MP 7,1 What does Apple's switch to ARM based processors mean for the future of the Mac Pro

[startergo]

Unlikely. There are those who love the Intel Macs and if you want to run Windows, natively or on a VM, then you're going to want an Intel Mac. In fact there's a lot of things that an Intel Mac will be more useful/flexible for than an ARM Mac. I suspect that the last generations of the Intel Macs will hold their value on the resale market longer than most for precisely this reason.

The advertised speed/power of the MBP is not coping with the thermal throttling. You hold in your hands one hot potato with reduced capability. That is all because of the wrong concept Intel (and AMD) were using :
Reduced die size and increased number of transistors (more and more heat), whereas processors with RISK-V and ARM architecture are the future from what we can see.

 

[fuchsdh]

The A-series chips are a genuine marvel for the devices they currently run but that isn't proof that the silicon will scale well for high-performance desktop parts. I would never believe their marketing fluff without some independent, platform-agnostic benchmarks; it certainly takes more than slapping on a HSF and cranking up the voltage to squeeze out linear performance gains. I'm cautiously optimistic that they'll have something rivaling their current high-end i9-Xeon offerings in a year or two. They're crushing the competition in the mobile space, so you've to give them some credit at least.

One thing that's certain is that Apple is steaming ahead with their One True Goal: total vertical integration of their hardware/software and gradual decoupling from the larger PC market. Apple wants very badly to avoid 1:1 commodity-style comparisons between their products and other offerings in the same product space because their entire business model relies on a significant profit margin on each item sold. It's much easier to market laptops when you've convinced your audience (rightly or wrongly) that you're the only company doing what you do.

I'd also argue that's a big reason they don't care all that much about the 'Pro' market, because by and large that segment actually does view computing power as a commodity. They just want a fast and reliable tool at a reasonable cost, interoperable with existing industry standards.

The first thing someone does when they get their A12Z dev kit is going to be to run Geekbench on it, and there's basically no way Ifixit doesn't get someone to throw them theirs to disassemble and we'll see what sort of cooling solution there is. The proof will be in the pudding soon enough.

 

[bsbeamer]

Why aren’t more ‘pros’ jumping ship completely?

Clients. They’re on macOS for video/creative usages and I’m required to be. Several big companies held off on the MP7,1 after the delays and were seeing how it played out this year, then moved to iMac/Pro as stop gap.

Several others went iMacs in February/March when the work from home started for COVID19, and some through at least the next 6-12+ months. They’re set for at least 2-3 years before next purchase.

We’ll see several sticking on Catalina for awhile, if IT departments allow it.

 

[DaveP]

Excellent point. Apple sure does play it off like they very much have the ‘pro’ market in their hip pocket though!

The pro market is a tiny percent of Apple's revenue and profit. It's not so much that they act like they have the pro market in their pocket, but rather that they don't really care very much. The Mac is like 10-12% of revenue and the Mac Pro is probably a few percent of that. It's likely a safe assumption that the Mac Pro is well under 1% of total revenue and I'd be surprised if it was even 0.5%.

 

[dspdoc]

The pro market is a tiny percent of Apple's revenue and profit. It's not so much that they act like they have the pro market in their pocket, but rather that they don't really care very much. The Mac is like 10-12% of revenue and the Mac Pro is probably a few percent of that. It's likely a safe assumption that the Mac Pro is well under 1% of total revenue and I'd be surprised if it was even 0.5%.

I understand it is a tiny margin, but Apple should still pay it more attention and take it very seriously given the price point at which people are into their machines. Not to mention they simply ought to respect the work being done, given Apple’s past history and reputation for catering to the creative pro.

 

[minifridge1138]

I find the statement that you can run iOS or iPadOS apps on the ARM MacOS to be kind of useless fluff. Of course you can, it's all basically the same, but who really wants to? I have a desktop precisely because a tablet and the tablet apps can't/don't do what I need them to.

Yeah, this has been an option for years. Developed run their iOS apps in the XCode emulator all the time. I’m not sure why they didn’t open this up to consumers a long time ago.
Of course it should be smoother now on native hardware and not in an iPhone emulator.

 

[blackadde]

The first thing someone does when they get their A12Z dev kit is going to be to run Geekbench on it, and there's basically no way Ifixit doesn't get someone to throw them theirs to disassemble and we'll see what sort of cooling solution there is. The proof will be in the pudding soon enough.

I sure hope so, but it'll have to involve breaking an NDA. Apple's lawyers are vicious.

