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

[deconstruct60]

Cascade lake Xeons are vulnerable to Zombie Load... what a good beginning

At least it seems they will bring some improvement over Skylake.

https://www.hpcwire.com/2019/05/13/...nt-gen-on-gen-advantage-on-stac-benchmarking/

Source? That article mentions nothing specifically about Cascade Lake's status.


Cascade Lake SP isn't....

https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/201...leaks-data-from-intel-chips-internal-buffers/

Some Meltdown/Spectre stuff is fixed in hardware and some stuff isn't. (there is a pretty clear table in this article).

https://www.anandtech.com/show/1330...e-intel-clarifies-whiskey-lake-and-amber-lake

These Microarchitectural Data Sampling ( MDS ) variants that popped up in this recent bunch is mainly variations on the same mechanism. The stuff associated with loading which were part of the root cause of Meltdown varianta 3 and 5 doesn't need individual fixes for each exploit variant layered on the same foundation. If they remove the base root cause then numerous of these variants all disappear.

Intel hasn't fixed everything possible in hardware, but there is very substantive fixes in Cascade Lake (and newer Mainstram processors. ). In the context of what is deployed already, that doesn't help much. But in terms of new products through the rest of 2019 the "danger" level is lower.


Searching the Internet found a copy of the paper.

https://arxiv.org/pdf/1905.05726.pdf

Table 2 on page 8.


Most the of "whip it out fast ... instead of correct" tech/rumors press can't wait to whip out the articles.
"ZombieLoad" in Cascade is more salacious clickbait than fact.

 

[deconstruct60]

The Cube mostly failed because it didn't have a niche at all. A different situation than the 6,1.

There was a niche ...... it was tooooooooo small of a niche. A major component of that smallness was its relatively expensive price. Way more than mainstream Macs. NeXT was "supposed to" stay out of Apple's way so it was a "higher education workstation" ( research grant money would buy the system so price target kept creeping higher $2000 , $3,000 ...... to $6000 in 1989 $ about $13K now. Then general retail for $9,999 even higher. ) . It was being targeted at what Sun and Apollo/HP already had a better grip on without a Mag-Optical drive and DSP bumping the costs higher.

On a more concrete note—if the Xeon-W moves from quad to six-channel memory, does that mean we get a minimum of six DIMMs on the Mac Pro? What about the iMac?

It is doubtful that the whole Xeon W line up is going to move to a new socket ( as moving from quad to six channel ) would require (and alao abandoning the C44x chipset ). While the W-3745 is unlikely to remain a sole "fluke" outlier in the line up, that move probably isn't going to represent the whole line up.
( either in the Xeon W or top end of the HEDT line up. )

In short, the Xeon W will become about as socket muddled as the Core i7-i9 line up. W-2xxx and W-3xxx models would at least be more clearly identifiable as separated as opposed to what Intel used to do in the i7 line up several iterations back.

I wouldn't bet on Apple going down the W-3xxx path. Not only do you get a 6 DIMM baseline foundation but the socket is even bigger. So the whole CPU + DIMMs footprint is even bigger. To put a cherry on top the alternative chipset ( C600 series) is about twice the TDP than the C44x set largely for features that Apple is probably never going to use. Same number of CPU PCI-e lanes ( no bump). Same RAM cap. (no bump). Which will push the system volume higher and base clocks lower (at any sensible price range). If one of the primary goals is to make the Mac Pro substantively more expensive than the iMac Pro that is fine.

However, that doesn't address much of the primary problems that most folks have with the iMac Pro ( and rest of the current Mac line up) that are either still circling the airport on Mac Pro 2009-2012 , MP 2013 , and/or previously left 3-4 years ago for other solutions.

The Xeon W-3xxx series exists mostly because Intel doesn't really have a workstation answer for Threadripper when the focus is primarily skewed toward core count. To a large extent it is just a gap filler.
Once their fab progression momentum disappears it will probably mostly disappear on the next socket change ( around 2021 or so).

I would doubt that Apple is going to chase some transitory path.

 

[askunk]

Source? That article mentions nothing specifically about Cascade Lake's status.

https://techcrunch.com/2019/05/14/zombieload-flaw-intel-processors/

 

[deconstruct60]

Apple may go with three. (The chipset in the 6,1 supported 12 DIMMs with a single socket - Apple went with four.)

Three doesn't follow any path that Apple has taken.

In the Mac Pro class space Apple has typically put one DIMM for each memory controller since Intel put memory controllers into the CPU. Corner case on only one (of the 3 ) controllers on the 2009-2012 era had two just to get to 4. The number of DIMMs generally some power of 2. ( 2 , 4 , 8 ).

