If you had to choose: Thunderbolt Vs Upgradeable GPU + PCIe slots?

[MagnusVonMagnum]

People doing 'literally millions of page views aren't working with and using the Mac Pro for... blah blah blah blah

Nice MEGA Post with NOTHING to say but, "I'm a 'Pro' and you're not, nah nah nah nah nah, nah!" What a waste of time. It's just SAD you can't accept ther are other people in this world with views and opinions different than your own that you have to waste so much time trying to put these people in their "non pro" place and then kiss Apple's butt a hundred times over to boot as well. You like the new machine. Great. Others don't. So what?

 

[VirtualRain]

A tiny population of PCIe cards available for the MP and the ones that are tend to take up enough room to eliminate at least one of the other three left....and no, you don't just buy a card and plug into the MP. It doesn't work like that. Never has. There's been more issues with PCIe cards in the MP than any off the shelf Windows machine I've ever bought. It's a joke.

Kinda wild. There aren't but about a half dozen evangelists in this 10 page thread that don't see the future. The big beige box is gone. In ten years it won't exist. Smaller form factor, bigger power, unlimited external expandibility, extremely fast storage...that will continue to speed up and approach RAM/swap speeds, so more RAM will be less of a big deal....these are the sweet spots. When you see laptops outselling desktops and tablets closing in on laptops...isn't it obvious where the future if computing is going?

Yep.

 

[beaker7]

I must be the only person in the world who has never had substantial problems with PCI-E cards.

This is across a sample size of about 40 Windows workstations and 50-60 Mac Pro's, all are full or nearly so with PCI-E.

 

[EpicBlob]

Ok, I think you guys aren't fully understanding Thunderbolt. Thunderbolt 2 will run at pcie 2.0 x4. For almost all cards (even the 670) pcie 2.0 x4 gives 90-95% of the full capability. The 20Gbp/s will NOT bottleneck the cards in a way that they will become unusable. And the fact that there are 6 Thunderbolt ports, AKA a theoretical total bandwidth of pcie 2.0 x24 (whatever that is in real numbers). The point is Thunderbolt can be successfully used to plug in x16 graphics card with little to no loss. External graphics work with OS X and external expansion will be huge. What do I have to back this up? My current system.

I have a 2012 Mac Mini with a 3615qm CPU and a ViDock (external graphics card enclosure) with a nVidia 660 inside plugged into my Mac Mini via the Thunderbolt port. This is working in OS X and Windows 8. My system cost is about $1400; much cheaper than a baseline Mac Pro and it also takes up no space at all (my mac mini is stacked on top of a case the same size as my GPU).

Thunderbolt 2 is one of the biggest game changers in a while; the question is whether or not Apple can realize this and really show it's potential. I'm hoping they do but you never know.

----------

I must be the only person in the world who has never had substantial problems with PCI-E cards.

This is across a sample size of about 40 Windows workstations and 50-60 Mac Pro's, all are full or nearly so with PCI-E.

Seriously. To get my external GPU working in OS X with my Mac Mini, I just edited 3 files and downloaded the CUDA drivers from nVidia (which everyone should do) and boom, my card was fully recognized.

 

[slughead]

Ok, I think you guys aren't fully understanding Thunderbolt. Thunderbolt 2 will run at pcie 2.0 x4. For almost all cards (even the 670) pcie 2.0 x4 gives 90-95% of the full capability. The 20Gbp/s will NOT bottleneck the cards in a way that they will become unusable. And the fact that there are 6 Thunderbolt ports, AKA a theoretical total bandwidth of pcie 2.0 x24 (whatever that is in real numbers). The point is Thunderbolt can be successfully used to plug in x16 graphics card with little to no loss. External graphics work with OS X and external expansion will be huge. What do I have to back this up? My current system.

You've got a couple things very wrong.

