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> they're doing it at a price point that's competitive compared to all of the companies out there I think they're blowing all their competitors out of the wate

> they're doing it at a price point that's competitive compared to all of the companies out there I think they're blowing all their competitors out of the water with the price point. It's not just a 10-20% difference in price anymore.

throwaway894345 5y ago
And you can tell because they were marketing their products in relation to older Apple products rather than other manufacturers.
NorwegianDude 5y ago
$8k for 128GB RAM, 8 TB solid state storage and 22 trillion ops/sec isn't exactly a bargain. I do however image that the performance per watt will be really good.
- cj 5y ago
  > $8k for 128GB RAM, 8 TB solid state storage Maybe not, but 32GB RAM + 512GB SSD for $2k is a pretty competitive price point.
  - adgjlsfhk1 5y ago
    a 512 gb ssd is kinda inexcusable in a machine that costs more than $1000 1tb of ssd is only around $100.
    - gigatexal 5y ago
      But ssd is not 100 usd gumstick from of the shelf it’s integrated and sports speeds of 7.4GB/s at the top end. Shrug
      - brailsafe 5y ago
        No, it's a $200-400 gumstick that you can get off the shelf https://www.newegg.com/seagate-2tb-firecuda-530/p/N82E16820248198 https://www.newegg.com/seagate-2tb-firecuda-530/p/N82E168202...
        yborg 5y ago
        The Apple upgrade cost to 1TB is also $200.
        brailsafe 5y ago
        Right, but the link was for 2TB at the same speed, and it's a $600 upgrade for 2TB from 512, which means literally $800 for 2TB in total, plus tax! To be fair, it is likely higher quality, more efficient maybe, but I just think it's quite a reach to charge $800 USD for 2TB of storage that's not uniquely fast or anything. If you think that's a good value, it certainly might be depending on your work, but it would be twice as good value if it wasn't twice the price as off-the-shelf.
      - llampx 5y ago
        That gumstick can be replaced in two minutes with a single screw if and when it goes bad. As opposed to spending your day at the Genius Bar. I like Apple stuff but let's not make specious comparisons. Unless you think Apple SSDs are magic and can never go bad just because they are soldered in.
    - brailsafe 5y ago
      It's a bit miserly, to say the least
    - throwanem 5y ago
      A terabyte of dead-slow and flaky SSD costs a hundred bucks, sure. But it doesn't matter much because, in the kinds of professional workflows this machine is targeting, local storage is more like swap space than anything. It needs to be fast more than it needs to be big.
      - goosedragons 5y ago
        A 1TB Samsung 980 Pro is $150 retail and arguably overpriced. 512GB in a $2000 computer is a joke in 2022.
        assttoasstmgr 5y ago
        You're forgetting Apple sources their SSDs from the same merchant that sold Jack the magic beanstalk beans. Or they just get generic chips from Hynix. One of those.
        ksec 5y ago
        >arguably overpriced Find me a 1TB SSD that perform as fast as Samsung 980 Pro and is much cheaper. Say under $125.
    - asiachick 5y ago
      it's there for framing, solely to push you to the next tier
    - go_prodev 5y ago
      $600 extra for a 2tb drive. So they're just giving them away now? /s
  - heavyset_go 5y ago
    Not at all. You could buy 32GB of RAM and a 512GB NVMe drive for a couple hundred dollars.
  - numpad0 5y ago
    That’s less than my 2019-ish desktop, and I don’t remember paying that much for it.
- efficax 5y ago
  Try and price out a PC with those specs, it will come in around $6k minimum, but much more power intensive and very very loud
  - gigatexal 5y ago
    Don’t feed the “but I can build a pc for less” crowd. They can’t see the apples to oranges comparison they’re making: a Mac is not a PC. They have different use-cases and run different software.
    - radlad 5y ago
      This thread started with a comparison to PCs... I mean I assume, since no competitor is putting out Macs... > That's kinda crazy, and they're doing it at a price point that's competitive compared to all of the companies out there.
    - goosedragons 5y ago
    - MisterTea 5y ago
      > They have different use-cases ... Likely mostly running the same workloads such as web browsing. > ... and run different software. Maybe if Apple wrote it. Otherwise you can run the same Chrome/Firefox, Photoshop and Office on a Windows or even Linux Machine. Most software is shared between platforms nowadays with posix/windows being the lowest common denominator in terms of "cross platform".
      - bee_rider 5y ago
        You definitely shouldn't buy a $4000 computer if your only workload is web browsing.
        dexterdog 5y ago
        If people listened to that advice Apple's stock price would be cut in half. 99% of Mac users can get along fine with the base m1 models.
- oneplane 5y ago
  Depends on what we're comparing, an average 20-core Dell Precision workstation costs about $10k.
- supermatt 5y ago
  I think you would struggle, TBH. The m1 ultra will likely have geekbench scores equal to the 3990x ($5k). The gpu (based on double performance of the max) should be something similar to an RTX 3070 ($1k). 128GB RAM is going to set you back another $1k. 8TB of storage will be another $1k. Then you have to add on motherboard ($1k), case ($200), cooling ($200), psu ($200). Even if you cut a few corners, you are still over $8k for equivalent performance, and a substantially larger form factor. Yeah, you can upgrade, etc, but thats not really the point of the exercise. That said, if you can think of speccing it another way, id be interested, as im looking for a decent workstation build that is x86.
  - arvinsim 5y ago
    If one is only interested in single core performance, the M1 Ultra doesn't offer anything significant from the M1 Pro/Max, AMD, or Intel CPUs.
traceroute66 5y ago
> I think they're blowing all their competitors out of the water with the price point. Not only on price point but also performance per watt. The M1 laptops were a game changer on that front, and I expect the M1 Ultra to be the same.

throwaway894345 5y ago

And you can tell because they were marketing their products in relation to older Apple products rather than other manufacturers.

