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

[Blair Paulsen]

There's a difference between obsolete and no longer state of the art. I'm looking forward to PCIe4 as much as the next guy, but the 7,1 does provide a lot of PCIe3 lanes.

There's also something to be said about more mature sub-systems being more reliable. Saving a few minutes on a render is great, but mix in a couple of render fails that need to be re-run against deadline...

 

[pasamio]

Feels to me that the Mac Pro is more likely to be canned in a 5 year time frame than replaced by an ARM version in a 2 year time frame. I can’t see how it makes any economic sense whatsoever for Apple to make server/workstation class ARM cpu‘s for the trivial volume that would get used in the Mac Pro.

The decision to revamp the Mac Pro was surely made long before the decision to switch to ARM.

The Mac Pro "apology" came out in early 2017 with a promise to revamp the Mac Pro however no actual details behind it, Bloomberg did a piece around a year later in 2018 with the prediction that by 2020 Apple would be transitioning to ARM and in December 2019 we finally see the Mac Pro announced almost out of the blue barely six months ahead of the ARM transition announcement that they've apparently been planning for years. Certainly six months out I have to imagine that they have plan for what they want to announce at the WWDC keynote. They had two years to figure out what to do with the Mac Pro in the context of their ARM shift. They still launched it as is and are talking about continuing to launch some more Intel Macs in the two year transition window.

I wouldn't characterise it as "long before", based on public information it might be a year but one has to imagine the ARM transition work was happening before the leak. There was more than enough time to can the project early and not waste another two years worth of engineering effort.

 

[Ethosik]

But it didn't fix anything.

Every subsystem in the 7,1 was obsolete on launch day.

Yes, we want PCIe lanes - but not 3.0, we want 4.0 now, and 5.0 in 2021.

Upgradability is a mirage - MPX is the 7,1s version of thunderbolt.

You won't see Apple ARM with Vega, because AMD has already stopped making VEGA chips (You might see RDNA2 however, NAVI 32 appears to be tied to Apple OS).

...How was it obsolete on day one? There were no newer Xeons when it released. And the Xeon it came with does not support PCIe 4.0. https://ark.intel.com/content/www/u...on-w-3223-processor-16-5m-cache-3-50-ghz.html

What about PCIe 6? 7? This whole idea of a system being obsolete on DAY ONE because another technology is JUST STARTING to come out is ridiculous. There were no suitable RDNA2 or NAVI GPUs when the 2019 Mac Pro was released. I fail to see how something NOW means it was out of date on DAY ONE.

 

[ssgbryan]

...How was it obsolete on day one? There were no newer Xeons when it released. And the Xeon it came with does not support PCIe 4.0. https://ark.intel.com/content/www/u...on-w-3223-processor-16-5m-cache-3-50-ghz.html

What about PCIe 6? 7? This whole idea of a system being obsolete on DAY ONE because another technology is JUST STARTING to come out is ridiculous. There were no suitable RDNA2 or NAVI GPUs when the 2019 Mac Pro was released. I fail to see how something NOW means it was out of date on DAY ONE.

Why go with Xeon when both Threadripper & Epyc out perform both? Xeons are hot, slow and expensive in comparison to the competition. Apple knew this 3 years ago when the 1st generation of Eypc was launched. AMD went from strength to strength, while Intel fiddled about on 14nm++.

PCIe 4.0 wasn't starting to come out - it was already available. It was on my motherboard (ASUS WS-570 ACE) before the 7,1 came out. It isn't like Apple was unaware that PCIe 4.0 was coming.

Why were there no RDNA or RDNA 2 CPUs? - Apple went with MPX - yet another Apple solution in search of a problem to solve. If I decide that I need an RDNA2 GPU, I simply buy one and install it. And it just works.

Apple users, on the other hand, will convince themselves that they don't actually need a modern video card.

 

[pasamio]

Why go with Xeon when both Threadripper & Epyc out perform both? Xeons are hot, slow and expensive in comparison to the competition. Apple knew this 3 years ago when the 1st generation of Eypc was launched. AMD went from strength to strength, while Intel fiddled about on 14nm++.

