[ This article generated a lot of technical comments. Be sure to view the comments in this blog to learn more. ]
Updated: June 15, to reflect a variety of technical comments from readers.
On Monday, Apple gladdened the hearts of power users everywhere by providing a “sneak peek” at the new Mac Pro. Stylish, diminutive, and blindingly fast – at least according to the specs provided by Apple. Since that time, I’ve been thinking a lot about a system that is directly targeted to meet the performance needs of video editors, and other power users.
First, keep in mind that this was a “Sneak Peek” — a tantalizing glimpse of what is coming in the future, not a formal product launch. (This is similar to what Apple did a couple years ago when they provided an “advanced look” at Final Cut Pro X at the 2011 NAB SuperMeet.) Consequently, while this “peek” provided an overview, it was intentionally sparse in providing details. Partly, I suspect, because Apple wants to gather feedback from potential users before nailing down the final specs.
HIGHLY CUSTOMIZABLE
One of the key things I realized was that this system is envisioned to be highly configurable. Just as the current Mac Pro has a wide variety of options for RAM, GPU, storage, and connectivity, this unit is envisioned to be highly customizable as well.
If you think about it, the current Mac Pro is the most customizable system that Apple makes. Configuration is at the heart of the new Mac Pro as well. While I expect that there will be one physical unit, we will have a lot of choices about what goes into that unit.
This also means that we will see a variety of price points as well, depending upon how each system is configured. In this regard, the new Mac Pro is identical to the current Mac Pro.
THUNDERBOLT IS KEY
Also keep in mind that Apple views Thunderbolt as more than a fast way to move data to and from a hard disk. Apple considers Thunderbolt as a direct connection to the PCI bus of the computer, able to deliver up to 20 Gb/second of data. Think of Thunderbolt as a direct line connecting the PCI bus to the expansion chassis of your choice.
NOTE: According to a reader, Intel is claiming a throughput of Thunderbolt 2 of about 1.6 GB/second, which is still very fast.
For most people, a fast computer coupled with lots of RAM and a really fast storage system will be all they need. In fact, Philip Hodgetts has written that more than 80% of Mac Pro users don’t have any PCI cards in their system; aside from the graphics card. For those users, the new Mac Pro fits their needs for raw power, without adding tons of unneeded expansion slots.
NOTE: We used to think of PCIe card performance in terms of the number of “lanes” they used to connect to the motherboard. There were four, eight, and sixteen lane cards. The more lanes, the faster the potential communication speed between card and bus. With Thunderbolt, Apple is moving away from the concept of lanes, to straight data transfer speeds.
Thunderbolt 2 is fully-backward compatible with the original Thunderbolt. Thunderbolt devices can be connected by either copper or optical cables. Copper cables can be up to 3 meters in length (about 10 feet). Optical cables can extend up to 100 meters, for users that want to store their computers or RAIDs in a machine room for security, noise, or air conditioning reasons. Currently, optical cable lengths of 10, 20, and 30 meters are available on the market.
For users that need to expand the capabilities of their computer, for example DSP audio cards, video ingest and capture cards, mini-SAS or eSATA cards, more graphics cards, a very real question becomes “how many card slots should the computer hold?” Apple felt that picking any number of internal card slots would be limiting to some number of users. By moving all expansion cards outside the box, then connecting with the very high-speed Thunderbolt 2 data bus, Apple essentially provided a virtually unlimited number of card slots for users that need the maximum in expandability.
NOTE: As a sidelight, one Thunderbolt 2 connection provides sufficient data bandwidth to ingest uncompressed 4K images, or output video to a 4K video monitor, or support VGA, DVI, and DisplayPort computer monitors. Plus Apple put an HDMI port on the back of the Mac Pro just for good measure.
Already, ATTO and Sonnet, along with others are offering Thunderbolt to “X” converter boxes: mini-SAS, FibreChannel, eSATA, Ultra-SCSI. And vendors such as AJA, Blackmagic Design, and Matrox offer ingest and monitoring options connected via Thunderbolt.
