MP 7,1 Mac Pro 8.1 - WHAT IF...

[deconstruct60]

Now, if we look at a current Mac Pro it could be outfitted with many different GPUS. The original radeon Vega II each have about the rendering perf of single m1 Max. The single of the shelf (now 600 $) 6900xt

was $999 MSRP when released. I think driving off into the swamp when trying to position Apple's primary target for the Mac Pro is a largely a container for two year old video cards

Launching Today: AMD's Radeon RX 6900 XT - A Whole Lot of Radeon for $1000

www.anandtech.com

Apple has been very consistent across the last decade ( MP 2013 , iMac Pro , MP 2019) positioing the primary GPU offerings in this general area of their product line up as being "Pro GPU" offerings. Far more aligned with AMD's Pro card line up than chasing the pricing swings of the consumer gaming GPU card market.


Apple's GPU driver stack has been far closer to "Pro driver" objectives ( focus on stable and longer term) than on chasing the latest shiny game and dozens specific tweaks to goose individual games faster (even if that causes some instabilities).

[ e.g., Nvidia bragging that more than one (close to 2 ) driver release per month is a 'good thing'

https://www.tomshardware.com/news/nvidia-subtly-digs-amd-intel-low-volume-driver

in a production shop were configuration stability is important that is 'plus' ? ]


To go from a W5500X to a W6600X is $300.

is about 35% faster than a m1 ultra. And a system specced out with dual 6800 duos renders at similar perf as 8 m1 Max chips.
I list this a "evidence" that Apple just won't release a new Mac Pro that is worse than the current, almost 4 year old system.

"evidence"? The M1 Mini has a lower RAM capacity cap than the Intel Mini ( in part why it is still for sale). The iMac supports less external monitors. The M1 Studio is less RAM than the iMac Pro .

Apple isn't operating under the some rigid rule that every single sub feature category has to go forward for them to deploy a Apple Silicon solution.

Sure they could make something doesn't beat the top of the line version but if we don't get better perf per $ then what is the purpose? Just for specialty audio work? I mean, for video, does anyone really need anything better that the current Ultra? Or even m1 max?

For as much as Apple charges for RAM and VRAM on the MP 2019 options. If they can do 'double duty' on the system ram and chuck the relatively very expensive VRAM then the pref per $ will go up.

Much of this thread is likely lost on myopically chasing after the Nvidia 4090 (which isn't coming to Macs) and > $25K Mac Pro market.

The conclusion might then be: if there is a Apple Silicon Mac Pro, it will be better than a middle of the road 2019 MP at least. That means rendering capabilities at least better than dual 6900xt but with the benefits of silent running and large VRAM.

Probably not a dual 6900xt. Perhaps a dual 6800. But yes, adding more value in the $6-15K range of Mac Pros than in the $25-50K range. The respective units sold is currently likely not the same size ( higher range , lower in number). Apple shifting to selling more systems (grow the lower range more than shrinking the higher one) then why would they not go down that path? A lower volume of SoC packages isn't going to help them get scale on production of those SoCs..

For that to be true, a M2 "Extreme" without extras will just not cut it. It might touch similar scores but it would't be better. So, apple adds RT HW in the m2 pro series, that could save the day and most people would have a good enough system. Maybe it will not beat a dual 6800 duo or be close to PC/nVidia perf but at least useful.

hardware RT would only perhaps 'save' it on heavy RT workloads. Compute? Nope. It is isn't a silver bullet if trying to drag them into the commodity GPU market pricing dynamics.


A MI210 (or future MI310 ) compute focused accelerator would probably have more synergy between AMD and Apple's objectives. There is no $600 mainstream card for either Apple or AMD customers to price anchor on. So if perhaps $500-1K lower than the standard Linux card ( Apple wrangles some discount because going to help relative increase sales 10-20% AMD goes from 60K/yr to 70k/yr . accelerator sales go up 16% for AMD and Apple gets a slice of the action. The cards generate enough revenue to pay for the extra work for both sides. ).

However, not being able to upgrade the GPUs would make the system a lot less interesting as an investment.

