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Apple M1 Ultra

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Re: Apple M1 Ultra

#222

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They tried that before and flopped. The server market is different. Companies buy servers from the low bidder. Apple has never really played in that market.

People care about performance per watt now. So they could compete. The real question is if they would support Linux. In our containerized world I can’t see their servers getting super big running macOS

The reason they dominate at PPW, is because they are on TSMCs 5nm process. No one else has made a cpu chip on this process yet. AMD are scheduled for later this year (they are currently using 7nm).

It will be interesting to see the difference in performance and performance per watt, when both companies are on the same node.

Re: Apple M1 Ultra

#223

Is it actually more powerful than a top of the line threadripper[0] or is that not a "personal computer" CPU by this definition? I feel like 64 cores would beat 20 on some workloads even if the 20 were way faster in single core performance. [0] https://www.amd.com/en/products/cpu/amd-ryzen-threadripper-3...

It doesn’t support your argument when we’re talking about a massive processor like a threadripper vs. a M1 Ultra. The performance per watt isn’t in the same universe and that matters.

The article claims that the chip is "the world’s most powerful and capable chip for a personal computer". It's reasonable to ask whether it genuinely is faster than another available chip, it's not an implicit argument that it's not powerful.

Re: Apple M1 Ultra

#224
So then, when will common ML frameworks work on Apple? I guess compiled Tensorflow works with some plugins or whatever, where afaik performance is still subpar. Apple emphasizes that they have this many Tensorcores... but unfortunately to use them one has to roll one's own framework on what Swift or something. I am sure it gets better soon.

Re: Apple M1 Ultra

#225
post #20

I'm cross posting a question I had from the Mac Studio thread (currently unanswered). ---- Mac Pro scale up? How is this going to scale up to a Mac Pro, especially related to RAM? The Ultra caps at 128 GB of RAM (which isn't much for video editing, especially given that the GPU uses the system RAM). Today's Mac Pro goes up to 1.5TB (and has dedicated video RAM above this). If the Mac Pro is say, 4 Ultra's stacked tog…

This went by so fast I'm not sure I heard it right, but I believe the announcer for the Ultra said it the last in the M1 lineup. They just can't ship a Mac Pro without expansion in the normal sense, my guess is that the M2 will combine the unified memory architecture with expansion busses. Which sounds gnarly, and I don't blame them for punting on that for the first generation of M class processors.

This is what I've been thinking as well, a M2 in a Mac Pro with 128/256gb soldered and up to 2TB 8 channel DDR5-6400 expandable, and do a tiered memory cache

Re: Apple M1 Ultra

#226

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ice Lake shipped in 2019. The current generation is Alder Lake, which is slightly ahead of the M1 in single-threaded performance according to most benchmarks.

And massively behind in terms of power consuption

Yes, certainly. I don't think that's relevant in this case, though. Why would anyone care if their workstation CPU draws 60W or 200W? It's easy to cool in either case and the power consumption is trivial.

M1 is clearly the best design on the market for mobile devices and is merely very good for desktops. Let's keep the enthusiasm realistic.

Re: Apple M1 Ultra

#228

Apple have some serious chip design abilities. Imagine if they entered the server market, with this architecture it could be very successful.

They tried that before and flopped. The server market is different. Companies buy servers from the low bidder. Apple has never really played in that market.

That was before people cared about performance per watt.

Besides for some use cases, these Mac Studios will be racked and in data centers as is.

Re: Apple M1 Ultra

#229
post #76

At what point Apple will put those chips in their servers or sell server chips? It only makes sense for them to take this architecture to the cloud deployments

It makes sense, although what I am concerned about is the cost. Apple isn't exactly know for providing services at or near cost.

Re: Apple M1 Ultra

#230

Is it actually more powerful than a top of the line threadripper[0] or is that not a "personal computer" CPU by this definition? I feel like 64 cores would beat 20 on some workloads even if the 20 were way faster in single core performance. [0] https://www.amd.com/en/products/cpu/amd-ryzen-threadripper-3...

My workstation has a 3990x.

Our "world" build is slightly faster on my M1 Max.

https://twitter.com/kiratpandya/status/1457438725680480257

The 3990x runs a bit faster on the initial compile stage but the linking is single threaded and the M1 Max catches up at that point. I expect the M1 Ultra to crush the 3990x on compile time.

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