M1 Ultra Mac Studio is 2 Pounds Heavier Than M1 Max Version Due to Thermal Differences

[LenticularTapir]

Do we know already if the SSD is upgradable?

I am wondering about this too. I know it's a long shot, but we haven't actually seen a clear shot of the logic board.

Based on the cut-out videos from Apple, the one area where there could be space for an m.2 slot (or the bespoke SSD modules used in the Mac Pro) is the bottom of the logic board, where the air vents are.

Wishful thinking, I know.

 

[supercoolmanchu]

When I first saw the leaked images, I said to myself, "oh! this must be the Apple's form factor for the future with tons of room to grow!" only to find out it's packed to the brim with heatsinks. I seriously thought there were expansion slots inside

The expandability is the biggest disappointment here.

Soldered in RAM is obnoxious in a desktop box,
but a soldered in HD is a war crime.

The other reality sinking in, is that Apple's in-house silicon is facing significant cooling issues.

The external iMac power brick, along with the upper 3 floors of cooling in these Mini+ boxes, are signs of foreboding in the transition. If the past is any indication, these case sizes are likely to swell even further by the time Apple silicon hits gen 3.

Without Jony Ive hiding the ever increasing component sizes in fancy designs, Apple products are getting real ugly, real quick too.

 

[lazyrighteye]

Maybe the reason there is no iMac Pro or 27” iMac is because the thermals, and subsequent size of case and fans/cooling system just wont work in display case for the Ultra.

Just speculation, of course. Maybe Apple could go backwards to the bubble back iMac design from years ago, but maybe that’s a bridge too far, even for the new, smarter Apple which is more focused on user needs, not product shots and designer fetishes.

I know Bloomberg says the iMac Pro is still coming, and I hope it is. But maybe the 27” iMac form factor is really, truly gone.

Just place a wide slit atop the back row of cheese grating on the Mac Studio, insert the base of the Studio Display and call it a 27" iMac. ?

 

[JippaLippa]

That's $1,000 a pound difference between the models!!

In my country it's 1300$ extra just to move from a 48 to a 64 core GPU...same chip otherwise.
That's the main reason why I chose the 48-Core version, as it's still plenty and my workflow is much more CPU/RAM dependent.
I spent the money on 128GB of ram.
18 Additional GPU cores would have been nice, but not 1300$ nice...

 

[strayts]

Wow all of that power with just a 370w power supply is pretty incredible.

 

[firewood]

I remember dragging a Compaq Portable II around back in the late 80s, that thing was almost 25 lbs ...

The original Mac (128k) was 16.6 lbs, and Apple sold a fitted canvas carrying case with a shoulder strap for it. I have one somewhere in storage.

There were also fitted carrying cases of varying types for the Apple II/II+.

The Studio is a lighter and a bit faster than either of those.

 

[Kierkegaarden]

That's $1,000 a pound difference between the models!!

Pretty good value. Chanel No. 5 is $1000 per ounce.

 

[elmateo487]

The expandability is the biggest disappointment here.

Soldered in RAM is obnoxious in a desktop box,
but a soldered in HD is a war crime.

The other reality sinking in, is that Apple's in-house silicon is facing significant cooling issues.

The external iMac power brick, along with the upper 3 floors of cooling in these Mini+ boxes, are signs of foreboding in the transition. If the past is any indication, these case sizes are likely to swell even further by the time Apple silicon hits gen 3.

Without Jony Ive hiding the ever increasing component sizes in fancy designs, Apple products are getting real ugly, real quick too.

Is this satire? Most everything you just said is utterly ridiculous.

There is no longer "soldered in ram". It literally is the design of the entire system on a chip to have directly accessed shared ram.

Significant cooling issues? Have you used an M1 yet? My guess is you have not. If you have then your statement is just plain uneducated.

Making a quiet computer tall so it can remain quiet while providing nearly the most powerful chip on earth? only the 3990x beating it? And you are complaining?

 

[BillyBurke]

Some people would complain about the weight if you gave them a bag of gold.

 

[Analog Kid]

Is anyone else getting trash can Mac Pro vibes from the studio's

Sadly, no…. The trashcan was beautiful. This is a square chunk of aluminum. A beast inside, which is where it counts, but I think even the MacPro has a better look. Maybe it would be less weird if it didn’t look like a photoshopped Mac mini.