The one missing piece is the lack of high-speed Thunderbolt-native RAID 5 storage systems, with the notable exception of Promise. There are plenty of two-drive RAID 0 and RAID 1 systems, but very, very few 5 to 10 drive RAID 5 systems, which we editors need the most. I’ve heard lots of rumors of what’s causing the problem. Without pointing fingers, I hope this bottleneck gets resolved quickly.
MULTIPLE GPUs
We also need to consider that this is a system and not focus on one single element. The new CPU is twice as fast as the current Mac Pro in floating point operations. Memory bandwidth has doubled and now supports four channels of communication between RAM and the CPU.
The big news, though, was the addition of multiple GPUs. Although the ATI FirePros were featured, I suspect other options will also be available as part of the customization options Apple offers at launch.
Now, things get interesting.
On Monday, Apple made a point to say that Final Cut Pro X would release a new version that supports the Mac Pro. That instantly made me think that all applications would need to be rewritten in order to run on the Mac Pro, which would make this new system a non-starter.
This is not the case.
Instead, think of the dual-GPUs in the Mac Pro as similar to when Apple released multi-processor CPUs. All applications would run on a multi-processor system, but until they were re-written to support multi-threading (which is the technical ability software uses to take advantage of more than one processor) the application would be limited to using only one processor. This was one of the big limitations of Final Cut Pro 7.
NOTE: In terms of Final Cut Pro X, multiple GPUs offer significant performance benefits for real-time effects playback, rendering, optical flow retiming, and exporting.
So, the Mac Pro will run all current Mac software. However, if the software wants to take advantage of the dual GPUs, it may need to be reconfigured to do so. This is not a small task for developers, but it isn’t impossible. This is what Apple was referring to when they said a new version of Final Cut Pro X would be released to support the Mac Pro.
NOTE: Once developers know they can count of dual GPUs, they can design new software from scratch to take advantage of it, the way that everyone writes software today to take advantage of multiple processors and multiple cores.
UPDATE: A reader points out: “When using OpenCL, no code modification is required (problem only for Dev’s which don’t use OpenCL). Some use CUDA-API (Nvidia) – and this requires re-coding.
UPDATE: Another reader points out that the next version of Adobe Premiere and After Effects already support Open CL.
And the performance results of optimizing for dual GPUs can be astounding. Grant Petty, CEO of Blackmagic Design, tweeted earlier this week that they have been testing Resolve 10 on the new Mac Pro and it “screams.”
SUMMARY
Apple designed the Mac Pro as its most powerful and flexible desktop computer. They architected it to reflect where they see computers going for the next ten years. They provided a wealth of Thunderbolt ports – and converters – so that all legacy monitors, storage, and cards can be supported.
This has the potential to be an amazing piece of gear and I can’t wait to learn more at the launch.
As always, I’m interested in your thoughts.
Larry
75 Responses to Thoughts on the New Mac Pro
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Tim says:
June 15, 2013 at 2:00 pm
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Larry says:
June 15, 2013 at 2:09 pm
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Seth Chambers says:
June 15, 2013 at 3:26 pm
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dr.no says:
June 15, 2013 at 4:17 pm
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Larry says:
June 15, 2013 at 4:42 pm
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bicycleCommuter says:
June 15, 2013 at 5:46 pm
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Larry says:
June 15, 2013 at 6:30 pm
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Evan Krueger says:
June 15, 2013 at 6:03 pm
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Larry says:
June 15, 2013 at 6:22 pm
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Dave Heinzel says:
June 15, 2013 at 7:36 pm
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Larry says:
June 15, 2013 at 9:40 pm
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Guido Gautsch says:
June 15, 2013 at 7:41 pm
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Larry says:
June 15, 2013 at 9:40 pm
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Bruce Payan says:
June 15, 2013 at 7:46 pm
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Larry says:
June 15, 2013 at 9:41 pm
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bicycleCommuter says:
June 15, 2013 at 9:34 pm
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Larry says:
June 15, 2013 at 9:42 pm
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Guido Gautsch says:
June 15, 2013 at 10:37 pm
Newer Comments →Larry,
I think the new MacPro is a pretty impressive machine. Seems to be inline with just what I need and how I’ve used my MacPro/PowerMacs in the past. They trimmed the fat that most Pro users don’t need.
