MP 7,1 Waiting for Mac Pro 7,1 A1991 (no more)

[koyoot]

Well, Zen will be between Broadwell and Skylake IPC, but it will be at the beginning locked only to 6 and 8 core versions. I do not see a reason why they would wait for Zen.

 

[pat500000]

Well, Zen will be between Broadwell and Skylake IPC, but it will be at the beginning locked only to 6 and 8 core versions. I do not see a reason why they would wait for Zen.

Would zen make lot of difference? Anyway...I ended up reading one of yahoo articles and that Asian lady who introduced zen during presentation stated she didn't have any date when they will release it...so I'm thinking it would be in 2017 or later.

I was thinking Apple might have given up on Intel and seeking alternatives.

 

[koyoot]

Would zen make lot of difference? Anyway...I ended up reading one of yahoo articles and that Asian lady who introduced zen during presentation stated she didn't have any date when they will release it...so I'm thinking it would be in 2017 or later.

I was thinking Apple might have given up on Intel and seeking alternatives.

Intel and Apple have partnership. AMD would be ONLY supplier. Intel helps Apple develop standards that Apple later uses in their tech. Apple has really much to loose if Intel will go away from Apple computers.

All AMD can think of at this stage is TV setup contract from Apple, for supplying APUs for it.

 

[pat500000]

Intel and Apple have partnership. AMD would be ONLY supplier. Intel helps Apple develop standards that Apple later uses in their tech. Apple has really much to loose if Intel will go away from Apple computers.

All AMD can think of at this stage is TV setup contract from Apple, for supplying APUs for it.

I guess that partnership will be ongoing, right? or is there an alternative?

 

[koyoot]

Ask Apple about that, but nobody should underestimate power of money, technology and... "diplomacy" .

 

[pat500000]

Ask Apple about that, but nobody should underestimate power of money, technology and... "diplomacy" .

Tim should be "diplomat"

 

[Stacc]

In other news: Apple is gonna wait for zen chip for Mac Pro which is likely in 2017.

Probably not. Like Koyoot mentioned, AMD first expects to deliver Zen enthusiast processors in the 6-8 core range. The server processors up to 16 cores are unknown at this point. For reference, Intel takes an additional 12-18 months to bring its consumer chips to its workstation/server lineups.

I think the big draw for Apple to move to AMD chips would be for AMD's future APU products. Having a modern CPU and a modern GPU on the same package would allow Apple to package in more powerful graphics, something they have historically strived for in macs and its iOS products. AMD's interposer technology means that they can mix and match CPUs and GPUs without having to fabricate a new chip design each time. This allows for a more customized CPU/GPU combination for each product.

This has been where Intel has been struggling as of late. They have not been able to deliver a quad core chip with iris graphics on the 14 nm process until very recently. Quad core Broadwell/Iris was missing in action and only now is skylake slowly trickling out into the market.

Of course this all depends on AMD being competitive in performance per watt. Apple won't make the macbook/pro thicker and heavier just to fit in an AMD chip. Apple still tries to deliver the best products it can, which is why they have been using exclusively Intel chips ever since they switched to x86. Simply put, over the last 10 years Intel has dominated AMD in performance and efficiency. Catching up to Intel will be no easy challenge, so it will be interesting to see how Zen pans out. AMD's future likely depends on it.

 

[pat500000]

Probably not. Like Koyoot mentioned, AMD first expects to deliver Zen enthusiast processors in the 6-8 core range. The server processors up to 16 cores are unknown at this point. For reference, Intel takes an additional 12-18 months to bring its consumer chips to its workstation/server lineups.

I think the big draw for Apple to move to AMD chips would be for AMD's future APU products. Having a modern CPU and a modern GPU on the same package would allow Apple to package in more powerful graphics, something they have historically strived for in macs and its iOS products. AMD's interposer technology means that they can mix and match CPUs and GPUs without having to fabricate a new chip design each time. This allows for a more customized CPU/GPU combination for each product.

This has been where Intel has been struggling as of late. They have not been able to deliver a quad core chip with iris graphics on the 14 nm process until very recently. Quad core Broadwell/Iris was missing in action and only now is skylake slowly trickling out into the market.

Of course this all depends on AMD being competitive in performance per watt. Apple won't make the macbook/pro thicker and heavier just to fit in an AMD chip. Apple still tries to deliver the best products it can, which is why they have been using exclusively Intel chips ever since they switched to x86. Simply put, over the last 10 years Intel has dominated AMD in performance and efficiency. Catching up to Intel will be no easy challenge, so it will be interesting to see how Zen pans out. AMD's future likely depends on it.

I dont get this: Intel had been so slow with releasing chips even though they had been reliable.

 

[deconstruct60]

iOS devices are full of sensors that many apps rely on... they'll be emulated?

The are are emulated now in the XCode development toolchain. This patent would be a useful tool to wave at anyone trying to tip-toe into doing alternative iOS development tools space. As a sign that iOS is going to take over OS X ( macOS) it is more than somewhat toothless justification.
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I dont get this: Intel had been so slow with releasing chips even though they had been reliable.

