The New Mac Pro is Here!!!

[Bob Gundu]

Exciting times for Apple for sure. FCPX is so efficient already. RED tapping into the new ecosystem is dope.

 

[Bruce Allen]

https://developer.apple.com/videos/play/wwdc2019/608/ - Metal for Pro Apps

A great presentation showing how apps can utilize Metal and the new hardware. Can't wait to see what Red is able to do with it for R3D decode!

Thanks Andrew! Very interesting stuff.

Seems like the smart move (unless you're a developer) is to wait a year for everyone to code all the stuff that takes advantage of this, then buy a refurb or used Mac Pro!

As you know I'm an NVIDIA fan but I didn't rush out to buy an RTX because I knew it would take a while for them to get all of the renderers actually optimized for it.

I actually still have 8x 1080ti / Titan Xp cards - now looking into RTX because all of the renderers are FINALLY starting to use it but might just skip a generation and wait for next year.

OK that's my plan: wait till 2020, for Apple, NVIDIA, Intel etc to all play their hands and for the software developers to have a chance to optimize stuff for them.

Play with the systems a bit on real-world projects. Then I will choose between:

- refurb / used 1st gen Mac Pro
- wait a little longer for 2nd gen (better GPUs, maybe Intel will react to AMD pressure with better CPU pricing, PCIe 4.0)
- NVIDIA 3000-series (Ampere on 7nm Samsung) coupled with AMD Threadripper v2 or Epyc v2 (64-128 cores) & PCIe 4.0

Bearing in mind if I went Mac Pro I'd need to buy two because if one goes down I can't fall back to my old 8-core, 6-core and 40-core Windows PCs to render something (my old MacBook Pros and iMacs from 2011 might not cut it methinks!).

Bruce Allen
www.bruceallen.tv

 

[Jeff Kilgroe]

It's not what they did with the past cheese grater Mac Pros. In the past the entry Xeons were quad core starting at $2499-2999. Now the entry Xeon is 8 cores, but they're starting at $5999. Why the big jump in price?

But it is what they did in the past. They were locked in sync with HP Xeon workstation pricing. Yes, there’s a big price jump. Same as we’ve seen across the industry. Your price breakdown is a bit off. The 8-core Xeon W-3225 that they will be using just went into production and has a volume price of $1200. Street price on that CPU is $1335 for pre-orders, so nearly double your $750 number. This motherboard is pretty insane, it would easily MSRP for $1600 if offered on the open market and probably have a street price of $1200. Apple also spends a lot of money on things that the rest of the PC industry typically avoids. I would be shocked if their case has an actual production cost less than $550~$800. Along with the typical markups for memory and storage, etc.. You can’t match this same config from HP or Dell for any less, or at least not by a meaningful amount.

As for your comparison to an X299 build. You’re right. This system doesn’t make sense for your usage. IMO the 8-core version of this new Mac Pro makes little sense in any way. Only really makes sense if you can do with 8-cores, but need a lot more RAM than the lesser X299 or similar platforms provide and a need to couple it with quad GPUs and thunderbolt ports running Mac OS.

I don’t necessarily agree that we don’t need Xeon in our industry. Sure, we can get by without it. Most here are just fine with a desktop configuration like you specified above. Hence why I think Apple is ignoring a huge segment of potential market. There are a LOT of people out there who need more than the iMac or Mac Mini, but don’t need the Mac Pro.