From Anandtech:

And although the A12Z SoC inside the DTKs is a known quantity at this point, like their other beta programs, Apple will be keeping a tight lid on performance. The DTK license agreement bans public benchmarking, and even though developers will pay $500 to take part in the program, the DTKs remain the property of Apple and must be returned. So while leaks will undoubtedly drip out over the coming months, it would seem that we’re not going to get the chance to do any kind of extensive, above-the-board performance testing of Mac-on-Arm hardware until the final consumer systems come out late this year.

 

[fuchsdh]

I sure hope so, but it'll have to involve breaking an NDA. Apple's lawyers are vicious.

From Anandtech:

Yeah, that's not going to stop anyone.

 

[Unregistered 4U]

I can trade in my reliable tiny key FOB in exchange for lugging are round a huge piece of breakable glass that needs to be constantly recharged to get in my car!

You... CAN... I guess. But, knowing how you feel about it, why WOULD you do such a thing??
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Apple, you effing make me sick.

From personal experience, when any of the folks I’ve dealt with indicate that Apple made them sick, I suggested AND helped them move on to another platform. It wasn’t easy, but it was always the right thing to do. Those Pro’s moved on LONG ago and are looking at Apple only with a casual interest... nowhere near the amount of emotional connection for it to cause them any pain whatsoever!

 

[kucharsk]

You don't see a huge wave of people jumping ship *today* because many of them (including myself) jumped ship a long time ago. The 2013 trashcan was my own last straw. Anecdotally: I went to an art school where 95%+ of people were on first gen MacBook Pro's through our program, and almost none of them I'm still in touch with is using a Mac for their work anymore. Some are still using MacBooks casually as secondary devices.

I know lots of graphic designers, and almost every one of them bought a Mac with their own money after suffering with a Windows box for six to seven months.

 

[goMac]

The first thing someone does when they get their A12Z dev kit is going to be to run Geekbench on it, and there's basically no way Ifixit doesn't get someone to throw them theirs to disassemble and we'll see what sort of cooling solution there is. The proof will be in the pudding soon enough.

The A12Z has already been benchmarked in an iPad Pro. I don't think there will be any new performance details to be learned. A12Z is a known quantity.

My guess is that it's air cooled in a Mac Mini in since A12Z is designed to be air cooled. But they could throw a heat sink or fan on there for fun.

 

[DaveP]

I understand it is a tiny margin, but Apple should still pay it more attention and take it very seriously given the price point at which people are into their machines. Not to mention they simply ought to respect the work being done, given Apple’s past history and reputation for catering to the creative pro.

I would assume that is one of the main reasons they threw people a bone with the Mac Pro and didn't just kill it off like the XServe.

 

[Pressure]

Apple margins are going through the roof after this transition.

The 28-core Xeon W-3275 has a list price of $4449. The i9-10900 is $439.

 

[phobos]

The A12Z has already been benchmarked in an iPad Pro. I don't think there will be any new performance details to be learned. A12Z is a known quantity.

My guess is that it's air cooled in a Mac Mini in since A12Z is designed to be air cooled. But they could throw a heat sink or fan on there for fun.

I'm sure what is there on the Mac Mini dev machines is a modified version of the A12Z on the iPad. Probably more cores running on higher frequencies that work with USB and other extra bells and whistles.
So it's definitely worth benchmarking once the devs get their hands on it.

 

[incoherent_1]

The A12Z has already been benchmarked in an iPad Pro. I don't think there will be any new performance details to be learned. A12Z is a known quantity.

My guess is that it's air cooled in a Mac Mini in since A12Z is designed to be air cooled. But they could throw a heat sink or fan on there for fun.

Yep. Agreed. I don't think we'll see anything new or stunning from the Mac mini with an A12Z in it.

Apple is moving very intentionally here – they clearly don't want anyone to know the capabilities of their first production ARM Mac that'll ship to consumers. 12 years ago, I would've said that's a bad sign, but knowing now how amazingly Apple has built out its SoC design teams, I think they have a real beast of a processor they're working on.

 

[JPack]

I'm sure what is there on the Mac Mini dev machines is a modified version of the A12Z on the iPad. Probably more cores running on higher frequencies that work with USB and other extra bells and whistles.
So it's definitely worth benchmarking once the devs get their hands on it.

If it had more cores, it would not be called A12Z.

Updating the A12Z means expensive photomasks (hundreds of millions of dollars alone). Not to mention tying down the silicon design team. And to what end? So 10,000 developers can feel more speed? The silicon team would rather spend time working on silicon for the next iPhones and Macs.