Apple has to get a return on investment for the extra work for enabling something that doesn't exist now. $600 GPU cards that people don't directly buy from Apple generates $0.0 worth of money to pay for that extra work.

Would you guys buy an AS MP 2023 with a really fast 48 core (32+16) CPU but with a GPU in the realm of dual 6900xt at max? List price 12000$ with 192 GB RAM?

A current MP 2019 with 24-28 cores , 192 GB RAM , and single W6900 is $20-21K . So a Mac Pro that is $8K cheaper probably would find more buyers.

Even if 'dialed back' that W6900 (it is priced for the max cryptocurrency craze era ) to a single W6800 the price is $18K ( still have a $6K gap) .

Apple's M-series system RAM prices work better when compared again equivalent capacity VRAM prices. If fold the MPX module cost back down into the base system price more effectively then can deliver relatively higher bang for the buck. For some workloads that will be helpful and for others it won't. For the areas that Apple still does have substantive traction it will probably work. (may get some grumbles from the audio crowd that have close to zero GPU workload. )

No accelerators to be had?

There are other kinds of accelerators than just GPU ones. Or display GPU ones.
There are already 50 PCI-e cards that work with macOS on M-series now. The likelihood that the next M-series Mac Pro has access to zero accelerations is about zero.

Apple probably should try to get some more, but it is a grow a larger market target thing; not whether they are doing it all.

 

[innerproduct]

was $999 MSRP when released. I think driving off into the swamp when trying to position Apple's primary target for the Mac Pro is a largely a container for two year old video cards

Launching Today: AMD's Radeon RX 6900 XT - A Whole Lot of Radeon for $1000

www.anandtech.com

Apple has been very consistent across the last decade ( MP 2013 , iMac Pro , MP 2019) positioing the primary GPU offerings in this general area of their product line up as being "Pro GPU" offerings. Far more aligned with AMD's Pro card line up than chasing the pricing swings of the consumer gaming GPU card market.


Apple's GPU driver stack has been far closer to "Pro driver" objectives ( focus on stable and longer term) than on chasing the latest shiny game and dozens specific tweaks to goose individual games faster (even if that causes some instabilities).

[ e.g., Nvidia bragging that more than one (close to 2 ) driver release per month is a 'good thing'

https://www.tomshardware.com/news/nvidia-subtly-digs-amd-intel-low-volume-driver

in a production shop were configuration stability is important that is 'plus' ? ]


To go from a W5500X to a W6600X is $300.




"evidence"? The M1 Mini has a lower RAM capacity cap than the Intel Mini ( in part why it is still for sale). The iMac supports less external monitors. The M1 Studio is less RAM than the iMac Pro .

Apple isn't operating under the some rigid rule that every single sub feature category has to go forward for them to deploy a Apple Silicon solution.






For as much as Apple charges for RAM and VRAM on the MP 2019 options. If they can do 'double duty' on the system ram and chuck the relatively very expensive VRAM then the pref per $ will go up.

Much of this thread is likely lost on myopically chasing after the Nvidia 4090 (which isn't coming to Macs) and > $25K Mac Pro market.




Probably not a dual 6900xt. Perhaps a dual 6800. But yes, adding more value in the $6-15K range of Mac Pros than in the $25-50K range. The respective units sold is currently likely not the same size ( higher range , lower in number). Apple shifting to selling more systems (grow the lower range more than shrinking the higher one) then why would they not go down that path? A lower volume of SoC packages isn't going to help them get scale on production of those SoCs..



hardware RT would only perhaps 'save' it on heavy RT workloads. Compute? Nope. It is isn't a silver bullet if trying to drag them into the commodity GPU market pricing dynamics.


A MI210 (or future MI310 ) compute focused accelerator would probably have more synergy between AMD and Apple's objectives. There is no $600 mainstream card for either Apple or AMD customers to price anchor on. So if perhaps $500-1K lower than the standard Linux card ( Apple wrangles some discount because going to help relative increase sales 10-20% AMD goes from 60K/yr to 70k/yr . accelerator sales go up 16% for AMD and get a slice of the action. The cards generate enough revenue to pay for the extra work for both sides. ).