Perhaps because they have an established relationship with Intel that they don't have with AMD that gave them better access? Perhaps because whilst the AMD chips do have better performance they have other stability and reliability issues in other places? Perhaps because if you're about to shift to your own silicon six months after release you don't want to partner with an entirely new company to get the last few products of your line out the door because you don't want to commit to the volume they'd be expecting?

I can think of just a few reasons off the top of my head for not going to AMD for the Mac Pro without even really trying.

Not that I entirely disagree with the sentiment, I think a Mac Pro with those chips in it could be amazing but given the strategy position that was never going to happen.

 

[Ethosik]

Why go with Xeon when both Threadripper & Epyc out perform both? Xeons are hot, slow and expensive in comparison to the competition. Apple knew this 3 years ago when the 1st generation of Eypc was launched. AMD went from strength to strength, while Intel fiddled about on 14nm++.

PCIe 4.0 wasn't starting to come out - it was already available. It was on my motherboard (ASUS WS-570 ACE) before the 7,1 came out. It isn't like Apple was unaware that PCIe 4.0 was coming.

Why were there no RDNA or RDNA 2 CPUs? - Apple went with MPX - yet another Apple solution in search of a problem to solve. If I decide that I need an RDNA2 GPU, I simply buy one and install it. And it just works.

Apple users, on the other hand, will convince themselves that they don't actually need a modern video card.

The motherboard I am looking at that supports the i9-9900k is only PCIe 3.0. You are acting like PCIe 4.0 is available in every single motherboard and is so widely used that the Mac Pro was suddenly obsolete. FYI, latest Xeons still only support PCIe 3.0. So yes, PCIe 4.0 is still new technology.

 

[OkiRun]

The Mac Pro "apology" came out in early 2017 with a promise to revamp the Mac Pro however no actual details behind it, Bloomberg did a piece around a year later in 2018 with the prediction that by 2020 Apple would be transitioning to ARM and in December 2019 we finally see the Mac Pro announced almost out of the blue barely six months ahead of the ARM transition announcement that they've apparently been planning for years. Certainly six months out I have to imagine that they have plan for what they want to announce at the WWDC keynote. They had two years to figure out what to do with the Mac Pro in the context of their ARM shift. They still launched it as is and are talking about continuing to launch some more Intel Macs in the two year transition window.

I wouldn't characterise it as "long before", based on public information it might be a year but one has to imagine the ARM transition work was happening before the leak. There was more than enough time to can the project early and not waste another two years worth of engineering effort.

It's possible, maybe not likely, that while heavily into the development and production of the 7,1, an ARM breakthrough was achieved.

Am not knowledgable about most of the tech issues in this thread ~ but doesn't impede the discussing. The Trash Can Mac Pro received many complaints and Apple agreed they had build-in constraints to the computer. I never read anything about 'an apology'. I guess it is the semantic argument therein.
Something that is visible to me is that the 6,1 is still selling and is sought after machine. It's prices are high on eBay and other internet sites. Apple render farms are buying them up as many as can be found. Is this the case of the ugly duckling turning into the swan? If you found $500 6,1 for sale on eBay, would you buy it? I think many would.

 

[pasamio]

For reference here's the MacRumors article entitled "Apple Apologizes About Mac Pro's Lack of Upgradability, Ensures It's Still Committed to Pros" where in it has the quotes from Phil Schiller saying sorry on a couple of different topics about the Mac Pro.

The Mac Pro 6,1 still has a quality that comparative hardware doesn't have: the entitlement to run MacOS. If you're after a cheap Mac, and a Mac Pro 6,1 at $500 would be that, then of course it'd be tempting to pick it up. I don't see that happening for a few more years though.

 

[ssgbryan]

The motherboard I am looking at that supports the i9-9900k is only PCIe 3.0. You are acting like PCIe 4.0 is available in every single motherboard and is so widely used that the Mac Pro was suddenly obsolete. FYI, latest Xeons still only support PCIe 3.0. So yes, PCIe 4.0 is still new technology.

No, I am acting like PCIe 4.0 (and ECC ram) is available on mid-range and above motherboards, whether consumer grade Ryzens, workstation level Threadrippers, or server level EYPC based systems.