FWIW, the Mac Pro configuration I’m intending for myself is a 16-core with 384GB RAM, 2TB SSD and dual GPUs. I’m unsure if I’ll do the duo Vega GPU or will go with two separate ones. Depends on how all the price/performance numbers work out. I plan to buy RAM aftermarket and will add 24TB or more of secondary storage. I’m intrigued by the MPX module storage from Promise, but price will definitely be a deciding factor there. Will consider more cores if the budget allows. I’m also interested to see how they’ve assembled their CPU mount and heatsink system. If CPU pricing is completely wack and it’s reasonable to swap, I’ll order the base 8-core and throw in a 24 or 28 core on my own. However, I expect Apple to keep with their past methodology on pricing, which is what HP and others usually do. Price the upgrades to where they’re too expensive, but not expensive enough to justify buying the base CPU only to throw it away or sell it to buy the one you want. The 28-core Xeon W-3275 just went into production and has a volume price of $4400/each in 1000 unit blocks. I have not seen what they’re pre-ordering for on the open market, but I’m going to expect around $4600. So we’re talking a $3200 price differential between the two. I’m expecting the cost to go from the 8-core on the new MP to the 28 core to be in the neighborhood of $3800 to $4200. If you do it on your own and sell the old CPU, at best you’ll break even or maybe make $100 or so. But you’ll have to invest the time and hassle of doing it. It mucks up the warranty if you sell the original CPU because if the system fails and needs to be replaced, they won’t take it in without a CPU installed and they won’t replace your aftermarket CPU, only the one included and warrantied with the system...

 

[DJ Meyer]

But it is what they did in the past. They were locked in sync with HP Xeon workstation pricing. Yes, there’s a big price jump. Same as we’ve seen across the industry. Your price breakdown is a bit off. The 8-core Xeon W-3225 that they will be using just went into production and has a volume price of $1200. Street price on that CPU is $1335 for pre-orders, so nearly double your $750 number. This motherboard is pretty insane, it would easily MSRP for $1600 if offered on the open market and probably have a street price of $1200. Apple also spends a lot of money on things that the rest of the PC industry typically avoids. I would be shocked if their case has an actual production cost less than $550~$800. Along with the typical markups for memory and storage, etc.. You can’t match this same config from HP or Dell for any less, or at least not by a meaningful amount.

As for your comparison to an X299 build. You’re right. This system doesn’t make sense for your usage. IMO the 8-core version of this new Mac Pro makes little sense in any way. Only really makes sense if you can do with 8-cores, but need a lot more RAM than the lesser X299 or similar platforms provide and a need to couple it with quad GPUs and thunderbolt ports running Mac OS.

I don’t necessarily agree that we don’t need Xeon in our industry. Sure, we can get by without it. Most here are just fine with a desktop configuration like you specified above. Hence why I think Apple is ignoring a huge segment of potential market. There are a LOT of people out there who need more than the iMac or Mac Mini, but don’t need the Mac Pro.

FWIW, the Mac Pro configuration I’m intending for myself is a 16-core with 384GB RAM, 2TB SSD and dual GPUs. I’m unsure if I’ll do the duo Vega GPU or will go with two separate ones. Depends on how all the price/performance numbers work out. I plan to buy RAM aftermarket and will add 24TB or more of secondary storage. I’m intrigued by the MPX module storage from Promise, but price will definitely be a deciding factor there. Will consider more cores if the budget allows. I’m also interested to see how they’ve assembled their CPU mount and heatsink system. If CPU pricing is completely wack and it’s reasonable to swap, I’ll order the base 8-core and throw in a 24 or 28 core on my own. However, I expect Apple to keep with their past methodology on pricing, which is what HP and others usually do. Price the upgrades to where they’re too expensive, but not expensive enough to justify buying the base CPU only to throw it away or sell it to buy the one you want. The 28-core Xeon W-3275 just went into production and has a volume price of $4400/each in 1000 unit blocks. I have not seen what they’re pre-ordering for on the open market, but I’m going to expect around $4600. So we’re talking a $3200 price differential between the two. I’m expecting the cost to go from the 8-core on the new MP to the 28 core to be in the neighborhood of $3800 to $4200. If you do it on your own and sell the old CPU, at best you’ll break even or maybe make $100 or so. But you’ll have to invest the time and hassle of doing it. It mucks up the warranty if you sell the original CPU because if the system fails and needs to be replaced, they won’t take it in without a CPU installed and they won’t replace your aftermarket CPU, only the one included and warrantied with the system...

If Apple is serious about their advertised 1.5 TB ram limit then they'll have to use the W-3275M for 28 core so add $3K to your estimate.