Apple has to get a return on investment for the extra work for enabling something that doesn't exist now. $600 GPU cards that people don't directly buy from Apple generates $0.0 worth of money to pay for that extra work.



A current MP 2019 with 24-28 cores , 192 GB RAM , and single W6900 is $20-21K . So a Mac Pro that is $8K cheaper probably would find more buyers.

Even if 'dialed back' that W6900 (it is priced for the max cryptocurrency craze era ) to a single W6800 the price is $18K ( still have a $6K gap) .

Apple's M-series system RAM prices work better when compared again equivalent capacity VRAM prices. If fold the MPX module cost back down into the base system price more effectively then can deliver relatively higher bang for the buck. For some workloads that will be helpful and for others it won't. For the areas that Apple still does have substantive traction it will probably work. (may get some grumbles from the audio crowd that have close to zero GPU workload. )



There are other kinds of accelerators than just GPU ones. Or display GPU ones.
There are already 50 PCI-e cards that work with macOS on M-series now. The likelihood that the next M-series Mac Pro has access to zero accelerations is about zero.

Apple probably should try to get some more, but it is a grow a larger market target thing; not whether they are doing it all.

I will not debate the details here but there are of course some things I would strongly agree with while other things I feel different about. For me as a person that needs rendering perf. on the workstation I do the design work on , the optimal system would be something with high single core perf with a decent amount of cores (20?) and top of the line GPU or compute cards that that could be updated. A 16 core MP 2019 with dual third party 6800xt and a single slot 5500 card for connecting to the display would cost me in total $12000 as of today. That would be about as fast as a dual m1 Ultra in blender and redshift. Good enough for working. But it would also probably be the end of the line for that system. Not possible to upgrade (drivers for 7900 cards seems unlikely). Also I would risk that in the near future the GPU renderers would not even support it for some reason. Otoy already dropped Octane for AMD on Mac out of the blue and focus solely on M* going forward. So with the MP 2019 out of the question, then everything becomes the waiting game again. Will the MP2023 be for me? Worst case seems to be about 2.5c ->5x an m1 Max. But with guaranteed great CPU perf. That has got me thinking again, maybe the future is on CPU after all (again). VRAY, Corona, Blender and Arnold now works fine on M* and Clarisse, even in emulation, performs spectacularly for it's weight class. So confused. I have tried go PC and at work that is the only sane choice. But for me personally, I really would like a decent Mac even for 3D and am prepared to pay for it. Had a thread ripper pro 32 core + nvidia 3090 as main workstation for a while and while it was fast on rendering, most other tasks felt so sluggish compared to my M1 Max I wondered if there was some bug/issue with it. That system was also quite loud even though I used super high quality noctua fans and a high end version of the 3090. It is now put into a dedicated server room in another city so I don't have to see or hear the monstrosity The value of being able to work in silence should not be under appreciated

 

[mode11]

was $999 MSRP when released. I think driving off into the swamp when trying to position Apple's primary target for the Mac Pro is a largely a container for two year old video cards

That's mischaracterising @innerproduct's argument. His full sentence was: "The single of the shelf (now 600 $) 6900xt is about 35% faster than a m1 ultra." The point being that AMD's top consumer video card from two year's ago is 35% faster than the $4000 Ultra's GPU. The new $1000 7900XTX is therefore around 80% faster than the Ultra, and the new Mac Pro will be competing with PCs with one or two of those (or the Nvidia equivalent).

Much of this thread is likely lost on myopically chasing after the Nvidia 4090 (which isn't coming to Macs) and > $25K Mac Pro market.

The focus on the RTX4090 is because it's currently the fastest consumer video card. By the time the Mac Pro materialises (WWDC?) there may be an even faster Ti version. And even though at $1600 it's considered a very expensive card, Apple currently charges $5400 to upgrade to a W6900X (essentially a 6900XT). Also consider that whatever hardware the MP 8,1 has, it likely won't be updated for at least 3-4 years.

A current MP 2019 with 24-28 cores , 192 GB RAM , and single W6900 is $20-21K . So a Mac Pro that is $8K cheaper probably would find more buyers.