The Ryzen 3900x & the 3950x out perform i9 based systems in productivity. Zen 3 will see another 15% increase in performance on top of that.

PCIe 3.0 is the downside of staying with Intel. Of course, both Intel and AMD will be on PCIe 5.0 by the end of next year (Just in time for the AM5 socket), whereas the 7,1 will still be on PCIe 3.0 in 2022. If you don't need performance, why buy a 7,1 at all?

You aren't going to sell this as a good thing - I have already lived through this with my 4,1 and PCIe 2.0, when the rest of the world moved to PCIe 3.0.

If you moved to AMD you have better performance, at a lower TDP and lower cost.

Don't even have to give up OSX, AMD systems make fine hackintoshes.

Am not knowledgable about most of the tech issues in this thread ~ but doesn't impede the discussing. The Trash Can Mac Pro received many complaints and Apple agreed they had build-in constraints to the computer. I never read anything about 'an apology'. I guess it is the semantic argument therein.
Something that is visible to me is that the 6,1 is still selling and is sought after machine. It's prices are high on eBay and other internet sites. Apple render farms are buying them up as many as can be found. Is this the case of the ugly duckling turning into the swan? If you found $500 6,1 for sale on eBay, would you buy it? I think many would.

If you don't understand the tech issues, what do you bring to the discussion?

The 6,1 is junk - the D700 GPUs died by the bucketload; No way to replace them, because the GPU rom is on the motherboard, not the video card.

Thunderbolt 2 is no longer supported by Apple. Both the CPU and the GPU are thermally throttled. I.e. you can't push either one to it's maximum potential, much less push both of them at the same time. Which is why we buy workstations.

The people who are collecting up 6,1s are the same folks that collected up the G4 cube after it crashed and burned. They are pretty, but not powerful.

 

[Ethosik]

No, I am acting like PCIe 4.0 (and ECC ram) is available on mid-range and above motherboards, whether consumer grade Ryzens, workstation level Threadrippers, or server level EYPC based systems.

The Ryzen 3900x & the 3950x out perform i9 based systems in productivity. Zen 3 will see another 15% increase in performance on top of that.

PCIe 3.0 is the downside of staying with Intel. Of course, both Intel and AMD will be on PCIe 5.0 by the end of next year (Just in time for the AM5 socket), whereas the 7,1 will still be on PCIe 3.0 in 2022. If you don't need performance, why buy a 7,1 at all?

You aren't going to sell this as a good thing - I have already lived through this with my 4,1 and PCIe 2.0, when the rest of the world moved to PCIe 3.0.

If you moved to AMD you have better performance, at a lower TDP and lower cost.

Don't even have to give up OSX, AMD systems make fine hackintoshes.




If you don't understand the tech issues, what do you bring to the discussion?

The 6,1 is junk - the D700 GPUs died by the bucketload; No way to replace them, because the GPU rom is on the motherboard, not the video card.

Thunderbolt 2 is no longer supported by Apple. Both the CPU and the GPU are thermally throttled. I.e. you can't push either one to it's maximum potential, much less push both of them at the same time. Which is why we buy workstations.

The people who are collecting up 6,1s are the same folks that collected up the G4 cube after it crashed and burned. They are pretty, but not powerful.

Then I fail to see why you are stating that its (even now) out of date? The latest Xeons possible only support PCIe 3.0. I fail to see how that means its an out of date system when ANY Intel based computer is on PCIe 3.0. Therefore, PCIe 4 and 5 is still rolling out.

Again, the 10th generation Intel chips - i9-10900k is still on PCIe 3.0. So what if AMD has it? That does not make the Mac Pro immediately outdated if even the latest Intel chips released in 2020 are on PCIe 3.0.

 

[mode11]

You never owned a G5 Powermac did you? If your computer sounds like a 747 taking off, someone somewhere has failed to achieve sufficient efficiency.

No, but my Mac Pro has two 130W CPUs in it and is pretty quiet. I sat out the G5 era on Windows, but I've experienced an MDD G4 (like Concorde taking off) and my QS 1.0DP is certainly loud by today's standards, even with some silencing mods.