 

[Marc Wielage]

Well, I’ll have a better idea what I can get for 10k once preorders begin.

The top of the line 12-core Trashcan Mac (which I still use every day) was $12K 6 years ago; I'm thinking a reasonable power/cost balance for the 2019 Mac Pro could be had for somewhere around $15K. At least it's upgradable over time, so that counts for something.

 

[Kwan Khan]

OK that's my plan: wait till 2020, for Apple, NVIDIA, Intel etc to all play their hands and for the software developers to have a chance to optimize stuff for them.

www.bruceallen.tv

Agreed, decided a long time ago. In the meantime, will be watching the play from the bench.

 

[Misha Engel]

NVidia is in the counter attack.

RTX Quadro 8000, MSRP at launch $10k (paper launch).
Today for only $5,600, that is a 44% discount in less than half a year.

 

[Eric Santiago]

I seriously don’t get the bitching about the price. The Mac Pro was never for the average user. If it’s too expensive for you, odds are you really don’t need one.

I agree. I can't afford the one I want but I do agree that you pay for staying in the Apple eco.

I did with RED knowing full well I could have purchased two BMD Cinema Cameras, which I actually did and canceled when the BT Scarlets came out.

Hoping something gives in a few years where they fill in that gap between the iMac Pro and this new beast

 

[James Falco]

This is a lot like what I've said in the past. We don't need Xeon. Desktop class CPUs and RAM is good and they'll sell a lot more of them.



It's not what they did with the past cheese grater Mac Pros. In the past the entry Xeons were quad core starting at $2499-2999. .

You forgetting the fact that back in the days (2006) most tasks like image retouching, print publishing, vector graphics, audio and video ending cold not be done on anything else but a mac pro.

This days computers are way faster and the actual pro market is microscopic.

Today most Mac Book pro laptops and iMac's are fast enough to do basic HD video editing, audio work, run photoshop, and lay out entire magazines.

So todays Mac Pro market consists only of people like us that are constantly on the bleeding edge.
That do 3D animation, edit and process 4k and 8k raw footage, shoot with medium format cameras sensors at 150mp, do VFX, graphics and compositing, as well as complex sound scores for movies and commercials. On a world scale we are not even 1% of the computer market.

In the PC world its gaming that keeps the hi end rigs affordable, as there is way more gamers than pro users like us.
Gaming is what keeps GPU pricing down drives innovation and covers R&D cost.

I personally am grateful that Apple din't give up on us.

 

[Misha Engel]

In the PC world its gaming that keeps the hi end rigs affordable, as there is way more gamers than pro users like us.
Gaming is what keeps GPU pricing down drives innovation and covers R&D cost.

A realtime 8k.R3D editing/grading workstation doesn't have to cost more than one 1TB RED Mini-Mag in 2019 (even without GPU decoding), thank you gamers...

 

[Mike Halper]

But it is what they did in the past. They were locked in sync with HP Xeon workstation pricing. Yes, there’s a big price jump. Same as we’ve seen across the industry. Your price breakdown is a bit off. The 8-core Xeon W-3225 that they will be using just went into production and has a volume price of $1200. Street price on that CPU is $1335 for pre-orders, so nearly double your $750 number. This motherboard is pretty insane, it would easily MSRP for $1600 if offered on the open market and probably have a street price of $1200. Apple also spends a lot of money on things that the rest of the PC industry typically avoids. I would be shocked if their case has an actual production cost less than $550~$800. Along with the typical markups for memory and storage, etc.. You can’t match this same config from HP or Dell for any less, or at least not by a meaningful amount.

It’s the W-3223 that matches up with their specs, not the W-3225. And that one is $750.

 

[Joel Arvidsson]

If you get
16 core Xeon Processor
96GB RAM
1x Vega II Dual MPX Module
Afterburner card
2x1TB SSD

If you get this for 10k, I'm willing to have a second look at it (I'm in no hurry to upgrade the PC yet. So I can read user experience s of it once it hits the market.)

Also hoping they get there act together and let us us add an rtx card.

