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Apple Introduces M3 Ultra Chip With Impressive Performance, Up to 512GB of RAM, and More

RedWeasel said:
Well there's AMD Ryzen Threadripper workstation CPUs with 64 and 96 cores - and none of them efficiency cores. So the M3 Ultra is unlikely to the fastest CPU on earth.
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I'm curious, what is their best processor so far ?

Is it the 7995X 96-cores ? The M4 Max is already better (at least according to GeekBench, but the 7995X 96 cores results vary quite a lot surprisingly), so the M3 Ultra should be quite surprising.
 
Zdigital2015 said:
So what? I can buy a base M4 Air and get the same performance as an M4 Max in SC. Anyone buying an Ultra is not buying it for single core, they’re buying it for the multi core, but even more they are buying it for the GPU cores and memory expansion as those will be bigger factors in their specific workflows. GPU cores matter in video editing way more than single core performance. The fixation on SC for potential M3 Ultra buyers is just a smokescreen. Besides multi core performance is so far past where we started just a few years ago people are forgetting how bad the Intel Xeon years were for Pros. M3 or M4, we’re in happy fun time now compared to the old iMac and Mac Pros.
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I am just addressing that as matter of fact, you can't rule out if someone's workflow equally relies on single core as with the other specs, such that the M3 Ultra does have one short coming than the "lower" M4 Max model.

But yes this is not uncommon. The Intel Xeon Mac Pros had this going for a while, the more cores you get the worse clock it came with.
 
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MrENGLISH said:
I have a feeling that Apple is saving the M4 Ultra for the Mac Pro update. That way they can justify its existence over the M3 Ultra Mac Studio.
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I never would have thought this a few weeks ago but I guess possible this is the play to show off at WWDC. Though it would make even more sense if the soc design needed a bigger case and hence using the Mac Pro as additional justification.
 
RedWeasel said:
Well there's AMD Ryzen Threadripper workstation CPUs with 64 and 96 cores - and none of them efficiency cores. So the M3 Ultra is unlikely to the fastest CPU on earth.
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Depends.

In Geekbench, the Threadripper 7995WX beats the M2 Ultra, but not the M4 Max. It probably doesn't come close to the M3 Ultra.


(At single-core, it can't even compete with the M2, but that isn't meant to be its strength.)

Might be different once the Threadripper 8000 comes out. It's also quite different if you use something like Cinebench.
 
Chancha said:
I am just addressing that as matter of fact, you can't rule out if someone's workflow equally relies on single core as with the other specs, such that the M3 Ultra does have one short coming than the "lower" M4 Max model.

But yes this is not uncommon. The Intel Xeon Mac Pros had this going for a while, the more cores you get the worse clock it came with.
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But the difference in M3 to M4 single core speeds in day to day are just not large enough to be a knock against the M3 Ultra if you need the MC and GPU cores. If I need an Ultra, I’m all in at this point. Me personally, an M4 Pro will everything I need to do and then some. Posters here need to be honest with themselves as to what they really need. Most simply have FOMO even though they can’t afford why Apple is selling. Makes for a dysfunctional, yet colorful forum scene.
 
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Zdigital2015 said:
But the difference in M3 to M4 single core speeds in day to day are just not large enough to be a knock against the M3 Ultra if you need the MC and GPU cores. If I need an Ultra, I’m all in at this point. Me personally, an M4 Pro will everything I need to do and then some. Posters here need to be honest with themselves as to what they really need. Most simply have FOMO even though they can’t afford why Apple is selling. Makes for a dysfunctional, yet colorful forum scene.
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With Apple Silicon the generational difference also comes with other stuff left behind though. For instance the M3 Max is still on ARMv8, last gen neural engines, 400GB/s per Max die etc.

But Apple somehow managed to broke through the addressable memory to from M3 Max's 128GB (x2 to be 256GB) to 512GB, and then supporting TB5 which is the most puzzling part since the TB controllers are on die.

So the reality is there will be very delicate and subtle differences between the M4 Max and M3 Ultra variants of the Mac Studio. I won't be surprised the M3 Ultra will have more than a few ways perform lesser than the M4 Max, in some workflows.
 
Big_D said:
I guess they have their reasons in using an M3 series chip and calling it M3 (if they had called it an M4 Ultra, people would quickly have pointed that out as well)... But it does seem a little odd, "want the full power, don't use the new M4 chip, use the previous generation M3," it sort of grates, even if the M3 is demonstrably faster.