Alternatively, you could spend $12K with Puget and get a Threadripper Pro machine with 256GB of RAM and 2x RTX4090s. I get that many users are loyal to macOS, but it makes little sense for 3D pros to be buying Macs (so they largely don't).

There are other kinds of accelerators than just GPU ones.

Sure, but GPUs are the ones with the most widespread interest, given they are massive parallel processing accelerators that can be used for everything from 3D rendering to ML to engineering simulation.

 

[maikerukun]

Since the 7900 xtx reviews started to drop in we now have some blender benchmarks for 3.4 which give us some interesting insights. First, a properly utilised 7900 xtx is about 1.8 times faster for blender rendering that a 6900xt.
So if there was a Mac Pro 2019 compatible version of this card, we would be looking at just that: up to 80% perf gain at same power usage. That would have been a solid upgrade.
Now, if we look at a current Mac Pro it could be outfitted with many different GPUS. The original radeon Vega II each have about the rendering perf of single m1 Max. The single of the shelf (now 600 $) 6900xt is about 35% faster than a m1 ultra. And a system specced out with dual 6800 duos renders at similar perf as 8 m1 Max chips.
I list this a "evidence" that Apple just won't release a new Mac Pro that is worse than the current, almost 4 year old system. Sure they could make something doesn't beat the top of the line version but if we don't get better perf per $ then what is the purpose? Just for specialty audio work? I mean, for video, does anyone really need anything better that the current Ultra? Or even m1 max?
The conclusion might then be: if there is a Apple Silicon Mac Pro, it will be better than a middle of the road 2019 MP at least. That means rendering capabilities at least better than dual 6900xt but with the benefits of silent running and large VRAM.
For that to be true, a M2 "Extreme" without extras will just not cut it. It might touch similar scores but it would't be better. So, apple adds RT HW in the m2 pro series, that could save the day and most people would have a good enough system. Maybe it will not beat a dual 6800 duo or be close to PC/nVidia perf but at least useful.
However, not being able to upgrade the GPUs would make the system a lot less interesting as an investment.

Would you guys buy an AS MP 2023 with a really fast 48 core (32+16) CPU but with a GPU in the realm of dual 6900xt at max? List price 12000$ with 192 GB RAM? No accelerators to be had?

Nope. It has to be equivalent to at least 2 RTX 4090's...the reason being THEY AREN'T ALLOWING US TO UPGRADE IN THIS SCENARIO...no matter what, as a professional artist, I need to be able to buy my main ONCE and then upgrade it as newer faster more powerful CPU's and GPU's become available. I need to be able to take advantage of expandability.

And if you are going to LOCK ME IN to a thing, then that thing has to be insanely powerful FROM THE BEGINNING.

 

[innerproduct]

Nope. It has to be equivalent to at least 2 RTX 4090's...the reason being THEY AREN'T ALLOWING US TO UPGRADE IN THIS SCENARIO...no matter what, as a professional artist, I need to be able to buy my main ONCE and then upgrade it as newer faster more powerful CPU's and GPU's become available. I need to be able to take advantage of expandability.

And if you are going to LOCK ME IN to a thing, then that thing has to be insanely powerful FROM THE BEGINNING.

I guess the very simple answer to most of our thoughts is: once on the market we can quickly evaluate if it is a viable product for our needs. As I have written elsewhere, professionally I have had to use PCs for many years in order to meet market demands. Now that GPU renders finally are back and somewhat stable on mac, i look forward to evaluate a macpro 2023 as personal artist workstation.

 

[maikerukun]

I guess the very simple answer to most of our thoughts is: once on the market we can quickly evaluate if it is a viable product for our needs. As I have written elsewhere, professionally I have had to use PCs for many years in order to meet market demands. Now that GPU renders finally are back and somewhat stable on mac, i look forward to evaluate a macpro 2023 as personal artist workstation.

I get that. And as has been previously mentioned, there's some diehards on here willing to fund this thing out for Apple as long as it delivers "myself included".

I would honestly happily pay $60k for an 8.1 Mac Pro that runs equivalent to dual RTX 4090's and a 64 core cpu. They pull that off and my money is theirs. They don't and...for the first time ever, I simply don't know.

