4 ms·

I’m pretty sure you could escape for under 10k if you built this yourself in a PC.

by jimbob45 6y ago

seibelj 6y ago
... but macOS?!?
- forgingahead 6y ago
  Hackintosh!
  - tambourine_man 6y ago
    Those days are over, ARM transition and all. Enjoy while you still can.
    - judge2020 6y ago
      They "still have unrevealed Intel Macs" as per the keynote; given that the 2013 iMac is still supported for Big Sur, we almost certainly still have 7 years of support for both architectures in MacOS.
      - bilegeek 6y ago
        Jobs said the same thing (about new Macs) about PowerPC in 2006. By 2007, Macs were all Intel, and the Intel-only Snow Leopard debuted in 2009. Complete abandonment of Leopard in 2011. I give it 5 years at the most.
        virtue3 6y ago
        absolutely agree with you, if that. Support times seem to be getting worse as we have more overall system changes these days (or just bigger OSs?)
    - jachee 6y ago
      Eagerly awaiting the next-gen. "ApplePi" with ARM macOS on a raspberry pi 5. :)
omarchowdhury 6y ago
The two video cards alone cost $10k.
- rayiner 6y ago
  The memory alone is $15,000.
- jimbob45 6y ago
  It seems like they’re maybe Apple-exclusive so it’s possibly they’re drastically marked up. The Titan RTX is $2500 apiece and seems somewhat comparable.
  - foxrob92 6y ago
    The Titan RTX is a consumer GPU, not a workstation GPU. The cards are designed for different workloads, so are not really comparable.
    - indrax 6y ago
      What parts of the chip do they burn off for the consumer version?
      - deleted 6y ago
        [deleted]
      - judge2020 6y ago
        It has ecc memory, more memory, and the design allows for 4 stacked together, making it ideal for deep learning workflows.
  - 1123581321 6y ago
    I think your issue may be with the exponential scaling of GPU cost at the highest end. As a consumer, you wish that a card ~2x the Titan in tflops only cost twice as much, but it doesn’t work that way for either platform, and of course isn’t helped by the workstation card market being smaller by unit than the retail/ORM gaming card market. That said I did not downvote you; it’s an understandable frustration.
tedunangst 6y ago
What RAM are you buying?
kube-system 6y ago
Here's a $32,000 attempt at a PC build to compete with a loaded Mac Pro. The result was a mixed bag. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l_IHSRPVqwQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l_IHSRPVqwQ
- heelix 6y ago
  They threw a silly amount of RAM in it, so ended up using one of the AMD server CPUs/mainboards rather than a threadripper, since the threadripper could only leverage 256G of RAM. $1200 a stick... woof. I doubt the workload they put on things used that much memory. Would have been interesting to match a cheaper 24 core CPU ($1300) and 256G ($1000) or less of memory with that same test.
  - kube-system 6y ago
    If we're going for comparisons, the $43k+ refurb Mac Pro linked at the top of this page still has 50% more RAM than that PC does. I think the video's conclusion is spot on -- blindly comparing specs isn't really helpful for judging real world usability of hardware that is this high end. You should get the specific resources matched to your workload. That might be a Mac Pro, it might be a server in a closet with a TB of RAM, or it might be a PC with a couple of Quadros in it. Or maybe it's just a netbook with a Celeron :)
  - xenadu02 6y ago
    > They threw a silly amount of RAM in it, so ended up using one of the AMD server CPUs/mainboards rather than a threadripper, since the threadripper could only leverage 256G of RAM. $1200 a stick... woof. Are you arguing that no one needs >256G of memory? Or are you arguing that no one needs ECC memory? Or are you arguing that server chips and motherboards shouldn't exist? Or is your complaint that Apple sells a workstation? Or maybe you think workstations should be illegal? Should car makers only sell cars that you, personally, would like to buy? Should all manufacturers only sell things that you personally find useful? And if you don't find this computer useful how valuable is it for 100 people to chime in to say that? (IMHO opinion polls are better suited to that level of commentary.) > I doubt the workload they put on things used that much memory All anecdata to the contrary some workloads do in fact benefit from obscene amounts of memory. And if you've ever looked into it supporting >1TB of memory requires expensive dense memory modules because there are only so many memory busses on the chip and only so many sockets you can put on a bus.
lofties 6y ago
I was curious as to whether this indeed would be possible. But the CPU (W-3275M) itself starts at $6k, the Vega's are $8k each, I can't find any catalogue prices but each slab of ram comes in at around $600 which puts us at $30k. Not unthinkable that the remaining hardware can add another $5k to the bill and you're looking at a $35k machine. You can probably replace some of these with consumer grade parts, but I'll be impressed if you can create a machine with two titans, 28 cores, and 1.5tB of memory for under $10k.
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
usaphp 6y ago
What are you talking about? Just the 1.5Tb of RAM would cost you around $10K alone...
ponker 6y ago
“I could clone Facebook in a weekend”