 

[DJ Meyer]

If you get
16 core Xeon Processor
96GB RAM
1x Vega II Dual MPX Module
Afterburner card
2x1TB SSD

If you get this for 10k, I'm willing to have a second look at it (I'm in no hurry to upgrade the PC yet. So I can read user experience s of it once it hits the market.)

Also hoping they get there act together and let us us add an rtx card.

No chance that config is 10k

 

[Brandon Veen]

If you get
16 core Xeon Processor
96GB RAM
1x Vega II Dual MPX Module
Afterburner card
2x1TB SSD

If you get this for 10k, I'm willing to have a second look at it (I'm in no hurry to upgrade the PC yet. So I can read user experience s of it once it hits the market.)

Also hoping they get there act together and let us us add an rtx card.

Base: $5,999
2x1TB SSD + $1,200 = $7,199
16 core: +$1,600 = $8,799

For CPU, this is being generous and just matching Apple's pro-line pricing of the past of +$800 a step up, with the new Xeons costing more than the old ones, we're more than likely looking at a +$1,000 a step up (and +$4,000 to step up to the 24-core).
So that leaves your 10K budget with $1,201 for 64 more GB's of RAM, one of their top offerings for upgraded GPU, and their Afterburner FGPA.
The RAM is a little hard to price because the iMac Pro upgrade steps have more RAM but are 2666 Mhz instead of 2933 Mhz.
The jump to 48 GB's, since it's just adding two sticks probably will only be around $200 (the iMac Pro's jump to 64 is $400).
But the jump to 96 GB's, since it swaps to 6x 16 GB sticks, likely is going to be similar to the jump in price seen in the iMac Pro to 128 GB's and cost around $1,500.
So that brings us to:
96GB ram: +$1,500 = $10,299

For the Vega II Duo, let's just go with people's assumptions it'll be around $6,000 (I'd guess around +$4,000 though personally since the regular Radeon VII is $700).
1x Vega II Dual MPX Module: +$4,000-$6,000 = $14,299 - $16,299.

That leaves the FPGA, which is really anybody's guess as the closest thing to compare it to would be the Red Rocket X which is $6,750.
And while not an FPGA, the specialty Radeon Pro SSG which was $10,000 and then $7,000 for V2.

The silver lining, of course, is that you could just get aftermarket parts where it makes sense to.
2x 32GB RAM sticks (64 GB): $400
- Potentially could mix and match with the 32GB sticks already in the system for 96 GB's
3x 32GB RAM sticks (96 GB): $600
2x 64GB RAM sticks (128 GB): $800
- All options considered, 64 GB stick(s) would make the most sense as you could slowly work your way to 768 GB's of RAM (if needed).

So, best case scenario of getting aftermarket RAM and mixing it with the 32 GB's already in the system, that brings the system cost to around $9,199 before GPU choice. Which might just let you get a regular MPX Module Vega II (not Duo) in there for a total of roughly $10,000-$10,500.

 

[Antony Newman]

If the Afterburner + 32GB HBM2 (GPU memory) :
- Can handle realtime 8K R3D decoding & Debayering
- Use less wattage than a Generic GPU for the Hardware Accelerated workloads
- and Offload the CPU and GPU so that NLE's can work in 4K UHD timeline with 8K RAW.

Then Apple should consider updates to all the iMac Pro designs to have expansion space for an version of the AfterBurner :
- So that everyone with a Mac Desktop would have access to FGPA hardware acceleration
- And if an iMacPro Afterburner was at an enticing price point, software houses would have a far larger market to justify optimising their codebase to utilize it.

AJ

 

[Eric Santiago]

I’m expecting they will have an update to this new Mac Pro in 18 to 24 months after it launches and that update will be significant, bringing us PCIe v4 and Thunderbolt 4. Neither of which are ready to go at the moment. PCIe v4 will [should] be supported on the next Xeon iteration, which would work timing wise with the subsequent update.

This is the part that makes me happy.
With them actually releasing a new Mac Pro, it at least opens up doors for future options that might be (finally) geared to the middle.
Im over 80K in my foray into the RED eco and that's Canadian which is 300K US LOL!
If I really was into this seriously (which I am) then this price is not that bad.
Will I buy one...probably not till I know how it will all work together which could still be next year.