PCIe 2.0 4x (Thunderbolt 2) is certainly good enough for most midrange cards from 2012 and below. However, as video cards gain in speed, the bottleneck will be more apparent. The bottleneck is already 20-40% in the GTX680 and above on the NVidia side. The Radeon 7970, however, seems to do just fine. I do not know about the 7990. MacVidCards recently did some benchmarks with a GTX780 and found a severe bottleneck at PCIe 4x.

One important thing to realize is that the nMP will likely come with dual 7970. What kind of card would a nMP like to upgrade to? A Titan? The bottleneck is likely to be worse.

In another thread, a proponent of Thunderbolt and someone knowledgeable in the subject stated that at 16xPCIe3.0, high-bandwidth OpenCL tasks will definitely hit over 8GBps (Four times what TB2 can do).

As for the New Mac Pro, you fail to realize that the three thunderbolt controllers will only EACH have 2 lanes--for a total of 6GBps for all ports. Each pair of TB2 ports will actually be sharing 2GBps. In addition, these ports cannot be aggregated. It is not as though you can plug all the thunderbolt controllers into a single card and get even 6GBps.

So no, TB2 is not a game-changer in terms of bandwidth, and running a GPU through the TB2 port, while an adequate upgrade for a laptop or Mac Mini, will neuter any high-end card. PCIE 3.0 is up to 8 times faster per slot than TB2. This is simply a myth that has since been busted on this forum several times.

 

[ActionableMango]

If you truly like old school, grab some wax, a turntable...a D4 pad and drop the needle.

AKDJ,

No, I'm not truly old-school. I actually agree with most of your points.

but after reading through, I've come to the conclusion that its YOU that isn't using a MP for what it's made for.

Probably the only major contention that I have with you, and a few others, is the whole "not a real pro" thing. I freely admit that I'm not a real pro. It's fine; I think I would define myself as an enthusiast.

From what I read in these forums, there are tons of non-pros here. The "you're not a real pro" is used with negativity in the context of excluding us from some ill-defined circle of professionals elites. Amateurs, enthusiasts, and gamers need not apply; we never belonged here in the first place.

I guess the implication is that the nMP is only made for real pros and if I were a real pro I'd like it. Perhaps I'm speaking out of turn since I'm not a real pro, but I'm a little suspicious of that claim.

Don't some real pros have specialized PCIe cards?
Can't some real pro applications make use of GPU power beyond what Apple provides?
Don't some real pros prefer internal storage?
Aren't some real pro applications way faster with CUDA cards?

But what do I know? Perhaps the answer to all of the above is "no"; I'm not a real pro after all.

I'm glad floppies are gone; it should have happened sooner. Wax cylinders for recording music? Really?

Look, I'm no luddite. I just feel that taking PCIe, slowing it down, bundling it with MDP, and making it external, isn't some kind of wonderful advancement.

 

[EpicBlob]

You've got a couple things very wrong.

PCIe 2.0 4x (Thunderbolt 2) is certainly good enough for most midrange cards from 2012 and below. However, as video cards gain in speed, the bottleneck will be more apparent. The bottleneck is already 20-40% in the GTX680 and above on the NVidia side. The Radeon 7970, however, seems to do just fine. I do not know about the 7990. MacVidCards recently did some benchmarks with a GTX780 and found a severe bottleneck at PCIe 4x.

One important thing to realize is that the nMP will likely come with dual 7970. What kind of card would a nMP like to upgrade to? A Titan? The bottleneck is likely to be worse.

In another thread, a proponent of Thunderbolt and someone knowledgeable in the subject stated that at 16xPCIe3.0, high-bandwidth OpenCL tasks will definitely hit over 8GBps (Four times what TB2 can do).

As for the New Mac Pro, you fail to realize that the three thunderbolt controllers will only EACH have 2 lanes--for a total of 6GBps for all ports. Each pair of TB2 ports will actually be sharing 2GBps. In addition, these ports cannot be aggregated. It is not as though you can plug all the thunderbolt controllers into a single card and get even 6GBps.