 

[AlphaCentauri]

I don’t need graphics capabilities that strong (for music production). However, I’d love to have expandability (PCIe, not necessarily RAM). I’d gladly pay for that, this is the only reason I haven’t bought Studio Ultra yet. I’m waiting to see what Apple will come up to with Mac Pro.

My dream would be to have graphics on SOC (like iGP on some PC motherboards) for people like me and the ability to use discrete graphic cards (and then the SOC graphics would be switched off), for guys like you 😉

 

[mode11]

If Apple are serious about making dedicated processors for the Mac, rather than just souping-up iOS chips, they need a version with lots of PCIe connectivity. The current M-series is obviously fine (ideal) for laptops, but higher-end desktop machines deserve better. We're not at the point yet where an SoC can or should fulfil all needs.

Hopefully Apple are putting the finishing touches on such a chip, and in 6 months we'll all be laughing about our prediction that the future was all-SoC, just because AS to date has been.

 

[maikerukun]

I don’t need graphics capabilities that strong (for music production). However, I’d love to have expandability (PCIe, not necessarily RAM). I’d gladly pay for that, this is the only reason I haven’t bought Studio Ultra yet. I’m waiting to see what Apple will come up to with Mac Pro.

My dream would be to have graphics on SOC (like iGP on some PC motherboards) for people like me and the ability to use discrete graphic cards (and then the SOC graphics would be switched off), for guys like you 😉

That would literally be the ultimate machine and if Apple is more concerned with giving us the ultimate machine one time instead of us having to upgrade the entire machine bi-annually for profit then this is exactly what they'd do.

 

[maikerukun]

If Apple are serious about making dedicated processors for the Mac, rather than just souping-up iOS chips, they need a version with lots of PCIe connectivity. The current M-series is obviously fine (ideal) for laptops, but higher-end desktop machines deserve better. We're not at the point yet where an SoC can or should fulfil all needs.

Hopefully Apple are putting the finishing touches on such a chip, and in 6 months we'll all be laughing about our prediction that the future was all-SoC, just because AS to date has been.

LMFAO! let's laugh about it now and pretend this is going to happen *maniacally laughing to self

 

[enc0re]

Considering the existence of the Mac Studio, I think it’s a foregone conclusion that the Mac Pro will feature some form of internal expandability.

The big question is whether that’ll be PCIe, proprietary, or a bit of both.

If Apple includes PCIe, I don’t think it’ll be for GPU but just speciality cards. Sort of like the Studio has some USB-A ports. I expect a proprietary solution to add GPU power.

 

[fuchsdh]

If Apple includes PCIe, I don’t think it’ll be for GPU but just speciality cards. Sort of like the Studio has some USB-A ports. I expect a proprietary solution to add GPU power.

Bring back the mezzanine slot!

 

[maikerukun]

Considering the existence of the Mac Studio, I think it’s a foregone conclusion that the Mac Pro will feature some form of internal expandability.

The big question is whether that’ll be PCIe, proprietary, or a bit of both.

If Apple includes PCIe, I don’t think it’ll be for GPU but just speciality cards. Sort of like the Studio has some USB-A ports. I expect a proprietary solution to add GPU power.

My question is, what's the point of even calling it a Mac PRO then? Just make a Mac Studio Ultimate.

DO NOT use the name PRO on the Mac if it isn't targeting people who need the absolute most. It's not supposed to be a hobbyist product. It's supposed to be absurd. The price tag should NOT be the most absurd thing about it.

 

[mattspace]

My question is, what's the point of even calling it a Mac PRO then? Just make a Mac Studio Ultimate.

DO NOT use the name PRO on the Mac if it isn't targeting people who need the absolute most. It's not supposed to be a hobbyist product. It's supposed to be absurd. The price tag should NOT be the most absurd thing about it.

I’m going to disagree somewhat with that take on the basis that the Mac Pro doesn’t need to be ONLY high performance, and it doesn’t even need to be exclusively the fastest product Apple makes. A Mac Pro with pci slots, including gpu, and “only” the cpu of the studio, would be just as valid a Mac Pro - what makes it Professional is the reconfigurability, and flexibility, not the performance.

