Apple Silicon Mac Pro Revealed at WWDC 2023

[ramazarusx]

if so how (block diagram please!).

You're asking too much from Apple

 

[trs96]

There are many new MBA 15" reviews and M2 Max/Ultra Mac Studio reviews today on YouTube. Nothing yet for the Mac Pro Tower. Must take longer to pack and ship them out. Maybe they just aren't sending out review samples and we have to wait for those that actually paid to get one.

 

[Bustycat]

So we've got:
Mac14,8 - Mac Pro (M2 Ultra)
Mac14,13 - Mac Studio (M2 Max)
Mac14,14 - Mac Studio (M2 Ultra)
Mac14,15 - MacBook Air 15" (M2)

 

[etorix]

No, but I found the article very unclear as to lanes are actually handled. There's no obvious PLX chip on the motherboard—which would be the most appropriate solution—or are the lanes actually shared, and if so how (block diagram please!).
Hopefully, we'll get the answer once the Mac Pro is released and in the hand of reviewers.

:facepalm: Just click and search, stup!d!
Apple documentation:

All slots are connected through a PCI Express switch on the Mac Pro main logic board. PCI Express switch bandwidth is automatically configured through pool allocations. You can use the Expansion Slot Utility to manually configure pool allocations.

There is indeed a PLX switch. Two, actually.

A Mastodon post from an Asahi Linux developer, linked to in the French article, has more details:

They have two big PCIe switches and are hanging everything off of them.

From the device tree:

8x Gen4 lanes on die 0, switched:​

• x1 to USB internal
• x2 to SATA internal
• x4 to I/O card (USB, probably single lane connected)
• x8 to slot6
• x1 to LAN1
• x1 to LAN2
• x1 to WiFi/BT

16x Gen4 lanes on die 1, switched:​

• x16 to slot1
• x16 to slot2
• x8 to slot3
• x8 to slot4
• x8 to slot5

Assuming storage is 8 lanes on die0 (can't see the storage config in the device tree, but given the downstream port counts I hope the config is 8x/8x split on die0 and 16x for general purpose PCIe on die1).

So basically 5 of the slots including both x16 ones are bottlenecked into a single x16 gen4 channel. Boo.

2,25:1 oversubscription on die0 is actually not too bad.
3,5:1 oversubscription on die 1 is less good. But that would occur only if all slots are filled to use all their lanes. With some empty slots or x1 audio cards it should work quite well in practice.

 

[ramazarusx]

There is indeed a PLX switch. Two, actually.

As I suspected, it's a last minute, put together product. Considering the performance between Mac Studio and Mac Pro are identical there is no way in hell anyone can justify $3k premium on Mac Pro.

 

[etorix]

Understanding how the Mac Pro is engineered does not change the value analysis in the previous pages.
Yes, it's the same CPU as in the Mac Studio. The Mac Pro is a $3000 / 3000 E markup for a big aluminium case and six PCIe slots. For the professional who needs these slots, even for half a dozen of x1 audio cards, it's totally worth it.

Maybe the current Mac Pro was put together after M2 Xtreme was cancelled so that Apple could eventually complete the transition and discontinue its last Intel-based model.
The M2 Xtreme would have had four M2 Max dies, with 16 PCIe 4.0 lanes each. What would it look like?

Let's say: Die0 as in the Mac Pro Ultra (PCIe switch for I/O and x8 slot6); die2 and die3 feed their 16 lanes to slot1 and slot2; we're still 8 lanes short, die1 would need a switch to feed slots3-5 with 8 lanes each. Somewhat lopsided.
Second take: All six slots are x16. Die1, die2 and die3 each feed two slots through a PLX switch, a very reasonable 2:1 oversubscription. Somehow, die2 and/or die3 contribute some extra I/O (diverted Thunderbolt controllers, or an extra lane on the switch), and take over at least two lanes worth of burden from die0, which can then handle storage (x8) and the rest of I/O (LAN, WiFi, SATA…) without a PLX. Looks good—and "Xtreme". Still has three PLX to feed all six x16 slots. And should cost around 20k.

If that was the plan, there would still be a place for a cheaper version of the Mac Pro, with a "mere" Ultra CPU, alongside the Xtreme—just like the Mac Studio has a cheaper Max version and an Ultra version. So maybe the initial plan was to have two versions of the Mac Pro, Xtreme was cancelled and we only got Ultra—but Ultra was in the plan all along.

 

[Middleman]

FYI the 2023 Mac Pro has just been benchmarked - and it doesn't look good...well, not against hackintoshes anyway:

 

[pastrychef]

FYI the 2023 Mac Pro has just been benchmarked - and it doesn't look good...well, not against hackintoshes anyway:

View attachment 567806

What's wrong with those scores?

When I searched "13900K macOS", I got:


Also, there are things that can be done on Apple Silicon in macOS that can't be done on Intel based systems like Apple Game Porting Toolkit. Plus, we know that the M2 Ultra will continue to receive macOS updates longer than any Intel system will.

 

[bombardier10]

What's wrong with those scores?

When I searched "13900K macOS", I got:
View attachment 567809

Also, there are things that can be done on Apple Silicon in macOS that can't be done on Intel based systems like Apple Game Porting Toolkit. Plus, we know that the M2 Ultra will continue to receive macOS updates longer than any Intel system will.

Geekbench 5 or 6 is not a reliable benchmark. See on Cinebench R23 ; i9-13900K is more faster than any new Silicon MacPro. In real render apps of course. We dont buy i9 or m2 ultra for browsing net or use excell )

 

[craighazan]

But what is it for now?, Apple obseleted their own Mac Pro with the Studio, they did this to the 2019 Intel Mac Pro with the M2 Mini Pro. Sure it's got 6 PCIe slots but they're not much use, there's no GPU support unless the manufactures get off their backsides. The Mac Pro is dead!.