So no, TB2 is not a game-changer in terms of bandwidth, and running a GPU through the TB2 port, while an adequate upgrade for a laptop or Mac Mini, will neuter any high-end card. PCIE 3.0 is up to 8 times faster per slot than TB2. This is simply a myth that has since been busted on this forum several times.

Ok, I'll admit I wasn't as big as a hotshot as I made myself out to be

I still do think that for most cards, Thunderbolt 2 should be enough but once a dual 7970 becomes like the dual 5770s, 20Gbps won't cut it.

I guess the Mac Pro is really not the best system to work with Thunderbolt 2. A portable laptop or Mac Mini that can really utilize a 670 or 7970 will benefit much more.

 

[Donar]

This debate about "real pros" and "enthusiasts" makes me wonder which group generates more MacPro sales / profit for Apple.

 

[EpicBlob]

Leeets be honest, if real pros needed OS X they would build a Hackintosh

 

[flat five]

Leeets be honest, if real pros needed OS X they would build a Hackintosh

nah.. that's not really a smart direction to go in unless you have that sort of itch..
most people in working environments (and non-working environments) want to plug it in and it works as expected with no fooling around.. updates are simple.. and the machine/software is legal & supported..

i'm willing to bet there's an incredibly teensy tiny percentage of pros using hackintoshes.. probably low single digit % of all hackintoshes are being used in professional environments..

 

[portishead]

Leeets be honest, if real pros needed OS X they would build a Hackintosh

I hear about Hackintoshes on the internet, but I've only ever known 1 person who actually made one. I think after people built a few PC's, most realize it's more of a headache than it's worth. If that's your hobby, that's 1 thing, but most people don't want to deal with it anymore. They just want a machine that works. Also a lot of people only use laptops (myself included) so the hackintosh idea goes out the window.

 

[slughead]

From what I read in these forums, there are tons of non-pros here. The "you're not a real pro" is used with negativity in the context of excluding us from some ill-defined circle of professionals elites. Amateurs, enthusiasts, and gamers need not apply; we never belonged here in the first place.

I am no longer a "Pro" either. While I use multiple monitors to do web development, desktop publishing, and occasionally video editing, I no longer earn money from my work. I love the MP because it allows me to have a massive home RAID I use to archive video, and the multiple monitors driven by a GTX670 is a definite plus. I do burn DVDs and watch/run BluRay. On an iMac I would have to give up my KVM/PC, on a Mac Mini I would have to give up my video capabilities and I wouldn't be able to run the RAID.

I guess you could call me an "enthusiast" or "amateur." That's probably accurate at this point. Apple is basically saying that with this nMP, entire swaths of people will be left without options. If Apple's trying to cull the ranks of their user base to weed out the people that don't fit their tiny definition of "power user," they'll definitely succeed.

This thing will chop off the "bottom" rung with people who want internal SATA and cheap PCIe--people who say things like "Well I already paid $2,000 for this thing, it should have XYZ" and look for inexpensive solutions. Apple's also cutting off the top rungs who want multiple processors and high-end PCIe like CUDA-capable GPU and SSD over PCIe greater than 2,000MBps. What new user base does the iTube attract that will make up for all these lost users?

Look, I'm no luddite. I just feel that taking PCIe, slowing it down, bundling it with MDP, and making it external, isn't some kind of wonderful advancement.

But you can run 7 monitors and 36 devices! Just forget that all 36 have a combined throughput of only 6GBps and just revel in amazement.

The light is being shined on the limitations of Thunderbolt. It's a fantastic bus for people like Laptop users who do not have PCIe. This is a serious downgrade for everyone else.

 

[N19h7m4r3]

Since the nMP only comes with HDMI 1.4, and thunderbolt does that mean you have to mostly buy thunderbolt displays? Or is there going to be any Thunderbolt to DVI connectors?

 

[EpicBlob]

You've got a couple things very wrong.