Just like the basic, empty shell Volkswagen Transporter / Crafter, Mercedes Sprinter, Ford Transit etc are the “Professional” vans, because they can be individually tailored to every profession’s needs.

 

[mode11]

If Apple make an AS chip with lots of PCIe lanes, it would make sense for them to support (AMD) GPUs. It could essentially be an Ultra CPU + Max GPU + lots of PCIe lanes + 8 channels / slots of DDR5. With 64GB of unified on-package RAM as a 'cache'.

This would keep the pros happy, allowing them to plug in as many high-end GPUs as they like, without Apple needing to bother competing in that space. Otherwise, they would have to put out competitive PCIe GPUs on a bi-annual basis, or manufacture a colossal SoC with a massive integrated GPU. Either would be a massive ball-ache, and just for one low-selling computer. And the latter wouldn't be practical anyway, as Apple can't fit 450W+ of GPU in an SoC, so it wouldn't compete with even a single RTX4090.

 

[maikerukun]

I’m going to disagree somewhat with that take on the basis that the Mac Pro doesn’t need to be ONLY high performance, and it doesn’t even need to be exclusively the fastest product Apple makes. A Mac Pro with pci slots, including gpu, and “only” the cpu of the studio, would be just as valid a Mac Pro - what makes it Professional is the reconfigurability, and flexibility, not the performance.

Just like the basic, empty shell Volkswagen Transporter / Crafter, Mercedes Sprinter, Ford Transit etc are the “Professional” vans, because they can be individually tailored to every profession’s needs.

I mean you just described what I described 😂 An evolution of 7.1 lol

 

[mattspace]

I mean you just described what I described 😂 An evolution of 7.1 lol

Right, but I think a Mac Pro could just as easily have the processor (arguably not the mediocre ram allotment) from a Mac Mini, and still be a Mac Pro if it has all the PCI slots etc.

The performance isn't the strict metric, it's the ability of the owner to change how that performance is directed, and how the machine is task-specialised that's important.

 

[jmho]

Unfortunately with my developer hat on I really can't see a future where the 8.1 Mac Pro uses anything other than Apple Silicon GPU cores.

It just wouldn't work if Apple says "Hey, you know how you ported your software to Apple Silicon, well now you're going to have to port it again to the Apple Silicon Mac Pro with multiple AMD cards - and the only way you're going to be able to test it is to buy one"

I think it's a given that the Mac Pro 8.1 is going to be 100% software compatible with the rest of the Apple Silicon lineup.

I can see there being 2 ways Apple do this:

1) We just get a gigantic SoC that's double the Mac Studio and the Mac Pro is just a big Studio. If Apple do this I'm buying a PC immediately because ugh.

2) Apple exploits the fact that they control absolutely everything from the hardware to the software and turn the Mac Pro into something like an nVidia DGX. The DGX is essentially a mini-supercomputer that takes 8x discrete monster GPUs, and connects them together with a bunch of incredibly fast interconnects and handles most of the complexity of distributing tasks among 8 discrete GPUs.

Since Apple controls the software and the hardware, they could potentially make multi-GPU compute incredibly seamless. Handling multiple GPUs is still complex and requires a lot of data duplication and sending buffers all over the place, but if Apple can handle all that for devs at the Metal level then that could be really promising.

Also nVidia's H100 cards come in both the "slow" PCI-e format so they can be put in a regular computer, and a much higher bandwidth custom nVidia SXM format. Since this is the "What if" thread: I hope Apple start manufacturing discrete AS GPUs, which can either be daisy-chained via Thunderbolt 4 (or 5?) as an eGPU for consumer grade Macs or slotted in directly via a custom high speed connector into the Mac Pro.

The eGPU feature being both cool, and would also make sure that supporting multiple GPUs is something that becomes a standard part of the Apple Silicon software ecosystem, instead of just a feature that only exists on the Mac Pro.