For the Xeon W-2xxx class that has four controllers there would likely be either 4 ( or possible 8 if they doubled up all four... similar to how they double up the 2 controllers on the mainstream processor in the iMac. ). If Apple for some reason jumped on the W-3xxx bandwagon they'd probably attach all six. ( Intel is still likely to cap the max memory the same ). If going with the W-3xxx series primarily just to crank the 'entry' core count higher above 18 then it doesn't make any sense to then memory bandwidth kneecap them. A much bigger socket for more pins and then don't use them is more than a bit of a waste.
[doublepost=1558115630][/doublepost]

https://techcrunch.com/2019/05/14/zombieload-flaw-intel-processors/

Chuckle. I reference the paper of the folks who found the problem and they say no. Your counter is to yet another a tech porn press article which didn't do the research directly and didn't write up the core aspects of problem in detail . ( Techcrunch quotes Daniel Gruss. He name is on the paper). The vast majority of Techcruch readership doesn't have any Cascade Lake SP systems so I get why they are sweeping this into one big overly simplistic pile.


Yes, Intel released new firmware for the Cascade Lake. No that probably specifically wasn't just for ZombieLoad specifically. There is OTHER defect variants out there and the firmware may help with one the other foundations that ZombieLoad is built on. The articles that try to sweep all of this into one "Walking Dead" code name aren't really doing a clear and factual job.

 

[askunk]

Chuckle. I reference the paper of the folks who found the problem and they say no. Your counter is to yet another a tech porn press article

There is a continuous attitude here that if you write something is to prove your dick is longer than others'. I wasn't "countering" anything. I wrote my post BEFORE yours and when you asked me the source of my sentence, I wrote it. You have posted an exhaustive report, admirable and proved me wrong. I'm really glad, as if I weren't it would have been quite embarrassing for Intel.
There are people like you who are well into the sources, others like me who like to be part of the conversation and try to give a little contribution. I am an Electronic Engineer by training, but I ended up doing something quite different in life, applying my knowledge in a different field than microelectronics. I am not the first one posting something wrong (we just had two pages discussing a fake ... and it was fun ) and I don't do it on purpose. I'm relying on this forum to explain me if the news is false, like it just happened. Just don't take it as a confrontation. Peace, man.
Thank you.

 

[tralfaz]

Pfft.

Klein bottle design.

With folding oled touchbar keyboard and airpower magic trackpad.

Plus Klein bottles have built in handles. Perfect for Apple.

 

[Biped]

Plus Klein bottles have built in handles. Perfect for Apple.

The non-orientable surface topology might be the answer to Apple's thermal fetish.

 

[Boil]

What if Apple is using their work with LCP (Liquid Crystal Polymer) for Tetris-ing together a modular Mac Pro...?

 

[kiiso]

My predictions for MP 7,1:
​

Processors: Intel Cascade Lake Xeon-W. These are the updated versions of the CPUs used in iMac Pro. I think the 2nd generation scalabel Xeons (Silver/Gold/Platinum) are simply too expensive, and the base clock is not high enough. What about dual CPU setup? As mentioned previously in this thread before, the industry is moving towards single shocket systems.

• Xeon W-3275 28 core, 2.5 GHz base, 205W
• Xeon W-3265 24 core, 2.7 GHz base, 205W
• Xeon W-3245 16 core, 3.2 GHz base, 205W
• Xeon W-3235 12 core, 3.3 GHz base, 180W
• Xeon W-3225 8 core, 3.7 GHz base, 160W
• Xeon W-3223 8 core, 3.5 GHz base, 160W

Memory: 6 channel, ECC DDR 4, Apple probably going with 6 dimm slots (instead of the full 12) so up to 384 GB. I believe it will be user serviceable.

Storage: Similar to the iMac Pro, i predict that the new MP will have 2 custom SSD-s in RAID, locked by the T2/3 chip. ~4GB/s read and write.
1 TB standard, up to 6 TB as BTO option.
Lets hope for at least 1 additional user accessible standard NVMe slot.

Graphics: PCIe 4.0, AMD Navi 12 and Navi 10 based Radeon Pro. Dual GPU setup as BTO option, up to 24GB GDDR6/GPU.

Ports: 6x Thunderbolt 3, 4x USB-A, Dual 10Gb Ethernet

 

[Boil]

My predictions for MP 7,1:
​

Processors: Intel Cascade Lake Xeon-W. These are the updated versions of the CPUs used in iMac Pro. I think the 2nd generation scalabel Xeons (Silver/Gold/Platinum) are simply too expensive, and the base clock is not high enough. What about dual CPU setup? As mentioned previously in this thread before, the industry is moving towards single shocket systems.