PCIe 2.0 4x (Thunderbolt 2) is certainly good enough for most midrange cards from 2012 and below. However, as video cards gain in speed, the bottleneck will be more apparent. The bottleneck is already 20-40% in the GTX680 and above on the NVidia side. The Radeon 7970, however, seems to do just fine. I do not know about the 7990. MacVidCards recently did some benchmarks with a GTX780 and found a severe bottleneck at PCIe 4x.

Check out this link: http://www.techpowerup.com/reviews/Intel/Ivy_Bridge_PCI-Express_Scaling/23.html

Average, it is about a 12% loss in performance for a 680 (The AMD card was around 7%).

Also, the Mac Pro is coming with AMD workstation cards. While I'm sure the pros will want these cards more, some are going to want GTX or AMD gaming cards (tons of people add a GTX card to the current Mac Pro). In this case, I think Thunderbolt 2 won't pose as a huuge bottleneck for adding a gaming card. Is it future proof? Probably not. But it will still give gamers with the new Mac Pro enough horsepower.

----------

Since the nMP only comes with HDMI 1.4, and thunderbolt does that mean you have to mostly buy thunderbolt displays? Or is there going to be any Thunderbolt to DVI connectors?

I'm sure there will be Thunderbolt to HDMI 2 adapters

 

[beaker7]

Check out this link: http://www.techpowerup.com/reviews/Intel/Ivy_Bridge_PCI-Express_Scaling/23.html

Average, it is about a 12% loss in performance for a 680 (The AMD card was around 7%).

Also, the Mac Pro is coming with AMD workstation cards. While I'm sure the pros will want these cards more, some are going to want GTX or AMD gaming cards (tons of people add a GTX card to the current Mac Pro). In this case, I think Thunderbolt 2 won't pose as a huuge bottleneck for adding a gaming card. Is it future proof? Probably not. But it will still give gamers with the new Mac Pro enough horsepower.

----------



I'm sure there will be Thunderbolt to HDMI 2 adapters

I would consider 12% pretty significant considering its best case scenario. They are toggling an internal bus to lower speeds, so the added latecy of Thunderbolt + using a modern high performance card...

 

[flat five]

Since the nMP only comes with HDMI 1.4, and thunderbolt does that mean you have to mostly buy thunderbolt displays? Or is there going to be any Thunderbolt to DVI connectors?

thunderbolt is pcie & displayport in one cable which uses the mini displayport connection..

a mini displayport -> dvi adapter will do the trick. (most mbp owners will already have one of the adapters since they come with the computer)

 

[beaker7]

Since the nMP only comes with HDMI 1.4, and thunderbolt does that mean you have to mostly buy thunderbolt displays? Or is there going to be any Thunderbolt to DVI connectors?

For up to HD res:
http://store.apple.com/us/product/MB570Z/B/mini-displayport-to-dvi-adapter?fnode=51

For anything over 1920x1080:
http://store.apple.com/us/product/MB571Z/A/mini-displayport-to-dual-link-dvi-adapter?fnode=51

 

[EpicBlob]

I would consider 12% pretty significant considering its best case scenario. They are toggling an internal bus to lower speeds, so the added latecy of Thunderbolt + using a modern high performance card...

That's the average. While some games had a pretty significant difference, well known games such as Battlefield 3 or Metro 2033 saw like a difference of 2 fps.

But, I will continue to say this, Thunderbolt is really made for portable devices. It'll definitely benefit a Mac Pro if you want to game but 20Gbps won't be enough to completely beat out a dual firepro setup.

 

[N19h7m4r3]

For up to HD res:
http://store.apple.com/us/product/MB570Z/B/mini-displayport-to-dvi-adapter?fnode=51

For anything over 1920x1080:
http://store.apple.com/us/product/MB571Z/A/mini-displayport-to-dual-link-dvi-adapter?fnode=51

101 Euro for one? Bloody hell.

http://store.apple.com/ie/product/MB571Z/A/mini-displayport-to-dual-link-dvi-adapter?fnode=51

thunderbolt is pcie & displayport in one cable which uses the mini displayport connection..

a mini displayport -> dvi adapter will do the trick. (most mbp owners will already have one of the adapters since they come with the computer)

My rMBP never came with one of those cables. Ah well.

