AMD Ryzen 7000 CPUs announced

[Jamesbond007]

Right. Windows shouldn't be a problem, only macOS. In fact you should be able to run Big Sur and Monterey with your current systems no problem.

Yes I am aware of the previous Ryzen chips not needing it but I think it is required for Alder Lake. From what I remember, we had to have AVX-512 enabled in the BIOS before, otherwise macOS wouldn't boot. I believe it may be down to how the newer chips are recognised by the system (on an Intel setup). AVX-512 also affects Adobe applications as that is the other main tool they use in the app for processing aside from the single core processor afaik.

So what you mean is that while other x86 CPUs may not need AVX-512 to run MacOS, for Alder Lake (and perhaps newer Intel) CPUs they are needed?

If so then as you say future Intel CPUs and the currently selling Alder Lake CPUs may not be able to run MacOS if Intel does "fuse off" AVX-512.

While I know my current hackintosh systems are able to run Big Sur and Monterey, I don't plan to at this time. I run VMware Fusion, and Big Sur and Monterey have problems with it, relating to nested virtualization (very slow performance due to problems in Apple's hypervisor framework), which I consider unacceptable.

 

[pastrychef]

Right. Windows shouldn't be a problem, only macOS. In fact you should be able to run Big Sur and Monterey with your current systems no problem.

Yes I am aware of the previous Ryzen chips not needing it but I think it is required for Alder Lake. From what I remember, we had to have AVX-512 enabled in the BIOS before, otherwise macOS wouldn't boot. I believe it may be down to how the newer chips are recognised by the system (on an Intel setup). AVX-512 also affects Adobe applications as that is the other main tool they use in the app for processing aside from the single core processor afaik.

Previously, on consumer level Intel CPUs, AVX-512 was not available. We only had AVX2.

 

[Middleman]

So what you mean is that while other x86 CPUs may not need AVX-512 to run MacOS, for Alder Lake (and perhaps newer Intel) CPUs they are needed?

If so then as you say future Intel CPUs and the currently selling Alder Lake CPUs may not be able to run MacOS if Intel does "fuse off" AVX-512.

While I know my current hackintosh systems are able to run Big Sur and Monterey, I don't plan to at this time. I run VMware Fusion, and Big Sur and Monterey have problems with it, relating to nested virtualization (very slow performance due to problems in Apple's hypervisor framework), which I consider unacceptable.

Yes that is (correct). I do hope I am wrong, but that was what we'd discovered in our discussions when we worked through the first working Z690 boards (read @etorix's post on it here). Which was why I lamented Intel's decision to fuse off that part of the chip. For some reason it only affects Intel chips and not AMD ones.

 

[Middleman]

Previously, on consumer level Intel CPUs, AVX-512 was not available. We only had AVX2.

Yes that is correct. But according to @etorix, under SMBIOS MacPro7,1 and iMacPro1,1 macOS looks for AVX-512 compatibility. Without them it would crash upon loading (on Intel systems).

 

[pastrychef]

Yes that is correct. But according to @etorix, under SMBIOS MacPro7,1 and iMacPro1,1 macOS looks for AVX-512 compatibility. Without them it would crash upon loading (on Intel systems).

I used iMacPro1,1 with an i9-9900K for a long time with no issues and the i9-9900K didn't have AVX-512.

Also, AVX2 instructions caused a lot of heat. I assume AVX-512 instructions would cause similar levels of heat.

 

[etorix]

For your Z690, I am actually rather concerned if that is even possible. I'm sure you've heard that they (Intel) had begun to fuse off AVX-512 functionality on the newer Alder Lake chips coming out of the factory the last 7-8 months, which means potentially the newer chips cannot run macOS.

macOS requires AVX-2 instructions, but not AVX-512 so all is fine here.
Most Intel Macs do not have AVX-512 to begin with!

Yes it will do (run the Intel build of macOS). Biggest difference with this new Zen 4 chip is that ironically compared to Intel it has new AVX-512 instructions added! That means it should run the likes of Adobe Photoshop much better than Zen 3 and potentially without the problems we faced earlier.

"AVX-512" is an umbrella for a number of different sets of instructions (it seems Intel lives by and for complexity) but Zen4 implementation appears quite comprehensive (on par with Ice Lake/Rocket Lake, more extensive than Cascade Lake Xeons in the MacPro7,1):

Zen 4: AVX-512 F, CD, VL, DQ, BW, IFMA, VBMI, VBMI2, VPOPCNTDQ, BITALG, VNNI, VPCLMULQDQ, GFNI, VAES, BF16

We may indeed expect that Zen4 hackintoshes could run Photoshop & Co without patches and with full accelerations.
But this is to be confirmed—starting with running macOS on Zen4.

 

[Middleman]

I used iMacPro1,1 with an i9-9900K for a long time with no issues and the i9-9900K didn't have AVX-512.

Also, AVX2 instructions caused a lot of heat. I assume AVX-512 instructions would cause similar levels of heat.

Yes and I agree that would have worked fine. However I think the difference between the i9-9900K and Alder Lake chipset was probably in the way it appeared to the system. I remember when we were setting up the SSDT-CPUR for the i9-12900K the CPU registers came up as devices instead of as processors and I think that was one of the major differences in architecture.

 

[etorix]

Yes that is correct. But according to @etorix, under SMBIOS MacPro7,1 and iMacPro1,1 macOS looks for AVX-512 compatibility. Without them it would crash upon loading (on Intel systems).

Oops! Old post, less knowledgable me (not that it has much improved…) and some wrong reading.
Then I assumed that macOS software would probe for CPU capability by checking SMBIOS; that may not be the case, and I don't know how it actually works and how Photoshop (or others…) decide whether to load their specially optimised AVX-512 code.

macOS itself does not require AVX-512 to load. The number of users using iMacPro1,1 or MacPro7,1 SMBIOS with (non-AVX-512) Coffee Lake or Zen3 CPUs, or running Alder Lake with all cores on (E-cores on: No AVX-512, even if P-cores would be capable) is evidence of this fact.

 

[pastrychef]

Yes and I agree that would have worked fine. However I think the difference between the i9-9900K and Alder Lake chipset was probably in the way it appeared to the system. I remember when we were setting up the SSDT-CPUR for the i9-12900K the CPU registers came up as devices instead of as processors and I think that was one of the major differences in architecture.

I didn't want to deal with that especially for my daily driver. Since it's an architecture that Apple never used and probably never will, more will need to be done to make them work right. As Intel keeps moving forward, compatibility with macOS will only worsen.

 

[etorix]

Yes and I agree that would have worked fine. However I think the difference between the i9-9900K and Alder Lake chipset was probably in the way it appeared to the system. I remember when we were setting up the SSDT-CPUR for the i9-12900K the CPU registers came up as devices instead of as processors and I think that was one of the major differences in architecture.

"CPU devices" is a matter of ACPI specification: Apple still relies on the 2000 version. Though the most amazing thing is maybe that it took about 15 years for PC makers to enforce an ACPI declaration style which was introduced in 2004 with version 3.0 of the specification…
AMD platforms require CPU redefinition (SSDT-CPUR or equivalent) since the B550 chipset; consumer Intel platforms, since Z690. These adaptations have been made. I may be wrong, but the CPU side of things should be settled for some time; if new issues arise with future platforms, I'd rather expect compatibility issues with chipset features (e.g. SATA or USB controllers).