Perhaps @AngerDanger joined the Apple design team?

 

[PkennethV]

Is this satire? Most everything you just said is utterly ridiculous.

There is no longer "soldered in ram". It literally is the design of the entire system on a chip to have directly accessed shared ram.

Significant cooling issues? Have you used an M1 yet? My guess is you have not. If you have then your statement is just plain uneducated.

Making a quiet computer tall so it can remain quiet while providing nearly the most powerful chip on earth? only the 3990x beating it? And you are complaining?

I was also trying to figure out whether supercoolmanchu was being sarcastic or not. Unfortunately, based on the rest of the post, I don't think it's satire.

Sadly, it's far from the first time I'm seeing people on this forum thinking that because the cooling solution of the Mac Studio is so much larger than the Intel Mac Mini's, it is somehow an indication that the chip must be really difficult to cool.

Typically, I see this type of mentality coming from people who tend to be Mac-centric as far as their context in modern computing hardware goes, because as you said, anyone who knows what type of cooling the 3990X requires will understand that M1 Ultra in the Mac Studio is exponentially more thermally efficient.

Generally, these Mac-centric people are also unfamiliar with the variety of aftermarket CPU cooling solutions available for PCs, so they are not familiar with the concept that you basically cannot judge how much heat a CPU is putting out simply by the size of the cooler because the manufacture/user may have opted for a very large cooling solution in order to keep fan speeds (and therefore noise) low. Smaller fans and/or smaller heatsink = more fan RPM required for a given amount of cooling = more noise.

PC building folks understand examples like putting an NH-D15 on a 65w TDP chip so that you can run those 140mm fans at 1000rpm, in near silence with the processor at full load. Sure, you could have gotten by with a much smaller cooler and an 80mm fan and gotten basically the same performance, it would just be louder.

I, for one, applaud Apple for making a desktop product that is not needlessly compact at the expense of noise or thermal throttling.

 

[hoodafoo]

I was also trying to figure out whether supercoolmanchu was being sarcastic or not. Unfortunately, based on the rest of the post, I don't think it's satire.

Sadly, it's far from the first time I'm seeing people on this forum thinking that because the cooling solution of the Mac Studio is so much larger than the Intel Mac Mini's, it is somehow an indication that the chip must be really difficult to cool.

Typically, I see this type of mentality coming from people who tend to be Mac-centric as far as their context in modern computing hardware goes, because as you said, anyone who knows what type of cooling the 3990X requires will understand that M1 Ultra in the Mac Studio is exponentially more thermally efficient.

Generally, these Mac-centric people are also unfamiliar with the variety of aftermarket CPU cooling solutions available for PCs, so they are not familiar with the concept that you basically cannot judge how much heat a CPU is putting out simply by the size of the cooler because the manufacture/user may have opted for a very large cooling solution in order to keep fan speeds (and therefore noise) low. Smaller fans and/or smaller heatsink = more fan RPM required for a given amount of cooling = more noise.

PC building folks understand examples like putting an NH-D15 on a 65w TDP chip so that you can run those 140mm fans at 1000rpm, in near silence with the processor at full load. Sure, you could have gotten by with a much smaller cooler and an 80mm fan and gotten basically the same performance, it would just be louder.

I, for one, applaud Apple for making a desktop product that is not needlessly compact at the expense of noise or thermal throttling.

Obviously, this thing must generate a $hitload of heat for it to require a thermal solution that big

 

[CWallace]

Obviously, this thing must generate a $hitload of heat for it to require a thermal solution that big

It probably does run quite hot, but like the old iMac Pro, the thermal system might be that large to allow it to run quiet even when the system is under heavy load rather than going with a smaller system that has to push the fans faster (and louder) to cool the system (like the old Intel iMacs and MacBook Pros).

 

[PkennethV]

Obviously, this thing must generate a $hitload of heat for it to require a thermal solution that big

My post that you quoted literally just (tried to) explain why looking at the size of the cooling a solution used in a computer is not indicative of the heat produced by the chip it's trying to cool, because coolers can be oversized/over spec-ed to keep noise levels down.

