Apple Testing M3 Max Chip With 16-Core CPU and 40-Core GPU

[Warped9]

Building a computer from scratch is essentially a niche market. The VAST majority of people will never do it. So it’s a pointless comparison against a factory made off-the-shelf Mac.

In the real world Apple has nothing to worry about.

The most significant upgrade from one generation to another was Apple’s introduction of M1. After that you can comfortable skip a generation or two for an upgrade.

 

[nathansz]

Note, he bought all the parts, and put it together himself, which I presume made it even cheaper, and is something you can't do with any Mac.

You sort of can. it won’t be a Mac but you can run macos.

 

[spcopsmac21]

I assume that is putting zero cost on your own time for doing so.

Cost me nothing.

 

[spcopsmac21]

Building a computer from scratch is essentially a niche market. The VAST majority of people will never do it. So it’s a pointless comparison against a factory made off-the-shelf Mac.

In the real world Apple has nothing to worry about.

The most significant upgrade from one generation to another was Apple’s introduction of M1. After that you can comfortable skip a generation or two for an upgrade.

It’s one of the largest markets in computers. Building your own….. just because you don’t do it doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist.
Even pre built for around $1700 wipe the floor with the studio.

 

[nathansz]

I assume that is putting zero cost on your own time for doing so.

It takes a couple hours tops.

 

[nathansz]

Building a computer from scratch is essentially a niche market. The VAST majority of people will never do it. So it’s a pointless comparison against a factory made off-the-shelf Mac.

Going by os market share, i wouldn’t be surprised if more people build their own pcs than buy macs

I’d like to see some numbers on this actually

 

[nathansz]

Windows had 72% marketshare in 2019. Dropped to 52% in May 2023.

Mac 18.72% in 2019, 33% in May 2023.

Pretty sure that's a nice dent.

Where are you getting those numbers from?

I can’t find numbers that look anything like that

And quite frankly they are wildly unbelievable

 

[koyoot]

You say that Apple does not have a huge performance per watt advantage, but you seem to be comparing it to sheer performance (presumably on benchmarks) for AMD processors. Which measurement are we comparing here? Performance per watt, or raw performance?

AMD is winning in the raw benchmarks when you look at HEDT desktop processors, but I don't see how this implies that Apple "doesn't have that huge performance per watt advantage".

You do know that AMD does offer 25W APUs, that compete directly with M2 chip, right?

If M2 has 23W total package power, and AMD APU has 25W total package power design, then if AMD is faster in for example GPU benchmarks at the same thermal envelope then doesn't it mean that it straight up wins in performance, and because of that - performance/watt comparison?

 

[chucker23n1]

You do know that AMD does offer 25W APUs, that compete directly with M2 chip, right?

If M2 has 23W total package power, and AMD APU has 25W total package power design, then if AMD is faster in for example GPU benchmarks at the same thermal envelope then doesn't it mean that it straight up wins in performance, and because of that - performance/watt comparison?

M2's package includes the RAM.

 

[ArkSingularity]

You do know that AMD does offer 25W APUs, that compete directly with M2 chip, right?

If M2 has 23W total package power, and AMD APU has 25W total package power design, then if AMD is faster in for example GPU benchmarks at the same thermal envelope then doesn't it mean that it straight up wins in performance, and because of that - performance/watt comparison?

Do you have a CPU model with a benchmark to share? (Might make an interesting comparison).

AMD has done an impressive job on more recent models. Apple, I think, still wins the general efficiency competition hands down because of their E-cores (which, for typical workloads, are far superior to anything that x86 has to offer at this time). Apple is also able to get most of the performance in a relatively small percentage of the power envelope by scaling down power usage in low power mode, so these things would have to be factored in as well.

However, I will admit that AMD's recent offerings are very good.

 

[Lioness~]

I can’t wait to see what the M3 chips can do!

Neither can I, as my 2018 MBA is not doing what I want it to fast enough anymore.

