MP 7,1 Ice Lake Based 2021 Mac Pro Refresh Release Imminent?

[droman]

I figured I would bring this up to stir up discussion.

I'm in the market for a Mac Pro but the Xcode evidence and rumors floating around recently have me hesitant about purchasing the current 2019 model. So far, I have been seeing people suggesting a quiet update for July 12th, or July 20th. Of course, if these dates don't reveal the new MP refresh, then a late September (maybe the 22nd?), would reveal the new refresh, most likely.

https://twitter.com/x/status/1402330560656252936

What would you guys predict?

Presumably, Apple is working on the ARM based MP but I still believe the Intel will be here to stay for a while, especially since working professionals, like me, and production houses won't transition for a long time. I have a gut feeling the ARM based MP's won't beat a fully fledged Intel Xeon variant, at least not at release. I could be wrong, and I would surely hope so, but I just think it won't meet the power demands of professionals initially. Especially in regards to expansion.

PCI-e Gen 4 would be the biggest sell for me, since the storage speed increase would be worthwhile. Rumors are also suggesting up to a 40 core Intel chip option, since that definitely is a Ice Lake CPU SKU. With the newer SKU's, fall faster memory speeds as well, which is a plus.

I'd like to know your guys' input and predictions. I can hold off for the next 3 months but would definitely need to make a purchase end of the year.

 

[MarkC426]

It's anyone's guess really.... 🤔
Nobody knows 'really' until Apple drop the news.

There are some nice savings on the refurb store.

 

[goMac]

If the new CPU definition is only in the tools for Monterey that means the release is probably linked to Monterey.

 

[rondocap]

I recently got the 2019 Mac Pro too - and upgraded it myself to the 28 core, which value wise is certainly much better to DIY. The only thing the refreshed Mac Pro would bring is likely the 40 core CPU, and PCIE Gen 4, which is a plus but not entirely necessary for my workflow - considering the price increase vs the current model options as well.

The biggest thing for me are the MPX GPUs - that's where I feel performance changes are the most important, and luckily the current Mac Pro will be able to just drop in those new MPX such as the W6800, etc.

Now in terms of timing - that's hard to say, previously many people thought WWDC would reveal some new info, but I think it may be later rather than sooner. Apple is never in a hurry to release a Mac Pro or a refresh, for that matter. I wouldn't be surprised if it only came at the end of the year or even early next year.

The Apple Silicon Mac Pro I'm not even worried about right now, I think that's a long way away, and will take a lot of time for the GPU side to beat the AMD GPUs for most workflows imo.

If you can hold off until the fall, I think you may have a better answer - but if you need one now, I don't think it is a bad idea either, considering you can get a refurb for cheaper perhaps - and still be nearly as capable as a refreshed model.

 

[blackquartz]

I've been using the 2019 Mac Pro since early 2020 and its great! Also I'm holding my breath to see if we get those new MPX graphics modules along with a 8,1, so I hope they announce this new Mac Pro soon.

 

[Korican100]

I recently got the 2019 Mac Pro too - and upgraded it myself to the 28 core, which value wise is certainly much better to DIY. The only thing the refreshed Mac Pro would bring is likely the 40 core CPU, and PCIE Gen 4, which is a plus but not entirely necessary for my workflow - considering the price increase vs the current model options as well.

The biggest thing for me are the MPX GPUs - that's where I feel performance changes are the most important, and luckily the current Mac Pro will be able to just drop in those new MPX such as the W6800, etc.

Now in terms of timing - that's hard to say, previously many people thought WWDC would reveal some new info, but I think it may be later rather than sooner. Apple is never in a hurry to release a Mac Pro or a refresh, for that matter. I wouldn't be surprised if it only came at the end of the year or even early next year.

The Apple Silicon Mac Pro I'm not even worried about right now, I think that's a long way away, and will take a lot of time for the GPU side to beat the AMD GPUs for most workflows imo.

If you can hold off until the fall, I think you may have a better answer - but if you need one now, I don't think it is a bad idea either, considering you can get a refurb for cheaper perhaps - and still be nearly as capable as a refreshed model.

hey can you share any reference on how to perform the CPU swap? And where did you get your 28 core?

 

[Internet Enzyme]

Honestly, the timing of this is strange to me. But I think it's going to happen, and very uneventfully through a press release a minor product page revision occurring probably sooner rather than later.