• Xeon W-3275 28 core, 2.5 GHz base, 205W
• Xeon W-3265 24 core, 2.7 GHz base, 205W
• Xeon W-3245 16 core, 3.2 GHz base, 205W
• Xeon W-3235 12 core, 3.3 GHz base, 180W
• Xeon W-3225 8 core, 3.7 GHz base, 160W
• Xeon W-3223 8 core, 3.5 GHz base, 160W

Memory: 6 channel, ECC DDR 4, Apple probably going with 6 dimm slots (instead of the full 12) so up to 384 GB. I believe it will be user serviceable.

Storage: Similar to the iMac Pro, i predict that the new MP will have 2 custom SSD-s in RAID, locked by the T2/3 chip. ~4GB/s read and write.
1 TB standard, up to 6 TB as BTO option.
Lets hope for at least 1 additional user accessible standard NVMe slot.

Graphics: PCIe 4.0, AMD Navi 12 and Navi 10 based Radeon Pro. Dual GPU setup as BTO option, up to 24GB GDDR6/GPU.

Ports: 6x Thunderbolt 3, 4x USB-A, Dual 10Gb Ethernet

I would really rather see:

Processors: 7nm Zen 2 Ryzen Threadripper 3

• 3990WX 64C/128T, 3.5GHZ/4.2GHz, 250W
• 3970WX 48C/96T, 3.5GHZ/4.2GHz, 250W
• 3950X 32C/64T, 3.7GHz/4.4GHz, 180W
• 3920X 24C/48T, 3.7GHz/4.4GHz, 180W

Memory: Quad-channel, ECC DDR4, eight DIMM slots, maximum 512GB BTO, 64GB standard (4 @ 16GB DIMMs), user serviceable

Samsung A-die DIMMS, high-speed, low-latency, high-density, up to 64GB sticks

Storage: T2 (T3?) with dual Apple-proprietary SSDs in RAID, ~4GB/s read and write, 2 TB standard, up to 8 TB BTO

Graphics: PCIe 4.0, two triple-width slots (x16, x16), one double-width slot (x8)

• AMD Radeon VII, 7nm Vega 20, 60CU, 16GB HBM2
• AMD Radeon RX 3090X, 7nm Navi 20, 64CU, 8GB GDDR6 (available Q2 2020)
• AMD Radeon RX 3080X, 7nm Navi 10, 56CU, 8GB GDDR6
• AMD Radeon RX 3070X, 7nm Navi 10, 48CU, 8GB GDDR6

Triple-width slots give dual-width GPUs room to breathe
x8 dual-width slot for the 12G SDI 8K video I/O folks, or a wicked fast NVMe-based RAID card

Ports: four TB3 / USB-C, four USB-A, dual 10Gb Ethernet, one 3.5mm headphone jack

 

[ETN3]

I would really rather see:

Processors: 7nm Zen 2 Ryzen Threadripper 3

• 3990WX 64C/128T, 3.5GHZ/4.2GHz, 250W
• 3970WX 48C/96T, 3.5GHZ/4.2GHz, 250W
• 3950X 32C/64T, 3.7GHz/4.4GHz, 180W
• 3920X 24C/48T, 3.7GHz/4.4GHz, 180W

Memory: Quad-channel, ECC DDR4, eight DIMM slots slots, maximum 512GB RAM, user serviceable

Samsung A-die DIMMS, high-speed, low-latency, high-density, up to 64GB DIMMs

Storage: T2 (T3?) with dual Apple-proprietary SSDs in RAID, ~4GB/s read and write, 2 TB standard, up to 8 TB BTO

Graphics: PCIe 4.0, two triple-width slot (x16, x16), one double-width slot (x8)

• AMD Radeon VII, 7nm Vega 20, 60CU, 16GB HBM2
• AMD Radeon RX 3090X, 7nm Navi 20, 64CU, 8GB GDDR6 (available Q2 2020)
• AMD Radeon RX 3080X, 7nm Navi 10, 56CU, 8GB GDDR6
• AMD Radeon RX 3070X, 7nm Navi 10, 48CU, 8GB GDDR6

Triple-width slots give dual-width GPUs room to breathe, x8 dual-width slot for the 12G SDI 8K video I/O folks

Ports: four TB3 / USB-C, four USB-A, dual 10Gb Ethernet, one 3.5mm headphone jack

Threadrippers with Nvidia BTO would be a wet dream

 

[Boil]

Threadrippers with Nvidia BTO would be a wet dream

LOL, I could see Apple allowing Nvidea BTO, but only Quadro RTX cards...?
[doublepost=1558178352][/doublepost]HAH...! Just saw this, from a month or so before the 2013 cylindrical Mac Pro came out...