It's always that way when we waited to the right time to buy new Apple-stuff, it's always a bit to late.
Sometimes on our own choice, sometimes it's Apple's choice not releasing a fitting replacement.
This is on me, but my MBA was ok when Apple released M2. Now it gets sloooower with every update.

 

[koyoot]

Do you have a CPU model with a benchmark to share? (Might make an interesting comparison).

AMD has done an impressive job on more recent models. Apple, I think, still wins the general efficiency competition hands down because of their E-cores (which, for typical workloads, are far superior to anything that x86 has to offer at this time). Apple is also able to get most of the performance in a relatively small percentage of the power envelope by scaling down power usage in low power mode, so these things would have to be factored in as well.

However, I will admit that AMD's recent offerings are very good.

Apple wins only because of process node advantage. There is absolutely nothing in x86 that would make it less efficient than Apple designs, on the same node.

And there will come time, when AMD will have DIRECT competitors for other Apple SOCs. Not only plain MX, but also MX Pro, MX Max.

For benchmarks look for Ryzen 7 7940U, 7840U benchmarks.

 

[deconstruct60]

Sure, but how many studios exist worldwide? Let’s say 10,000. How many are in the market for something very high end from Apple? Maybe 10%?

So, 1,000 * $20,000, say. $20M is a lot for you and I, but it’s… nothing for Apple. Prestige and/or nostalgia (Ternus seems to have a weak spot for it) aside, I think the Mac Pro exists largely to stave off the threat of customers moving platforms altogether, not because it, per se, makes much business sense.

That is likely too low for 'music' and 'movie'. It isn't just theater release movie or mega distribution music. Apple is recording major segments of their keynotes. That doesn't get released in a theater where try to gross millions in ticket sales and yet is really work. it is the number of people getting paid to do video/music not the highly visible content products being released.


More likely the Mac Pro run rate is in the 40-100K/year run rate range. So you numbers are likely off by an order of magnitude.

That is a bit offset by the average sales price. It is likely no where near $20K at all. Apple explicitly mentioned that the 16 core CPU and the W5700X were the best selling components of their class ... and those two together are not going to put a Mac Pro configuration cost anywhere near $20K (average selling price ) at all.

50K * $9K = $450M (NOTE: same ballpark 100K * $4.5K = $450M )
50K * $8.5K = $425M

30-40K is likely a "not tall enough to ride the product release rollercoaster' threshold at Apple. Too few to even get over the overhead of having to deploy in the countries Apple deals with and get over the middle management overhead of dealing with the product.


I think folks have it backwards when they label the >= $20K workstations as being the 'real pro' workstation market that is the primary driver for the space. So the $7-10K workstation have to 'suck it up' and do/buy the infrastructure that the 'real pro' workstation needs in their systems also.

It is mostly the other way around. But even 40-100K is likely too small a run rate carry a unique chip/die given Apple's overhead and pragmatically finite resources. The > $20K configurations just happen to 'fall out of' what some additional components could do over the core product target. ( similar to how the Xeon W6200 product just happens to fall out of the Xeon SP Gen 2 product line. Intel is primarily trying to do the SP not the W6x00. Not enough unit sales of the SP and there won't even be a W6x00 variant. )





There is also a huge pragmatic difference between deployed total system costs and the price that Apple is seeing (getting). $7-10K into the Mac Pro and another $7-10K into the non Apple Mac Pro components to finish the completed system. That ~ $10K of "Other stuff" sunk costs is what partially drives the Mac Pro also. Very high end sound/audio capture/generation cards.

Partially why the MP 2019 got blowback from 'four 3.5/2.5 SATA driver " lovers for not having default 4 drive sleds (and the long term dubious R4i product to supposedly make up for that). And the even bigger blowback on the GPU cards path to nowhere on the MP 2023. Neither the add-ins that Apple has made a priority over the last 4-5 years in their transition plans.

 

[ilikewhey]

Building a computer from scratch is essentially a niche market. The VAST majority of people will never do it. So it’s a pointless comparison against a factory made off-the-shelf Mac.

In the real world Apple has nothing to worry about.