In plain English, it's possible for a computer with a larger cooler to actually consume less power (and therefore produce less heat) than a computer with a smaller cooler. The smaller cooler just has to work a lot harder (spin fans faster).

Theory aside, we can actually put numbers to this.

The M1 Max chip consumes 92w at the very most when BOTH CPU and GPU are pushed to the max (no pun intended).
(source: https://www.anandtech.com/show/17024/apple-m1-max-performance-review/3)

So we can estimate the M1 Ultra power draw to be roughly 200w when BOTH CPU and GPU are maxed out (heck I'll even say 250w to be generous because maybe Apple is pumping a little more juice into it since they don't have to worry about battery life, unlike with the M1 Max in the MacBook Pro).

The same article linked to above says the peak power draw of the M1 Max when only the CPU is under full load (no GPU load) is 43w package draw, or 63w measured from the wall socket (the latter takes into account the power consumption of the MacBook Pro's display).

In contrast, Apple lists the CPU ONLY (no GPU load!) max power draw of the iMac Pro as 370w at the wall (keeping in mind that the iMac's display probably consumes ~120w, rather than the 20w for the MacBook Pro's display). So even if you subtract 120w for the display, that's still 250w.
(source: https://support.apple.com/en-ca/HT208378)

Another data point is the power supply of the Mac Studio's power supply is 370 watts
(source: https://www.macrumors.com/2022/03/09/m1-ultra-mac-studio-heavier-thermal-differences/)

The iMac Pro's power supply is 500 watts. Granted, 120 watts or so of that is going towards powering the display of the iMac (which the Mac Studio doesn't have).
(source: https://www.macrumors.com/roundup/imac-pro/)


So let's all stop with throwing around statements stating/suggesting/implying that the M1 Ultra is so damn hot that Apple could not fit it in the same design as something like the iMac Pro, and instead, had to resort to designing a chungus Mac Mini because numerically, they totally could have fit it in the Intel iMac's enclosure...it would just be noisier than the Mac Studio's design.

(I'm not singling out hoodafoo with the statement above; I've seen this being said by multiple people in this forum)


Edit: bonus info, if you're wondering why, if the M1 Ultra will only consume an estimated 200w of power, Apple put in a 360w power supply, a huge factor is the minimum required power a Thunderbolt 4 port must be able to provide is 15w. 15 watts x 6 ports = 90 watts.

 

[hoodafoo]

My post that you quoted literally just (tried to) explain why looking at the size of the cooling a solution used in a computer is not indicative of the heat produced by the chip it's trying to cool, because coolers can be oversized/over spec-ed to keep noise levels down.

In plain English, it's possible for a computer with a larger cooler to actually consume less power (and therefore produce less heat) than a computer with a smaller cooler. The smaller cooler just has to work a lot harder (spin fans faster).

Theory aside, we can actually put numbers to this.

The M1 Max chip consumes 92w at the very most when BOTH CPU and GPU are pushed to the max (no pun intended).
(source: https://www.anandtech.com/show/17024/apple-m1-max-performance-review/3)

So we can estimate the M1 Ultra power draw to be roughly 200w when BOTH CPU and GPU are maxed out (heck I'll even say 250w to be generous because maybe Apple is pumping a little more juice into it since they don't have to worry about battery life, unlike with the M1 Max in the MacBook Pro).

The same article linked to above says the peak power draw of the M1 Max when only the CPU is under full load (no GPU load) is 43w package draw, or 63w measured from the wall socket (the latter takes into account the power consumption of the MacBook Pro's display).

In contrast, Apple lists the CPU ONLY (no GPU load!) max power draw of the iMac Pro as 370w at the wall (keeping in mind that the iMac's display probably consumes ~120w, rather than the 20w for the MacBook Pro's display). So even if you subtract 120w for the display, that's still 250w.
(source: https://support.apple.com/en-ca/HT208378)

Another data point is the power supply of the Mac Studio's power supply is 370 watts
(source: https://www.macrumors.com/2022/03/09/m1-ultra-mac-studio-heavier-thermal-differences/)

The iMac Pro's power supply is 500 watts. Granted, 120 watts or so of that is going towards powering the display of the iMac (which the Mac Studio doesn't have).
(source: https://www.macrumors.com/roundup/imac-pro/)


So let's all stop with throwing around statements stating/suggesting/implying that the M1 Ultra is so damn hot that Apple could not fit it in the same design as something like the iMac Pro, and instead, had to resort to designing a chungus Mac Mini because numerically, they totally could have fit it in the Intel iMac's enclosure...it would just be noisier than the Mac Studio's design.