 

[singhs.apps]

eGPU feature being both cool, and would also make sure that supporting multiple GPUs is something that becomes a standard part of the Apple Silicon software ecosystem, instead of just a feature that only exists on the Mac Pro.

That’s what I have been thinking too.

 

[mode11]

TB4 means PCIe 3.0 x4 lanes; less if daisy chained. If the cards get 16x PCIe when installed in an AS MP though, then fair enough.

Still seems like an unnecessary complication, based more on Apple’s needs than the customer’s.

 

[ZombiePhysicist]

Surprised no one posted this yet, but the plot thickens (no extreme chip for you!):

Gurman: Apple cancels plans for high-end ‘M2 Extreme’ chip, but new Mac Pro will retain expandability options for RAM and storage

Apple has apparently scrapped plans to make a new Apple Silicon Mac Pro with a high-end “M2 Extreme” chip featuring...

9to5mac.com

This Mac Pro is sounding more a mess by the day... On the positive side seems to have expandable ram, storage and "other" (which I pray includes graphics cards:

"Instead, the Mac Pro is expected to rely on a new-generation M2 Ultra chip (rather than the M1 Ultra) and will retain one of its hallmark features: easy expandability for additional memory, storage and other components."

Apple Scales Back High-End Mac Pro Plans, Weighs Production Move to Asia

The new high-end Mac Pro with Apple silicon is behind schedule, and you can blame changes to the company’s chip and manufacturing plans. Also: Apple prepares to allow third-party app stores and sideloading; iOS 16.2 is released; and Tesla cars finally get Apple Music.

www.bloomberg.com

And from the bat**** files, this apologist piece about the trashcan somehow 'merely' mentioning the apple apology tour, yet, glossing that over to rehash a case for the loser trashcan design, completely learning NOTHING from the debacle, to suggest, you really should just be happy with how awesome the studio is:

The 'Trashcan' Mac Pro: Remembering One of Apple's Most Controversial Designs Nine Years Later

Apple launched the controversial "trashcan" Mac Pro nine years ago today, introducing one of its most criticized designs that persisted...

www.macrumors.com

Thanks so much lackey tech press. In this case, assuming the "other components" part includes PCI and hopefully graphics cards (and why not if it includes upgradable RAM), maybe Apple has learned from its mistakes (at least one can hope).

Anyway, this maybe overall good news if the "other components" includes PCI graphics cards?

 

[fuchsdh]

Surprised no one posted this yet, but the plot thickens (no extreme chip for you!):

Gurman: Apple cancels plans for high-end ‘M2 Extreme’ chip, but new Mac Pro will retain expandability options for RAM and storage

Apple has apparently scrapped plans to make a new Apple Silicon Mac Pro with a high-end “M2 Extreme” chip featuring...

9to5mac.com

This Mac Pro is sounding more and more DoA by the day... On the positive side seems to have expandable ram.

And from the bat**** files, this apologist piece about the trashcan somehow 'merely' mentioning the apple apology tour, yet, glossing that over to rehash a case for the loser trashcan design, completely learning NOTHING from the debacle, to suggest, you really should just be happy with how awesome the studio is:

The 'Trashcan' Mac Pro: Remembering One of Apple's Most Controversial Designs Nine Years Later

Apple launched the controversial "trashcan" Mac Pro nine years ago today, introducing one of its most criticized designs that persisted...

www.macrumors.com

Thanks so much lackey tech press.

I don't see how you read that and say it's DoA. If anything, I think it's more heartening to the folks that just want an expandable system, because it was always possible Apple's view for the Mac Pro was an even-more-powerful version of the Studio, and that seems less likely (and, while it will still be expensive, will certainly be cheaper than a "we burned through X chips to deliver this single mammoth and complicated one" strategy.)

As for the Studio... I don't think it makes any sense to say they didn't learn anything. Apple's history is full of similar products that failed in their niches but provided lessons for future machines. There are plenty of pros who aren't served by Mac Studios, but I have yet to see any similar furor to the Mac Studio that we saw with the Mac Pro. While it's obviously going to depend on what the Mac Pro looks like, the mere fact that there is a Mac Pro coming suggests to me Apple did learn their lesson, and is interested in producing two different machines for two different use cases.