Assuming the four slot system they reference is double-width slots, the middle tower would be what is needed for my most recent hardware configuration...

But in Space Grey, and no front I/O, just a TouchID power button behind the Apple logo, okay Tim...?

And, since I really would not need the third PCIe slot, maybe even just go with two 2.5-width slots (GPUs still gotta breathe) and get something a bit smaller like the far right mini tower...!

 

[askunk]

Ports: four TB3 / USB-C, four USB-A, dual 10Gb Ethernet, one 3.5mm headphone jack

On-board (pun intended ) with you, it would be bliss. I would just expect 6 TB3 rather than 4. And I hope(...lessly expect) the return of the TOS-link (optical) in/out. They killed it on the tMP, the Apple TV and in notebooks... such a shame.

 

[Mago]

I based on plausible leaks I've been tracking, I consider the next mMP to be as follows:

Form factor: desktop, mini tower, about 18" tall, vertical airflow, CPU/RAM/PSU in the rear half, 2 GPU PCIE in vertical at the frontal "lobe" triple width, room for a common optional radiator on top, GPU has to include internal display port interface, legacy dp/HDMI interface's accessible thru an optional adapter Linking it to the back end.

Frontal lobe in space gray, rear lobe in space Black.
Rounded corners as the Mac mini, open top for natural convection, dual ~20cm fans on top.

CPU: no real clues, assuming apple and AMD has working own thunderbolt 3 compatible host Chip, we could see an Epyc - TR3 mMP with PCIE 4 , else apple will be stick with Intel Xeon-W and PCIE3

TDP ~ 900-1000W but "quiet" configurations may need barely need 250W

RAM, 6-8 slots ECC DDR4

Storage: ridiculous expensive apple PCIE but x8 interface faster than anything on Earth (.. )

GPUs: at launch AMD Vegas only, later nVidia as bto or as diy upgrade, AMD Navi may not come to the Mac this year

Ports: 6x TB3 4x-6x USB 3-whatever, 1-3 HDMI 2.x or DP1.4

No real cues on a 3rd PCIE slot for non GPU s peripherals.

Apple may launch it's own TPU for training/inference no cues if pcie or TB3

Base mMP cost the same as current tcMP 6 core, but starting with 8 cores and a single passive cooled GPU (Rx vega 48 likely)

Apple professional display to be usb-c/tb3 6400x2880 pixel, curved

A new pro desktop keyboard is possible including the touch bar and slim mechanical switches.

No chance for 2p sata m.2 neither arm switch.

 

[Boil]

Form factor: desktop, mini tower, about 18" tall, vertical airflow, dual ~20cm fans on top.

Going by the dual 200mm fans up top & the 18" tall, I would put the rough dimensions at 460mm H x 210mm W x 420mm D. This is about 45 liters, which is only 5 liters smaller than the Cheesegrater Mac Pro. That is a bit ridiculous...?!?

CPU: no real clues, assuming apple and AMD has working own thunderbolt 3 compatible host Chip, we could see an Epyc - TR3 mMP with PCIE 4, else apple will be stick with Intel Xeon-W and PCIE3

See specs below for my latest Apple / Threadripper thoughts...!

RAM, 6-8 slots ECC DDR4

Threadripper is quad-channel, Epyc is octo-channel; so four or eight RAM slots, depending on which CPU is used. But I would bet on Threadripper, as Epyc is slower & would drive the price up substantially.

GPUs: at launch AMD Vegas only, later nVidia as bto or as diy upgrade, AMD Navi may not come to the Mac this year

See specs below for my latest Apple / Navi thoughts...!

Ports: 6x TB3 4x-6x USB 3-whatever, 1-3 HDMI 2.x or DP1.4

Video output would probably be via the TB3 / USB-C ports...?

Apple professional display to be usb-c/tb3 6400x2880 pixel, curved

I don't know about curved, flat-panel better for CAD, page layout, other things with straight lines...?

A new pro desktop keyboard is possible including the touch bar and slim mechanical switches.

Not sure about that Touch Bar, but I am down for an Apple mechanical keyboard...!

 

[edgerider]

I see you, and raise you one over-engineered masterpiece...