Does that make an ARM based retrofit impossible, or just difficult?

Impossible. Not that Apple has any interest in that type of thing anyway.

You forget that Apple publicly apologized for the Mac Pro situation in 2016/2017 causing the iMac Pro to be created while the 2019 Mac Pro was being developed.

I didn't forget anything - I ended the post by saying that dropping the MP 7,1 would cause a lot of bad feeling amongst precisely the people they were trying to win back by releasing it in the first place. Also, I disagree with your timeline. Apple apologised for the Mac Pro situation in April 2017, saying they were going to bring out a new modular pro Mac. The iMac Pro was obviously already in pre-production by then - it came out later that year. It was clearly originally intended to be the Mac Pro going forward.

Something made Apple change their mind in early 2017, but they were starting from nothing at that point - which is why it took them until the end of 2019 to release the Mac Pro 7,1. They called the emergency press meeting as they knew developing the MP from scratch would take a long time and there might be no high end Mac market left by then. So Apple took the very uncharacteristic move of pre-announcing a product - years in advance.

 

[mode11]

The latest Xeons possible only support PCIe 3.0. I fail to see how that means its an out of date system when ANY Intel based computer is on PCIe 3.0.

I think the point ssgbryan is making is that if Intel is lagging behind, they could have gone with AMD, who are on a tear right now, rather than switching to ARM. But that wouldn't let them merge macOS with iOS, or save cash by using their own CPUs / APUs...
[automerge]1593856221[/automerge]

There's also something to be said about more mature sub-systems being more reliable. Saving a few minutes on a render is great, but mix in a couple of render fails that need to be re-run against deadline...

I've heard nothing about PCIe 4.0 being unreliable. Accept it - there is no advantage to older, slower technology in this context. If the 7,1 had PCIe 4.0, we'd all be touting it as the kind of advantage a $6000 (base) computer gives you. The MP 7,1 is supposed to be about money-no-object performance, not torn a new one by high-end Ryzen desktops.

 

[macguru9999]

No, but my Mac Pro has two 130W CPUs in it and is pretty quiet. I sat out the G5 era on Windows, but I've experienced an MDD G4 (like Concorde taking off) and my QS 1.0DP is certainly loud by today's standards, even with some silencing mods.

The wind tunnel G4 tower is much noisier than the g5 tower, which just revs up occasionally. The mac pro intel models are usually very quiet by comparison.

 

[mode11]

Yeah, I've got no experience with G5's - but their huge cases and heatsinks were designed for quiet cooling, so I'd be surprised if they were that noisy. Stephen.R seemed to think so, but maybe he's just speculating.

The MDD design was the G4 generation the jumped the shark. Apple were trying to do their usual thing of keeping the outside the same, whilst adding an extra 5.25" drive, PCI slot and cooling for two highly clocked G4's. But in a compact case with a solid front, it was a bridge too far.

 

[Stephen.R]

so I'd be surprised if they were that noisy. Stephen.R seemed to think so, but maybe he's just speculating.

I owned a dual 2GHz G5 PM for several years, before which I had a G4 400Mhz (I think?) PM. The amount of noise that G5 could produce was a crime against ears. I've heard quieter vacuum cleaners.

 

[Ethosik]

No, but my Mac Pro has two 130W CPUs in it and is pretty quiet. I sat out the G5 era on Windows, but I've experienced an MDD G4 (like Concorde taking off) and my QS 1.0DP is certainly loud by today's standards, even with some silencing mods.




Impossible. Not that Apple has any interest in that type of thing anyway.




I didn't forget anything - I ended the post by saying that dropping the MP 7,1 would cause a lot of bad feeling amongst precisely the people they were trying to win back by releasing it in the first place. Also, I disagree with your timeline. Apple apologised for the Mac Pro situation in April 2017, saying they were going to bring out a new modular pro Mac. The iMac Pro was obviously already in pre-production by then - it came out later that year. It was clearly originally intended to be the Mac Pro going forward.