 

[rondocap]

hey can you share any reference on how to perform the CPU swap? And where did you get your 28 core?

I got it from eBay, just ask the sellers questions, and most seem good if you do a little research. Working flawlessly so far - I followed some youtube videos, basically did it with the system standing up, and removing the heatsink - the trickiest part is dropping the cpu in, just be very careful, but otherwise it was very easy, took me under 30 minutes to do.

I did a little youtube video on it too:

 

[deconstruct60]

What would you guys predict?

Presumably, Apple is working on the ARM based MP but I still believe the Intel will be here to stay for a while, especially since working professionals, like me, and production houses won't transition for a long time.

Apple working on a 1-for-1 replacement for the Mac Pro 2019? Probably not. Apple working on a "half sized" Mac Pro (that dumps at least half of the PCI-e slots and some other modularity)? probably yes.

Pretty good chance Apple is not working on I/O at the Mac Pro 2019 scale. That's why would probably get a Ice Lake SP "gap filler". There is an I/O bandwidth (and probably capacity) gap they probably not working to close any time soon ( in the two year window they gave themselves).

I have a gut feeling the ARM based MP's won't beat a fully fledged Intel Xeon variant, at least not at release. I could be wrong, and I would surely hope so, but I just think it won't meet the power demands of professionals initially. Especially in regards to expansion.

I doubt it is purely just core count that is the primary driving issue.

PCI-e Gen 4 would be the biggest sell for me, since the storage speed increase would be worthwhile. Rumors are also suggesting up to a 40 core Intel chip option, since that definitely is a Ice Lake CPU SKU. With the newer SKU's, fall faster memory speeds as well, which is a plus.

Pretty unlikely going to get 40 cores. If Apple skips the Xeon W-3300 badging and just goes with the SP offerings then won't have stuff that is more single socket , high boost optimized ( binned ).

The fastest , non-water cooled, single core clock speed tops out at 3.6 and 32 cores. A bit questionable that Apple is going to add 50-60W to the CPU cooling zone too. They'd probably select from the "optimized for per core scalable" box in chart above. Substitute 16 for the "old" 12 core configuration and go up.
[ Similar if they waited for W-3300 series to show up. That too is going to stop short of 40 cores.


Going to 40 cores means tossing base and single core Turbo clock speed. Doubtful Apple is going to select that for a workstation. Apple would already be taking a hit on max turbo as SP Gen 3 clocks are slower. The ~20% IPC increase serves as an offset to the clock losses, but for low core count workloads this isn't much of a winner. And very likely loses to rest of M-series line up in single core drag racing.


For the folks after more count count than I/O bandwidth I suspect their "half sized" Mac Pro will be a better option. That won't be why Apple is kicking the can down the road with a Xeon SP Gen 3 model. It is the "require bigger container and I/O" folks. The "need > 512GB of RAM " folks are in that I/O need camp too.


I would be skeptical that Apple would roll PCI-e v4 out to all the slots. 1 and 3 that are direct, sure (with some retimer updates). The rest that feed through the PLEX switch, there is decent chance that those are still PCI-e v3 with less traffic congestion when the slots are full.

I'd like to know your guys' input and predictions. I can hold off for the next 3 months but would definitely need to make a purchase end of the year.

I predict that this will be a bit longer than 3 months, but before the end of the year. Around November for "normal folks".

i. Intel doesn't have loads of excess supply. Doubtful Apple is paying top dollar to sit that the bleeding edge front of the line. Likewise, for any MPX GPU upgrade to 6800-6900 there will be less supply constraints in Sept-October.

ii. there is a probably a macOS 12 tie in. ( which won't be pragmatically ready until October ). Software that did a high data traffic between PCI-e v4 GPUs and back would make for a good demo.


iii. Apple will probably want to release it in the context of the MBP 16" ( and possibly iMac large screen). Might even have a half sized Mac Pro prototype to point to. I think Apple is going to want to send the message that they can do the core count , that they just don't want to do the highest , bleeding edge I/O right now (or inside the 2 year window they gave themselves).

For example, if they use chiplets to go from 10 to 20 cores , it won't be hard to infer that could go to 40 if just used four instead of two even if they don't have a 40 to demo at the time.



