Yeah. Reminds of the jade 4 and jade chop word salads. Apple never said anything like that.
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MP 7,1 Mac Pro 8.1 - WHAT IF...
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Maybe apply the standards to your posts ?
Good explanation of how Apple approaches discussion (or lack thereof) of pipeline products.
Good explanation of why it might have been in the interests of Apple and its Mac Pro customers and potential customers to provide an outline of their roadmap in this product area.
I love the "surprise and delight" element of Apple's product reveals, but you can make a pretty strong case that the company's moves with the Mac Pro (starting with the 6,1) have been more along the lines of "confuse and disappoint."
The 2017 "apology tour" (not standard Apple operating procedure, by any means) was indicative that this product space is somewhat unique and might benefit from a bit more transparency regarding product plans.
Reportedly 'Jade' were Apple internal code words. If actually leaks from Apple than Apple did say that. Just didn't want to communicate that to folks outside of Apple and small set of contractors covered by NDA.
Jade ( M1 Max) and Jade Chop ( M1 Pro) pretty much came out as the codename described. Some folks went off the deep-end and tried to present the M1 Pro as a physically chopped/sawed Max die. But it is the same essential baseline floorplan with a section pruned off . So 'chop' is a descriptive code word.
Jade2C/4C was interpreted to be 2 chip, but may actually be "about 20 cores" and "about 40 cores". The Jade2C was probably a codeword for what became the M1 Ultra. The Jade4C failed. IMHO not all that surprising if trying to 'hammer' the baseline Max/Jade into a scalable chiplet that it didn't work well. Pretty good chance Jade4C is never going to see light of day in a released Apple product. Sometimes even well planned things fail which is one reason why Apple doesn't like to talk about them in advance. If it turns out to be a 'bust' they can just quietly discontinue development without disrupting any expectations.
Spinning 'Jade' as some unconfirmed 'word soup' is mainly misdirection. 3 of the 4 are real , confirmed products.
But official, widespread disclosure from Apple. No. they didn't. And not sure why anyone would expect them too.
However, once have a relatively very large group of folks read-in on the codes words leaks happen. There is usually an undisclosed amount of the 'telephone game' associated with these leaks also where the information bounces out indirectly from the company.
Treating leaks that come from Apple the exact same way as Apple's crafted , managed, and practiced interactions with the press is ludicrous. The first typically has substantive 'noise' injected into them. The leaker leaves out details in order to inhibit the leak being traced back to themselves. The leak goes through a telephone game phase as it bounces out of apple. etc.
Apple's big events are entirely scripted and rehearsed. in the pandemic phase they are pre-recorded and edited. The level of 'noise' and non-policy following utterances there are basically zero. The folks who get paid to communicate for Apple scrub those clean. These planned sessions with carefully preselect journalists where Apple makes 'follow on' comments about the product line ups ( Gruber's sessions post opening WWDC , some of the recent sessions after the Mini Pro relase , etc) are only slightly less scripted. The topic areas are predetermined. The Apple folks given access to are rehersed with candidate questions and also instructed on how not to violate their contracts.
The two information flows are 'managed' utterly different. So there is about zero rational to treat them exactly the same.
"surprise and delight" is somewhat linked to Apple's "no discussion of future products", but not really the foundation of it. There is a phrase " let us see if they can 'walk the walk' as much as they can 'talk the talk'". Essentially that is about can people deliver on what they say they are going to do.
Apple's "no discussion of future products" is grounded in doing vastly more 'walking' than 'talking'. Shipping a product is 'walking' (i.e., actions and 'doing something'.). The huge mismatch with the Mac Pro was not the 6,1 (MP 2013) , it was doing nothing until 2019 to come out with the next version. The 2010 -> 2013 was also a problem more so than ended up with the form factor of the 2013 model. It was doing almost nothing for 3 years. Note in 2012-2013 time period the Mac Pro was withdrawn from sales in the EU because it violated a rule laid down in 2007-08 time period. Apple had 4 years to get into compliance and had not 'walked the walk' to do so.