The most significant upgrade from one generation to another was Apple’s introduction of M1. After that you can comfortable skip a generation or two for an upgrade.

you don't have to build it from scratch, you can buy any dell/hp/lenovo and drop a newest graphic card in there at a later date. this is something you were able to do with intel mac pros in the past.

 

[deconstruct60]

Apple wins only because of process node advantage. There is absolutely nothing in x86 that would make it less efficient than Apple designs, on the same node.

x86 as in the general instruction set concept .. not so much . x86 as in the single threaded drag racing, high clock speed design criteria that Intel/AMD layer on top .... yes.

Apple is likely to win because they really aren't deep in the mode of overclocking focused customers. It is not so much the instruction set as willings to let from fringe customer's go. (i.e., another aspect of not trying to sell everything to everybody).

AMD's 4c and 5c are likely going to get closer to Apple , but still not close the gap. ( those still have a major 'gotta be placed in a server product' design criteria being pushed on them , that Apple will simply ignore because they don't need one, because don't really sell one. )

The real gap is just as much ( if not more) the SoC product placement focus as it is the instruction set. As long as AMD/Intel hold onto the "sell everything to everybody" mindset , they are likely not going to catch Apple on a vector that Apple places as a priority. Even on the same fab process can still have pragmatically different density mixtures.

And there will come time, when AMD will have DIRECT competitors for other Apple SOCs. Not only plain MX, but also MX Pro, MX Max.

More competitive ( to stop the bleed off Windows+'x86-64' ) , perhaps. Same level of focus on Perf/Watt not matter what ? Probably not.

 

[ilikewhey]

Building a computer from scratch is essentially a niche market. The VAST majority of people will never do it. So it’s a pointless comparison against a factory made off-the-shelf Mac.

In the real world Apple has nothing to worry about.

The most significant upgrade from one generation to another was Apple’s introduction of M1. After that you can comfortable skip a generation or two for an upgrade.

you don't have to build it from scratch, you can buy any dell/hp/lenovo and drop a newest graphic card in there at a later date. this is something you could do on macs but with the apple silicon

 

[Ethosik]

But that’s my point. How many ’professionals’ require computing power beyond the M2 Ultra? I would argue a very small percent. Apple hasn’t turned its back on professionals. When it comes to professional grade laptops the MacBook Pros set the standard and there are a ton of professionals who use MacBook Pros. In fact, many professionals were able to use the M1 MacBooks prior to the M-series MacBook Pros. I think Apple is in a very good position with their lineup currently. No they don’t have a one-for-one replacement for the 2019 MacBook Pro, but how many 2019 MacPros are they selling in the first place??

Uh a lot of them? That’s why an i9 and 4090 is winning in many areas. So they just get that instead and for $4,000 cheaper in some cases.

That’s like saying nobody needs the power of an i9.

 

[Ethosik]

I built a pc for $1400 that wipes the floor with my wife’s work Mac Studio. It renders videos about 12% faster. In every real work benchmark I can compare hands on with both devices my PC womps the studio. The studio is cool to look at, but I can actually replace parts and upgrade the pc. Apple is going down a path I think will come back to haunt them.

Yep exactly this. It’s not a good look for Apple. We do t have an answer for the Mac Pro, but we are focusing everything on the MacBook Air. This is exactly what happened with the trash can Mac Pro.

 

[seek3r]

I built a pc for $1400 that wipes the floor with my wife’s work Mac Studio. It renders videos about 12% faster. In every real work benchmark I can compare hands on with both devices my PC womps the studio. The studio is cool to look at, but I can actually replace parts and upgrade the pc. Apple is going down a path I think will come back to haunt them.

Ok, now do the comparison when it’s being bought for a company that needs to deploy 1,000+ of them, needs to have easy access to support, and needs to not have their IT dept spending their time piecing together workstations instead of orchestrating and managing the fleet.

Apple’s been more and more aiming their pro side of things at actual pro users again instead of prosumers, and in large part that means corporate buyers. IT depts dont deploy custom workstations that the IT dept has to build and support part by part unless they have a *deeply* compelling reason to

 

[nathansz]

Ok, now do the comparison when it’s being bought for a company that needs to deploy 1,000+ of them, needs to have easy access to support, and needs to not have their IT dept spending their time piecing together workstations instead of orchestrating and managing the fleet.