P.S. the 16 core Xeon 6326 is around $1,300 which is about what the 12 core W-3235 lists for ( $1,398 ) . The other reason for Apple to make the change is that their 2019 pricing value just isn't competitive in 2021-22. The price of the Mac Pro likely won't go down much at all. But at least get some core count bumps for the same prices. There is no "> 1TB RAM capacity" tax ( by Intel and Apple ) in the new Gen 3 models either which will help tremendously at the top end of the line up.

 

[deconstruct60]

Honestly, the timing of this is strange to me. But I think it's going to happen, and very uneventfully through a press release a minor product page revision occurring probably sooner rather than later.

Not strange at all.

1. The 2019 pricing per core count is highly screwed up in late 2021 versus the competitors.

2. If going to have PCI-e v4 native GPUs it sure helps to have a PCI-e v4 host bus to hook them too if doing computational data swaps. Again the offerings from 2019 aren't holding up well.

3. Apple probably has no extremely high I/O bandwidth solution on the near or intermediate term horizon.
( 2023 and more mature 3nm solution space )

Saddling the iMac 24" with the M1 means Apple is pushing "lower end" SoCs as high up into the product mix as they will go. As opposed to iterating from the other direction. That means the Mac Pro is the edge of "do custom work for" solution space. 3+ PCI-e slots is pretty far detached from an entire laptop line up with no dGPUs. (let alone the iPads).


They also still have zero visible solution for dGPUs in macOS for M-series. Probably not getting an initial stab at that until macOS 13 Fall 2023 and I doubt something production class stable before mid 2024. (if at all , if Apple goes rogue. )


4. with the pandemic schedule slides and Intel schedule slides this may have been planned several years ago as being an early 2021 product (maybe late December 2020 one). It probably is not super high priority so just slid into Q4 2021 as Apple worked around other higher priority 'drama' and things out of their control.

Even more so if Apple had only intended to do a "half sized", M-series Mac Pro for the transition anyway.

The initial reception for the Mac Pro in late 2019 and early 2020 was pretty good. (backlogs on getting units and substantive pre-order activity ).

The 2020-2021 sales data on the Mac Pro is probably muddled by the pandemic, but pretty good chance Apple is willing to "take a shot" on bridging the gap to perhaps doing something more than just "half sized" Mac Pro later.

5. They don't have to make many major changes here. Socket is slightly different. The PCH chipset is about the same. The basic board design and chassis can be largely reused as is. Keep it at Thunderbolt 3. Bump up the specs on the PLEX switch. Keep the T2 . Same SSDs data blades. Insert some re-timers to deal with some 'long' PCI-e v4 trace lengths and basically done. Keep the DIMM slot number the same (even though more memory controllers) so minor tweaks to the RAM data traces.

if the CPU core count in the > 28 range is too hot just cut them out of the product. Otherwise probably just raise the fan speeds for high counts and the general noise specs.

All of that is way, way , way , way cheaper than trying to build an M-series alternative that goes toe-to-toe with SP Gen 3 on max RAM capacity and PCI-e v4 throughput.

If they keep the pricing the same, it still has the "low product volume" tax applied so that they make money even if they don't relatively sell a large amount of them. The mods would cost several million and the product brings in more than that in profits.



6. Apple is still selling the old MBA Intel CPU powered , Non retina iMac 21.5 ( you have to go to the 27" buy page to find it when navigating the site. ).

Mac

The most powerful Mac laptops and desktops ever. Supercharged by Apple silicon. MacBook Air, MacBook Pro, iMac, Mac mini, Mac Studio, and Mac Pro.

www.apple.com

The amount of x86 inertia Apple has in the customer base is substantively high. Not a huge majority, but enough to show up on the 'radar'. Some folks are going to move slow as molasses over to M-series.

 

[MisterAndrew]

If you can hold off for a few months it might be better to wait. The new Intel version will be an incremental update. Perhaps there will be better deals on the 2019 model when the 2021 models arrive. The W6800X will be PCIe 4.0, but should still work just fine in the 2019 at PCIe 3.0.

 

[OkiRun]

Hoping that the CPUs will be compatible from an upgrade back down to the 2019.

 

[droman]

Hoping that the CPUs will be compatible from an upgrade back down to the 2019.

Highly unlikely unfortunately, since the entire chipset and socket will be different if it's indeed Ice Lake SP.

 

[deconstruct60]

Hoping that the CPUs will be compatible from an upgrade back down to the 2019.