2019 modular Mac Pro

7.7" cubed, but with the same vertical curved corners as the Mac mini (of which we are sharing the width & depth dimensions), appropriately sized feet to match the proportions of the chassis while still providing appropriate breathing room for bottom intake fan.

A quick video for insight into the PSU...

So, with that view of the layout on the Space Grey Mac mini, we move to the 7.7" Cube modular Mac Pro version...

Take the same PSU concept, make it go all the way up in the 7.7" tall (excluding feet) chassis. That should allow about 6x the volume for the PSU than in the mini. The mini PSU is 120W, hopefully Apple can do a 750W PSU...?

So now we have three of the 'interior walls' flat, but one still has those pesky curved corners (the one across from the PSU). What to do...? Storage...! Four 2.5" SSDs (two stacks of two SSDs) should not be an issue. That 'flattens out' the fourth 'interior wall'.

So on the inside of the front of the chassis, there will be a backplane with four daughtercard slots, all arraigned vertically.

First daughtercard next to the PSU is the main daughtercard, Threadripper 3 as outlined in above post, but only the two 180W versions (24C/48T & 32C/64T) with copper vapor chamber heatsink & four SO-DIMM slots (RAM slots located below PCH heat sink), & T2 chip with two (Apple-proprietary) NVMe SSDs; heatsink fins & RAM oriented vertically. Let's say the package 'stack' (daughtercard PCB / socket / CPU / vapor chamber heatsink) is 60mm thick, 140mm tall, & as wide as possible. Smaller copper vapor chamber heat sink on PCH as well. T2 / SSDs located on backside of PCB.

The next two daughtercard slots would be PCIe 4.0 x16 slots, for (Apple-proprietary) GPUs, more copper vapor chamber heat sinks with vertically oriented fins. Let's say these package 'stacks' are 30mm thick, with the heat sinks 140mm tall & as wide as possible.

GPU options (again, these are all going to be Apple-proprietary, not drop-in industry standard PCIe GPUs), all these have internal pass-thru (via the backplane) from GPU to rear TB3 / USB-C I/O.

Radeon RX 3090X (7nm Navi 20, 64CU , 16GB GDDR6, 225W, available Q1 2020)
Radeon RX 3080X (7nm Navi 10, 56CU , 8GB GDDR6, 190W)
Radeon RX 3070X (7nm Navi 10, 48CU , 8GB GDDR6, 160W)

Final daughtercard is the rear I/O card, this will be a 10mm thick package; four TB3 / USB-C ports, four USB-A ports, two 10Gb Ethernet ports, one 3.5mm headphone jack. If Apple has some nice ultra-high speed backplane action, this could allow I/O to be upgraded in the future!

Two Apple-specific (one can hope) Noctua Chromax NF-A14x25 PWM fans , one on the bottom as intake & the other on the top as exhaust. Fans 'smart-controlled' by inputs from a myriad of temp sensors.

So...! All that. packed into a 7.5 liter volume (not including feet).

if the go for cooling flow from bottom to top, it is alredy a dead end :
server and it room are designed with a standard : front to back cooling flow...

 

[aaronhead14]

My predictions for MP 7,1:
​

Processors: Intel Cascade Lake Xeon-W. These are the updated versions of the CPUs used in iMac Pro. I think the 2nd generation scalabel Xeons (Silver/Gold/Platinum) are simply too expensive, and the base clock is not high enough. What about dual CPU setup? As mentioned previously in this thread before, the industry is moving towards single shocket systems.

• Xeon W-3275 28 core, 2.5 GHz base, 205W
• Xeon W-3265 24 core, 2.7 GHz base, 205W
• Xeon W-3245 16 core, 3.2 GHz base, 205W
• Xeon W-3235 12 core, 3.3 GHz base, 180W
• Xeon W-3225 8 core, 3.7 GHz base, 160W
• Xeon W-3223 8 core, 3.5 GHz base, 160W

Memory: 6 channel, ECC DDR 4, Apple probably going with 6 dimm slots (instead of the full 12) so up to 384 GB. I believe it will be user serviceable.

Storage: Similar to the iMac Pro, i predict that the new MP will have 2 custom SSD-s in RAID, locked by the T2/3 chip. ~4GB/s read and write.
1 TB standard, up to 6 TB as BTO option.
Lets hope for at least 1 additional user accessible standard NVMe slot.

Graphics: PCIe 4.0, AMD Navi 12 and Navi 10 based Radeon Pro. Dual GPU setup as BTO option, up to 24GB GDDR6/GPU.