If Apple got the Mac Pro onto a regular schedule. (e.g., every 2 years , every 3 years ) then it would be in much better shape because they would be 'walking the walk". Treating it as a Rip-van-Winkle , hobby product is what is the huge disconnect from the overall corporate policy of not talking about future products. [ I wouldn't expect Apple to ship Mac Pro SoCs with every M-series generation. Every odd or Every even is probably an expectation track that would put down some relistic expectations. So if started at M3 and then followed M5 , M7 , etc that would help the Mac Pro going forward. It wouldn't hurt for Apple just to say 'don't expect yearly going forward'. They can leave an open door whether that is 2 or 3 , but just get folks off the "gotta update as fast as the iPhone' mindset. Just bust that disinformation 'bubble' so it doesn't get in the way. ]
Apple doesn't like talking very long term roadmaps because if something happens and need another 2-10 months to ship a very good product they have that flexibility to do it because not on a pre-promised deadline. All companies who 'bet the farm' on Intel 2017-2018 roadmaps about what was going to get delived in 2H 2020 got burnt. Deeply burnt. The more 'smack' a vendor talks about what they are going to deliver 3-4 years down the road the deeper the 'hole' they are digging if they do not execute well.
The other major problem with 'surprise and delight' is that the higher the price tag the more it is not a 'spontaneous purchase' product. $50K workstation is not going to be in the 'petty cash' purchase fund for most businesses. The tigher the budget constraints the more conservative and risk adverse the client base becomes. Conservative and risk adverse folks strongly dislike 'surprise' and will not be 'delighting' them with surprises. It is completely the wrong sales approach for that group. Chasing higher and higher price points really does the Mac Pro no favors. Higher price points only contribute to the update cadence being slower ; not faster. The slower the cadence the more disconnected it gets from the overall corporate policy. The folks cheerleading for the more and more expensive Mac Pro are only advocating a pricing-death-spiral; not a long term future for the product.
The 2017 'apology tour' is really was pretty much empty of substantive discussion of future product. The Mac Pro wouldn't have an intergrated screen. That was suppose to be a 'news flash' ? The next Mac Pro would have higher bandwidth and throughput relative to the other Macs in the line-up. So did the MP 2013. Most of the rest was really talking 'at' the MP 2013 . Two GPUs minimal was the current product spec. Painted themselves into a thermal corner ... was the current product spec. Leaned too much on Thunderbolt .. was the current product spec. Just one internal storage drive ... again ... the then current product spec.
The biggest 'future product' reveal there was about the iMac Pro ( allusions to that it would help Apple "Pro" line up to have iMac that covered more Pros. ). The Mac Pro stuff was more about that if any iMac Pro came , that it wasn't the Mac Pro. ( very similar to the Mac Studio introduction where the Mac Pro is mentioned primarily to clarify that the Mac Studio is not the next Mac Pro. )
The folks who hype that purely as a 'apology' session are a bit delusion. The product that quickly came after that 'apology' was the iMac Pro . .... which had much of the same constraints as the MP 2013. Around 400W power supply. Single air vent exit from enclosure ( but two fans for incremental decoupling of thermal sources at different levels). Single GPU that was still embedded . Apple took the "Mac Pro" label off of it, but were not saying it was a hugely flawed product not worth making at all.
Many of the folks hyping the 'apology' aspect were clamouring that Mac Pro by WWDC 2017 because Apple is just going to slap a board in the old 4,1 case and ship. Nope. April 2018 came and folks again in the Spring began to clamor that Apple is just going to slap a Thunderbolt-less Mac Pro board into the old case and ship. Nope. Apple announced "not this year". ( shades of "we intend to complete the transition" ) .
The huge conflict is with 'ship as fast/frequently as the new MBP models" and the pace that Apple wants to go at.
If Intel could have delivered something equivalent to the W-2400 in Q4-2020 - Q2-2021 then Apple could have set a 2 year cadence for the Mac Pro that would have help significantly in demonstrating it was not a Rip-van-Winkle product.
The W6000 series updates in 2021 helped provide some "walk the walk". If look just at the MPX GPU updates there have been updates in 2020, 2021 , and 2022 ( so 'allow us to regularly update' ). [ and why likely there will be a way to add raw TFLOPs to the next Mac Pro... just maybe not a display GPU fashion. ]
But other pronouncements of "about two years transition line up" has thrown contraindicating 'talk the talk" at it also.
Could be referring to cores, but 2-chip is exactly what the Ultra is, and 4-chip would be the reportedly-cancelled Extreme. This seems like the most straightforward explanation.
Yes. 'Surprise and delight' is great for maximising the impact of a product release, and worked well for Apple when they were the plucky upstart competing with Microsoft on a much smaller budget. It's still a good PR strategy for consumer products. But people planning business purchases need to know a supplier's future intentions. If Apple announces some paradigm shift with the next Mac Pro that makes it unsuitable for a company's workflow, they'd need to migrate to Windows. Many have just bitten the bullet and done so already, on their own schedule.