Effectectivly no .

If Apple actually used the Xeon SP Gen3 ( ice lake ) processors those are know to use a different socket . The are released, there is nothing to guess or hope at there .

( scroll down to package specs )

Sockets Supported

TCASE

Package Size

Sockets Supported	FCLGA3647	FCLGA4189
TCASE	76°C	84°C
Package Size	76.0mm x 56.5mm	77.5mm x 56.5mm

Compare Products

Compare Products

ark.intel.com

different number of pins and different physical size . Different PCH chipset for I/O .

there was tiny slim possibility that the W series might use a slightly smaller package . That also is disappearing with solid info

“ … Xeon W-3300 processors will drop into the new LGA4189 CPU socket and bring many attractive traits to the table. For starters, the core-heavy chips will support up to 64 PCIe 4.0 lanes. There is also rumored support for up to eight channels of DDR4-3200 ECC memory, opening the door to outfitting a single system with up to 4TB of memory. …”

Intel Ice Lake Xeon W to Challenge AMD Threadripper With 38 Cores

Coming after Threadripper

www.tomshardware.com

If Apple did do a bump to Gen 3 this too would likely be a ‘dead end’ socket . Gen 4 will shift again due to change of DDR4 -> DDR5 and PCIe v4 -> v5. ( should be LGA 4677 )

 

[OkiRun]

Effectectivly no .

If Apple actually used the Xeon SP Gen3 ( ice lake ) processors those are know to use a different socket . The are released, there is nothing to guess or hope at there .

( scroll down to package specs )

Sockets Supported

TCASE

Package Size

Sockets Supported	FCLGA3647	FCLGA4189
TCASE	76°C	84°C
Package Size	76.0mm x 56.5mm	77.5mm x 56.5mm

Compare Products

Compare Products

ark.intel.com

different number of pins and different physical size . Different PCH chipset for I/O .

there was tiny slim possibility that the W series might use a slightly smaller package . That also is disappearing with solid info

“ … Xeon W-3300 processors will drop into the new LGA4189 CPU socket and bring many attractive traits to the table. For starters, the core-heavy chips will support up to 64 PCIe 4.0 lanes. There is also rumored support for up to eight channels of DDR4-3200 ECC memory, opening the door to outfitting a single system with up to 4TB of memory. …”

Intel Ice Lake Xeon W to Challenge AMD Threadripper With 38 Cores

Coming after Threadripper

www.tomshardware.com

If Apple did do a bump to Gen 3 this too would likely be a ‘dead end’ socket . Gen 4 will shift again due to change of DDR4 -> DDR5 and PCIe v4 -> v5. ( should be LGA 4677 )

Then a question is ,,,,will the 2019 high core chips fall in price or stay the same or go higher as the are harder to jet for upgrade.

 

[deconstruct60]

Then a question is ,,,,will the 2019 high core chips fall in price or stay the same or go higher as the are harder to jet for upgrade.

When replaced by the Xeon W 3300 they will fall. I wouldn't expect them to crater over time like the W5xxx series did for the Mac Pro 2010-12. For the Mac Pro 2019 design the Xeon SP solutions aren't really compatible. ( different number of PCI-e lanes provisioned). So the dump of "e-waste" server CPUs onto the used market from future decommissioned severs shouldn't contribute as much to the price drops.

I think Dell largely skipped the W-3200 series in their workstations. Many Workstations vendors did , but just indicative that the number being retired eventually won't be as big of a pool as past iterations .


If Apple goes to 3300 (series) there won't be a PCI-e provision gap beteween W and SP models in the future "2nd half of lifecycle" model. It will still be a dead ender socket , but the spare parts, higher-core-count pool would likely be larger.

 

[tigo013]

Intel finally released the Xeon-W33xx series. Fingers crossed that Apple actually releases the updated version of the Mac Pro this fall, with their release of Monterey. Monterey - X-code 13 contains the code for those cpu's, and AMD has already released their W6800 GC series....- now, no excuses for Apple to delay the launch of these machines seeing that they've been testing them for a good few months. Perhaps a 6 months Q&A period for the machines before launching sounds reasonable

Intel launches "Ice Lake" Xeon W-3300 series with up to 38 cores - VideoCardz.com

Intel Announces New Xeon W-3300 Processors Intel optimizes its latest workstation platform for advanced workstation professionals. Intel today launched its newest generation Intel® Xeon® W-3300 processors, available today from its system integrator partners. Built for advanced workstation...

videocardz.com

 

[jscipione]

Apple was never going to release a new Mac Pro with Intel SP processors so now that the Ice Lake W-series Xeons are out (as of July 29th) we'll most likely see a new Mac Pro in December. I've waited this long to upgrade my old cheese-grater, I'll most likely be getting one of these machines on day 1. I'd prefer not to be stuck with PCIe 3.0 when I'm still using the machine in 2032...