Ports: 6x Thunderbolt 3, 4x USB-A, Dual 10Gb Ethernet

It needs PCIe and NVIDIA graphics, otherwise it will be an utter failure the day of its release.

 

[Boil]

Now, I see your modular Mac Pro, and raise you one over-engineered masterpiece...

7.7" cubed, but with the same vertical curved corners as the Mac mini (of which we are sharing the width & depth dimensions), appropriately sized feet to match the proportions of the chassis while still providing appropriate breathing room for bottom intake fan.

A quick video for insight into the PSU...

So, with that view of the layout on the Space Grey Mac mini, we move to the 7.7" Cube modular Mac Pro version...

Take the same PSU concept, make it go all the way up in the 7.7" tall (excluding feet) chassis. That should allow about 6x the volume for the PSU than in the mini. The mini PSU is 120W, hopefully Apple can do a 750W PSU...?

So now we have three of the 'interior walls' flat, but one still has those pesky curved corners (the one across from the PSU). What to do...? Storage...! Four 2.5" SSDs (two stacks of two SSDs) should not be an issue. That 'flattens out' the fourth 'interior wall'.

So on the inside of the front of the chassis, there will be a backplane with four daughtercard slots, all arraigned vertically.

First daughtercard next to the PSU is the main daughtercard, Threadripper 3 as outlined in above post, but only the two 180W versions (24C/48T & 32C/64T) with copper vapor chamber heatsink & four SO-DIMM slots (RAM slots located below PCH heat sink), & T2 chip with two (Apple-proprietary) NVMe SSDs; heatsink fins & RAM oriented vertically. Let's say the package 'stack' (daughtercard PCB / socket / CPU / vapor chamber heatsink) is 60mm thick, 140mm tall, & as wide as possible. Smaller copper vapor chamber heat sink on PCH as well. T2 / SSDs located on backside of PCB.

The next two daughtercard slots would be PCIe 4.0 x16 slots, for (Apple-proprietary) GPUs, more copper vapor chamber heat sinks with vertically oriented fins. Let's say these package 'stacks' are 30mm thick, with the heat sinks 140mm tall & as wide as possible.

GPU options (again, these are all going to be Apple-proprietary, not drop-in industry standard PCIe GPUs), all these have internal pass-thru (via the backplane) from GPU to rear TB3 / USB-C I/O.

Radeon RX 3090X (7nm Navi 20, 64CU , 16GB GDDR6, 225W, available Q1 2020)
Radeon RX 3080X (7nm Navi 10, 56CU , 8GB GDDR6, 190W)
Radeon RX 3070X (7nm Navi 10, 48CU , 8GB GDDR6, 160W)

Final daughtercard is the rear I/O card, this will be a 10mm thick package; four TB3 / USB-C ports, four USB-A ports, two 10Gb Ethernet ports, one 3.5mm headphone jack. If Apple has some nice ultra-high speed backplane action, this could allow I/O to be upgraded in the future!

Two Apple-specific (one can hope) Noctua Chromax NF-A14x25 PWM fans , one on the bottom as intake & the other on the top as exhaust. Fans 'smart-controlled' by inputs from a myriad of temp sensors.

So...! All that. packed into a 7.5 liter volume (not including feet).
[doublepost=1558202590][/doublepost]

if the go for cooling flow from bottom to top, it is alredy a dead end :
server and it room are designed with a standard : front to back cooling flow...

But it is not a server, it is a personal desktop workstation...

 

[danwells]

I think x8 storage is relatively likely - there aren't flash chips that fast without using RAID unless Apple went all-Optane or pure SLC at ridiculous expense - but two or four "drives" in RAID connected to an x8 version of the T2 /T3 controller would work at a more reasonable cost. The disadvantage is that this means a 2 TB minimum configuration (heavily Apple Taxed).

Probably the big-socket Xeon-W chips, which seems to be a developing consensus around here. Intel is said to be releasing 2066 pin Xeon-W chips as well, which will be limited to the lower core count dies (and 4 channel RAM).

My suspicion is that the iMac Pro will get the 2066 pin (avoids a major motherboard redesign) and be available from 10-18 cores (18 will remain the maximum for the smaller socket). The Mac Pro gets the big socket and is available from 12 or 16 to 28 cores. Neither one will be available with 8 core chips (even though Intel makes them) - those 8 core chips are actually slightly slower than the Core i9-9900K available in a consumer iMac for many tasks. They're really meant for entry-level servers where I/O is more important than raw processing power.