I'm guessing M4 yields aren't high enough yet or the process for an M4 Ultra isn't stable, so they have to go with the M3 architecture.
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It’s really weird, because M3 doesn’t support SME. Unless this is a substantially modified variant which I don’t think it is.

Very odd choice.
 
Zdigital2015 said:
The ultra is a niche SoC at best and I’m sure the UltraFusion tech is not something as simple as plugging two Max dies together and voila it works. If Apple ever gets someone on press tour to discuss the M3 Ultra, it will make sense. Retrofitting a Thunderbolt 5 controller in there suggest this is more than meets the eye in terms of this Ultra being a custom SoC, and much more sophisticated than previous Ultras.
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I don't disagree with most of what you said. However, that doesn't change the fact that it doesn't feel right buying a new M3 when everything else is moving (or at) M4, including the little brother to the Studio Ultra.
 
I'm sure that Mac Pro will be released tomorrow with M4 Ultra. The goal of Apple with this quiet release is to discontinue 64GB of storage and move forward with minimum of 16GB of RAM in all machines.

The highlight of the release is the Mac Studio M4 Max priced at $1999. To get the same config for MacBook pro that starts at $2800. I don't see the value of a Mac Mini M4P with 48GB and 1TB. The Studio is the better value!
 
Zdigital2015 said:
But the difference in M3 to M4 single core speeds in day to day are just not large enough
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25% is nothing to sneeze at.

I wouldn't be surprised if even with medium-sized Xcode projects, the M4 Max comes out ahead, because even moderately high-end users simply don't saturate 32 (vs. 16) cores (presumably 24p8e vs. 12p4e) that often.

 
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Rychiar said:
it's pathetic, if they were gonna go m3, why didn't it come out last summer?
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These "M3 Max" used in the M3 Ultra are different from the M3 Max at launch. They have TB5 controllers instead of TB4 and perhaps different memory controllers to support higher memory capacity. So Apple and TSMC would have been working on tweaks to the design post-M3 Max launch and that is why Apple could not update the Studio (and Mac Pro) shortly after M3 launched.

DaniTheFox said:
In my opinion, the M3 Ultra is the server chip that is being deployed in their AI farm. Previously, I had not anticipated seeing this technology in a commercial product.
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I thought the original rumors suggested M2 Ultra, but it does make more sense to use M3 Ultra since it can address 512GB.
 
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chucker23n1 said:
Depends.

In Geekbench, the Threadripper 7995WX beats the M2 Ultra, but not the M4 Max. It probably doesn't come close to the M3 Ultra.


(At single-core, it can't even compete with the M2, but that isn't meant to be its strength.)

Might be different once the Threadripper 8000 comes out. It's also quite different if you use something like Cinebench.
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Yeah I think it depends quite a bit on the use case/benchmark.

Interestingly, in Geekbench, the 7985WX beats the 7995WX, probably because the latter is clocked quite a bit lower.
There seems to be a couple of entries with a score of around 28000 to 29000.

Couldn't find numbers for the 7985WX right now for Cinebench 2024, but the M4 Max seems to do around 2000, the M3 Max around 1700. The 7980X does around 5500.

So it will be interesting to see the numbers for the M3 Ultra, but based on the above, I would guess around 3500 in Cinebench 2024 or so.
 
switz said:
I ordered my 16" M4 Max Mac Book Pro with both the 8TB SSD and 128GB of ram. It was not suddenly made obsolete by this product announcement.

I expected the new generation of Mac Studio to have 512GB of ram and obviously USB-C 5 ports, but the 16TB SSD was a surprise and certainly was at Apple's always high wallet burning pricing. Fully loaded price of about 14,100 before taxes separates the men from the boys....

Take two, they are small 🤓
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Actually, the expectation was 256GB M4 Ultra or 386GB M4 Ultra ... nobody expected 512GB
 
MRSugarD said:
Didn‘t Gurman claim/guess that the M3 Ultra was a unique chip? It is simply two M3 Max connected via UltraFusion. Nothing special or new there.
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No, it’s become evident that the M3 Ultra is not simply two M3 Max’s glued together. Apple’s lack of transparency doesn’t help clarify the differences. The updated memory capacity, the TB5 support, among other things we don’t know about.
 
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PsykX said:
I'm curious, what is their best processor so far ?

Is it the 7995X 96-cores ? The M4 Max is already better (at least according to GeekBench, but the 7995X 96 cores results vary quite a lot surprisingly), so the M3 Ultra should be quite surprising.
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Depends on the task. Only way to know is to benchmark a specific task. Finally, why people continue to use Geekbench for anything other than how was a system can run Geekbench is beyond me.
 
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