Apple’s been more and more aiming their pro side of things at actual pro users again instead of prosumers, and in large part that means corporate buyers. IT depts dont deploy custom workstations that the IT dept has to build and support part by part unless they have a *deeply* compelling reason to

A decent prebuilt pc is still going beat a mac when it comes to performance per $

Especially when buying at scale and having built to desired specs

Either way, those decisions are more likely to be based on os requirements

it only takes a single required windows or Linux software to take macs off the table now

 

[enb141]

That's true, but… how is that relevant to a rumor about the M3 Max?

Because M3 will likely have have higher RAM and probably storage options

Either way, I wouldn't recommend upgrading just one generation.

Neither me, I would recommend upgrading at least every 4/5 generations.

 

[enb141]

I built a pc for $1400 that wipes the floor with my wife’s work Mac Studio. It renders videos about 12% faster. In every real work benchmark I can compare hands on with both devices my PC womps the studio. The studio is cool to look at, but I can actually replace parts and upgrade the pc. Apple is going down a path I think will come back to haunt them.

I built a custom desktop too, my desktop smokes the Mac Pro, but unfortunately you can't build a laptop.

 

[enb141]

I assume that is putting zero cost on your own time for doing so.

Putting your time to build a PC is the annoying part, but I only need to do it once every 5 or 6 years, so yes your time has some cost but over the years doesn't feels like a waste of time.

 

[theorist9]

To me Macs are overpriced,

My checklist for a laptop

- Nvidia Video Card (3050 and up)
- Good Keyboard with backlight (apple have but I prefer Alienware Keyboards plus are RGB)
- Hz over pixels, I prefer 75Hz 1080P than 2k @60
- Upgradability, specially storage

So what computers are way cheaper than your beloved Macbook air

Dell XPS 13
Intel® Core™ i7-1250U
16 GB RAM
512 SSD
Iris Xe
Full HD+ (1900X1200)
$900.00


Dell XPS 15
i7-13700H
Arc™ A370M Graphics with 4GB GDDR6
16 GB RAM
512 SSD
Full HD+ (1920X1200)
$1500

Nice try. Both of those fall significantly short of the Air in several categories. For instance, a Chromebook is much less expensive than both of those. By your silly logic, that means both the XPS's are overpriced.

I.e., here's what you're saying: "The Air is overpriced."

But here's what you actually mean: "If you don't care about any category in which the Air is better than the XPS's, then the Air is overpriced."

But you could equally well say: "If you don't care about any category in which the XPS's are better than a Chromebook, then the XPS's are overpriced."

Thus all you're doing is game-playing. You're not being serious.

See, if you'd actually been honest, and said what you really mean, which is I think is "The Mac's not a good value for gamers", I would have agreed with you, and we wouldn't be having an argument. But you weren't. You instead said that Mac's not a good value, period, which is of course both simplistic and wrong—as is the case with most absolutist statements.

So now back to Desktops, can now move on to Mac Pro vs Core i9 + 4070 overpricing debate?

Nope. Given your game-playing about this topic, would I want to get in a debate with you about another? I'm done.

 

[chucker23n1]

More likely the Mac Pro run rate is in the 40-100K/year run rate range. So you numbers are likely off by an order of magnitude.

That is a bit offset by the average sales price. It is likely no where near $20K at all. Apple explicitly mentioned that the 16 core CPU and the W5700X were the best selling components of their class ... and those two together are not going to put a Mac Pro configuration cost anywhere near $20K (average selling price ) at all.

50K * $9K = $450M (NOTE: same ballpark 100K * $4.5K = $450M )
50K * $8.5K = $425M

I agree, and I think you misunderstood. I wasn’t saying that $20k is the Mac Pro ASP. It is indeed provably below $10k.

I was saying of those who do spend $20k on a Mac Pro, there are only about 1,000. I may still be low on that estimate, sure.