 

[monkeybagel]

It wont be that hard for these smaller developers because people aren't writing things in assembly anymore. Apple will

I wouldn't really say many people do this. Bare metal Hypervisors have largely superseeded this need to run VM's on your workstation. It's becoming more of a niche to host the VM's on your own machine directly and much more common to use containers now, probably 10 to 1 on containers to VM's on-machine actually and of course containers won't have any issue with the processor switch as all the libraries and frameworks underpinning what most people use containers for will all get updated very quickly.

I think this refers to developers mainly and not network/system engineers, which often pilot identical configurations on their workstations for regression/patch testing and .1 update testing before deployment to production systems. I myself use this capability often, and prefer the OS X environment for its flexibility.

 

[OkiRun]

In the same boat. Just ordered a new Mac Pro after the event today. Hardest button I ever clicked!

You're not in a boat, you're in a battleship. The 7,1 has been a workhorse since arriving. No issues at all with apple hardware and software - using the XDR -
If this computer is for your company, have peace of mind.
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I'm highly skeptical. I don't see a lot of compelling apps on the iOS side that would make me feel like I have to have them on my Mac. I have an iPhone and iPads and I'm happy to have lightweight apps designed to perform there and high-end apps for my high-end software.

I think most iOS apps won't be used much on full-blown Macs. There's a subset of apps that will be, but many of those already exist in MacOS versions anyway. This whole move isn't about app cross-compatibility. Apple could care less ultimately about that. It's about them making a more tightly integrated product they can totally control, and make even more profit from every machine. Having one unified code base is great for them on a cost-savings basis and app cross-compatibility is more like a side effect, not a target goal.

I agree. If someone wants to run apps, they will get a mac mini or iMac.

 

[jinnyman]

I’m worried about the performance of ARM.
Nothing at all was mentioned in the keynote with regard to the performance comparison. All keynotes just mentions like it’s great and works fast, etc. If so enthusiastic about the performance benefit, why not offer the performance comparison charts? They have Final cut pro running natively on beta, why not compare that with intel one?
Does “Apple Silicon” offer a true scalability for professional platform? If ARM chips are so great and has enormous potentials, Server market should have been dominated by them already. Why not?

Anyhow, we can all see that any major 3rd party software development for intel platform is dead. Good luck to all MP buyers and owners.

 

[daveedjackson]

You're good! I'm about to place my order for a 16-core. I bet Mac Pro will be the last model to make the transition to ARM. That gives us plenty of time (years) to make money with this new machine. And I bet we'll still get a pretty penny for it on the second hand market when it's time to move on. My 2012 Mac Pro is currently selling for $1800-$2100. We're good!

is there a chance, they will update the logic board and make it the same spec with a different CPU?

 

[tsialex]

is there a chance, they will update the logic board and make it the same spec with a different CPU?

History shows us that Apple did the upgrade route two times officially and one time more or less non-officially:

1. Apple I to Apple II (official upgrade process where at the time you could send your Apple I and get a discount on the Apple II)
2. Apple IIe to Apple IIGS upgrade kit (official upgrade kit)
3. One time more or less non-officially, where you could buy from Apple Parts a Quadra 900 to Quadra 950 kit with the new logic board, Workgroup Server PDS Card (SCSI+cache combo card) and the frontal faceplate from the server version and replace it yourself for you to run Workgroup Server 95.

AFAIK, Apple never did it again since 1995, if someone remembers another upgrade route that I forgot, please post.

So, if you gonna work with your Mac Pro and clients will pay for it - go ahead. If you don't make enough money from it to be a business expense and pay within 4 years, it's better to totally forget 2019 Mac Pro with the current scenario/info from WWDC'20.

 

[bsbeamer]

I’m worried about the performance of ARM.
Nothing at all was mentioned in the keynote with regard to the performance comparison. All keynotes just mentions like it’s great and works fast, etc. If so enthusiastic about the performance benefit, why not offer the performance comparison charts? They have Final cut pro running natively on beta, why not compare that with intel one?
Does “Apple Silicon” offer a true scalability for professional platform? If ARM chips are so great and has enormous potentials, Server market should have been dominated by them already. Why not?

Anyhow, we can all see that any major 3rd party software development for intel platform is dead. Good luck to all MP buyers and owners.