AMD , Nvidia .... not particularly any faster. Doing 14nm , 10nm , and below solutions is getting harder and the market for the results is getting tougher to operate in ( profits slimming). Consumers are buying replacements at a slower pace ( in cellphones as well as classic PC form factors ).

 

[koyoot]

I dont get this: Intel had been so slow with releasing chips even though they had been reliable.

The CPUs are reliable. The wafers for smaller nodes are not reliable. That is why you will see decrease in IPC on Intel CPUs on smaller nodes, that will be mitigated with much wider amount of cores.

Cannonlake will be 4 core i3, 6 core i5 and 8 core i7. Thank for this to AMD Zen.

 

[deconstruct60]

...
I think the big draw for Apple to move to AMD chips would be for AMD's future APU products.

If Intel really not so competitive?

http://www.anandtech.com/show/9960/...mers-our-igps-are-equivalent-to-discrete-gpus

Intel Iris Pro with eDRAM ( which is has been around for a while ) beats the AMD APU on those charts. ( the 5775 R is exactly what Apple looped into some 2015 iMac updates ).

AMD's interposer technology means that they can mix and match CPUs and GPUs without having to fabricate a new chip design each time. This allows for a more customized CPU/GPU combination for each product.

The interposer is a slightly newer delivery mechanism for MCM ( mulitchip modules ) but Intel has been doing MCM for the last couple of years. eDRAM isn't quite as sexy as HBM but there isn't a huge skills gap here.

If feed the Intel iGPUs with enough bandwidth they do decently well. It is more an issue of cost effectiveness and profit margins ( for Intel and the system vendors ). it has take AMD so long to get their x86 "half" together that Intel had a window to work on their GPU "half".

Zen + new GPUs could prove competitive but the notion that Intel has be completely asleep at the wheel is a bit off.


To try to redirect this back to Mac Pro ...... there is little to no indication that Zen is going to
provision the kinds of PCIe v3 lanes than a Mac Pro would need if wanted to go 3 TB v3 controllers and 2 high end PCIe SSDs along with two discrete GPUs. ( and maybe 10GbE thrown on top).

AMD has trailed not just on centroal x86 core preformance but there DDR4 and PCI-v3 bandwidth adoption has been behind the curve too.




[doublepost=1465493356][/doublepost]

The CPUs are reliable. The wafers for smaller nodes are not reliable. That is why you will see decrease in IPC on Intel CPUs on smaller nodes, that will be mitigated with much wider amount of cores.

IPC throughput has to do with code ( what parallelism is present in the binary code ) and the micro architecture's ability to exploit the parallelism. Flakey transistors isn't really a directly contributing issue. Wider/more cores may increase whole package instruction throughput (again on specific ode streams that present it ), but again has little coupling to IPC ( which is a individual core metric).

Cannonlake will be 4 core i3, 6 core i5 and 8 core i7. Thank for this to AMD Zen.

More so thank a bigger transistor budget. What Intel has been doing is throwing the bulk of the increase in transistor budget into the GPU. Have had 2 cores mainstream because the transistor budget increases was being spent on GPU cores. Gen 8 , Cannonlake, is a shrink ( Gen 7 , Kaby Lake, retargeted at 10nm ). With the shrink the x86 cores are going to get some allocation increase ( instead of all most all of it going to the GPUs).

Zen is perhaps contributing a bit to the issue as a hedge that AMD won't screw things up, but there are several 4 core norms at the level below Core i that point to keeping mainstream stuck at 2 was in part because the Core i cores were bigger. As they get smaller 4 is doable at the price points Intel wants to roll out at.

 

[koyoot]

dec. If Zen would not be potentially good, Intel would not even think about offering 8 or even 6 cores as mainstream options.

What I meant about IPC is that clock for clock, you will see decrease in performance of future CPUs compared to, lets say, Skylake.

 

[goMac]

I don't think Apple is thinking about moving to AMD APUs that strongly. There has been talk that the Radeon unit might be spun off, and that they might also work with Intel as well on APUs.

 

[pat500000]

The CPUs are reliable. The wafers for smaller nodes are not reliable. That is why you will see decrease in IPC on Intel CPUs on smaller nodes, that will be mitigated with much wider amount of cores.

Cannonlake will be 4 core i3, 6 core i5 and 8 core i7. Thank for this to AMD Zen.

I'm guessing this is going to be the trend, huh? back then it was tick tock...and now it's tick tock beep.

 

[deconstruct60]

dec. If Zen would not be potentially good, Intel would not even think about offering 8 or even 6 cores as mainstream options.

If going to 6-8 cores is indicative of a serious threat what does Cannonlakes 4 cores tell you? You just pointed out that Cannloake's objective was to take 4 cores mainstream.

The Zen Summit Ridge that is going into the AM4 slot is no thread to the E5 series. Socket AM4 has 1331 pins/contacts (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Socket_AM4) versus > 2000 of the E5. In terms of Mac Pro applicability and system design it is a non starter. It is the same class as the mainstream Core i series.... which is exactly what it will compete with.