 

[rondocap]

Intel finally released the Xeon-W33xx series. Fingers crossed that Apple actually releases the updated version of the Mac Pro this fall, with their release of Monterey. Monterey - X-code 13 contains the code for those cpu's, and AMD has already released their W6800 GC series....- now, no excuses for Apple to delay the launch of these machines seeing that they've been testing them for a good few months. Perhaps a 6 months Q&A period for the machines before launching sounds reasonable

Intel launches "Ice Lake" Xeon W-3300 series with up to 38 cores - VideoCardz.com

Intel Announces New Xeon W-3300 Processors Intel optimizes its latest workstation platform for advanced workstation professionals. Intel today launched its newest generation Intel® Xeon® W-3300 processors, available today from its system integrator partners. Built for advanced workstation...

videocardz.com

I would imagine it would just have the updated W33xx cpus, and some of the new MPX modulels such as the W6800x.

Should be straight forward refresh I think. I wonder if PCIE Gen 4 will have any impact or new SSD options, possibly could see gen 4 speeds?

Otherwise I think that should be it. Of course won't be able to upgrade the current Mac Pro to the W3300 since it's a different socket, but likely not worth the cost to go from 28 cores to 38 cores unless you specfically need it. W6800x will be plug and play with the current Mac Pro, and that's where most of the performance gains are anyways.

Could they surprise us with some Afterburner update too? Seems like it never got much aside from the initial pro res support, even though it can be programmed for other things, supposedly.

 

[leman]

With new Ice Lake W-series out I’m sure that the updated Intel Mac Pro is coming very soon. We’ll probably get an announcement at the same time as the new ARM Macs are introduced this fall.

The all-ARM Ma pc Pro will then follow next year.

 

[deconstruct60]

I would imagine it would just have the updated W33xx cpus, and some of the new MPX modulels such as the W6800x.

Should be straight forward refresh I think. I wonder if PCIE Gen 4 will have any impact or new SSD options, possibly could see gen 4 speeds?

The nominal T2 SSD is not connected to the CPU so the CPU PCI-e provisioning should have zero impact on the primary SSD. Relatively very low changes getting anything other than a reused T2 for secuirty/SSD/fans/audio/etc. If the SSD controller is the same, then pretty likely the implemented SSD is about the same performance.

The CPU PCI-e lanes going to v4 means that the PLEX PCI-e switch that provisions most of the lanes would have a better backhaul to the CPU. I'm somewhat sketipical that Apple is going to provision that v4 increases all the way out to the physical slots ( other than Slot 1 and 3 which don't have the PLEX connected at all. They'll need some additonal PCI-e signals re-drivers to get the single all the way down there from the CPU socket, but that is probably straightforward to do.

Higher backhaul would help. If put two x8 SSD carrier cards in slots 6 and 7 could actually get full x16 aggregate bandwidth if the other slots are filled and active. Wouldn't get full PCI-e v4 throughput, but it was "sag" less with full slots workloads.

It would be cheaper for Apple to hold off on propagating PCI-e v4 downstream from the PLEX switch. Even cheaper still just to use the same PLEX switch as in the Mac Pro 2019 ( and not even get even higher backhaul to CPU). If this is more of a "stop gap" system Apple could possibly cut that trade-off for this update. Apple is rolling out this system, but it is doubtful they are spending the maximum amount of money to do it.

Could they surprise us with some Afterburner update too? Seems like it never got much aside from the initial pro res support, even though it can be programmed for other things, supposedly.

Probably not. Afterburners nominal location is slot 5 ( which is hanging off the PLEX switch). There is a corner case where have on MPX module on slot 1 and put Afterburner into the slot 3 , but I doubt that a norm that Apple would try to sell into. As noted above if they can do some backhaul uplift on the PLEX switch that slot 5 ( 2, 3, 6,7,8) is sitting on then that would help the current Afterburner be more effective in "full slot" setups. That would be "value add" with the same product they got.