Something made Apple change their mind in early 2017, but they were starting from nothing at that point - which is why it took them until the end of 2019 to release the Mac Pro 7,1. They called the emergency press meeting as they knew developing the MP from scratch would take a long time and there might be no high end Mac market left by then. So Apple took the very uncharacteristic move of pre-announcing a product - years in advance.

How exactly is my timeline incorrect? I said they apologized in 2017 and said they are making the iMac Pro during the wait. Which they did in 2017. I am not sure what you are referring here when you actually agreed with my timeline.
[automerge]1593860603[/automerge]

I think the point ssgbryan is making is that if Intel is lagging behind, they could have gone with AMD, who are on a tear right now, rather than switching to ARM. But that wouldn't let them merge macOS with iOS, or save cash by using their own CPUs / APUs...
[automerge]1593856221[/automerge]


I've heard nothing about PCIe 4.0 being unreliable. Accept it - there is no advantage to older, slower technology in this context. If the 7,1 had PCIe 4.0, we'd all be touting it as the kind of advantage a $6000 (base) computer gives you. The MP 7,1 is supposed to be about money-no-object performance, not torn a new one by high-end Ryzen desktops.

I still fail to see how this makes Apple's Mac Pro immediately obsolete. They are restricted by Intel which does not support PCIe 4.0. PCIe 4.0 is brand new technology that is just starting to come out - as just AMD has it. So I do not think its a fair argument to say that lacking PCIe 4.0 makes it obsolete when even new Intel processors in 2020 do not support it yet.

 

[mode11]

I was referring to your characterisation of the timeline i.e. announce intention to make MP > quickly design and release iMP in a few months > bring out MP after almost 2 years. My point was that the iMP was already in the pipeline for release that year, which was why there were no plans at the beginning of 2017 for a new MP.

Then the MP eventually did come out, which is why there's been no iMP update in over two and a half years. It'll likely now get discontinued. So a bit of a mess all round.

 

[Ethosik]

I was referring to your characterisation of the timeline i.e. announce intention to make MP > quickly design and release iMP in a few months > bring out MP after almost 2 years. My point was that the iMP was already in the pipeline for release that year, which was why there were no plans at the beginning of 2017 for a new MP.

Then the MP eventually did come out, which is why there's been no iMP update in over two and a half years. It'll likely now get discontinued. So a bit of a mess all round.

Yeah and I stated that exact same thing. Between the announcement in 2017 and release of the iMac Pro it was obviously in the works for some time, not something they just woke up and discussed. I am confused here as to what the issue is? Everything I said was true. The apologized in 2017 and said they are working on an iMac Pro in 2017 to be available in the meantime. Obviously the iMac Pro was in development before it was publicly stated. But so has this ARM transition. Does not make it wrong if I state Apple publicly stated in WWDC 2020 that they are moving away from Intel because all we had to go on before was rumors. Yeah it was in the works for a long time but doesn't make the statement false that it wasn't announced until WWDC 2020.

 

[NotTooLate]

Why go with Xeon when both Threadripper & Epyc out perform both? Xeons are hot, slow and expensive in comparison to the competition. Apple knew this 3 years ago when the 1st generation of Eypc was launched. AMD went from strength to strength, while Intel fiddled about on 14nm++.

PCIe 4.0 wasn't starting to come out - it was already available. It was on my motherboard (ASUS WS-570 ACE) before the 7,1 came out. It isn't like Apple was unaware that PCIe 4.0 was coming.

Why were there no RDNA or RDNA 2 CPUs? - Apple went with MPX - yet another Apple solution in search of a problem to solve. If I decide that I need an RDNA2 GPU, I simply buy one and install it. And it just works.

Apple users, on the other hand, will convince themselves that they don't actually need a modern video card.

Can you please provide a general description on what work do you think it take to move from Intel to AMD ?

 

[mode11]

I still fail to see how this makes Apple's Mac Pro immediately obsolete. They are restricted by Intel which does not support PCIe 4.0. PCIe 4.0 is brand new technology that is just starting to come out - as just AMD has it. So I do not think its a fair argument to say that lacking PCIe 4.0 makes it obsolete when even new Intel processors in 2020 do not support it yet.