Long story short, the Apple Silicon they'll put in ready to deploy machines is not yet made and what is ready is not yet ready to deploy for primetime. It's a beta and testing setup at best. They'll base the developer kit on the A12Z and there are "strict" criteria not to run benchmarks. We likely won't see true benchmarks until the first machine is available for purchase, but likely will see Apple branded benchmarks at announcement time for the first offering.

At a 2 year roadmap transition (minimum) it'll be awhile before we see Apple Silicon versions of MP8,1 or even higher end iMac/Pro. The G5 to MacPro 2006 was at least (mostly) the same sort of external design. I'd assume the ARM MacPro would at least use the main design to save on R&D, but who knows...

I'm glad the majority of the businesses I work with took the "wait a year" approach with the MP7,1. Then the COVID19 pandemic hit and nearly all transitioned to iMac/Pro machines for extended work from home situations. Some are on MBP16,1's and really pushing those to the limits. Those machines are typically less of an "investment" and usually a 2-5 year planned lifespan, so hopefully the kinks are worked out and we'll have more clarity as it gets closer to budgeting for replacements. If not, they'll be dual-booted with macOS on Catalina and running Windows X.

 

[Yebubbleman]

I would imagine apple's new processor would eventually apply to their whole mac lineup. Wondering if that means Mac Pro 7,1 will be phased out sooner or later? Perhaps my concerns don't make sense, but I wanted to ask the board their thoughts around the future of the Mac Pro with apple's own ARM processor.
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ARM/Apple Silicon advancements are such that the raw power to overtake anything weaker than a 16" MacBook Pro is here NOW.

Past that, it will be another year to two years for the performance to eclipse anything 16" MacBook Pro or beefier.

You're not going to see the Mac Pro replacement until later. Even then, even by 2000's standards (which is to say, back when things weren't supported for as long by Apple as they are now anyway), you will have another six years from now before the current Mac Pro is no longer supported for even security patches for its last macOS version. But, considering that Apple is now supporting their things for much longer (plus the aforementioned lead time on an all-ARM product to replace the current Mac Pro), that's most probably the BARE MINIMUM. It will likely be quite a bit longer from 6 years from today.

Wondering the same thing myself.

I am within the return window for my 7,1 MP, but I am not sure if it is worth returning.

The ARM thread is causing a lot of hype and panic that Apple is going to suddenly obsolete machines they just released within a year or two. Would they really do that with this all new 2019 MP design? It seems to me that they put a whole lot of effort into developing it. It is quite a polished machine and built phenomenally.

I would think that Apple has had a roadmap laid out long before they released it. So if ARM was right around the corner why wouldn't they just save it for that?

The 7,1 sure does feel like the modular design all us MP users were begging for. It seems like a machine that should still be current 10 years from now...?

Considering how many Power Mac G5s were still in use by the time they were finally kicked out of security patch support from Apple (let alone thereafter), I'd say that a 7,1 will still be very much worth having in ten years from now. Realistically, the Mac Pro is probably going to be the last machine to switch from Intel, much like it was the last machine to switch to it. Apple only has the ability to outperform machines weaker than a 16" MacBook Pro in terms of performance with its own silicon today. They're going to need another year or two to be able to successfully catch the bigger fish. The performance you get from a 28-core (let alone 16-core) Xeon is going to take Apple some time to replicate for ARM.

 

[daveedjackson]

History shows us that Apple did the upgrade route two times officially and one time more or less non-officially:

1. Apple I to Apple II (official upgrade process where at the time you could send your Apple I and get a discount on the Apple II)
2. Apple IIe to Apple IIGS upgrade kit (officiall upgrade kit)
3. One time more or less non-officially, where you could buy from Apple Parts a Quadra 900 to Quadra 950 kit with the new logic board, Workgroup Server PDS Card (SCSI+cache combo card) and the frontal faceplate from the server version and replace it yourself for you to run Workgroup Server 95.

AFAIK, Apple never did it again since 1995, if someone remembers another upgrade route that I forgot, please post.

So, if you gonna work with your Mac Pro and clients will pay for it - go ahead. If you don't make enough money from it to be a business expense and pay within 4 years, it's better to totally forget 2019 Mac Pro with the current scenario/info from WWDC'20.

Not likely. Given some people have spent 30k + on this system. Expensing us one thin. But 4 years no way.

 

[bsbeamer]

Unfortunately, it does not matter what you've spent on the system. It's basically the same for those that bought into the XSERVE and multiple XSERVE RAID units for FCP. This is a repeating ebb/flow pattern with Apple's PRO user focus. So much promise for change, but just circles back to more of the same.