EPYC would be very nice, but the Thunderbolt issue is a big one, and Apple is conservative enough that I strongly suspect Intel. Dual socket is extremely unlikely unless Apple gets Intel (or AMD) to make some custom chips. The fast $1000-$3000 single socket chips Apple is using don't come in dual socket versions - they come in single socket and 8 socket versions, and the 8 socket chips are three times the price per chip. HP does use the 8 socket chips in dual socket workstations, but the prices are absurd. If Apple could get ahold of dual socket chips at a 125% or 150% price of single socket instead of 300%, maybe...

6 or hopefully 12 RAM slots, user accessible. Minimum RAM 48 (possibly 96) GB. 16 and 32 GB Registered ECC DIMMs - what the iMac Pro uses, probably carried over to the Mac Pro - are quite a bit cheaper per gigabyte than 8 GB, so Apple may very well offer a minimum configuration of 96 GB (6x16) instead of using the more expensive 8 GB DIMMs (at Newegg prices, the difference between 48 and 96 GB is under $200). 32s are actually the cheapest per byte, but the difference is smaller, and a 192 GB minimum configuration seems awfully high. 384 GB maximum (768 GB if they allow 12 slots).

1 AMD GPU in an Apple GPU Slot in baseline configuration, 1 Apple GPU Slot free. An Apple GPU Slot is probably just a PCIe v3 x16 slot with a small extension to funnel the video out a Thunderbolt port on the motherboard, but it accepts a GPU with a different physical shape (no rear ports, for one thing) and with (liquid?) cooling supplied by the Mac instead of huge, loud fans on the GPU. It might be a PCIe v4 slot, again with a nonstandard GPU shape. Apple won't accept loud, inefficient standard GPUs, especially when the different form factor helps keep NVidia away. Depending on the timing of Navi, the baseline GPU will either be a Vega 64 (64X?), a Radeon VII or some Navi equivalent. Upper-end GPUs may well run into the Radeon Instinct range.

Possibly a couple of standard NVMe SSD slots, possibly a nonstandard Apple Storage Expansion slot or two (not both).

Possibly a PCIe slot, probably half-length with 75 watts of power (no fans) for odd I/O cards.

Ports:
A bunch of TB3 ports - most likely 6 on 3 buses (like the existing Mac Pro, except TB3), possibly 4 on 2 buses (iMac Pro), some chance of 8 on 4 buses. There may be a way of bridging two Thunderbolt ports on different buses for high-performance eGPU boxes (etc.)?

Dual Ethernet (either dual 10 Gb or 10 Gb plus 1 Gb). The secondary Ethernet doesn't need to be 10 Gb (it's for Internet, printers, etc. while the primary Ethernet handles the fast LAN with NAS, servers, etc.) - will Apple keep it simple and use two of the same, or will they conserve PCIe lanes with a slower secondary port?

A few convenience ports (almost certainly a couple of standard USB-A , ideally front-mounted - they're largely for memory sticks and the like). Probably a headphone jack. Maybe, but unlikely, a SD or SD/XQD/CFExpress reader?

They won't include a port other than TB3 unless it meets one of two criteria.
1.) It's so universal that most people want it (USB-A)
2.) It's widely used, and uses so much bandwidth that it messes up TB3 docks (10 Gb Ethernet).

Only 10 Gb Ethernet and maybe a very high bandwidth HDMI port mess up the bandwidth a dock has available - anything else fits on a $300 dock easily enough. There's one dock with 10Gb Ethernet, but it has reduced USB and video connectivity to deal with the Ethernet port's high bandwidth requirement.

The obvious "fits on a dock, but everybody wants it" port is USB-A - headphone jacks, HDMI and card readers might also fit in this category.

 

[ZombiePhysicist]

Anyone else wishing apple would go with AMD? I like their chips better than intel. Beyond them having a realistic likelihood of getting 7nm chips out, they have more PCI lanes. And cores. They seem to be working harder and better than intel and frankly intel deserves some 'punishment' for their stalled processor development.

 

[danwells]

I'd love to see AMD, but Apple's conservative and loves Thunderbolt.

I'll also change my price prediction - I've long said $6499 to start, but Intel did us a big favor with those single-socket Cascade Lake Xeon-Ws that are so much cheaper than the SPs.

12 core, 48 GB, 1 TB, Vega 64 starting configuration at $5499

Possibly $5999 but higher starting configuration: 12 core, 96 GB, 2 TB, Vega 64.