 

[mslide]

And the fact that there are 6 Thunderbolt ports, AKA a theoretical total bandwidth of pcie 2.0 x24 (whatever that is in real numbers).

How do the thunderbolt 2 chips work? Is it one chip per port? One chip for all 6 ports? What I'm getting at, does 6 thunderbolt ports = 6 x the bandwidth of 1 port or is it something like the bandwidth of one thunderbolt 2 connection spread across 6 ports? I'm honestly asking here. I'm curious.

edit:

I quickly glanced at the thunderbolt wikipedia article and it looks like there are 1-port and 2-port chips (not sure if for both thunderbolt 1 and 2). If that's true, then it's possible that there are only 3 chips controlling those 6 ports and thus the theoretical bandwidth of all 6 ports might only be x12 and not x24. In other words, just because there are 6 thunderbolt ports, that doesn't necessarily mean you get 24 lanes of bandwidth. I wonder what chips Apple is using.

 

[OS6-OSX]

There is one way to end this on going debate.
Have the nMP go app for app with a 5.1. The nMP will be the "high end" model with all the TB enclosures and cards needed for the "battle". The 5.1 will be configured by Slughead including any Raid setup, PCIe cards or what is needed for the "battle".
Each setup will have it's own large display facing the camera. There will be a separate clock for each setup. The price for each setup will be listed under the appropriate display.
There will be a wide variety of apps tested:
Music- a. MOTU Digital Performer b. Steinberg's Nuendo
c. Apple's Logic Audio d. Avid's Pro Tools for mixing (trks and plugs added until a setup calls uncle).
Video- a. Side Effect's Houdini b. Autodesk's 3ds, Mudbox and Maya c. Maxon Cinema 4D d. e-on's Vue e. Adobe's After Effects and Premiere Pro f. Avid's Symphony g. Apples FCPX h. BMD's DaVinci
Scientific and others- Will have to leave this to those in that field.

Run the apps Run the clocks Show the speed and quality of work!
How about it Apple, up for the challenge?

 

[beaker7]

There is one way to end this on going debate.
Have the nMP go app for app with a 5.1. The nMP will be the "high end" model with all the TB enclosures and cards needed for the "battle". The 5.1 will be configured by Slughead including any Raid setup, PCIe cards or what is needed for the "battle".
Each setup will have it's own large display facing the camera. There will be a separate clock for each setup. The price for each setup will be listed under the appropriate display.
There will be a wide variety of apps tested:
Music- a. MOTU Digital Performer b. Steinberg's Nuendo
c. Apple's Logic Audio d. Avid's Pro Tools for mixing (trks and plugs added until a setup calls uncle).
Video- a. Side Effect's Houdini b. Autodesk's 3ds, Mudbox and Maya c. Maxon Cinema 4D d. e-on's Vue e. Adobe's After Effects and Premiere Pro f. Avid's Symphony g. Apples FCPX
Scientific and others- Will have to leave this to those in that field.

Run the apps Run the clocks Show the speed and quality of work!
How about it Apple, up for the challenge?

You'd need to include some competing modern workstations for this to mean much.

 

[VirtualRain]

How do the thunderbolt 2 chips work? Is it one chip per port? One chip for all 6 ports? What I'm getting at, does 6 thunderbolt ports = 6 x the bandwidth of 1 port or is it something like the bandwidth of one thunderbolt 2 connection spread across 6 ports? I'm honestly asking here. I'm curious.

edit:

I quickly glanced at the thunderbolt wikipedia article and it looks like there are 1-port and 2-port chips (not sure if for both thunderbolt 1 and 2). If that's true, then it's possible that there are only 3 chips controlling those 6 ports and thus the theoretical bandwidth of all 6 ports might only be x12 and not x24. In other words, just because there are 6 thunderbolt ports, that doesn't necessarily mean you get 24 lanes of bandwidth. I wonder what chips Apple is using.