To add:

I had the pleasure and displeasure of two O2s and an OCTANE. I didn't pay for them but back then, it wasn't hard to convince then companies to pay for them.
Since a seat of Power Animator was close to 100K.
It was EIAS on a Quadro that killed it for Alias from my side of the fence.
Thank goodness Maya came in under 10K once it was ported to Windows.

 

[Jeff Kilgroe]

It’s the W-3223 that matches up with their specs, not the W-3225. And that one is $750.

But it’s not. The 3223 only has 16.5MB cache. They’re probably using the W-3243, which has the 24.5MB cache listed in Apple’s specs and the 3.5GHz base clock and 4GHz turbo. I don’t have a price for that one...

EDIT> scratch that, the 3243 is a 12 core it seems with 24.5MB cache... There are a couple newly announced W series Xeons announced and they’re not on the Ark yet. I guess we’ll see when more details come out. It could be the 3223 and Apple is stating the wrong cache size.

 

[andrewhake]

But it’s not. The 3223 only has 16.5MB cache. They’re probably using the W-3243, which has the 24.5MB cache listed in Apple’s specs and the 3.5GHz base clock and 4GHz turbo. I don’t have a price for that one...

EDIT> scratch that, the 3243 is a 12 core it seems with 24.5MB cache... There are a couple newly announced W series Xeons announced and they’re not on the Ark yet. I guess we’ll see when more details come out. It could be the 3223 and Apple is stating the wrong cache size.

It is the total cache amount, L1, L2, L3 cache. https://en.wikichip.org/wiki/intel/xeon_w/w-3223

 

[D Fuller]

Oh yeah, totally agree. Also folks don't take software license costs into account - the hardware is often less than that cost per machine! For Avengers: Endgame I got us to upgrade to 48-core systems for the render farm because you're paying Arnold licenses per unit, not per core...

That said, the $6000 option is still kinda a lousy deal if it will be slower than a $4000 PC for most professional tasks... and seriously a 0.25TB SSD - it's the 2019 equivalent of one of those little 4 megabyte compact flash cards that Canon would bundle with their cameras that you throw away instantly haha.

RE: keeping stuff for many years - absolutely. It is awkward timing since PCIe 4.0 is here (have you SEEN the speeds those PCIe 4.0 SSDs are getting - 5GB/sec already!! that's what you want for 8K...) - there's no way I'm spending $10k on a system that won't let me plug in one of those suckers.

Bruce Allen
www.bruceallen.tv

The base configuration of a high-end workstation is never a good price/performance deal. That's because no one intends you to buy the base configuration, it's intended as a platform to support the upgrades you need for your particular work. But which upgrades do you need?

Maybe you're doing a small, fast scientific model that runs almost completely in the processor cache, so you need the biggest processor, smallest GPU, and a modest allotment of RAM.

Maybe you're running After Effects, where a lot of CPU cores and a lot of RAM will make your day, but you only need one good graphic card.

Maybe you live in Resolve and need lots of GPU power and RAM and lots of GPU helps too.

Maybe you run a high-end music studio and need all of 28 cores and a half-terrabyte of RAM, but only need the base GPU to draw controls to the scrteen.

The Mac Pro can suppport each of these configurations, and probably quite competitively with the competition. No, the base configutation doesn't make sense, but look at an HP workstation at its base configuration. That doesn't make sense either. It's the ability to support any upgrade path you need that makes this Mac a truly Pro machine.

 

[Misha Engel]

No, the base configutation doesn't make sense, but look at an HP workstation at its base configuration. That doesn't make sense either. It's the ability to support any upgrade path you need that makes this Mac a truly Pro machine.

HP workstations make a lot of sense, you can start with: HP Z2, Z4, Z6 or Z8 and then customize it for your needs.
The MacPro is 8 to 28 cores and 64 PCIe-3 lanes, with the HP solutions you have a lot more choice.