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So, surprise, the M1 Ultra is 2x M1 Max chips. They've been secretly planning since inception to attach 2 chips together. Why am I so unimpressed? Because conne

So, surprise, the M1 Ultra is 2x M1 Max chips. They've been secretly planning since inception to attach 2 chips together. Why am I so unimpressed? Because connecting 2 chips together is so dang obvious. Because I would have expected Apple to connect 10 of them together in a semi-circle and not only own the desktop and mobile market, but in a truly shocking surprise, release a new Apple server that has 10x the processing power of the next most powerful server running at 1/10th the Wattage, and a new macOS server version with a footprint smaller than iOS that is binary compatible with the whole of linux development.

kllrnohj 5y ago
> release a new Apple server that has 10x the processing power of the next most powerful server running at 1/10th the Wattage The power efficiency of M1 is vastly overstated. Reminder here that the M1 Ultra is almost certainly a 200W TDP SoC (since the M1 Max was ~100W, and this is 2x of those...) So 10x M1 Max's would be ~1000W. That's possibly to put in a server chassis, but it's of course also not remotely 1/10th the wattage of existing server CPUs, either, which tend to be in the 250-350w range. And interconnects aren't free, either (or necessarily even cheap). The infinity fabric connecting the dies together on Epyc is like 70w by itself, give or take.
- GeekyBear 5y ago
  >The power efficiency of M1 is vastly overstated. Reminder here that the M1 Ultra is almost certainly a 200W TDP SoC 114 Billion transistors are going to draw some power. An RTX 3090 is 28.3 Billion transistors drawing 350W or so for just the GPU portion of the system.
- jeffbee 5y ago
  The M1 Pro is slightly faster than other CPUs at that ~35W design point, but it doesn't scale up beyond that, or Apple just doesn't care if users can experience its latent scaling abilities, if they exist. I like this chart from "Hardware Unboxed" that puts current Apple, AMD, and Intel CPUs in context: https://imgur.com/PKHelVY https://imgur.com/PKHelVY
  - wtallis 5y ago
    It's suspicious how the bottom point on each of those curves is exactly 35W. Real-world power measurements don't line up that cleanly, so I wouldn't be surprised if what they're graphing on that axis (for the x86 processors) is merely the power limit they set the systems to throttle to, rather than a real measurement. That or they interpolated to produce those points.
    - jeffbee 5y ago
      God knows what their method is, but the numbers on here for the CPU I actually own are consistent with 1) the benchmark results I see, and 2) the package power reported by the PMU, within a reasonable approximation.
    - kllrnohj 5y ago
      Most of the x86 CPUs support setting power limits, which the CPU does actually respect with a fair degree of accuracy. They probably did that & verified it lines up.
      - wtallis 5y ago
        That'll get you within 5W easily, but it's definitely not as precise as what that graph is depicting.
Melatonic 5y ago
ARM is already being heavily looked at for datacenters regardless of Apple - I do not see them entering the server market anytime soon. Their bread and butter has always been to market "Pro" devices but more at the consumer level.
sbierwagen 5y ago
Sounds like you're looking more for the upcoming M2 refresh of the Mac Pro.

kllrnohj 5y ago

> release a new Apple server that has 10x the processing power of the next most powerful server running at 1/10th the Wattage The power efficiency of M1 is vastly overstated. Reminder here that the M1 Ultra is almost certainly a 200W TDP SoC (since the M1 Max was ~100W, and this is 2x of those...) So 10x M1 Max's would be ~1000W. That's possibly to put in a server chassis, but it's of course also not remotely 1/10th the wattage of existing server CPUs, either, which tend to be in the 250-350w range. And interconnects aren't free, either (or necessarily even cheap). The infinity fabric connecting the dies together on Epyc is like 70w by itself, give or take.

GeekyBear 5y ago
>The power efficiency of M1 is vastly overstated. Reminder here that the M1 Ultra is almost certainly a 200W TDP SoC 114 Billion transistors are going to draw some power. An RTX 3090 is 28.3 Billion transistors drawing 350W or so for just the GPU portion of the system.
jeffbee 5y ago
The M1 Pro is slightly faster than other CPUs at that ~35W design point, but it doesn't scale up beyond that, or Apple just doesn't care if users can experience its latent scaling abilities, if they exist. I like this chart from "Hardware Unboxed" that puts current Apple, AMD, and Intel CPUs in context: https://imgur.com/PKHelVY https://imgur.com/PKHelVY
- wtallis 5y ago
  It's suspicious how the bottom point on each of those curves is exactly 35W. Real-world power measurements don't line up that cleanly, so I wouldn't be surprised if what they're graphing on that axis (for the x86 processors) is merely the power limit they set the systems to throttle to, rather than a real measurement. That or they interpolated to produce those points.
  - jeffbee 5y ago
    God knows what their method is, but the numbers on here for the CPU I actually own are consistent with 1) the benchmark results I see, and 2) the package power reported by the PMU, within a reasonable approximation.
  - kllrnohj 5y ago
    Most of the x86 CPUs support setting power limits, which the CPU does actually respect with a fair degree of accuracy. They probably did that & verified it lines up.
    - wtallis 5y ago
      That'll get you within 5W easily, but it's definitely not as precise as what that graph is depicting.

Melatonic 5y ago

ARM is already being heavily looked at for datacenters regardless of Apple - I do not see them entering the server market anytime soon. Their bread and butter has always been to market "Pro" devices but more at the consumer level.

sbierwagen 5y ago

Sounds like you're looking more for the upcoming M2 refresh of the Mac Pro.