An Afterburner 2 that was $600-800 more affordable (perhaps lowered the thermals a bit) , but stll PCI-e v3 x16 bound probably would be better. [ Follow next gen FPGA tech to remove costs. ] There are probably more folks who don't use Afterburner because it is currently too expensive than folks that need more than four concurrent 8K PreRES RAW streams. Would be effective in both 2019 and 2021 Mac Pro which is a broader market.


Apple's comments about the adaptability for Afterburner's FGPA were always couched toward handling ProRES family codec changes/evolution. It was not about doing every codec for everybody. Aftrburner's primary job is to get more folks to buy into recording ProRes RAW. If some big gap in the T2's codec coverage ( versus A14-A15 ) then might be another candidate ( although that gap coverage should also be on the newer GPU chips. But if Apple is backing away from the 3rd party GPUs (and therefore en/decoders...) that could be their super expensive consolation "prize" .

RED RAW on GPUs would get a "free" uplift with new MPX 6800/6900 class implementations and PCI-e v4 connections to pump data across faster. That would be slot 1 and slot 3 that bypass the PLEX switch. Doubtful Apple is going to put lots of effort to "steal" that specific workload back from the GPUs.

As the SoC transistor budgets get bigger Apple is more likely to put fixed implementation of what is on Afteburner into the main package. Afterburner would have been a "bridge to the future" offering just like this ice Lake update is. ( Use this for 3-4 years until we replace it with out own highly custom stuff. )

 

[deconstruct60]

With new Ice Lake W-series out I’m sure that the updated Intel Mac Pro is coming very soon. We’ll probably get an announcement at the same time as the new ARM Macs are introduced this fall.

The all-ARM Ma pc Pro will then follow next year.

Apple has to cobble together enough volume to ship. Dell and HP don't seem to have anything off the bat here. Boxx does but they are a much smaller niche player. Not like AMD is fully restocked shelves with 6800's either. Announced with other AS Macs, but the ship times probably are going to be substantively disconnected between those two groups.

In part, Intel is getting this "out the door" in highly limited quanties now because coming after the new Threadripper launches is even worse optics.

That "all ARM" Mac Pro probably won't be a direct replacement for this. Especially if it is "half sized".

 

[deconstruct60]

Intel finally released the Xeon-W33xx series. Fingers crossed that Apple actually releases the updated version of the Mac Pro this fall, with their release of Monterey. Monterey - X-code 13 contains the code for those cpu's, and AMD has already released their W6800 GC series....- now, no excuses for Apple to delay the launch of these machines seeing that they've been testing them for a good few months. Perhaps a 6 months Q&A period for the machines before launching sounds reasonable

Intel launches "Ice Lake" Xeon W-3300 series with up to 38 cores - VideoCardz.com

Intel Announces New Xeon W-3300 Processors Intel optimizes its latest workstation platform for advanced workstation professionals. Intel today launched its newest generation Intel® Xeon® W-3300 processors, available today from its system integrator partners. Built for advanced workstation...

videocardz.com

Apple will either skip the 38 core options. Go 32 , 24 , 16 ,12 only. Or put some firmware cap on the 38 to turn off SMT. ( they might sell that as a special case for those who don't want any SMT at any time. But it would be more uniform for Apple just to skip putting in a quirk in the line up they'd have to "explain". ) Not using the 38 would be more affordable anyway after Apple has tacked on their 20+ % markup. Apple could slide the 12 core in at the old 8 core price , 16 at the 12 core , 24 at 16 , etc. Just a shorter price ladder to the top. And no obscene "> 1 TB" RAM tax at the top two slots anymore.


macOS 12 contains code for a subset of new offerings but not really all of them. ( capped at 64 threads. 38 tips over the edge. )


P.S. Apple probably is not really happy with the documented TDP shooting up from 205W to 275W at that very top end of the line up either. The Mac Pro power supply is capped out for standard wall power draw. And you know that the processor blows way pastwhat Intel marks as the limit in bursts. I doubt this blows out what the thermal zone Apple has on the Mac Pro 2019 chassis for the CPU section's fan. But they are also probably not looking to grossly push the edge with the 38 model either ( never mind the mismatch with mac OS limitations. )

 

[leman]

Apple has to cobble together enough volume to ship.