Yes, it came quickly because it was already far in development and heading for release later that year. Whatever prompted Apple to announce in April 2017 that they would make another tower Mac Pro, it was clearly a panic move. They had not planned to make this machine - it took them over two and a half years to ship it.
Perhaps like you, they took Apple PR at face value and so assumed the new Mac Pro was already in development and would be coming out shortly. Apple's message was basically "hang in there a bit longer and keep the faith". It likely never occurred to those customers that they would be waiting until December 2019. And no-one thought Apple would reuse the 4,1 case; that's a ridiculous straw-man.
Apple isn't Intel. For the most part Intel doesn't make completed systems and have hundreds of customers buying their system subcomponents. Intel has to 'court'/'solicit' system vendors to adopt their parts. It is a kind of "young and single and love to mingle" dating bar scene vibe.
Apple silicon group has just one customer. Apple product groups. The SoCs are not intended to fit into no other systems other than exactly what Apple product groups choose to make. The SoC folks are looped in the entire part of the way during development so they don't have to ask to be looped in at all. Post transition the product folks won't be able to ask any other SoC vendor to participate. So it is more of a single, married to just one person for life vibe.
There is zero need to be on a dating app/service.
It isn't about killing future product sales at all. Apple's iPhone drop a new version every September. The 'new one is coming' is basically known to anyone paying attention by the time May-June rolls around. Apple doesn't comment about new products because for the most part they are always 12-18 months (or less) away from shipping something new. On the upcoming dog-and-pony show they can 'shout' about the new stuff then and for several months in commercials. Rinse and repeat.
The Mac Pro has 'problems' for more so because they don't have any discernible schedule for new whole system updates. The irregularity is the core problem not 'details'. Most of the histrionics revolve about 'if' there will be a new product, not what the next feature set is.
Apple also effective said they would support macOS on Intel for several years to come. So there was no drop dead line in the sand 2 years out for the MP 2019 product any more than there is now.
If someone had a real business requirement/need ( not 'want' or 'lust' ) for a Mac Pro in 2019-2022 they could just buy one (given a budget match. If a budget mismatch or function mismatch then buy something else that is better. )
The only folks that in trouble are the ones who are disconnected from explicit Apple support policies who want the system to last 10, or more, years. Apple never said even back in the Intel or PPC era.
The MP 2019 has a T2 chip in it. That was not a clue that a transtion was coming? MP 2019 does not work like the older Intel models did. Change was being indicated to anyone paying attention. It wasn't merely 'talk', Apple was 'doing'.
If the situation was could wait "about 2 years " for the next Mac Pro to show up then there really was not any deep core business need for the new Mac Pro. 'like 5 years ago" is even more indicative of a "nice to have" want than a hardcore business requirement/need.
As for the 'trashcan' being 'no way buying' because not 'future proof'. That is a bit of Orwellian doublespeech. It is really not the future roadmap at issue there but the backward facing support policies. Apple clearly lays out their Vintage/Obsolete policy. "I paid $24K for may system so support should last xx years" is not present at all and yet some folks continue to invoke that premise. Even the Intel with mac specific firmware era Apple didn't formally support new leading edge cards going into n-2 or n-4 Mac Pro systems. Typically it was just n-1. Apple really doesn't do maximum legacy hardware support. n-3 version of macOS is gets nothing. n-4 even more likely to get nothing.
If many folks do not read or listen to what Apple is actually saying about backward facing stuff why should Apple engage them in forward looking stuff? Didn't pay attention on the first , so likely to pay attention to the latter? Probably not.
If Apple got the Mac Pro on a regular 2, or 3, year update cycle, it would be slow moving enough so that most folks would not get hit with unexpected short term surprises. The regularity would largely clear up the 'if' something was coming or not. And it is a long enough gap so that even though the Mac Pro is not an Apple strategic or tactical priority product, Apple would have time enough to get something done.
Avkills wasn't suggesting they are. He was simply saying that other workstation manufacturers have a clear roadmap, because they predictably release new models based on Intel's public roadmap.
Agreed.
Sorry, are you claiming it was obvious at the launch of the MP2019 that Apple would be shortly transitioning to Apple Silicon??