Yeah, there's a lot of confusion about Thunderbolt and Thunderbolt 2. As you point out, a Thunderbolt controller can have 1 or 2 ports. The new Mac Pro will use three controllers with each having 2 ports. Each controller has a x4 PCIe 2.0 bus input and a DisplayPort input. So the new Mac Pro will allocate a total of 12 PCIe lanes to Thunderbolt. Thus total PCIe data bandwidth is 2GB/s per controller (16Gbps) or 6GB/s across all three controllers.

The difference between TB1 and TB2 is that TB1 is implemented with two channels each switching at 10Gbps. (Don't confuse channels with ports). One channel is dedicated for carrying data (the PCIe bus), the other for displayport. Since 10Gbps is not enough to support 4K displays, Intel solved this by aggregating the two 10Gbps channels in TB1 into a single 20Gbps channel and called that TB2 (there's no actual net gain in data capacity). This single channel now has enough headroom for a 4K display signal (which consumes about 16Gbps) or the full satuation of the x4 PCIe bus (also about 16Gbps). The PCIe and DisplayPort are switched between the two ports and muxed together if necessary. This means if you run a 4K display off one port, you're probably going to want to connect your data peripheral to the other port since the 20Gbps of a single port is not enough to handle both the 4K display and not bottleneck the PCIe data. But running the two on different ports (same controller) will allow them to both work at maximum potential.

Last but not least, it's misleading to refer to the I/O of TB in terms of 20Gbps or any multiple thereof. Thunderbolt is simply carrying Displayport (16Gbps) and or x4 PCIe 2.0 (also 16Gbps). The 20Gbps simply provides some headroom to run a display and data peripheral off a single port. The capacity of TB on the new Mac Pro is not 60Gbps, or 120Gbps or anything like that. There's x4 PCIe to each of the three TB controllers for data. That's it.

 

[flat five]

My rMBP never came with one of those cables. Ah well.

yeah, i wasn't sure if they still came with one.. the last laptop i bought was in 2011 and the adapter was included

 

[flat five]

There is one way to end this on going debate.
Have the nMP go app for app with a 5.1. The nMP will be the "high end" model with all the TB enclosures and cards needed for the "battle". The 5.1 will be configured by Slughead including any Raid setup, PCIe cards or what is needed for the "battle".
Each setup will have it's own large display facing the camera. There will be a separate clock for each setup. The price for each setup will be listed under the appropriate display.
There will be a wide variety of apps tested:
Music- a. MOTU Digital Performer b. Steinberg's Nuendo
c. Apple's Logic Audio d. Avid's Pro Tools for mixing (trks and plugs added until a setup calls uncle).
Video- a. Side Effect's Houdini b. Autodesk's 3ds, Mudbox and Maya c. Maxon Cinema 4D d. e-on's Vue e. Adobe's After Effects and Premiere Pro f. Avid's Symphony g. Apples FCPX h. BMD's DaVinci
Scientific and others- Will have to leave this to those in that field.

Run the apps Run the clocks Show the speed and quality of work!
How about it Apple, up for the challenge?

the apps are mainly dependent on ram,cpu,&gpu.. raid setups, hard drives, pci cards etc-- that stuff doesn't really matter for app performance (at least the applications i'm familiar with)..
i'm pretty sure the new mac will out perform the current one when it comes to running software

the battle or whatever would have to be less application based (even though that's the main importance imo) and more about storage/data moving workflow.. (though again, i don't really see how the new mac would lose this battle either.. it will lose when cost comes into the picture because it's going to cost additional money for the external enclosures needed with the new mac)