You wrote “CPUs,” but Apple only mentioned 1 CPU in the keynote. Are you suggesting that this will be one of the customizable options? I thought the inside was a triangle with 1 CPU, and 2 GPUs on each side.
Is Thunderbolt fast enough for external video/graphic cards? I thought 20Gb/second was too slow for these applications.
With Apple’s recent trend to make their computers less customizable, I suspected that we wouldn’t have much an option at all aside from (perhaps) HD size. I could very well see Apple saying “This is the graphics card our Pro computer uses, code your software to it or use something else.” This way they can ensure that their OS and FCP X run optimally on it. Agree or have any thoughts?
Tim:
When I wrote CPUs, I was thinking multiple cores. I don’t know whether Apple will have more than one CPU chip inside.
Thunderbolt, especially Thunderbolt 2, is more than fast enough for even 4K video. For standard HD, it has speed to burn. The gating factor will not be Thunderbolt itself, but how the individual vendors implement it.
I disagree on customization. I suspect Apple will support a number of customization options, in terms of CPU speed, GPUs, ethernet connectivity, RAM, storage, and so on.
Larry
Worth noting, too, is that Adobe Premiere Pro & After Effects CC already have OpenCL and Multi-threading support out of the box (er, out of the cloud?) when they release next week!
OpenCL already takes into account multiple processors.
OpenCL uses Just-in-time compiling the kernels for given
system. It adapts to added processors.
FCPX will be recompiled for newer processor and 5K displays.
Developers should be using already supported multi-threaded
app written to API. nothing Developers need to do for newer system.
All the people who are going to complain about slots.
should know that new Mac Pro already uses all of PCIe
slots for all the bandwidth. Only way more can come if Intel
adds it to the chip sets.
All the Dual CPU crowd should know that days of software
relying on CPU for performance are over.
All the 4 DRAM crowd will also need to know that Mac OS X
only supports 128MB. so no need to cry about RAM either.
Dr. No:
Thanks for your comments. The only thing I’m confused about is your statement that “All the 4 DRAM crowd will also need to know that Mac OS X only supports 128MB.” I’m not sure that statement is correct as written, or it doesn’t make sense, because I have far more RAM than that in all my systems.
Also, while you are correct that multi-threading is currently supported by recompiling, I am not sure that you are correct when it comes to supporting dual-GPU displays. (I’m not arguing, just trying to understand.)
Larry
How do I get CUDA support (as opposed to OpenCL) without adding a PCIe3 card cage via Thunderbolt 2?
What is the data transfer speed cost of using a 16-lane PCIe3 card in the Thunderbolt 2 card cage(1) as compared to plugging the card directly into the motherboard?
(1) you also have to consider the cost of the card cage in addition to the PCIe3 card itself.
Modular computing via Thunderbolt 2 is great for some things:
-FireWire 800
-1000BaseT Ethernet (not need for this machine)
-disk storage arrays (SSD or fast hard drives)
-USB3 (could be needed)
-USB2
-video (Blackmagic) compression/manipulation
But, I think it falls short for:
-high data through put things like 16-lane PCIe3 video cards
One of the interesting things you could do with the 2013 Mac Pro:
-use Thunderbolt 2 to daisy chain two or more 2013 Mac Pros together and create an on the fly computing cluster with 24, 36, or more CPU cores (and 4, 6, or more GPUs)
Mac Pro 2013: a super car with its engine compartment welded shut. (no support for 3 to 5 PCIe3 full-sized cards)
take care,
Chris
Chris:
These are all good comments and many will need to be addressed by Apple when they finally launch the product.
Keep in mind that, except for graphics cards, very few PCIe cards use all 16 lanes. Most use four. Thunderbolt 2 is the speed equivalent of an 8-lane PCIe card – and you have 12 channels of Thunderbolt 2 coming out the back of the system. Also, popular video formats such as AVCHD, H.264, and XDCAM can be easily imported using USB3 or a FireWire adapter attached to a Thunderbolt port.