No, the issue was that the graphics cards were completely un-upgradeable, and not that great to start off with. This turned out to be an even bigger issue, as they were also unreliable, and spares were expensive. Plus there was no other internal expansion, to e.g. fit TB3 or faster NVMe storage.
I made my point.
Apple publicly said the transition will take two years. It has taken longer. Certainly wasn’t inside info supply chain grapevine. No idea how to treat that.
One executive openly saying the AS Mac Pro is for another day (completely unreleased product by the way) while another cannot because..wait for it.. Apple doesn’t talk about unreleased products. Meanwhile in 2017 invites media to talk about un released product.
Trying to suggest Apple is consistent with its policies flies in the face of contrary evidence.
One can continue twisting one’s neck or split hairs to define how they are to be treated.
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No, 'they' didn't.
Tim Cook's words were "...and we expect this transition to take about two years."
Apple has never once promised it would take two years and no more/less.
That’s still talking about the ENTIRE lineup of unreleased Mac products 🤣🤣, never mind ‘will’ vs ‘expect’ splitting of hairs.
Yeah, to be fair to Tim, he gave himself some wiggle room with the "about two years" comment.
Also, the "about two years" clock didn't start when he made his comments at the WWDC in June, 2020, but when the company began shipping the first Apple Silicon Macs to customers on November 12, 2020.
But, we're at nearly 28 months. Is that "about" 24 months? Nope.
Let the bashing continue!
Also, the "about two years" clock didn't start when he made his comments at the WWDC in June, 2020, but when the company began shipping the first Apple Silicon Macs to customers on November 12, 2020.
But, we're at nearly 28 months. Is that "about" 24 months? Nope.
Let the bashing continue!
It's simply unrealistic, and more than a little unreasonable, to complain about a suggested 'deadline' (which was an objective, nothing more) when Apple has switched the majority of the Mac line in this timescale. Even without the ongoing effects of a global pandemic and the largest war in Europe for decades being taken into account…
Global issues have NOTHING to do with not releasing a Mac Pro. All the products shipped within the ‘expected’ timeline including a new product (Mac Studio). Unclear what world conditions have to do with a Mac Pro, when the rest of the iOS and macOS lineups shipped under those same conditions.
Just to be clear: I wasn’t talking about Apple missing it’s expected deadline, global issues notwithstanding. That Apple hasn’t yet released a nMP, points to some snag. That said, it gets done when it gets done.
I was just addressing the claim that Apple not talking about unreleased products is a consistent policy. It isn't.
Just to be clear: I wasn’t talking about Apple missing it’s expected deadline, global issues notwithstanding. That Apple hasn’t yet released a nMP, points to some snag. That said, it gets done when it gets done.
I was just addressing the claim that Apple not talking about unreleased products is a consistent policy. It isn't.
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It is pretty consistent though. The 2017 apology session was very unusual, and the result of a sudden course correction. Their hand was forced; there would have been very few Mac Pro customers left on macOS by the time the 7,1 came out otherwise.
The exec didn’t mention the Mac Pro in the recent interview as there’s currently nothing else to say. To mention it would just invite questions about it’s configuration and when it’s due, which he wouldn’t be free to answer.
Ternus only mentioned the MP at the spring event last year to make it clear the Studio - particularly the Ultra - is not its replacement. This might otherwise be the assumption, given the Studio is a new product line and is faster in various respects.
I agree the Mac Pro does appear to have suffered a delay though. In the same timeframe most of the other ASi products are on their second generation.
The exec didn’t mention the Mac Pro in the recent interview as there’s currently nothing else to say. To mention it would just invite questions about it’s configuration and when it’s due, which he wouldn’t be free to answer.
Ternus only mentioned the MP at the spring event last year to make it clear the Studio - particularly the Ultra - is not its replacement. This might otherwise be the assumption, given the Studio is a new product line and is faster in various respects.
I agree the Mac Pro does appear to have suffered a delay though. In the same timeframe most of the other ASi products are on their second generation.
Does Ukraine or Russia build anything for the Mac Pro? Surely not... I can't see how that conflict has anything to do with Mac Pro.
It seems more likely they experience difficulties in development of the new machine or changed strategy with it part way along the line. We will never know unless someone leaks something.
Even in the best of times, two years would have been highly optimistic (the Intel switch would have been a lot slower if that maker's roadmap had slipped the way it has since). No, the MP obviously does not have any components directly affected- but it's a far lower priority and much lower scale than iPhone or MacBook manufacture, and the schedules for the latter if not the former have clearly been impacted (M2 Pro/Max MBPs were several months late). Throw in the likely engineering difficulties for the MP, and the current situation results.