NorwegianDude 5y ago

$8k for 128GB RAM, 8 TB solid state storage and 22 trillion ops/sec isn't exactly a bargain. I do however image that the performance per watt will be really good.

cj 5y ago
> $8k for 128GB RAM, 8 TB solid state storage Maybe not, but 32GB RAM + 512GB SSD for $2k is a pretty competitive price point.
- adgjlsfhk1 5y ago
  a 512 gb ssd is kinda inexcusable in a machine that costs more than $1000 1tb of ssd is only around $100.
  - gigatexal 5y ago
    But ssd is not 100 usd gumstick from of the shelf it’s integrated and sports speeds of 7.4GB/s at the top end. Shrug
    - brailsafe 5y ago
      No, it's a $200-400 gumstick that you can get off the shelf https://www.newegg.com/seagate-2tb-firecuda-530/p/N82E16820248198 https://www.newegg.com/seagate-2tb-firecuda-530/p/N82E168202...
      - yborg 5y ago
        The Apple upgrade cost to 1TB is also $200.
        brailsafe 5y ago
        Right, but the link was for 2TB at the same speed, and it's a $600 upgrade for 2TB from 512, which means literally $800 for 2TB in total, plus tax! To be fair, it is likely higher quality, more efficient maybe, but I just think it's quite a reach to charge $800 USD for 2TB of storage that's not uniquely fast or anything. If you think that's a good value, it certainly might be depending on your work, but it would be twice as good value if it wasn't twice the price as off-the-shelf.
    - llampx 5y ago
      That gumstick can be replaced in two minutes with a single screw if and when it goes bad. As opposed to spending your day at the Genius Bar. I like Apple stuff but let's not make specious comparisons. Unless you think Apple SSDs are magic and can never go bad just because they are soldered in.
  - brailsafe 5y ago
    It's a bit miserly, to say the least
  - throwanem 5y ago
    A terabyte of dead-slow and flaky SSD costs a hundred bucks, sure. But it doesn't matter much because, in the kinds of professional workflows this machine is targeting, local storage is more like swap space than anything. It needs to be fast more than it needs to be big.
    - goosedragons 5y ago
      A 1TB Samsung 980 Pro is $150 retail and arguably overpriced. 512GB in a $2000 computer is a joke in 2022.
      - assttoasstmgr 5y ago
        You're forgetting Apple sources their SSDs from the same merchant that sold Jack the magic beanstalk beans. Or they just get generic chips from Hynix. One of those.
      - ksec 5y ago
        >arguably overpriced Find me a 1TB SSD that perform as fast as Samsung 980 Pro and is much cheaper. Say under $125.
  - asiachick 5y ago
    it's there for framing, solely to push you to the next tier
  - go_prodev 5y ago
    $600 extra for a 2tb drive. So they're just giving them away now? /s
- heavyset_go 5y ago
  Not at all. You could buy 32GB of RAM and a 512GB NVMe drive for a couple hundred dollars.
- numpad0 5y ago
  That’s less than my 2019-ish desktop, and I don’t remember paying that much for it.
efficax 5y ago
Try and price out a PC with those specs, it will come in around $6k minimum, but much more power intensive and very very loud
- gigatexal 5y ago
  Don’t feed the “but I can build a pc for less” crowd. They can’t see the apples to oranges comparison they’re making: a Mac is not a PC. They have different use-cases and run different software.
  - radlad 5y ago
    This thread started with a comparison to PCs... I mean I assume, since no competitor is putting out Macs... > That's kinda crazy, and they're doing it at a price point that's competitive compared to all of the companies out there.
  - goosedragons 5y ago
  - MisterTea 5y ago
    > They have different use-cases ... Likely mostly running the same workloads such as web browsing. > ... and run different software. Maybe if Apple wrote it. Otherwise you can run the same Chrome/Firefox, Photoshop and Office on a Windows or even Linux Machine. Most software is shared between platforms nowadays with posix/windows being the lowest common denominator in terms of "cross platform".
    - bee_rider 5y ago
      You definitely shouldn't buy a $4000 computer if your only workload is web browsing.
      - dexterdog 5y ago
        If people listened to that advice Apple's stock price would be cut in half. 99% of Mac users can get along fine with the base m1 models.
oneplane 5y ago
Depends on what we're comparing, an average 20-core Dell Precision workstation costs about $10k.
supermatt 5y ago
I think you would struggle, TBH. The m1 ultra will likely have geekbench scores equal to the 3990x ($5k). The gpu (based on double performance of the max) should be something similar to an RTX 3070 ($1k). 128GB RAM is going to set you back another $1k. 8TB of storage will be another $1k. Then you have to add on motherboard ($1k), case ($200), cooling ($200), psu ($200). Even if you cut a few corners, you are still over $8k for equivalent performance, and a substantially larger form factor. Yeah, you can upgrade, etc, but thats not really the point of the exercise. That said, if you can think of speccing it another way, id be interested, as im looking for a decent workstation build that is x86.
- arvinsim 5y ago
  If one is only interested in single core performance, the M1 Ultra doesn't offer anything significant from the M1 Pro/Max, AMD, or Intel CPUs.

traceroute66 5y ago

> I think they're blowing all their competitors out of the water with the price point. Not only on price point but also performance per watt. The M1 laptops were a game changer on that front, and I expect the M1 Ultra to be the same.