That's a good point.

That "all ARM" Mac Pro probably won't be a direct replacement for this. Especially if it is "half sized".

If the rumors (40-core CPU, 128-core GPU) are true, it sounds like a replacement and then some...

Apple probably is not really happy with the documented TDP shooting up from 205W to 275W at that very top end of the line up either. The Mac Pro power supply is capped out for standard wall power draw. And you know that the processor blows way pastwhat Intel marks as the limit in bursts.

If I remember correctly, the 2019 Mac Pro is designed to sustain the full turbo speed. So around 300 watts. Should be sufficient for these new Ice Lakes...

 

[deconstruct60]

If the rumors (40-core CPU, 128-core GPU) are true, it sounds like a replacement and then some...

If it has soldered on RAM , less than 4 PCI-e slots , no PCI-e v4 (or v5) , and/or can't take any discrete GPU cards, then I guarantee there will be a 20+ page long thread extolling that it is not. Essentially, yet another replay of what happened when Apple "replaced" the Mac Pro 2012 with the MP 2013 only the I/O "bar" is set higher with the Mac Pro 2019.

also have little doubt that Apple would probably use the myopic core count metric to claim that they "finished" the transition, but probably keep selling the Intel model for a substnatively long time. (because several customers are going to tell them it isn't). If Apple doesn't drop it immediately upon when the AS version comes out then that tacitly an admission themselves that it isn't.

Pretty doubtful Apple would dump this refresh model in less than 12 months after release. Your timeline doesn't have the "half sized" model coming in a long time. That overlap is inidicative that it won't be. The AS model my get more buyers. But that isn't necessarily a replacement.

documented TDP shooting up from 205W to 275W

If I remember correctly, the 2019 Mac Pro is designed to sustain the full turbo speed. So around 300 watts. Should be sufficient for these new Ice Lakes...

Intel's practice for their TPD numbers is that's the TDP for when it is running at base clock rates. Not turbo. Tubro is higher still. W-3300 generally runs as a slower clock rate than W-3200 does. They are on the non-super-fin 10nm process that leaks like a sieve at higher clock rates. That's why Intel had to blow a big chunk of the IPC improvements on slower clock settings just to tread water. ( dropping to 4.0GHz turbo from 4.4 GHz that the 3200 mostly topped out at. Loosing about 10% ).

Anantech got 292W

" ... When it comes to power, we're measuring a peak 292 W during AVX-512 workloads and 286 W in AVX2 workloads, however this is preliminary data from a few tests we've been able to run so far. ..."
https://www.anandtech.com/show/16822/intel-launches-xeon-w-3300-3365-ice-lake-workstations-38-core

So that's about 25W over base. Even if the W-3200 ran 50W over its base they'd still be below 260 ( which is lower than were the W-3300 starts). It isn't that high though.

"...AMD also has a 48 core EPYC 7642 part that is around the Intel Xeon W-3275 price range. One gets fewer cores than with the EPYC 7702P, but one also gets higher base clocks and turbo clocks. The Intel solution features a 20W lower TDP. In practice, we have seen the Intel Xeon W-3275 idle a bit lower, but it can also hit slightly higher power consumption using AVX-512. ..."

Intel Xeon W-3275 Review A 28 Core Workstation Halo Product

Our Intel Xeon W-3275 review shows how this 28 core and 56 thread processor stacks up as a halo single-socket workstation/ server part for the Xeon family

www.servethehome.com

The writer seems flip-flops a bit there talking about the EYPCs. The 7642 is about 220W (where AMD nominally is talking about turbo or boost clocks as opposed to base ones.). The W-3275 is base rate 200W. So talking about blowing incrementally past around 225W.
[ the 7702P is TDP isn't higher. ]

Apple probably didn't repeat the Mac Pro 2013 mistake of tightening the thermal boundaries a close as possible around the components. They probably gave themselves some wiggle room (especially with Intel struggling with 10nm while putting together the MP 2019 design). But Intel appears to have taken all the slack. If Threadripper can be 280W then take the 290W.

the problem is taking 300W and then the two MPX bays are taking 500W then that is pretty close to peak power without accounting for other stuff ( and losses through power supply.)

P.S. decent chance the 38 core will tip over the 300W line . Yet another possible contributing reason to drop it.