What I meant about IPC is that clock for clock, you will see decrease in performance of future CPUs compared to, lets say, Skylake.

Don't hold your breath on that happening. May see overall slower base clock rates as the number of cores goes up. That is more so to do with coherency and trying to hit lower power levels for rather pedestrian workloads far more so that defective/unreliable electronics. For the same class of processors I don't think you'll see Intel backsliding very much over the bulk of their major product line ups. Intel may kneecap some models at the edges of those lines for purely market segmentation reasons (lower overlap with other products), but it won't be because of the underlying process technology limitations.

 

[koyoot]

If going to 6-8 cores is indicative of a serious threat what does Cannonlakes 4 cores tell you? You just pointed out that Cannloake's objective was to take 4 cores mainstream.

The Zen Summit Ridge that is going into the AM4 slot is no thread to the E5 series. Socket AM4 has 1331 pins/contacts (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Socket_AM4) versus > 2000 of the E5. In terms of Mac Pro applicability and system design it is a non starter. It is the same class as the mainstream Core i series.... which is exactly what it will compete with.

Hehe, I was talking about Mainstream i3, i5, i7. And that is because Zen will be offered in 6 and 8 core versions .

Of course, I do not contradict anything what you have written about technology behind this. This is in addition to what you have written. But without Zen being good, Intel would not even think about putting 8 or even 6 cores on mainstream CPUs. You know, money from customers smells really good .

 

[Zarniwoop]

I hope software generally starts to utilize more that four cores. There are just few specialized application that really benefit of six and more cores. Even Adobe stops around six cores, unless rendering a video. Almost all games stop at two cores + ht.

 

[ManuelGomes]

Apple now an Energy Company, selling excess power. Man, they're everywhere.
Good thing they're green - not NVidia green though

http://9to5mac.com/2016/06/09/apple-energy-company/

 

[Zarniwoop]

Soon you can charge your iPhone with Apple electricity... only. But don't worry, you can make an unlimited subscribtion like with Apple music. Just pay 4,99€/month.

Most likely it is for Apple iCar. With proprietary charging system. With subscription model: Everything included for four years. Apple care and electricity. After that they change the plug... ..and it's ready for scrapping.

 

[ManuelGomes]

http://www.techpowerup.com/223291/nvm-express-over-fabrics-specification-released

NVMe over fabrics, might be seeing that on nMP soon.

http://www.techpowerup.com/223288/n...-way-sli-restricted-to-select-non-gaming-apps

Only on benchmarks for now it seems.

 

[koyoot]

I hope software generally starts to utilize more that four cores. There are just few specialized application that really benefit of six and more cores. Even Adobe stops around six cores, unless rendering a video. Almost all games stop at two cores + ht.

DirectX12 and Vulkan has lifted the CPU limitations. Dan Baker from Oxide yesterday tweeted that 12 cores in his computer were loaded with Ashes of Singularity. The general consensus is that for DX11 you needed 4 core CPU. For DX12 - it is 8 core CPU.

 

[zephonic]

http://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2016...to-use-your-gtx-1080-in-4-way-sli/?comments=1

 

[Zarniwoop]

DirectX12 and Vulkan has lifted the CPU limitations. Dan Baker from Oxide yesterday tweeted that 12 cores in his computer were loaded with Ashes of Singularity. The general consensus is that for DX11 you needed 4 core CPU. For DX12 - it is 8 core CPU.

Thanks for that report. So, software is following the trend.

macOS with Metal should follow it too. Grand central dispatch v2 avec Metal v2. I suppose they need to co-opertate in order to async computing work nicely.

 

[fuchsdh]

I don't think the word "deprecated" means what you think it means. Adobe has added OpenCL support for most operations, but the CUDA ones are far from deprecated and perform far better most of the time. It remains to be seen how much effort they continue with supporting OpenCL though given Apple's nonexistent support of it on their platform.

AE is no performance champion but if you're not seeing multithreading advantages its either your footage codec or a plugin. Quicktime is the typical culprit. Switching to modern codecs or sequence file formats should give you a boost. I am on a 20 core machine and regularly see 95%+ CPU usage during AE renders.

If it's a big file, I'm using image sequences, and it really doesn't make a major difference. Not to mention that there's no actual effective way of figuring out what is slowing your render times makes it exceptionally frustrating when you're on deadlines. *And* that Adobe actually *removed* multicore rendering from AE2015

I'm betting on waiting on macOS.
Or indeed wait for another year (or more with all the delaying) for Skylake-W, which would be a great platform but another year of waiting :-(

No reason not to just push out another update then. At some point you just end up waiting for everything to align and you get to the point where you've wasted a lot of time that new gear could have been making you money.

 

[ManuelGomes]

USB-C Alt Mode mess...
Let's hope this is all set when nMP and rMBP come with USB-C (only).
[doublepost=1465502871][/doublepost]Not even Siri knows (or won't tell) what we'll be seeing announced at WWDC. :-(

https://www.macrumors.com/2016/06/09/siri-wwdc-2016-responses/