I’m pretty sure you could escape for under 10k if you built this yourself in a PC.

seibelj 6y ago

... but macOS?!?

forgingahead 6y ago
Hackintosh!
- tambourine_man 6y ago
  Those days are over, ARM transition and all. Enjoy while you still can.
  - judge2020 6y ago
    They "still have unrevealed Intel Macs" as per the keynote; given that the 2013 iMac is still supported for Big Sur, we almost certainly still have 7 years of support for both architectures in MacOS.
    - bilegeek 6y ago
      Jobs said the same thing (about new Macs) about PowerPC in 2006. By 2007, Macs were all Intel, and the Intel-only Snow Leopard debuted in 2009. Complete abandonment of Leopard in 2011. I give it 5 years at the most.
      - virtue3 6y ago
        absolutely agree with you, if that. Support times seem to be getting worse as we have more overall system changes these days (or just bigger OSs?)
  - jachee 6y ago
    Eagerly awaiting the next-gen. "ApplePi" with ARM macOS on a raspberry pi 5. :)

omarchowdhury 6y ago

The two video cards alone cost $10k.

rayiner 6y ago
The memory alone is $15,000.
jimbob45 6y ago
It seems like they’re maybe Apple-exclusive so it’s possibly they’re drastically marked up. The Titan RTX is $2500 apiece and seems somewhat comparable.
- foxrob92 6y ago
  The Titan RTX is a consumer GPU, not a workstation GPU. The cards are designed for different workloads, so are not really comparable.
  - indrax 6y ago
    What parts of the chip do they burn off for the consumer version?
    - deleted 6y ago
      [deleted]
    - judge2020 6y ago
      It has ecc memory, more memory, and the design allows for 4 stacked together, making it ideal for deep learning workflows.
- 1123581321 6y ago
  I think your issue may be with the exponential scaling of GPU cost at the highest end. As a consumer, you wish that a card ~2x the Titan in tflops only cost twice as much, but it doesn’t work that way for either platform, and of course isn’t helped by the workstation card market being smaller by unit than the retail/ORM gaming card market. That said I did not downvote you; it’s an understandable frustration.

tedunangst 6y ago

What RAM are you buying?

kube-system 6y ago

Here's a $32,000 attempt at a PC build to compete with a loaded Mac Pro. The result was a mixed bag. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l_IHSRPVqwQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l_IHSRPVqwQ

heelix 6y ago
They threw a silly amount of RAM in it, so ended up using one of the AMD server CPUs/mainboards rather than a threadripper, since the threadripper could only leverage 256G of RAM. $1200 a stick... woof. I doubt the workload they put on things used that much memory. Would have been interesting to match a cheaper 24 core CPU ($1300) and 256G ($1000) or less of memory with that same test.
- kube-system 6y ago
  If we're going for comparisons, the $43k+ refurb Mac Pro linked at the top of this page still has 50% more RAM than that PC does. I think the video's conclusion is spot on -- blindly comparing specs isn't really helpful for judging real world usability of hardware that is this high end. You should get the specific resources matched to your workload. That might be a Mac Pro, it might be a server in a closet with a TB of RAM, or it might be a PC with a couple of Quadros in it. Or maybe it's just a netbook with a Celeron :)
- xenadu02 6y ago
  > They threw a silly amount of RAM in it, so ended up using one of the AMD server CPUs/mainboards rather than a threadripper, since the threadripper could only leverage 256G of RAM. $1200 a stick... woof. Are you arguing that no one needs >256G of memory? Or are you arguing that no one needs ECC memory? Or are you arguing that server chips and motherboards shouldn't exist? Or is your complaint that Apple sells a workstation? Or maybe you think workstations should be illegal? Should car makers only sell cars that you, personally, would like to buy? Should all manufacturers only sell things that you personally find useful? And if you don't find this computer useful how valuable is it for 100 people to chime in to say that? (IMHO opinion polls are better suited to that level of commentary.) > I doubt the workload they put on things used that much memory All anecdata to the contrary some workloads do in fact benefit from obscene amounts of memory. And if you've ever looked into it supporting >1TB of memory requires expensive dense memory modules because there are only so many memory busses on the chip and only so many sockets you can put on a bus.

lofties 6y ago

I was curious as to whether this indeed would be possible. But the CPU (W-3275M) itself starts at $6k, the Vega's are $8k each, I can't find any catalogue prices but each slab of ram comes in at around $600 which puts us at $30k. Not unthinkable that the remaining hardware can add another $5k to the bill and you're looking at a $35k machine. You can probably replace some of these with consumer grade parts, but I'll be impressed if you can create a machine with two titans, 28 cores, and 1.5tB of memory for under $10k.

deleted 6y ago
[deleted]

usaphp 6y ago

What are you talking about? Just the 1.5Tb of RAM would cost you around $10K alone...

ponker 6y ago

“I could clone Facebook in a weekend”