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OT – is the “new” Mac Pro a failure
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[Joe Marler] “[Walter Soyka] “You can hit about 5 GB/s in a Z840 with an internal RAID of 16 SSDs…the fact remains that there is simply no way to get it on the nMP.
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The nMP has three TB2 buses…..That would imply that around 3 GB/sec total should be achievable. I wonder has anyone ever tested that?”If they haven’t, I’m sure they will.
There gets to be an interesting dynamic as we start to push against the limits though. Remember the 1999 “supercomputer” campaign? Apple had print ads touting that these computers were so powerful that Apple wasn’t allowed to export them to certain nations.
And this spot.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gSFeunkpng8
Although the tagline is priceless (“Pentium processors? They’re harmless”), this was exaggerated at best. The G4 wasn’t a weapon, and while the processing power exceeded some export thresholds at manufacture date, the ceiling had already been raised, leaving only about a 4-month window where this was even vaguely true a LITTLE….
…but really, can you imagine Apple saying that they make the most powerful computer?
Even on a dollar-for-dollar basis? I know that that’s part of what we’re debating here — does it do the stuff that **I** need it do — but the “not available at any price for a Mac” state of things is a real one.
Billions of colors is one that has recently come around. During the six years that Macs couldn’t do it, the general refrain was “Yeah, but I don’t need that,” and there have only been a handful of articles to treat Apple’s catching up as an actual innovation LOL but looking at things like HP Z workstations and RAM capacity far outstripping Macs, Apple bringing up the rear on Thunderbolt 3…it seems like one conclusion that we should at least debate drawing is that Apple is out of the “most powerful” game for good.
And maybe for the VERY good. Their goal isn’t to be the Tesla of computing. Apple is the Prius of computing, all the way. Anything else is a distraction that will ultimately not serve Apple’s users or shareholders well at all.
And I bet that the Apple car is going to prove my point. LOL I can’t wait! On-topic car analogies for everyone!
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[Joe Marler] “The nMP has three TB2 buses. Even if you leave one bus for a 4k display, you could theoretically put multiple large RAID arrays on the other buses.”
I considered proposing this up in my last post, too. A software RAID 0 of two hardware RAIDs could nearly double the performance.
But there’s a huge tradeoff: even after mortgaging nearly all of the available expansion bandwidth, plus extra CPU cycles on every read and write, you’ve still only achieved half of the top storage speed available from a single new PCIe RAID controller.
If you really need top-line system speed, I don’t see how the nMP is a consideration. Is this the architecture you would want to build a high-end finishing system on?
Tim said it best:
[Tim Wilson] “…but really, can you imagine Apple saying that they make the most powerful computer? “
Walter Soyka
Designer & Mad Scientist at Keen Live [link]
Motion Graphics, Widescreen Events, Presentation Design, and Consulting
@keenlive | RenderBreak [blog] | Profile [LinkedIn] -
[Walter Soyka] “If you really need top-line system speed, I don’t see how the nMP is a consideration. Is this the architecture you would want to build a high-end finishing system on?
[Tim Wilson] “…but really, can you imagine Apple saying that they make the most powerful computer? “”
I’ll just take a moment’s break from happily editing on my “lower-powered” nMP to observe that Macs and PCs have been leap-frogging each other for as long as I have been buying computers. If a nMP is not high enough powered to do the “high-end finishing” you need for your niche than buy something else. Next year perhaps a n(ewer)MP will be the high-end system you need to buy because it leap-frogs PCs. Same as it ever was. Fortunately, most of us can do high-end finishing with our existing systems because even an iMac or moderately powered MacBookPro is more than fast enough for most of the finishing done today.
If only we could all be paid somehow for our time complaining.
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[James Culbertson] “I’ll just take a moment’s break from happily editing on my “lower-powered” nMP to observe that Macs and PCs have been leap-frogging each other for as long as I have been buying computers.”
When was the last time that Apple produced a machine that could outperform a souped up PC (running Windows or Linux) though… maybe not since before the Pentium 1?
Shawn
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[James Culbertson] “Next year perhaps a n(ewer)MP will be the high-end system you need to buy because it leap-frogs PCs.”
For MPs “next generation” might be more applicable since annual updates haven’t been a thing in 5 or 6 years. 😉
[Shawn Miller] “When was the last time that Apple produced a machine that could outperform a souped up PC (running Windows or Linux) though… maybe not since before the Pentium 1?”
Off the shelf PC from a vender like HP or Dell or an overclocked, water cooled, hot rod built in someone’s basement?
For less ‘exotic’ machines the old MPs would hold their own when they were new (though as James said PCs would update faster and the MP would get eclipsed after 6-12 months). For PCs that were packed to the gills with internal RAIDS, multiple GPUS, etc., the Mac hasn’t been able to compete toe-to-toe on that level since the they started cutting back the PCI slots 10-15yrs agod.
I think the single CPU in the nMP hamstrings it as the number of applications that really leverage GPUs is still relatively limited. Though I guess that’s the whole point of their Metal API.
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[Andrew Kimery] “[Shawn Miller] “When was the last time that Apple produced a machine that could outperform a souped up PC (running Windows or Linux) though… maybe not since before the Pentium 1?”
Off the shelf PC from a vender like HP or Dell or an overclocked, water cooled, hot rod built in someone’s basement?”
Good question – off the shelf is relative to the PC vendor of choice, I think. Boxx (for instance) has been shipping OTS machines that blow the doors off OTS builds from Dell and HP for years.
[Andrew Kimery] “For less ‘exotic’ machines the old MPs would hold their own when they were new (though as James said PCs would update faster and the MP would get eclipsed after 6-12 months). For PCs that were packed to the gills with internal RAIDS, multiple GPUS, etc., the Mac hasn’t been able to compete toe-to-toe on that level since the they started cutting back the PCI slots 10-15yrs agod.”
