available.

C620 will be available when Pcie4 debuts next year's on the next Xeon E5 Platform. Don't hurry only things really important on C620 are the 48 Pcie4 lines and 3D-XPOINT native support.

 

[ManuelGomes]

http://www.techpowerup.com/221857/amd-releases-codexl-2-0-as-open-source-through-gpuopen

 

[zephonic]

On Tuesday, Intel said it would cut 11% of its workforce, or 12,000 jobs, through mid-2017, to “speed its transition to a company that powers the cloud and billions of smart, connected computing devices.”

Wake up, pull you heads out of the tower drive bays and smell the future all you dinosaurs.

This is probably the most profound thing that has been said in this entire thread, nk.


Or as I like to say:

"The world is ever-changing. Change along with it, or be a sourpuss."

 

[ManuelGomes]

Yeah, but those are exactly the things the nMP needs, right now, not a year from now.
And again, those 48 PCIe lanes are not PCIe4 but PCIe and only on the Purley platform, which might not come to the nMP.
We keep having this argument but Purley, according to Intel's roadmap, is only for 2S systems and up, not 1S as the nMP.
For 1S workstations, ad you will agree that the nMP is such a system, we will get the Basin Falls platform with Kaby Lake PCH, which should be similar to the soon to come 200 series on the desktop with 24 PCIe 3 lanes, which is of course very good. On the Apple ecosystem this means lots of free lanes (FlexIO slots) since SATA ports are not used.
This would be the ideal setup for the nMP but still a long time to go, and we don't know the max core count for the Basin Falls config.