Fully loaded (28 core, 384 GB, 8 TB, some sort of Radeon Instinct), it'll hit $25000 or more

I hope it's not as tightly packed as Boil's possibility - that Mac Mini RAM upgrade looks as tricky as a "take the screen off" iMac. I'm hoping at least the RAM (and maybe storage expansion) is either a hatch or at worst a "take the cover off and it's staring you in the face" type upgrade.

A system as tightly packed as Boil's would also be fun to cool... Not impossible - liquid cooling would certainly work - but a design challenge.

 

[ridgero]

Do you really think Apple could release a Mac Pro with AMD Epyc? They need to have a Thunderbolt solution.

 

[Mago]

Now, I see your modular Mac Pro, and raise you one over-engineered masterpiece...

7.7" cubed, but with the same vertical curved corners as the Mac mini (of which we are sharing the width & depth dimensions), appropriately sized feet to match the proportions of the chassis while still providing appropriate breathing room for bottom intake fan.

A quick video for insight into the PSU...

So, with that view of the layout on the Space Grey Mac mini, we move to the 7.7" Cube modular Mac Pro version...

Take the same PSU concept, make it go all the way up in the 7.7" tall (excluding feet) chassis. That should allow about 6x the volume for the PSU than in the mini. The mini PSU is 120W, hopefully Apple can do a 750W PSU...?

So now we have three of the 'interior walls' flat, but one still has those pesky curved corners (the one across from the PSU). What to do...? Storage...! Four 2.5" SSDs (two stacks of two SSDs) should not be an issue. That 'flattens out' the fourth 'interior wall'.

So on the inside of the front of the chassis, there will be a backplane with four daughtercard slots, all arraigned vertically.

First daughtercard next to the PSU is the main daughtercard, Threadripper 3 as outlined in above post, but only the two 180W versions (24C/48T & 32C/64T) with copper vapor chamber heatsink & four SO-DIMM slots (RAM slots located below PCH heat sink), & T2 chip with two (Apple-proprietary) NVMe SSDs; heatsink fins & RAM oriented vertically. Let's say the package 'stack' (daughtercard PCB / socket / CPU / vapor chamber heatsink) is 60mm thick, 140mm tall, & as wide as possible. Smaller copper vapor chamber heat sink on PCH as well. T2 / SSDs located on backside of PCB.

The next two daughtercard slots would be PCIe 4.0 x16 slots, for (Apple-proprietary) GPUs, more copper vapor chamber heat sinks with vertically oriented fins. Let's say these package 'stacks' are 30mm thick, with the heat sinks 140mm tall & as wide as possible.

GPU options (again, these are all going to be Apple-proprietary, not drop-in industry standard PCIe GPUs), all these have internal pass-thru (via the backplane) from GPU to rear TB3 / USB-C I/O.

Radeon RX 3090X (7nm Navi 20, 64CU , 16GB GDDR6, 225W, available Q1 2020)
Radeon RX 3080X (7nm Navi 10, 56CU , 8GB GDDR6, 190W)
Radeon RX 3070X (7nm Navi 10, 48CU , 8GB GDDR6, 160W)

Final daughtercard is the rear I/O card, this will be a 10mm thick package; four TB3 / USB-C ports, four USB-A ports, two 10Gb Ethernet ports, one 3.5mm headphone jack. If Apple has some nice ultra-high speed backplane action, this could allow I/O to be upgraded in the future!

Two Apple-specific (one can hope) Noctua Chromax NF-A14x25 PWM fans , one on the bottom as intake & the other on the top as exhaust. Fans 'smart-controlled' by inputs from a myriad of temp sensors.

So...! All that. packed into a 7.5 liter volume (not including feet).
[doublepost=1558202590][/doublepost]

But it is not a server, it is a personal desktop workstation...

So this is the mMP of your dreams, keep dreaming....

There is 0 chance to see CPU in daughter board, current architecture is too complicated for that (#lines HS capacitance etc)

Same for m.2 data spinners, its like enable microsd and FM radio in iPhones

About AMD TR Epyc and ryzen, while Intel tb3 controller can be interfaced to any PCIE it also needs Intel certification, so I really give it little chance this year

 

[Macintosh IIcx]

It needs PCIe and NVIDIA graphics, otherwise it will be an utter failure the day of its release.

I agree, but nVidia will only happen as a third party down the road, certainly not an Apply supported solution at launch!

 

[Mago]

Do you really think Apple could release a Mac Pro with AMD Epyc? They need to have a Thunderbolt solution.

Intel's TitanRidge tb3 controller, but it may needs Intel certification, hackers found a way to enable Alpine ridge tb3 PCIE cards in Thread ripper system by editing the firmware, so it is possible but needs Intel cooperation...