Why Apple don't use AMD Ryzen/Threadripper CPU?

[mavericks7913]

I know that TB3 does not support AMD CPU but at least they can pay separate controller for AMD CPU isn't it?

AMD is preparing 3rd gen Ryzen CPU in 2019 which have more cores and clock speed. I really dont see any advantages for Intel CPU since they are still using 14nm for a while and have serious security issues.

So I still dont understnad why? Just becasuse of TB3 controller or?

 

[AidenShaw]

I know that TB3 does not support AMD CPU but at least they can pay separate controller for AMD CPU isn't it?

AMD is preparing 3rd gen Ryzen CPU in 2019 which have more cores and clock speed. I really dont see any advantages for Intel CPU since they are still using 14nm for a while and have serious security issues.

So I still dont understnad why? Just becasuse of TB3 controller or?

Have you bought AMD CPUs?

I have, and have regretted it (they've all been sent to eWaste).

If something isn't 100% the same as Intel, it can be a PITA to use them.

 

[mattferg]

Have you bought AMD CPUs?

I have, and have regretted it (they've all been sent to eWaste).

If something isn't 100% the same as Intel, it can be a PITA to use them.

Have you bought something on the Zen architecture?

 

[mavericks7913]

Have you bought AMD CPUs?

I have, and have regretted it (they've all been sent to eWaste).

If something isn't 100% the same as Intel, it can be a PITA to use them.

Intel has more issues than AMD such as overheating CPU due to poor architecture and weak securtity. I doubt that you used Zen architecture.

 

[keysofanxiety]

I know they’re both x86 but from my limited understanding, don’t they handle the instruction set slightly differently?

So based on that, MacOS would need an awful lot of recoding to sing on AMD. Besides, Intel have better per-core/per-watt performance, and if Apple are going to do a major rewrite of MacOS I imagine they’d think of the long game with internal processors rather than engaging in the short-term core race that AMD and Intel currently seem locked in.

I’m happy to be corrected if I’ve missed the mark.

 

[mavericks7913]

I know they’re both x86 but from my limited understanding, don’t they handle the instruction set slightly differently?

So based on that, MacOS would need an awful lot of recoding to sing on AMD. Besides, Intel have better per-core/per-watt performance, and if Apple are going to do a major rewrite of MacOS I imagine they’d think of the long game with internal processors rather than engaging in the short-term core race that AMD and Intel currently seem locked in.

I’m happy to be corrected if I’ve missed the mark.

"Besides, Intel have better per-core/per-watt performance" Wrong. At same cores and clock speed AMD Ryzen or Zen architecture consumes less power and temperature. Also AMD Ryzen cost much lesser than Intel CPU such as Intel i9 7960X 16 cores 2.8ghz $1900 VS AMD Threadripper 16 cores 3.5ghz $900. Intel CPU has overheating issues that they can not control the temperature while Ryzen and Threadripper never have that kind of issue due to wonderful CPU design.

After Zen architecture, AMD is leading CPU market while Intel is facing the biggest crisis due to poor architecture and security issue.

AMD Ryzen works with Hackintosh. I dont see any problems of using AMD Ryzen at this point except for few features such as TB3 ports(Only Intel CPU support TB3)

 

[keysofanxiety]

"Besides, Intel have better per-core/per-watt performance" Wrong. At same cores and clock speed AMD Ryzen or Zen architecture consumes less power and temperature. Also AMD Ryzen cost much lesser than Intel CPU such as Intel i9 7960X 16 cores 2.8ghz $1900 VS AMD Threadripper 16 cores 3.5ghz $900. Intel CPU has overheating issues that they can not control the temperature while Ryzen and Threadripper never have that kind of issue due to wonderful CPU design.

After Zen architecture, AMD is leading CPU market while Intel is facing the biggest crisis due to poor architecture and security issue.

AMD Ryzen works with Hackintosh. I dont see any problems of using AMD Ryzen at this point except for few features such as TB3 ports(Only Intel CPU support TB3)

Do you, err, really hate Intel or just really love AMD? Coming on a little strong there buddy.