Actually, I think they do.
Seriously, the war has caused a lot of upheaval in the availability of tubes for audio gear and guitar amps, but I agree, it's hard to see it having an impact on the Mac Pro's development.
Yikes ! .. I guess I’ll run the wa7 firefly v2 less now to extend the tubes life.Actually, I think they do.
View attachment 2168389
Seriously, the war has caused a lot of upheaval in the availability of tubes for audio gear and guitar amps, but I agree, it's hard to see it having an impact on the Mac Pro's development.
You feel you have more expertise in this area than Tim 'supply chain' Cook? Why wouldn't they have said the transition will take three years to complete, if that was a more realistic timeframe?
They likely had good reason to feel two years was accurate, but then ran into unforeseen issues with the Extreme version and had to rethink their plans. If the Mac Pro tops out at an Ultra, how will it meaningfully set itself apart from the Studio?
It's quite possible that the plan for the Mac Pro was always the 4x Max ('Extreme'), no more, no less. There's probably enough unused TB connections from four chips to form a reasonable amount of PCIe lanes, especially if PCIe GPUs won't need to be accommodated. Throw in some PLX switches and you can support a bunch of AV capture cards and SSD RAID cards. I believe this would allow data streams from e.g. video capture to go straight to an SSD raid without needing to go through the SoCs (correct me if I'm wrong).
If there are production issues with joining 4 Max chips together, that would put the Mac Pro in a bit of a spot. There may not be a plan B, if custom silicon for this model is out of the question. They may need to choose between delaying the Mac Pro until the Extreme issues are resolved (the timeframe for which may be hard to predict), or releasing soon with an M2 Ultra. To avoid competition, the Studio would then be kept on the M1 for the rest of the M2 cycle. It would be a bad look for the Studio, who's customers would clearly be getting shafted, but Apple may be out of options.
Unfortunately, the Ultra version of the Mac Pro, if originally planned for at all, would have been the gimped, low-end version. Assuming external TB ports are driven by the equivalent of one Max chip, that would only give another Max worth of internal PCIe bandwidth, which is a bit marginal. 3x Max worth of TB / PCIe bandwidth would be necessary to be considered adequate (if still not particularly impressive). So only launching with the low-end, Ultra version of the Mac Pro would likely be a damp squib; Apple may therefore have decided against this option. If production issues are able to be resolved in the next couple of months, however, Apple will demonstrate / detail the Extreme Mac Pro at WWDC, with deliveries later in the year.
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Not really. X86 was so far ahead of PPC that the switch would still have made sense even if Intel had been stuck on Core Duo for a while. In any case, PPC had completely stalled, especially for laptop use, so Apple would have had to move from it regardless.
Ultimately, the PC has always been the comparison point for the Mac - even Apple used to run on-stage bake-offs of Photoshop etc. on both platforms. By adopting x86, Apple was guaranteed parity. If x86 stalled, it didn't really matter, as the competition stalled with it.
Gurman is saying this morning:
"Aside from the iMac, Apple is scheduled to launch about three new Macs between late spring and summer, I’m told. Those three models are likely to be the first 15-inch MacBook Air (codenamed J515), the first Mac Pro with homegrown Apple chips (J180) and an update to the 13-inch MacBook Air (J513)."
"Aside from the iMac, Apple is scheduled to launch about three new Macs between late spring and summer, I’m told. Those three models are likely to be the first 15-inch MacBook Air (codenamed J515), the first Mac Pro with homegrown Apple chips (J180) and an update to the 13-inch MacBook Air (J513)."
The worrying thing is that Gurman's rumors are saying "New Mac Pro coming with M2 Ultra!" while at the same time saying M2 is a stop-gap generation that sucks compared to M3.
So... could be anywhere from May 5 to June 21, dependent upon which seasonal model is in play with Apple. Vague, as usual.
Mac Pro as of spring 2023: An overclocked M2 Ultra, max RAM 192 GB, maybe an IO chip and some extra thunderbolt bandwidth, a lot better cooling than Studio, and some huge internal storage options, by Apple proprietary NAND modules, all controlled by SoC itself obviously. It's gonna be a 20% speed upgrade compared to M1 Ultra, but advertized to be 50% speed-up by some carefully chosen metrics, and presdented to us as pretty difficult to comprehend and impossible to read them right - charts.