(I'm not singling out hoodafoo with the statement above; I've seen this being said by multiple people in this forum)


Edit: bonus info, if you're wondering why, if the M1 Ultra will only consume an estimated 200w of power, Apple put in a 360w power supply, a huge factor is the minimum required power a Thunderbolt 4 port must be able to provide is 15w. 15 watts x 6 ports = 90 watts.

Oh, don't worry about me.. I got tough skin ?

I think the point here is that apple made a conscious decision to squeeze every drop of performance out of this chip and in doing so, they somewhat took away a strong selling point that the initially had with prior releases of the chip - that it ran cool without the need for excessive fan noise. Sure, they might get "3.8x" out of it now, but 100C is still 100C no matter how you look at it and to save face from going back to loud fan again, they have to compensate with humongous heatsinks. I'm all fine with this, but I can see how it's a bit of a head-scratcher to the "Mac-centric" crowd where apple's obsession has always been smaller, thinner, lighter!

 

[ThunderSkunk]

I like that 2/3 of the bulk of this beast is the air cooling system. But I imagine a liquid cooler & exchanger wouldn’t be any smaller.

 

[arobert3434]

Freaking hell, I bet these machines are beasts. If the M1 is so power efficient that a Macbook Air doesn't need a fan at all and performs decently, imagine these machines which need all this cooling.

Looking forward to seeing some real world benchmarks.

370W with these chips is massive. But between this and the increased power brick for the 16" Macbook Pro it really seems like the long-held claims from the AMD/Intel camp that the excellent performance/watt of the A series wouldn't necessarily scale to desktop levels are proving true, no matter how Apple spins it in its graphs. And based on Apple's previous struggles with thermals in numerous small chassis, I seriously doubt this thing is going to be able to dissipate that much heat without throttling.

 

[Krizoitz]

Maybe they'll announce wheels for it later.

Personally I'd love sculpted Lion's feet.

Make it like a Roomba so it can follow you.

 

[Krizoitz]

If the ultra needs an 8-pound heatsink, then will the Mac Pro weigh as much as a cartoon anvil? lol

The heat sink is not 8-pounds. The entire device is 8lbs WITH the heavier heat sink.

Aluminum model is 6 lbs.
Copper model is 8 lbs.

Copper is roughly 3x more dense than aluminum, so assuming similar/same design on the heat sink (its probably not, but its good enough for this thought exercise) that would indicate the aluminum heat sink is about 1lb and the copper one is about 3lbs, give or take. So the rest of the device, including case is about 5lbs or less.

 

[skitidetdu]

Seriously looking forward to Logic Pro tests on the M1 ultra machine

 

[MrCrowbar]

This should answer the question of whether the M1 Ultra will end up in a laptop...

Not necessarily. Big heat sink allows for mostly passive cooling so the fan can spin slow enough that you can't hear it unless your ear touches the case.

On a laptop, you just offset a smaller heat sink with faster and more fans. For software development, you do actually want loads of RAM and a CPU that's crazy fast but sits idle most of the time.

Personally I'd love a control center slider where I can move the fan noise between "silent" and "full noise, full power". Ideally detect my Apple Watch to figure out if I left the room and go full tilt to finish intensive tasks and go back silent as I approach.

 

[George Dawes]

How bizarre , a computer who’s back is more interesting than its front

If I bought one I’d seriously consider using it back to front , maybe they designed it on purpose so people would ?

 

[Kabeyun]

Copper has a little less than twice the thermal conductivity of Aluminum (for the pure metals, alloys may differ). Presumably the M1 Ultra has twice the TDP of the M1 Max. So they should run at similar temperatures all else being equal.

Of course this assumes that everything outside the metal (computer guts, enclosure, air) isn’t already saturated in its ability to carry away heat.

 

[JosephAW]

And just like that we’re already at the end of the line of Apple‘s new technology reaching thermal limits.
Time to start looking for the next architecture.

 

[JosephAW]

We’re just about at the G5 limit again, the next model will have to have liquid cooled system.