True, however, in addition, you could always put more processors and RAM inside of a Windows or Linux box. So, I’m not sure when (pre G2 maybe?) Macs ever had any real performance advantages over high end PCs.
Shawn
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[James Culbertson] “[Walter Soyka] “If you really need top-line system speed, I don’t see how the nMP is a consideration. Is this the architecture you would want to build a high-end finishing system on?
…Macs and PCs have been leap-frogging each other for as long as I have been buying computers. If a nMP is not high enough powered to do the “high-end finishing” you need for your niche than buy something else. Next year perhaps a n(ewer)MP will be the high-end system you need to buy because it leap-frogs PCs…
“Bingo. While impressive, high-end finishing is a tiny market niche. Yes it’s fun to see what Quantel’s Pablo Rio can do. There are PC manufacturers who will build you a 48-core, overclocked, liquid-cooled Xeon workstation. The now two-year-old nMP cannot really compete with those.
However IMO the nMP was never designed to occupy the absolute highest echelon of the workstation market. It is a generalized design. Chasing rarified niche market segments for “biggest/fastest” prestige often does not yield good business results. A good example is the supercomputer market segment. It is exotic and impressive but many companies have gone bankrupt pursuing that.
The next Mac Pro update will probably bump it up the performance ladder. When that is released it will be interesting to see how it compares to its upper-end competition.
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[James Culbertson] “‘ll just take a moment’s break from happily editing on my “lower-powered” nMP to observe that Macs and PCs have been leap-frogging each other for as long as I have been buying computers.”
Well, now Macs ARE PCs, so that trend is likely to be very different going forward. Not only is Apple currently trending away from performance/expansion and toward portability/form factor — how can Apple hardware leapfrog PC hardware when they’re the same?
But Apple hardware + software, that’s another story! See any of the neighboring threads on speed and FCPX.
[James Culbertson] “Fortunately, most of us can do high-end finishing with our existing systems because even an iMac or moderately powered MacBookPro is more than fast enough for most of the finishing done today.”
We’re probably getting hung up on the word “high-end.” Of course you can do fantastic work on a Mac.
But in terms of compute performance, Apple’s very best machine is only mid-tier. No big deal, though, because in terms of this forum, most folks don’t really care about compute performance. But adjacent markets — finishing, comp, 3D — can actually make use of more grunt than any Mac can provide.
I’m not saying the nMP is a bad machine, or that you can’t do good work on a Mac. Quite the contrary. My studio has four of them, and I like them. I’m just saying we shouldn’t delude ourselves about what the nMP is. It is not a workstation (which some people still actually need). It is a “pro computer” just like Apple says.
[James Culbertson] “If only we could all be paid somehow for our time complaining.”
Start consulting! Works for me.
In all seriousness, I hope I’m not coming across as complaining. I think that I’m one of the few posters here who regularly uses both Macs and PC workstations, so I’m just trying to give a little perspective that’s otherwise lacking here.
Walter Soyka
Designer & Mad Scientist at Keen Live [link]
Motion Graphics, Widescreen Events, Presentation Design, and Consulting
@keenlive | RenderBreak [blog] | Profile [LinkedIn] -
[Walter Soyka] “Well, now Macs ARE PCs, so that trend is likely to be very different going forward. Not only is Apple currently trending away from performance/expansion and toward portability/form factor — how can Apple hardware leapfrog PC hardware when they’re the same?”
Sorry but I have to comment on that one. Mac and PC hardware are definitely NOT the same. I’ve used a PC for 30+ years and the PC laptop trackpad is the WORST input device I have ever encountered. Every time I got a new Thinkpad I would disable the trackpad as one of my first steps. Then I got a MacBook Pro and experienced what a “real’ trackpad is supposed to feel like and behave like. OMG, it was night and day! Why? Because other then the commodity CPU, GPU. memory, and HDD, Apple designs all of their own hardware. They don’t use PC motherboards, they don’t use PC input devices, they don’t use PC BIOS (they use UEFI which PC’s are now moving to) they are NOT the same as PCs… not by a long shot.
[Walter Soyka] “But Apple hardware + software, that’s another story!”
That, of course, is the “secret sauce”. Microsoft is dependent on other hardware manufacturers to take advantage of capabilities in their OS and it gets boiled down to the least common denominator of hardware. Apple has very tight integration with purposeful built software for the their hardware and the end user experience is considerably better because of it (take my previous trackpad experience as an example).
~jr
http://www.johnrofrano.com
http://www.vasst.com -
[John Rofrano] “Sorry but I have to comment on that one. Mac and PC hardware are definitely NOT the same.”
Same RAM, CPU, GPU, HDD/SSD, underling architecture, etc.,. With regards to motherboards, they come in many shapes and configurations. The biggest thing that sets Apple apart is that Apple doesn’t use standard form factors, such as ATX or BTX, in its desktops. Conversely pretty much all laptops use custom motherboards because laptops come in such a variety of shapes and sizes where as desktop towers still pretty much fall into either ‘full’, ‘mid’ or ‘small’ form factors. Regardless of size and shape, the motherboards (including Apple’s) still have to adhere to the same technical specs so that the all the parts ‘connected’ to the MoBo (from CPU and GPU to external hard drives) work as expected.
One can buy a Dell or an HP and run easily OS X on it w/a readily available hack. RISC vs CISC, x86 vs PPC… that’s all in the past. Aside from maybe paying for a window of exclusivity here and there Apple uses the same chips and specs from Intel that everyone else does.
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