 

[mcnallym]

Apple uses quicksync quite a bit, whilst amd have there equivalent then would be extra thing to develop with.

 

[AidenShaw]

Have you bought something on the Zen architecture?

Of course not - I've learned not to buy incompatible CPUs.

Intel has more issues than AMD such as overheating CPU due to poor architecture and weak securtity. I doubt that you used Zen architecture.

But Intel, AMD and ARM have the security flaws. Even Zen has them (claimed to be fixed in Zen 2).

I know they’re both x86 but from my limited understanding, don’t they handle the instruction set slightly differently?

Yes, there are real differences in the instruction sets. In addition, there are differences in the microarchitecture that affect optimizations. Code optimized for real (Intel) x64 chips might be less than optimal on Fake x64 (AMD) chips.

Since Apple is struggling with quality control in its current lineup, I'm not sure you'd want Apple to add a line of computers with incompatible CPUs.
[doublepost=1544143394][/doublepost]

such as overheating CPU due to poor architecture

Please explain that - hundreds of millions of cool Intel x64 CPUs would disagree.

 

[Ludacrisvp]

I’d just like to point out that the x86_64 instruction set that is used was originally from AMD... intel’s 64 bit Itainum instruction set never took off.

That being said I prefer intel mainly due to being the defacto standard and arguably better stability and reliable performance numbers.

I’ve run older AMD setups in the past as desktop format and newer (non zen) AMD laptops and in both situations felt very cpu bound.

Yes modified kernels can run macOS on zen. I’m sure Apple doesn’t stray from intel due to power and thermal profiles and they likely have a very good contract with them.

 

[jtara]

I really dont see any advantages for Intel CPU since they are still using 14nm for a while and have serious security issues

ALL CPUs have serious security issues, due to fairly recent innovations in attack techniques. It is not easily fixed, and for consumer products I would say simply not fixable.

Most of security problems relate to the ability to use statistical methods to examine fluctuations in timing and/or power consumption to surmise what other code is doing.

A truly secure CPU would have to have uniform timing for all instructions (slowing down all instructions to the speed of the slowest instruction) and uniform power usage (CPU would have to run at a constant power drain using the highest power needed to perform any operation. Not only that, but each SECTION or FUNCTION of the CPU would have to follow these rules as well. You would need careful shielding between various parts of the CPU as well.

So, you'd have a CPU that the worst of all worlds as far as practicality - slow and power hungry.

Some very early RISC architectures might come close to fitting this. I'm sure there are "secure" CPU designs that do this as well.

It is more of a problem for "cloud" computing than in consumer computers. You have no idea who else is using the same physical resources in the cloud, unless you have a dedicated cloud.

 

[mavericks7913]

Of course not - I've learned not to buy incompatible CPUs.


But Intel, AMD and ARM have the security flaws. Even Zen has them (claimed to be fixed in Zen 2).


Yes, there are real differences in the instruction sets. In addition, there are differences in the microarchitecture that affect optimizations. Code optimized for real (Intel) x64 chips might be less than optimal on Fake x64 (AMD) chips.

Since Apple is struggling with quality control in its current lineup, I'm not sure you'd want Apple to add a line of computers with incompatible CPUs.
[doublepost=1544143394][/doublepost]
Please explain that - hundreds of millions of cool Intel x64 CPUs would disagree.

AMD Ryzen already solved security issues and due to their own architecture, they barely have security issues unlike Intel. Check Intel security crisis in early 2018.

Never heard of overheating Intel CPU? Gosh. Check Youtube about Intel CPU's temperature. They reach around 100c and even gigabyte admitted that Intel CPU is too hot that they had to use a water cooler.
[doublepost=1544145329][/doublepost]

Do you, err, really hate Intel or just really love AMD? Coming on a little strong there buddy.

Well telling facts only. Nothing more.
[doublepost=1544145672][/doublepost]

ALL CPUs have serious security issues, due to fairly recent innovations in attack techniques. It is not easily fixed, and for consumer products I would say simply not fixable.