Unfortunately with my developer hat on I really can't see a future where the 8.1 Mac Pro uses anything other than Apple Silicon GPU cores.

It just wouldn't work if Apple says "Hey, you know how you ported your software to Apple Silicon, well now you're going to have to port it again to the Apple Silicon Mac Pro with multiple AMD cards - and the only way you're going to be able to test it is to buy one"

I think it's a given that the Mac Pro 8.1 is going to be 100% software compatible with the rest of the Apple Silicon lineup.

I can see there being 2 ways Apple do this:

1) We just get a gigantic SoC that's double the Mac Studio and the Mac Pro is just a big Studio. If Apple do this I'm buying a PC immediately because ugh.

2) Apple exploits the fact that they control absolutely everything from the hardware to the software and turn the Mac Pro into something like an nVidia DGX. The DGX is essentially a mini-supercomputer that takes 8x discrete monster GPUs, and connects them together with a bunch of incredibly fast interconnects and handles most of the complexity of distributing tasks among 8 discrete GPUs.

Since Apple controls the software and the hardware, they could potentially make multi-GPU compute incredibly seamless. Handling multiple GPUs is still complex and requires a lot of data duplication and sending buffers all over the place, but if Apple can handle all that for devs at the Metal level then that could be really promising.

Also nVidia's H100 cards come in both the "slow" PCI-e format so they can be put in a regular computer, and a much higher bandwidth custom nVidia SXM format. Since this is the "What if" thread: I hope Apple start manufacturing discrete AS GPUs, which can either be daisy-chained via Thunderbolt 4 (or 5?) as an eGPU for consumer grade Macs or slotted in directly via a custom high speed connector into the Mac Pro.

The eGPU feature being both cool, and would also make sure that supporting multiple GPUs is something that becomes a standard part of the Apple Silicon software ecosystem, instead of just a feature that only exists on the Mac Pro.

I dunno. It feels like to me manufacturing their own GPUs is more complicated than just blessing certain AMD GPUs for Mac Pro and eGPUS (aka the current status quo of Intel Macs.)

 

[Joe The Dragon]

why can't they may an dual socket M2 Ultra system?

and storage can be on sticks like the mac pro is now. But it does need slots to add non apple storage as well. How hard will it be to 2-4 disks not sticks (that can be raideded built in?)

 

[fuchsdh]

(dp)

 

[ZombiePhysicist]

I don't see how you read that and say it's DoA. If anything, I think it's more heartening to the folks that just want an expandable system, because it was always possible Apple's view for the Mac Pro was an even-more-powerful version of the Studio, and that seems less likely (and, while it will still be expensive, will certainly be cheaper than a "we burned through X chips to deliver this single mammoth and complicated one" strategy.)

As for the Studio... I don't think it makes any sense to say they didn't learn anything. Apple's history is full of similar products that failed in their niches but provided lessons for future machines. There are plenty of pros who aren't served by Mac Studios, but I have yet to see any similar furor to the Mac Studio that we saw with the Mac Pro. While it's obviously going to depend on what the Mac Pro looks like, the mere fact that there is a Mac Pro coming suggests to me Apple did learn their lesson, and is interested in producing two different machines for two different use cases.



I dunno. It feels like to me manufacturing their own GPUs is more complicated than just blessing certain AMD GPUs for Mac Pro and eGPUS (aka the current status quo of Intel Macs.)

I revised my post to say "a mess" from "DOA" before your post quoting went up, but apparently after when you hit reply on your end.

Disagree. Apple has made this stupid machine over and over. The the cube, the trashcan, and now the studio. The big difference is at least with the studio they were more upfront that it's a giant fat unupgradable dead end Mac mini pro, which is what all the other machines really were too. The Studio really should just be called a Mini Pro and end the last vestiges of pretense there.

UPDATE: You could kind of add in the 20th anniversary Mac and iMac Pro into the same 'vibe' of machine. Which they really should just make an iMac and an iMac Pro. For those that don't want any chance at upgradability, and as a bonus, want to throw away a perfectly good monitor every time they upgrade (so great for the environment btw).