No video capture card needs more than 8-lanes of connectivity, most use four. HD requires the equivalent of about 2 lanes. Keep in mind that most manufacturers of PCI3 cards are creating either expansion chassis for the card or repackaging the card with a Thunderbolt connection.
Again, Apple will share more specs closer to the ship date. However, for most video editors, Thunderbolt 2 provides most of the speeds and connectivity we will need.
Larry
Larry, I believe ‘dr.no’ is referring to the 128 gigabyte memory/ram limit of the OSX operating system. I assume MB was a typo, however I am not sure of what exactly his point might be.
Evan:
I figured it was a typo, but I couldn’t figure out the references. Thanks.
Larry
Thanks for the great write-up, Larry. I’ve been checking your blog daily since the announcement, knowing you would be writing something like this. I appreciate the time you take to stay on top of things.
All specs aside, I am just happy that Apple is coming through on this and isn’t dropping the Mac Pro altogether. I’ve been concerned about Apple’s commitment to pros ever since the bungled release of FCPX. I can’t help but wish they could have made the new Mac Pro look less like a garbage can, but that feeling will pass.
Dave:
Think, instead, that the Mac Pro looks more like the ingest engine for the Delorean in “Back to the Future.”
Larry
Hi Larry,
I think the Areca Arc-8050 fits the bill perfectly with regards to fast hardware RAID5/6/10/50/60 via Thunderbolt. 8 x SATA tower for $1,500 – add your favourite HDDs for ~1GB/s of screaming I/O.
While it doesn’t match the Mac Pro in design prowess, it should do the trick for 99% of home editors. Can’t think of anyone who needs more speed than that, really, but I guess if you did, you could fit the thing with SSDs or daisy-chain two units together?
The distinct advantage over something like the Pegasus is that it comes empty and users can add whatever drives they want. The advantage of something like a Drobo 5D is the ability to throw in random drives with unmatched sizes.
If I had the money and need (I have neither..my Samsung 840 Pro/1TB HDD MBP with 16GB of RAM does the job just fine for my limited needs), I’d got the Mac Pro and the Areca – plenty of power for the next 4-5 years IMO.
Guido:
Thanks for the background on Areca – this is a company I had not heard of before today.
Larry
A single-lane PCIe (v3.0) card is capable of 985 MB/s (bytes) in each direction. That’s 7.88Gb/s (bits).
An 8-lane PCIe card is capable of 7.88*8=63Gb/s — more than 3 times faster than TB2.
Put another way, TB2 is akin to a 2.5 lane PCIe card (if there was such a thing), NOT an 8-lane card.
There are 6 channels @ 20gbps on a new Mac Pro… combined throughput akin to a SINGLE 16-lane v3.0 PCIe card (126gb/s).
Bruce:
Thanks for the math – much appreciated.
Larry
You actually have six bidirectional 20 Gbit/s channels (not 12, see below).
Each Thunderbolt2 port is _one_* 20 Gbits/s bidirectional channel (2.5 GBytes/s)
(original Thunderbolt is two 10GBits/s bidirectional channels)
*look at anandtech.com’s TB2 article (Intel slide image)
PCIe2 1-lane = 500 MBytes/s
(so, TB2 = 5-lanes of PCIe2; probably figure 4 in actual use, due to overhead)
PCIe3 1-lane = 985 MBytes/s
(so, TB2 = 2-lanes of PCIe3)
Thanks, also, for the clarification. I’m always happy to get more accurate information.
Larry
@Bruce
That math checks out as far as I can tell.
Don’t forget though that the Mac Pro is using those lanes for its dual GPUs – while it isn’t mentioned anywhere, the FirePros would have to sit on 2 x 16 PCIe lanes, or perhaps 2 x 8
Then there’s the PCIe SSD storage – at least two of them, right?
And then there are three more for TB. Lots of PCIe grunt!
@Larry
I hadn’t heard of them either until I started researching TB RAID storage. Apparently, they’re very well respected for their RAID cards and server storage. This is their first TB storage unit and it looks like a winner. Found this comparison earlier today:
http://wolfcrow.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2013/06/DASComparison.jpg
The GB ethernet is very handy too – you can make all the data available on a LAN, which would be handy for backup and sharing.