Most of security problems relate to the ability to use statistical methods to examine fluctuations in timing and/or power consumption to surmise what other code is doing.

A truly secure CPU would have to have uniform timing for all instructions (slowing down all instructions to the speed of the slowest instruction) and uniform power usage (CPU would have to run at a constant power drain using the highest power needed to perform any operation. Not only that, but each SECTION or FUNCTION of the CPU would have to follow these rules as well. You would need careful shielding between various parts of the CPU as well.

So, you'd have a CPU that the worst of all worlds as far as practicality - slow and power hungry.

Some very early RISC architectures might come close to fitting this. I'm sure there are "secure" CPU designs that do this as well.

It is more of a problem for "cloud" computing than in consumer computers. You have no idea who else is using the same physical resources in the cloud, unless you have a dedicated cloud.

Yes, all CPU have security issues but Intel has more than AMD at this point. Because AMD architecture has nothing to do with those issues and they already made a plan to block most of those issues in 2019 while Intel cant.

Meltdown, Spectre, Intel AMT, Spectre N, BrachScope, L1TF bug, and more. Intel have these flaws and they cant fix it until they make a whole new architecture. AMD officially announced that they dont have these issues. Since then, I totally doubt about Intel CPU.

 

[AidenShaw]

AMD Ryzen already solved security issues and due to their own architecture, they barely have security issues unlike Intel. Check Intel security crisis in early 2018.

Never heard of overheating Intel CPU? Gosh. Check Youtube about Intel CPU's temperature. They reach around 100c and even gigabyte admitted that Intel CPU is too hot that they had to use a water cooler.
[doublepost=1544145329][/doublepost]

Well telling facts only. Nothing more.
[doublepost=1544145672][/doublepost]

Yes, all CPU have security issues but Intel has more than AMD at this point. Because AMD architecture has nothing to do with those issues and they already made a plan to block most of those issues in 2019 while Intel cant.

Meltdown, Spectre, Intel AMT, Spectre N, BrachScope, L1TF bug, and more. Intel have these flaws and they cant fix it until they make a whole new architecture. AMD officially announced that they dont have these issues. Since then, I totally doubt about Intel CPU.

Without links to support your claims, not buying it. (And links to YouTube usually aren't worth the bandwidth to watch.)

Intel CPUs at 100°C - really? Really? Put the heatsink back on and measure again.

 

[mavericks7913]

Without links to support your claims, not buying it. (And links to YouTube usually aren't worth the bandwidth to watch.)

Intel CPUs at 100°C - really? Really? Put the heatsink back on and measure again.

Same thing to you. Without links or proofs, only thing that you have is theory.

https://www.amd.com/en/corporate/security-updates
https://wccftech.com/amd-zen-2-cpus-fix-spectre-exploit/

See? Physically no issues with security flaws that Intel CPU have.

About temperature, too bad. Gigabyte already officially admitted. 9th and 8gen Intel CPU have this issue cause they increased the clock speed and cores without improving from 14nm. Their FAB didnt change since 2015. What do you expect? Also, because of their poor TIM, Intel CPU have a poor temperature control that they even applied thermal paste to Xeon CPU which cost $10,000. Without water coolers, 100c is easily achieve and 9th gen is so bad that the water cooler cant hold the temperature.

 

[koyoot]

I wonder how much people who are stuck to Intel are benefiting from it . I wonder how much SDX helped people.

I am writing this from Intel/Nvidia combo computer. AMD is releasing new hardware by Q2 next year: Zen 2/Ryzen 3000 series, and AMD Navi, and my next computer will be 100% red tinted, even with FreeSync monitor. There is nothing that stops me from doing this. I wonder what people who are so tightly bound to Intel will do, when Intel will struggle to compete with AMD in upcoming 3 years? They are preparing 10 core Comet Lake for mainstream, built on 14 nm process, and rebranding Skylake Architecture once again(how hot and inefficient it will be, when 8 cores are breaking the power spec so easily?), and for Server there will be 350W dual CPU monster, with BGA package, because that is the best Intel can come up with.