Well, first of all, obsolete is a bit strong. Obviously PCIe 3.0 is still plenty fast for most applications. The issue is that the MP is a 'no-compromise' model, with a price to match. The MP is only for people who demand the best and have a business case for a high-throughput machine. Otherwise, buy an iMP (or a PC). But the crux here is whether Apple 'had' to stay with Intel, or could move to AMD. If we are looking at the PC market as whole, then yes, PCIe 3.0 is clearly obsolete.

Yeah and I stated that exact same thing.

Yeah, but you didn't:

I said they apologized in 2017 and said they are making the iMac Pro during the wait.

This implied to me that you were saying Apple originated the iMac Pro as a stop-gap until the Mac Pro. Whereas I'm saying the iMP was the MP's planned successor, until Apple changed their mind. But perhaps I misunderstood you.

 

[ArPe]

When the Mac Pro transitions to Apple Silicon the price will come down as they don’t have to buy expensive processors from a third party. There will be no sales lost to Hackintoshes too.

This will boost sales of the Mac Pro line up and allow Apple to offer more configurations - midi tower with less slots, full tower with more slots.

I’m waiting for that transition before I buy a pro desktop again. I really want my Mac Pro to be midi sized and have an OS and apps that are fully optimised and close to the metal like they are on iPadOS.

 

[mode11]

Can you please provide a general description on what work do you think it take to move from Intel to AMD ?

Trivial for a company of Apple's size - hobbyists have been reliably running hackintosh's, even with Ryzens, for years now. And that's having to stay one step ahead of Apple - obviously Apple themselves have all the macOS source code etc. Certainly less work than transitioning macOS to ARM.

Companies like ASUS bring out piles of motherboards a year based on various chipsets. In fact, unlike Intel, AMD uses the same socket for ages. So updating Macs would be a lot more straightforward, as Apple wouldn't need to design a new motherboard just to update to a new CPU.
[automerge]1593864005[/automerge]

When the Mac Pro transitions to Apple Silicon the price will come down as they don’t have to buy expensive processors from a third party. There will be no sales lost to Hackintoshes too.

This will boost sales of the Mac Pro line up and allow Apple to offer more configurations - midi tower with less slots, full tower with more slots.

I’m waiting for that transition before I buy a pro desktop again. I really want my Mac Pro to be midi sized and have an OS and apps that are fully optimised and close to the metal like they are on iPadOS.

Hate to disappoint, but unless Apple has a massive change of heart, most of this isn't going to happen. Firstly, Apple Silicon could actually cost Apple more than (lower end) Xeons, as they will need to make a special AS version for the radically different requirements of the MP, and spread the cost over the tiny number of MPs sold. More pertinently, any savings will not get passed on to the customer anyway - they will just increase the margin (i.e. profit).

Many people have wanted what you describe - essentially the form factor of a mainstream desktop PC, with a bunch of slots in a reasonably sized and priced tower (the so-called xMac). Apple has spent the last 17 years demonstrating they have no intention whatsoever of making such a machine - and as the sole supplier of macOS hardware, have no pressure to do so. They would rather force you to pay eye-watering upgrade prices on an iMac, at the time of purchase.

The OS, and Apple apps at least, will certainly be optimised for the hardware, though.

 

[Ethosik]

Well, first of all, obsolete is a bit strong. Obviously PCIe 3.0 is still plenty fast for most applications. The issue is that the MP is a 'no-compromise' model, with a price to match. The MP is only for people who demand the best and have a business case for a high-throughput machine. Otherwise, buy an iMP (or a PC). But the crux here is whether Apple 'had' to stay with Intel, or could move to AMD. If we are looking at the PC market as whole, then yes, PCIe 3.0 is clearly obsolete.




Yeah, but you didn't:



This implied to me that you were saying Apple originated the iMac Pro as a stop-gap until the Mac Pro. Whereas I'm saying the iMP was the MP's planned successor, until Apple changed their mind. But perhaps I misunderstood you.

I still don't agree with this:

If we are looking at the PC market as whole, then yes, PCIe 3.0 is clearly obsolete.

How can anyone agree with this statement when Intel just recently released new 10th generation processors that are PCIe 3.0 only? I do not see it as PCIe 3.0 is now obsolete, I see it as PCIe 4.0 is new and just rolling out.