10 nm is Dead on Arrival. 7 nm is biggest saving chance for Intel, but that is at least 3 years till we will get it.

Without water coolers, 100c is easily achieve and 9th gen is so bad that the water cooler cant hold the temperature.

Yep. I wonder how 8 and 10 core CPUs will throttle in Fanless scenario...

I think there is pretty clear at this point that on this forum, there is very apparent Intel/Nvidia fanboy/user, that its not worth trying to tell him that somebody else can have better hardware, and solutions . It is pointless .

Let me ask you guys this simple question. If AMD has better product, and you need new hardware - will you buy it?

Or you wan't AMD to be competitive, so that way you can buy Intel/Nvidia hardware for cheap?

 

[Amethyst]

i have both intel system (8700K Alienware aurora R7) and and system (R7 1700 4.0GHz OC)
I have found that while system performance is better on AMD, AMD have less problem about heat.

 

[mamcx]

Code optimized for real (Intel) x64 chips might be less than optimal on Fake x64 (AMD) chips.

Developer here. This is non-sense. AMD is not "a fake" x64, heck, it invent it in first place!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/X86-64#Intel_64

but with x86-64, roles were reversed: Intel found itself in the position of adopting the ISA which AMD had created as an extension to Intel's own x86 processor line.

Apple could use some EXTRA additions by intel here and there, but as happened with windows and linux, is nothing out of ordinary, and are smallish.

Hackintosh already run on AMD. It not explode.

Apple already implement other ARCHs much more different than x86.

Most of the changes to do this can be automated a lot, by compilers, JITs or virtualized calls.

-----

A more logical reason? Apple have a good deal with Intel, and AMD can'T out-bid it just yet.

And if Apple do a change, is more likely it go for his own custom chipset.

 

[danwells]

Apple has a deal with Intel, I'm sure - early access, large quantities guaranteed and some semi-custom CPUs in return for no AMD...

An example of this is the iMac Pro CPUs - they're very close to some publicly available Intel CPUs, but not exactly the same. Apple could conceivably even have the volume to get ahold of CPUs in a different socket from what they normally come in - this could prove important in the nodular Mac Pro, which will almost certainly use the big Xeon socket (Apple will want the 28-core chips, and possibly dual processors, as options).

The problem with the big socket is that some of the modest core counts (8-10) at relatively high speeds either aren't available or are very expensive because they're in the Xeon Platinum line, which supports up to 8-way multiprocessing. I could easily see Apple getting versions of those chips (and the 28-core, for that matter, although that looks like it's going to be a public product as an ultra-high end "enthusiast" CPU) that support either only one processor, or 1-2 processors (much cheaper than 8-way chips). These are available as Xeon-W chips, but Xeon-W is in the iMac Pro socket, not the big socket Apple needs for the 28-core. Easy custom chip - either drop the Xeon-W in the big socket OR disable the multiprocessor functionality on the Xeon Platinums... If Intel chose to do a big-socket version of Xeon-W chips, they'd either have to add PCIe lanes and memory channels OR produce "oddity" chips that had fewer lanes and channels than usual for the socket.

Another place Apple might get ahold of a semi-custom chip is that I wouldn't be surprised to see them use something that's almost a 9900K in a future iMac. How about an "i9-9900" with 8 cores/16 threads and very similar clocks to the publicly available i9-9900K, but no overclocking? It might be ~$50 cheaper per chip than a 9900K, and that's significant at Apple volumes...

As for early, guaranteed volumes - Apple got the 6-core laptop chips right as they were released, and I suspect that 90% of all laptops sold with those chips in them are MacBook Pros. Nobody else has them in a high-selling laptop that I know of that uses them (probably the next-best seller is the Dell XPS 15 - and that's not the common Dell laptop). Most other models are either big, heavy gaming laptops or workstation models that barely exist for public sale (they're sold mainly through dedicated sales forces to large businesses).

 

[jscipione]

I know that TB3 does not support AMD CPU but at least they can pay separate controller for AMD CPU isn't it?

AMD is preparing 3rd gen Ryzen CPU in 2019 which have more cores and clock speed. I really dont see any advantages for Intel CPU since they are still using 14nm for a while and have serious security issues.

So I still don't understand why? Just because of TB3 controller or?

Corporate Inertia + Arm switch coming makes it better for Apple to keep the variables down. The Mac Pro 7,1 will be the last (hopefully great) Intel Mac before the Arm transition comes in 2020.

 

[HomeLate]

Without links to support your claims, not buying it. (And links to YouTube usually aren't worth the bandwidth to watch.)

Intel CPUs at 100°C - really? Really? Put the heatsink back on and measure again.

Maybe you should Google 'Macbook Pro cpu throttling' and do some reading.

I'm not an AMD fanboy, I use both at home. But there are indeed heat issues with Intel chips when used in laptops or poorly cooled desktops (lack of airflow).

 

[weckart]

Corporate Inertia + Arm switch coming makes it better for Apple to keep the variables down. The Mac Pro 7,1 will be the last (hopefully great) Intel Mac before the Arm transition comes in 2020.

ARM isn't close to being a replacement for Intel/AMD unless the aim is to dumb down the OSes to Android/iOS levels.

 

[DearthnVader]

I know they’re both x86 but from my limited understanding, don’t they handle the instruction set slightly differently?

So based on that, MacOS would need an awful lot of recoding to sing on AMD. Besides, Intel have better per-core/per-watt performance, and if Apple are going to do a major rewrite of MacOS I imagine they’d think of the long game with internal processors rather than engaging in the short-term core race that AMD and Intel currently seem locked in.

I’m happy to be corrected if I’ve missed the mark.

The macOS runs just fine on Ryzen, but it helps if it thinks it's running on an Intel CPU. I found the latest version of Photoshop doesn't want to run on the Ryzen, there must be some sort of CPU check.

Passing -cpu Penryn via KVM on the Ryzen fixes the issue. So all the instruction sets are really the same, SSE4.x works, even tho Penryn doesn't support SSE4.2 the Ryzen does, so what you end up with is a Penryn that supports SSE4.2.

I use a Ryzen on the macOS as my daily driver, and have no issues with it, but I'm not booting native, rather using Qemu with KVM and PCI Passthrough.

 

[koyoot]

I think everybody saying that Apple has a deal with Intel, forget that Apple was working on AMD based MacBook Air, some time ago.

Aiden claims that AMD lacks instructions. Zen 2 is confirmed to have instructions that will ONLY appear in IceLake and later CPUs, if IceLake will ever exist.

Intel wil have inferior products for upcoming three years. Everybody who will use Intel hardware will fall behind AMD-based products. Apple tied themselves to Intel, so if they want to be competitive with everybody who will use AMD CPUs - they better switch. And that may actually happen from 2020, with the use of AMD APUs, or Semi-Custom APUs in their MacBook Pro line.

 

[gnasher729]

Intel has more issues than AMD such as overheating CPU due to poor architecture and weak securtity. I doubt that you used Zen architecture.

Well, you can argue all you want and try to convince posters here on MacRumors, but as long as you can't convince the engineers and the financial people at Apple, it doesn't make a difference.

Apple doesn't want a product that is seen as cheap, they don't want a product that isn't 100% reliable both now and at least for the next 5 years, they don't want a product that isn't 100% compatible with everyone's software.

One colleague built a machine with top of the line AMD processors, and he had a lot of trouble with that. If you multiply that trouble by a few million Macs sold, you have a lot of unhappy customers.

 

[koyoot]

Apple doesn't want a product that is seen as cheap, they don't want a product that isn't 100% reliable both now and at least for the next 5 years, they don't want a product that isn't 100% compatible with everyone's software.

One colleague built a machine with top of the line AMD processors, and he had a lot of trouble with that. If you multiply that trouble by a few million Macs sold, you have a lot of unhappy customers.

Have YOU actually owned and used Ryzen CPU?