Obsolete means something else exists that is better, in this case 4.0 exists that is better than 3.0. However, in Intel, this is not true. 4.0 does not yet exist.

The hackintosh community does not need to do things legally binding, business contracts, and others that Apple would need to go through if they went to AMD processors. We do not know if Apple has a contract with Intel to never use AMD or something like that. We just do not know the business side of things. Businesses do not have the freedom that you or I do where we can just switch between AMD and Intel.

Yeah it seems there was a misunderstanding on what I was referring to regarding the iMac Pro. Sorry about that!

 

[mode11]

I get your point. If you are 100% wedded to Intel, then even if Intel never release another product, a 14nm, PCIe 3.0 CPU will stay state of the art until the end of time.

But if Apple are capable of ditching Intel for ARM, they are certainly capable of ditching them for AMD. I expect, though, that given the many advantages for Apple of doing the former, they weren't about to jump ship to AMD for the final year or two of x86.

Intel may also have been giving Apple steep discounts on their CPUs, to stop them jumping to AMD. On a similar note, I expect AMD are more flexible on pricing than Nvidia are, which is why Apple uses their GPUs exclusively. As the sole hardware supplier to the macOS platform, Apple get to chose what gives the best margins.

 

[deconstruct60]

I was referring to your characterisation of the timeline i.e. announce intention to make MP > quickly design and release iMP in a few months > bring out MP after almost 2 years. My point was that the iMP was already in the pipeline for release that year, which was why there were no plans at the beginning of 2017 for a new MP.

Apple's investment in the iMP and Mac Pro being low enough that they can't walk and chew gum at the same time is also points to why they probably are not going to invest in a ultra, super duper workstation SoC. They'd both probably share the same SoC baseline infrastructure. And that too would be anchored on at best the iMac targeted SoC (highest volume desktop ) , if not heavy tweaks on the laptop ( even higher volume model ).

The basic thing is that a new Mac Pro didn't come quicker because Apple has "better things to do". Given a 3-4 year update cycle, just how competitive is a the Mac Pro SoC going to be after a couple of iterations if AMD and Intel are on 1-1.5 month tick tock cycles. ?

Then the MP eventually did come out, which is why there's been no iMP update in over two and a half years. It'll likely now get discontinued. So a bit of a mess all round.

Apple is sitting on a iMac Pro update in the CPU dimension. Intel significantly dropped the prices on the Xeon W-2200 and Apple has done nothing. If anything the iMP is waiting on a AMD GPU. If so and if it would need a 2022 era Apple SoC then it likely still should ship later in 2020. Apple doesn't have to move the prices down, but they could lower the number of CPU options. Just 10, 14 , 18 cores. Or 12, 14, 18 cores if just strictly want to have non-overlap with the the 27" model's need 10 count max.


Even if Apple bumps the 27" iMac up to 10 cores, there is still a gap from 10-18 cores and triple digit like RAM capacities. If there isn't a major iMac case redesign then 10 cores in that case isn't going to be a good fit.

With a 2021 the Apple SoC the iMac Pro and iMac 27" could be merged. Technically could wave that as discontinued but one of the major differences of the iMac Pro was adjustments to host a higher power consuming CPU. Since one of the principle of objectives of Apple SoC is to take same "horsepower" at lower TDP, then the 27" iMac variation gap will close. Not disappear as the SoC would be used o construct better iMacs ( not abandoned the form factor , but expand it with specifically designed silicon to do that. Use the silicon to 'undo' corners the design corners painted into by self imposed physical constraints. ).

Decent change the Mac Pro would get a slightly modified "hand me down" from the iMac Pro class system.

The two reasons not to do something with the iMac Pro in 2020 is either the MP/iMP are hobby products to do in their spare time (and not have any in 2020). Or there is a Apple SoC in the first half of 2021 to move to for the iMac Pro ( or something good enough in the 27" space to drop a huge Osborne effect on the iMac Pro sales while waiting. Apple puts in minimal investment because going to limp along with cratered sales for another year (still no price decrease, so milk as much as possible out of the cash cow. ) )